Rikki took the time given to head down to the Sick Bay of the good ship Bronze Bolt to stow her sea chest and take stock of things. Fairly standard layout, of course. A few bunks lined up along one wall, with the other wall lined with shelves and drawers presumably stocked with everything the expedition would need. She would have to make a full inventory later, but for now she would just have to take the Prof’s word for it. Dropping the sea chest on the bunk situated against the far wall, Rikki pulled the curtain around to wall off a little area from the rest of Sick Bay. There was no need for the Ship’s Doctor to be any further away than necessarry from her patients, if and when she had them.

Wanting to quickly return above deck, Rikki grabbed a large backpack that served as her field medkit out of the chest and swung it onto one shoulder. After lifting out the bottom of the sea chest, she pulled out a seven-cylindered revolver complete with holster and gunbelt in an almost reverent manner. Other than the extra cylinder, the revolver was a fairly standard one: longish barrel, regular ammunition, cherrywood lined grip. The last thing she pulled out of the chest before closing it were her goggles. Simple and practical, with a blue tint in the lenses, nobody sailing on an airship should go without them.

Satisfied that everything was in order, at least for now, Rikki hurried back towards the main deck. On her way past a set of stairs that led to the upper decks, something made her pause for a moment. It might have been a twinge in her knee, or a twitch in her eye that made her stop. There was a door, in an out of the way place, and only visible if you looked for it. With the shadows and the colouring of the door, it could be easily dismissable to the eye, but Rikki could feel its presence. Several moments passed, how many she didn’t know, when she was roused out of a stupor by the calls on deck, hand resting on the doorknob.

Puffing her bangs out of her eyes and readjusting her goggles, Rikki ran over to the railing to see what was going on. All thoughts of the strange door were completely forgotten as she laid her eyes on the huge chunk of metal. Something about it remided her of the Horned Men she had encountered during her voyages with the Deadalus. The metal thing looked like nothing more than…

“That’s the propulsion exhaust-thinger, isn’t it?” The Doctor asked aloud. “I’m not an engineer, so I don’t know the lingo, but that thing’s just a bigger version of what propels this ship. Something that gihugeic, though… that ship would be massive!”

Rikki peered around at those gathered around the rail, her eyes resting a bit longer on the girl that seemed to be floating at the rail next to her, before staring evenly at the Professor.

“Prof, if we’re going to check that thing out, make sure all your people are updated on their Tetanus shots before we do,” she said sternly, before adding more lightly: “But of course all you Cogsman folks would already be inoculated against whatever metals you work with.”

About to respond again to the Professor, Rikki was startled somewhat by a squee from a strange little girl. It registered in her ears on a different level than normal human hearing, which is why she pivoted so quickly to find the source of the sound. The next moment found the ship's doctor dropping to the deck quite quickly on her right knee, clutching her left knee which was shooting all sorts of pain up her leg. An old injury from one of her very first adventures had torn and more or less completely destroyed the patellar tendon, rendering her knee completely unable to support any weight. Except for the ingenious clockwerk brace Rikki had created, she would never have been able to move about with alacrity.

Pulling a screwdriver from a pouch on her hip, she quickly re-tightened the loosened screws that held it all together, and, after another moment or two of pain, Rikki once more rose to her feet. Only to find a student apologising to her about some sort of interruption.

"Interruption, dear girl? Whatever do you mean?" The doctor replied with a wink and a spark from her violet, not so human eye. "The Prof obviously has a lot on his plate leading this expedition, whatever it is... And hmm... is that your friend there who just squeed quite loudly and gave us all a bit of a start?"

A rather crooked smirk to show that she was only gently teasing, Rikki glanced about again for the source of that squee. Not immediately finding it, she called back over to the Professor in friendly query: "Just what exactly is this expedition about, Prof? You weren't exactly forthcoming when you sought me for this position..."

Finding herself approached by whom was apparently the expedition leader, Rikki smiled politely at the man and shook the proffered hand quite firmly. "Professor Evaristus, I presume? We shared some correspondence when you were looking for someone to fill this post. I'm used to reporting directly to the captain of any ship I am expected to serve upon, sorry. I'm guessing I'm supposed to be serving as expedition doc as well as ship's doc?" Rikki replied, noticing the man's glances and his avoidance of asking about her eye. "Yes, it is a clockwerk eye. I lost my real one in a bar fight..."

After laughing to make him think she may or may not be joking, she dropped the chest to the deck and kicked it open. Perusing the contents with a practised eye, she looked back up at the prof and said, "Well, I guess I'm better on supplies than I thought, so long as you are well stocked on painkillers and antibiotics..."

Clutching the sea chest that held all her meagre belongings and everything that consisted of her profession tightly to her side, Rikki disembarked from the transport ship as quickly as she could amongst the other passengers. For the first time in quite a while, she was merely a citizen aboard ship. It didn't really help though, as the man serving as ship's doctor was a complete quack. Somehow, word had spread through to the other passengers, and even a few of the sailors, that she also was a doctor. So, of course they came to her instead, and thus she hadn't actually relaxed to the full extent. And, of course, a fair amount of her medical supplies had been depleted. That was the first thing she needed to do after reporting to the captain of the good ship Bronze Bolt.

Wending her way through the crowd, it wasn't terribly difficult to spot the Bronze Bolt, surrounded by a crowd of students in the process of boarding. Falling in behind a woman maybe slightly younger than her, Rikki marched up to the forecastle and demanded of a passing sailor, "Where is the captain? Inform your captain that the ship's doctor has arrived, but has to replenish her supplies before we disembark."