<USS Avalon> Holding Open the Door (Part 1)
- From: TKilyle@xxxxxxx
- To: avalon@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 1 Apr 2006 10:17:15 EST
Holding Open the Door (Part 1)
by quite a few people
Raven stretched lazily in her chair, seemingly oblivious to the plight of
the Avalon, though to assume this would be a mistake. She remained aloof from
the others aboard her shuttle, seemingly uninterested and unapproachable,
discouraging disturbances of any sort, monitoring all com traffic, unbeknownst
to
the others, as they reported in, one by one, confirming that all on their
rosters had made it aboard.
All but the Lancelot.
It seemed one of her crewman - an engineer, apparently - had failed to
report aboard before launch. Raven shook her head. Damned engineers. Dumb ass
probably stayed back to try to cure the ship or something equally
stupid."Stupid
shit," she muttered, frowning.
Annabelle kept looking at the door to the back of the shuttle. Was it her or
did that English girl look ready to pop? Did stress, such as say being
evacuated from your ship, cause labor? The thought nearly made her gasp, Anna!
Turning to look at the woman sitting next to her in the cockpit she realized
the
woman had said something. "Is there a problem, Ensign?"
"Maybe not," Raven answered, turning her attention to the scanners in search
of an extra shuttle. "Seems they thought one of the crewman may have chosen
to take his own shuttle out instead of sharing air with the rest of them on
Lancelot. I don't see any on the screen but ours, though. Unless he's running
cloaked..." She stopped, deciding it might be better not to complete the
thought as she noted her shipmate's expression.
All color drained from Annabelle's face. The only person on the ship with
his own shuttle was Josh, her Josh. Had he been able to fix the shuttle? It
looked trashed after his wormhole ride. Without a word, and with trembling
hands
Annabelle started to scan for Josh's shuttle, his life signs, anything.
"Look, hun," Raven said gently, hoping to reassure her, though such things
had never been her strong suit. "I was listening in on the report to the
Cap'n, meaning he got the word on our missing boy, too. He's probably already
putting the search together."
"He has a whole ship broken into a group of shuttles to worry about."
Annabelle replied without looking away from what she was doing. "I'm sitting
here
with my best friends out there on who knows which shuttles, one of whom is
very pregnant with quints, and that missing boy is my husband!"
***
Mac listened in on the reports coming in and swore a blue streak when word
of Lancelot's crew shortage came in. He didn't bother looking at the Captain,
certain he'd heard it too. "Dammit Josh," he spouted as he searched the
surrounding space for any sign of his best friend's shuttle. "Where the hell
are
you now..."
The Captain didn't even turn to him. "Is he still on Avalon? Make sure you
scan there also." Keith looked at the fleet of runabouts. He didn't ask,
he reached over to open a comm to Skyler. "Take the fleet forward to Izar.
I will be there when we can, we have one crewman missing. We're looking now."
***
Ming's fingers tightened around the rosary he had wrapped in his fingers.
His other arm held his son tightly to him. He still distrusted the comms and
left it to his father-in-law, leaving the pilot free to fly. Nalas shook his
head. His dark eyes bored into the pilot and then into the man they'd
learned was the chief support services officer.
"He was assigned here," Nalas said simply. "We should not leave."
"Somebody needs to hold the door open after all," Ming added.
***
The sudden tension on the small shuttle was giving Melanie a headache.
"Something's not right."
Opening a link from their shuttle to Mac, Annabelle looked up form her scans
for only a moment. "Anything Mac?"
***
Nalas knew the substance of his son-in-law's prayers might not be
appreciated but he supposed the intention would be. He didn't understand the
softly
whispered language, an old dead one from Earth he was told, but the cadence of
prayer was similar in any language: Nos tali animati confidentia ad te,
Virgo Virginum, Mater, currimus; ad te venimus; coram te gementes peccatores
assistimus. Noli, Mater Verbi, verba nostra despicere, sed audi propitia et
exaudi.
He tapped open the comm to the shuttle the missing young man's wife was on.
"Young lady, if it helps any, you've got the grace of higher powers being
asked for," he said.
***
The voice was Vilya's father. Josh liked Vilya's family. "Thank you, Sir."
Raven shook her head, but said nothing. She had no belief in any sort of
'higher powers' other than her own. She learned early on how stupid faith in
anything else was. She sincerely hoped this poor woman didn't have to learn
that
lesson the hard way now.
***
Mac scanned for the third time, desperately. "Come on, kid...I know you're
here somewhere..." he muttered. As if in response, the scanner alerted him
quietly. "Captain...sir...I think we've found him," Mac answered, relief in
his
voice. All at once, a second alert sounded. Two life signs? "Um...sir...has
anyone else been reported missing? According to the scanner, we've got two
aboard..."
"No, only missing Mr. Garrity. Bring them aboard and let's get underway.
Alert medical as necessary."
Vevay blinked then jumped to her feet. "Sir, you can't seriously be
thinking of beaming an unknown person aboard this vessel, can you?"
"Ms. Davis, you can't seriously think that I would let any being remain on a
dying ship, except maybe the Borg. You can oversee their security."
Mac ignored the byplay, focussing instead on getting a lock then beaming
them both aboard. They materialized both unconscious and nearly blue for the
lack of oxygen on the Avalon. "Shit," Mac muttered, as the EMH sprang into
action.
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