'Bump in the Night' is an Understatement

Posted on Mon Apr 18th, 2022 @ 4:56pm by Aarix Teral

Mission: Mission 15: Adrift
Location: Sickbay
Timeline: MD01 - 2100
802 words - 1.6 OF Standard Post Measure

Aarix was looking forward to sleep as he trudged into his quarters. It was a long day of… well, not really anything, yet somehow it was utterly exhausting. After the holoworld shenanigans, activity died down, which was good because the crew was not getting injured, but it also meant less for him to do. All of his time was spent processing the medical reports, which was what he assumed was the boring part of every job, but still a necessary one. The doors to his quarters shutting behind him with a hiss, Aarix kicked off his shoes as he made his way to his bed. Stopping at the foot of the bed, Aarix spread his arms wide and let himself fall forward, expecting to make contact with the soft material.

Instead, the sudden jolt of the ship pushed Aarix to the side, making him miss his bed entirely and unceremoniously land on the floor.

Blinking in confusion, Aarix stayed on the ground until the shaking stopped before he scrambled to his feet. The shaking knocked out what minimal lights there were in his quarters, and he squinted in the dark to try and make his way back out. Ships don’t normally shake like that. He needed to get back to sickbay. A curse left his mouth as he stubbed his toe on what he guessed was a wall corner, and he waved his hands around in the dark until he found something to guide him to the door. Stumbling over his shoes, Aarix leaned down to put them back on before approaching the door, a frown crossing his expression when the doors didn’t let him leave. “Of course,” he muttered, searching blindly for the seam in the door. “Why would the doors work if there’s no power?”

It took a moment, but Aarix finally found the door’s seam, and with a grunt he slowly pried the doors open. It took time, but eventually they were opened enough for him to wiggle through, quickly removing his hands to avoid pinching them. “Teral to Sickbay,” he said, tapping his badge. His frown deepened when there was no reply. No word from sickbay was bad, and he tried a couple more locations before determining that comms were out, or at least very finicky. Knowing a jostle like that would probably send people to sickbay, Aarix decided to make his way there and broke into a run down the corridor.

By the time he made it to sickbay, power had somewhat returned. Aarix ran through the double doors to see people with a variety of injuries, though most from a first glance looked like minor scratches and bruises. The medical staff were all over the place trying to get people healed and out while struggling with flickering consoles and wall panels. “Where’s the chief?” he asked a nurse, falling into step with her so she didn’t have to stop.

“No word yet, Teral,” the nurse replied. “Until we hear from Dr. Weaver, someone needs to call the shots here.”

Aarix looked around again, noting the chaos. He opened his mouth to speak, but was cut off by the sound of comms returning. The voice was fuzzy, but the message was clear: the ship's power is unstable, everyone relocate to the cargo hold on deck 6. Acknowledging, Aarix then cleared his throat. “Alright everyone!” He yelled over the commotion. “We need to relocate to the cargo bay! If you can walk, help a crewmate who can’t. Med team, collect the emergency supplies.”

“Some of the injured aren’t stable enough to be relocated,” a medic called out. He was standing next to a biobed with an unconscious crewmate sporting burns over the face and chest, and two other people in scrubs were assisting. A look to the three other beds showed crewmates in similar conditions.

Aarix looked between the available medical team and the biobeds, frowning at the situation. There were not enough people to evenly split between stabilizing these crewmates and taking care of those going to the cargo bay. Hell, there just weren’t enough people. “You two,” Aarix said, pointing to two medics. “Go with everyone else to the cargo bay and tend to the injured there. Recruit anyone who has some basic first aid training to assist until more of us can get there.” A little louder, to the still present crowd, he added, “if anyone can carry supplies, assist the med team please!” He didn’t like taking over like this, but the ship’s doctor was unreachable and someone had to take charge until she arrived, otherwise things would spiral out of hand very fast.

Turning his attention to the biobeds, Aarix addressed the medic who spoke up. “Alright, gimme the news. What's their condition?”