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Kari
| | Posted on Monday, October 14, 2002 - 08:03 pm: | |
The Reorsan Ship Vanquish sailed towards Reorsa, the immensely powerful slipstream engines creating barely a murmur through the small Defiant II class escort craft. In its ready room Commander Kariasa Ma’Aru stared at an oversized computer monitor, planning the contents of a message.
It had been a long time since she had spoken with her husband – their schedules never seemed to sync enough for a real time conversation, even over anisble – so she had resolved to record a message for him to watch at his convenience. Though she liked being able to read his emotions and expressions whenever they talked, sometimes you just have to make do with what you get.
Taking a breath, she hit the record button, a still image of one Lieutenant Commander Thompson immediately popping onto the screen giving her something to talk to. “Jason!” she exclaimed with uncharacteristic glee, “I got tired of waiting for you to end your shift so I just decided to send you this now. I talked with Wallace last night; he said that once the Articles are signed that we will be in the first group to get some downtime. He’s also agreed to let Marcy take over for a bit after that, he needs the command experience anyway and shouldn’t have any problem running things for a while.”
“So I should have near two and a half weeks of leave coming real soon and I was thinking that if you could talk to Drexler we might actually be able to see each other.” She paused for a moment, planning out the phrasing of her next though, “I was even thinking about acquiring a shuttle and heading out for a while – you know, just the two of us. Get away and just catch up. Maybe we could even head for the Artemis system, see if it can live up to its name.” She grinned, wondering if he would catch the reference to ancient Earth theology.
“Anyway, it’s just an idea. If you can’t get away for some reason I would understand. Oh, I might even be able to come see you there. I haven’t been on the Coro in ages; I’d love to spend some time on her. Maybe even arrange to get direct access to LORASON again for a bit; that would be worth the trip itself.”
She stopped and shifted in her chair, realizing she had wondered off topic. “Well, uhh, what have you been up to? I’ve already heard rumors about what happened to you all a few days ago with the Maron you’re transporting and the stories are just to strange to be true, even for Coronado. Seems like it was a good thing that our phase balance went out of whack after all, I was worried that we’d be stuck with that mission. On the other hand, the Tsien we picked up have been very well behaved.”
Pausing again, she couldn’t help but laugh. “This isn’t as easy as it looks, you know. You should really try it. It’s not easy to sit here trying to have a conversation with a service photograph. Have you ever noticed the expression on your face? It’s just strange, you really should look into getting it re-.”
She was interrupted by the door chime. Stopping the recording and immediately regaining her normal austere expression she called out, “It’s open.”
The door slid into the wall and her Executive Officer, Kyle Marcy, stuck his head into the room. From his expression she could tell something was wrong.
“Problem in engineering, one person critically injured. Situation is under control and they’re taking him to sickbay now.”
Kari was up and around her desk in an instant. “We really don’t have time for this, we will be to Reor within the hour,” she said with a sigh, followed him out onto the bridge.
At the mission operations station LtCol Prescot spotted the two Vanquish senior officers in one location and made towards them. Kari shook her head and he stopped, obviously understanding that now wasn’t the best time.
They continued towards the turbolift, inside she had a few moments to talk with Marcy. “What were they doing when the accident happened? Is the ship still alright?”
“I’m not really sure. Reigels was taking him to sickbay when the report came in and I was only able to speak with an assistant. From what I can gather certain safety protocols weren’t followed and a large amount of plasma was sent through a Jeffries tube were someone was working. Fortunately, the problem seems to be solved and there shouldn’t be any major damage.” He seemed slightly bothered that he didn’t have more to add.
Kari nodded, glad to hear they wouldn’t be late to Reor; she had her reputation to think of after all.
There are quite a few advantages to having a ship the size of a Defiant, one of them being that a turbolift ride between any two points was always short. They walked the short distance from the lift doors to sickbay.
Inside they were met with the general chaos of a medical facility during a critical case, the effect furthered when one realized that it was caused by only two doctors, a nurse, and the EMH. The crewman had already arrived, lying sprawled across a bio bed. The three person medical staff rushed about getting ready to whatever it was they planned to do. Off to the side stood another engineer, it wasn’t Reigels, the CEO must have gone back to oversee the repairs. Kari, surveying it all, was pleased. She couldn’t have asked for a better response to this crisis. Marcy went off to talk with the engineer so she decided to walk around the bed observing the doctors, eager to see them work.
Commander Sullivan, the ship’s CMO, stood to the side of the patient, waving an instrument above him while arguing with the other doctor about something or another. Kari took a few steps towards them and finally saw the body.
It was the worst case of plasma burning she had ever seen; nearly his entire body was scared, from knees to neck. He was unconscious and had hopefully been so since the accident had occurred. She would later learn that in fleeing from the fireball he had fallen down a vertical Jeffries tube, causing sever internal injuries.
The argument seemed to be over and Sullivan pulled out an Exoscalpel, cutting through the charred flesh. Kari winced and stepped back, running into the nurse carrying a tray of hypo vials in the process. Luckily, they didn’t spill and the nurse continued on his way without a second thought.
She watched for a while longer, still confident in the medical staff’s ability to save her crewman when a voice carried across the room. “So if you weren’t rushing to get the fusion flux generators calibrated before your shift ended we wouldn’t have a critically wounded man over there, would we?” It was Marcy – he had the by standing engineer at full attention, having obviously gotten to the true cause of the incident.
The engineer, a junior grade lieutenant, said something in reply but Kari couldn’t hear it from across sickbay. She walked towards them, seeking a better vantage point.
Spotting his commanding officer approaching he visibly relaxed. Kari lowered her brow, trying to look angrier. Marcy continued with his interdiction, not seeming to notice her arrival.
“Furthermore, your actions go beyond criminal negligence and, barring a miracle, I will see you brought up for court marshal. Now, security is on their way. They’ll escort you to the brig where you can begin to plan your defense.”
Kari took a step forward, finally garnering Marcy’s attention. “I don’t think the brig is entirely necessary, confinement to quarters should suffice for now. And there is no need to bother security, you should know the way by now. You have three minutes to get there, dismissed.”
He nodded in acknowledgment and practically ran out of sickbay. A moment later and she was out in the hall as well, motioning for Marcy to follow her. Walked slowly down the corridor, they passing their original turbolift door in favor of one farther away.
She glancing at her exec, indicting that she wanted to know his thoughts.
“Do you think that was too much?” It wasn’t the first time he’d asked that, and as before she didn’t respond. “I remember this guy. He came over when we were doing the joint ops with the Belkon, some kind of personal problem with their CEO. We don’t need him, after all we’ve been through.”
She nodded, stopping in front of another turbolift door. “You’re right, and we can pick up another engineer when we get to Reor, there should be a new class graduating at the end of the month. Ohh, and try not to question your decisions until you can see their effects, it rarely does good to speculate prematurely. In the meantime I want you to go and ensure the repairs are coming along, we will be coming out of warp presently and I don’t want there to be any problems. I’ll be on the bridge.”
He nodded an affirmative, stepping into the first lift car and heading towards engineering. A moment later another came along for Kari, the ride up was uneventful and short. When the doors opened she suddenly remembered Prescot wanting to have a word with her about something or another. She really wasn’t in the mood, only wanting to get back to her Ready Room for a few minutes rest before they got to Reor.
Sticking her head around the corner she spotted him, still working at the mission ops console. In a moment he turned his back on the turbolift and she took to opportunity to dash across the bridge. Her ops officer noticed her but was apparently too surprised to say anything and she made across the bridge without being bothered.
Inside, she secured the door and went around to sit in her chair, slouching enough to swing her legs up onto the desk. Gazing at the tactical map displayed across the length of the otherwise barren metallic walls she couldn’t help but take a moment and think back to the decisions she had made here during the final stages of the war. Designing attack patterns to trap Pfhor ships away from their precious gravity wells while keeping the Defender ships relatively out of harm’s way. Fabricating plans that had put here where she was now – near the top of the list for the captaincy and with a good shot of being offered command of an entire squadron of ships once the articles were signed.
She turned towards the computer screen and grimaced when she saw Thompson’s picture staring back at her. Not wanting to bother with finishing the message, she decided to shelve it; they would probably see each other sometime during the signing anyway.
The ship’s status monitor sitting on a corner of her desk indicated that they were less than five minutes away. She stood and walked out on the bridge, surprised by how long her reverie had lasted. From the turbolifts she sported Marcy coming towards the command dais as well. “Everything checks out in engineering, backup systems are taking care of the inop conduits; should be back to normal within two hours.”
She nodded, dropping into her chair. The helm officer was busy making the final adjustments for coming out of slip near Reor – a process she and heard described as trying to drop a marble into a bucket from a mile up – and the rest of the bridge crew seemed anxious to return to what was essentially their home planet.
With a slight lurch the Vanquish reenter normal space, its impulse engines kicking in almost immediately. “Reor center confirms clearance, tacking us in,” said the voice from the helm.
As Reorsa grew in the viewport she plotted her next moves. This conference would see the entirety of fleet command in one place and while it would tax all of her diplomatic skills, she had to impress them. She didn’t want to spend the rest of her career on this dinky 5-deck-tall piece of scrap metal. |
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