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 Posted: Sun Jan 23, 2011 7:54 pm
Why me? This decision must have come out of a lack of other options, not actual trust, she thought. Nevertheless, if the captain asked her to do this she would. She found it was easier for everyone if she didn't ask questions immediately after someone requested a favor, which was hard for her curious mind. So instead of bombarding the captain, Ashara took the handle of the pistol with a slight surprise. "I understand. How long are you going to be gone?" Whatever was going on, Pavan obviously needed Iris to be doing whatever she was doing. That meant Ashara needed to know if this was going to affect her appointments; and if there was a reason to be worried about whatever it was they were doing. However, she also wanted as few details as possible unless it was something she needed to know.
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Posted: Sun Jan 23, 2011 8:42 pm
"Not long," the woman responded, "I'll let you know as soon as we're back."
Moving quickly and quietly, she headed over to the other shuttle and slipped inside to find Letti already seated. "Do we have a location?" Pavan asked as she saw the data that was up on the nav computer.
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Posted: Sun Jan 23, 2011 9:08 pm
 Letti looked over as Pavan came in. Running a hand through her short hair she looked back at the computer before back at the captain.
"I think so," Letti said pointing to the computer. "We got this, and," she paused, "It seems to be our man."
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Posted: Tue Jan 25, 2011 5:35 pm
 Pavan didn't say anything else as she slid into the pilot's chair and instead started to undock from the Galileo. Mindful of the large ship, the woman gently maneuvered so that they were headed in the direction of their missing medic's transponder. "Iris," the dark woman said as she flipped a switch to communicate with the Galileo, "I need you to stay in the cockpit and watch for any unusual chatter. We need to know if there's going to be any trouble... hopefully before it happens." The instruction was a given and Pavan doubted that it needed to be stated, but it was more to make sure the pilot stayed where she was safest. The cockpit had various security measures in case of emergencies and Pavan also knew that Iris had added to those measures extensively since they'd had the ship. The next few minutes seemed to go by at an agonizingly slow pace as they made their way closer to the source of the beacon. There was a moderate amount of air traffic but that was starting to dissipate the farther they got away from the dock. There were also still a few smaller ships that were heading to and from the planet that curved far below. It was one of these ships that caught Pavan's eye, a shuttle flying low and clearly marked with Alliance insignia. It didn't seem to have an escort, which seemed to mean that she and Letti were in luck, but Pavan wasn't about to take any chances; just because she couldn't see any back-up didn't mean there wasn't any waiting to pounce. "Letti," Pavan said, not taking her eyes from the viewscreen as she brought them slowly closer towards the shuttle, "I need to know you're here. With me." The dark woman's eyes flickered for a moment towards the red-head. It was something that normally went without saying; Letti had saved her life more than once, but today was different. She seemed different, confused and anxious almost. Pavan wasn't sure if it was Rex getting grabbed or something else; whatever it was, though, she needed to know that the merc's head was in the game.
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Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 12:31 pm
Letti flinched in her seat as the captain said her name. Her eyes darted to look over at the other woman momentarily before falling back to the panels and screens before her.
"Sorry," Letti started with, "I'm here. One hundred percent."
Taking a deep and slow breath she did her best to calm herself. She didn't like letting her anxiety show, and she was upset that she had become so emotionally distracted for the job at hand.
"So, what's the plan?" she finally asked.
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Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 2:08 pm
She didn't say anything as her brown eyes narrowed, assessing Letti for a moment longer as the other woman fiddled with the controls in front of them. Despite what the red-head had said, Pavan was far from feeling reassured. However, Letti's attempt to direct the conversation back to the task at hand had merit and, despite the acting captain's misgivings, there were far more pressing matters to be concerned with. The merc would either do her job or not, at this point they were too far gone for Pavan to do anything but hope that Letti was good to her word.
Her hands tightened on the controls as she turned back to the viewscreen, voice cool, "The plan is --- Son of ahhhh!" Pavan attempted to bite back a yell as she yanked back on the controls to steer them away from the incoming debris of the shuttle in front of them.
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Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 2:25 pm
"Tah mah duh hwoon dahn!" the words escaped her lips before she knew she was saying them.
Her whole being was moving and shaking along with the shuttle as they maneuvered out of the way of the debris. And as the pieces of the other shuttle flew past their own the merc was scared to death that they were going to be hit and that would be the end of their little outing, not to mention the end of their doctor.
"What the hell just happened?" she asked the captain her eyes wide with a mixture of both shock and fear. Though the question was rhetorical, she still felt the need to voice it regardless of whether or not an answer could be come by.
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Posted: Thu Jan 27, 2011 3:04 am
The shuttle itself was falling apart, though the sound of rushing air was almost deafening to all but piercing noises. The sound of the shuttle itself falling apart in flight and his own heartbeat were such sounds. Three dead men laid without their utility uniform shirts and covered in their own blood. The medic himself had torn a piece of one of the shirts to use as a field dressing on his leg. His adrenaline was flowing through his body and gave him the strength to focus. He was in pain, no doubt, but from his years of dealing with it and his medical skills, he knew that pain was just a reaction. A simple notification that something wasn't right, no matter how bad it was. Soon the cabin of the shuttle was flashing with a red light and an alert could be heard, though barely. 'Damn, I thought I had more time!' Rex thought as he finished tying one of the shirts together.
With some fast adjustments the doctor's contraption was complete; a small, makeshift parachute only about two yards across. Using the bootlaces of the dead men around him and the shiv he had kept on him he was able to tie portions of the parachute to his wrists and ankles. Crawling to the door of the shuttle, he could not see much through squinting eyes. Overall he was evaluating a safe way to jump out of the craft. As he was looking back he could see another shuttle fast approaching the one he was on and recognized it. 'If there is a God, this is divine intervention at its finest.' he thought as he edged towards the door more. Just before making his final move to exit the craft, he heard a voice being spoken, so loud that it was blowing out the already fried speakers of the shuttle. "Mr. Seiben -- seems we-- CRRRKTZ --ed you a-- KZZST --ill meet again, I g--GMMM"
"Stop stalling!' Rex thought before he rolled out of the shuttle. Holding his arms and legs out, he winced in pain as his leg rebelled the movement with a force not felt before. Rex yelled in aggression at it, but could not be heard over the air speeding past him. The parachute was definitely providing plenty of drag and it pulled enough to stabilize him in his free-fall. Looking off to the side he could see that the shuttle he had just jumped out of was having random explosions near the rear of the shuttle, veered off course, spun a few times and then detonated in a fire quickly overcome with black smoke as the debris fell down from it. 'Of all the divine intervention I've encountered today, I'm going to need one more miracle if I hope to avoid hell so early.' Rex thought. Of all the FUBAR situations he had been in, this was certainly topping the list.
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Posted: Fri Jan 28, 2011 11:39 am
Pavan didn't respond as she gritted her teeth and reversed their thrusters, determined to put more distance between them and the distressed shuttle. The smoke that was billowing from the Alliance transport was making it hard to see; already the viewscreen had taken hits from chunks of flying metal, Pavan was sure any more hits from anything larger then her fist was going to cause it to crack.
The woman carefully maneuvered so their shuttle so it was flying slightly higher with the it's port-side angled toward their target. Keeping pace was becoming tricky, though the Alliance transport was rapidly losing altitude. Pavan was beginning to have a very bad feeling of anything being left alive onboard. She hadn't seen a shot nor had seen any force nearby that could have done this to the transport. While it was possible that it was a mechanical malfunction, she doubted the Alliance would be so negligent to allow for a prison transport to not be up to code. The third option seemed the most likely: an escape attempt. Although, as the transport continued to descend further down, Pavan began to mentally amend that option as a botched escape attempt. It certainly looked as though Rex had been killed by whatever had gone on internally. If that were case, they were going to need to get out of their before back-up showed up.
Just then, emerging out of the smoke and on the bottom corner of the viewscreeen, came a large shape. Pavan veered closer toward it to see it was definitely a man with his arms and legs spread wide to slow his descent... with something billowing slightly from his outstretched limbs. Whatever it was seemed to be working, if just barely.
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Posted: Sat Jan 29, 2011 9:42 am
The red head followed the captains gaze out of the cracked view screen, and saw the Rex shaped form falling rappidly towwards the planets surface. Her eyes darted from Rex to Pavan and then back o the controls before her that were blinking in warning and alarm.
The shuttle was build for short ship to planet runs not combat, and thus it was not designed with any shields or protection from outside forces beyond that of the vacuum of space. Though the little shuttle was currently holding itself together Letti was not sure how much longer even that would last.
Letti shut down the audible alarms and looked back towards Pavan, "We gotta get him quick or I have a feeling we won't be any better off than that Aliance shuttle."
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Posted: Sat Jan 29, 2011 9:09 pm
As Rex glanced off to the side he could see that the shuttle from the Galileo was keeping its distance. As he was looking, something caught his attention from above him. The debris from the shuttle was far enough away from him, but shrapnel from the final explosion was dispersing upon everything below it, including himself. As he pulled his chute over himself and curled into a ball once more, he could feel a few pieces of hot metal hit him and burn holes in the ragtag parachute. But then one piece shot in him like a dart. A sliver of sheet metal lodged itself into his right shoulder blade. He yelled in pain as tears flew from his eyes, the wind had masked the expression overall. 'Now is not the time for pain! Just get your feet on solid ground.' he kept thinking to himself as he slowly opened up once more to slow his decent. Now his arm and his leg both rebelled against the movement.
He had only ever jumped out of an aircraft once before and that was with a parachute and company to show him how it was done. The knowledge of that event had only taught him how to stabilize himself midair and that one fatal fact remained: He only had a minute before he met the waters below like a bullet hitting concrete.
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Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2011 10:40 am
"How close can you keep the shuttle to him?" Letti asked Pavan as she checked the technical readouts on the shuttle one last time.
Standing up she went into the main hold of the shuttle and scanned the area. Grabbing the heavy lifting harness she quickly took a lenght of rope and secured it to the makeshift harness.
Securing the other end to the sturdiest looking pipe she could find. Grabbing one of the bungies used in shipping, she attatched it to the side of the vest ans kept the free end in her hand. If she could make the mid air grab it would hopefully aid her in keeping a hold on the falling doctor and keep some of his dead weight off her arms. That is as long as her knots held and they both didn't fall to their deaths.((I appologise for any glaring mistakes, I'm on my phone and can't really see what I've posted. Also if you think it needs some revision let me know))
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Posted: Sun Feb 20, 2011 8:03 pm
Pavan's mouth was a hard line as she steered the shuttle nearer to the falling medic, the only answer that Letti needed. She would keep the shuttle near enough, but it was anyone's guess once the shuttle door was opened.
The craft was meant for prolonged flights in atmosphere, but flights in atmosphere (even in and out of atmosphere) were very different then flying with shuttle door open. The fledgling captain had rudimentary piloting skills at best; she was hoping that she would be able to keep the shuttle under control when the pressure in the cabin changed.
Ideally they would have had Iris here, but Pavan had long since learned that ideal situations seldom existed. This entire situation was teetering on the precipice of disaster and was hardly ideal, but you worked with the cards you were dealt.
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Posted: Tue Feb 22, 2011 11:48 am
She looked out the front window a final time to check her distance, and then checked her straps once again. She was as tightly strapped in as she ever was going to be, and it was now or never.
Letti closed her eyes for an instant and said a prayer. The merc had never considered herself religious, and didn't believe in a higher power, but when blindly jumping out of an aircraft it just felt better to hope that someone was watching out for her. She had never done anything like this before, and just thinking her fate in her own hands was just a little more stressful than she had anticipated.
With one final deep breath she readied herself and then pushed the shuttle door control. The door few open and the change in pressure sucked her out before she could fully get her bearings. Letti tumbled through the air, the currents bopping her about haphazardly.
It took a moment but she was finally able to streamline her body and fall headfirst towards the ground. Without goggles she couldn't keep her eyes open the whole time, but quickly opening and closing them let her keep the doc in slight. As she neared him she spread her arms and legs wide, and got ready to grab him. She only had one chance to get it right.
As she neared the falling doctor she reached out and was able to just barely grasp his arm. She would need just a few more seconds before she would be able to secure a tighter grip on him.
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 8:09 pm
Once Letti had ahold of Rex, the medic tilted his feet up and let the makeshift parachute off his feet. The result was that his descent was hastened to match the speed of the rescuing mercenary. Swinging under her, Rex wrapped his legs around her waist. The wildly flapping parachute caused enough drag to pull the two into a stable free fall, which kept them from tumbling. Rex soon let go of the chute and bear hugged Letti. A rush of relief came over him as his bloody and injured leg and shoulder could let off the tension that the parachute had caused. Knowing that the fight to live was not over, Rex reached behind the mercenary and grabbed the rope that tethered her to the shuttle and began pulling, reeling the two in. Using his right hand to hold the rope and his left arm to pull, his shoulder still screamed at him in pain, making it hard to focus with the inch-thick sliver of metal protruding from it. Though it was too loud with the sound of the rushing wind, Rex was yelling something along the lines of "Thank God yer here, Letti. Let's just… go." though he was in pain and starting to black out, which made any audible words that much harder to distinguish.
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