Luis is finally starting to come out of Crisis Mode as the displays start heading toward zero. He takes a few deep breaths, and then looks around. He's threaded the needle, as it were, and his stomache isn't troubling him as much as the first boost. As the adreneline from the past half hour or so drains from his system, he gets a little shakey, but he's still okay. He looks over, and notices Max stealing under the console with assorted tools. As he checks the Whirr's vitals to ensure he can be moved, he calls back over his shoulder, "Might want to check with One-Ton before you do anything we might regret, Max." He nods to himself as he surveys his patient, then turns to Hugh, "Actually, sir, might be good to bring everybody up to speed. Us, them, everybody. Oh, and see if they've got any sort of med-kit. I'd be more confident about moving this guy this if I had some more Whirr-specific drugs to use when I got there. I'm kinda flying half-blind on this. Or at least get me a stretcher so we don't have to stress him as much when we move him."
Stanhill and the captain trundle Swims-the-Black to the lounge on the collapsible carrier Luis had in his gear and set him up on a low couch. Although he'd like to look for a medical kit for Whiirr, he's worried Swims might not have time. Hugh's first aid skills, though up to snuff for humans, could use improvement when faced with high-G maneuvers and xenobiology. The wound's reopened, and although Luis wishes he had one of the alien healing devices, he sets to work with his medical kit and his patchy knowledge of general biology. Hugh lends a hand, and between the two of them (Hugh knowing what he did before and Luis knowing what to do now) they close up the wounds, remove yet another handful of stinger slivers, and manage to wake Swims back up - mostly because of the acute pain of being operated on sans painkillers.
With his hands busy holding the threads that Luis is using to stitch up Swims-the-Black, Hugh can only answer in Imperial.
"The ship got through the gate, you're going to live and we owe you a lot of answers. I'll explain everything once we've made sure the ship won't tear itself apart from the damage it took. I have my men running damage control as we speak. Oh, and my medical specialist wants to know if you keep a Whirr-specific first aid kit."
Now that the ship has stopped bucking like a bronco at a rodeo, Semo rises from the couch and starts searching for obvious damage. Most of the crew is forward of his position, so he slowly makes his way toward the back, then down to the cargo bay. Any damage encountered will be radioed in.
Davis is wrapping his hands with gauze, and looks over at One-Ton. "If you're up to it, we took a beating on our way through the gate. We'll need your help to get things patched up. I'll get something to set your leg with, first, and then we can stop the ship from breaking apart, alright?"
As he checks the Whirr's vitals to ensure he can be moved, he calls back over his shoulder, "Might want to check with One-Ton before you do anything we might regret, Max."
"I don't see him around and this ship's grid is fragged. Until Captain Verrill tells me otherwise, I'll take that risk in lieu of losing precious time." replies Max, sorting through the tattered mess of wiring and alien circuitry.
Angel collects himself and checks that all his gear survived the excitement before beginning to make his way through the bowels of the ship, looking for obvious damage or - what he imagines - the telltale hiss of a small leak.
"Much pain.... kit is... supply box on Engineering landing... Human kit there too, and... and also airlock entrance," Swims-the-Black manages. "Rrrrg... " he shudders from another wave of pain. "I've... I've had worse, but not in a l-long time... tell pilot to set course.. Ossogur Nebula... broadcast whatever he l-likes on frequency 448 and home in... in... on Jang-xur."
---
With his personal gear none the worse for wear, Semo heads down a level and finds the cargo bay in disarray. All the equipment and sleeping gear was thrown to hell and back during the microgravity and the acceleration. Luckily, his earlier work with the late Kovos prevented the agros or the cargo containers from sliding around and crushing anything important. It's a mess, but it's recoverable. Other than the mess, Semo doesn't find anything, leaks or otherwise, that would indicate a problem.
Angel's near the airlock, conducting his own sweep. No hissing, no obvious holes, but there is a rather disconcerting red glyph blinking on the inner airlock door. He waves the inner door transparent and sees that the outer door's been partially melted through in several places. It doesn't look holed, but with some work, Angel remembers his alien alphabet and figures out the glyphs. It's not holed - it's jammed. The outer door's been melted into its housing and won't open. Additionally, the air inside the lock's pretty hot - if anyone was in there when it was hit, they could've been cooked by waste heat. As it is now, it'd just be a blast of Saharan air.
---
One-Ton listens to Davis and nods. "Medkit's outside on the landing. Wherever we're headed, we should be able to barter our cargo for parts. Hell, I doubt we'll be doing honest trade for a while... might as well strip one agro before we sell 'em."
Davis snags the medical kit, heads back inside, and starts working on One-Ton's leg. Between the twin luxuries of a built-in tutorial from the medkit and recognizable human biology, Davis easily sets the engineer's leg into a sprayfoam cast that hardens in under a minute.
---
Max dives into the sensors console and discovers that most of the raw sensor feeds are working fine, except for the aforementioned port thermals. The problem is the display - he has a signal, but the television's broken. Beyond that, Max needs replacement parts. What's he going to sacrifice?
"Much pain.... kit is... supply box on Engineering landing... Human kit there too, and... and also airlock entrance," Swims-the-Black manages. "Rrrrg... " he shudders from another wave of pain. "I've... I've had worse, but not in a l-long time... tell pilot to set course.. Ossogur Nebula... broadcast whatever he l-likes on frequency 448 and home in... in... on Jang-xur."
Luis chuckles quietly as he works. Something in the chest cavity is bleeding, but he can't track down the source. He gets a second to look up, replies, "Right now, I am the pilot. For all but maybe one of our team, this is our first time on a ship. We're sitting tight until I get you patched up. Speaking of which," Luis turns to Hugh, "Could you grab me that med-kit? And while you're down there, might be good to tell Davis to check in with Max. "
"Guess that's all my officer training is good for, eh Stanhill?" Hugh chuckles. He leaves Luis to his patching and hurries down to engineering.
"One-Ton, Swims-the-Black is hurt. He told me there's a medkit specifically for Whirr down here. Also, one of my men is trying to fix up the bridge controls. If you've got nothing in danger of exploding in the next five minutes, I suggest you get on the vox and talk him through the hotwiring. Davis, Stanhill's setting up triage for the skipper. I see you've already figured out one medkit, so lend your expertise to our medic - and get your burns looked at by a pro, while you're at it."
Semo pauses to survey the mess in the cargo bay. In truth, it's not as bad as it could have been; seems the work they did early paid off.
"Cap? Cargo bay got tossed around a bit, but I'm not seeing any real damage. Should have it cleaned up in a bit."
That said, Semo sets to work straightening up. He'll use one of the agros, if needed, to move anything heavy, but mostly a little sweat and exercise should do the job.
Luis looks up as Davis walks into the room. He accepts the Whirr medkit, and pops it open, looking first for a painkiller. He'll take a closer look at the burns he noticed on Davis's hands once he's sure Swims is stable.
"The General'll hold together, as will Master, but I should see to the nav consoles," One-Ton says. He leans heavily on the wall and clambers his way to the cockpit, where he sees Max halfway submerged in pasta-like circuitry.
"Um... I guess you found the problem," he grunts to Max. One-Ton thinks for a bit, then replies, "Okay, yeah, get down to the cargo bay. Take this - " he rips free an charred bundle of wiring - "and rip anything matching it out of those agros. I'll get started on some adapters to wire it all back up."
"BOY!" One-Ton bellows. The crimson child appears at the bridge door. "Go with... Max, innit? You do anything he asks." The shipboy nods and waves to Max. "This way!"
---
The Whiirr medkit Davis brings Luis isn't as sophisticated as the handy automatic kit meant for humans. Luis instantly recognizes a plasma container and wastes no time in setting up an infusion. Each item is marked in Whiirr runes as well as Imperial. Swims finally gets his painkillers and relaxes on the low couch. A ridiculously easy-to-use wound sealant foams over Swims' wounds, binding it shut. Then there's special anti-infection/inflammatories that Luis injects straight into the binding foam.
"Thank you," Swims-the-Black signs. "You should know... whatever physical pain I suffer is nothing compared to the healing my spirit has undergone this last hour. Too long have I been a toothless grahj, soiling its own cage, content only to exist but not to live." His eyes glisten with the promise of battle.
Once Swims is treated, Luis handles (pardon the pun) Davis' digits. The medkit proves valuable yet again - Davis basically ends up with latex gloves under which biotic gel speeds the healing process.
Luis gets Hugh to stand still for five minutes and cleans up the captain's own ragged shoulder wound. It's more a job for painkillers - the wound wasn't that deep but it certainly tore through a lot of nerves.
As he cleans up and seals Hugh's shoulder, Luis turns to Swims-in-Black. "On Earth, there's a saying that comes from two hundred years ago when the nation we come from was first fighting for the right to be free from the unfair control of those who saught to impose their will on us. It's from a speech by a man named Patrick Henry and I think you'll agree with it: give me liberty or give me death. It's a sentiment our nation stills holds dear.The Imperium seeks to deprive us of that liberty, as it has done to your people, to the people of Bashakra, and I suspect to many others before. We're just the first scouts from our planet, trying to find those to help us stop the Imperium from doing again what they have done too many times before. We have the resources, it's figuring out how to use them and who our allies might be when we do that's our goal. I think you might be able to help us do that." Luis turns back to Hugh for a molment to put on the last touch, then turns back, "I think we both have something to gain from working together, and if you'll lay some of your cards on the table, we'll show some of ours."
EDIT: Please ignore the OOC note that was here. I was originally going to use "Live free or die!" and thus was going to have Luis saying it was "so important it's the motto of the place I grew up" but since I didn't use it, he no longer needs to be from New Hampshire
Hugh winces as Luis fixes up his shoulder. He nods to Semo's report and turns to Swims-the-Black.
"Fancy rhetoric aside, we have some trading to do. As soon as the ship is spaceworthy again, we should gate to another shadowport to lose our tail and start looking for some people willing to help us."
Angel gets a blast of hot air and frowns. "Well, that was pleasant."
"Sir? I'm at the airlock, it's sustained some pretty serious damage. Outer door is...stuck...in the mounting. Inner door looks fine, but we're one layer away from space."
e of pi
