MEDICAL - EDITED 11-8-2018
A “haze” would be a nice thing to call the blurred sensations I had, but I could clearly hear someone screaming. Something was jammed into my neck, and I felt the sensation of a pin piercing my skin.
“Where did she come from?”
The next thing I could tell was that there was a lot of light. Blinding beyond anything I had ever experienced, and that includes the morning after a Marine Birthday Party. The screaming was back, but it sounded different, hoarse. Again, something was jammed into my neck. Then, I think I heard more screaming to the side of me.
“How the fuck are they still alive?”
A fog followed by more brightness. This time at least there was no screaming, my throat felt like I had spent an hour breathing the toxic burn off from a slagged set of grunt armor. I could hear the beeping of medical equipment, and then I started to note that the more patient I was at opening my eyes, the less the brightness hurt. I was also beginning to see that there was more than just light. Yeah, that was a ceiling panel. Wherever else I may have thought I was all signs were now telling me it was in Medical. Paying attention to myself, I noticed that the only thing I could feel in my body was the rawness in my throat.
That scared me more than realizing the screaming I had heard while things were fuzzy was probably me. Did I really understand someone asking how I was alive? What did they mean by where did I come from? Starting to panic a bit I noticed that the steady beeping had become a single long, low yet shrill tone, then a flare of pain which shook my entire body and that sharp note became a series of rapid-fire pulses, almost too high pitch for me to hear. Then I was out again.
This pattern repeated itself several times before there was a change. One time when I opened my eyes, I moved my head to my left side first. Opening them, I saw a ton of bandages over my shoulder. That’s right; I had dislocated my shoulder when all this started. I tried to say something, but my voice was gone due to loss of use. I had to work up some saliva to swallow. Even that hurt. What came out next was more a series of cracks than it was an actual noise. That was promising, though. My throat was also no longer feeling burnt raw. Just dry and sticking to itself like a bad case of strep throat. The beeping was back, steady this time and not changing speeds. Also, I didn’t hear it drop into a single low tone. Progress.
“Doctor, I think she’s waking up,” I heard from behind and to the right of me. The voice sounded familiar. But I couldn’t place it.
I moved my head, trying to identify the owner of the voice, but wasn’t having much luck. I didn’t feel that there was any control over my neck and still couldn’t feel my body.
After trying to speak a few more times, I finally gave up and attempted to access the ship network.
ACCESS DENIED
Quarantine Protocols active
Well, what was this about. Shifting again, I finally managed to get my head to move the direction of the voice. Corpsman Torres.
“How lo… How long?” That took substantial more effort than it should have.
Corpsman Torres finished checking some lines that I am not sure if they were coming from the bulkhead and connecting to me, or if they were going the other way. She looked at me with something that was a mix of pity and disdain. Perhaps pity and fear, or maybe it was some other combination, but it wasn’t pretty.
“The doc will tell you everything that’s important.”
“How long have I been here?” The talking was starting to get more comfortable.
“Don’t ask me.” Torres then finished logging some information and walked away quickly.
Not long after, an older man that managed to make his multi-generation old ocular implants have a gentle look came from the other direction. He had a Rod of Aesculapius on his uniform, and an officers ranking, so I assumed this was the doctor that Torres was referring to.
“Ms. Jax, I see you have decided to quit napping. What do you remember?” A slight accent from the New Anglican Republic colored his voice
“How long have I been here?”
“I asked first. Please let me do my job before we get into the tawdrier of details.”
That cocky ass. Looking at the good doctor warily, I gave a quick summary
“Woke up to the klaxons, checked in with Engineering, went to the engine room, saw my DC team get blown up, then had to fix my suit and arm in an emergency shelter. After that got into the engine room, couldn’t raise anyone on coms but could interact with Rasputin. Then pain and here I am.”
“Interesting. According to Rasputin, you left the ship for three hours after the initial explosion. Then you somehow teleported into the engine room and managed to fuse your arm with a console, and your leg fused inside a member of the second damage control team.”
What. The. Fuck.
“Teleported? The fuck, doc! I was there the entire time. And what do you mean my arm fused with a console? That would have killed… wait, can you say that last part again? My leg fused INSIDE a member of the second DC team? Who did I kill?”
That last part I was barely able to get out. At least I solved why Torres was looking at me strangely.
“The answer to that last part is straightforward. No one. Who you FUSED with is a different matter. It was UT3 Agumbe. Somehow both of you survived. For a while anyway. Then we had another power spike from a different reactor, and his medical pod microwaved him. Chief Takeda can’t figure out how it happened. Everything was set up for the pod correctly. He even had several of the EDOs in the fleet verify that it was physically impossible. In short, you ruined your day as well as Agumbe’s. Now to answer your first question. Just over three years.”
“How long relative?”
“That is relative. The first few months you were out is when we had to disable your neural implant.”
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
“That explains the quarantine messages,” I said thinking back to the message from my attempted interface to the ship's network.
“You’re getting quarantine messages? You shouldn’t even have those pop-ups.”
“Yeah, it’s a basic ‘Access denied due to quarantine protocols’ message.”
I had to bring up the message again, just to make sure there wasn’t anything special listed that may have been needed.
“Well, that’s really interesting. You haven’t been disabled due to Quarantine. You’ve been removed from the system, PERIOD. We even pulled some of your interfaces out of your head by request from Rasputin.”
Now that was interesting.
“Why did he request that? I mean, that seems ‘off.’”
“Rasputin, care to give her the run down?” As he said that, I noticed the doc pull out a tablet and start fiddling with something.
“Certainly, sir!” He sounded cheerful. It’s not good when an AI in charge of your life is chipper to explain WHY he’s crippled you.
“Miss Jax, since you were either dead or not on board the vessel at the time of the incident, it seemed prudent to pull your memory and sensory arrays. That way we could determine exactly what had happened. What we have determined, however, is something entirely unprecedented seems to have happened.”
“What are you even talking about, Rassie?”
“What did they look like?”
“Belay that! Rasputin, you will cease communication with Miss Jax immediately!” A gruff voice called out. At the same time, the doctor immediately dropped his tablet, and I felt a twitch in my left shoulder.
“Captain! I see you have decided to take note of her wellbeing?” The doctor said while looking at me with a glare.
“Sir!” I said at the same time and a little too loudly. My discomfort at the captains’ special interest apparent in my voice.
“As you were.” I think the Captains response was reflexive. No way for me to stand and salute right now.
MEDICAL - ORIGINAL
I was in a haze, but I could clearly hear someone screaming. Something was jammed into my neck, and I felt sensation of a pin piercing my skin.
“Where did she come from?”
The next thing I could tell was that there was a lot of light. Blinding doesn’t even begin to cut it. There screaming was back, but it sounded different, hoarse. Again, something was jammed into my neck. Then, I think I heard something besides the screaming.
“How the fuck is she still alive?”
A fog followed by more brightness. This time at least there was no screaming, by my throat felt like I had spent an hour breathing the toxic burn off from a slagged set of grunt armor. I could hear the beeping of medical equipment, then I started to note that the more patient I was at opening my eyes, the less the brightness hurt. I was also starting to see that there was more than just light. Yeah, that was a ceiling panel. Wherever else I may have thought I was all signs were now telling me it was in the sick bay. Paying attention to myself I noticed that the only thing I could feel in my body was the rawness in my throat.
That scared me more than realizing the screaming I had been hearing while things were fuzzy was probably me. Did I really hear someone asking how I was alive? What did they mean by where did I come from? Starting to panic a bit I noticed that the steady beeping had become a single long, low yet shrill tone, then a flare of pain which shook my entire body and that shrill note became a series of rapid fire pulses almost too high pitch for me to hear. Then I was out again.
This pattern repeated itself several times before there was a change. One time when I opened my eyes, I moved my head to my left side first. Opening them I saw a ton of bandages over my shoulder. That’s right, I had dislocated my shoulder when all this started. I tried to say something but my voice was gone due to loss of use. I had to work up some saliva to swallow. What came out next was more a series of cracks than it was an actual noise. That was promising, though. My throat was also no longer raw. Just dry and sticking to itself. The beeping was back but steady this time and not changing speeds to a rapid fire, and I didn’t hear a low tone. Progress.
“Doctor, I think she’s waking up,” I heard from behind and to the right of me. The voice sounded familiar. But I couldn’t place it.
I moved my head, trying to identify the owner of the voice, but wasn’t having much luck. I still couldn’t feel my body.
After trying to speak a few more times I finally gave up and attempted to access the ship network.
ACCESS DENIED
Quarantine Protocols active
Well then. What was this about. Shifting again, I finally managed to get my head to move the direction of the voice. Ahh, Corpsman Torres.
“How lo… How long?” That took substantial more effort than it should have.
Corpsman Torres finished checking some lines that I am not sure if they were coming from the wall and connecting to me, or if they were going the other way. She looked at me with something that was a mix between pity and disdain. Maybe pity and fear. Maybe it was some other combination, but it wasn’t pretty.
“Doc will tell you everything that’s important.”
“How long have I been here?” The talking was starting to get easier.
“Don’t ask me.” Torres then finished logging some information and walked away quickly.
Not long after, an older man that managed to make his ocular implants have a gentle look came from the other direction. He had a Rod of Aesculapius on his uniform, and an officers ranking, so I assumed this was the doctor that Torres was referring to.
“Ms. Jax, I see you have decided to quit napping. What do you remember?”
“How long have I been here?”
“I asked first. Please let me do my job before we get into the tawdrier of details”
That cocky ass. Looking at his I gave him the quick summary
“Woke up to klaxons, checked in with Engineering, went to the engine room, watched my DC team get blown up, then had to fix my suit and arm in an emergency shelter. After that got into the engine room, couldn’t raise anyone on coms but could interact with Rasputin. Then pain and here I am.”
“Interesting. According to Rasputin, you left the ship for three hours after the initial explosion. Then you somehow teleported into the engine room, and managed to fuse your arm with a console, and your leg fused inside a member of the damage control team.”
What. The. Fuck.
“Teleported? The fuck, doc! I was there the entire time. And what do you mean my arm fused with a console? That would have killed… wait, can you say that last part again? My leg fused INSIDE a member of the second DC team? Who did I kill?”
That last part I was barely able to get out. At least I solved why Torres was looking at me strange.
“The answer to that last part is straight forward. No one. Who you FUSED with is a different matter. It was UT3 Agumbe. Somehow both of you survived. For a while anyway. Then we had another power spike in another of the Thorium reactors and his medical pod microwaved him. Chief Takeda can’t figure out how it happened. Everything was set up for the pod correctly. He even had several of the EDOs in the fleet verify that it was physically impossible. In short, you ruined your day as well as Agumbes. Now to answer your first question. Just over three years.”
“How long relative?”
“That is relative. The first few months you were out is when we had to disable your neural gear.”
“That explains the quarantine messages.” I said thinking back to the message from my attempted interface to the ships network.
“You’re getting quarantine messages? You shouldn’t even have those pop up.”
“Yeah, it’s a basic ‘Access denied due to quarantine protocols’ message.”
I had to bring up the message again, just to make sure there wasn’t anything special listed that may have been needed.
“Well, that’s really interesting. You haven’t been disabled due to Quarantine. You’ve been removed from the system, PERIOD. We even pulled some of your interface out of your head by request from Rasputin.”
Now that was interesting.
“Why did he request that? I mean, that seems ‘off’.”
“Rasputin, give her the run down.” As he said that, I noticed the doc pull out a tablet and start fiddling with something.
“Certainly, sir!” He was sounding cheerful. It’s not good when an AI in charge of your life is chipper to explain WHY he’s crippled you.
“Miss Jax, since you were either dead or not on board the vessel at the time of the incident, it seemed prudent to pull your memory and sensory arrays. That way we could determine exactly what had happened. What we determined, however, was something entirely unprecedented. What did they look like?”
“Belay that! Rasputin, you will cease communication with Miss Jax immediately!” A gruff voice called out. At the same time, the doctor immediately dropped his tablet and I felt a twitch in my left shoulder.
“Captain! I see you have decided to take note of her wellbeing?” The doctor said while looking at me with a glare.
“Sir!” I said a little too loudly. My discomfort at the captains’ special interest apparent in my voice.