Walking Into What

Posted on Saturday 26 February 2022 @ 12:18 by Lieutenant Nir’anyar & Sergeant Korotayev Tarr & Lieutenant JG Zirvell Khen

Mission: Disaster!
Location: Shuttlebay One
Timeline: Mission Hour 1 @ 0000 Hours
3174 words - 6.3 OF Standard Post Measure

ON

The Benzite lead Zirvell into the shuttlebay, the cavernous room a buzz of activity given the recent incident on the nearby planet but also the call for the medical team. It had been something of a surprise as she had thought the injured had already attended sickbay or one of the triage areas.
If she was being honest with herself she was beyond tired at this point and needed some rest, as did most of the crew but she needed to power on regardless.

Her determined stride gathered interest from a young woman, still, a cadet by the looks of her uniform and she pointed to one of the larger side rooms, what looked to be an EV Suit equipment storage and cargo hold. Once again she redirected her direction, Zirvell falling in step.

"I've never seen an incident of this magnitude," Zirvell confessed, his eyes holding a troubled look as he glanced around, "well... not since I was a child that is..."

Anya entered the room through the transparent pressure doors to find a large pod of some kind which she immediately recognized as a medical stasis pod.
"Ensign?"

Zirvell froze at the sight of the pod, an odd sense of fear and claustrophobia washing over him as he watched the device.

"Lieutenant, Ensign... I have this cargo for you. Picked it up from this one other guy who brought it from this backwater planet. Before you ask ma’am, I don’t have much information besides what the other pilot told me. He said it was an extraction and the guy inside is on our side.” He then nodded to himself, quickly adding more pieces of the puzzles.

“Oh and he is Romulan and looks like he’s had better days in his life, like not having a stab wound in the belly better. So, here is your pineapple on the pizza.” The pilot pulled a smile, the crook of it underlying his opinion on the Romulans. Pulling out a data pad, he checked once more if he is about to give out to correct one and handed it over to the doctor.
“I am sure, this will tell you more.”

The Cardassian nurse glanced sideways at his new superior officer, then inched closer to the pod as anxiety was clear on his face. "As soon as we deactivate the pod, his life will be in danger," he commented carefully.

Instantly Anya's hackles went up as the unknown pilot mentioned the word Romulan. Her history with that species was not a comfortable one and in part was the reason she had been thrust into a crisis of ability and faith in herself in the last few days. Still, she was here and her Hippocratic oath obligated her to render aid no matter her personal feelings.
"Zirvell can you assess the reanimation process and I can get a feel for the severity of his injuries!"

"Yes doctor," Zirvell answered as he moved to the pod's headside. Flipping open his tricorder, he made sure he had the cortical stimulators ready as he watched the pod pressurize. "What should i set the stimulators on?" he asked, "I don't really know much about Romulans."

"Set for the baseline Vulcanoid biometrics... Romulans are sturdy so they should be suitable" She said as the wand from her tricorder had already started to run a detailed scan of the wound through the pod. "Abdominal wound looks like a serrated blade. Internal bleeding and damage to the surrounding organs. Some necrotized tissue around the wound from the cryostasis but we can heal that easily enough in sickbay... Start the reanimation!"

Nodding curtly, the Cardassian touched the controls to the side of the pod, starting the process to bring their patient up from stasis.

Anya started to watch the display on the pod start to count up the thermal readings and the stimulants it released into his bloodstream to aid the waking process but as it reached around forty-seven percent the deck pitched violently knocking the three off their feet, crates flew from their stacked positions, EV suits not properly fixed into their holding tumbled like rag dolls and the cryopod itself slipped across the deck impacting the pilot and fatally trapping him between the pods hefty bulk and the storage rooms bulkhead.

Anya heard her shoulder pop as she hit the floor, a crate hitting her firmly on the forehead opening a wound that started to drip dark blue blood which turned black with the flashing red emergency lights that sprang to life, casting the room into momentary darkness every few seconds.
"Zirvell... Zirvell, are you ok?"

Zirvell moaned as the pod had first knocked him aside, only for a stack of crates to topple on top of him, one of them striking him full in the chest. "I don't know," he confessed as he tried to reassert himself. "You?" The time for politeness was now past as he tried to struggle to his feet and found himself trapped. "What did just happen?"

He took a shallow breath, then another. His whole body hurt, not just the stab wound in his abdomen. Cold, yes that was the other discomfort that was gnawing at him.
Last thing he remembered was being put into cryostasis, so following the stream, he should be at his destination. Tinnitus ringing in his ears and all input his eyes currently provided was recognition of light and dark.
The reanimation process was not complete and he was thrown back in the land of living prematurely. So either he was not at the Starfleet vessel or something went terribly wrong. Korotayev decided to stay put in the now open cryo and wait for more data to assess coming his way. He could always panic later.

The Benzites attention was drawn away from their waking patient as she heard the telltale alarm coming from the main shuttle bay. Her attention was pulled to the glass doors and despite her dislocated shoulder, she started to run towards the door, intent on opening them to allow the officers heading towards it to their futile rescue. The alarm was a warning of power failure, the forcefield holding the vacuum of space at bay was failing.
She reached the door in time to see the field collapse. Shuttles, debris from whatever hit them, crates of supplies, and her shipmates... She estimated nineteen of them in total. A blond woman had caught a handrail on the other side of the door and she was silently screaming, the air forced from her lungs because of the vacuum, and her eyes emerald green started to frost over as the cold of space caressed her.

"Doctor!" the Cardassian nurse called out. He was pinned by several crates which he couldn't move from his position, and it was starting to hurt. "Our patient, please check our patient. Anyone behind that door is gone if the bay door is open! I'm stuck...I can barely move and I can't get these off." He could see the Benzite woman, but could not see what she was seeing. He could only see the glass doors, but not what was beyond it.

"Yes," she said weakly to start with but then snapped herself back to the reality of their own situation. She turned from the door, unable to watch the woman start to drift away from the doors, now frozen by the cold caress of space. "The bay has depressurized... Everyone is dead... Can you get yourself free Ensign?"

"No doctor, I am pinned down, I can barely move." Zirvell tried to wiggle again but nothing would budge, "I need your assistance, so I can assist you."

"The reanimation process is complete but I need your assistance Ensign!" she said, moving across the Zirvell to start dragging the crates away with her still functioning arm. In truth she needed the Cardassian to pop her shoulder back in as much as he needed her to free him from his weighty bindings.

Once most of the weight was gone, Zirvell was able to push the last crate away by his own volition. He gave his boss a quick once over and gave her a concerned look. "Sit," he ordered her, as he sat up himself. He gave her no further warning, no chance to retort as she did sit, and in a swift motion pulled her arm back into position. He caught her just as quickly, reasoning she might pass out from the pain. "Our patient needs us both," he said softly, getting them both up to their feet though he continued to support her. "I don't think I was injured...much. How do you feel?"

His world was still a loud ringing and haze of light and shadow, some shapes seemed to be moving but he did not really trust his vision right now. He focused on deeper breathing and getting muscles in his hands working. Some movement to help out his heart distribute the green. So far, no one seemed to be around, at least judging by the lack of physical contact or even the sense of someone being close. Maybe the transfer crashed and his pod miraculously triggered reanimation, or the pilot did, surely this one will be answered shortly. It looked like no help was coming, so he started to flex his limbs, preparing to get out of the pod. Time to find help, again.

"Stay still, please... We've taken damage and you are still wounded!" Anya ordered as she and Zirvell came back around the stasis pod and back into the field of vision of the man that had been held within. Unmistakably he was Romulan and her own prejudice started to take hold. For now, she was the Doctor and she would treat her patient but she couldn't bring herself to look him in the eye. "What happened to you?"

Korotayev noticed human shapes moving in front of him and his hands automatically shot up to guard. From what he saw it looked like they wore Starfleet uniforms but he could not be certain. He shouted at first, slowly adjusting the volume as he paid attention to the strain on his vocal cords.
“I don’t hear you or really see you. It looks like you are Starfleet but we can’t be sure, so please prove me right.”

"Your vision and auditory senses should adjust shortly sir," Zirvell tried to reassure their patient. "My name is Zirvell, I'm a nurse with Starfleet medical. The officer next to me is Doctor Nir’anyar, she's the chief medical officer. You're aboard the USS Merlin, and as soon as we can, we'll get you to sickbay. It seems the ship has run into some difficulty as we were just all thrown from our feet. Can you tell me your name?"

Korotayev pricked his ears but the bells were still singing like there was no tomorrow, since nothing happened besides the blurry shadows moving slightly he assumed someone was just talking to him. Maybe they were both deaf and that must have been a bloody nice sight. With a suppressed chuckle in his voice, he said.
"If you said anything, I am terribly sorry but I don't hear you, or see you really. So how about you lend me your comm badge, you must have one being Starfleet, so I know if you are my friend." With that, he extended his left hand, palm open and ready to feel the familiar shape.

Without pause, Zirvell took his combadge and handed it to their newly awakened patient. "Your eyes and hearing should adjust over the next few minutes.." He turned his head towards the CMO. "Should it not?" he asked, just to be sure.

"That depends on the type of injury he has... We need to get him to sickbay", the Chief Medical Officer tapped her own combadge. "Doctor Anya to the transporter room, three to beam directly to sickbay... transporter room respond!" but the line remained quiet for a moment too long. "Anya to bridge... Can anyone hear me?"

Anya gave up on the combadge, she had half expected given what she had witnessed in the shuttlebay that no reply would have been forthcoming. "Looks like we are on our own Ensign... Can I ask you to triage his stomach wound while I try and get an idea as to what is going on!" she asked as she pulled her tricorder from her belt and started scanning.

"Yes doctor," the Cardassian answered smartly as he gently tried to make sure his patient understood he needed to remain lying down. Then he carefully started to remove the clothing around the injury to get a better visual assessment. "If we can't reach sickbay and transport there, we'll have to treat him here doctor." He turned his attention to his patient and continued to speak even if the patient likely still couldn't hear him. At least he would know he wasn't being ignored. "I am going to try and treat your injury, please remain still," he said, while briefly turning his attention to the medkit he'd had the sense to bring.

Korotayev palmed the comm badge and rubbed it between his fingers, identifying the familiar shape of Starfleet delta, then extended his hand to return it. “Sergeant Korotayev Tarr, nice to meet you whoever you are. I don’t think it’s too bold to assume we are not in a sickbay since I am still laying in the pod. I don’t know how bad the situation is but if it’s of any help, I have a superglue and stapler gun in my pants, left thigh pocket. That’s how I fixed it the first time.”

"We need a more detailed scanner than I have here and if the ship is as badly damaged as I fear..." who knew, she was a senior officer, and given what could have happened who was to say she wasn't the only senior officer left alive. "The question is, how do we get out of this room... There are no Jefferies tube access points, limited air, and a vacuum on the other side of the only door into the cargo area!"

"I recommend relying on training ma'am," the young nurse suggested, keeping his eyes on their patient, "surely we can do this without our advanced equipment?"

"And if in our stumbling we find a severe cerebral injury I do not want to be stuck in delicate brain surgery with nothing but a tricorder, dermal regenerator, and a length of plasma conduit as my only tools. We wait and get him to sickbay... somehow!"
A noise came from another corner of the room, towards the back, groaning and what looked like an EV suit being thrust out of the way. "Who's there... do you need assistance?"

From under the pile of stuff that had fallen on top of him, a man in marine colors came up for air. "What the hell? Doc?" he looked around at those that were there. His name was Emmet Dinslow, a private first class who was part of the Marine Corps as a combat engineer. His brown hair was mussed up with a cut on his forehead and a shiner that was developing on his left eye. "What happened? I was here as part of the team to fix up what happened during the explosion. Then... something knocked me for a loop!" He stood up, somewhat unsteadily. "I am Private Dinslow." As a way for the introduction.

"Are you hurt Private?" The Doctor asked as she moved over to him, leaving Zurvell to continue tending to the other man from the Cryopod.

Zirvell kept his attention on their patient who was comfortably resting in his pod, or at least he should be relatively comfortable according to the Cardassian. Listening to what the patient said, he followed the suggestion and got the items from said pocket. "That was an interesting means, and it probably did keep you alive," he commented lightly, reasoning that he should keep talking even if the patient might not yet hear. While very unsanitary, Zirvell felt that this might actually be their only option to keep him alive, until such time they could get to sickbay. A dermal regenerator only went so far too. "I am going to inject you with a broad-spectrum antibiotic," he said while picking up his patient's hand and letting him feel the hypospray before bringing it to his patient's neck. "I am also injecting you with various supplements to help sustain you.

He felt someone slip a hand into his pocket and took the items. The communication channel was open and someone answered seconds later. Something was placed into his hand, it was a hypospray, and someone was about to give him a nice cocktail of broad-spectrum antibiotics and standard supplements. Maybe even some painkillers. That would be very kind. Something from good old poppy. Korotayev realized he should probably disclose some medical facts about himself, the person treating him should be aware of some facts.

“You should probably know that I am half Romulan, not a full-blood goblin. I had some nips and tucks done.”

Zirvell arched an eyebrow at that. "Nips and tucks? To what purpose?" he asked out loud as he pressed the hypo to the hybrid's neck a second time, hoping this cocktail would help him clear up his auditory and visual senses. "What is your other half then?"

"The other half is human, hard to tell looking at me I guess."

It was now that Anya and the still slightly dazed Dinslow came back around the debris, Anya was putting away her tricorder, the Private was lucky and had come away with only superficial injuries.
"How is our patient Ensign?"

"His vitals are stable doctor, I have injected him with a broad-spectrum antibiotic and nutritional supplements. However, he seems to be still deaf and blind, to a degree. I am at a loss on how to treat that in this instance."

"Well, Private Dinslow and I think we may have discovered a way out of here... You won't like it!" Anya said with a dire expression.

"I won't?" The young Cardassian looked concerned. "What kind of way out?"

"We are going to be dressing in the EV suits and we will have to go out on the hull, and find another way into the ship. There is no other way, I am afraid." the private replied. "Sorry, this is the only thing we can do."

END

●● Lieutenant Nir’anyar
Chief Medical Officer
USS Merlin


● Ensign Zirvell
Nurse - PNPC CMDR Seklar
USS Merlin


((>>> Gunnery Sergeant Emmet Dinslow
Marine - PNPC LT McPhee
USS Merlin


>>> Sergeant Korotayev Tarr
Infiltration/Recon Specialist
USS Merlin