*** Tunnel to Shuttle Bay * Underground Einhoften Complex *** The two officers ran along the corrider side by side. The way was well lit and each carried a phaser set to 'heavy stun'. The way behind them was blocked, the way in front open, but somehow that didnt seem to hold the appeal it should. They slowed to a walk and finally stopped a few meters short of the tunnels end. Rangi looked at Terek through the visor of her orange suit. "We'll find the first shuttle and get it ready to leave.We need to get this information back to Chimera as soon as possible.We'll give Okrin and the others five minutes." It was a pitiful amount of time given the circumstances in which they had left the men but Rangi wasnt prepared to leave it longer. The more time they stayed in the compound, the more risk they ran of being engaged in a fight. They walked the remaining distance to the large sealed doors. "Right" Rangi said. "Let's see whats on the other side shall we?" She looked down at her phaser and checked the setting. Terek just nodded as Rangi decided that they have to transport the information back on board and tried to keep his mind focused on the things ahead of them. A simple thing, preparing the shuttle - he was trying to remember the basic controls of the crafts from the academy... unfortunately without great success, but better something than nothing. He didn't want to think of what happened a few minutes ago. There will be time for it, but the monotonous way through the tunnel wasn't a much of help. But in the moment he tapped an opening sequence to the hangar bay doors which weren't affected by the security seal as the one they just left, he was forced to think of anything else than what happened. The size of the space was overwhelming. He didn't expect anything like this in his wildest dreams. "The Sovereign class hangar bay is almost tiny compared to this" he said as they entered the space. There were six of runabout hold posts, two of them empty and in the middle of the room another two vacant places. As they approached the center he noticed that all those posts are marked with yellow floor signs so typical for Federation. Signs like ' Keep Clear '. What draw his attention were marks in the middle of the square posts. Those in the middle of the bay said: 'Defiant Class' "Holy cow !... I hope that those Defiants were just planned to be settled here... otherwise those up there (he looked to the roof) would be in great troubles..." Rangi glanced at Terek as he exclaimed his thought. "Lets try that one..its open." she said, pointing to the second shuttle in front of them. "How are you at flying these things?" she asked, looking sideways at him as they approached the ramp then said simply.."Oh." as his expression answered for him. They climbed the ramp slowly, wary of the ease with which a waiting shuttle was found. Inside, all seemed completely normal. There was noone aboard and nothing seemed out of place. They made their way to the front of the craft. "Right." Rangi said, looking at the control panel." Let's get this going then try to open communications to Chimera." she said, giving Terek a quick glance. " The dampening fields might not be operating now." She stretched out her hand and tapped in a sequence that she knew would power up the shuttle. it was a standard runabout that she had had some experince with, albeit slight. Nothing happened. She frowned then repeated the sequence,aware of Terek looking at her, frozen in his own action of activating the overall systems status. "I cant think in this thing" Rangi said in sudden annoyance touching the neck of the helmet collar. " I'd like to be rid of this." She bit her lower lip in effort to remember the power up sequence, and certain she had it right, tapped it in again.A warning light glowed to her right. "It can't!..sleep mode..and not enough energy to reactivate systems? We're onboard a dead shuttle! she said in disbelief. The runabout had Chuan'Che welcomed them aboard with a silence. They passed the aft compartment and got to the bridge. Rangi sat behind the main navigation console and was trying to power up the systems. Terek himself sat behind the system monitors. He tapped a few commands and then felt the sight of Rangi on him, so he turned to her, shugged his shoulders and returned to work. As little he knew about ship systems he soon recognized from the information on the screen that this runabout won't fly anywhere... at least not in the nearest future. "Well, it seems that warp core is offline. It would take a precious time to reactivate it and reinitiate the matter / antimatter reaction. Now I'm not mentioning that I don't even know how...." he added with a bitter smile thinking he should take some engineering crash course. His technical skills werent that bad, but when it came to the ship systems like engines or power distribution he was out of game. "OK, we should better try another one." said Terek raising himself from the chair and went out of the runabout followed by the XO. Outside he looked around and then shugged and made it straight to the next one in the line. 'USS Amazon' said the name on the hull. {Let's hope we'll have a better luck with this one} Rangi followed him down the ramp. {Nothing is as easy as it seems!} she thought and stepped onto the next ramp.Once inside she stopped. The shuttle appeared at first instant as though it had been gutted. There were no seats and other standard fittings were missing. "Dont tell me this one is out of action too." she said following Terek towards the controls. Terek was a bit perplexed as they entered the runabout. {No seats... what the...} Then he noticed one more important problem they didn't see from outside. The windows were blacked out. So he looked at Rangi... "Eh... even if it wouldn't, we can't fly this..." smiled a bit and then turned on his heels and followed Rangi back. "This is a nightmare!" Rangi said and stood at the entrance. She reached for her tricorder and scanned the area around themThe results showed the air was fit to breath with no sign of any contamination so Rangi pulled at the seal of her helmet and lifted it off with a sigh of relief. "Thats better!" she said shaking her head to free her hair that had dried in tails. "Right...THAT one then...third time lucky?" She pointed to the opposite shuttle bearing the name USS Congo. "Let's hope you're true" replied Terek removing his helmet as well. They both moved to the Congo. {Prophets stay with us...} he thought as they entered a cockpit and settled behind controls. After a minute of tapping on the system monitors he smiled "Good, it's all right. All systems are green." Then he moved to the navigation console, tapped a few commands "Power up all systems please, I'll initiate a preflight sequence.." he asked Rangi. Rangi settled herself in the seat and once again entered the power up sequence. She beamed a smile at Terek as a 'hum' became audible and increased. Green and amber lights blinked across the consol. One after another systems activated and drew full power. "Excellent" Rangi murmured and turned to Terek. "What do you have?" she asked almost eagerly for it looked as though this time luck really had changed. A few moments of flying fingers on the buttons. Few mistaps as he wasn't used to this navigational configuration of the layout, then engage the preflight sequence. A series of diagnostics begun, checking all systems and one after another reporting results. "Give it a few minutes please..." he answered to Rangi still checking the screen. Meanwhile the humming took on an intensity to the certain point where it remained and in that moment diagnosis report showed that all systems were powered and fully operational. "OK, warming up the impulse engines....." he reported monotonously thinking of Nejor and the others. "Now we'll have to find out how to open the exit doors.... I'll look outside for some controls OK?" There was a moments hesitation before Rangi replied.. " Quickly then...two minutes tops...then we leave." As she spoke the peered through the window towards the doors hoping against hope to see Okrin and the group coming in. There was nothing. "Hurry up." she told Terek Terek nodded "Aye madam..." and immediately ran out of the Congo. He looked around the hangar and saw a console near the crates at the wall between two exit shafts that led to the surface. {That must be it...} he thought as he ran towards the device. One short look told him that this will be the easy part as there were except manual control also the access codes for remote access so they can transmit them from the runabout. He downloaded them to his tricorder and set on run back to their runabout. The moment he was at the ramp he heard strange noises and saw that the door of the other evac tunnel was opening. He ran into the cockpit and shouted to Rangi sitting at the consoles staring at the air: "They're coming!" She spun round in her chair {Coming?...Okrin..or....} and tapped at the consol with slim fingers." If its Okrin and the others...prepare to transport them." She peered again through the window and Terek, leaning forward in his seat, looked out too. *** End Log *** Ltjg Terek Weranis ASciO USS Chimera & Commander Rangi Summers XO USS Chimera