Mission 4

[Amanda Rose]

O'Connor then turned to Wells, "Keep this ship in one piece. Do you need to be in Engineering to do that?"

tag - Wells

O'Connor sneered as she turned back to the screen. She called out, "Culture, we have no intention of leaving. We are rendering humanitarian assistance, as requested. We have an obligation to help. We will defend that obligation with our very lives."

'With our lives.' Jessie thought. She know that as a Starfleet Officer she had sworn a vow to do just that but she would much rather this "The Culture" pay with their lives if it came down to it. She would defend her ship... her home, her crew... her family, with her life if need be but she was going to be damn certain that these attackers went down with them.

The Culture representative appeared on screen. It was merely a glow of yellow light, circular in shape. It spoke in a normal tone of voice rather than the booming tone reserved for the entire ship to hear, "You have powered weapons. You have defied us. Now, you shall pay with your lives."

General Tat put his large paws on O'Connor's shoulders and begged, "Power down. Power down. They will crush us! We've seen it done before. You must listen! We have to leave!"

Jessie shot a look over her shoulder at General Tat. Some General, he was a coward in the face of danger. Jessie was starting to wonder if the rank of General was an honorary title or he had earned it. O'Connor brushed one paw aside and argued, "We'll do no such thing."

"Tat I suggest you step back and be quiet for the time being. You're panicking is only going to make matters worse." Jessie said.

Before she could utter another word, a glow of light appeared from the Culture ship and only lightly rocked America. O'Connor called out, "What the hell was that?"

While shields appeared to be intact, something very odd started happening. The hull sounded like it was creaking. In fact, according to sensors, America's shields compressed in towards the ship several meters.

And there it was... the thing that Jessie has been waiting for. Whatever they were firing at the America had left the shields intact but definately made an impact on the Constitution Class ship. The Chief of Security made a quick check of the weapons and then targetted the attacking ship, unloading with a volley of phaser fire and salvo of photon torpedoes. If they wanted a fight then that was what they were going to get and "The Culture" would be the ones regretting it.

O'Connor looked over at Jessie and said, "I have no idea what that was, but it appears to be a weapon. So, you know what to do! Open fire! Fire at whatever weapons and navigation systems you can find first."

Jessie gave a nodd. They had choosen to attack a Federation vessel on a mission of peace and for that they would pay. The attacking ships configuration was a lot different than anything that she had seen before and in a lot of ways didn't make sense so it took her a lot longer to find what she was looking for than it should have. Still she was able to locate the weapons ports and target them with a rapid burst of phaser fire. Hopefully that would keep them from firing whatever weapon they were using on America's shields.

Tag - O'Connor and Wells

Lieutenant Commander Jessica Kirk
Chief of Security / Second Officer
USS America NCC-1776-A

[Amanda Rose]

O'Connor then turned to Wells, "Keep this ship in one piece. Do you need to be in Engineering to do that?"

*NM*

Laura checked her console. "Yes, to be honest. I'll call you from down there." She rushed to the turbolift and was gone to engineering.

*OM*

O'Connor sneered as she turned back to the screen. She called out, "Culture, we have no intention of leaving. We are rendering humanitarian assistance, as requested. We have an obligation to help. We will defend that obligation with our very lives."

'With our lives.' Jessie thought. She know that as a Starfleet Officer she had sworn a vow to do just that but she would much rather this "The Culture" pay with their lives if it came down to it. She would defend her ship... her home, her crew... her family, with her life if need be but she was going to be damn certain that these attackers went down with them.

The Culture representative appeared on screen. It was merely a glow of yellow light, circular in shape. It spoke in a normal tone of voice rather than the booming tone reserved for the entire ship to hear, "You have powered weapons. You have defied us. Now, you shall pay with your lives."

General Tat put his large paws on O'Connor's shoulders and begged, "Power down. Power down. They will crush us! We've seen it done before. You must listen! We have to leave!"

Jessie shot a look over her shoulder at General Tat. Some General, he was a coward in the face of danger. Jessie was starting to wonder if the rank of General was an honorary title or he had earned it. O'Connor brushed one paw aside and argued, "We'll do no such thing."

"Tat I suggest you step back and be quiet for the time being. You're panicking is only going to make matters worse." Jessie said.

Before she could utter another word, a glow of light appeared from the Culture ship and only lightly rocked America. O'Connor called out, "What the hell was that?"

While shields appeared to be intact, something very odd started happening. The hull sounded like it was creaking. In fact, according to sensors, America's shields compressed in towards the ship several meters.

And there it was... the thing that Jessie has been waiting for. Whatever they were firing at the America had left the shields intact but definately made an impact on the Constitution Class ship. The Chief of Security made a quick check of the weapons and then targetted the attacking ship, unloading with a volley of phaser fire and salvo of photon torpedoes. If they wanted a fight then that was what they were going to get and "The Culture" would be the ones regretting it.

O'Connor looked over at Jessie and said, "I have no idea what that was, but it appears to be a weapon. So, you know what to do! Open fire! Fire at whatever weapons and navigation systems you can find first."

Jessie gave a nodd. They had choosen to attack a Federation vessel on a mission of peace and for that they would pay. The attacking ships configuration was a lot different than anything that she had seen before and in a lot of ways didn't make sense so it took her a lot longer to find what she was looking for than it should have. Still she was able to locate the weapons ports and target them with a rapid burst of phaser fire. Hopefully that would keep them from firing whatever weapon they were using on America's shields.

*NM*

Laura rushed into engineering and quickly checked the status board. The lower ranking Ensigns and crewmen were trying to counter what was happening. The young lieutenant sucked in her breath.

"This is bad." she opened the intercom. "Captain..this is Wells. We have a situation. They're trying to crush the ship using the energy of our shields. They're trying to reverse it somehow. I need time to change the polarity and set up a duo-dynetic field that will push against this. But, you need to find a way to disable that beam while I do this. I may have to bring down our shields to reverse the polarity. Can we get away if I need to do that?"

[tags..sorry for the delay, very busy]

[Amanda Rose]

OOC: Sorry for my late reply!

IC:

> As they put a little distance between them and the plants, Brian began thinking about
what they could do. "Presumably the Huanni went in for large-scale clearance when they
set up here. Even if we removed the buildings, it's a brownfield site now. We'd have to
remove any toxic chemicals and presumably get the nutrient levels up again... I don't know
if we've got access to that kind of kit. We can maybe manage a small area as a gesture of
goodwill and then get a terraforming team in to do the large-scale stuff?"

> T'Pruk raised an eyebrow at Pendragon and responded, "I do not detect anything toxic
within the soil. However, it is clear that there are few nutrients within the soil under the
Huanni base through Lemmi's crust. It is logical to assume that the Huanni completely
sterilized the area prior to building their base here. It is a testament to these plants
strength that they could move into such a field and still create the damage they have
caused."
> "So..." Brian didn't know much about plants, but was sure nitrogen was involved
somewhere... and phospherus? phosphates? "... we need to get the right chemical balance
back in there and fast..."
> "What about accelerated substrata molecularization?" he suggested. "Beam the
chemicals directly into the ground? If we can do it, it'd get the chemical balance rectified
pretty quickly."
> T'Pruk nodded. "By my calculations, it would take exactly 2.3439 minutes to repair the
nutrients and soil by substrata molecularization. However, there would still remain the
issue of removing the Huanni base. That could simply be done by beaming up the
materials. But for either process we need America and it is engaged in battle. I would
suggest contacting the Captain." She looked at Delaney, expecting her to do so.

Tegau shook her head. "America is likely involved in negotiations herself," she pointed out.
"What kind of havoc would be created if we suggested that the Huanni pick up and leave
during such a delicate time? If there is any way we can get any sort of ground- a peace
offering, if you will, to get Keth back and assure them of our wish to help- we need to find
that."

The doctor turned her head to look back, checking on Keth and the plant. For a moment,
her worry showed on her face, but then she firmly shifted her mind to business.

"You two keep working here- and keep an eye on D'Val. I'm going to try to convince them
to part with Keth and see if I might have an idea...."

"Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium are what plants need on Earth," she told Brian as
she walked back to the plants, remembering a little from her plant biology courses.


When she got back to the plants, she said, "Your grounds are covered by the Huanni base,
correct? My friends are trying to come up with a plan to help you, but we need resources
to do so, and our ship is engaged in talks right now. We heard from the Huanni about a
race, called the Culture. What do you know about them?" It was a long shot, but sometimes
one had to take them.

[Amanda Rose]

T'Pruk nodded. "By my calculations, it would take exactly 2.3439 minutes to repair the nutrients and soil by substrata molecularization. However, there would still remain the issue of removing the Huanni base. That could simply be done by beaming up the materials. But for either process we need America and it is engaged in battle. I would suggest contacting the Captain." She looked at Delaney, expecting her to do so.
Tegau shook her head. "If there is any way we can get any sort of ground- a peace offering, if you will, to get Keth back and assure them of our wish to help- we need to find that. You two keep working here- and keep an eye on D'Val. I'm going to try to convince them to part with Keth and see if I might have an idea...."
"Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium are what plants need on Earth," she told Brian as she walked back to the plants, remembering a little from her plant biology courses.
As Tegau headed back to talk to the plants, Brian sighed. Without the ship, there was very little they were going to be able to do, but the way the D'Val-head was talking, they had only a short time to prove their noble intentions were more than just words.

He pulled a couple of tools from his bag. "If you can look after D'Val, I'll see if I can earn us some merit points..." he said to T'Pruk.

He selected a corner of structure that had already been damaged. If the Huanni weren't happy about whatever Tegau negotiated, at least they shouldn't mind him tidying up the broken parts and if he cleared some space, perhaps the plants would take it as a positive action.. He began dismantling and clearing the ground by hand. It would take ages to clear this way, but actions were supposed to speak louder than words.

[Amanda Rose]

--- In uss_america_a@yahoogroups.com, "Ali" <AliDave@...> wrote:
>
>
> T'Pruk nodded. "By my calculations, it would take exactly 2.3439 minutes
> to repair the nutrients and soil by substrata molecularization. However,
> there would still remain the issue of removing the Huanni base. That
> could simply be done by beaming up the materials. But for either process
> we need America and it is engaged in battle. I would suggest contacting
> the Captain." She looked at Delaney, expecting her to do so.
>
> Tegau shook her head. "If there is any way we can get any sort of
> ground- a peace offering, if you will, to get Keth back and assure them
> of our wish to help- we need to find that. You two keep working here-
> and keep an eye on D'Val. I'm going to try to convince them to part with
> Keth and see if I might have an idea...."
>
>
> "Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium are what plants need on Earth," she
> told Brian as she walked back to the plants, remembering a little from
> her plant biology courses.
>
>
> As Tegau headed back to talk to the plants, Brian sighed. Without the
> ship, there was very little they were going to be able to do, but the
> way the D'Val-head was talking, they had only a short time to prove
> their noble intentions were more than just words.
>
>
>
> He pulled a couple of tools from his bag. "If you can look after
> D'Val, I'll see if I can earn us some merit points..." he said to
> T'Pruk.
>
>
>
> He selected a corner of structure that had already been damaged. If the
> Huanni weren't happy about whatever Tegau negotiated, at least they
> shouldn't mind him tidying up the broken parts and if he cleared some
> space, perhaps the plants would take it as a positive action.. He began
> dismantling and clearing the ground by hand. It would take ages to clear
> this way, but actions were supposed to speak louder than words.
>

"All very interesting but can we hurry up!" Keth squeaked, eyes
blinking and hazy as the plant's vine like grip tightening about him.
It felt painful, to painful for words or even a jerry Springer
Special. He made a quick bargain with the Gods, that he would pray
every day if they saved his hide right now...
or now!...NOOOOWWW!!!

How about now?

No?

Now good? What about now?

Fudge.

Keth-From zealot believer to atheist in the drop of a hat, or maybe
it was the sudden searing pain driving into his thigh. Grunting he
looked down and froze as one of the tendril like vine began to feed
into a hole in his uniform cut by one of the main thorns.
"AHH ITS TRYING TO EAT ME!!" he screamed as the vine's thorn like tip
scrabbled across his fur covered leg, trying to seek purchase as he
began to giggle uncontrollably "Th-at tickles! STOP HAHA! OH GOD
STOOPPP HAHAHAHA-snort-HAHA!!"

TAG-All

Ltjr Keth Soban
ACSO
USS America

[Amanda Rose]

General Tat put his large paws on O'Connor's shoulders and begged,
"Power down. Power down. They will crush us! We've seen it done
before. You must listen! We have to leave!"

Jessie shot a look over her shoulder at General Tat. Some General, he
was a coward in the face of danger. Jessie was starting to wonder if
the rank of General was an honorary title or he had earned it.
O'Connor brushed one paw aside and argued, "We'll do no such thing."

"Tat I suggest you step back and be quiet for the time being. You're
panicking is only going to make matters worse." Jessie said.

Before she could utter another word, a glow of light appeared from the
Culture ship and only lightly rocked America. O'Connor called out,
"What the hell was that?"

While shields appeared to be intact, something very odd started
happening. The hull sounded like it was creaking. In fact, according
to sensors, America's shields compressed in towards the ship several
meters.

And there it was... the thing that Jessie has been waiting for.
Whatever they were firing at the America had left the shields intact
but definately made an impact on the Constitution Class ship. The
Chief of Security made a quick check of the weapons and then targetted
the attacking ship, unloading with a volley of phaser fire and salvo
of photon torpedoes. If they wanted a fight then that was what they
were going to get and "The Culture" would be the ones regretting it.

O'Connor looked over at Jessie and said, "I have no idea what that
was, but it appears to be a weapon. So, you know what to do! Open
fire! Fire at whatever weapons and navigation systems you can find first."

Jessie gave a nodd. They had choosen to attack a Federation vessel on
a mission of peace and for that they would pay. The attacking ships
configuration was a lot different than anything that she had seen
before and in a lot of ways didn't make sense so it took her a lot
longer to find what she was looking for than it should have. Still she
was able to locate the weapons ports and target them with a rapid
burst of phaser fire. Hopefully that would keep them from firing
whatever weapon they were using on America's shields.

Laura rushed into engineering and quickly checked the status board.
The lower ranking Ensigns and crewmen were trying to counter what was
happening. The young lieutenant sucked in her breath.

"This is bad." she opened the intercom. "Captain..this is Wells. We
have a situation. They're trying to crush the ship using the energy of
our shields. They're trying to reverse it somehow. I need time to
change the polarity and set up a duo-dynetic field that will push
against this. But, you need to find a way to disable that beam while I
do this. I may have to bring down our shields to reverse the polarity.
Can we get away if I need to do that?"

O'Connor barked back into the comm, =/\=You just want a miracle, don't
you? If we lower the shields, we're toast. Hang on a second. I'm
going to call down to the away team and see if they have found
anything.=/\=

O'Connor looked at Jess, full of determination. _Why are the Culture
being so protective over the Huanni to the point of risking a war with
the Federation? What's the missing piece?_

O'Connor called out, =/\= Delaney, this is the Captain. Tell me you
have found out something down there because if you have not, you may
not have a ride home. Capiche? =/\=

tag - all

[Amanda Rose]

T'Pruk nodded. "By my calculations, it would take exactly 2.3439 minutes to repair the nutrients and soil by substrata molecularization. However, there would still remain the issue of removing the Huanni base. That could simply be done by beaming up the materials. But for either process we need America and it is engaged in battle. I would suggest contacting the Captain." She looked at Delaney, expecting her to do so.
Tegau shook her head. "If there is any way we can get any sort of ground- a peace offering, if you will, to get Keth back and assure them of our wish to help- we need to find that. You two keep working here- and keep an eye on D'Val. I'm going to try to convince them to part with Keth and see if I might have an idea...."
"Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium are what plants need on Earth," she told Brian as she walked back to the plants, remembering a little from her plant biology courses.
As Tegau headed back to talk to the plants, Brian sighed. Without the ship, there was very little they were going to be able to do, but the way the D'Val-head was talking, they had only a short time to prove their noble intentions were more than just words.
He pulled a couple of tools from his bag. "If you can look after D'Val, I'll see if I can earn us some merit points..." he said to T'Pruk.
T'Pruk asked, "What do you have in mind?" Before Pendragon could answer, he headed towards the base.
He selected a corner of structure that had already been damaged. If the Huanni weren't happy about whatever Tegau negotiated, at least they shouldn't mind him tidying up the broken parts and if he cleared some space, perhaps the plants would take it as a positive action.. He began dismantling and clearing the ground by hand. It would take ages to clear this way, but actions were supposed to speak louder than words.
"What exactly do you intend to achieve by manually clearing space, Mr. Pendragon? You cannot possibly remove the Huanni base by yourself nor can you get it off the planet just by moving things around. Your actions are highly illogical. A logical course of action would be to have America transport these items to the ship and proceed with the accelerated substrata molecularization."

tag - Pendragon

"All very interesting but can we hurry up!" Keth squeaked, eyes blinking and hazy as the plant's vine like grip tightening about him. It felt painful, to painful for words or even a jerry Springer Special. He made a quick bargain with the Gods, that he would pray every day if they saved his hide right now...or now!...NOOOOWWW!
How about now?

No?

Now good? What about now?

Fudge.

Keth-From zealot believer to atheist in the drop of a hat, or maybe it was the sudden searing pain driving into his thigh. Grunting he looked down and froze as one of the tendril like vine began to feed into a hole in his uniform cut by one of the main thorns. "AHH ITS TRYING TO EAT ME!!" he screamed as the vine's thorn like tip scrabbled across his fur covered leg, trying to seek purchase as he
began to giggle uncontrollably "Th-at tickles! STOP HAHA! OH GOD STOOPPP HAHAHAHA-snort- HAHA!!"

T'Pruk looked over at the hapless Huanni and replied, "Mr. Soban, would you stop that incessant howling? If you look down at your leg, I'm sure that you would see that the vines around you are loosening. Curious." T'Pruk started to think.
That was when T'Pruk heard O'Connor's voice from Delaney's communicator.
=/\= Delaney, this is the Captain. Tell me you have found out something down there because if you have not, you may not have a ride home. Capiche? =/\=

T'Pruk raised her brow as she looked at Delaney, silently asking what Delaney wanted T'Pruk to do.
tag - all

[Amanda Rose]

> Tegau shook her head. "If there is any way we can get any sort of ground- a peace
offering, if you will, to get Keth back and assure them of our wish to help- we need to find
that. You two keep working here- and keep an eye on D'Val. I'm going to try to convince
them to part with Keth and see if I might have an idea...."
>
> "Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium are what plants need on Earth," she told Brian as
she walked back to the plants, remembering a little from her plant biology courses.
>
> As Tegau headed back to talk to the plants, Brian sighed. Without the ship, there was
very little they were going to be able to do, but the way the D'Val-head was talking, they
had only a short time to prove their noble intentions were more than just words.
> He pulled a couple of tools from his bag. "If you can look after D'Val, I'll see if I can
earn us some merit points..." he said to T'Pruk.
> T'Pruk asked, "What do you have in mind?" Before Pendragon could answer, he headed
towards the base.
>
>
> He selected a corner of structure that had already been damaged. If the Huanni weren't
happy about whatever Tegau negotiated, at least they shouldn't mind him tidying up the
broken parts and if he cleared some space, perhaps the plants would take it as a positive
action.. He began dismantling and clearing the ground by hand. It would take ages to clear
this way, but actions were supposed to speak louder than words.
> "What exactly do you intend to achieve by manually clearing space, Mr. Pendragon? You
cannot possibly remove the Huanni base by yourself nor can you get it off the planet just
by moving things around. Your actions are highly illogical. A logical course of action
would be to have America transport these items to the ship and proceed with the
accelerated substrata molecularization."
>
>
> "All very interesting but can we hurry up!" Keth squeaked, eyes blinking and hazy as the
plant's vine like grip tightening about him.

Grunting he looked down and froze as one of the tendril like vine began to feed into a
hole in his uniform cut by one of the main thorns. "AHH ITS TRYING TO EAT ME!!" he
screamed as the vine's thorn like tip scrabbled across his fur covered leg, trying to seek
purchase as he
> began to giggle uncontrollably "Th-at tickles! STOP HAHA! OH GOD STOOPPP
HAHAHAHA-snort-HAHA!!"
>
> T'Pruk looked over at the hapless Huanni and replied, "Mr. Soban, would you stop that
incessant howling? If you look down at your leg, I'm sure that you would see that the vines
around you are loosening. Curious." T'Pruk started to think.
> That was when T'Pruk heard O'Connor's voice from Delaney's communicator.
> =/\= Delaney, this is the Captain. Tell me you have found out something down there
because if you have not, you may not have a ride home. Capiche? =/\=
>
> T'Pruk raised her brow as she looked at Delaney, silently asking what Delaney wanted
T'Pruk to do.

Delaney held up a finger for T'Pruk to wait and answered her communicator, giving the
Captain a quick update. =/\= Captain, we've made contact with the plants down here.
They can change to resemble our faces and they speak coherently and intelligently. They
are angry with the Huanni for taking over their lands and destroying them, threatening the
existence of their people. It'd really help if we could put nutrients back in the ground and
give these plants a bit of their land back- they aren't very trusting. D'Val is down, but
stable, and Keth is entangled in plants. Pendragon is trying to clear a peace offering to
build trust, and I'm negotiating for Keth's release =/\= Aware of the essence of time, she
talked fast but tried to keep her voice clear.

"T'Pruk, help Brian with clearing a bit of land. We need to show them they can trust us to
try to help them, however small our efforts might be right now," Tegau told the Vulcan.

[Amanda Rose]

General Tat put his large paws on O'Connor's shoulders and begged, "Power down. Power down. They will crush us! We've seen it done before. You must listen! We have to leave!"

Jessie shot a look over her shoulder at General Tat. Some General, he was a coward in the face of danger. Jessie was starting to wonder if the rank of General was an honorary title or he had earned it. O'Connor brushed one paw aside and argued, "We'll do no such thing."

"Tat I suggest you step back and be quiet for the time being. You're panicking is only going to make matters worse." Jessie said.

Before she could utter another word, a glow of light appeared from the Culture ship and only lightly rocked America. O'Connor called out, "What the hell was that?"

While shields appeared to be intact, something very odd started happening. The hull sounded like it was creaking. In fact, according to sensors, America's shields compressed in towards the ship several meters.

And there it was... the thing that Jessie has been waiting for. Whatever they were firing at the America had left the shields intact but definately made an impact on the Constitution Class ship. The Chief of Security made a quick check of the weapons and then targetted the attacking ship, unloading with a volley of phaser fire and salvo of photon torpedoes. If they wanted a fight then that was what they were going to get and "The Culture" would be the ones regretting it.

O'Connor looked over at Jessie and said, "I have no idea what that was, but it appears to be a weapon. So, you know what to do! Open fire! Fire at whatever weapons and navigation systems you can find first."

Jessie gave a nodd. They had choosen to attack a Federation vessel on a mission of peace and for that they would pay. The attacking ships configuration was a lot different than anything that she had seen before and in a lot of ways didn't make sense so it took her a lot longer to find what she was looking for than it should have. Still she was able to locate the weapons ports and target them with a rapid burst of phaser fire. Hopefully that would keep them from firing whatever weapon they were using on America's shields.

Laura rushed into engineering and quickly checked the status board. The lower ranking Ensigns and crewmen were trying to counter what was happening. The young lieutenant sucked in her breath.

"This is bad." she opened the intercom. "Captain..this is Wells. We have a situation. They're trying to crush the ship using the energy of our shields. They're trying to reverse it somehow. I need time to change the polarity and set up a duo-dynetic field that will push against this. But, you need to find a way to disable that beam while I do this. I may have to bring down our shields to reverse the polarity.

Can we get away if I need to do that?"

O'Connor barked back into the comm, =/\=You just want a miracle, don't you? If we lower the shields, we're toast. Hang on a second. I'm going to call down to the away team and see if they have found anything.=/\ =

O'Connor looked at Jess, full of determination. _Why are the Culture being so protective over the Huanni to the point of risking a war with the Federation? What's the missing piece?_

O'Connor called out, =/\= Delaney, this is the Captain. Tell me you have found out something down there because if you have not, you may not have a ride home. Capiche? =/\=

Jessie quickly ran her fingers over the controls to the targeting computer. Their opponent was definately tough, but then again the America was a lot tougher. She was a Constitution Clas... the pride of Starfleet, or at least one the pride of Starfleet. She definately wasn't going to let it take her ship down.

With the computers locked in place Jessie decided to up the ante a little "Locking on photon torpedoes." the Chief of Security announced. "High yield, full spread."

With that Jessie let fly with the most powerful weapons that the USS America had to offer.

Tag - everyone

Lieutenant Commander Jessica Kirk
Chief of Security / Second Officer
USS America NCC-1776-A

[Amanda Rose]

He began dismantling and clearing the ground by hand. It would take ages to clear this way, but actions were supposed to speak louder than words.
"What exactly do you intend to achieve by manually clearing space, Mr. Pendragon? You
cannot possibly remove the Huanni base by yourself nor can you get it off the planet just by moving things around. Your actions are highly illogical. A logical course of action would be to have America transport these items to the ship and proceed with the accelerated substrata molecularization."

"That would be the logical course of action," Brian grunted as he lifted a piece of rusty metalwork, hefting it out of the way, "if the ship did not currently have its shields up. If they were able to beam these items up, they would have been able to beam us up and this..." he nodded toward Keth, writhing in... well... writhing anyway, "...wouldn't be happening at all."
He hoped he hadn't offended her. He had always had respect for Vulcans – they were more straightforward than pretty much anyone else and usually that meant he was less likely to put his foot in it, but as good as telling her her logic was faulty? She might not appreciate it...

=/\= Delaney, this is the Captain. Tell me you have found out something down there
because if you have not, you may not have a ride home. Capiche? =/\=

Delaney held up a finger for T'Pruk to wait and answered her communicator, giving the Captain a quick update.

"T'Pruk, help Brian with clearing a bit of land. We need to show them they can trust us to try to help them, however small our efforts might be right now," Tegau told the Vulcan.

Brian shot T'Pruk an apologetic smile and indicated a patch he had been working towards. At least it would go quicker with two.