Waking up in Darkness

Posted on 01 Jul 2024 @ 6:54pm by Lieutenant JG Christina Hartley & Lieutenant JG Kin'Fuji Hartley MD
Edited on on 02 Jul 2024 @ 7:44am

896 words; about a 4 minute read

Mission: Stranded
Timeline: After "Tugboat"

Pain.

Siren’s blaring.

Red Lights flashing.

Pain.

Where am I?

What happened?

What’s going on?

Explosions… I remember… KIN!

“KIN!” Christina finally found her voice as her eyes shot open, finding herself in the dark of her office. As she pushed up, she realised she was standing… on the door? Wait, what was going on with the gravity? What was going on with the ship?

No, there wasn’t time. She saw Kin on the floor, or rather, on the wall, next to the door. Christina knelt down, feeling a pulse, before another sense of fear washed through her.

“K’tress!”

Christina forced the doors beneath her feet open, dropping down into engineering. As soon as she fell through the door, she felt herself pulled sideways to the floor. It took her a moment to realise that the gravity plating malfunction was in her office and not main engineering.

Was this even main engineering anymore? Christina felt dizzy as she could smell smoke, burning flesh, blood… and the smell of fried circuitry. She struggled to keep her eyes opened as she looked around, trying to make sense of anything.

It was then she heard a soft whimper, which caused her to turn her head, where she saw K’tress holding onto Amy. Christina ran over to her daughter, picking her up.

“Are you okay, baby?” Christina asked, wiping some dust from K’tress’ face.

“Momma, I hurt,” K’tress whimpered weakly. “Mommy… where’s Mommy?”

“In my office,” Christina said, leading the way quickly, where Kin was starting to open her eyes. “Kin, are you okay?” she asked from the doorway.

“I… I don’t know,” Kin replied weakly. “What happened?”

“I don’t know love,” Christina said. “You need to lower yourself from the doorway; the gravity plating in there is screwed.”

“Okay love,” Kin replied softly. Christina put K’tress down gently and held out her arms. It was strange, watching Kin’s legs come out of her office, almost as though she was floating through the doorway. As Christina helped Kin out of the office, she let out a sigh of relief.

“Kin, there’s a medkit by the entrance,” Christina said. Kin nodded and went to the doorway, getting the medical kit as Christina ran over to Amy, who was on the floor, groaning as she was starting to wake up.

“Amy, are you okay?” Christina asked.

“Five more minutes, mom,” Amy replied weakly, her eyes still closed.

“Sorry Amy, but I need you,” Christina said softly. Amy’s eyes opened, a look of confusion in them.

“Christina? What… what’s going on?” she asked weakly.

“No idea, but we need to figure that out,” Christina replied, as Kin came over with the med kit.

“K’tress is okay, I’ve got a minor cut, but I’ve treated that,” Kin said, scanning Christina. “You’ve got a concussion, bruised ribs, and a hairline fracture on your left arm.”

“Treat me as I help the others and try and get some semblance of power back on,” Christina said, helping Amy up, using her right arm. She could feel the pain in her left arm now; how hadn’t she felt the pain before?

“Adrenaline,” Kin answered the unspoken question, as Christina knelt down by one of the engineers, Richard. He hadn’t been there for long, but he had been doing well on the ship, but Christina knew he was beyond help. His neck was twisted at an unnatural angle, clearly having been snapped in the explosion.

“Damn,” Christina said bitterly, gently closing Richard’s eyes. “You were a good engineer, and would have been one of the best.”

“I’m sorry, love,” Kin said softly, as K’tress held onto Kin.

“Amy, can you get K’tress out of here?” Christina asked softly, still on her knees.

“I can,” Amy promised.

“No, I wanna stay Momma,” K’tress replied. Christina looked at the little girl.

“Baby, it’s not safe for you here. Mommy and Momma need to get the ship fixed, and we need you to be safe,” Christina said.

“I’ll be good Momma. Please don’t make me go,” K’tress pleaded. Christina looked at Kin, who sighed and nodded.

“Stay with Amy out of the way, okay baby?” Christina asked. K’tress nodded as Amy led K’tress to the entrance, both sitting on the floor.

“What… what the hell happened?” Lucas asked weakly, having pulled himself up.

“We need to figure that out right now. Looks like emergency lights are still on, and the warp core is dead,” Christina said.

“How are we not dead? If the core is dead, wouldn’t the antimatter have gone up?” Lucas asked.

“Thank Richard for that,” Christina said, indicating the dead engineer. “He was working on a new project and had connected the antimatter containment to an isolated power source, and had come up with the idea of ejecting antimatter if there was a loss of power.”

“So we need to… clear up this mess. First, let’s get everyone up, and help those in need,” Christina said.

“I’ll do what I can,” Kin replied.

“I know,” Christina flashed her a small smile. “Let’s just hope we can fix everything before we lose life support and suffocate.”

 

RSS Feed