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Monday, October 6th, 2008
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7:50 pm - Floating In A Most Peculiar Way
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The shuttle landed with a mighty splash and if it hadn’t been for the pressor field, Data thought that even his android body would have been damaged in the crash. He blinked several times as the waters of the North Sea began to crawl up the sides of the shuttle. “That’s the trouble with wormholes,” he commented out loud. “Notoriously unreliable.” He tried the engines, but there was no response. He considered smashing his fist on the console in frustration, but decided against it. He needed to get out of the shuttle and find out where he was. There wasn’t any real hurry; it’s not as if he’d drown. But sitting at the bottom of the ocean in a non-working shuttle would serve no useful purpose. Data pressed the switch that keyed into the shuttle’s log. “This is Commander Data of the Starship Enterprise, piloting the shuttle Hawking recording. Stardate unknown. On returning from a conference on positronic advancements at the Daystrom Institute, I encountered a wormhole and was unable to avoid being drawn in. My shuttle sustained damage to its navigation systems and I was forced to make an emergency landing on what appears to be Earth. I detected no ion signatures that would indicate warp-drive capability, nor did I receive any answers to any hails on normal Starfleet frequencies. I must therefore conclude that I am either in the past, before the use of dilithium was wide-spread or I have somehow been transported to an alternate Earth. Therefore I will exercise the Prime Directive in accordance with Starfleet regulations and my programming. I will endeavor to keep my contact with humans to a minimum while trying to affect a way to communicate with or to return to my own time line. To that end, I will be leaving the shuttle here at these coordinates. Data tapped a switch and automatically fed them into the shuttles log. I will also be engaging the cloaking device, though there is little chance of it being discovered here. According to the last reading I was able to get, I am approximately twenty-seven kilometers from Canterbury. Wish me luck. Commander Data, out." Data clicked off the log and released the pressor field. Water was beginning to seep into the Hawking. He activated the cloaking device and the shuttle shimmered around him, still visible since he was inside. He waded to the door and lifted off the hatch that revealed the lever to manually open the door. He pulled it water poured into the shuttle. “In case of an emergency water landing, your pilot may be used as a floatation device.” He laughed at his own joke and stepped out of the shuttle. He swam strongly away, not wishing to be caught in the undertow as it finished sinking. Data tread water for a moment, orienting himself. Then he began swimming for the closest beach.
current mood:  curious
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