House Call
Posted on 04 Jun 2023 @ 8:18pm by Chief Petty Officer Ibis Xeri & Captain Corvus DeHavilland
Edited on on 15 Aug 2023 @ 6:37pm
Mission:
M3 - Into the Deep
Location: USS Pathfinder - Guest Quarters
Timeline: After Turbo Lifts Go Up and Down
2507 words - 5 OF Standard Post Measure
To have said that there were a lot of moving pieces in play at the moment would have been a world-class understatement. Corvus had so many different issues in play in her head right now it was hard to maintain a coherent thought for more than a few minutes. It was bad enough that she’d had to make a list of all the items in play just to have a steadying point - a basis from which to work off of. The problem with her list, at least to Corvus’ mindset, was that not much of it was actually doing anything. It was all, for lack of a better word, touchy-feely. She wasn’t making repairs, charting their course, running drills or even deciding who was on what shift. She was checking in on the crew, making sure everyone saw her and felt motivated. Corvus thought it was bull at first, but after considering it for a bit, and putting herself in the crew’s shoes, she realized that the time when life had been most difficult aboard, seeing the Captain taking their problems seriously had done a lot to make her feel more valued. Calliope had been right.
Her first stop wasn’t to Sick Bay, though. It was to crew quarters. Namely the one assigned to the remaining survivors of the USS Sunrise, those that weren’t in the Sick Bay. Corvus still needed to spend some time with the Korin, and make them feel welcomed here, then make her rounds of Engineering before coming back to Sick Bay, but she felt that these people. These survivors needed comfort first. Had she the tools at her disposal that she had on OC, she would have brought a Counselor (or two) and though she debated summoning the one from Theseus she ultimately decided a quieter approach was in order.
Corvus paused at the door to the quarters that had been assigned to the survivors and adjusted her uniform, then pressed the chime. She wasn’t sure what she was walking into and so took a deep and steadying breath.
It was a long minute until the door opened to the dim inside of the cabin. A woman was there, barely more than five feet tall, although she didn’t even look that. Her was face even more skull-like in the sharp light from the corridor which cast harsh shadows. She looked up at the red haired woman in uniform, and noted her rank.
“Are you the Captain of this ship?”
“I’m Corvus DeHavilland,” she answered with as friendly of a smile, and tone of voice as she could manage. She didn’t want to seem disingenuous, but knew that a kind tone would go light years farther right now. “I wanted to come by and speak with you. Find out more about you, and what’s happened. And to make sure there’s nothing else we can provide for you, and your children,” she added. “May I come in?”
Her shoulders seemed to release from where she was tensing and she stood a little straighter. “So… you don’t have news. From sickbay.” She couldn’t read minds anymore, but Ibis decided someone would have to be cruel to deliver bad news with that kind of smile.
“May I?” Corvus repeated, gesturing into the room.
Ibis nodded. “If you’re quiet. They fell asleep.” She motioned inside. There was soft breathing from the sofa, and when seen from over the back of it, a thin preteen with blonde dreadlocks and a little dark skinned boy with a curly head of hair were loosely propped against one another, left where Ibis had pulled herself apart from their limbs to answer the chime.
“Ah,” Corvus said as she stepped inside, “I’m glad they were able to get to sleep,” she said, smiling at them. She didn’t have children of her own, though she wasn’t so far down the road that that couldn’t change. But regardless she felt a sympathetic pang of worry for them, and sadness for what they’d lost. “They’re lucky to have you to look out for them, Petty Officer Xeri” she smiled.
Ibis looked away, thinking of Laura and Matt, and Rachel and Jimoh. “I tried.”
Corvus glanced back at the kids, hearing one stirring. “I do have some information on Major Wallace,” she said quietly. “It’s not… bad…,” she said softly. “Doctor Corduke has informed me that he’s stable. They’re making sure his body recovers a bit more before continuing any more treatment. Once we’re back within the Starfleet comm’s relay network, he is going to see if he can summon a more qualified surgeon to complete the Major’s recovery. If not, we’ll continue to keep him stable until we can return to Obsidian Command. That’s where we’re going,” she smiled. “I command the starbase. This… this is just our garrison vessel,” she explained.
“Obsidian Command?” That was the hub of the ninth fleet. Her fleet. Still, by her reckoning, that was a long way for a garrison ship to putt around. She slid into one of the chairs at the glossy dining table, able to let herself relax a little further with the news that Wallace was something like stable for now. “How did you come to be in the Korix system?”
“The Korin sent for us,” she answered, then quickly as succinctly as she could outlining the series of events that had led them there. “Had we not stumbled on their space station… we would have never come this far.”
“The Communications beacon? I was told they sent one about ten years before we were interned on the island. It was a little too late for me to suggest any direct telemetry for it.” She smirked sadly while remembering back to how hard she’d reached for ideas on how to change their situation. “And I was short of enough chronitons to get a note back in time.”
She chuckled lightly in response, “It’s… I wish we’d found that beacon before. I was on the Challenger. We were one of the ships that went out looking for the Sunrise. When she didn’t return as expected, or respond to hails,” she explained. It had been a small blip in the grand scheme of things and one she hadn’t even really connected until after the fact. After they’d finished it all and were on the way home and she was trying to find out more about them. Only then did she realize that she’d been part of that.
Ibis momentarily hid her face in her hands. She’d spent so many nights with her neck craned, as if she could see a search party by looking harder. “Thank you,” she said. “I knew. I knew Starfleet would search.”
“I’m sure you have questions. I’m sure there’s a lot that’s going through your mind. I’m happy to answer all of that for you. But, my immediate concern is… what do you need from me? What can we provide?” she asked, hoping her genuine concern was evident.
Ibis looked down into the sheen of the table. It was something like meeting a genie. And yet she didn’t know what else to ask in that moment. She swallowed a lump in her throat before she whispered again. “I thought that island would finish us. Now. Or later. But now Wallace has a sickbay of medical help. I would have slit a vein for a couple hypos of antibiotics. I’d have given you my eye for a fistful of common antivirals. Now…” She fixed her gaze on the replicator installed in the wall across from them and shook her head. “The work I did to have a couple of ounces of fish to boil. The vile compounds I mixed to bust Kelbonite out of a rock so we could eat.” She motioned to the replicator. “Can you believe I haven’t even touched it yet? I don’t know what more to even want right now. I had the first hot shower in a decade.” She plucked her shirt. “The first fresh clothing not made out of seaweed.” She looked up and away, to the place thoughts formed and tried to think. “I guess I want to know. Did the Irix slaves really get back into the ocean? Did they escape the Pyrryx on the volcano?”
“I haven’t gotten the full report yet, but Lieutenant Tahriik was on the surface. With the Marines that rescued Major Wallace. He said that the people fighting with the Pyrryx stopped and actually fought against their overlords.”
“The Z’ala? They fought back?” Ibis looked shocked. There had been a handful that were turned against the Governor over the years. But for them to have turned wholesale?
“Fought back on their own. It was nothing the Starfleet team did,” Corvus smiled, having had at least that much information from Tahriik and Brightwood. The full details would have to wait until Finn was coherent, or Tahriik had a moment to compile his reporting on the matter.
She huffed. “Wallace told the resistance planners the Z’ala could still turn sides. I didn’t believe it. I…” Had she been jaded? Wallace busted his back keeping their pools pollution free and the Z’ala owed all their express food and accommodations to collaborating. Between that and the fear of retaliation for offending the Pyrryx on the volcano, she just had assumed there was little cause for them to change their minds about their god.
“I don’t know the details, Ibis, but you’ll be the first I share the reports with, ok?” Corvus answered with a smile. “All I know is that, after the Pyrryx was killed, they turned. All of them. Whether they made friends, took over for themselves, I don’t know… just that the Pyrryx hold seems to be gone. At least for now.”
“Hold on. Killed? The Governor was killed?”
“The large one?” Corvus asked, “In the… war armor, is it?” she pressed. “I’m afraid we know precious little about the Pyrryx. I would expect Admiral Sepandiar will be very interested in debriefing you when we get back on that alone.”
Ibis closed her eyes, reliving the moment of the nightmare shadow passing them over in the elevator’s alcove. In truth she’d lived under that shadow the entire time. “You’re certain? It’s dead?”
“Yes. Lieutenant Tahriik killed him,” she nodded. “He is the Theseus’ Chief Tactical Officer. Currently on my bridge until we clear this area,” she added for color.
“I’d love to thank him.”
“I…” Corvus shuffled her feet awkwardly a moment, “I can understand that sentiment, Petty Officer, but I think in this instance, it’s not something that the Lieutenant is particularly proud of. Taking a life isn’t easy, and from what I gather, his culture considers doing so a very, very solemn deed. Even if it was fully deserved.”
“Well then, I’ll thank him solemnly.”
“I’ll let the Lieutenant know how cruel this being was to you and yours. It may not be a thanks, but it will hopefully give him some comfort that what he did was earned by the Governor.”
Ibis nodded her appreciation.
Corvus put her hand on the woman’s shoulder, “You’re safe here. We’re well past the reach of the Pyrryx moving at high warp. As soon as we’re back in comm’s range, I’ll call for support to escort us home,” she explained with conviction. Nothing was stopping her now. They were getting home, hell or high water. “Use the replicator. Take another shower. Take three showers,” she chuckled. “But remember, no matter what… you’re one of us, Ibis. You’re Starfleet, and we take care of our own,” she declared emphatically. “You’re welcome on my bridge and in my ready room for anything, ok? Anything.”
“Okay. I’ll bring the kids to tour the ship. Ikemba... He’s never seen this kind of thing before now. And Olivia. I don’t know if her memory goes that far back. She was a toddler when she was handed into my escape pod.”
“I’ll take you myself. Just tell me when you’re ready,” Corvus shrugged.
“Wait. There’s something.” Ibis got back up and crossed to the bathroom, reaching beyond the door to the vanity counter. She appeared again with a padd and a pristine yellow case. “Wallace managed to keep the Pyrryx from finding these on us. He had us pass them around in a ration tin while we were stripped.” She extended them to the Captain.
“What is this?” Corvus asked, accepting both as if they might be the last testaments of all those that had died from the Sunrise.
“You know Marines. I wish Major Wallace could hand them to you himself and throw you a salute, but you probably want them right away. It’s the data recorder from the Sunrise. He was the ranking officer when we escaped, ordered to go with us. One of his men, well, he made sure Wallace didn’t stay behind with the ship. He gave Wallace the unit’s last letters. That’s the padd.” Ibis knew the story, at least as told to her by someone else in the pod who had witnessed it.
DeHavilland let out a long, slow, reverent breath. “There’s a lot of families that are going to finally have some closure because of this,” she said quietly. “Thank you. I’ll make sure that they all know what it took to get this to them,” she said, now clutching it all as if these were the most important things on the ship.
“Thank you. For sending help when you did. If Wallace had been fighting the Governor any longer, I don’t think he’d have the chance he does now.”
Corvus felt that statement like a punch to her guts. She hadn’t sent them. She had refused to send them. It was Declan that had made the call, against her orders and led them to the position that they were in now, paying for that call with his own body. Something he may bear the scars of for life. She simply nodded in reply, repressing the sudden rush of embarrassment and shame. “I’m going to make sure these go out as soon as we hit the relay. Take care of these little ones, and let me know if you need anything,” Corvus managed, having to clear her throat to get it all out.
Ibis glanced back to the sleeping kids. “I will,” she promised.
