With the ship holding position some twenty kilometers from the station, Streth and Van Der Luan went back to the half-deck Briefing room to review the incoming sensor date with the senior staff. Commander Walker from the Don S Davis was beaming over to join them.

The sensor readouts displayed directly on to the Briefing room screen. Van Der Luan looked over the live feed. Only the First, Third and Fourth decks, One and Three were in the cone at the top of the structure, appeared to be completely powered and have a partial atmosphere. There were some energy readings on other decks, Computer core, parts of Engineering and down on Deck Nine where a lot of sensor and communication systems were, but no much else.

With just automated systems there was not much need for heat or a full atmosphere on most of the station. “Well, looks like somebody forgot to leave the heat on. It’s a cool Minus Seven Fahrenheit in Operations and Minus Twenty on most of the other decks. Air’s not just cold, it’s thin too, only about sixty percent normal. I’m assuming it was mothballed that way, Mister Beck?”

All this time he had been figuring out some trick to up the power conversion level and he believed he found it. Apparently there was a section that has received its routine maintenance but nothing more. After doing some checking, he finally got it. But when his name was called, he set his padds down and got up from his seat to walk over to the screen with his hands clasped behind his back. He eyed the screen for a bit as he looked it over, basically just refreshing his memory from when he read the fine details about what Starfleet did to turn this station over to automation.

“Aye. Typically, starfleet wad leave some way tae send a signal ower tae the automatit system tae let it know thon beings were comin tae dae maintenance on it, or i this case, turn it ower back tae a crew. Thon way the life support system wad kick intae hich gear an make it comfortable for us. Now ye wad think thon starfleet wad have it more structurally sound wi it bein i an asteroid field but it appears thare are some structural damage. Guid thin we got the corps wi us.” He spoke with his Scottish accent. Maybe if he had spent more time in English class, he’d sound more like Gerard Butler or other Scottish people, but it didn’t bother him one bit if anyone understood him or not.

“Unless our Breen friends have moved in…” Streth commented and nodded to O’Glynn. “Mr. Kaksos, give me your analysis of the sensor data. Any potential Been interference, or tampering?”

“I’ve been monitoring our whole approach. What’s more suspicious is the lack of any monitoring device or signal. They are definitely here but I cannot detect them which worries me. Call it Paranoia if you like but we need to keep a tight lid on our our transmissions until we find their eyes and ears. As for the station, we will need to do a visual inspection and particle scan to be sure there’s no other surprises.”

“Noted. Short range comm wavelengths only.” Streth confirmed.

Van Der Luan turned to the physcian, “Doctor, any issues you can see with atmosphere, temperature and life support for an initial landing party? It won’t be pleasant but is it safe?”

The Vulcan nodded, “I would advise rerunning scans from onboard the station to confirm, but those levels are within safe levels for all species currently serving aboard the Altai.”

“Thank you Doctor” Van Der Laun nodded, “You’ll be going on the Away Team, so bring your tricorder”

Nodding crisply N’Vea answered, “Yes sir.”

“Christine, weapons and tactical look ok to you?” Van Der Luan asked their Security Chief.

Christine was a little unclear if he was talking about the ship or the stations so she figured she’d answer both. “The ship is “ship shape” as they say. It is hard to get good reading from the station as everything seems to be powered down. I’ll need eyes on to get any more than that.”

“Good, once we are on board and bringing everything back up, make tactical systems your priority”

Van Der Luan spoke to the Operations Officer next “Cam, once we get onboard we’ll need a full inventory of whatever supplies and stores are left over there, if any. And if they are still any good! Last time anyone was here was seven years ago and that was just for a day or so to do a routine upgrade to the sensors. So pretty much everything else is over twenty five years old.”

It was only an hour after Cam arrived on the Altai that she was involved in this briefing. She never had the time to unpack her belongings so she was involved very quickly… front and center. She never really had the time to study the structure to find out what the history of it was. Just hearing from the XO, it seemed that her work was cut out for her indeed. She was a little surprised that the XO would call her out by her first name… even if they might have mis-pronounced it. She was not about to correct them but her first name was pronounced almost like the old country name of “Vietnam”… but it would be “Cam” instead … almost sounding like the English word “calm”. She spoke as loud as she could as she nodded softly, not worrying about the possible language pronunciation of her name. “Understood. I will get my teams assigned and complete the inventory to see what is left that can be salvaged once we arrive at the structure.”

“Good enough. Like the Doc and Christine, standby to gear up, you’re coming over on the Away Team too” Van Der Luan replied

Cam let out a smile as she remembered her father’s teachings that she would have to go where it was needed. With her getting more responsibility aboard the ship in her new position, she expected nothing less. Though her voice may not carry as far as a normal person, she did acknowledge her XO. “Aye. I will be ready.” She replied back, feeling more comfortable in not giving out specific pronouns to her XO. She was glad that she learned about that in her arrival tour a couple of days ago.

The door slid aside and Walker entered.

Walker had a giddy look on his face as he went to stand out of the way of everyone else. Though he did hold up a padd that shown the station as well, his ship having done their own scans. “Now this is a piece of fine engineering. If we can get the Lifesupport generators kicking back to hundred percent, we should be able to warm up the station. Then my team can get to work on removing the automated systems, replacing them with stations for the crew.”

He did some tapping on his padd. “Commander, do you want this station to have better defensive systems? We have the parts to replace the power core with something more high grade. We can then give it a better weapon and defensive systems, but it’ll still have to rely on a starship if the Breen were to discover it.”

“Anything you can do to help would be greatly appreciated.” Streth admired Walker’s optimism. To his Andorian eyes, the station appeared to be a dump. No doubt the Engineer he now stood face to face with felt it to be more of a canvas upon which to practice his art.

Our away team will take care of getting station life support back online, then your people from The Don will be clear to start patching her up. Of course we’d love it if you could fix us up with a good rec room.” He added, voice tinged with more hopefulness than intended.

Walker chuckled at the Commander’s request. “I’ll have to go over the station’s schematics once more and what exactly Starfleet has done with the old girl. But I think me and my team can come up with something.” He winked. The PADD he needed to give to Commander Streth for Cooper’s transfer sat there in one of his pockets, just one last signature to complete it but he was going to wait after the briefing. “Just let me know when your team is done and you’ll get to see a show from The Don.” He chuckled.

“Very well, Captain.” Streth smiled at the man, a little bemused, “I look forward to it.” He noticed the bridge was getting more crowded. The Chief Of Operations, Lieutenant Hawthorne, had arrived. “Good morning, Lieutenant.” He called over, “You certainly came at the right time.”

Cam was trying to get focused with the task at hand when she was distracted by a friendly voice. She may not have met Streth before out she was glad that someone other than the CO and XO acknowledged her presence in the briefing. “I guess that I did.” She spoke softly but was glad that someone else on the crew was welcoming her presence in the briefing.

“Okay, Doc, Christine, Cam and Alex you’re with me on the Away Team. EVO Suits and sidearms” Van Der Luan stated. “Commander Walker, can you spare Chief Cooper to join us?

With that said, Walker fished into his pocket and pulled out the small padd before handing it over to Streth. “Well if you just place your thumb print there, which will finalize the paperwork, and Chief Cooper will be all yours.” He told him before tapping his badge.

=^= Chief Cooper. Get yourself suited up and report to the Altai’s transporter room, you’re going with their away team. =^=

He paused for a moment before looking at Streth again. “She’ll be there.”

Streth looked over to the group of officers gathered around the briefing room table. “So the Doc says there’s probably something to breathe, and we’ve got incoming renovations from Captain Walker. Outstanding.

You should be able to ditch the EVO suits fairly soon after boarding. Away team members, grab your diagnostic kits and phasers. I still don’t entirely trust what’s onboard that station.

For safety, we’ll beam you into the main Transporter Room, Deck Seven. You’ll need to fire up the fusion reactors on Deck Six; restore the main power and get life support back online. Should be simple enough, but be damned careful. This tech hasn’t seen maintenance in decades, it could get volatile. If there are no questions, kit yourselves out and report to Transporter Room One immediately. Dismissed.”