The ship was still tilting dangerously. Sulu hurriedly strapped himself down to his seat and any crew members who had managed to remain in their chairs did the same. As the ship finally started to become under control, Sulu glanced over and saw that his Russian friend was currently out of action. He turned to Emilia, who had managed to crawl her way back into her seat,
'Get a location on the blast.'
'Aye, Mr Sulu'. Emilia turned back to her console and began to search Engineering Deck 4. Within a couple of minutes she had a vague idea of where the explosion had initiated and she figured she didn't need an exact location since the site of the blast would be fairly hard to miss once you were in the area. She turned toward the Captain's chair.
'Commander Spock, I have a location of the epicentre of the explosion'. Spock glanced at her, then flipped open his communicator,
'Bridge to Engineering, what is your status?' Only static could be heard. Looking back at Emilia, Spock formulated his plan. He turned to a security officer in a red shirt,
'Mr Turner, you will accompany me to the Engineering Deck.'
Turner nodded and advanced towards the turbolift as Spock continued giving his orders,
'Uhura, continue attempts to contact Engineering. You, Ensign..?'
'Emilia Chaser, Sir'
'Ensign Chaser, take me to the blast site. Mr Sulu, you have the conn'
Emilia stood immediately, grabbed her PADD and followed the First Officer to the turbolift. She took a deep breath. This wasn't like the scenarios set up by the Academy for training, this was real. There were actual people's lives in danger. James T. Kirk's life could be in danger.
When the doors of the lift slid open, a choking fog of smoke enveloped Emilia and Spock. Immediately the two of them started coughing and Emilia's eyes burned and watered. They covered their noses and mouths with their sleeves as well as they could and advanced into the cloud. Spock drew his phaser, set to stun, just to be safe. They didn't know what had caused the blast after all. Slowly through the decreased visibility, they headed towards the location Emilia had identified, using her PADD to navigate. When they reached Deck 4, it was clear to see what had caused the explosion. Flames licked around the right side of the warp core and the cooling system on that side had been completely obliterated, leaving a blackened crater. Emilia felt sick when she saw a dozen bodies of the Engineering crew around the site and silently prayed one of them wasn't the Captain she had idolised for her whole Starfleet career. She looked over at Spock and could practically see his brain working as he took in the scene. He took a phaser from a nearby desk and gave it to Emilia, then gave a signal with his hand that she should circle the core to the left and he would go round the right whilst Turner would check intruders in the lower levels. Emilia nodded. The phaser felt too heavy and clumsy in her hands and she thought for sure her legs were visibly shaking. As Spock disappeared round one side of the warp core, Emilia thought of how easy it would be just to stay here and wait until he found something or came back. She found her traitorous mind telling her that joining Starfleet may not have been the best idea. She shook he thought away, angry at herself for even thinking it. Now was the time to prove herself. She was a Starfleet Officer. She could do this.
Jim wiped the ash from his eyes for the millionth time and coughed until he was sure he'd lose a lung. Now Jim Kirk was not claustrophobic, but the space under the console that he was currently trapped in was a little small for his liking. Now it was getting even worse as the thick black smoke had managed to worm its way into his air space. He had no idea where Scotty was and his communicator had been smashed beyond repair so he couldn't even contact the Bridge. He tried again to shift whatever metal thing was blocking his escape but it stayed stubbornly where it was. He had only crawled under here to try and manually disable the warp core. He probably shouldn't have, since Scotty had already warned him it was unstable but he was never one to back down from a challenge. Then Scotty had disappeared off mumbling something about polarity to himself and one of the cooling systems had exploded above Jim. Now he wasn't sure how anybody could find him. He coughed again and heard something smash outside. His makeshift roof groaned dangerously. He searched his prison, trying desperately to find a way out and found a fairly smashed up communicator lying near him. Even though he knew it wouldn't work, he still opened it and tried to contact the Bridge. Nothing. He eventually settled for bracing his feet against a wall of debris and pushing as hard as he could. After a few minutes in vain, he let out a shout of frustration when it refused to budge.
'Captain? Captain Kirk?' Emilia kept asking the empty deck with a small and shaking voice, hoping with everything she had that there would be an answer. She was sure she wasn't qualified for this. Her communicator buzzed,
'Ensign Chaser, this is Lieutenant Uhura, your surroundings are unstable, you need to get out of there.' Emilia's heart thumped in her chest. What if she was caught in another explosion? What if the warp core malfunctioned without its cooling system fully functioning?
'Ensign Chaser, do you receive me?'
Emilia found her voice,
'Yes, I receive you.' But what if the Captain was alive? Injured or trapped but still alive and alone? Can I really leave him down here to die?
Then Emilia had a thought that made up her mind for her: What would James T. Kirk do?
With her heart beating fast and everything she had going into telling herself this was the right thing to do, she opened her communicator,
'Ensign Chaser to the Bridge, I am aware of the dangers but I need to carry on looking for him. It's what he would do.'
'Ensign, this is Sulu.' Emilia waited for the order to return she was sure was coming,
'I'm sending a team down to help you. Bring our Captain home.'
This announcement was met by a clamour from the Bridge of various voices consisting of a mixture of,
'How could you put an Ensign's life in danger?!' and,
'That's the right thing to do, Sulu.' But all the commotion on the Bridge was not Emilia's concern. She nodded and smiled, even though Sulu couldn't see either action,
'Aye, Mr Sulu.'
