Star Trek: Starbase 777 - main-engineering

Skittering into engineering spider-style, Calliope touched down, looking around as they did. Any sign of weapons lockers or nearby personell would be good to know. Not that they knew what a weapons locker looked like.

Polaris also touched down and skated into the engineering area, staying close to the tube as to not draw too much attention outside of it.

M'arra needed a solid minute to steady herself. Her old bones were VEHEMENTLY protesting. "I need to work out more—"

The group luckily touched down in quite a dark and empty part of engineering, and even for this part of engineering, it was practically deserted. This could easily be attributed to the absolutely skeleton crew they were operating on; still, it would be good to be on your guard.

Calliope tapped twice against Polaris' shoulders, gesturing for her to disable the wheels. Bad for stealth.

"Can I assist you in any way?" Men asked M'arra, who seemed to be struggling a little. He had yet to break a sweat while climbing down.

Polaris didn't disable the wheels, but rather, took off her skates - she'd need to use them as makeshift sledgehammers or nunchucks. "Better use these to my advantage," Polaris said. "Thanks for reminding me!"

Tavaen stretched, his entire back popping as he made sure his joints were in alignment again. "Alright, that's part one. Let's move as quickly as possible, transporter control is our top priority." If he saw someone he didn't trust, he'd just whack them with his cane.

"No, no, thank you, young man.." Young by Vulcanoid standards, anyway. "I'll be perfectly alright once this is all over and done with." Following Tavaen!

"You are quite skilled at navigating these tubes," Calliope said thoughtfully. Their voice was soft, just in case. "If not for the way my memory is stored, I would never be able to keep up."

For a man of his stature, Rojin blended into darkness surprisingly well. He angled his head left and right, listening to any signs of Marked nearby, and followed the group.

Unlike the other two morally questionable Romulans in the group, Veldan was a little bit in awe at Engineering. It wasn't a place he had been to before and it wasn't at all anything like what he imagine it would be. "This place is massive, how are we going to find the transporter control here?"

"You learn things, over the years. On your left, we're looking for manual controls, these consoles are, I think, for life support system maintenance." No, he would not explain how he knew that. He'd been on a lot of ships and stations before, alright? And speaking Vulcan well meant he could read some Standard, which helped.

"I will try to recall what Alizati has explained to me. Perhaps it will help." Hopefully, considering he had no engineering experience otherwise.

Calliope did their best to keep up. "This is like a labyrinth," they agreed quietly. "I have a newfound respect for engineers.'

"They do important work, there is no substitute for them. You could put a pistol in an engineer's hand and trust they at least sort of know how to aim, but place a tactician in engineering and your ship blows up. Or your station, I suppose." Tavaen was scanning the room, but his lack of knowledge of Federation Standard wasn't a great help here. "Can the people who speak Standard be on the lookout for anything reading "manual control" or something of the like?"

4

"Understood." They kept their bug eyes peeled for that. Not literally, that would be nasty. "I have my own reason to be fond of them, but it is only amplified by this aspect."

Polaris nodded in response to Tavaen. "Sure can do!" Polaris responded. "I'll be lookin' for a doohickey labelled manual control or anythin' of the sort."

"It's over there," he said, pointing to a thing that said manual control.

Not expecting Men's voice to creep up behind her, Polaris jolted slightly, and looked over where Men was pointing. Then Polaris looked to Tavaen and pointed where Men pointed. "It's over there."

There was an engineer in the way... hmmm. What to do, what to do...

1

"No, really? You're kidding." M'arra said with a heavy drawl of sarcasm. She shrank a bit further into the group. "What now?" (edited)

He used his oddly quiet footsteps and and graceful stride to sneak up behind the engineer... And... Vulcan pinch!

6

Well, that was pretty easy! The engineer fell to the ground with a thud, which. well, it wasn't the quietest, but it solved the issue for now.

Polaris knelt down to the side of the fallen engineer, studying them for a second - before she promptly stuck her hand out and flipped off the engineer, giving them the finger. Before she stood back up. "Sorry. Just felt like doin' that. What next?"

Hey man, what did that guy ever do to you?

6

5

4

"Efficient," M'arra delicately stepped over the unconscious figure, tail swishing behind her. "Let's see.. What exactly should we be looking for on the controls?"

"Oh, nothing. There should be a panel on the side or back we can start removing chips from. Maybe cut a few wires too, just for good measure." Sorry to the poor systems engineer who was going to have to fix all that.

Having never seen a Vulcan nerve pinch before, Veldan leaned closer to Men and talked quietly - in case there were other people in engineering. "Can you teach me to do that?"

6

"A.. panel. Ah, yes, I see it. Should I just start pulling chips out with reckless abandon, or." She was actually looking for a label for transporter controls, or something to that tune.

"Oh, yeah, absolutely, go crazy. Try not to scatter them too far, but don't be afraid to stick a few in your pockets. In case we get overpowered, and all that." Tavaen was enjoying these people's enthusiasm for wrecking stuff.

"Very well." Yoink. M'arra began yanking out chips, pocketing a few in the many different pockets she had— in her apron, and her dress, and even one under her hat for good measure.

Tavaen leant down as well, just ripping a few wires where M'arra wasn't busy with the chips. This reminded him of that time on Vulcan- ah, no matter. He was having fun.

Polaris found another nearby panel and also started pulling out chips from it - no need for her to use her skates as battering rams yet, it seemed, which was good! She didn't want to have to damage her skates, but she would if she needed to. For now, just pulling out every chip she could!

"If we're convinced that was enough, we can move on to the power controls for the security systems. We need to unlock the doors, somehow." That was honestly going to be a more difficult than disabling the transporters. You don't just want to open all doors ever, or anyone currently in the brig might just walk off, and he didn't want to create that problem if he could help it.

Polaris looked around - Tavaen was right, that was going to be difficult. "Are the quarter door controls centralized somewhere?" She asked, searching for anything that might lead her towards a solution.

"Anything we should be looking for in particular?" Men asked Tavaen. "We could free the officers, perhaps."

She patted her pockets, pleased with how many she'd managed to scatter and stash. Certainly this would not have drastic consequences later. M'arra stepped back to listen for further instruction.

1

"Depowering the doors entirely would do it, they'd open automatically to prevent anyone getting stuck in the case of an emergency. We'd need to localise it to the quarter levels though, I would not like to be the cause for criminals suddenly running amok." Insert a funny joke here about Tavaen being a criminal running amok, something Jin surely wouldn't miss either.

"Yeah, that's what I mean," Polaris explained. "If the quarters and the brig are two separate places, there have to be two separate controls for them, right? Maybe if we can find where the quarter door controls are. I'm guessing since they're on different decks they may not be close together here."

He was definitely here the whole time, helping out with searching and still looking out for more trouble. "Whatever controls there are, if there's a lock on them, don't try and break the console. Most of the times it will, unsuprisingly, not work. Signal me, I'll try to break through..."

Hey, awesome, there's Rojin! One of the two major threats of the group, to an outsider at least, given that he's one of two tall Vulcanoids. And this stray engineer had noticed too, sneaking up with a phaser pistol on hand, picking the one he could likely hold. "Alright, and that's enough of that. Everybody stay still and put your hands where I can see em, or this guy gets it," A pale ex-Borg humanoid of indeterminate origin said as they snaked one of their hands around Jin's throat, the other holding the pistol to his temple.

6

Oops. M'arra put her paw-hands up. "Don't do anything stupid," she advised, both to the group and to the engineer. Particularly to the bright colored young woman with the rollerskates. It was too risky to try to launch anything right now, it could hurt Rojin..

Tavaen immediately put both hands up, still holding his cane in one. They really should've seen something like this coming.

Polaris also put her hands up, although they were still holding her rollerskates - but she kept her face calm and professional. "Alright now, buckaroo," Polaris said calmly. "Let's approach this without any bloodshed. We can come to an agreement together. So let's just bring it back, alright?"

"Oh." Calliope put their hands up as well. Not that they were holding anything, or doing anything particularly interesting. "Not good." Thank you, captain obvious. You have done a great service to this Starbase.

"No bloodshed to a phaser, girl. You're intruding in engineering, and I don't trust any of that for a second. Keep your hands up." It was quiet for half a second, and then one of their ears twitched. "And you've somehow managed to turn off the transporters, which would be impressive if it wasn't really very inconvenient. Tell me why I shouldn't just shoot this man in front of you?" they asked, tightening their grip on Jin's throat, pushing the pistol harder against his skull.

He stared coolly at the engineer. Plan A: get behind this guy somehow without him noticing, then pinch. He wasn't sure how to do that, though. The others could distract the engineer, perhaps, but he couldn't just ask them to do that out loud. Hmmm. None of them were telepaths, he didn't think. He'd just have to wait for an opportunity.

Polaris kept her voice calm and cool. "Because yer boss specifically said you aren't allowed to harm civilians," Polaris said. "By doing that to our friend here you'd be disobeying direct orders and going against her wishes. So what are you gonna do?"

"And it would, put simply, be foolish, given the fact that you are outnumbered." Calliope added on. "You are operating on a skeleton crew. This deck is practically a ghost town."

"Hah! What Ether doesn't know can't hurt her. Besides, it's better to neutralise opponents quickly, if it helps the cause. I've done worse, and I will continue to do worse in the future." Well, this XB may not have been impressed, but at least they weren't shooting immediately?

"So your cause advocates for the murder of those who disagree with your methods? What kind of ideals are those?" Calliope was an artist, not a diplomat. She didn't know what would help and what would make things worse.

Polaris decided to use the same tactics she used on Ether, on this engineer. "What Ether doesn't know can't hurt her." She said. "How can you assume she won't find out? You'd have to kill all of us to make that happen. And you said you've done worse?" Before Calliope piped in, and Polaris nodded. "You're not supportin' a good cause, pardner. Doesn't matter how much yer gettin' paid. At the end of the day Ether's just using ya."

"You talk a great deal for someone who knows nothing at all. I don't get wages. I get food and a bed to sleep in, which is more than I had before. And as for noble causes, they're for those who sit in chairs and do the delegating. The real world is for the rest of us to deal with. And the real world contains death, and murder." Well, now at least it was clear what Ether meant by people who joined for less altruistic reasons.

2

Polaris nodded and listened closely - diplomacy was the key here. It was keeping the engineer talking, and not shooting. "So you don't get any wages, you get food and a bed to sleep in, which is more than ya had before. Okay, that's understandable," Polaris said, hoping to help the engineer feel heard. "Death and murder in the real world, you say. Well, that may be true. But there's way more of life and peace in the real world than murder." Polaris looked at this engineer with genuine eyes. "Who put these negative thoughts in yer head, hm? Who hurt you?"

"Shut up, I'm not Ether. You're not getting my sob story." Well, oops. That was the end of that.

"For fucks sake, they're an engineer, not a therapy patient," M'arra hissed. "Use your head. Don't treat them like a child."

Polaris looked over to M'arra with a polite smile. "I'd think we'd like to handle this diplomatically, we don't have to escalate anything," Polaris suggested before she turned back to the engineer. "Alrighty, pardner. What's gonna get ya to let our friend here go and so that ya can leave us about our business?"

"See, there's the thing. I need something to show for apprehending you... And currently I'm the one with the hostage. The real question is, what can you offer me?" A bargain could be struck, maybe?

"Hmm... you're willing to negotiate? Maybe we can strike a deal." Polaris said, as she looked around the rest of the civilians. "What are yuh in the market for? I'm a diner owner, but bringin' up food ain't gonna be somethin' to show for apprehendin' us. Anybody else here got sumthin'?" Before she got an idea. "Unless yuh wanna take me instead. I got armor and rare fancy schmancy roller skates." (edited)

"This is going nowhere. Hostage for hostage, blood for blood, what is the use?" M'arra was visibly frustrated despite her tail tucked between her legs. "When running around pointing your weapon at whatever you don't like gets you no recognition besides an unmarked grave, will you be content to die a fool?"

4

"Do you usually speak like you belong on a stage, or is that reserved for hostage situations? I'm not hearing anything useful yet." Sorry M'arra, no use. This one wasn't swayed by pretty words.

"Allow me to put it in simpler terms." A step forward. "You're an idiot. Is that better?"

1

Polaris looked at M'arra again. "You're not helping." Polaris snapped at M'arra, before she turned back at the engineer. "What about knowledge about somethin?" Maybe we can tell yuh something yuh wanna know. Then yuh can present somethin' to yer higher ups."

The engineer seemed amused by the bickering, and at least they weren't shooting. "Yeah, sure, tell me what you know. I'll decide afterwards if it was worth my while."

M'arra barely bit back a smart remark about watching her tone, but it was not the time or place. She kept her mouth shut. All she knew was that she was tired, and just wanted all of this to end with no casualties.

And Polaris knew exactly what she was going to do. She was going to lie. She was going to fill his head with information that didn't lead anywhere. "If yuh wanna restore control to the transporters, yuh gotta head back there in that little corner." She motioned with her eyes and her head. "But only one person can fit in back there at a time. Just turn the switch back on and yer gonna get everything back up and moving." She hoped he'd fall for it.

"I'm an engineer, kid, and you're not. Start making sense, or I'm pulling the trigger. I'm losing my patience." They certainly looked the part.

"Okay, so you know yer stuff," Polaris said. She had to make a risky move. But if it worked, she'd be able to bring the engineer close enough for Men to Vulcan nerve pinch him and subdue him. "There's a way to restore control to the transporters. But yer gonna be the one to do it, we're not. Or else yer not gettin any more outta me." As she looked to the rest of the group - any one of them could have the transporter card, but the chances of them picking the right one would be small.

Oh my, what a familiar position to be in, he thought as he felt the warm pressure against his throat, and cold steel against his temple. His body froze up, compliant, arms raised up just slightly, gaze shifting to the side where he heard the voice speaking, something sly stretching out on his lips as both they and his team stalled, talking, talking, talking, talking... And, admittedly, the adrenaline rush hit him like a long awaited drug, like a gentle wave crashing onto the beach shore, and the old war dog embraced it with open arms, rushing after it with giddy. As soon as there was a lull in the verbal battle, he grabbed onto their phaser arm and forced it upwards, his body moving to the side and around them, his weight hopefully making them stumble, weaken their grasp on him. The Romulan was intending to bend the poor engineer's arms at an awkward, numbing angle, and force the weapon out of their grasp. Gods, this was about to look very bad for him - with the whole innocence spiel. But Rojin heard enough, and this one had to be neutralized, fully. So his arms found their neck and curled around it, fingers finding a large vein and pressing down on it - not killing, gods no, but bringing the opponent's body into the numb, sweet, dark cradle of unconsciousness.

6

5

"So yuh gotta--" Before she noticed Jin just floor the engineer without any issue. "O-oh, okay then." Before she rapidly began pulling more chips out of the consoles like mad. "Well! At least I distracted 'im! So Jin could go in with the one-two-punch!" (edited)

"Oh my," Calliope watched them go down with a small head tilt of amusement. "Well, that settles that. Let's find those door controls, shall we?"

Tavaen had to say, he was impressed with the speed and accuracy with which Jin moved. It reminded him of when he was younger, younger than the bartender was now, neutralising targets with efficiency... But that was another time, nearly a century ago. "Say, Mr. Lareth," he started as others turned for the security system consoles, "you should know, I have a son, a little younger than you. A doctor, has been for decades. I think you would get along, if you met." Grandpa Taav on the case again. The doors could wait. "He's very lonely, has been for years. Married to his job, I'm sure you know the type. I just want what's best for him, even if that is something different from what I would want. But I think... well, if given the chance, you could protect him, which is more than I can say for him right now. An old man worries, you know, I just want to see him thrive..." he trailed off. Perhaps that was laying it on a bit thickly. Truthfully though, he wanted to see Ev'kor happy, and sometimes, the look in Rojin's eyes, when it wasn't mirroring his father, he could recognise it in Ev'kor's tenacity... His refusal to let him die when by all accounts, he had a foot and a half in the grave already.

5

Feeling the warmth in his arms go limp, he carefully lowered the unfortunate soul to the ground, putting them somewhere dark so that the ex-Borg wouldn't get trampled nor noticed by their buddies. "Lots of talking," he commented, standing up properly and fruitlessly combing some of his hair back. "Let's get back to it." And that he did, by popping open another panel and taking a careful peek at its insides - in case there was some sort of sneakily hidden failsafe. He hummed something inarticulate upon hearing Tavaen address him, mind not quite catching up on the "you would get along" part, to which he hummed again... Until suddenly, as Tavaen trailed off, it clicked. Rojin turned, the back of his head briefly connecting with the top of the console with a muffled "thump", and looked at the older Romulan in such vivid bewilderment it almost looked comical on his normally impassive face, "What."

4

Tavaen shrugged, as if to say "I'm just saying", before turning to the security systems. "I'm not familiar enough with these systems or with Standard to help, so I'll leave this bit to you."

Repressing the urge to laugh at Tavaen's presumably unsuccessful attempt at marrying off his son, M'arra took the opportunity to continue searching for the controls to the doors..and to apologize to Polaris. "I put our lives in jeopardy. Twice, now. My impatience is a fatal flaw, and I am sorry for that. You did well. You are very well spoken." She hunted for something to indicate what security systems were tied to what. A label, anything?

1

Polaris kept on ripping out cards to and fro, but when M'arra addressed her, she stopped... took a look at M'arra, and approached her with a smile. "Apology accepted, friend!" Polaris smiled. "Maybe I can teach yuh a thing 'er two. I think yuh have a lotta potential on how to be able to communicate effectively in crises like this! Former cop trainin', lemme tell ya. But I don't hold any of this against ya personally. Say, when all this is over, how about a milkshake on me from muh diner? So we can clear the air a little bit more."

"I have no interest in negotiation lessons. Or a drink. I am going home and I am going to sleep for twelve to eighteen hours." M'arra said simply. (edited)

Polaris opened her mouth to respond, but thought for a second - and then changed her response. "Heh. Understandable, touché, I might do the same. But in general yer welcome to muh diner any time ya like!" Polaris did want to build the bridges back between herself and M'arra, even though they just met - Polaris didn't want to come off as someone who held grudges, because in truth, she didn't. With that, Polaris went back to ripping out cards from the consoles!

He stared at the back of Tavaen's neck like it personally offended him and his House, exhaled and made a gesture that was a bastard hybrid between a shrug and throwing up his arms in frustration, and continued his poking around.

5

His eyes crinkled in amusement at what Taeven was doing. "I have two eligible bachelors, my son V'Lilyn and my daughter Mirmir, as well as my granddaughter Mirabel, and they are all of marrying age, if we're discussing such things."

1

Once you saw the system, it was hard to miss. Door locks, backup locks, forcefield activation and bulkhead sealing, for the different levels, all the way from the highest deck to the lowest reaches of Engineering. With a bit of poking around, you could feasibly remove the bits and pieces that directed how much power went to the relevant decks, causing the computer to panic a little and cut all power for a few seconds before it would likely reset itself. But at that point, the damage (or good deed, depending on how you wanted to look at it) would have been done already. There was a reason the Engineering rooms were far more important for takeovers than the command deck; when you have Engineering, you have the entire vessel or base.

Tavaen turned to Men, interested. "Really? How old are they? My son is turning 63 this year, but his mother and I differ 38 years, so we're no stranger to age differences. Perhaps someone more energetic would force him out of the house more, on his days off."

"Marked Resolve, retreat as quickly as possible. Starfleet has escaped their quarters en masse, I repeat, Starfleet has escaped their quarters en masse! Retreat!" The announcement rang out throughout the entire station.

4

Polaris halted in her tracks, not pulling any more cards! "Yes!" She said, throwing her fists in the air! "And they're running like cowards!"

M'arra emptied her dress pockets of chips (and a few stray candies). "Oh, wonderful timing."

With that, chaos erupted across the deck. As much as was possible on a deserted deck anyway, but some twenty people ran from other corners of this part of Engineering (it was a large space) and in the corridor, many, many more footsteps could be heard. Then, before too long, some scattered phaser fire, and it was quiet again.

"Careful..." he warned, perhaps urging the group to move back a little bit before they could get in some running officer's way. He then huffed out a laugh, "You know, technically we're not allowed to be here."

"They -" He was about to reply to Taeven, and then the announcement came, saving Onion from having to calculate the ages of his children and grandchildren. Thanks, benevolent Matt. "-Perhaps we should discuss this another time." Knowing him, over brunch he made himself. (edited)

"Certainly, certainly! I will have to come to Surak Snacks more often, anyway. I'm sure we will see each other there." He looked around the room, before marching out towards the hallway. "Say, when we tell them we freed the entire Starfleet population of this planet, they'll forgive us the mess, won't they?" he asked, though he knew that that was probably the case. You can't slap your saviours on the wrists for bending the rules like that.

"Likely," M'arra hoped, following along behind. Chips still in her apron pocket and under her hat. Oh well, it was too late to stop her now.