Cleaning Up the Crew

Posted on Mon Feb 22nd, 2016 @ 2:26am by Captain Tim Williams & Doctor Talm Aleint-Um MD & Doctor Rikka Takanashi M.D. & Lieutenant Ryan North & Ensign Vex Krylore

Episode: Lost Property
Location: DeSalle

Rikka stood on the bridge of the DeSalle just behind the tactical console. There was quite a lot of biomatter plastered over the bulkhead and the consoles.

Their tricorders were uplinked with the Highlander's computer core, allowing them to scan each biomatter and determine who was who. Also Rikka wanted not to cross contaminate each individual and mix them up together. Each person was equipped with a medical tricorder and a small powerful vacuum which was designed to extract every aspect of the biomatter and store it in a storage jar.

Rikka couldn't help but feel a little fascinated by what had happened. It wasn't everyday that you came across such a scene.

"Takanashi to Williams," she said tapping her comm badge.

"Williams here," came the response over the comm. channel.

"We've cleared the bridge sir. However there is no sign of the Captain or the Armoury officer" she explained. "When this happened they were not on the bridge, but according to our tricorders the rest of the senior staff, barring the Chief Engineer and Doctor were present."

There's a whole mess of crew down in the dinning room captain. We're working on sorting them out now but it's going to take some time, Ryan's voice said over the open com channel. I'm going to head down the armory and look around.

Rikka looked around for the signs of a ready room. A door that led off the bridge seemed like a promising answer. She soon found herself in a small cramped room, and on the wall just over the viewport was a huge splatter of biomatter.

"I found them sir. In the Captains Ready Room," she reported. "They were standing next to each other... It'll be difficult to distinguish them"

"Understood," Tim responded. "Do whatever you can to separate them. Any pieces you can't... we'll deal with when we've got everything back over here."

Vex had never been in one of the NX Class ships, not even in the museum. His own species ships were of similar construction when it came to the raw materials used and how they basically operated. But never in their recorded history of space travel did they come across anything that had done this to one of their starships.

"I wonder if it was some sort of kinetic weapon," Vex mused aloud, looking around the room. "Like some sort of massive subspace catapult."

<>

With science and medical teams clamoring all over the ships interior trying to identify what crew members were who, Ryan and two medical assistants headed to the armory. He had seen the very same layout in the NX Columbia, which had been turned into a museum in tribute to the NX class of starship.

He raised his tricorder and started scanning the room, the sensors on the ship hadn't picked up anything out of the ordinary, though that didn't mean there wasn't something to be gleaned from the a careful inspection of the interior. He collected some more biomatter and then turned toward the ships weapons lockers, a quick inventory showed that all the ships handheld weapons were accounted for.

"This is so weird," Ryan mumbled, moving to the main control panel. A quick scan showed no biomatter to catalog.

"What is weird?" Doctor Aleint-Um asked, as he and one of the medical techs moved around the room collecting the remains. Though happy to help his new crewmates with their task, he did hope to get his task done quickly, as the bulkier-than-normal EV suit he wore meant that his wings had to remain pressed against his back, which was an uncomfortable position for them to be in for extended periods.

There wasn't much in terms of remains in this room - from what the avian doctor understood, this was one of the rooms where the ships weapons were controlled from, and wasn't normally manned by more than a few humans at a time. What there was seemed to mostly be against a single bulkhead, and consisted of just two crew members.

"All this," Ryan remarked, gesturing around. "When I was in the MACO's we came across a derelict freighter once and never did find the crews remains or anything. The logs had been erased and all the escape pods were intact, it felt... wrong."

"Perhaps they merely fell victim to a natural phenomena?" Talm responded. "I would not imagine a spatial disturbance or some other affecting force would be concerned with computer data or biological remains. Then again, if there were some antagonistic entity responsible for the fate which befell this craft, perhaps they felt that the slow decay of time would complete any erasure they deemed necessary?"

"A very perceptive statement," Ryan said. "Either way I'll feel a lot better when we get off this creepy thing."

"Agreed," Talm answered, as he stored the last piece of biomatter into a container, which he detached from his little vacuum and placed carefully inside a back he had around one shoulder. "I will be most grateful when we can return to the Highlander and change out of these extra-vehicular suits."

"I always hated these things," Ryan muttered. "They're about as comfortable as heavy combat armor. What do you think Doc? We've been over every square inch of the ships and I think we found all the crew that we are going to find."

"Understood" Rikka replied. "Lets get them back to the Highlander. We need to start determining who we actually have here... or whats left of them"