Unexpected Encounter 2
06 Apr 2016Rebecca Hail
Ria woke up lying on a cold, hard metal table, to a painfully bright light shining into her eyes. Her hands and chest hurt like hell and, confused, she blinked a few times before she realized she was looking into a bright lamp. She looked around trying to recognize her surroundings. Slowly her eyes adjusted to the bright light and the contours of the room began to sharpen. She was in a white, sterile-looking room with a lot of small locked cabinets and well-ordered shelves.A sudden deep voice behind her said in a curious tone: "I think she's awake.". Ria winced and tried to move her hand to shield her eyes against the bright light, but her arm didn't want to move. Perplexed, she lifted her head and saw the blurred outlines of leather handcuffs around her wrists and ankles. Another, probably female, voice said something but she couldn't understand it.
Slowly she started panicking and, totally focussed on breaking free from the handcuffs, she didn't notice the woman behind her until she pressed something against the side of her neck. She felt a sudden sting and her head fell back onto the thin pillow. The last thing she saw before she drifted back into the sleep was the blurry face of a blonde woman leaning over her.
„Why did you stun her again? And could you switch the camera back on?“, Derry asked while slowly going through his notebook. As someone who helped creating the Standard Operating Procedure, he noted every step Rebecca took when dealing with the stowaway, since it was a new situation. Rebecca covered the young stowaway with an isolating blanket, then turned back to the monitor displaying Derry, Noah and a few other rats who had heard of the incident and were free.
„Ship, activate the communication camera in the infirmary.“
One of the rats in the background grumbled: „Damn, you covered her up again.“, and earned a sharp look from Derry and Noah.
„I stunned her because a few of her ribs are cracked and I don't want her to break them having a panic attack. I'll go to the cargo hold, check if the equipment and limpets are still intact. Could you stay here in case she wakes up? She should wake up in around 2 hours but I don't want to take a risk.“
Derry looked at the young girl lying on the table, approximately 1,70 cm tall, a slender build, brown hair and sixteen years old at best. Then he said, „And what shall I do if she wakes up?“
„Calm her down. You're excellent at calming afraid people down. I'll take a com-unit with me so just say if something happens and I’ll come back up from the cargohold.“, Rebecca answered. Then she dimmed the bright lights and left the medical station.
The next time Ria awoke was much softer than the last time. Her head didn't hurt as much because the light was dimmed to a minimum and the only stronger source of light was a monitor somewhere to her right. The metal table was still uncomfortable but at least it had warmed up a bit, thanks to the blanket someone had put over her. She still felt the cuffs around her wrists and ankles, and tried to move with them, but they were as tight as before.
Suddenly there was a change of light from the monitor behind her and a deep male voice asked: „Hey, how are you?“
She tried to move her head to see more of the monitor but it wasn't possible to turn a neck that way without breaking it.
„Uhm, well, my chest hurts and it feels like the palms of my hands are skinned and I'm tied onto a metal table after getting threatened with a gun and got stunned by someone and I don't know if that someone will throw me out of the next airlock or sell me into slavery, but apart from that, I'm fine. Ah, and my head hurts, too.“
Before he could answer she heard the sound of the door and someone coming in. Her head turned around to see who was entering the room and she saw a tall blonde woman standing in front of the door. Ria was pretty sure it was the same woman who stunned her before. She decided to remain silent and observe the woman as closely as she could. Ria estimated the woman’s height was around 185 cm and her age somewhere around 25 years, she looked athletic, was relatively pretty with her blonde long hair and her symmetrical face, and carried a dangerous-looking pistol in a shoulder holster.
The woman walked through the room until she was behind her head, somewhere near the monitor, then she said: „Thanks for calling me up, Derry. I owe you one.“
Ria felt how the woman grabbed her metal table, turned it around and tilted it until she could see the monitor without problems. There were two men on the monitor - one older brown haired man and bearded with warm looking eyes, and a younger one with red hair who looked worriedly at the blonde woman standing in front of her. Ria decided to call the bearded man "Beardy" and the younger one "Ginger". The blonde woman turned her head to the bearded man and asked: „Shall we get started?“
Beardy just nodded and asked Ria: „What's your name?“
Ria thought one second about giving them a wrong name, then she decided to cause as little trouble as possible: „My name is Ria. What are your names?“
„And your surname?“
„... Finn.“
The blonde woman looked at Beardy again, but before she could say anything Ginger smiled and said: „My name is Noah. The one besides me is named Derry and I think you've already met Becci. She was the one who treated the palms of your hands and your ribcage, and she's the Commander of the ship you're currently on. May I ask where you're from?“
Ria carefully asked: „Why do you want to know that?“
Noah kindly answered: „Because you seem very young and we would like to notify your family about your whereabouts.“
„Thanks, but I can take care of myself. If you let me off the ship, I can search for my relatives and I'm sure they will cover the expenses I caused.“
Becci raised one eyebrow and asked: „Where exactly do you think are we?“
Confused Ria answered: „In Sol - my friend told me he would put the limpet on a ship going to Sol. He gave me narcotics to calm me down and keep me quiet for 8 hours during the trip.“
„Well, your friend lied to you. The Dark Runner isn't going to the Sol system.“
„Oh … where is it going then?“
Derry looked at Rebecca with an expression Ria couldn't identify and then he just said: „How much do you know about the space beyond the frontier?“
„Only that it's mainly unexplored and extremely big.“
Ria took a moment to realize what he implied with that question. Then she shouted out very loudly and in a panicking tone: „This ship is going beyond the frontier? Into the unexplored space? Are you kidding me? Let me out at the next station!“
Rebecca started calmly speaking again, „Unfortunately, that is not possible since we already passed the frontier and the twilight zone. This mission is planned for 2 months out. With another person I probably have to shorten it because of the amount of food I have on board, but it will still take longer than a month. I have a schedule to keep.“
Noah started speaking again: „To shorten it: Rebecca is part of a rescue operation out there and since you are already more than fivethousand lightyears out, there is no way she could turn around, let you out at a station and fly back while keeping her schedule. The limpets and equipment in her cargo hold are extremely important for the rescue. Without them, there is no point in trying.“