I was personally in the meeting room, one paw resting on the edge of the table.
We had lost contact with the away team soon after landing.
"We know where they landed," Dinah said and pointed at the screen on the wall showing the shuttle sitting on the ground of the planetoid, "But sensor conditions are not great. We have the shuttle on optical sensors, but anything else is a wash."
"Any chance of modulating the sensor arrays?" Janeway asked, turning her head in my direction.
I shook my head, "In this case, it wouldn't help. The issue isn't one of calibration, there's a soup of radiation in this system. A lot of it overlaps with the readings of Federation technology and lifesigns so we can't effectively filter it out. So unless they come back on comms or return to the shuttle, the only way to find them is to go down there."
Janeway glanced at Tuvok.
"In practice, we only have two logical options," Tuvok said, "We send a second team down to investigate, or we wait."
Sometimes the hardest thing to do was nothing. And often it was the right thing to do as well.
In this specific case, I don't know.
"There is a third option," I supplied, "We could launch another survey probe. This one to land on the surface. That could verify if the comm outage is because of something on the surface or because the away team is in danger."
"If they're in danger, that would delay rescue by the better part of an hour," Dinah pointed out.
I nodded, "If there is danger, they may already be lost. And a probe would let us avoid losing more people."
Janeway was staring at the screen before she finally nodded once, "Commander Tuvok, assemble an away team. Launch as soon as possible."
"Acknowledged, Captain," Tuvok said and got to his feet, "Lieutenant Navari, with me," he said and left, Dinah quickly moving to follow.
I drummed my claws once on the table, studying the screen.
"You don't agree, Lieutenant?" Janeway asked.
I shook my head, "Not at all, sir. There are three options, all of which are valid. All of which could be right or wrong. Which to choose is a judgment call and reality will prove if it's the correct one or not."
Janeway got to her feet, "What would you have chosen?"
I turned my head to her, "To send an away team down to investigate."
She nodded and then headed out onto the bridge. Getting up, I followed her, moving along the left side of the bridge to take the normally unoccupied science station. That was usually routed to Ops so it was free for me to take.
I connected my visor to it and sat down, reaching over the chair and deploying the claw protector on my right paw to tap a couple of buttons, bringing the crash site up on the main viewer. Even at maximum zoom, it was only barely possible to make out the shuttle through the haze of the primitive atmosphere.
Some adjustments to the filters made things a little clearer, but not much.
"Tuvok to Bridge."
"Bridge here," the Captain answered.
"We're launching now. Estimated time to arrival, twenty four minutes, thirty seconds."
"Understood, keep an open comlink."
Then there was nothing much to do but wait. Secondary bridge team went about their business. I knew some of them by name, most by look. I didn't spend a lot of time on the bridge to be honest.
I made a mental note to actually put some effort into learning people's names outside engineering. There were only so many people onboard after all.
I should use flashcards or something.
As we waited, I kept an eye on the sensor readings from the surface, carefully adjusting the calibration and filters.
Despite what I said, there was a tiny chance I might be able to spot something.
I didn't.
"Tuvok to Voyager. Landing now."
On the main viewer, the second shuttle was set down by the first one.
"Exiting shuttle to investigate shuttle one."
It was just about possible to see four dots moving out of the second shuttle, two of which moved over to the first one and disappeared inside.
"Shuttle one is clear," Tuvok's voice said, "No trace of the away team. We are beginning our search."
"Not a comm system error," Ensign Kelkeen said from the Ops console, "Not if we have contact with the second team."
"Agreed," I said, giving him a nod, "Unless it's a local phenomenon. Be careful, commander."
"Acknowledged. Proceeding with caution."
As we watched, the dots split into pairs and started to move away from the two shuttles in different directions. We really needed to speed up the drone production. If they could have a pair of drones with each group, that would greatly increase the safety of the away team.
The drones may be dumb as a bag of bricks, but they could at least walk ahead and get destroyed first.
Once they're through onboard testing, I'm going to create a policy to present to the Captain that each member of away teams are to be accompanied by a supporting drone at all times.
"Captain, incoming signal from the Val Jean," Ensign Kelkeen said.
"On screen."
The image of the surface was replaced by Chakotay and I brought it up in my visor instead.
"Captain Janeway," he greeted her, "Any issues? We detected you sent down another shuttle."
Janeway nodded, "Captain Chakotay," she answered, "We have lost contact with the away team. We've sent down a second team to locate them."
"Is there anything we can do to assist?"
She shook her head, "Not at this time. It's most likely just a communication malfunction."
Chakotay smiled, "We'll move into orbit so we can assist if necessary. Val Jean, out."
He closed the channel and I eyed the sensor contact of the Val Jean move across the system. They passed Voyager and then deliberately slid into an orbit ahead of us.
Which was either a deliberate action to put themselves into a worse tactical position to keep us at ease or a trap.
No. That didn't make sense for this to be a Maquis plot.
Even if they somehow managed to capture Voyager with me onboard, they wouldn't have enough people to fly her effectively. Not for any real time anyway.
Hell, there's a lot more of us than them and we're still critically short staffed!
Even if Chakotay had not thought of that, I knew Torres was way too smart not to have.
So I dismissed that from my mind and refocused on the sensors from the surface.
"Janeway to Tuvok."
Silence.
"Voyager to away team, respond."
I felt a soft growl rumble through my chest and I pulled away from my console, "Fine, if you want something done," I said and headed towards the turbolift.
"Lieutenant," Captain Janeway said, "Give them a minute."
"We might not have a minute and I'm not as squishy as they are."
She raised her hand, "Just... give them a minute."
I growled softly but half turned to look at the viewscreen. The two shapes of the shuttles sat on the surface of the to-be planet. A flick of eyes in my visor caused it to zoom out slightly.
We waited. Time dragged out. One minute. Two. Five.
A dot could be seen moving, seemingly appearing from nowhere, "Crewman Yu to Voyager."
"Voyager here," Janeway said, "Report."
"We found the missing away team, Captain," he said, "The dilithium signature is in a cave system and they were caught in a cave in. The walls seem to refract sensors and completely block comms. The entire area is highly unstable."
"Is anyone hurt?"
"Ensign Kim and Crewman Winters, sir. We're trying to find a way to dig them out without collapsing the entire structure," he said before he paused, "...Crewman Winters is pinned, we think his suit may be breached."
That rock did have an atmosphere, but absolutely nothing in it was good for humans.
"Acknowledged," Janeway answered, "Proceed with caution."
