Yard Time

Posted on Sun Apr 6th, 2025 @ 9:07pm by Chief Armoury Rormu Yazlin & Captain Rueben Gregnol

Mission: Shackles
1848 words - 3.7 OF Standard Post Measure

Shairo was pacing the cell, she was quite certain it had been longer than usual for someone from the Coterie to come visit her. It was usually Mina. But there had been others at times. Sometimes out of curiosity, sometimes out of necessity. They still made sure she got her food and she got to stretch her legs once or twice a day outside. She had worried often in the long dark hours between those visits that they wouldn't come back. That some calamity would befall the group on the surface. Often she had told herself to plan for such an eventuality. Then again if they were to find her stocking up on ways to get herself out of the holding cell there was no telling how they'd react. She had been sentenced to life in the prison cell in service of the Coterie, after all. As a thank you for fixing the replicators, and perhaps partially because they believed her when she said she hadn't quite been a willing participant in the proceedings.

The second in command had not been so lucky. There had only been a handful of the original crew left after the mutiny and subsequent crash. He had stood trial as well. He was defiant to the end. His bullheadedness couldn't stop the arrow from piercing his skull, though. She had lost her lunch when that sentence got carried out. She got queasy again just thinking about it.

But now it had been too long. And there had been new sounds coming from up above. Things she couldn't account for. Granted, she had never been shipwrecked on an unknown planet before, but the sounds were different from the first couple of months there. What if something had happened? Something bad? What if she was alone? Left to wither away in a cage light years from home.

Mina was worrying the new people from the sky were causing routines to change and for people to get worked up. She had places to be and despite the ruling that Shairo was not to have any other interaction other than her one hour outside in the light per day, Mina did not believe that to be fair. She rushed to where the woman was held and opened the hatch passing food through silently.

Shairo immediately got up from her seated position, "Hey. Mina? What's going on?" She took the offered food and saw that it was still being provided by the replicator unit she had fixed all those months ago. So there wasn't a calamity that had affected that at least.

The woman smiled sadly and shrugged. "Nothing unusual. Just had a few issues with some local animals getting inside the ship." It was not unusual for the local wildlife to get close especially when they noticed the firelight and the cooking smells so it did not feel like a big lie that she could be caught out on.

"Animals inside?" Even though Mina said it wasn't unusual, the way the ship was set up with the secure doors it would be very unlikely for some animal to randomly wander in. "Did you figure out who left the doors open? We can probably have a look into the logs if you want?"

"Most likely Petof." She shrugged trying to look non plussed as she sat down and crossed her legs. She did not know what they were going to do about the sky people realising there was still a slaver alive even if Mina did not think after all this time one woman could take over the community. "It is no bother it is sorted now." She assured. "Where were we in you teaching me this game?" She asked lightly.

Shairo narrowed her eyes a bit, taking a bite off the offered food and moved closer to the board set up on her side of the locked door. "We can go through some standard situations, see if you can figure out what the optimal moves are." The game was all about capturing areas with your pieces. Each had their strengths and weaknesses, and most games came down to forcing the hand of your opponent until you owned more than 75% of the board. On modern boards that was tracked automatically, but they had to revert to a more primitive version with pegs on either side of the board signifying the total captured hexes.

Mina nodded. It was an interesting game, there was something similar on her world but this seemed to be more well known across many worlds that were in this federation that Shairo spoke about. “That sounds acceptable.” She assured waiting for the woman to eat her food first.

Setting up the first scenario, Shairo still wasn't convinced about the woman's explanation. "The danger is gone then?" She just wanted to confirm whether Mina wanted to double down on her explanation or if there had been more to it. "Because if so, I could really do with a bit if yard time. I think I might be getting cabin fever."

“Unsure.” Mina stated looking at the floor for a long time before she looked back up at the woman and sighed. “I can’t let you out today. It’s safer.” The woman said wishing that she knew what to do with the sky people being there now.

"At least let me have a bit of a walk about down the corridor then." Shairo figured if there were outsiders about Mina wouldn't want to risk her running into them inside the ship either. "The walls really are closing in on me, Mina." She didn't like being duplicitous, but it seemed to be the only way to get anywhere at the moment.

Mina sighed softly. “Give it a few minutes and then I will see if I can. You know it’s not just my decision. Myoporulin has to agreed.” She pointed out gently. She might be the consistent person who came down there but this woman was not just her responsibility.

Shairo didn't pretend to quite understand how they had organised themselves, it seemed to be some sort of representative democracy, but the intricacies seemed a bit more complex than that. Especially since nobody wanted to make decisions, even easy ones, on their own. "Sure, I can wait. Gives me some time to finish my dinner." She turned to the meal that was provided to her.

Mina went and spoke to a couple of other people and finally opened the door. She had not been able to fine Myoporulin so she had asked other people who were on the community leadership. "Everyone agreed you can have some time in the corridor only." She said glancing up and now hoping that because it was the night cycle that the sky people would be asleep or occupied to much to care about down there.

Immediately Shairo got up, forgetting about finishing her food. She'd try and find out more about whatever was going on once she was out and about.

Mina shrugged as she looked unsure how to answer the newest question raised to her. "It has been a busy day." She said finally just settling on the shrugging of her shoulder that the sky people seemed to use as unsure.

"If you want I can look at the doors, make sure they don't open for animals again. Or that they close automatically when not used for an extended period of time." If she could only get to a console, then she could perhaps tap into sensors, on the off chance that there were still sensors to tap into. They hadn't done a full diagnostic, because there was no point with the ship fully embedded into the planet they 'landed' on. "Make your lives a little easier. Safer."

"I believe that they are okay but you are more than welcome to look." She said looking up and down the corridor and indicating that they could go for a longer walk as long as they stayed out of trouble. "Our lives. Your life depends on us." Mina reminded quietly.

It was a small victory at least. If there weren't any logs she could set up something to make sure that from then on they would track it. That way when she came back around to them, because she would find an excuse to do so, she'd be able to read back those logs. Then again, knowing the paranoid delusional Captain of the ship she was pretty sure those logs had already been activated. "Could you grab me one of those engineering kits?" She stepped towards the operations centre from which she had been doing most of her work for the community. It wasn't much in the sense of stretching legs, but working on tech did feel like a breath of freedom to her. She'd walk up and down the corridor a bit once she was done.

“This one okay?” She wondered. Mina rolled her eyes and grabbed the engineering kit holding it out for the other woman to take. She hated that she had to be this woman’s jailer when she was a pawn just like them all but she had no choice in this.

Without thinking too much Shairo grabbed the engineering kit and started to pull the relevant tools from it. She worked her way through the controls and found the logs. Happy to see that the tracking was still intact and finding that unknown entities had been entering and exiting. "I think you owe me an explanation, Mina. Exactly who landed here? Starfleet? Fenris Rangers? Romulans?"

Mina looked at the other woman and finally sighed and sat down on the floor and shrugged. She could not keep it from the woman, despite what everyone else had decided; this woman had fixed things that had kept them alive. Mina owed her life to the Orion as much as Shario owed her for speaking up and becoming her jailer. "All of them in some form or another." She stated quietly.

Shairo folded her arms and looked at the woman quizzically, waiting for her to elaborate on that particular bit of information. The three factions weren't really known for their tight bonds and alliances. Why would they all be there, seemingly working together on this?

“I do not know.” Mina assured gently. “They all look like the people you have described over the last 18 moons cycles.” Mina took in a shuttering breath as she paced for a moment before turning to the woman. “I think I need to take you to them.” She decided finally thinking this might be the woman’s only chance for any type of freedom. Even if Mina had no chance of getting home, the Orion had the option if the new sky people could.

There was a bit of hesitance there, what if it was Starfleet? She was sure they didn't look to kindly on Orions serving on slaver vessels, even if they didn't do any of the actual slaving themselves. "Yeah. I guess. Yes. That would be good actually. Lead the way."