Collateral Damage - A Sudden Detour Part III

Posted on Sat 30th May, 2020 @ 6:10am by Lieutenant Elliot Jericho & Lieutenant Commander Kiara Lena
Edited on on Sun 9th Aug, 2020 @ 11:15pm

1,417 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: Resolution
Location: Runabout Churchill
Timeline: MD: 15, 1330 hours

Previously:

Kiara switched stations and tried everything she could to get the impulse engines back online. She wasn't an engineer, but she knew a few basic tricks. When that failed, she grabbed a toolkit and went in the back to try to repair them.

"If all else fails, could we either try a hard landing with full power to the forward shields or transport to the planet?" she asked.


And Now:

"We should try it with thrusters and if it looks like we're going to hit too hard we can always beam out. If we beam out too soon and don't help the runabout, it could be damaged beyond repair." Elliot paused for a moment, "I can beam you out and I will stay with the runabout, that way you can be safe, besides only one of us need be here."

"No, we do this together." She came back to her seat and buckled in. "Repairs would take longer than we have. You're the pilot, I trust your decision."

"You outrank me so I can't just beam you off without your say so." Elliot worked his magic with the thrusters, but it wasn't enough for a good landing, "We're coming in hot, need to find a soft place to land." The Runabout flew over various types of terrain including forests and snow-covered mountains. "Hang on, it's about to get rough!" Elliot said as the runabout clipped the rocky tip of one of the mountain tops. He was nearly thrown from his seat even though he had already buckled in.

Kiara was busy sending all power to maximize forward shields, inertial damping field, and the deflectors.

"There!" Elliot pointed with his finger, "That looks like the best spot." He continued to scan the area, but that spot appeared to be the best. As they moved closer to the ground Elliot tried to reduce speed but the thrusters were not up for the task, one had been damaged by the impact with the rock earlier. "I can't slow us down so this is going to be a little hard." The small ship began to trim the tops out of trees, "Brace for impact!"

Kiara was already belted in as tightly as she could. Rather than bracing, she relaxed, trusting the harness to keep her safe. She attached the head brace and waited.

After plowing through some trees the ground came quickly. The nose of the craft bounced a few times off of the ground before digging itself into softer soil. The Runabout came to a stop, but not before the impact had caused Elliot to hit control pan with his head causing him to lose consciousness, his world went dark.

Kiara fared better. She was sore and shaken, but relatively unharmed. She looked at Elliot but had to wait for the shuttle to settle. She shut off the thrusters and impulse engines, in case they caused a problem, unbuckled, and went to check on the pilot.

She grabbed the medkit and checked to be sure there were no serious injuries. "Good." His injuries were fairly minor. She eased him to the deck and began to take care of him.

Elliot began to moan softly as he stirred. Slowly his eyes began to open and finally they focused on Kiara's face, "What....happened?" he asked softly.

"We're on the planet, but the landing was rough," she said. "I've done what I can, but you'll need to take it easy for today." She found a hypo and injected him with a pain killer. "That should help. Rest here and I'll have a look around."

The next thing she did was to run a diagnostic. Just about everything was offline. They had minimal power, but no communications, engines, or thrusters. They were stuck here until someone came to their rescue. Kiara hoped her distress call made it back to the station. If not, they'd have to wait until the colony asked why they hadn't arrived yet. That could take two weeks or more.

She walked around the shuttle, pulling anything that could be useful. They could stay here for as long as possible, but if the power failed, they'd need to go out and fend for themselves.

She went back to Elliot. "How are you feeling now?"

"I have a bit of a headache, but other than that, just a little sore. At least I'm in one-piece." He shifted the conversation away from him, "How about you, are you hurt?"

"No. I used the harness," she said. "We aren't in jeopardy of a fire right now, but I don't know how long we'll have power. Communications are offline, as are most functions."

"I will take a look at the ship and see what I can do, but if those hostiles come looking for us, we need to be ready to bug out." Elliot picked out the tricorder that was by his leg and began to scan. "I'm searching for a place to hide if we have to leave, but because of the minerals in this area, the scanning range is limited."

"I hadn't thought of the people who shot at us coming back." Kiara shook her head. "It might be best to find a safe place away from the shuttle to make a camp, at least for a couple of days." She began to pull out gear they would need to make camp.

"Agreed, we should be able to find a cave to hide in and use the interference around here to hide our life signs," Eliot suggested.

Kiara found the emergency gear, complete with camping gear and a medkit. "The shuttle's sending out a distress signal, in case anyone comes looking for us. We can come back in a few days to check for messages. In the meantime, I like your idea of finding a cave."

"That distress signal could also let the attackers know where the ship is and that we are alive. I recommend we shut it down to be on the safe side." Elliot said. There was a slight chance that the minerals around this area could mask the shuttle from sensors in orbit and the distress call would pinpoint the shuttle's location to anyone.

"It's automatic," Kiara said. "They're as likely to think its the crashed ship only. If we find a cave so they can't scan for life signs, they're as likely to think we're dead. I'd rather risk them blowing up the shuttle than not being found by a rescue party." She decided to grab a few more things, just in case they couldn't come back to the shuttle and ended up with two large duffel bags of stuff.

Elliot nodded, "You're in charge Commander, so what you say goes. I can only make recommendations for different courses of action." Elliot's head was swimming. He was getting a little deja vu from just a couple of months ago with the Prototype. He stood and used the bulkheads to steady himself before gathering gear and placing the stuff in another duffle type bag. "We have enough stuff to sustain us for a while, you ready?"

"I'm not in charge anymore," Kiara countered. "We're in this together. The way I see it, we have two choices, both have good and bad. The other ship knows we crashed. What they don't know is if we lived through it or not. Hiding in some caves will help, but if we don't leave some sort of signal, we may not be found, and that, I believe, is more of a priority."

Elliot smiled, "You're beating a dead horse Commander, I have already succeeded to you. Now, why don't we go and look for our home away from home, this pack is getting heavy." Elliot realized several things could happen. First off, the attackers could leave them for dead, they could pick up the distress signal and come down on the shuttle which could lead to the destruction of the shuttle and the distress signal in which case they would probably never get rescued. He wasn't going to argue which course of action would be better since they both had merit. Right now their time was better spent finding a place to hunker down and hide.

Kiara nodded. She wasn't ready to give up her argument but now was not the time. She nodded, grabbed a small grav cart, and loaded on the two duffels and headed out.

Elliot picked up his tricorder with his free hand and followed after her.

 

RSS Feed

Comments (1)