Valkyrie Quest

Posted on Fri Jan 22nd, 2021 @ 11:09am by Commodore Phoenix Lalor-Richardson & Captain Gary Taylor & Lieutenant Commander Aurelia Taylor & Lieutenant Victor Barclay de Tolly & Lieutenant Tonya King ( Barclay de Tolly ) & Lieutenant JG Louis Bordeaux ( Magnus ) & Lieutenant JG Joral Bin. ( Barclay de Tolly ) & Lieutenant JG Paulie O'Rourke ( Barclay de Tolly )

Mission: Season 4: Episode 3: Guided by Starlight
Location: Engineering on the Elysium
Timeline: Current
1574 words - 3.1 OF Standard Post Measure

A signal came in for the chief engineer from one of the fighters. "Vaii to Elysium, I need to speak to the Chief Engineer, pronto." Jessica's voice came through a hail.

In Engineering, Victor answered, "This is Lt. Barclay de Tolly, the Chief Engineer. How may I help you?"

Jessica responded. "El-Tee, I'm right below one of these convoy ships, and I've noticed something." She put on her flight cam. One of the convoy vessels were venting something into space. "You see that? That is outgassing. it what happens when Oxygen and Nitrogen encounters a vacuum. Both gases freeze into solids and begin scouring the hull as dust particles. The worst part is when the gas turns to a solid and begins grinding on the hull." Jess mentioned. "To put it simply, they're loosing their artificial atmosphere."

"We need to notify the Captain and the XO," Victor says as he sent Jessica's report to the two of them. He brings up the scans as he could see what Jessica was talking about. "I will assemble the personnel to go over there."

"The worst part is trying to fix this, El-Tee. We'd need to pull the hull plating and the superstructure off the ship. " Jess noted. "Preferably, I'd wish we had this ship back at the shipyards on Earth. This job would be a snap there." Jess mentioned.

"Tonya has first hand experience on this many times," Victor says as he knew this Tonya has no fear of taking risks if the need be she has to do a space walk. "Hopefully we can do all of this with the use of what our ship can do. Using the tractor beam wrongly could cause the gases to cause an explosion when they defrost. Plus there is the matter of electrical matters as well."

"I'll gladly do the spacewalk with her. No one should be out there alone. I do spacewalking for kicks." Jess noted. "I'm a 24th century astronaut."

"Judging from your report," Victor says complimenting Jessica, "You understand Leidenfrost Effect. I do understand your eagerness but you can there only be there as a safety precaution for the Engineering Crew. I can not have a non-Engineer doing what the Engineers are meant to do. Best bet would for you to stay in a Shuttle in case an Engineer has an accident and they need to be beamed to Sickbay as quickly as possible. You can make badda bing badda Teleport quicker."

"Whatever you say, El-Tee, I'm not going to step on your shoes on this, however I am a certified extra-vehicular instructor." Jess mentioned. "As I said; 24th Century Astronaut." She smiled. "We better get a hold of the Captain."

"Great but we might need to think twenty-first century on our approach if we are able to help them as in what kind of epoxy technology they have," Victor says as he gets his thoughts in order. "Captain Lalor and Commander Taylor. Lt. Commander Vali has discovered outgassing on one of the ships hull. You will see she is near the one in question as she has brought it up on her screen."

"Commander, Captain. I need permission to board Quiespe's ship. I have knowledge on sealing pressure hulls from decompression. This will require plenty of welders to create a temporary pressure seal on the ships decks." Jess mentioned. We can't repair the hull while several sections are pressurized, or we'll have an explosive decompression, and we don't want that."

Phoenix had been going through reports with Gary when the call came through. She frowned. "How long do we have before the situation becomes totally irretrievable Commander?" she asked Vaii

"Well the hull is Tritanum. It should have been as hard as a diamond. Their saving grace is they didn't get the cheap stuff. But outgassing is still grinding the crack into a hole. Im also concerned about the superstructure, Ma'am. They have i estimate two weeks."

"Two weeks." Gary repeated. "Can a temporary patch be affixed over the hole Jess? Like a band-aid. Just long enough to get them to their destination?"

"You know NASA once had a procedure for hull breaches on the international space station back in the day. Back in 2018 there was a 2 millimeter hole in one of the Soyuz modules. They fixed it with Epoxy and Tape. Literally. A patch won't fill the molecular crevices of the hull. What we need is a seal that settles into the hole like clay or putty and hardens like diamond." Jessica noted. "And since this group is low-tech. They probably won't have forcefields, and I think I have a low-tech way of locating the leak too." Jess mentioned. "What do you think, El-Tee. Can you Lt. King come up with something a bit more specialized than Epoxy and Duct Tape? Because filling in as much of this hole as possible is what we need."

"That will work but when they reach their destination," Victor responds with his assessment, "They run the risk of entering the atmosphere of catching fire. So Tonya what do you think."

"We could do the spacewalk fixing it with their own technology," Tonya suggests. "We remove from the hull the ice with twentieth century lasers focusing the light to use the vacuum of space to scrape it off. It would take five but I will suggest six because everyone needs a buddy. Jessica and I can be buddies, Victor can be buddied with Bordeaux and Joral Bin can be buddied with Petty Officer Drew Brady. Worst case scenario,something goes wrong and you will be faced with Paulie O'Rourke who runs the Gamma Shift as Acting Chief Engineer."

"We could use both ideas, Lt. King. A patch and a filling. Say some kind of self-hardening aerogel. Possibly polycarbon based. We will the hole, then we patch it with a thermo-protective patch. I'll land and get into an enviro-suit then I'll board the ship and start locating the breach. If they give me grief, I'll explain to them what it's like to die in hard vacuum." Jess noted. "Commander, I think we have a plan. I'll follow up when I land."

"Someone should go with you Jess," Tonya shrugged. "I could go."

"Good." Came the captain's reply. "Jess, Contact Operation as well, have them set up quarters for the people on that ship just incase we have to evacuate it,"

"Just what we don't need." Gary muttered. "I think we should look at evacing some of the people. Women and children as a precaution." He added.

*Later*

Jess opened a private coms to the Convoy Ship. "Attention Convoy vessel. This is the USS Elysium. You have a serious problem, please pick up."

Avonaco's comms Officer had been listening to the exchange, he looked towards Avonaco. "Do we answer them Leader?" Avonaco nodded and then spoke, "What is this problem you speak of? Our instruments show no problem, all is well as far as we can see".

Jessica spoke. "I suggest you re-examine your life support systems. Your ship is venting atmosphere into space." She sent her fighter's image to him.

"Do you know what that is? That is what happens when Oxygen and Nitrogen hit hard vacuum. It clumps and freezes instantly, and it will get only get worse from here. You are going to suffocate long before you reach your destination." Jessica mentioned. "Would you like to know how it feels like to die in a vacuum? Look up what happened to the crew of Soyuz 11. Here I'll send the autopsy reports the Russians did on the bodies if you'd like?"

The captain's voice crackled in Jess's ear. "Commander, Be polite"

"Our life support systems show no leak, perhaps we may borrow an engineer to check them? Providing that engineer is male, for now we shall see what damage has been wrought on the inside of the hull". Avonaco cut the connection, and sent a team to check.

Jess shook her head. "Goddesses almighty!!!"

On the Bridge, Phoenix sighed and rolled her eyes. "Its like being at home" she quipped.

"This is Avonaco, our hull has indeed received damage. We request an engineer to assist us in it's repair". The static continued as the colonist vessel awaited the reply, it now visibly slowed further.

Jessica prepared what looked like an injector gun. Inside was a mixture of ceramic and aerogel. She tapped her combadge. "Tonya, are you suiting up?"

"Indeed I am," Tonya replied.

"Ladies, try and keep away from any windows." Phoenix advised.

Tonya nodded. "We will."

"Good. You have a go Ladies. Get this done and quickly."

Jess beamed aboard the ship in an EVA Suit and approached Avonaco holding an injector gun. "Okay what we have here is a composite polymer based Aerogel and ceramic type of Epoxy. The gel will harden like forged tritanium in the crack. The patch will not do alone, as we need to fill every part of the breach on a molecular level. This will work. They did something like this on the International Space Station back in the 21st."

Tonya beamed over with instruments including the injector gun. She looks at the crack as she felt they appeared in time. "We can do this together. Always seems smaller on the view screens but when one sees it for real, it is bigger than it was visualized."

"Fix it and get out of there." Came the reply from the Elysium.