Objectives pt.2

Posted on Fri Feb 12th, 2021 @ 2:10am by Lieutenant Commander Tyroh Vantic & Lieutenant Thriss Kla'ren

Mission: The Jungle
Location: Somewhere in the Jungle
Timeline: Current

ON:

Tyroh and Thriss had been working their way towards the location the security officer had indicated he may have seen something of interest. While they walked, Tyroh's mind had continued to race thinking about how and why the Liberty crew was in this situation at all.

"Something about this situation does not feel right," Tyroh turned his head slightly to get a look at the Andorian behind him. "Have you any thoughts on the matter?"

"Actually, I do. To me, what doesn't add up is how we encounter the Manchester's debris so easily. In fact, even more so, why didn't any other Federation ship encounter it in the near 10 years it was missing? It could be anything, and I have a feeling that there is more going on here than just a 'game'", answered the Andorian.

Tyroh had been thinking about that line of reasoning himself ever since they had arrived on planet. He was fairly certain he had an answer.

"I would surmise that we, that is the Liberty, was enticed to move close enough to investigate. The reason no other ships had seen anything before was that they weren't allowed to see or find anything before now," Tyroh paused momentarily, getting his bearings as best as he could. "Something changed on this planet, or with the Manchester crew situation, to cause someone to allow us to see wreckage that hadn't been seen before."

"That is a possibility." Thriss was formulating a theory, but he was waiting to confirm it. He wondered if they were actually on the planet below, or some other place.

The walked in relative silence for a bit before Tyroh slowed, then stopped. "I think what I saw from above is just beyond these fronds," he stated. "It could be a cache of some kind but it could be a trap. I should scout the area first. Do you have that pipe piece still handy?"

Kla'ren took it off of his back. "Sure thing", he said handing it to Vantic.

Tyroh held his hands up, not moving to grab the item. "No, that's for you. Keep it for protection, just in case my scouting turns up something nasty." He then reach behind him for the length of sturdy rope that had been used to bind him earlier and wrap a portion of it around the knuckles of his right hand.

"I think we were being watched as we got closer to this location," Tyroh stated calmly before settling himself. He eyed Thriss in readiness, then nodded his head. "I don't know how many, exactly, but keep your senses tuned and watch yourself. Run to protect yourself, if you have to. I'll try to flush them out. Be right back."

The security officer turned and melded into the jungle foliage, leaving barely a rustle as he disappeared.

"Wait a minute", Thriss said to himself as the Chief of Security left. He realized that there were floating cameras in the air, probably for people to watch their progress. However, there wasn't too many in the area. He looked up and calculated how far up it was. the Chief Engineer came to the conclusion that the camera was about 7 feet off of the top of the treeline. However, if he climbed up to get it, he'd have to jump, as the camera was hovering over them in an opening in between some of the trees. It would be risky, as whoever was hunting them would be alerted to it. However, it could give him, and Commander Vantic, an advantage. Not only that, but he could probably have an aerial view of Tyroh. So, he started his ascent up the tree closest to the camera.

***

Tyroh moved quickly and as quietly as we could, trying hard to not make any noises while he was still relatively close to the Liberty's engineer. Once he felt he was far enough, he changed directions towards where he believed one or possibly two of individuals who had been observing them were.

Tyroh paused, taking the length of rope he'd wrapped around his fist into his other hand, unwrapping it, then tied it to two sturdy pieces of trees about five feet apart. He then checked the tension of the rope, satisfied with its effectiveness, then stepped over it towards where he felt their antagonists might be. He started making noise, crashing through the heaving foliage towards the item that had caught his attention before.

Before long, Tyroh stumbled into a clearing. He looked around briefly, not seeing anyone but catching sight of the item he had spotted from his high vantage point from before. It was a chest, probably a metre and a half in length and half a metre in height and depth.

He started moving towards to chest, wary of his surroundings, when he was rewarded with an individual crashing out of the brush. They were large, a little larger that Tyroh himself, and menacing. Tyroh had been expecting someone to come after him so he wasn't in the least bit surprised. The being bellowed incoherently and started charging for the security officer. Tyroh turned and started running back in the direction from which he entered the clearing.

***

The tree wasn't has hard to scale as it would have been, if Thriss had of tried to climb it with his binds. After a few minutes of trial and error in climbing the tree, he crouched on the branch, as it was strong, and big enough to hold his body weight. He looked around to find no enemies in his area. However, he heard a loud bellow from a creature in the distance, and he also heard some running. Originally, he would have called for the Chief of Security, but that could be reckless, as that would make both of their locations even more known than they were. Then again, the task Thriss was going to attempt would probably risk revealing himself anyways. He got up quietly and carefully and quickly saw were the camera was floating. He quickly continued ascending as high up as possible, and found a branch were he was both on top of the treeline, but also slightly hidden by the leaves. In front of him was the rest of the branch that would double as a runway for his run up to the camera. The best course of action for him was to count down from 3, and on 1, he'd be at the point were he'd have to jump. However, he needed to be cautious, because the camera could have been filming him, or someone else, and there was a chance it wasn't Tyroh. He started the countdown as he balanced himself.

"Three....", he started his run-up.

"Two....", he had ran about 75% of the branch.

"One....", The Andorian said to him self as he jumped at the end of the branch. He quickly grabbed onto the camera midair with one hand, which caused the camera, along with Thriss to crash to the ground, due to the Chief Engineer's body weight. The momentum caused Thriss and the camera to crash into the trees, where he grabbed onto a branch, only to fall again. After a cycle of falling, and crashing through branches, he finally landed on his back on the ground, with the camera in his arms. He let out a small groan and got up with a struggle due to the bruises the fall caused him. He would be fine, and was able to continue at least. He grabbed the disabled camera and fled into the foliage, to a spot were he could hide himself for a bit.

***

Tyroh's flight through the dense jungle thicket was a swift one. He could hear and feel his assailant behind him, moving swiftly as well, starting to gain. Perfect. The security officer reached the point where he had tied off his length of rope and nimbly stepped over it. The rope was covered just enough that, if you didn't know it was there, you'd never see it.

Which is exactly what the Angosian had hoped for. Behind him, Tyroh's attacker blindly crashed through and proceeded to trip over the cord. The assailant's eyes widened in shock, not only because they were normally sure-footed but also because - as they were falling to the ground - Tyroh had already stopped, spun around and delivered a crushing roundhouse kick to their head.

The bulky being's eyes rolled up into their head and they hit the ground, unconscious. Tyroh took a moment to slow his breathing down, resting his hands on his knees, then he moved toward the being and did a quick search of their person. There were a couple of items that seemed to be ration packs, a scimitar/machete-like weapon at the hip and not much else.

There didn't appear to be any communications gear of any kind but Tyroh knew he didn't have a lot of time to search. There was someone else out there, he was sure of it know. He thought he'd heard something relatively near to his position when he'd been running through the jungle. Perhaps this being's partner was trying to flank him. Either way, time was short and Tyroh quickly gathered the items from the unconscious assailant and tied them up with his former bindings.

Vantic heard a thunderous crashing sound in the direction he had left Thriss Kla'ren. Then, he heard rustling in another direction moving towards that sound. That must be the other assailant. Tyroh moved quickly, he had to get to Thriss before their foe did...

***

At this point, Kla'ren had been in the foliage for a little bit now. While he was hiding, he opened up the camera, and found a circuit with a very small LCARS screen that he found to be cracked. Interesting. He hadn't seen anything like this before. He knew there were probably probes with LCARS screens this small, but never in a camera. He noticed the flight systems could be repaired. He wondered if he could use it to send a message to the Captain, or any other members of the Liberty crew. After that, he started to repair the camera. First, while he couldn't repair the crack in the screen, he was able to make the system functional again, to at least display a message of some kind. Next, he got to work on the camera's flight systems. He pulled out a few wires, and very small conduits that were very close to being ruptured. After he fixed those, he put the wires back in after fixing the conduits. However, he did get shocked a few times, but other than that he was fine.

A few moments later, he heard rustling, however, he didn't know who it was. Was it Vantic? Was it an enemy? Thriss readied his make shift weapon, and prepared for who, or whatever was causing the rustling.

***

The large jungle fronds split to reveal a sizeable, humanoid being with a deadly bladed weapon in one hand. It took in it's surroundings quickly then spotted the Andorian nearby. It's wicked grin was crooked and jagged, what sounded like a wheezing chuckle emanated from its large mouth. It raised its weapon and started to advance on Thriss, quickly.

Being Andorian, it was very hard to sneak attack Kla'ren, due to his antennas. This was no exception. He knew it was a humanoid this time, so, there was a high chance they knew about Andorian biology, so Thriss had to play his cards right. He stayed on the ground, but kept his pipe hidden in arms reach. He figured the humanoid was approximately 15 feet and closing on him. He felt the humanoid was now picking up the pace, and nearly sprinting towards the Andorian. He quickly lept of of the ground, however he was met with struggle from the humanoid, who pushed Thriss against a tree, and tried to strike him with the blade he had in hand. However, Kla'ren was faster, as he held up the pipe right in front of his chest to block the blade from striking him. There was a struggle of strength from both Thriss and the humanoid. After a little bit of sparring, Thriss went in for the attack, but he failed, as the hunter pushed the Andorian to the ground, and disarmed him. He crawled back, and got up again, and dodging the next attack to come towards him. Thriss lept for the pipe, and blocked the next attack. However, the hunter managed to get a hit on Kla'ren, which caused him to be wounded in his side. He took a breath, and everything started to go slow. Was this it? No. It wasn't. He got up again with a struggle, with a little of his Andorian blood on his left hand, to cover the wound. He stared the hunter directly in the eye, and went into a full sprint at the humanoid, and blocked the hunter's readied attack with the pipe, and struggled to, but managed to disarm the hunter, and then struck him with with both the pipe and the blade. When the now unconscious humanoid hunter fell to the ground, Kla'ren carefully searched him for useful materials, in which he didn't find too much, except an extra dagger, which could render useful. He also snagged a bandage from the hunter, and ripped up part his own shirt to make a make shift bandage.

When the Andorian sat down, he sensed that Commander Vantic was nearby.

Tyroh burst out of the foliage, weapon in hand and ready for anything, and spotted Lieutenant Kla'ren wounded but crudely bandaged, sitting next to the unconscious form of their former assailant.

"Well," Tyroh commented, taking a deep breath and starting towards the Andorian. He was relieved to see the engineer alive. "That one was fast. I'm glad to see you're mostly okay."

"I might be wounded, but I'm in one piece. Anyways, I managed to disable this camera, and use it to our advantage, to maybe send some kind of message to any of the other crew members somehow. That being said, it might be safer to get a move on now, as the hunters might know our current location". answered the Andorian.

"You're assessment is a correct one," Tyroh nodded, holding out a hand to Thriss to help him up. He loved how creative engineers were and was fascinated with what the Andorian had come up with. Tyroh was interested in exploring other possibilities as well. "I found a chest back that way. We can regroup there momentarily before figuring out our next steps."

tbc...

OFF:

Lieutenant Thriss Kla'ren
Chief Engineer
USS Liberty

&

Lieutenant Commander Tyroh Vantic
Chief Security/Tactical Officer
USS Liberty