Posted by Captain John Tiberius Glen (Captain) in Main Sim - Underground Cave System - Landing Party
[snip]

One at a time, Glen switched on the headlights on the two helmets, and then he threw them over the head of the giant snake and behind it. He hoped that the combination of the bright lights, the movement and the noise as they hit the stone floor, would distract it in the opposite direction and away from them. If it worked, he would call out the signal for them to run away.

As Glen had thrown the helmets, their movements caught the Mother’s attention, the lights spinning about in the air also made the bugs which had scurried out from the cover of the destroyed building the Mother had destroyed freeze from whatever they had planned to do falling still.

Just as Cross and the injured (but not injured?) NE security guard limped off for more cover, there was a rumbling sensation greater then even the mother serpent’s arrival. The whole caveran seemed to splitter apart as if by some giant shockwave struck it. Peering all around them the entire surface of the cavern was peeled back as if by the hand of the gods. One would expect the vacuum of space peering in with the endless void of space to suck them out, but seems luck was in their favor as a noticeable faint shimmer of some kind of forcefield was evident, but all this was then sheared away when a all encompassing red-fiery explosion just slammed all around the shield bubble the result further being every got thrown this way and that.

When the felling of the hell itself visiting them passed 10 seconds later it was to find themselves floating within the moon strewn rubble on a chunk which contained the shield bubble. Peering into the now vacuum of space, sparks of energy and the swirls of what seemed a black hole or some other kind of vortex was drawing in it seemed a massive Serpent ship with several smaller ones already breaking up behind it. Somehow they werent being drawn to it…

With a wink the vortex as quickly as it seemed to appear winked out sucking in the massive ship and its smaller escorts, to some size far smaller then their vision could see. With that wink out, there was another baleful cry coming from the Mother Serpent, something akin to sorrow/anger before it seems as it ended the fight seemed lost upon it. Its cry also caused little tinier squeaks of sorts to come from the baby Serpents around Tia’s legs still thankfully uninjured. These squeaks turned the sorrow/angered looking Mother to look her way but thankfully now no fiery laser eyed death was coming their way for the moment.

”..Orders sir?” the two mobile NE security guards spoke up from their own cover nearby.

It took Glen some seconds to process what had just happened. I turned around to see that the option of climbing back up the cliff was no longer on the table - the cliff had vanished, along with everything else. The whole planet had disappeared, just exactly as history would later record. However, they had somehow survived, still within the odd upside down force-field that now seemed to be the right way up. “By Fingale, what just happened?… Er… maintain a weapons lock on the creature… and er… standby!”

“I need some answers,” Glen said. “What exactly is this force barrier causing this bubble?”

Cross decided the best thing to do was close her eyes and hold on to the injured man .The doctor had given him a rather potent painkiller since there was no time to do anything else ,knowing it would make him drowsy she had no choice but to grab him from his tunic making sure she held on to him.

William looked around in astonishment. He frantically grabbed his scanner and started to get to the bottom of this “Well captain I’d take my hat again if I could, you might be the first man to unmake a planet with two helmets and some flashlights” He called out, masking extreme nervousness with humour.

Glen laughed at William’s joke… it was a joke, right? he thought. “No, I don’t think it was anything to do with us!” Then he remembered the sub-space weapons that Kord had made.

=^=This is Ensign Lacey to away team, do you read? Status please.=^= she said.

Cross still had her transmitter open before they...................

She opened her eyes =/\=Status?Status!=/\= the doctor exclaimed =/\= We are in some kind of bubble and if it burst we’re done for=/\= her tone was from cool and calm.

Scans of the energy bubble seemed to show it was powered in by the bug city around them, from some kind of organic like battery system just beneath their feet which thankfully had not been damaged in the planet’s destruction.

Jasper was thankful for hearing the officers voice through the communicator. He kept quiet to not interfere with away mission business. But he was hoping to go back to the ship. soon. this mission has gotten beyond him now. But he knew he would have to talk to the others sooner or later during a mission debriefing. As Jasper kringed over the thought.

“I advise that we all stay perfectly still,” announced Glen. “I’m not sure how this force field works but if it is being powered by the bugs in this bug city, we certainly don’t want to do anything to stop that. I’m hoping that the comms being back online is a good sign - that the Merrimack has resolved the issue and returned - or that if that was the result of a space battle, then it is now over. They should return now and rescue us. We just need to be patient.”

Glen, CO

Cross’ answer took Anna by surprise. She wondered if the XO might do better at handling this communication.

=^=Acknowledged away team.=^= she said a bit shakily and turned to the commander.

• NE Lacey, Comms