.
Dot
Dottage here
.
dot
.
Dot
The first thing you become aware of is the dull ache in your chest as lungs that haven't drawn breath in months are suddenly forced to life. You feel the full-body throb of your heart lurching and struggling to push the blood around your body once more. You're waking from stasis...
As the grey-blackness of your vision clears a little, you're hit by the odours of damp metal and spilled oil, mingled with the acrid biting stench of the cryogenic liquids your body has been depending on since you went in to suspended animation.
Finally what's colloqially known amonst frequent travellers as the 'defrost cycle' completes, and you realise that it's still dark, the usual welcoming lights of a rejuvenation bay are dark. In fact, red flickers at the edge of your vision and as your hearing returns you realise things aren't all right, an emergency beacon of some sort is repeating over and over.
Leaving the pod you almost mis-step as you realise your pod is suspended a couple of feet from the floor by a cargo hook. You can see 3 other chambers in a similar situation to yours, with shapes also clambering out, though the pod nearest the airlock seems to have stuck partway open. You can just make out a shape within.
This ship smelled like home, but Sirus knew a bad thing when he saw it. He's not sure how the artificial gravity system is still functioning, but it is so he takes the small blessing and coughs his way out of the cryotube. It's probably just inertial spin. These kinds of freighters rarely invested in proper anti-grav and used good 'ol fashion spin.
Sirus is a thick man. Not fat, just large. He has the grease-stained hands of a mechanic and confident demeanor even as he rushes to the manual release on the jammed pod.
Don' worry. I got'cha! He calls to the pods occupant.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Thursday takes a moment to consider the situation. 'Death by Decompression' was low on her list of preferred expiration methods - had to be 16th or 17th. Number 1 was - as it had been for many years - suffering a massive brain aneurysm in the midst of a mind-shattering orgasm. Quick, clean, and relatively pleasant. Looking at the bed-like cubicle that was likely to be her coffin, she thought Well, I'm horizontal and in bed so I'm halfway there...
Unfortunately, halfway wasn't good enough. Thursday struggles to roll over in the tight space and attain a crouch. Fortunately, she was as limber as a yogi. She puts her back against the lid and pushes with an unladylike grunt and all her might. She clamps her hand in the crack between lid and box, wiggling her fingers to attract attention, the blare of the claxon drowning out her would-be rescuer's words as she yells. "Help! Help! Help! I'm stuck!"
I ga'cha! Sirus yells back. The last thing he needed in a decompression was someone getting all panicy.
His throat dry, Cord coughs once or twice before he regains consciousness. Hate defrost. he manages through cracked lips and multiple body aches. Hey, where is the light? he reaches for his holdall and the pad that it contains, knowing that he can summon a light with it. But just as he finds the bag he begins to hear. And he does not like what he hears. S&*@! S#!&! S#*+! he says as he sits bolt upright and tries to peer through the emergency warning lights.
Something's blocked the airlock. And we gotta get out of this room pronto. He calls out as he notices he is not alone. Standing up in the open pod he assesses options. He sees a large man trying to open a partially open pod and hears someone calling for help inside. He sees another person climbing out of pod to his right. Watch out for that first step. he warns. He sees the airlock to the west. The problem. And he sees the pressure door to the east. [/i] The goal.[/i] he surmises.
He hopping down with the holdall on his back he races to the east door and tries to figure out how to open it or hold it open .
You recall storing your holdall in the biometric-sealed cargo compartment of your stasis pod just before you went in to cryosleep. As you glance over the pod, even in the gloom of the emergency lighting you can see the cargo section is missing, ragged edges of metal showing where a power tool of some sort has been employed for the purpose. A quick glance shows the other pods have had the same treatment and are missing their cargo units as well.
The East pressure doors are closed and the control panel next to them is unresponsive, displaying a simple 'LOCKED' message. This is a standard and well known protocol, requiring command-level priviledges to override from a systems console on the bridge or in engineering.
You become aware that you are still dressed in the Cryo-suit you were wearing when you entered the stasis pod, thin black rubber clothing that ends at neck, wrists and ankles, leaving your feet bare on the cold and filthy floor.
You also detect a hissing noise and slight draft around the metal sticking out of the inner airlock doors. Through the dirty window you can just about make out that the outer doors are open, possibly jammed with something that you can't make out in this light. The control panel next to the door flickers between 'LOCK' and 'OPEN'
Someone cut away the cargo section of our pods. Cord's face pales as he considers that all the pods hang from cargo hooks. They were throwing us outside! Something must have gone wrong and they jammed the airlock doors. That is the only reason we are still alive! He speculates with horror creeping into his voice. While looking about Cord notes the handle to the Magna-wrench and retrieves it on the way to inspect the east door. No good. he calls out. Door panel is dead. We are not getting out this way without outside help.
Almost manic he then runs to look out the grimy airlock windows on the west side. Bad, bad, bad!
Calm down and hand me that wrench, boy. Your eating oxygen. Sirus growls. He takes tree wrench and works to get the lid free. Normally he'd just cut the hydraulic lines and let the pressure drop. Unfortunately, these lines were inside the arm housings and Betsy didn't have enough power to cut through that much metal. Not without tapping into the clearly damaged power system. Which was a bad idea.
Joram grunted vaguely as he came awake in the newly opened pod, absently massaging his chest with a weak, twitching hand. As his body struggled to begin functioning again, his mind sluggishly kicked into gear as well. It took him a moment to recollect where he was and why he was there, but after a few moments it all came rushing back, flooding his system with adrenaline. By the time he managed to calm down and control his shaking hands, two of his fellow 'sleepers' were up and out of their pods.
He shoved the door open the rest of the way and stepped out, the cryo suit slick against his skin. He looked quickly around the room and spotted the other two men attempting to jimmy open the final pod, which appeared to be stuck. He stumbled over to the other two men, joints stiff and aching from being so long in one position, but even as he moved he could feel strength and control returning to his body.
He watched as one of the men seemed to be panicking somewhat, while the other seemed much more phlegmatic. The second, calmer man was working on the stuck pod lid systems with a wrench. Must be some sort of mechanic or something. Joram stumbled over beside the man and spoke quietly. "Hey. Anything I can do to help? You're, what, trying to force the hydraulics? I'm...well...I'm a software engineer. Maybe I can hack the control panel?"
Even as he questioned the other man, Joram was moving towards the Pod controls. He tapped the keypad panel, trying to bring up the controls, but it appeared to be dead. With a grunt of frustration he began looking for an access panel. Even as his hands worked, Joram's subconscious, still somewhat foggy from his cryosleep, triggered his powers. He reached out with his senses, attempting to find any sort of active signal within the pod.
Sirus grunts as he breaks the tension on one of the bolts.
The circuit's fried! See of you can do anything about that inner hatch. We need to get out of here. He suggests.
Even if she could move around easily in this coffin and get to the door machinery, Thursday's only tool was her smile. And that tiny gap for her fingers wasn't likely to be space enough for tools to be passed through.
And sometimes a wrench makes a better hammer...
"Break the glass! Cuts won't kill me but sucking vacuum will!" She lays down flat on her belly, as far from the glass as she can get, then buries her head and neck beneath her arms. "DO IT."
The other man's snapped comment broke Joram's concentration and he jerked his head up, about to snap back at the other man. It was in that moment that his sleep addled mind finally registered the room around him. The fact that the lights were out. That the room had an external door! That had a lock that was flickering between on and off!! And WAS HISSING!!!
For just a moment Joram's brain completely shut down as sheer panic flooded his system with adrenaline. His heart pounded, he could feel his pulse thudding in his eyes, and sweat sprang out on his forehead. Fortunately, the woman in the pod chose that moment to call out her order to break the glass. That broke Joram out of his paralysis and he nodded sharply. "Take care of her. I'm on the hatch!"
He jerked into motion and hurried over to the inner hatch. Quickly he activated the door's control panel and began calling up menu's. His fingers flew as he tried to override the lock, and failing that, began pulling up machine level controls so he could hack the panel. Once again, he instinctively reached out with his nascent powers, trying to get a better 'read' on the system.
Sirus looks up from his work. As much as he hated to admit it, she might be right... Still, there was no promise of care nearby. He tested the bolts to see just how desperate the situation was.
Cord is able to see through the grimy window of the inner airlock door that the outer airlock door is open, in fact Cord can just about see the remnants of a temporary airlock corridor typically used in docking between ships of dissimilar size. The tattered remnants of a docking corridor sag in the void of the vacuum of space. Evidently something happened to cause the corridor to be rent asunder. Regardless of the cause, it is clear that the inner door has not sealed properly due to the metallic remnants of a previous stasis pod being stuck in the inner door.
Sirus sets to with the Magna-Wrench, dismantling the hydraulic system and removing the modular elevation system that allows the canopy to raise up.
Joram realises almost instantly, the circuit has been fried, however a replacement board from a similar pod would allow the burned out pod to open without an issue, however the other man is using a wrench to disable the hydraulics, which would leave the circuit board replacement pointless...
Too late though, the Sirus realises removing the canopy will take many more minutes then the air available, and abandons his attempt to remove the canopy via the tool, and instead smashes the canopy, over and over until the hardened glass splits and shatters in a cascade of glittering shards, over the back of the occupant.
Looks like some kind of cargo transfer was taking place when something went wrong. Cord says from the grimy window at the airlock. Maybe they were fired on or something while docked to a larger ship. Or maybe the other ship took of fast while still docked? he speculates. Anyway our inner door is jammed with debris and can't close. Maybe we can clear it somehow?
As he hears the glass shatter Cord turns to see what happened. I could have done that. He says as he moves to help Thursday our of the pod.[/b] Taking inventory he calms some. OK. We have 4 people and a wrench. What else? My name's Cord by the way. Pilot. I think I can fly this thing if I can get to the bridge.
Good. I'm the mechanic now, I guess. Sirus grumbles as he retrieved his Holdall. The name's Sirus. Can anybody hack the other door? We can't stay here much longer.
Thursday gingerly pulls herself from the mound of broken glass, trying to avoid more cuts than she's already taken. She climbs carefully through the shattered remains of the lid with Cord's help and slides off the pod in a mist of glass shards freed from her hair and cryo-suit. She nods to Sirus and his wrench approvingly, "Thanks, big man."
Finally able to view the whole bay without the dubious filters of a greasy window or a slit-like crack, she takes precious seconds to gather their situation in a flood of data-points. Airlock violated... decompression... gear removed forcefully... pods being transferred... docked ships separated violently...
She sums up the most favorable possibility. "Pirates, maybe. Right now, not our biggest problem." Spurred on by Sirus' question, Thursday moves to the pressure door. "If there's a security lock-out due to the decompression, I might be able to rascal the system." While she might not be much good in a cryo-pod, the young woman clearly knows her way around security systems as she deftly spoofs the sensors and door controls.
Joram tried to point out the fact that it was nothing more than a burned out circuit board keeping the pod closed, but Sirus had already begun pounding on the cover.
When the glass shattered he winced, noting the wounds on the woman's back. Nevertheless he helped her out of the pod, then glanced around, getting the lay of the land.
When the woman suggested that she could work the door Joram followed her, absently calling to the other two men, "I'm Joram...Joram McAndrie. I'm an...engineer. I'll give her a hand with the door."
He did exactly as he said, smiling absently at the dark haired woman. While she worked on spoofing the door controls he examined the various panels to make sure they were all greenlit, and offered the occasional constructive bit of help.
Joram studies the inner door lock, and almost instantly realises that it will be nigh-impossible to override from here. The pressure door closing is a safety feature to protect the integrity of the ship, without such automated systems a single hull breach would doom a whole ship. Thursday too finds the touch screen controls next to the door are locked out and unresponsive to commands for just this reason. The only way to open this door without command-level codes from a system console would be to remove the situation causing it to be locked. The control panel on the airlock door is however still accepting commands, judging from the outputs being displayed.
Joram swore as he looked over the panel. Finally he threw up his hands in frustration and looked at the woman. "As much as I hate to admit it, that damn thing has me stymied. Without machine level access, we're just spitting in the wind." He looked over his shoulder at the other door and gulped nervously, then turned back to her.
"I think we're going to have to see if we can get that other door locked down properly. I dont know about you, but I am NOT looking forward to fiddling with a hinky airlock door with hard vacuum on the other side!"
Despite his fear, however, Joram took a few deep breaths to settle his nerves. Get it together McAndrie. This is 'do or die' time. Either you putz around til the airlock decides to open on it's own...and you die. Or you go fiddle with it, screw up, and it opens...and you die. What you need to do is NOT SCREW UP! Now get going!
He shook his head sharply and, mental pep talk finished, pushed off the wall and headed towards the outer airlock door. He nodded to Sirus on the way by and said softly, "Inner door's in 'mantrap' mode. We cant override it from here, and the damn thing wont open until we lock down the outer door, since the ships computer is apparently detecting the hull breach. If you and the young lady there feel lucky, I could use some extra eyes before I start fiddling with that outer door."
Even as he spoke, he continued marching towards the outer door. Even as he got close, the adrenaline surging through his system once more triggered his nascent power and he reached out with his senses, probing the electronics of the door system, even as his eyes began to probe the control panel and surrounding area.
At no time did he actually touch anything, however. He wanted to wait until everyone had had a chance to look it over before they started messing about.
**********************************
Sirus nods. Inside he was fuming. His holdall was gone. Betsy was gone. That better not be a permanent state poor someone was going to answer for it.
He follows Joram over to the door and inspects it more carefully. Maybe there was a way to remove the metal causing the leak.
Joram is one hundred percent certain that the inner airlock door is operating as it should, the problem appears to be a mechanical issue where it simply can't seal.
Sirus examines the metal blocking the door, there's no doubt it's a cryo pod just like the ones you just woke from. Judging by the damage, it was halfway in to the airlock when the outer door breached and caused the inner to slam shut. It looks like there is a mess of rope attached to the cryo pod inside the airlock, and at the end of that, floating almost outside the outer doors... someone in a space suit. They are just drifting, either dead or unconscious, but there's just not enough light to see any more.
Joram is sure the controls will respond if he asks them to close the outer door, but this would leave the floating suit outside the ship. Alternatively and more dangerously, he could force the inner doors open enough to shove the twisted metal of the cryo tube free and pull the suit in before closing the outer door, but this is risky as the pressure change would remove the remain ing atmosphere from the room so everyone had better be holding tight to something. Lastly, you'd have 30 seconds at best before the room itself was vacuum, so would have to work fast to clear the lock and get the doors closed.
There are welded metal hand grips on either side of the air lock door, or else the cryo pods might offer some shelter.
Joram relayed his finding's about the inner airlock door, including the mechanical issues.
When they spotted the suited person tethered to the cryo pod, he almost opened the door instinctively, only pulling his hand back at the last instant as his sense of self preservation started screaming at full volume. Shaking, he drew his hand back, then turned to the others.
"There's someone out there, tethered to the ship, floating around in a suit. If we close the outer door, we'll be safe, but they'll get their tether cut, and be stuck outside. I dont think I could live with myself if I saved my own life at such a callous cost."
He once again glanced over his shoulder and out the window, then looked around the room. "If someone were to be at the other door...maybe tucked up tight against the far side of the cryo pod, then once we evacuate the pressure in here and reel the suit in, we can slap the outer door closed, and the person on the other end can open the inner door."
He gulped, seeming to struggle with himself for a few seconds, then tightened his jaw and looked around at the others. "I'm good with the panels, as well as potential hacking, so I'm likely the best one to be at the other door. That being said, I'm not about to suggest putting everyone else's life at risk while I take the safest position. If we have two people to pull the rope, and one of you at the other end to handle the inner door, I'll volunteer to handle this one."
Joram looked genuinely terrified at the thought, and his skin was nearly white with anxiety, but his eyes were steady and had a determined look in them.
Sirus nods. This guy had a spine. Good to know. I'll be here. If anything goes wrong during depressirization I'm the best to fix it. You need to be over there in case the computer doesn't get the drift when the airlock seals. Now, we need two more people here. Who's with me.
Cord nods at Joram and Sirus, taking up a position holding one airlock door handle, the other hand outstretched and ready to grab the rope when the door opens
Better make it quick, breathable air's gonna be at a premium shortly...
He glances over at Thursday
You gonna shove the metal or grab the rope?
"Uh, I'll pull the rope."
Joram nodded shakily to Sirus, then, not trusting his voice, he headed towards the pod closest to the inner door. He hunkered down, braced himself against the structure of the pod, and got a good grip. When he was ready, he called out: "Ready when you are...Remember...DEEP BREATH!!"
Following his own advice, Joram hyperventilated several times, then, when he saw that Sirus was ready, he took a final, deep breath, and braced himself.
Sirius instructs everyone, Listen up! If you haven't been spaced before I'm not gonna lie. It sucks. Hyperventilate now. When I pop this hatch were gong to have pea soup fog in here for a few seconds. Don't panic. It'll get sucked out. If you're not watching for a signal, close your eyes. It's about to get cold!
Ready! One...two....
Joram taps away at the airlock control panel, and suddenly there is an agonising creak of grinding metal, then a as the remaining air in the room rushes through the widening gap in the door...
*your skin tingles with the exposure to sudden vacuum...so cold...*
...the metal of the trapped cryo tube gets pushed outwards with the explosion of air, and it's only because both Thursday and Cord are holding to the airlock handholds and grabbing for the rope together that they manage to snag it and haul it in...
*...lungs are burning now as the change in pressure tries to rob you of your breath...*
...as the suit gets dragged in and clears the outer door space, Joram hammers the lock control, and the outer doors close, or at least try to...
...the outer doors slide across and immediately you see one of them is twisted and torn, it looks like ship-grade munitions did the damage, no way that will seal...
...Sirus checks the pressure door in vain hope but it's still red...you're all locked on this side...
*...your eyes feel like glass as you squeeze them shut, allowing yourself only the slightest peek so you can see what you're doing...*
...Hauling for all they're worth, muscles burning, Cord and Thursday drag the suit across the line of the inner doorway, the passage easier now there's no competing gust of air escaping too...
...Joram thumbs the controls repeatedly and the inner doors slide ponderously shut...
For a moment nothing happens, then the computer's voice crackles over the speakers... and there is the hissing sound of air re-entering the room...
The cryo pod floats free, spiraling away from the ship through the airlock window, the suit lies on the floor, and the pressure door control panel by Sirus flickers from red to green.
Sirus falls to one knee as pressure is restored. He was right. That sucked.
His joints are stiff from the cold as he slowly half-crawls over to the suit and tries to see if there was anyone inside.
Thursday rubs her arms briskly, feigning being overly cold. Her modified genome inured her - at least partially - from many environmental rigors. She quickly starts rubbing Sirus's limbs to get heat back into them. "You alright, big man?"
Sirus coughs a little and spits out ice crystals tinged slightly pink. His mouth barely moves as he says, Not the first time I've faced the void. I'll be ok in a minute. Check on them.
He motions at the suit, then falls back into a sitting position and groans. The worst part of vacuum exposure wasn't the cold or the fact that some of your surface blood vessels burst. It was the Bends, nitrogen coming out of solution in your blood as the pressure dropped. It wasn't awful this time. They were only exposed for a coupe seconds total, but it still sucked. Everything was going to hurt for a few minutes as the nitrogen Re-disolved.
Thursday nods and moves to check on the other men, glancing into the vac-suit helmet in passing.
Cord falls to the deck when the inner door finally closes. He is out for a moment and when finally rises the is blood on the floor from where his mouth was. What hit me? he coughs. He seems dazed for the moment then shaking his head to clear it he notes. That outer door... the damage. We were fired upon.
Sirus wipes the condensation from the face-plate of the helmet, revealing the rictus grin of a man who did not appear to be as fortunate as yourselves.
Thursday is sure that aside from the Magna-wrench you found earlier, clinging to the side of one of the pods, there doesn't appear to be anything else left in the area.
Sirius looks the suit over, but he's still fighting to regain normal motion in his hands, his joints are screaming at him, and his eyes sting. Finally he sits back down and continues trying to recover.
this feller's dead, but I got nothin' right now as to how. Give me a sec.
We might need that suit. Cord suggests. Best try to get the gentleman out of it. Maybe put him in a pod?
"He's not going anywhere and we don't need the suit yet. I'd rather get into the rest of the ship and maybe find out what the hell happened."
Joram shakes his head
He might have something in there we can use...
It takes only a couple of minutes, but the suit's pressure seals come apart as per design, and the dead man is soon lying on the floor in his underwear. The smell is... significant. Evidently showers are at a premium out here. Joram looks over the body but finds nothing.
Ah well...
As the suit pieces are stacked together, Thursday notices that whilst the ship ID patch has been ripped off the arm, the collar branding is still there. The suit came from a ship called 'Alazarin'
Thursday's nose wrinkles at the smell. "Pretty sure his only girlfriend was paid by the hour." She holds a finger beneath her nose trying to block the worst of the stink. "The Alazarin is an armed, long-range hauler for the Amaranth mining group - not a small outfit. Somehow, he got this suit."
Interesting. Well we know a little more than we did. He winks at Thursday, not verbalizing that his idea was a good one. Anyone recognize any of these tatoos? Some almost look tribal. Lets pack hin in a pod just to get away from the stink. And then lets try the door out of here.
Thursday rolls her eyes. Civilian.