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Post by Cate Baxter on Jan 29, 2015 0:39:32 GMT -5
And then it was time for one of Cate's least favorite activities. She leaned back in her seat, popped open a container of pain medication and downed one of her hated pills. With that out of the way it was time to dig out... something. "I know there's pants somewhere in here..." She muttered to herself, grabbing her cane and pushing out of her chair to limp about for "proper attire".
Of course, Cate's view of proper attire was a bit different from most people. She briefly wondered if she could get away with one of her plainer pairs of pajama pants, but Silas would likely recognize the fake. She'd taken her pain meds, so she might as well dress up right. That meant rather normal pants, which for her were tighter than normal. Cate preferred loose leg coverings as to not irritate her old injury, in fact a skirt seemed the perfectly if she didn't have a strangely stubborn opposition to them.
After the pants it was simple enough; a fresh bright shirt, her overly-worn green sweatshirt, and then topped it off with an archaic aviator hat. The goggles were somewhere else in the room and after failing to spot them in a cursory check she returned to her seat to confirm a few aspects of the course.
"Sendin' you the info now Si." Cate's voice rang through the intercom, as she pulled up the relevant data and sent it to the conference room terminal.
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Post by Charlie Willow on Jan 29, 2015 10:53:30 GMT -5
It wasn't long before Charlie had that SD-12 in her lap, occupying her endlessly wandering mind with a bit of tinkering. Nothing in depth. She only jumped a little when the intercom suddenly sounded. "Don't think I'll ever get used to that." She mumbled, carefully replacing a screw.
"Once I know how to shoot this thing, maybe I'll get an idea." She grumbled, frowning at the plasma pistol before replacing it on her belt, and instead tinkering with her trusty, over-modded multi-tool and entertaining over-the-top fantasies of Cate and Silas fighting alien bug monsters all-heroic-like.
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Post by Silas Sedgewick on Jan 29, 2015 19:17:29 GMT -5
Silas muttered a silent thank you to Cate's reply, stepping over to the nearby console to look over their information. "Looks like the station is sitting pretty as far as energy signatures go," she muttered, her voice coming through the intercom rather quietly. It was still on, but she wasn't close enough to give anyone a heart attack with the sudden volume. "Gonna hail them now," she warned, clearing her throat and sending the proper signal over to the station, awaiting their response.
"Evening there, gents," she offered once there was a connection. "This is Silas Sedgewick of the Knight-Class T-22 Paragon, representing miss Soline of the Olympus space station. We're here on reports of a tripped beacon, and to follow through with security protocol twenty-nine are-three. Requesting docking patterns and permission to board."
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Post by The Tired God on Jan 29, 2015 19:22:55 GMT -5
There were a few moments of waiting before the hail was accepted. The viewscreen crackled into life, and staring Silas in the eye was a Narid who could only be described as "grizzled". His carapace was cracked and splotchy, giving him a well aged look, and his eyes seemed almost creamy with blindness. The way he carried himself, back straight and eyes narrowed into glaring slits, made him out to seem more like a mercenary than a scientist. "This one acknowledges," he croaked, his voice gravely and heavy. "Sending docking instructions to Paragon. Standby, representatives of Soline."
The screen flicked off immediately, the hail dropped as soon as it needed to be. The cockpit then lit up with lights as information came streaming through, giving Cate everything she would need to calculate the docking sequence, and then some.
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Post by Cate Baxter on Jan 29, 2015 19:36:19 GMT -5
Cate let out a low whistle as the Narid signed off. A sound that likely wasn't overly pleasant when run through the intercom system. "Nice folk. That was a Narid weren't it? I guess that means you get to be lead chatterbug on this trip Si. Ya better make sure they don't go fiddlin' with my baby while we're docked though. I have bug spray I ain't afraid to use."
Whether she was referring to actual bug spray, or some other toy was unclear. While Cate wasn't normally aggressive she did get pretty defensive when it came to others tweaking the Paragon. It was impressive Charlie got away with as much as she did with how new she was to the ship.
Once the system was done parsing the information Cate pulled up the parts she deemed relevant for her path and began to bring the ship in to the proper dock. With any luck her pain meds would be in full swing by the time the ship was sitting cozy and she could leave her cane behind. Or she could bring it anyway to swat curious bug fingers.
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Post by Charlie Willow on Jan 31, 2015 15:21:59 GMT -5
"What kinda voice was that?" Charlie garbled with her face a little too close to the intercom. Mentally, she made a note to finally ask who 'Soline' actually was. The name was familiar enough that she knew she had heard it before being on the Paragon and, as such, decided to completely disregard it until she had heard that weird heavy voice had said it.
"Wait, Cate, are they gonna start undoing all my fixes? I volunteer as bug spray-er!" She huffed through the intercom, thankfully a few feet further a way. The giddy mechanic was already pacing in and out of her little closet quarters. Truthfully, the more real this whole thing was getting, the faster her heart-rate was going, and she really couldn't sit still on her bed at one-twenty bpm.
Her voice slipped through again. "Bug spray. Bugs. Wait, what? Are... those those, er, aliens that I've heard about, Silas?" She popped a peanut between her lips to stop the rest of the word vomit of nervousness brewing in her bony chest.
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Post by Silas Sedgewick on Feb 1, 2015 22:09:38 GMT -5
"Narid," she replied over the intercom, right before leaving the meeting room and starting down the hallway to the boarding ramp. Given the unique layout of the ship, they would have to dock with the underside connecting to the station, and would need to enter a room designed to shift the gravity to properly board. The tube was in the same place as the boarding ramp, which made it easy to work with.
If Silas caught Charlie scurrying by, she'd wave her down and encourage her to join her at the airlock. If not, she'd simply speak over the intercom there instead. "They're a fascinating bunch. They don't understand pronouns, though. Don't go using words like "I" or "she" around them, unless you want a bunch of confused bugs skitching at you." Skitching was a slang word for the Narid language.
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Post by Cate Baxter on Feb 2, 2015 10:16:00 GMT -5
"They ain't undoin' nothin'. They ain't doin' nothin' neither. No Narid steppin' foot on my baby." Cate's answer rang back over the intercom. Of course, she wasn't going to be staying on the ship this time to make sure of that. At that thought, she realized she still had to pull on her shoes, and likely grab the sidearm Silas had her keep just in case things somehow ended up ugly.
Once that was done, the Paragon would be brought up right under the station, smooth as can be. A few presses of various console buttons would set an automated docking process. Normally Cate would handle this manually, but she knew Silas wouldn't want to wait for her to catch up once they were set to go. So it was that Cate left the cockpit and joined up with Silas and possibly Charlie down near the boarding ramp that they wouldn't be using.
"What kinda proper station don't have a docking bay of some sort?"
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Post by Charlie Willow on Feb 2, 2015 10:30:45 GMT -5
"At least it'll keep them away from the outside of the ship." She was indeed scurrying by when Silas beckoned her over, and Charlie was clunking her boot heels in place, up and down, in time with her own erratic heartbeat when Cate joined them in the airlock. "Unless..." Her eyes narrowed. "Can they breathe in space?" She mumbled, along with a string of inaudible little swears.
She silenced herself with another peanut--or ten--eyes locking on the tube they'd be traversing, then up at Silas. "Why am I getting the feeling that there was supposed to be a, y'know... human? That answered our hails? It doesn't seem like I'm the only one confused." Or she was. She was good at projecting her worries.
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Post by Silas Sedgewick on Feb 2, 2015 11:39:26 GMT -5
"It's probably just a small station," shrugged Silas, answering Cate's query to the best of her ability. "I don't think this is really designed with visitors in mind, plus there aren't really any ships docked with it either, so I don't think the scientists really ever . . . leave," she added.
"And no, contrary to popular belief, Narid cannot breathe in space. They can survive in the vacuum of space, but they still need oxygen, as well as protective goggles for their sensitive eyes," she explained, always happy to talk about the superior species. "As for human, I wasn't really expecting anything. Narid have been getting ingrained in human society for generations now. A little bit has been rubbing off of us onto them, and vice versa. I'm just glad to see an intellectual mind among them. Usually they're . . . a bit focused. They don't really . . . pause to study things, everything just kind of clicks for them, or it doesn't. No in-between."
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Post by Cate Baxter on Feb 3, 2015 8:41:31 GMT -5
"Basically Narid are like Silas, but weirder. There's a reason she works so good with them ya know." Cate elbowed Silas as she teased the other woman. "Anyways, Paragon should be handlin' the last bit o' dockin' as we speak so I hope ya both are ready." The pilot eyed the tube dubiously, despite her own words she wasn't so sure she was ready to leave the ship.
There would be a shunting sound as the ship and station connected, and several further clicks would occur as the boarding tube was prepped. "At least this is another space station, righ' Charlie? It'll be just like home for ya, 'cept with more bugs."
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Post by Charlie Willow on Feb 4, 2015 13:21:28 GMT -5
Charlie nodded quickly as Silas spoke, making a variety of facial expressions ranging from 'Wow!' with wide eyes full of intense curiosity, to a barely stifled 'what the frick-frack?!' cringe. Keeping in mind, of course, that she did not see the response from the station, only heard it. Her mind was sufficiently boggled that she could resolve her feelings to a muttered, "Must investigate more."
Her pulled her warm old coat a bit tighter, hiding her hands in the sleeves. The engineer was vibrating ever so slightly. She smiled a janky, anxious smile at Cate, then turned to the tube and stared. "Yeah. Just another space station. Not like I'm touching down on a planet for the first time. Easy peasy." She took a tiny little step toward the tube, as if to say 'oh yeah totally not afraid or nervous'. Somehow, the second step wouldn't come until Silas or Cate went through it.
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Post by The Tired God on Feb 5, 2015 11:12:23 GMT -5
With the xeno-specialist leading the way, the crew of three found themselves in a standard situation, though for naïve Charlie it was certainly a unique experience. They stepped through the airlock into a docking tube, which to the human eye appeared curved, starting at their level and then shifting at a near ninety degree angle, with the airlock into the station sitting at the end of the hallway, and on the ceiling.
The tube was white, clean, and quick to traverse. It set the standard for sanitariness aboard the station, one with health codes and rules that Charlie was breaking by just being here. The old coat might have carried some sort of foreign disease if it were from a planet. Instead it was just dirty, which to reclusive scientists might have been worse.
Entering the station proper, the trio of space-fairing adventurers found themselves in a large reception area. There were futuristic couches and chairs, glass tables with holopads positioned neatly on top of them, and even an honest to goodness plant in the corner, a tall fern that threatened to reach up and tickle the even taller ceiling, which was as white as the rest of the room, and sporting fixed panels which provided light and made everything seem brighter than they actually were. If the Paragon was sleek and elegant, this single room put her to shame.
At the end of the room, standing in front of a closed door, was the Narid Silas had spoken to. He was tall, even for his race, and stood at an intimidating nine feet. His face and carapace showed his age, the colors muted and dark, unlike that of one younger which might sport colorful bursts of orange or green, or the females who were even more vibrantly hued. He wore a white labcoat over a set of scrubs, designed to keep his unique physiology in mind, and at his side he held an old fashioned clip-board.
"This one is honored to meet representatives of Soline," he gargled, bowing his head and suddenly losing a few feet with the gesture. "How might this one be of service?" he croaked, tilting his head and waiting for a response from one of them.
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Post by Silas Sedgewick on Feb 5, 2015 11:19:34 GMT -5
Silas took charge and led the three into the station. She certainly wasn't going to ask Cate to do it, and poor Charlie might end up having a heart attack if she was given too much responsibility. That or she might vibrate through the walls and slip into the vastness of space. Either way, no more engineer, which was very bad.
As they went into the tube, Silas set the example of simply pressing on, one step after another. She followed the curved path and seemed untroubled by it. Once Charlie went she'd find out that the gravity in the tube allowed them to virtually walk on walls, to re-align them so that they were on the same plane as the station.
"Smiles, people," suggested the gunslinger, as she opened the door and stepped into the white reception room. She had to tip her head and shield her eyes to get used to the sudden burst of brightness and cleanliness. She couldn't ever recall seeing the Paragon this shiny, and it had chrome panels in some places!
It was so bright that she hardly even noticed the Narid standing across the room, right up until he started speaking, which by then Silas had adjusted a small amount, and forced herself to stand up straight to seem presentable. "Several days ago there was a tripped beacon? A security breach? I need to look at the station's records, and do a headcount of the staff. Any research that has been conducted in the past two months will need to be compiled and handed over as well," she explained, her serious business face on.
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Post by Cate Baxter on Feb 5, 2015 11:50:28 GMT -5
"When am I ever not smiles? Actually, when are either me or Charlie not smilin'?" Cate's elbow nudged Charlie as she followed after Silas, and as the door opened into a room of blaring white she let out a low whistle. The Narid was the next thing to catch her eye, and she held back a snicker at the bug in the labcoat. Certain outfits just looked ridiculous on Narid to her, and this one was up there with that one Narid on Maya in the overalls.
Once Silas started talking business Cate knew to just hang back, it was her usual style to do so although normally hanging back meant staying in the comfy cockpit. Instead she leaned back to Charlie and tried to catch the no-doubt over-excited engineers attention. "How much ya think they're gonna have to scrub this place down after we leave?"
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