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[To: Commander Briggs, Department Head (Chief Engineer)CC: Captain Kirok (visibility)Re: Health Status]

[Ops - Novaar]

Novaar nodded to indicate her understanding the issue.  She had heard Zex talk about Lonar helping out with communication over the Tholina lattice.  Maybe that could still help as well.

"Sure.  I'm happy to help.  With competing demands, maybe we could send a text type message out that will appear on all the monitors.  Kind of like a public services announcement.  Something like 'don't use your combadge unless it's an emergency.

In addition, Lonar can maybe send out the same message on the lattice.  It would reach the many Tholian's on the station.  Andy anyone who can communicate with them" the Orian suggested.

[Katra Station | Medbay]

"Better..."

Serena cracked open an eye experimentally and found the room wasn't spinning as much, but the stun grenade had affected her more than most, with her ear implant affected.

Pulling her PADD from its customary thigh pocket, she tapped it on and typed out a low priority message to her Department Head, who also happened to be XO:

To: Commander Briggs, Department Head (Chief Engineer)
CC: Captain Kirok (visibility)
Re: Health Status

Commander/Captain, I don't know who used a stun grenade and saved Engineering, but I'm in Sickbay, recovering. I'm not complaining mind you because I don't know the circumstances, but I'm effectively out of action for a day. Maybe it's justified, maybe it's not, but I'm now sidelined from doing any repairs myself at this critical moment.

Commendations to Spalding and Gardner. Those two are doing a fine job running things and coordinating in my absence, though. Commendation nomination to Zex as well for making it all the way to Engineering under trying circumstances. Her info and protocols helped.

The message sent, she reholstered the PADD in the thigh pocket and went back to sleep.

[Katra Station | OPS]

"Close but not quite, Lieutenant."

Spalding thought about it, noting that she was getting distracted from the repair work. "This isn't people comms, it's hardware comms. The station keeping thrusters send a pulse saying no issues maybe every five minutes, which forms a health check. It's a low priority piece of infrastructure. The shuttlebay doors send an update every ten seconds because it's high priority. Life support systems such as air recirculators and atmospheric sensors might be once every half second. So to imagine, over a five minute period, we would have 600 updates from life support per segment, plus 30 updates from each shuttlebay door plus one from each station keeping thruster. Just three systems in isolation. Now multiply that across the station."

Spalding shook her head. "With the data network being the way it is, if the life support doesn't get an update, it sends the request through again. It's having two people go through a door. That's what's happening. Lieutenant, you and Ensign T'Prith must find a way to halt those low priority systems from sending those updates through until we're under control. People aren't the issue, the systems are."

https://www.shadowfleet.org/forum/katra-station/s3-m8-best-laid-plans-13866/msg260404/#msg260404

Soft tag to Sickbay. Direct tags to Novaar and T'Prith

[Ops - Novaar]

When Spalding called for T'prith, Novaar paused and looked up too.  "Is there anything I could help with?  The sooner we get communication fully restored the better" the Orian said.

"Sorry," Dr Xiiv murmured as gently as she could and gave her something for pain that would help without much side effects. "This should help with the pain for now. Try to relax the best you can and stay still for now. Once you're feeling better, we can get youon your feet and to your quarters where it's quieter."

[Katra Station | Medbay]

"Thank you..."

Serena felt almost instantly happier, but now groggy. "Goodnight... Day..." She started snoring.

[Katra Station | OPS]

"Sure."

Spalding turned to Novaar, making sure to include T'Prith in the conversation. "The problem right now is competing demands for attention." She paused to bring up the network log. "The station's ODN and Bioneural Gelpak network constantly sends and receives data. Time synchronisation, making sure they are all able to communicate. Normally this polling goes unnoticed. But let's say you have a toothache, but then you stub your toe. The two are sending pain responses to your mind for attention and you have to decide which has more priority and can be treated first. Similar thing."

Spalding paused for a second to check something. "If I can get the two of you to... Maybe not isolate, but send instructions to these lower priority systems. Science Labs, Promenade Holodecks, that kind of thing. That will help with comms. It's mainly the instructions that are trying to get through the network. Squelch them or stop them from clogging up the network first. Once we get more ODN nodes and comm lines reestablished, we can look at bringing them back. But right now we need to see where we prioritize repairs and primary systems first."

Xiiv sighed and indicated free biobed with one hand while working on stabilising King. It was a neverending rain of injuries from one to the next and she would like it very much if they would stay out of trouble and save her from the deluge. Alas, everyone had something save the Gorn directing traffic as it were.

The nurses could handle broken bones, Belmont and the EMH could snag some as well but as she knew the nature of King's ear troubles, that was her case. She began working quickly to restore the woman's equilibrium using the device that had been effectively rendered useless via the stun grenade and brought it back online. If they were lucky, it would work just fine now. If not, she was going to have to replace it, which would be tricky during a crisis like this.

She explained all this to King as carefully as she could.

"Tell me if it starts feeling better...or worse," she said as she rebooted the technology she'd implanted a while ago. "We'll try to get you up on your feet as soon as possible but I'd avise rest in your quarters if you can make it there."

[Katra Station | Medbay]

"Owwwww..."

Serena had to cover her eyes. The implant was back online, but she was still feeling the aftereffects of the stun grenade. The room was no longer spinning as such, but she kept herself still. Part of her wanted to show bravado and to get up, but her head throbbed somewhat. As a stock human, she didn't have any special healing powers, so she just lay there. Doctor Xiiv's ministrations were working, but it would take some time for her head to settle. Dimly, she knew Spalding and Gardner were handling things perfectly. Resisting the urge to tap her commbadge, she knew it would only distract them. Let them do their work...

https://www.shadowfleet.org/forum/katra-station/s3-m8-best-laid-plans-13866/msg260321/#msg260321

Tags to Zex/Skargarr. Express permission granted to move her to Sickbay. In OPS, T'Prith and anyone who wants to jump onto the repairs bandwagon.

Voice comms work slowly (think walkie-talkie with "over" and 10 seconds' delay), or just carry around a PADD and message with a few seconds between send.

[Hatch above Engineering]

Zex noticed that the noise died down after the last stun grenade when off.  Maybe it was because her hearing had been affected by the last one.  Still, she cautiously open the hatch and peered down.

"Skargaar!  Was that you that just nearly blew all the hair off my head?  Not cool, dude.  Not cool at all" she replied and then noticed King.

"Give me a minute to crawl down from here.  Keep her head pointed down till then.  If she pukes, let her puke, just have her mouth pointed down at your feet" the Deltan advised.

[Katra Station | Main Engineering | Outer Citadel]

"Zzfph"

Serena couldn't focus. The disabling of her ear implant plus the stun grenade left her rolling around, unable to focus. Existence was spinning around and she tried to call out, but couldn't. Medically speaking, it was the equivalent of a concussion, but without the brain injury. She couldn't even ask to be transported to Sickbay. Fortunately, the staff she had trained could now help out...

[Katra Station | Main Engineering | Inner Citadel]

"Confirming packet send."

Petty Officer 2nd Class Harrison Gardner stood at his console, tapping at keys. Short and barrel chested, he was yet another stalwart Katra Engineer. However, he wasn't that particularly good. With a shrug, he realized he probably wouldn't advance any further than maybe PO1, but he'd never make Chief. Still, he was solid and reliable, when given a clear set of instructions. With the Hunter threat sorted, he was gathering the Engineering crews when his console gave a notification...

[Katra Station | OPS]

"Partial Communications established."

Petty Officer 1st Class Samantha Spalding looked up. "Ensign T'Prith, I require your assistance." She bent over the Engineering console. "Our efforts at probing have finally allowed us to route and isolate enough bandwidth for limited voice communications with some delays, or text messages with minimal delays. We can start coordinating repair efforts." She finished with a flourish.

https://www.shadowfleet.org/forum/katra-station/s3-m8-best-laid-plans-13866/msg260294/#msg260294

Tag to Skargarr. Minorish tags to Zex. In my next post cycle I'll have NPC Gardner start establishing control via Zex back to OPS (and Spalding)

@Gideon, they're actually in Engineering, Skar got into a Runabout and beamed over. Transporters work inside the station.

[Katra - Shuttle bay]

Skar entered the shuttle bay and ran over to the the closest danube class runabout near the door, ran in and immediately had the ship run a complete sensor sweep of engineering section of the starbase, as the data came in.  It revealed Engineering wasnt breached, but it also read that Serena's bio-signature was out side of the room while the other combadges being read was inside engineering.  Power out, and most air processing units were malfunctioning.

'What is going on down there?' he thought to himself as the reading of hunters approaching the bio-signature of King came in.  He had to act fast.  So he pre set the coordinates of the runabouts transporter to engineering just outside of the main engineering doors, he took out two stun grenades in either hand.  "Computer open a comm channel to Serena." Skar ordered as the computer chirped.

Skar tapped his combadge to contact King but nothing came back even after relying the signal through the Runabout like a relay.  "Computer, what is the cause of damage to Kings combadge?" Skar asked the computer.  "An EMP was released, causing an overload of most technology in the radius of the explosion." the computer replied.  'Not bad human' he thought to himself.  'Not bad at all.' he added as he ran through his actions before hand.

"Energize." Skar said as he was transported to the pre set coordinates.  In quick succession, several things happened at once.  He primed the stun grenades and threw them.  As they hit the ground, they exploded in bright light that harmed the eyes and the ears of anyone in there radius, hoping King was out of the radius of the explosion.  Skar, then charged forward while he had the advantage, bowling right into the three Hunters, Breaking one of there legs in the charge.  He kneed another in the stomach and managed to hard elbow the remaining hunter in the head to further cause problems for them.

Just then Skar roared in pain as there was a gash on his arm made by a hunter who recovered.  Skar merely sneered and took out one of his knives and like lightning it flung from his hand and struck the hunter who sliced his arm, right into his shoulder with such force the hunter fell back several paces and struck the ground writhing in pain.  As he took the knife out of his arm in hopes of being free of additional agony, all three hunters found themselves stun pulsed by Skars particle rifle.  Which was an old MACO style rifle but still was effective in his hands.  He merely sneered and shook his head as he looked at his wound that was already being fixed by his bodies accelerated healing.

[Katra Station | Main Engineering | Outer Citadel]

"Oh... Deal."

Serena muttered slowly with the shortest and simplest swear word that came to mind as she had continued backing away and laughed quietly. Many months ago, Doctor Xiiv had done surgery and implanted a device in her left ear. Having been born with a deformity in her ear canal, it made her especially prone to dizziness. While most people would feel a little lightheaded, she would feel as if the entire room was spinning. The EMP she had set off was highly intense, not helped by the fact the Citadel walls contained and reflected the pulse.

She was still backing away when she realized there as transporter activity. Her own commbadge and everything else electronic had been completely deadened by the EMP. Serena had barely started bringing up her hands to protect her ears when the stun grenades went off. First, she felt as if her eardrums had burst. Her slightly better than normal range of hearing had her writhing on the deck. Second, the stun grenade not only dazed her, the effect on her ears, now no longer protected by the aural implant almost incapacitated her mind. Swallowing, she barely managed to hold down the contents of her stomach. From her perspective, the room was spinning wildly.

Serena looked for all the world like a landed fish as she gasped for breath, trying to regain control. Dimly, she felt the vibrations through the deck plates of someone walking towards her as opposed to hearing them through the loud ringing in her head. Through tear blurred eyes, she thought she was someone in a Starfleet Uniform standing over her. With a mighty effort, she tried to tap her commbadge, but it was simply inert metal, her voice barely a whisper: "Gardner... Higgins... Secure... Bring me back to En-"

Serena did finally throw up, the dizziness caused by her ear deformity and the stun grenade got the better of her. Briefly, she hoped she didn't throw up on whoever her saviour was before she blanked out.

https://www.shadowfleet.org/forum/katra-station/s3-m8-best-laid-plans-13866/msg260273/#msg260273

Tag to Zex and Security. Never mess with an Engineer.

[Ops - Lonar]

The Tholian saw the message come across his screen.  "Captain.  Zex has found some Hunters in main engineering.  I'm going to dispatch a security team.  And King from engineering" the Tholian announced.

Then he forwarded Zex message to Kyan, Skargaar, Balan, and King.  He added this.   "Please respond to this urgent situation as you are able."

[Katra Station | Main Engineering | Inner Citadel]

"What?"

Serena looked at her PADD. Though she knew Zex was on her way (thank you, Spalding), she had started taking people off duty to give them some power naps. Gritting her teeth, she thought briefly. "Gardner! Take Higgins with you to the Outer Citadel! We got a Deltan Ensign who needs to be brought inside the Inner Citadel!" The two named Engineers charged off.

Serena brought up the feed that Zex was talking about and slapped her forehead hard, then said a string of high, nasal Cantonese which the Universal Translator didn't bother translating. "Katra's Main Engineering is made up of two Citadels. This is more extensive than a starship's because more physical security is needed due to the size and inability to secure such a large compartment. Both are made of strengthened materials, more exotic than Duranium and whatever else a station or ship hull is made from. It's a fabulously expensive and time consuming process. When the Snake was blocking transporters, it was founding anything inside a protected hull has no issues. They beamed through the Outer Citadel and now they're at the junction. They can't get through the Inner Citadel, that's even more secure and made of energy scattering materials. Transporter beams would dissipate." She paused, waving her arms in the air as she talked out loud.

"Make a hole!" Serena shouted, barging through Engineering, ending up at one of the small workbenches, from which she pulled out a breadboard and a cart full of spare parts. Hammering away at the Replicator, it produced a small mountain of components. By this point, those Engineers not on duty were crowding around. Pulling the Hyperspanner from her pocket, the other Engineers were trying, without much success to follow the movements, but they knew a maestro was at work. The eyes were darting about the components, moving fast enough to be a blur. The hands were twirling instruments and making connections with the skill of a surgeon (though respectfully to them, they had nanites and their subjects had larger blood vessels or parts... These components often measured in the picometre range), darting about, assembling, fusing. She couldn't even spare a moment to flick away the lock of sweat soaked hair, but instead pulled away long enough to shake the sweat away.

"Not bad. Should work." When she straightened up, it was about the size of a shoebox. There was componentry going in every single direction, with enough wires, chips, transtators and technology jammed in every which way. "Pull everyone into the inner core. Try and get OPS to send security down here." Tucking the box under one arm, she then went to an emergency locker and pulled out a few things, stuffing them into her pockets.

Serena led the small group back to Main Engineering. "If I'm not back in fifteen minutes, I expect all of you to comport yourselves in the finest traditions of the Engineer and sell your lives dearly." The assembled Engineers snapped to attention as she exited the Inner Citadel.

[Katra Station | Main Engineering | Outside Citadel near Hunter location]

"Serena King, Engineering. Ow, my knees!"

Serena had kicked the ceiling panel and dropped into the corridor, landing in a classic hero pose, one knee on the deck, the other stretched out behind her. One arm outstretched, almost touching the ground, the other still clutching the breadbox. However, she had promptly toppled over, having badly bruised her already fragile knees. One of the many occupational hazards of being an Engineer that had to kneel in Jeffries Tubes and her knees weren't in the best shape.

As expected, she ended up a few metres away from where the Hunters were wrecking the primary ODN junction. Startled (though their helmets hid any facial expressions), they stopped. All of them towered over the diminutive Engineer. "Where was I? Oh, yes, Serena King, Engineering." She set the breadbox down carefully, straightening up slowly, hands on her knees gently massaging them. "I'm unarmed, as you can see. You'll find Engineers, we're a lovely bunch. We have no idea what happens most times, just that we deal with technology and we fix things when they don't work. We hide ourselves away and we never really get outside of our Engine rooms, because we'd rather deal with machines than people. I'm going to put my hands in my pockets for a second. I'm still unarmed, by the way, but I need to get something." She reached into her pockets, pulled out some longish sticks. Chemical flares, ignited them, tossed a few around, giving the compartment an eerie glow.

Almost as one, the Hunters tilted their heads slightly as Serena stooped to pick up her breadbox. She pressed a control. There was an almighty ear whine that built up to a screech when suddenly all the electronics went out. The lights went dark, along with everything else in the corridor. Even the air recirculators stopped. So did the Hunter's illuminated helmets. The Hunters tried to use their energy crossbows, but all it did was make a satisfying click but nothing happened. Even their personal shields were inoperative. "If there's something you must also learn. You break it, you have to pay the price. Electromagnetic Pulse."

Serena turned slightly side on, left foot forward, lowering her right hand behind her. She raised her left hand and beckoned. "As the Ancient Greeks of Earth used to say: Molon Labe. Come and get me."

The first Hunter charged forward. Serena dodged backwards slightly, one hand wrapping around his punch, her leg darting out. She slapped him on the chest, causing him to flip over her leg and land on his tailbone. The second Hunter snarled and also charged. This time, Serena had to move a bit more. She wrapped her arm around his, leg also darting out and moving a bit more and slapped him on the back, sending the Hunter face first over her leg and onto the deck.

"Engineers." Serena grinned broadly, but then stepped back as the two Hunters got back to their feet, they formed a solid wall with the others and started to advance. "Now would be a really good time for Security to show up." She muttered as she started backing away.

[Jeffries Tube]

Zex had advanced far away from the hatch to turn back now.  She was not in Ops.  So she could not help assign a team to help.

"Sirol, I'm no longer in Ops.  Lonar had been left in charge of communications.  I'm sure that he can assist, but the most reliable form of communication right now is the lattice.  If that is still not an option, you should text him threw a pad.  Otherwise you can try your chances with your com badge" she send over the lattice.

[Katra Station | Main Engineering]

"Get ready."

Serena was watching her PADD. She was standing at the threshold where she expected Zex to be, but she had no way of knowing where the Deltan Diplomatic Officer was. Spalding's message had finally come through, after much backlogged network traffic. Serena smiled. Good old Spalding had passed over promotion to Chief Petty Officer to remain on Katra and was one of the stalwart Engineers. Though a bit more prone to be emotional, she was a steady presence and OPS was in good stead. But they still didn't know the big picture.

She had charged off to Engineering and only heard fighting along the way, but wasn't sure who, how many, or what exactly they were fighting. Her work party had armed itself with the few phasers they had on hand from the small arms locker, but there wasn't much more they could do. Theoretically, Zex's PADD should pick up on Main Engineering local network soon enough. It was only long distance that was the problem, but Engineering's local computer and comms network was working perfectly... What was keeping the Deltan?

[Ops - Novaar]

The Orian Operations Officer arrived on the station.  She heard the last bit of what Spalding had said.  "I've got two free hands.  How can I help?" he asked.

[Ops]

Kirok lifted a hand to indicate stop.  "I am needed here.  And I need a sec/tac officer here as well to help us battle the incoming enemy vessels.

You or Balen will do.  The other can go with Markington and Jack to the brig.  If Dr. Jyur is free, him as well" the Captain replied.

[Katra Station | OPS]

Samantha Spalding turned to Novaar and nodded. "Coordination, really." She said slowly, acknowledging the Orion Engineer. "Warm bodies. Someone to scout the corridors and act as relays. To keep Engineers safe, to help with civilians and injured. More or less extra helpers for miscellaneous tasks, or shifting debris, or fetching more equipment. At this stage, we don't know yet. There'll be a lot of hands on work for everyone for a bit. Although the systems can broadly tell us what's damaged, we can't really make an assessment without hands on inspection."

Late welcomes to Skargarr, Susan, T'Prith and Balan, congratulations to Doctor Xiiv, and a welcome back to Ser!

[Ops]

Zex was a little excited and a little scared.  She was typically not one to thrust herself into the middle of the action.  But she knew that she could help.

"Thank you" the Delta said to Spalding.  She accepted the padd.  Then slid into a pocket.

Before she left though, she reached out to Sirol again over the lattice.  "Hello.  Is Eydis ok?  Did he ok the use of hir people and Lonar to help with communication over the lattice?   I'm prepared to crawl into a Jeffries  tube and go to Engineering.  Just wanted to check be making the trip" Zex said, hopeful that her friend Eydis would be ok with the plan - at least temporarily.

[Katra Station | Main Engineering]

"Alright, we need to plan a bit."

Serena rubbed bridge of her nose. There were around 30 Engineers, plus almost that many as various Sciences, Operations, a few security and civilians from the lower levels. Spalding had sent back information that someone was on the way down who could apparently reestablish communications.

"Internal security, communications, power, systems overview, damage control, in that order." Serena nodded grimly. "We need to contain these Hunters. Then start pulling people into safe areas. Once we do that, we can hard squelch anything except for the core. Then we can start rebuilding core systems once we know the overall state of the central core. Then we can start fixing things. We're going to have to start sending DC teams once we establish stable communications with OPS."

https://www.shadowfleet.org/forum/katra-station/s3-m8-best-laid-plans-13866/msg260007/#msg260007

Tag to Zex