Talis In Vita

SECTION #2
Three days and a couple of crew changes later, Neraya sat at a bar on Mars, ignoring the constant looks she got from the other bar patrons. She was now envious of Vremanda Potter (who she always referred to as ‘medic’), who, as a Martian, wasn’t out of place. Around the circular table sat Peter Sumner (the Spacerunner’s captain sat to Neraya’s left), Gil Barain and Vremanda Potter, who sat to Neraya’s right and was the ship’s doctor.
“What now?” Neraya asked Sumner, thankful that she’d engaged the privacy mode. “Ganymede Base’s gone, there are no other bases known to us. We’re reduced to half of the original crew and we have to double on jobs because of it.”
Sumner stared into his beer thoughtfully. “I don’t know.” He admitted. He didn’t say anything more.
“We can’t stay here long. It’s possible that the street law that caught Kalim have gotten enough information out of him to go after us.” Neraya added.
“That was half of Mars away.” Vremanda pointed out.
Neraya gave her a thin smile and Gil rolled his eyes.
“Street law are like bloodhounds.” Sumner said. “I’m going.”
He stood up and pressed the button that would disengage privacy and then left without finishing his beer.
Neraya, Gil and Vremanda just looked at each other.
“I suppose it all went downhill when Amar killed himself.” Neraya said quietly.
“I couldn’t do anything.” Vremanda remembered.
“Of course not, he was dead.” Gil said.
“We have the two we came for.” Neraya said. “We’d better leave. And hope.”
“Hope we don’t get caught.” Gil said gloomily.
“No, hope that those two Terrans can cheer us up!” Vremanda said lightly.
It brought a smile to the faces of her two companions, but that was all.
They trudged back to the Spacerunner’s docking room, occasionally glaring at Martians who stopped to openly stare at this bunch of people with skin that wasn’t brown and hair that didn’t have a red tinge.
It all went to prove that the Terrans and Lunans didn’t have much to do with Mars, Neraya thought sardonically, after all, the gravity and atmosphere of Mars made all people look the same one way or the other and the Federation had always kept the Martian governor, well, Martian. It really depended on who annoyed or bribed whom, though. It always did.
They entered the hallway of the Spacerunner and immediately headed to the mess room.
The two spoken of previously were there. Tobias Ramon and Rafe Katanai were the only ‘loose’ rebel operatives that anyone in the crew knew of so they’d travelled to Mars to tell them what had happened. Tobias and Rafe had volunteered to help out and had been taken up on their offer.
“You need cheering up,” Rafe said as they entered. He had a mountain of food pills at his elbow.
“Got any new food pills?” Vremandra asked, hoping that this selection wasn’t nearly as boring as the last lot had been.
“A lot. If pill vendors weren’t machines, they would have been suspicious at the number of pills we took.”
“Which flavours? Any of the traditionals?” Gil asked in interest, pulling up a chair and sitting down.
“Roast chicken, roast turkey, Peking Duck, lasagne, Mongolian chicken and corn soup – ” Rafe read out the labels. It was amusing to watch, actually. Rafe had black hair, tanned skin and looked like he should be lifting weights to get a bit more muscle going. The sight of him reading out pill labels was unnatural.
“Ah, corn soup, my favourite.” Neraya said happily, taking a seat next to Gil. “Any from Luna?”
“He got all Earth recipes. Always does.” Tobias spoke up. He had auburn hair and slightly tanned skin. He looked like he was the one who should be reading the labels.
“Oh well.” Neraya said, somewhat regretfully, before thinking on business. “We need to get rosters.”
“Does your mind always come back to work?” Vremanda asked.
“I’m half-Lunan, it comes with it.” Neraya replied. “I’m on board the ship, so my mind returns to work easily.”
“Mmm, best to get work out of the way first.” Rafe said. “What do you need to know?”
“I need to know what you can do. Specialties and such.” Neraya pulled out a Pad, an IX Series 4 and started typing names in a database.
“Well, I can qualify for weapons system operator.” Rafe said. “I’m a weapons expert and I qualify as a weapons system operator as well.”
“Science, pilot or communication. Also intelligence.” Tobias told her.
Neraya finished typing and then passed the Pad around. It said;

Avon, Neraya – commander
Barain, Gil – engineer/defensive systems operater
Katanai, Rafe – weapons expert/weapon system operater
Potter, Vremanda – ship’s doctor/scientist
Ramon, Tobias – pilot/communications/scientist/intelligence
Sumner, Peter – captain

“That’s good. That covers all areas.” Rafe said when the list got around to him. “You’re going to have to narrow it down, though.”
He handed it back to her, and Neraya made the necessary deletions, passing around the Pad when she was finished the new list. Given the tiny amount of modification needed, it took a few a few seconds for her to organize everything.

Avon, Neraya – commander
Barain, Gil – engineer/defensive systems operater
Katanai, Rafe – weapons expert/weapon system operater
Potter, Vremanda – doctor/scientist
Ramon, Tobias – pilot/communications

“I’m sure we don’t need the captain on the list.” Neraya said, handing the list back around. “I’ve got everyone doubled for duties and I don’t want to triple anyone.”
Rafe handed the list back to her. Judging from the general silence but slight enthusiasm (after a day of depression, the prospect of returning to work always did that) in the air, it was acceptable, so Neraya printed out enough copies to go around.
“The majority of you won’t need it, but the minority will.” She told them. “I’ve made the list, but, right now, I don’t know what to do.”
The enthusiasm grew. Apparently brainstorming was a favourite.
“We’re the last rebel ship and we don’t know where the bases are, so let’s find them.” Vremanda said.
“And get ourselves killed?” Neraya asked dryly. “I’m in favour of doing some serious damage to the Federation before they destroy us.”
“Good, but that’ll get us killed quicker. I say we should go back to Ganymede and see if anyone survived or if we can find some record disks in the ruins.” Gil said.
“Record disks would be completely covered over with debris and Ganymede doesn’t have any wind so we’d have to spend days digging. But yes, we should return to Ganymede.” Neraya asserted. “Any other ideas?”
Rafe and Tobias said nothing. Everyone else put it down to the fact that they weren’t part of the original crew and felt that they should leave the vote up to more experienced people.
“I’d brief the captain and he’ll decide.” Neraya sounded as though that wasn’t a good idea. “I should be able to draw up a complete roster after the decision.”
She got up from her chair and walked off to find the captain, pausing at the doorway to instinctively scan the corridor in both directions.
“Now, what were you saying about the pills?” Vremanda asked and Rafe began to read the labels again.
Neraya inwardly groaned. Poor guy. Thankfully, she was out of the door before she could be subjected to hearing the pill labels.
One of the things with a scout ship was that it could comfortably hold twenty crewmembers, still have top-of-the-line equipment and still manage to be small and light. Unfortunately, the crew’s quarters were so spread out from each other – and anything else – that it took Neraya four minutes to get to Sumner’s quarters.
She pressed her hand to the ID-scan so that it could identify her and open the door. At the same time, it was letting the room’s inhabitant know someone was there.
“Access denied.” The computerized voice said after the scan was completed.
Neraya sighed and pressed on her badge, which was attached to her black shirt. “Gil, can you override the door system?” She asked.
A moment later, Gil’s voice came back through the badge. “I’ll be there shortly.”
Neraya pressed the badge again and waited until Gil arrived, override control in hand. He pressed the override control against the ID-scan and pressed a couple of buttons.
“Access denied. Access denied, access denied, access denied, access granted.” The voice said as the door slid open.
“Thanks.” Neraya said.
“No worries.” Gil said, and then looked at the override control. “It’s working better than usual. Besides, I need to see Sumner myself. I need to get some spare parts for a few of my devices.”
“Well, why didn’t you come along in the first place?” Neraya asked.
“And miss the chance to see Vremanda discomfiting our two new crewmembers?” Gil grinned as he stepped inside the room and looked around. “He’s not here.”
“Nonsense. He’s always here.” Neraya stepped in and looked around herself. “He’s probably in one of the other rooms.” She walked to the room on her left and froze.
“What’s wrong?” Gil asked when he saw her. When the answer of a pointed finger came, he paced over to have a look. Falling back a few paces, he swore.
“Suicide.” Neraya said quietly. She felt sick, although not as sick as she had when the Ganymede Base had been destroyed.
“I know, but did he have to…” Gil asked, his voice trailing off.
“Medic, Rafe, captain’s quarters, medic, get a body bag.” Neraya said into her badge, after pressing it. She pressed it again once she was finished. “All the signs were there. But suicide didn’t seem likely.”
“No.” Gil agreed. “Why did you call Rafe?”
“He’s the weapons expert. I can’t see a weapon and I am not about to take a look around for it, either. I want Rafe to examine the weapon and when Vremanda’s done with the post-mortem and done a report on how the fatality occurred, I want to compare how the fatality happened and Rafe’s analysis of how the weapon could kill a person at close and distant ranges.”
“With a sentence like that, I can almost believe you’re military.” Gil remarked.
“Most of my people act that way.” Neraya replied. “After all, Luna is the Federation’s main army base. I will admit that there are times when I wish that I did have military training. It would be very convenient.”
“If you had military training, you wouldn’t be here. You’d be with the Federation, accepting bribes.”
Neraya winced. “I don’t like that mental image of myself.” She objected.
“I’m sure the Federation doesn’t, either.” Gil said.
“Mmm – I wonder what they call it? Additional tax payment for a good cause?” Neraya half-joked as Rafe and Vremanda, who was carrying a body bag, entered the room. “In here. Be warned, it’s not pretty.”
“No death is.” Vremanda said grimly.
“This is a lot worse than what Amar did.” Gil also warned them. Then he and Neraya stepped away.
Vremanda dropped the body bag, went pale and started looking for the bathroom. Spotting it, she rushed off to remove the contents of her stomach. Rafe just blanched.
“I don’t think she’s well-aquainted with death.” Neraya commented.
“I don’t think anyone’s well-aquainted with the shot-off head version of death.” Rafe told her shakily.
“Well, not the shot-off head version, but she is familiar with the decapitated version. We all are.” Gil said grimly, remembering Amar.
“Not now.” Neraya said. “Rafe, I want you to examine the weapon and write a report on what it is, what sort of injuries it causes, detailing all ranges. We haven’t found the weapon yet.”
“Have you looked?” Rafe inquired his voice more steady now.
Neraya and Gil swapped glances. “No.” Neraya admitted. “But I would have, eventually. I’ve seen plenty of dead bodies, we – with the exception of Vremanda – all have. I’m assuming you’ve seen a fair amount, too.”
“I have.” Rafe acknowledged. “They were usually all shot, though.”
“Well, there you go, we’re all veterans.” Gil said.
Vremanda poked her head around the corner, which was followed by the rest of her body. Everyone started smirking a little immaturely.
“What’s wrong medic, you look a little green.” Neraya said. Vremanda did look green – about as far as a Martian could. She also looked like she had just woken up from an hour-long sleep when she had needed twenty hours of sleep.
“Well, I’m glad all you veterans are enjoying yourselves.” She snapped, but the smirks didn’t die down after she had spoken. “You’re not the ones who have to put the body in the bag.”
“Good point.” Rafe said.
No one moved until Neraya walked over to the body bag and grabbed both it and Vremanda, who had returned to stand next to it. “Come on, medic, I’ll help you move the body to the bag.” Neraya said, dumping the body bag next to Sumner’s body. “I was moving corpses when I was a kid. Some of them were worse than this one is.”
“If some of them were worse than this, then why did you freeze up when you found it?” Gil asked, making a mental note to ask Neraya about what precisely had happened before she joined the rebellion. Vremanda also made a similar note.
“I knew him. I didn’t know those other corpses so it didn’t really matter to me.” Neraya said.
“Sounds like you should have been the doctor, not me.” Vremanda told her, walking over to the general area around feet of the corpse.
“Everything militiant is Lunan, everything scientific is Martian, everything politic is Terran and everything still settling is Venusian.” Neraya type-casted, very reluctantly grabbing the corpse by its shoulders as Vremanda – with even more reluctance – grabbed the feet. They both lifted and settled the body into the bag. Vremanda zipped up the bag and then both women shuffled carefully out of the room, past Gil and Rafe and out of the door.
“Don’t forget the weapon!” Neraya yelled from the corridor.
“This is not good.” Vremanda said, looking like she was about to perk again.
“No, but I’ll expect a full report.” Neraya told her.
Vremanda winced.

[quote] I was wondering, does the story take place during the early days (pre-Enterprise) of the Federation from Star Trek? [/quote]

No, actually, it doesn’t! I originally started writing this (and pinched cloaks and transporters from Star Trek in the progress).

I started writing it and then I watched Blake’s 7 some 6 months later and nearly had a heart attack – it’s so similar! But at least on Blake’s 7 they didn’t have cloaks 🙂

It’s worth noting that the rebels have cloaks and the Federation have teleporters. The Fed don’t have cloaks and the rebels don’t have teleporters – YET. Kinda like the Fed and Romulans in TNG, when you think about it 😀

~~~~~LOL the car!~~~~~~
I never even realised!