SET - Rojar I Orbital Survey (Part 2 of 4)

Posted on 18 Apr 2013 @ 8:30am by Chief Warrant Officer 3 Lamar Darius & Commander Andreus Kohl & Lieutenant Theron Rhodes

4,429 words; about a 22 minute read

Mission: Episode 03 - Frontier
Location: Rojar I (Orbit) - Shuttlecraft Virginia
Timeline: MD 04 - 1045 hrs

Previously, on Rojar I Orbital Survey (Part 1)...

"We've lost one of our starboard thrusters." Lamar called out, his heart beginning to beat rapidly in his chest. "Must be some type of debris...I'm attempting to compensate..." he added as his hands flew across the console. The shuttle began to wobble from side to side as the four primary thrusters were now reduced to three, sending the ship's thrust vector into an unstable state.

And Now, the Continuation...

[ON]

Sounding clueless, and yet desperate to put his own two hands to work, Kohl asked, "Can we, uhm, do anything to help?"

Maenad's self-satisfactory smile disappeared. She wasn't sure if the loss of one starboard thruster mattered; she knew nothing about flying. The planet's gravitational field was very small, but they were low enough now that without sufficient thrust they plummet to a fiery death. Under normal circumstances, she figured one thruster would be enough - but these weren't ordinary circumstances. The planet was surrounded with a field of rocks blasted away from, probably, the moon collision. They couldn't just gun it out of here, could they? Probably not. Definitely not. Could they ease out on one thruster? Her eyes darted around her console as she jolted again in her seat, harder now than before. She pushed her tongue against the back of her bottom front teeth until it hurt. She was in charge. She had to do something.

"Can you get us out of here on one thruster?" she asked, her voice confident but not completely absent of worry.

Lamar frowned at the chief's question and did his best to level them out. Ever so slowly, he finally regained control of the craft and stabilized their descent by overcompensating using the remaining thrusters. "I'll try..." came his uncertain reply. This was only one of a handful of shuttlecraft missions which the new support craft pilot had participated in, and he had never experienced any type of situation exactly like the one they were currently facing.

Unfortunately, the compensation of the flight path meant that he had lost control of their planned trajectory, and Virginia began to fly through the thickest parts of the planetary debris. "Now this is a debris cloud.." he muttered to himself with disapproval and a shake of his head. The cockpit was soon showered by ash and small rocks until their visibility through the windshield became zero as the space in front of them was completely covered with the moon's rocky particles.

Maenad felt a lump in her throat as her chest tightened. It sounded like she were under a tin roof in a hailstorm. She could barely hear anything over the pelting rocks and struggling engines. Her hands gripped the arms of her chair so that her knuckles turned white, and she craned her neck to get a better view of Lamar's hands on the controls. She couldn't make anything out because of the turbulence, and she was starting to have doubts about getting out on one thruster. Her eyes went wide as she considered her end. She didn't want to burn to death. She looked at her white skin, imagining it peeling and crackling away into charred blackness and, as she clenched her teeth behind her lips, she suddenly became very aware of her entire body and all that it did. Her pulse, her breathing, her thoughts, her feeling - what was it? Where would it go? She pressed her lips, trying to push the thoughts out of her mind. There was still a chance. And a good chance, too, she told herself.

Another large piece of debris slammed into the port thruster and the craft shook violently. Lamar's helm console burst into sparks from an EPS overload and sent him tumbling out of his seat with his hands around his face to protect himself. Other consoles throughout the shuttlecraft began to spark and overload, showering Maenad with shrapnel. Laying on the floor next to Rhodes, he could think of nothing else to do than call out the last status report he had received. "Port thrusters are offline!" he yelled, and could feel the craft listing towards the left as it began to tumble out of control. "Take the helm!" he yelled at the Rhodes.

Rhodes was very concerned when Lamar was cast to the deck. Yet, he had to remain focused, taking control of the shuttle from his panel, he began to manoeuvre the shuttle to miss any more large pieces. He also increased the shield to 90%. That was as much as it would operate at this time.

When Lamar's console erupted in sparks and smoke, instinct took over. Maenad ducked her head to the right, hiding behind her left forearm and elbow. But her console was to her right and, just as she'd blocked the explosion from ahead, there was another from her side. Part of the science panel blew out from the residual power surge in the cockpit, blasting shards of glass and plastic toward her. Her head was mostly still shielded by her arm, and her neck was protected by her raised shoulders, protecting her from the brunt of the explosion. She felt a tugging feeling as she turned away from the sparks, her eyes tightly closed, on her right arm and shoulder, upper back.

She couldn't hear anything anymore. She lowered her arm and opened her eyes. Lamar was on the floor. She felt heavier, probably from the listing shuttle as it lost control. Her side was warm, too, and she felt like she was sweating profusely. With her left arm, she touched her face and hair. Soot stained her fingers and palm, there were minor scrapes. She quickly looked at her right arm and saw that her sleeve was torn and frayed. She started to raised her arm for a better look but felt resistance in her shoulder blade that wasn't quite pain. She stretched her neck to look over her back and she could see several shards of glass had embedded in her jacket. Maenad's breathing quickened, then, as she felt the glass in her skin. "Oh no," she whispered inaudibly from all the noise and chaos. Looking at her right arm again, she could see the holes in the uniform were darkening. Blood. She was bleeding. She tried to say something. A warm trickle, she could feel it, on her back. It was sticky, like someone had tried to glue her to her uniform. No, she knew, it wasn't glue. It was blood. The glass in her back. She tried to sit back to calm herself until the shuttle had righted its way again but the chair only pushed the glass further. How much was there? How bad was it? She could only smell ozone and iron. Her eyes stung. She didn't want to burn to death. She wiped at her cheeks with the tops of her blackened wrists, making a muddy grime on them. She couldn't breathe. She looked at her knees. Her tights had torn. She thought of Liyar. She couldn't feel her hands anymore, she couldn't feel at all. Her mouth opened as though to say something. Everything went black.

Rhodes was not able to increase their elevation. Things were not looking good for this mission. "Sir, I am not able to increase our elevation. We may need to set it down before we are able to. We may need to contact the Galileo for assistance."

Kohl, meanwhile, was laying on the deck beside Lamar. When the EPS conduits were overloading, Kohl's consoles had been spared. His only apparently injury was a high-pitched ringing in his ears from the noise of the collision and explosions. Having watched Lamar slam against the deck, Kohl had unbuckled from his chair and pounced towards his patient. The rocking and dipping of Virginia had sent Kohl careering into the opposite bulkhead, and knocked him to the floor. Having heard Lamar report on the status of the engine, Kohl suspected the pilot's airway was clear.

Crawling towards Lamar, Kohl pulled the tricorder from his belt to check on his patient's vitals faster than his naked eye could do. Breathing and circulation were within acceptable levels, because Lamar's hands and forearms had taken the brunt of the damage. Kohl slot the tricorder back into its holster and he worked at tearing the remnants of sleeves away from Lamar's burned arms. As he worked, Kohl took notice of Panne's stillness in his peripheral vision. He called out, "Lieutenant Panne, report please," as he retrieved burn gel from his medikit. No reply came. No sardonic remark from Panne seemed improbable, to Kohl. After applying a large dollop of burn gel to each of Lamar's hands, Kohl said, "Rub that all over," as Kohl struggled to his feet.

Doing as he was instructed, the red-collared warrant officer applied the medical gel to his forearms and hands. It stung at first, but Lamar was not unaccustomed to burns, especially having served in the Marine Corps. It took only a short few seconds of application after which the stinging sensation finally subsided and he felt much better. "Thanks, I'm good. Check on her." he said to Kohl, motioning with his head towards the woman who was injured behind them.

Rhodes brought the craft closer and closer to the surface. Remaining in control was difficult. "I am picking up a high plateau 1,500 kilometers ahead."

With one arm clinging to Panne's chair to keep from falling over, Kohl manually opened Panne's mouth. He didn't have another hand for a tricorder and so he visually inspected her oesophagus. She wasn't breathing. Diving his hand into the medikit, Kohl blindly rummaged until he pulled out an oval-shaped device. He fitted it over Panne's mouth and he toggled the controls to begin intubation. Forcefield projectors in the tool began to clear her airway and stimulate ventilation of her lungs.

Very slowly, Maenad came back from unconsciousness. She couldn't hear anything and her sight was blurred. She blinked several times to clear her vision while trying to figure out where she was and what was going on. Several more seconds went by as it came back to her; she was on an away mission in a shuttlecraft. They were going to the first planet, it was a B class, and they were crashing. She was injured. I must have passed out. Maenad looked down at her chest and knees, saw again that her tights were torn. She saw minor cuts and scrapes through the holes in the nylon, she looked at her right hand and held it up to look at it. It too was cut and scratched, but half of it was red with burns, but it felt numb. There was something in her mouth, she realised and she used her left hand to get rid of it. The numbness of her right arm and shoulder became suddenly obvious as she turned her head to look it over. Once more, she saw the stain of her blood on the tattered sleeve and remembered that she had glass still in her body. She was breathing heavily again, but she knew she wasn't going to faint for a second time.

She could see that Lamar was still on the floor, but he seemed all right. The shuttle was rocking and jolting less severely than she recalled too. "Can we land?" she shouted up to the cockpit, more shrill and desperate than she'd intended. Maenad bit her lip and looked then looked to Kohl. "Are you all right?" she asked him.

Still holding onto Maenad's chair as he stood beside her, Kohl could only reply with a loud, "What?" He could see Maenad's lips move, and he could even hear the sound, but the exact detail of her words were distorted by the ringing in his ears.

Theron hesitated not wanting to take his eyes off of the controls. "We will be landing. It may be a little bumpier than I would prefer." He took a second to glance down and saw his left sleeve was torn and right thigh with red dripping down the length of his leg. "I will be fine as soon as we set down."

Kohl's head turned at the sound of Theron's voice. Kohl heard the man's words but, like Maenad's, they were murky and unclear through the ringing in his ears. While he stared at Theron, stared at the red stain on his thigh, Kohl felt his stomach lurch. It may have been caused by the heaving of the shuttlecraft, but it was probably because Kohl had forgot about Theron. Forgot to check on Theron. Maybe it was triage-brain, but Theron's ability to remain at his post had lead Kohl to assume he was fine. With stubborn Starfleet officers, that usually wasn't the case. Kohl palmed his tricorder and pointed it Theron's way.

Lamar returned to the pilot's seat, albeit with a slightly shattered console now in front of him. Fortunately for him, the redundancies in the LCARS system allowed him to bring up the shuttle's flight controls on the nearby auxiliary console. Smart engineers, he thought to himself, then turned to the security officer next to him. "I've got it." he said, then took back control of the shuttle from Rhodes. He eyed the plateau in front of them. 1,500 kilometers was a fair distance, but they were still traveling at a decent velocity which meant they would be approaching it within the minute.

"It is all yours." Theron replied as he switched his console back to look at power flow and shield systems.

Unaware of what was transpiring behind him with the chief science officer, Lamar focused all of his attention on preventing them from crashing. A quick tap of his hand on an overhead LCARS button opened a comm channel back to their mothership. "Galileo, this is Virginia...we have encountered heavy debris and are adjusting course to prepare for an emergency landing. Please be advised, we have one casualty: Lieutenant Panne." he called out to whoever was listening on the other end.

Unfortunately, the high concentrations of solar radiation from the sun combined with metallic rock debris deflected their comm signal, and the only reply was one of scattered static. Experience and instinct took over, and Lamar knew that they were on their own. "Comms are down." he said with a surprising lack of panic in his voice, most likely the result of his years of Marine combat experience. This was not the first time he had faced a potentially life-threatening situation, and had fortunately developed the mental skills to remain poised and calm under pressure.

Hugging the side of Maenad's chair, Kohl had returned his attention to the Chief Science Officer. He took one last look at his tricorder and then he told her, "Take off your jacket."

Maenad didn't hear him over the noise in the cabin. The shuttle continue to rock and the engines and systems whined like an old air raid siren getting higher and higher. She felt that they were getting closer, now, because the shuttle was pulling Gs which couldn't be felt in space. She winced with every rock and jolt of the shuttle; each time she bumped with her chair, the shards of glass went deeper and the burs rubbed painfully against her uniform.

Lamar knew they were coming in too fast and did his best to reduce their speed by firing the remaining operational thrusters while rotating the craft sideways to increase what little atmospheric drag where was. Approaching the plateau, he reached behind his seat rest and grabbed hold of the emergency harness, then strapped himself into the seat. "Strap in." he called out to crew members in the cabin. "Twenty seconds till we make contact."

Theron checked his restraint as he maintained a close watch on the controls. He felt sweat beginning to run down the right side of his forehead. He wiped it wih his sleeve and then realized that it was red. He didn't understand how he got these injuries, but hadn't noticed the pain yet.

Pushing off from Maenad's chair, Kohl shoved himself across the compartment. His arms flailed for a moment --as he feared he might collide with a bulkhead head-first-- and then his backside connected with the padded chair. Sharp pain lanced through Kohl's body, but his thoughts remained on Maenad's wounds and Maenad's condition. Despite where his mind was at, triage muscle memory remained in command of Lieutenant (JG) Kohl. He buckled himself into the chair and assumed crash position. He would be of no use to any of his patients if he died in the saving of them.

As the shuttle approached the plateau, Rhodes transferred all power to the forward shield.

The warrant officer waited until they were about ten seconds from making contact with the surface, then rotated the craft back to its forward heading in order to use the nacelles as landing skids. Virginia might be a small craft, but she was made of a very durable tritanium alloy which he hoped would keep them in one piece and avoid a hull breach. "Nine...eight...seven..." he called out the ETA to impact as was displayed on his nav console. "Hold on!"

The tiny shuttle's nacelles made impact with the surface of the plateau and the shuttlecraft bounced back up into the air for a brief moment before slamming itself back down into the rocky terrain. It glided across the surface for almost two thousand meters and did a series of 360 degree spins, sending heavy G forces into the cabin which pinned Lamar to the side of his seat and against his restraints. Lights flickered and an uncomfortable screeching noise reverberated through the cockpit, until Virginia finally came to a slow stop near the far edge of the plateau.

When the shuttle finally came to a stop, the only sound that Maenad could hear was the hissing of the ruptured consoles, a long wind-down drone of the shuttle's systems, and her own heavy breathing. Her hands were still clawed into the armrests of her chair when she managed a grimace of a smile. They had missed the lava. "Is everyone all right?" she asked, leaning forward despite the resistance in her back and side. It sent a sharp pain up her neck, she winced, and went back to the way she was.

Rhodes raised his head, blinking his eyes to focus. He coughed a little, raising his right hand and then seeing a burn on the back of it. He began padding down his body to see if he was hurt further. He found a strip of metal embedded in his left calf. Just a trickle of blood. Not a big deal, but why was he not feeling the pain he expected to feel?

Andreus Kohl turned his chair towards Maenad, but it became stuck halfway into the turn. The miracle of their survival should have been on the forefront of Kohl's mind, it really should have been, but he was stuck on the mental image of blood seeping through Maenad's uniform. Through huffs of panicked breaths, Kohl said, "Lieutenant Panne, I need you to strip down to your undershirt, right now." And he said the words commandingly, like it was an order.

Maenad jerked at the command. She fumbled for her seatbelt and unbuckled it like she were drunk. Her uniform was sticky from the blood and the pain was getting sharper. She got herself to the edge of the chair and tried to pull the jacket over her head, but the piercing glass in her side and in arm snagged it. "I can't, Andreus," she said helplessly. She hated being like this, she hated needing help. "I can't get it off," and she would have if she could have. She wanted to. She could feel her heartbeat against her ribs and the lump in her throat getting larger. "I can't get it off," she repeated, more panicked this time.

"I'm here. I'm right here," Kohl said, as he approached Maenad's side. He could make out her words now; the ringing in his ears wasn't quite so overpowering. He offered his hands, helping to remove her uniform jacket and teal tunic. "I-- I'm sorry. I'm going to stop the bleeding. Nothing vital has been hit, but I'm going to stop the bleeding. All of it. We can beam out the shrapnel later."

She clenched her teeth and winced as the the uniform jacket tugged at the shards in her burned skin. She was glad that she couldn't see it, really. She felt humiliated. She was supposed to be in charge of this mission, she was supposed to be setting an example, and here she was like a child who'd stubbed her toe. It wasn't her fault, and she knew that no one thought it was, but it didn't help her any. Very painfully, and very stiffly, Maenad allowed Kohl with his parental touch to remove the jacket and tunic. She was sitting now in just her bra and skirt, but she wasn't embarrassed, and she wiped some water from her eyes. She looked at Kohl. "Is it bad?" she wondered quietly. She knew that it was, but she had to ask.

"Here," Kohl said softly, and he placed a programmed hypospray in her hand. "Take this. For the pain." --To answer her question, he shook his head-- "It's not bad. It's really not. What worries me is you losing any quantity of blood..." As he spoke, Kohl slowly waved a cylindrical tool down Maenad's back. The tool projected waves of sterilizing radiation across her skin and into the open lacerations.

As she felt Kohl beginning to work on her back, Maenad stared at the hypospray in her hand. But she was too preoccupied to say or do anything. She felt cool ripples, like a tickle but not quite, against her skin that went right up the back of her neck. It was almost pleasurable, she thought with a smile. "Do I inject myself with this?" she asked uncertainly. "Does it matter where?"

Looking away from what he was doing, Kohl lightly tapped a spot on her upper arm. "Right there should be easiest," he answered. As he continued to sterilize Maenad's lacerations and clean away some of the soot from her skin, Kohl explained, "I'm going to have to heal the lacerations over-top the shrapnel. I don't have the resources here to take it out. You're going to need painkillers until we get to Sickbay."

Maenad's jaw fell open as she considered that. She didn't want glass and shrapnel under her skin. What if she moved a certain way and it did even more damage? What if a piece of glass was poking an artery but hadn't cut it yet, and if she moved it would slice open beneath her skin. Her heartbeat sped up again, faster and faster. She said nothing, though, but her breaths became more laboured as she tried to keep calm.

With the shuttlecraft safely parked on the planet's surface, Lamar unbuckled his harness and looked around, first at Rhodes then at the two crew members behind him. The security officer appeared to be fine at first glance, and the tall science chief was almost naked but her wounds were being tended to by Kohl. "Not a bad landing...all things considered" he said quietly to Rhodes, then began a systems check to see how much damage the shuttle had sustained.

"Well done, guys," Maenad said as sincerely as she could in the direction of the cockpit. She wanted to thank Lamar and Rhodes, she wanted to be there as their senior officer. How could either of them respect her like this? How could either of them ever look at her the same again? She was shaken and visibly unhappy with herself, but she was trying to be in the best spirits. Still, she couldn't get the picture of shrapnel in her body out of her head and it suddenly took precedent. "No, Andreus," she unexpectedly snapped - hardly giving the pilots time to respond. "No, you have get it out of me now. Just do whatever you have to do." Her burned right hand was beginning to tremble uncontrollably. "I can't wait until sickbay. Just, now take it out."

"Maenad..." Kohl said, clearly struggling to temper the emotion out of his voice. He couldn't look at her when he said, "I don't have medical-grade targeting sensors to beam the shrapnel out, and I'm not a surgeon. You, uh, you don't want me digging tiny fragments of polyduranide out of your flesh with a soup ladle."

Maenad sighed heavily. Her burnt hand was still trembling, which was starting to get on her nerves. She didn't like not being in control of herself. "Is it safe to do that, to leave them there?" she asked, staring angrily at the floor. "

"It's safer to leave them in. The fragments aren't near vital organs or arteries," Kohl replied, starting to sound pained and frustrated. Partly because of Maenad, but also because of the body aches, from bouncing around the shuttle, catching up with him. "Besides," Kohl said with a dermal regenerator in hand, "I've already regenerated the skin over most of your lacerations."

Theron believed that he had not lost consciousness, but things were a little fuzzy to him. He could hear conversations about him. Something about shrapnel and soup ladles. He blinked his eyes and shook his head to clear his foggy thinking. Looking at the control console he took in the ship's status. He then shut down main systems to conserve energy. He released his restrain to get up, but as soon as he did pain struck his body violently. "AAAAHHHH!!!" he screamed out falling back into his seat. His head pounded. His body screamed with pain, especially his thigh. He had forgotten about the shard of metal sticking out of it.

To Be Continued...

[OFF]

--

WO Lamar Darius
Support Craft Pilot
USS Galileo
NPC'd by Lirha Saalm

Lt. Theron Rhodes
Asst. Chief of Security
USS Galileo

Lieutenant (Junior Grade) Andreus Kohl
Asst. Chief Medical Officer
USS Galileo

LTJG Maenad Panne
Chief Science Officer
USS Galileo

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