Lt. Cmdr. Aiden Morrow's Story

The growing site of the Atlas before him was a welcome sight. Aiden Morrow found it strange, but the old bird was the image that formed when he closed his eyes and thought of home. The more that they were stranded away from the world and half the crew seemed to be replacements and transfers from “bigger” and “better” ships, the more fiercely protective he became of the majestically-aging old lady.

“Atlas, this is Angel Wing One requesting priority landing. Open the barn door, the wild horses are a’comin’ home,” he transmitted, rocking the wings of his craft to confirm visual approach for both the traffic controller and the pilot flying on his wing.

“I’m still having trouble with my instrument panel,” he said with passing concern. “Maybe we weren’t totally out of range of those energy blasts. That’ll be a fun conversation,” the pilot chuckled.

Luckily for everyone involved, combat landings were not the order of the day. From the day that they’d addressed the subject and ran their first simulations back on Triton Station, pilots were told that more birds and flight jockeys were lost to combat landings than enemy fire.

“Roamer, on final,” Morrow spoke, having already killed his main propulsion and instead using small course corrections to “float” the fighter down toward one of the large painted rectangles on the floor of the deck. As soon as his speed was reduced and his bird was in position, Morrow would be putting his fighter and his life in the hands of the deck team to activate the large electromagnets that would pull him to a stop and down to the ground so that the system of cables and towing wenches built into the deck would ferry the grounded Angel as necessary.

“That’s a good trap. Roamer, signing off,” he said, beginning the series of checks before he could clear his hatch and kiss the sweet oil-stained deck of the old girl.

Recycled air pumped through the closed atmosphere of the Angel, recycled air pumped the ventilation ducts of the Atlas – Aiden Morrow knew that there was absolutely no difference between the two, but the sickly-sweet smell of the dancing aromas on the flight deck always hit him like a warm welcome home any time he climbed out of the cockpit. If those smells were the home-cooked meal celebrating the return of the prodigal son, the ship’s deck chief was usually the father who’s approval Roamer could never win waiting with a lecture.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot that your name is stenciled in on the side,” he said, tossing his flight helmet down to one of the techs as he gripped the railing of the steps. “Yeah, it’s right here under – oh wait,” he said in sarcastic shock, “that’s my name.”

The good-natured (most of the time) banter on the flight deck was something that could make or break a crew. And, whether they knew it or not, almost everyone in the unspoken rivalry between pilots and deck crew gauged it all by the levels between the deck chief and the wing Commander.

“And for the last time, her name is not Stephanie!”

Another member of the deck crew handed reach out, handing Morrow a datapad for his post-flight checklist. Second nature took over as the pilot made a few marks and then signed the bottom of the form before handing it back. He wasn’t about the miss the show between these two.

A newly-promoted Wing Commander and filling shoes that he hadn’t asked to wear was something that Aiden tried like hell to keep to himself. He knew that Ramirez was aware unless she’d miraculously forgot his pleas for her to choose another officer. Lucy knew, of course. He’d never been able to hide anything from his Echo Company bunkmate and comrade. He wondered if Digger had a clue.

“Chief, Lt. Mackenzie Hawkins, previously of the Endeavor. Blades, I give you the mother hen of the grease monkeys,” he jabbed before turning his attention to the bird. For all his smirking remarks, he wanted the first look at what effect the energy weapons might have had.

The back-and-forth banter was quickly becoming lost on the senior of the two pilots as the thrill of a mission and returning safely quickly gave way to a curiosity and concern for the nature of what they’d encountered out there. Crouching down and tilting his head to the side to run his eyes down the length of the Angel’s hull, his hand smoothed over what looked like a very light energy burn. Not enough to cause structural damage, but clearly enough to have caused the problems he’d noticed on landing.

“Chief,” he spoke flatly, eyes never leaving the ship, “This was probably at a distance of around 300 meters or so, small-ship stand-off fire. Never seen anything like it.”

“Hard to tell what was new and what’s the same hell we’ve had since jumping into this system.” He knew that he didn’t have to spell out the rest for Digger, but Blades was another story.

“We don’t have a full automated repair system aboard, so damn near half the Wing is banged up one way or another from the scrap at Melchoir. Couple that with the fact that almost all the birds we picked up as transfers before gatejumping to Karas still need refitting for our launch system and every pilot this side of the home systems is suffering from exhaustion and early signs of combat dementia and I can’t stand to tell what’s hitting us from the outside and what we’re doing to ourselves.”

A harmless but effective slam of the officer’s forearm into the side of the Angel’s hull preceding a curse and his pacing off to the side of the deck. The pressures of command, or something like that.

The moment alone was enough to clear his head for the time being. It wasn’t perfect, but Captain Ramirez’s trust in him could be wasted this early. Staying on the deck and complaining about how they should have expected something like this wasn’t going to help, either. Delegation of authority. He wasn’t going to serve anyone a lick of good by kicking around the deck and barking orders at Digger and his crew.

“C’mon, we need to see the XO,” he said after whispered words from Blades. Turning and nodding to Digger, Morrow reached for the ladder leading up to the secondary causeway leading from the deck and started forming the words of his report in his head.

Lt. Cmdr. Aiden Morrow supersecrettest

EDF Atlas CIC

"What do you intend to do? Fly this ship? Handle the 1000 officers beyond this hold? We are in the middle of fucking nowhere! No response from commander! We’re in enemy territory. We’ll all die and no one will care. No one will know. If you fully expect to seize this ship and then command it with your sorry lot you are sorely mistaken. They could just as easily open the hold and dump us all out. All of us. Including the innocents, which there are more of than you.”

The static-burst sight and sound of the young medical officer filled the CIC as the bridge officers watched with bated breath. As Medina released her weapon, she was immediately charged and secured by two men none too please with her show of heroics thus far.

"Fool girl is going to get herself killed," someone muttered from behind a dark panel in the CIC.

"If they were going to shoot Medina, they would have done so the first time she took down one of their men," Narita responded with a gruff smile. As much as he and the ship's chief medical officer dressed one another down and as much as he personally would like to take a swing at the woman, he had to admit that she would have made on hell of a Marine.

"Make a log entry. Effective immediately, I am declaring that Captain Ramirez is incapacitated and am hereby taking command of the Atlas. Note the time."

"Aye, sir."


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Cargo Bay Slums

"Glad you could join us, doctor," Ramirez spoke. The area that had once served as the makeshift civilian medical clinic for the Slums was now used as a convenient way to hide away the high-profile hostages used in the impromptu attempt to take over the ship. Zip-ties bound hands together. If there was a way to escape, it certainly was doing a good job of hiding itself.

"Mr. Heldane took tough blow to the head. Lost some blood," the captain said, her eyes drifting between the crewman who'd accompanied her down into the Bay and the small exit to the curtain-enclosed area to which they'd be relegated. Two guards, both armed, including the one who'd taken the gunshot that claimed the life of a civilian, the body just on the other side of the curtain before being dragged away.

Somewhere beyond the curtain, a phone rang. The silver-haired man took measured steps toward the ringing device, making sure that his team shifted in position to compensate before he answered.

"Speak."

"This is Lt. Col. Narita. I demand to speak to the person in charge."

"You are speaking with me, Colonel."

"Very well. You know my name. Who are you?"

"You can call me Perses for now."

"The Titan of Destruction. Amusing. Very well, Perses. You are illegally holding members of my crew. I demand that you release the personnel immediately."

"You and I both know that I'm not going to do that, Colonel. Not until I get what I want from you."

"You and your crew are in an indefensible location with not alternate route of egress and surrounded by lots of very angry Marines. You aren't exactly in a position of power."

"Shame, shame, Colonel. Did you really think that the little rumble on your Flight Deck was an isolated incident?"

"You're bluffing."

"Let's test that assumption, shall we?"

Seconds later, fire alarms begin to light on the board in the CIC, causing one of the duty officers to bolt from her position and nearly trip down the stairs as she reported to Narita.

"Sir, a fire just broke out in secondary atmospheric control. I was able to shut down the system, but it's going to be offline for a while now."

Slowly, Narita raised the CIC phone back to his ear and caught the phone on the other end again.

"That was just a baby. His big brothers are attached to your engines, fire control systems, and maybe even one right under where you are standing. This is the part, Colonel, where you ask me my demands."

"...I'm listening."

"I want a group of Boomers large enough to take a group of 30 men down to the surface, packed with weapons and supplies. I want them waiting in your auxiliary hangar and ready to go within three hours, otherwise you find that your position commanding this ship becomes permanent and your first duty will be to explain the deaths of a whole bunch of civilians."

"That doesn't give us much time. I'll see what I can do."

"You do that, Colonel, and maybe I'll see about keeping these people alive while I'm waiting. Just don't make me wait too long."

With that, the silver-haired man hung up the phone and nodded to one of his associates, who took his position as the leader walked into the curtain-enclosed area and tossed a small medical kit down on the floor between Heldane and Medina.

"That should be everything that you need to patch him up," he said with a surprising sense of sympathy. "We aren't monsters, you see."

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EDF Atlas CIC

Invoking the image of his predecessor, Narita pinched the bridge of his nose softly as he contemplated his options in silence. After a few seconds, he locked eyes across the table to the waiting face of his Wing Commander.

"You better get to work."

With that, Morrow bolted out of the room with half a plan and no time to waste.

"Ensign Grey, have a fire team assemble in the auxiliary hangar. And if you're not to busy, now would be a good time say a prayer."

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EDF Atlas Flight Deck

"Make a hole, make a hole!"

The last time Aiden Morrow ran that fast, he'd been an Echo cadet contending for the Cup. The stakes were just a little higher now. Flying down the manual hatchway and barely touched the rungs of the ladder as he crashed onto the Flight Deck, he skidded in front of Jason "Digger" Mieczyslawa, grabbing the chief by the arm and jerking him to face the officer.

"You're with me, Chief. We've got about five hours of work and half that time to do it in," he spoke at a million miles an hour. "When's the last time you took a walk in space?"

"Let's walk and talk, Chief," the young officer said, taking one last overarching glance at the intricate dance that was the full-scale relief and repair effort going on within and around the flight deck. Nary a soul on the entirety of the Atlas was off-duty at the moment, every half-able-body of a crewman work on something. About the only way to find some rack time in the middle of all this was to have been witness to a suicide bomb and take a personal flight across the deck yourself. Some people had all the luck.

"See, as the cruise director on this luxury trip around the Karas System, it's my job to make sure that all the passengers are cozy and comfortable. I've been hearing some nasty reports that the emergency ventilation shafts for our luxury Cargo Bay suite aren't up to snuff, so I was looking for someone that might be looking for a little crawling action."

The crpytic conversation lasted long enough to carry the two men into the same lift that had carried Digger and Blades earlier in the same day. As soon as the door shut behind them, the man in standard bridge dress uniform turned and dropped the pretense.

"Armed civvies rushed and locked out the bay. They've got the Captain, Doc Medina, and handful of others. Claim they've got charges rigged on half the ship. XO's been trying to talk them down, but he wants something down yesterday," the pilot spoke with no breath between his sentences, waiting impatiently for the slow lift.

"This war was a lot more fun when I knew who we were fighting."

Lt. Aiden "Roamer" Morrow
Sickbay, EDF Atlas
Melchoir System

The day was shaping up to be a banner one for the young pilot. Fresh off a public berating by his Wing Commander in the middle of a briefing and pulling the glorious position of manning the alert fighter -- sitting in a ready launch tube for half the night just in case something actually happened on what was turning into the most mundane joint mission in the history of manned space flight -- Morrow brush off the sleeve of his utility dress uniform and stepped through the hatch leading down the hall toward the Atlas sickbay.

If the day wasn't bad enough, he'd been putting off his standard round of injections and was going to catch more hell if he didn't get them taken care prior to his next launch. The standard joke was that you needed at least twelve shots to avoid getting an infection just by stepping onto one of the old Titan-class cap ships, but in this case it seemed that the Chief Medical Officer running things aboard the Atlas was either short of a sense of humor or suffering from on overabundance of satisfaction in sticking flyboys with big needles. Either way, Aiden wasn't going to weasel his way out of this one.

"Just in time, Lieutenant," a voice sounded to his left as he entered the bulkhead secured sickbay, causing him to meet the figure of Nora Grey, sporting a rolled-up sleeve and a bandage covered her own arm. Apparently the command and bridge staff weren't immune to the new regulations, either.

"What's the matter, they worried that you deskchair types are in danger of some nasty papercuts?" Aiden flashed the best smile that he could manage under the circumstances, never much of a fan when it came to needles, doctors, or even being around blood and sick people.

"Something like that," the young communications specialist said with a nodding, slipping on the jacket of her duty uniform and sliding off the examination table where she'd been seated. Black hair was pulled back into a tight ponytail behind her, giving way to exceptionally clear skin and bright blue eyes. "Althought I think they saved and extra long one just special for you."

"Well damn, thanks," Morrow shot back with a glare before Grey offered a smile and headed back down the same way from which "Roamer" had come just moments before. Good to know that some people were having a good time with getting filled up to their eyeballs with god-only-know what kinds of drugs. It wasn't long after the officer allowed his eyes to trail Nora Grey walking again that the technician fielding all of sickbays vistors for the shift was before him and checking another name of the clipboard.

"Lt. Moor-oh," she said, mispronouncing the name with all the concern and care of a leaf blowing on the wind, "last curtain to your left. Take off your shirt and have a seat, the doctor will see you in a moment."

"Right, thanks," he said dismissively, but not before the technician had already dismissed his presence and moved on down the line. Aiden was beginning to feel like a cog in a machine, just another running on the assembly line. Still, he found the curtained-off "room" and dutifully removed his jacket and shirt and waited with a long sigh.

On the other side of the curtain, someone was puking their guts out into what sounded like a bucket. Or a flight helmet.

A banner day.

Lieutenant Commander Delilah Medina MD
EDF Atlas MedBay

Previously...

“Are you sure this is proper? To be offloading so much of our supplies?” a nurse quipped. Delilah found herself standing in the primary medbay’s pharmacy, peeling off tabs and counting off additional vials of antiviral vaccinations. “If everyone gets sick, then we’ll be in trouble. Right now we’re not and we can prevent that trouble from coming. Keep shooting them up,” she instructed. The brunette was quite focused on the slew of vials before her but no sooner had the nurse left with a shrug than her fingers started shaking. The lieutenant commander exhaled deeply and set the vial of vaccine in her hand in a basket with twelve others. Gripping the edge of the steel table on which she was working, she tried to brace herself for the panic that seemed to continuously re-emerge. She was the bitch who ran things now, what with their chief of staff dead along with their direct Medbay CO. That left her unofficially in charge and making this decision.

Vaccinate as many as possible. If there’s an outbreak of anything we’re all dead out here. I have next to nothing in terms of formal drugs to dole out. All I have are vaccines. I had better use them. Her decision had been within perfect rational action in her mind. Yet all of her staff were barely following through with the protocol, including that last nurse. The woman was the ninth person that day to ask her the same question. Should we really be doing this? The vaccines were meant to prevent illness. They were also in foreign space, facing foreign bacteria and illness. The change in environment would be hard enough for some, even though the EDF Atlas itself hadn’t altered. Given their complete lack of supplies in the face of disease, even battle, she didn’t know what else to do.

“Ma’am?” one of the nurses asked. His name was Brad Dawes she remembered quickly. Delilah blinked twice and turned her head viciously to face one their male lieutenants. He was one of the few staff she had that hadn’t yet pressed her nerves and better yet, he was good with the patients. They call that bedside manner. Oh Lord how many times she’d been told she didn’t have any.

“Mhm?” she hummed, sighing again as she collected the basket of vials and moved beyond the storage area to their main medical area, designed much like standard Earth Emergency Rooms at the moment, providing curtained off areas for every patient in their cue. Apparently they don’t want the officers seeing each other shirtless.

“Nurse Hale is off duty. We’re now short staffed,” Brad announced. “I’ll be on the floor now. Have to make sure things are getting done now anyways,” Delilah half smiled, moving a gloved hand to her hair to brush the wavy locks from her eyes. Her most recent haircut was proving troublesome. The woman had called it layering, making her cheekbones more pronounced. Instead, half her hair refused to stay in a ponytail. She’d have to bug one of the other lieutenants for bobby pins or whatever she could to keep it out of her face. If she wore her surgical cap around everywhere, now, when she was trying to convey confidence in what she was doing, would likely only disturb any of the officers coming in for this. Not to mention the aggressive campaign she had planned for any of the passengers who weren’t crew, given that they were eons away from EDF health standards.

Brad nodded in response to her comment and moved, discarding his old latex gloves to retrieve a fresh tray set up with the prescribed doses and vials. Under his arm he maintained a tablet which flashed the information of the latest lieutenant to check in.

Delilah moved over to her primary nurses station, a circular hub close to the middle of the MedBay’s layout. Drop screens projected information as to who was in what curtained area and which staff were on the floor and who was off and how long they had before they would return. The new programming was something she’d just instituted but it was helpful to know who was on and off the clock and for how long. Delilah set the signed out vaccinations into a rolling trolley of other vials and supplies. When each officer checked in at the door, their information would allow a nurse to draw up the specific doses. Depending on their field and station they would face specific vaccinations. The more exposure they had, the more they got. As Delilah began to schedule in the next round of shifts it popped up on the touch screen that Lieutenant Commander Aiden Morrow checked in. “I thought we had covered all of the flight deck personnel,” she clucked, touching her finger to the corner of Morrow’s name to drag it to a tablet on the desk to her left. She set aside what she had been working on and the screen returned to normal. Delilah picked up the tablet and Brad came to look over her shoulder absently.

“He’s late,” he answered her, pointing to the stamp date in the corner that indicated when he had been initially called for his round of vaccinations. As the pilot walked by, Delilah watched him exchange words with another crew member, his eyes lingering more than she would have thought appropriate. “I’ll take this one,” Delilah smirked at Brad. “Be nice!” the lieutenant quipped. Delilah rolled her eyes. “Enough of that. Get back to work, all of you,” Delilah barked and at that came the loud struggled noises of vomiting from curtain three.

Delilah pulled a white doctor’s coat over her black scrubs, taking the tablet with her and a tray of several vials and pre-loaded syringes loaded to Morrow’s specifications. The doctor was quick and she didn’t doubt that he had been in the curtained off area for long. Part of the program required them to be fast on their feet. They had a lot of people to see and she had a rule with her staff on how long they could allow a person to wait. Delilah knew it would be ill of her to break her own regulations and so she was fast, whipping the curtain open and stepping inside the small area. Morrow was seated and shirtless. She bit her lower lip, glanced at him and moved quickly to close the area again.

“Lieutenant Commander, I’m Dr. Delilah Medina,” she introduced herself though she didn’t look directly at him. The brunette kept her back turned to the pilot momentarily as she fished through a small cart for a pair of fresh gloves. Snapping them over her hands, she stood tall and turned to him, flicking her head so that the loose strands of hair remained out of her eyes.

“So, what’s kept you Morrow? I have twice the reason to give these vaccinations to you in a less than pleasant way,” she taunted him, glancing up from the tray as she moved to withdraw specific doses. The tablet with his information was set next to the tray of vaccinations and she eyed his weight and height, mentally crunching the numbers on the fly before she stabbed the caps with the syringe tip and withdrew the appropriate amount. Three needed to be prepared, the other two were spring loaded needles measured predetermined doses. Apparently, on top of her vaccination scheme he was due for regular shots as well. Fun for me, not for him.

“Unfortunately because you’re a pilot and you're overdue, you get twice as much as the others but from the looks of you,” and here she paused momentarily to let her eyes take in his physique, “I’d say you’re no baby and you can take it, but I’ll pin you down if I have to.”

Unfortunately, Delilah couldn’t say why she was rambling off the way she was. When she looked up in his eyes, she saw charm. For a pilot, he lacked that rugged look that accompanied most of the flight deck crew. Instead he was well kept and, unlike herself, appearing well slept and fed. I need a break and I can’t even take one.

“Just remain seated upright,” she instructed, moving to his side and pulling the cart with her. She pulled a stool from the corner of the curtained off are and took a seat. Delilah pulled a handful of cotton balls into her lap before she took his right wrist with her left, gently guiding his hand to face palm up to quickly check his circulation. “At least one of us has been eating,” Delilah commented, seeing the healthy blue of his veins trailing up the length of his forearm. Dropping his hand she proceeded to wiping the skin of his forearm with an antibacterial swab. Here, she dropped her bedside manner completely. She focused on his arm the shots before her. Were it some other medical officer attending to him, Delilah didn’t doubt they would try to take to him to distract him. Delilah didn’t feel that kind, especially seeing as he was late. Instead she pulled the first syringe into her left hand and pulled the skin tight with her right on his arm. “Deep breathe,” she instructed before she stabbed the tip through his skin and into the muscle of his deltoid. The spring loaded mechanism in the first clicked audibly and she didn’t doubt that he felt it. “Exhale,” she instructed, swallowing herself and discarded the used syringe into a bucket of medical waste. “Four more to go.”