The Graveyard at the End of Never #3

Posted on Fri Feb 17th, 2023 @ 6:07am by Lieutenant Thraxina & Chief Petty Officer Meredith Corden & Ensign Syaffia

1,195 words; about a 6 minute read

Mission: Mission 1: A Fool’s Errand
Location: Object B55677t
Timeline: During Midway's sojourn at SB10

The Guardian

Despite what she had been through, of the three uniformly clad women, Meredith was the least worse for wear. Syaffia looked virtually comatose and Thraxina was groaning on the sandy ground, holding her stomach and trying to stand up.

The shuttle sat behind them, for in reality they had never left this spot; before them stood an oddly translucent figure, the shimmering image of some alien species who was able to speak to them in an odd, bombastic, echo laden voice in their own language.

"Behold, visitors! I am the Guardian of Never! It is I who have caused you to see these long dead phantasms of your past!!"

Meredith ran first to Syaffia who seemed completely nonresponsive. She knelt down next to the cadet and felt her pulse, addressing Thraxina. "She's alive but she needs the medkit from the shuttle." She waited a moment to see if Thraxina would be able to address this strange alien, but only a moment. The situation was urgent. She spoke to the Guardian of Never when she saw the lieutenant was in poor shape. "These women need medical attention. We have emergency medical supplies in the shuttle."

The Guardian replied in his big, echoing voice: “Visitors to the Temple of the Departed You are welcome. They that have gone before are here to greet you!”

Thraxina was at least on her knees now, rubbing the side of her head. “Don’t bother... ow... he’s probably just a recording or a computer or something. We don’t want to set off another spate of painful illusions.”

She said illusions, although her pain and dizziness felt real enough and what she could see through her dim vision told her that Syaffia, too, seemed to have suffered some form of physical trauma.

“How’s she doing?” the Lieutenant asked as Meredith tended to the Cadet.

Syaffia stirred and scrunched up her face. Everything felt soft, like she'd been run over several times by a vehicle... which wasn't that far from the truth, actually. She registered voices around her. Lieutenant Thraxina. Chief Meredith. The Guardian... the Guardian of what now? Ugh, why did everything have to hurt so much? The last thing she remembered was the rapidly approaching shuttle careening towards her... in her memories the hull found its mark, and she lapsed back into unconsciousness with a weak sounding 'no, please...' escaping her lips.

“Behold! Those that once were, arise and speak again” the Guardian continued to ramble on like a dummy at a 20th Century Disney world.

“Let’s try and get her on the shuttle” Thraxina groaned as she got herself fully upright “... and hope the Ghoul of Ghost Town doesn’t try to stop us...” she winced and held her side: it felt like all her ribs had been broken one by one. “... not sure how much help I’ll be” Still, she dragged her boots, step by step to where Meredith was crouched over the Argelian’s crumpled form.

"I can carry her," Meredith said, as she gently lifted Syaffia up. She was ready to pause on a dime if it seemed to worsen the woman's condition but, barring that, she started for the shuttle with the Argellian Cadet in her arms. "Are you ok to walk, ma'am?"

"I'm all right." Thraxina nodded, then stopped. That hurt.

"See them again!..." the Guardian boomed, and Thraxina had to bite her tongue to stop herself telling him where he could shove his phantasms of the deceased.

They got into the shuttle and managed to lay the half-dead looking Syaffia on a seat. Thraxina collapsed into the co-pilot seat. "We'll have to lay a warning buoy once we're clear of the atmosphere. I can't see properly. You'll have to take off. Can you remember what to do?"

"Don't worry, I'm not expecting a text book take off" she actually managed to raise a pained smile.

"Emergency pro..." Meredith was already starting to say before she realized Thraxina was actually teasing her. She smiled back. "That's very understanding of you, ma'am." And they were rapidly rising. It was rushed in the emergency but Meredith remembered what she was doing. As soon as they were clear, she launched the buoy and, as he set course for the ship, she hit the comm. "This is Corden. I have two passengers in need of emergency medical assistance."

Thraxina was determined to walk out of the shuttle on her own two feet, and on the journey back to the Ship recovered sufficiently to do so, although still groggy and with a million aches and pains. If Meredith thought that she was in anyway monitoring her performance, she was mistaken. The Ardanan was too busy trying to keep conscious and not to moan in pain. She was more than worried about the Cadet in her charge, too.

When they reached the Midway and Corden got the shuttle though the hangar bay doors with all its paintwork still intact, she got unsteadily to her feet and gave the Yeoman a slap on the shoulder.

"Well done, Corden. Get the deck crew to shut down the ship and report what's happened to the Captain, I'm going with her to sickbay. Get down there yourself when you can, you're probably not totally unaffected." she ordered firmly, if a little woozily.

Syaffia felt herself being carried, put down and then rising off the ground on something hard. It was that that roused her, and she sat up with a groan, slowly taking in her surroundings...

Memories came back in force, rushing into her head and swallowing all other coherent thought like a tsunami, shattering all semblance of sense. Her father dying in her arms, the shuttle careening towards her on a collision course, that shadowy figure in the pilot's seat...

"NO! Nonononono! No! Please no, please please... I need out. I NEED OUT! This thing is a death trap, it's gonna kill us all-" The words ripped their way from the Argelian's throat as she lunged forward, collapsed to her knees with fatigue and began to crawl towards the pilot's seat. Her cheeks felt hot and wet; hot tears ran down her face and dripped onto her blouse. Her expression was one of sheer, genuine terror. Something was wrong. Very, very wrong. "Please-" She curled into a ball and began to sob bitterly, muttering to herself in Argelian.

By this point medics were more or less strapping the girl to an antigrav gurney while a not too well looking Thraxina held her hand and muttered surprisingly sympathetic if unpractised attempts to calm her down.

"There there, cheer up. Home now. Soon be right as rain!" and other ineffective admonitions.

"You need medical attention too, ma'am," Meredith said, politely but possibly more firmly than Thraxina would appreciate. The medics, of course, had about the same attitude.

Thraxina, was struggling with the pain and trying to keep some sort of officer-ly persona up. "You have your orders, Yeoman, get on with them" she snapped a little at Meredith.

"I do at that, ma'am," Meredith said with a smile. She turned and started towards the deck crew.

 

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