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[somemildmanneredidiot]

I'm good with the narrative shift. It makes sense and it's good prep for future narrative shifts. The Away team can't always be in contact with Command, right?

Also I'm rather thrilled by the chance to do things from the Away Team's end. Very nice dig at the Commander, I like our Team Lead.

should we load the power cell into the missile bay? We might be able to bring down the ship if we can check to see if it's actually out of missiles.

Let's review the options.

1. Shard Room: Sounds like it might be the power room.

2. Barracks: Has a very secure locked door.

3. Missile Silo: Seems to be a maintaince room.

4. Unknown Room: We just don't know.

5. Central Room: May contain controls to the rest of the facility.

6. Nope: What are we even talking about, this is valuable functioning alien tech, we can't just use it to try to save lives?!?!?!

6 is mostly a joke. Mostly.

I think I'm going to need to sleep on this some, but here's some thoughts. 1 might allow us to power the rest of the base, but if it doesn't then we're SOL. 2 might lead to an armory or other area with supplies that we can use to wreck HS#1's day or to escape. Or it could lead to nothing useful. 3 could let us shoot missiles from there and make a fantastic recovery from all of this. Or there could be no missiles or one might not be able to shoot them from there. 4 could do just about anything or absolutely nothing. 5 could let us do things involving all of the above rooms or even unlock options we couldn't dream of. Or the other rooms need to be powered for the Central room to do anything. And all of the above depends on not needing to know the language to be able to activate anything.

[Kashyyk]

I think the room that is most likely to not have dependencies anywhere else is the barracks, but it doesn't have the highest potential payoff either. I think it's our safest best to get something useful, as I reckon working out how to unlock a door in a foreign language would be easier than working out a missile prep and launch sequence.

[Vivalas]

I have a sneeking suspicion that the missile room has an auto feed system that only works when on, and that there actually are missiles, but agree it would be difficult if not impossible to figure out how to use it. The barracks sounds like a better choice.

[somemildmanneredidiot]

The moment they mentioned the missile silo, I've been thinking about the missile defense system in Atlantis and how the missiles didn't look like missiles.

But yeah, agreed that the barracks seems to be the safest bet.

[Chiefwaffles]

Power room is the room with the shards in it, yes. It was called so in the update because I believe that Greenfield or some other person told you (the commander) and others that the shard room is probably some sort of power source.
2nd Encounter at Destination 5: Update 10
"Egress"
You are still Emma Dawson. Operation leader.

"Alright, Leaf." You say as you activate your radio. "See if you can put it in the Barracks. I'll meet you there."
"Gotcha. People in the barracks, I need you to look for, well, some kind of panel on the wall that when opened, seems to have a slot inside. It's probably in some less-trafficked area."

A bit later, Leaf arrives along with the rest of Team 2. After a few minutes of searching the glow stick-lit room, a soldier calls you and Leaf over, showing you something that looks suspiciously like what Leaf described.
"Looks like what I need." She says in an almost murmuring fashiong, beckoning for the power cell. With an R&D tech's help, she carefully inserts it in. A "click" is heard. Almost immediately, the whole room lights up. A soldier inspecting the bay door's panel almost yells in surprise as the panel lights up, displaying a palm print.

Lerth, who has been quietly helping the search up until this points, speaks up. "Don't see any 'shoot-y' type systems here, and that palm is shaped awfully like a human hand. May as well try it out."
You run to try and stop Lerth because triggering security systems is never a good idea. You can't reach him in time as he places his palm on the reader(?). Very surprisingly, nothing bad happens. The display turns off. But then something even stranger occurs.

The bay door lurches upward, then starts to slowly rise the rest of the way. Behind it, you see some various machinery and stationary equipment. No weapons, sadly.
Oh, right. You also see an active Warpgate.

What now?

Spoiler: Team 1 (click to show/hide)

14 Soldiers
- 5 Assault Rifles
- 1 Rocket Launcher
- 1 Anti-Materiel Rifle
- 1 Flamethrower
- 1 LMG
- 5 Grenade Launchers

Sarah Leaf (LIGHT WOUNDS)
- Assault Rifle
Emma Dawson
- Assault Rifle
Jason Lerth
- Assault Rifle

Spoiler: Team 2 (click to show/hide)

3 Engineers
- 3 Assault Rifles
5 R&D Techs
- 5 Assault Rifles

Spoiler: Waypoint Base (click to show/hide)

Personnel
3 Soldiers (CRITICAL WOUNDS)
4 Soldiers (MODERATE WOUNDS)
1 Soldier  (LIGHT WOUNDS)

Dan Stevens (HEAVY WOUNDS)
- Nothing

Other
1 Man (Recovered from village) (CRITICAL WOUNDS)

[Kashyyk]

Active as in powered up? Or active as in connected to somewhere?

Either way, that's amusing. I don't think we should use it just yet though, we might as well stick around until we're certain of the fate of Farpoint if we now have a back door.

[somemildmanneredidiot]

That. That. I. That. I didn't expect. 

I want to laugh maniacally.

New weapons would have been nice, but we have a spare Warp Gate now. Let me say that again. We have a spare Warp Gate. Screw the ship, we can begin work on making our own Warpgates. Farpoint is now infinitely more valuable. Once we can connect Waypoint and Farpoint, we have a new base we can expand on and research and deploy from and just yes. We can move D5's main gate to signficantly further away from anything important and disassemble it. We can secure Farpoint and ensure that both bases are constantly connected and safe from anything but FTL deployed enemies. I am too excited about this.

I want to explore the new Warpgate. I need to explore the new Warpgate (I'm assuming it is currently connected to some place). But it's entirely possible that anyone going through there will end up dying through exposure or automated systems or dozens of possible things. If we can access the camera feed in one of the helmets, we could tie it on a pole of some sort and take a peek into where it leads. Heck, sticking a pole into there and pulling it back out to see what happened to it could at the very least check to see if it leads to a star or is submerged.

Are we able to access the feed from the RSU? We can maneuver it to a specific place so I would assume yes. We might be able to use the same system to access our camera feed. We should also check on what HS#1 is doing. We should have someone constantly monitoring HS#1. We should have done that the moment we realized we had control over the RSU and that we were cut off from Command.

I'm disorganized right now.

List of Actions:
Use RSU to observe HS#1 so we know if they are advancing on us and to see what they are doing in general.
If Gate is connected to some place:
See about using that same RSU system to connect to our camera feed.
Find a pole or make a pole we can use to poke into the active Gate to see if it burns to a crisp or something.
If no, tie helmet to pole and check it out.
Meanwhile, look into the surrounding equipment to see if we can find anything resembling the Switchboard.
If yes, do the Meanwhile action.
If it is connected and we can apparently survive going through the Gate, further decision is based off of what we see through the Gate.
If we can't survive and we find a Switchboard, see about recording the location and then try dialing to Waypoint.
If Gate is not connected to some place:
Look for Switchboard-a-like, try dialing to Waypoint.

If we can't find a Switchboard then I'd recommend scouring the base to try to find one.

If we can dial Waypoint, then hello reinforcements and supplies and being able to do a two pronged attack on the HS#1 ship.

If none of the above works out, then I have several ideas of other actions but don't have the capacity to expand on it right now.

[Chiefwaffles]

Active as in connected to somewhere.

[stabbymcstabstab]

Ok let's send a four man team through two rifle to launchers, and holy shit we now can start working on a new offworld base. Also maybe the council will stop face palming when our division comes up now that we made up for trapping 17 of the top soldiers and field specialists in the world on a separate world.

[Vivalas]

That. That. I. That. I didn't expect. 

I want to laugh maniacally.

New weapons would have been nice, but we have a spare Warp Gate now. Let me say that again. We have a spare Warp Gate. Screw the ship, we can begin work on making our own Warpgates. Farpoint is now infinitely more valuable. Once we can connect Waypoint and Farpoint, we have a new base we can expand on and research and deploy from and just yes. We can move D5's main gate to signficantly further away from anything important and disassemble it. We can secure Farpoint and ensure that both bases are constantly connected and safe from anything but FTL deployed enemies. I am too excited about this.

I want to explore the new Warpgate. I need to explore the new Warpgate (I'm assuming it is currently connected to some place). But it's entirely possible that anyone going through there will end up dying through exposure or automated systems or dozens of possible things. If we can access the camera feed in one of the helmets, we could tie it on a pole of some sort and take a peek into where it leads. Heck, sticking a pole into there and pulling it back out to see what happened to it could at the very least check to see if it leads to a star or is submerged.

Are we able to access the feed from the RSU? We can maneuver it to a specific place so I would assume yes. We might be able to use the same system to access our camera feed. We should also check on what HS#1 is doing. We should have someone constantly monitoring HS#1. We should have done that the moment we realized we had control over the RSU and that we were cut off from Command.

I'm disorganized right now.

List of Actions:
Use RSU to observe HS#1 so we know if they are advancing on us and to see what they are doing in general.
If Gate is connected to some place:
See about using that same RSU system to connect to our camera feed.
Find a pole or make a pole we can use to poke into the active Gate to see if it burns to a crisp or something.
If no, tie helmet to pole and check it out.
Meanwhile, look into the surrounding equipment to see if we can find anything resembling the Switchboard.
If yes, do the Meanwhile action.
If it is connected and we can apparently survive going through the Gate, further decision is based off of what we see through the Gate.
If we can't survive and we find a Switchboard, see about recording the location and then try dialing to Waypoint.
If Gate is not connected to some place:
Look for Switchboard-a-like, try dialing to Waypoint.

If we can't find a Switchboard then I'd recommend scouring the base to try to find one.

If we can dial Waypoint, then hello reinforcements and supplies and being able to do a two pronged attack on the HS#1 ship.

If none of the above works out, then I have several ideas of other actions but don't have the capacity to expand on it right now.

This.

Ok let's send a four man team through two rifle to launchers, and holy shit we now can start working on a new offworld base. Also maybe the council will stop face palming when our division comes up now that we made up for trapping 17 of the top soldiers and field specialists in the world on a separate world.

Let's not lose 4 more soldiers by sending them into a star or whatever the hell is on the other end of that gate. For all we know it could lead directly to HS#1's home base.

[somemildmanneredidiot]

Hmmm. If HS#1 has tech to override Gates that are currently connected, that could work out a lot worse than planned. And there's evidence suggesting that they might too.

I want to mention getting RSUs in the form of small quadcopters. And by small I mean what Amazon is using for their drone delivery or something like that. I don't imagine it being more expensive than an RSU, but mentioning and etc so it's on the table.

@Current situation: We should probably man some sort of Guard on the new Gate while we get together the resources to peek into it.

[Chiefwaffles]

I should have mentioned this in the 1st/2nd actual update, but there is a different alien device for natively operating Warpgates. They don't have a name (as the switchboard is a human-alien hybrid invention, not one of these), but just about everyone knows how to use it and the way to get back to Waypoint's gate.
2nd Encounter at Destination 5: Update 11
"Blind"
You are still Emma Dawson. Operation leader.

"Jones! Cole!" you yell, assigning some soldiers to defensive positions around the gate. Briefly turning away for a moment, you consult Lerth about seeing the RSU's feed.
"Don't have a display. I can do some basic controlling of the RSU via our existing communications equipment, but viewing its feed is out of the question. Remembering the rough area where it was and moving it based on that is easy enough, but we have nothing to look at its feed."

You simply nod in acknowledgement, planning for a much more homemade method of surveillance. Kneeling down, you fashion some various supplies into a rather long pole. You motion for the other soldiers to clear and slowly push it through the event horizon. You wait a couple seconds, then pull it back. Completely intact.

"Hey, Dawson, over here!" Leaf beckons as she stands next to a dialing device. "It looks like it's --"
The room briefly rumbles and shakes and dust falls from the ceiling.
"Huh." You state quizically.
"Not a great sign," Leaf continues. "Anyways, it obviously appears to be an external call. Something else connected to this gate, but for some reason nothing's coming through."

Farpoint suddenly starts shaking again as you hear a muffled explosion from outside. Your radio crackles as a soldier assigned to defend the caved-in entrance starts speaking.
"Definitely looks like they're trying to break through, but I'm not sure if they care whether the entire cave collapses in all us."

Spoiler: Team 1 (click to show/hide)

14 Soldiers
- 5 Assault Rifles
- 1 Rocket Launcher
- 1 Anti-Materiel Rifle
- 1 Flamethrower
- 1 LMG
- 5 Grenade Launchers

Sarah Leaf (LIGHT WOUNDS)
- Assault Rifle
Emma Dawson
- Assault Rifle
Jason Lerth
- Assault Rifle

Spoiler: Team 2 (click to show/hide)

3 Engineers
- 3 Assault Rifles
5 R&D Techs
- 5 Assault Rifles

Spoiler: Waypoint Base (click to show/hide)

Personnel
3 Soldiers (CRITICAL WOUNDS)
4 Soldiers (MODERATE WOUNDS)
1 Soldier  (LIGHT WOUNDS)

Dan Stevens (HEAVY WOUNDS)
- Nothing

Other
1 Man (Recovered from village) (CRITICAL WOUNDS)

[stabbymcstabstab]

Well fuck, I guess is time to yell Geronimo and jump through cuz we ain't going to survive otherwise.

[somemildmanneredidiot]

Well we did try to get missiles that could sink an aircraft carrier, so it COULD be Waypoint firing on the ship. I would trust our soldier's assessment though.

So we have a dialer. Options.

We stay.

We go through the gate.

We try to dial Waypoint and go through.

Problems.

Staying could cause death by cave in. Also we don't have any guarantee that Waypoint can come get us in time and prevent HS#1 from advancing on us. We could try to buy more time with anither cave in on our side, but that could destabilize things further.

Going could lead to "lack of an human friendly atmosphere" death. We checked for temp, but we can't check air quality quite so easily. We could have someone stick their head in to check for a vacuum, but we probably shouldn't look for volunteers on that. Which is to say we should probably be the one to try it if we want to be fair. Consulting with Leaf and Lerth on a safer way to check would be a good idea.

Waypoint might not be able to be connected to. It would take time which we might not have. It would lead to the loss of the connection that is currently in place. We might not be able to disconnect from the current connection on our end.

Proposed Actions:
Pull all personnel including the civilians into the Barracks.

Consult Leaf, Lerth, and Team 2 about how to check the atmosphere beyond Farpoint Gate without just sticking one's head in real quick and taking a whiff.

If they have a solution that can be quickly done, have them do it. Meanwhile, make sure gear is prepped for departure.

If they don't have a solution, bite the bullet and stick our head through and hope we get lucky.

If safe (enough), address troops and civilians and let them know that we're going through the Gate. Order plan is Soldiers through to secure the other side followed by the c
Civilians.

If not safe (and we survive), dial Waypoiny and hope. If Waypoint is a bust, try D4 (the island). Then D1. Then D5. Then a random set of coordinates which will be then tested.

Thoughts?

[Parsely]

All you need to find out if there's vacuum on the other side is a glass of water. Stick it through. Pull it back. If the water has boiled away then there is no atmosphere.