===== Some corridor, Research station ===== Keylor patted the corporal on his shoulder and signalled him to remain silently where he was. Both men were on their way back to the infirmary to inform their fellow officers about the shuttle they'd discovered. Now they managed to avoid the intruders and were now only a single deck below the infirmary, when the trained marine ears of the colonel picked up some unusual noise. A noise coming from not too far away. Keylor strained to pick out the direction of the noise, but for some reason the sound seemed to echo form everywhere. It almost seemed muffled as if listening to a conversation from the other side of a wall. {Could it be that way?} Keylor thought and looked sharply at the corridor's walls. "Shhhh...Peter...shhh!" Rangi placed a finger to her lips in an effort to silence the 'happy' mood the medication had caused."Please be quiet we're going to go outside and you mustn't make a noise." She glanced at Mercedes. Mercedes checked the device hanging from her belt to make sure it was still functioning properly. The lights on it were still flickering, so she figured it was working. "It's still working," she said to Rangi in a whispered tone. "We should be safe... as along as we can keep Peter quiet." The two marines remained calm and silent as Keylor tried to determine the source and the direction of the noise. Soon, the noise became more clear and now the corporal pointed to the half hidden exit of an jeffries tube some three meters to the right. Keylor nodded in understanding. He thought like the corporal, the noise is coming out of the tube. What was making the noise was still a secret to both marines ... it good could be a rampaging alien as well as a lost human ... Keylor pointed to the exit and kneeled to one knee.He armed his weapon and aimed at the tube's exit. The corporal made a few quiet paces and did the same as the CO. Peter pressed his finger to his lips too and grinned at Rangi who gave him a frown for his trouble. "Please be very quiet" she whispered and when he nodded she turned away and moved to the hatch.{Please don't let there be a ghoul} she thought and gingerly edged forward. She listened carefully, hearing no sound. While Rangi tried to keep Peter quiet, Mercedes inched forward and slowly opened the hatch, then peered into the corridor to see if the coast was clear. Like a large worm ... there appeared the female head of Ens. Carpenter anxiously looking around for any danger. Still more than two thirds hidden in the jeffries tube she darted the surrounding to spot any trouble she supposed there was waiting for them. She was quite right ... cause the Colonel suddenly left his concealment at the wall and came nearer to her with his rifle on his shoulder again: "Ensign!" he started, "where did you come from? We thought we lost you already ..." he added with a bit harder tone. Bretam nearly gave Mercedes a heart attack and she had to stop herself from screaming out loud. "Colonel! You startled me," she said, catching her breath. "I found Dr Summers, and one of the scientists." Inside the tube Rangi recognized the voice. {Colonel?} She turned to Peter. "Its Colonel Bretam, my CO." A smile broke across her face."Come on..." Turning back once more, she crawled forward and peered outside. The medicament Peter became only several minutes before was still working and he was still in the sweet lightly sedated state where nothing worried him. It was quite funny that he crawled through this tube with two teal coloured woman ... {Maybe Orion slave woman?} he wondered ... {Her CO?} he wondered again, {maybe a BIG orion slave man?} he guessed. He gave the woman a sweet smile. The corporal only had to shake his head in disbelief as one after the other the two doctors and one civilian male crawled out of the jeffries tube. He could not help himself ... all three looked like wet cats after a loooooong night. He looked at the Colonel who stared at the three the same as he did and almost gasped as he recognized Rangi: "Commander!" he cried in surprise. "That's a story worth listening" he continued, "Shane is disassembling the ship while he is searching for you ... and I've found you here ... how is that possible?" Straightening up and brushing a hand across her tunic, Rangi smiled at the expression on Keylor's face. "Colonel" she said and gave a brief shrug of her shoulders. "I don't know sir. I was on my way to the Bridge and ended up here. Sir...this is Peter Heher, one of the research scientists." she turned to Peter who took a step forward. "Have you found the others ?" Rangi questioned, returning her attention to the CO. Peter watched the big green marine and thought: {That's DEFINITELY no slave man!} Keylor nodded, "Aye we have found a few. But unfortunately the ones we have found have reported several casualties." He let the happy surprise of seeing Rangi fade. "So far I have at least 5 of the researchers accounted for dead. Though it seems the station had a few guests. A Starfleet officer and a marine escort had delivered quantum torpedoes right before this all happened. " he waved a hand to the station. At the mention of quantum torpedoes, Rangi darted a glance at the AMO and then said. "Colonel...we found two aliens examining a torpedo..I dont know what they were doing sir...we didnt wait to find out." Keylors interest perked up. "Examining? Interesting. Torpedoes have a power source for propulsion, but unless activate, It should have been of little interest to them. " he commented. He looked at Rangi, "So they were passing their ghostly appendages through the casing and prodding it?" he asked. Rangi considered." Well.... they had some kind of tools with them.They were very oncentrated in their work" "Trying to close the doors ... little fools" Peter murmured quietly with a short glance of a clear mind before the 'sedated' effect took its reigns again. "If we can get back to the ship, I think I may know of a way to treat the infected crew," Mercedes said, raising the device she was carrying. "We've set the device to emit a subspace bubble set at -22.5 Hertz and so far it's helped to hide us from the ghouls. It may help to lead us to a possible cure." Keylor nodded. "Aye that is interesting. At this point we can use every little thing to help protect us from these aliens. And in the process if we find a cure it will be good." Keylor then looked back to Rangi and smiled,"I cant wait to see the expression on the Xo's face when he sees you.!" Peter's eyes lit in interest: {XO? Finally the slave man?} he thought. Rangi gave a smile of pleasure at the mention of Shane and blushed slightly.She glanced at Peter and gave him a quick second look as she caught the expression on his face. For a moment she could have sworn he winked at her and her own expression became one of suspicion.She looked back at the CO. "We need then to be careful Sir when moving the injured" she said. Keylor nodded. "Aye There is a marine with a phaser burn to his torso up in the infirmary. Ens. Hathaway was treating him the last time I saw them. May be you should go to the infirmary and see if he can be moved." "Ofcourse" Rangi opened the med case slung on her right shoulder and looked inside, seemed satisfied with what she saw looked at the Colonel . Keylor pointed back in to the Jeffries tube. "The corporal and I were just going back to the station infirmary to get the others. Deck 9 seems to be safe. I figured we would all move down there. With any luck we will pick up the remaining stragglers as we move back and forth, not leaving any one behind." Slowly Peter's mood state changed again. Now fears filled his heart ... fears and long supressed feelings of guilt. From a certain point of view He was co-responsible for all this horror. He ... he was on the Ops when this freaking experiment was launched ... he was there when the very first transwarp tunnel was created ... he enjoyed the spectacular view of the first transwarp tunnel ... he was shocked when he saw the second tunnel appearing ... A sob escaped from his mouth ... "Lets leave this haunted place ... lets leave it" he said darting the Colonel with his eyes. "We opened the Pandora's box ...." "We will Peter...dont worry." Rangi patted the scientists arm reassuringly, but wondered to herself at his reaction. The sedative was certainly having an effect beyond its usual limits with him. Keylor looked puzzled at the civilian he looked to Rangi and asked, "Is he alright? He seems...... well not right." "He's ok Colonel" she replied watching Peters aggitated movements."He's gone without food and sleep...been scared witless by these things. ...but he'll be ok when we get him to sickbay." Keylor then pointed back down the corridor, "The shuttle the crew used to delivere the torpedoes are on deck 9. It seems to be intact and ready to fly. If we can move everyone down there, we can prepare the shuttle for launch and hopefully get back to the ship." Peter looked at the Big green man and noded slowly: "Away ... just away" he whispered to himself. Keylor nodded, he then looked over the three of them. "Ok commander, why dont you go with the corporal here and retreive the people in the infirmary." Keylor then looked over to Mercedes. "Do you think you can handle this man?" he asked pointing to Peter. Peter turned a bit and looked at Mercedes. Even if the effects of the medicaments were somewhat weared off, there was still 'juice' inside him to get his (man-) mind working on full speed. Mercedes was a pretty woman ... human south-ish type, long brown hair and dark eyes. Just the type of a woman that makes man crazy ... Peter beamed a broad smile at the 'green man' and said in a satisfied voice: "That's a gift my friend, many thanks." He looked in the direction of his (empty) stomach and said: "Been on diet for few days, but I'll handle anything {anyone}" "Yes sir, I can handle him. It shouldn't be a problem," Mercedes replied. "We'll see you at the shuttle then sir." Rangi said, turning her attention to Keylor. She paused for a second or two then moved to the Corporal standing nearby. ===End log=== Col Bretam Keylor & LtCmdr Rangi Summers & Ens Mercedes Carpenter & Peter Heher (NPC)