We Are Going On A Bear Hunt

Posted on Wed Feb 23rd, 2022 @ 4:02pm by Captain Rueben Gregnol & Laurier Cami & Jęará Nasha
Edited on on Wed Feb 23rd, 2022 @ 4:06pm

Mission: Mission 14: Holoworld
Location: SS Holoworld
Timeline: MD 05 22:00
2059 words - 4.1 OF Standard Post Measure

Gregnol looked at the scene in front of him. The ship looked like every other time that they had passed by it or been this close but this time something felt deeply off, something about the ship just felt wrong. He was sure everyone else could just feel it from the way everyone was barely speaking. They all knew the situation, no comm signals, no bio signs, holograms acting odd nothing that indicated anything from the ship in two hours other than a medical emergency cause by what he suspected was the big issue. But it did not answer why the holograms were acting odd. It did not just happen.

“No comms still other than Hiram and Eva with their emergency but it is allowing us automatic landing privileges,” Gregnol told the group in the shuttle with him as a blinking green light guided him into the darkened shuttlebay. They landed with the gentlest of thuds as the Captain piloted with Cami for support.

Jen was scanning the information from her PADD that was hooked into the shuttle's sensors, curious and cautious, and when they landed she shouldered the strap of her phase rifle, grimly surveying the airlock as they made their way forward to disembark. She turned to regard her shipmates, offering them as reassuring a smile as she could, her frizzy green-interspersed hair tied neatly behind her head to reveal rows of deep black dermaglyphs along her temples. "We'll figure it out," she did her best to bolster them. "We just need to take it slow and steady."

"But not too slow. We've got friends who might be in trouble," Cami noted. She looked around the bay. "Basic emergency lights. Is main power out? It didn't seem so from the scans...which means that either there have been some redundancy failures, or someone doesn't want us to have a warm welcome."

“Slow and steady.” The older man repeated in a calming way. Gregnol was pretty sure that it was very much the not wanting to give a warm welcome option but he simply stated the facts in front of them. “The ship has main power. It just seems that lighting is trying to set a mood.” The man commented standing from the pilot seat retrieving his weapon.

"That's oddly intentional, isn't it?" Jen shook her head with a niggling little smile, not one of humor or pleasure but a kind of confusing jumble of features particular to Trills. She took point and pressed her hand into the sensor that opened up the airlock and deposited them out through the gangway and onto the ship, poised and at the ready as she split her attention between her environment and the tricorder in her hands.

Gregnol did not believe in intentionality in any form at all especially if the holograms were rogue. It was something he had always avoided before in Starfleet when it felt like every ship had issues, yet the Victory or Starbase 50 never seemed to have issues. Maybe it was him as head of security that accept random objects or visitors but those issues never seemed to haunt him until he had his own command. "Stay close." The Captain whispered to Cami as he raised the rifle he has picked. He was not sure how much use it would be against holorams but he felt better having it.

"Don't need to tell me twice," she murmured back. "There should be an access point at the end of the hall. A good place to plug in and run a status check. But...a bad place to hunker down if things go wrong."

Jen moved them, as mentioned, slowly and steadily through the airlock door as it hissed and into the ship's interior, rifle poised at the ready, continuously scanning for anything out of the ordinary. The access point was lit up on her nav and she guided them toward it as carefully as she could. This was her first real assignment as a security professional in an environment potentially dangerous, and as master-of-arms in lieu of a security chief that left her responsible for these individuals-

She breathed it steady, easy does it. Fear was a normal reaction, but right now, she had to focus and concentrate. Years of xia'pan directed her mentally where combat training would have otherwise propelled her. Keeping her alert and stable, even as the environment around them glowed and shifted ominously. "We're about two meters away," she told everyone after consulting her device.

“You are not designated crew?” A voice called out from the darkness making Gregnol pause for a second before he noticed the hologram behind them.

“Keep moving to the access port.” The Captain said turning to the host stood there impatiently. It was not like the previous host they had met. “We are a rescue party sent by the Suarez Company.” He said just about remembering the company who controlled the ship.

Cami slinked behind Gregnol and used him as a shield as she tapped into the interface. This probably only needed a few seconds, but she needed him to keep whatever it was talking while she worked. Assuming that nothing went wrong, of course.

"What's your name?" Jen asked the apparition, fingers still curled around her weapon, but her primary method of engaging with the world was less at the barrel of a gun and more this. Connection. Communication. It may be a hologram, but Jen was a Trill, predisposed to addressing that which she could see and taste and smell as having value, intrinsic.

"I am the host and that is my destination." The host answered the question. "It is unfortunate that you have come, today Sirs. The ship is expectantly busy with parties arranged by Miss Nyx." Gregnol eyed the security crew member with him to ask who was Nyx? There was no onboard apart from them.

"Miss Nyx?" Gregnol questioned as the hologram glitched again.

“You are not designated, crew?” It repeated as if the whole conversation had not just happened.

"Identify Ms. Nyx," Jenara tried, calling up in a loud, clear voice.

"Prophets, this could get annoying," Cami hissed, tapping rapidly at the panel until it finally relented. "Power to several key systems has been cut. Life support is at minimal levels. Yet most of the holoprojectors have been given priority power routing. Someone is really keen to keep those online. I can't access them from here; we'd need to directly interface with it either in the computer core or main engineering." She folded up her engineering kit. "Do you think the holo will take us there?"

“No,” Gregnol said pressing the nearest console deactivating it. It would not give them much time but it would give them enough time to get out of there to another area. “Main engineering is out of bounds so let’s go to the core. That was where Curtis and Jeassaho were.” The main engineering was one of the places undamaged but they were unable to access due to them being unable to release the blast doors.

Hopefully they were still there. Jenara didn't voice her sudden pessimistic lingerings, because it wasn't needed for the moment, but she re-adjusted her grip on her rifle and gave both of them a nod. Her directional PADD lit up in her hands and she displayed the path outward so they could both see, leading them further into the abandoned vessel toward the core.

"If you two get me killed..." Cami sighed softly, still using Gregnol as cover as they moved.

As the group silently edged closer and closer to the core Gregnol suddenly stopped hearing footsteps coming towards them and motioned for them both to stop and listen. They were fast but there were no voices attached as the footsteps came running around the corner and smack bang into Jenera sending the person who had come around the corner flying. "By the deities..." Jeassaho's familiar voice said as she fell on her butt.

"Woah, hey, please don't shoot me. I swear, we were just running, there was nothing else going on other than the murder-holograms trying to kill us, and please please please don't shoot me...please..." Curtis jabbered as Gregnol's phaser rested a couple of inches from his nose.

"Jea." Gregnol said with relief as he almost took the woman off the floor one-handed and tugged her close in a quick hug still levelling the phaser at Curtis for a second before he lowered it. "Murder holograms?" He demanded quickly once he was assured that the woman seemed to be in perfect health other than breathless and frazzled from the events that she had seen.

"They killed Roberston," Jeassaho said taking the spare phase from Gregnol's belt into her own hands. She had not been able to get a weapon before now and wanted something against the murder holograms.

"That shouldn't be possible. Holograms are..." Cami shook her head, but didn't finish the thought. She put a comforting hand on her best friend's shoulder. "We came to find you all. Where are the rest?"

"There is no one else with us. Everyone else is back on the ship or still onboard somewhere." The Captain explained as he let Jeassaho go and looked at Cami. "Anderson, Ka'see, Ford, Burnie, Liha and Ramirez are still missing." It was all that was unaccountable with Hiram and Eva back on the ship.

"If there were any safeties to begin with, they're undoubtedly off," Jen murmured curiously, watching Jeassaho and Curtis and giving them as reassuring a smile as she could provided the circumstances. "Let's get to the core, from there we should be able to access the ship's systems and run a sweep for life-signs," the Trill suggested, as reasonable as she knew how to be.

"Oh, there were safeties. I enjoyed a nice spa session." Jeassaho said taking a few deep breaths. "Others would have headed towards the computer core if they are fighting for their lives especially if they are engineers. They would try and turn things off," The woman agreed.

"And we should, too," Jen nodded.

"We just could not by ourselves. Every time we tried to go anywhere it was impossible." Jeassaho explained as Gregnol shook his head. She did the right thing when they had no weapons against holograms nor a good sense of any direction.

Jen turned to Gregnol. "I believe it is your call, Captain." Either they could keep pushing forward, or they could withdraw strategically while they still had the ability to do so-if they still did.

“We go on,” Gregnol said simply. “We need to get to the rest of the crew and establish what is going on.”
Gregnol said reluctantly. He wanted nothing more than to go back but he could not leave everyone else there after what Curtis and Jeassaho had told him.

"We have to leave!" Curtis exclaimed, amazed that they were thinking of going anywhere but off the ship immediately. "You can't kill a hologram on a ship filled with holoemitters!"

"Hey." Cami grabbed him by the shoulder, a sudden stern expression on her face. "Get it together. Those people are our shipmates, we won't just leave them behind. You're supposed to be some sort of computer whiz kid, right? So figure out what's happening and how to stop it."

"Uhh..." Curtis was shaking a little, though it wasn't clear if that was because of the whole situation or just the fierce Bajoran woman who looked like she was ready to slap him across the face. "I mean...if I had a direct computer connection terminal...I might be able to...run some tests?"

As they started to move the ship shook violently and Gregnol smiled as he glanced at Jeassaho. One thought going through their head: Burnie. There was only one person who would blow something up like that and leave most of the ship intact. "Someone try communications now." He demanded.

Jen hooked her tricorder into the ship's systems and attempted to send out a signal. "It's triangulating," the Trill said, eyes scanning the data. "And it looks like the signal's going through. You're patched in, captain."

Good was all that went through Gregnol’s mind. The nightmare was at an end.