Ensign Jocelyn Marshall - Aftermath
Jo Marshall
(( Main Engineering, USS Gorkon ))
:: She heard the cries for a report coming from Chythar, although she couldn’t tell where he was in the frenzy that Engineering had descended into. Her hands were covering the wound of the young Petty Officer, pressing down as hard as she could without fracturing bone, trying to keep the wound sealed, in a futile attempt to keep her lifeblood inside her body. It was already too late.::
Marshall: Doctor Skyfire! She’s bleeding out!
:: Jo looked into the woman’s eyes as she tried to gasp for air, a low rattle echoing through her chest and her hands gripping at Jo’s arm and uniform at her chest. The Petty Officer had beautiful eyes, blue and light, locking with Jo’s, as though she were trying to speak, to drift into her mind.::
:: Looking up for the Doctor everything felt like it was moving in slow motion. Smoke clung to the air, making it thick and hot, Engineers clutching at head wounds, holding arms in support, moving away from the twisted metal that was the destroyed console. Others barked orders, issuing commands to get the chaos sorted out before any more happened in it’s wake.::
:: She looked back down at the young woman and with her free hand covered the woman’s hand on her chest, holding it tightly, insisting she wasn’t going to let go. Blood pumped through the hand held tightly to her throat. Jo recognized the Doctor as he dropped down beside her, medical kit in hand, here to save the day.::
Skyfire: Keep pressure on the wound, darlin'. Let's see if I can make it work.
Marshall: Aye, Sir. ::she looked to the PO:: We’re going to get you through this, OK? Keep looking at me.
:: Chythar handed her some gauze from the kit and Jo attempted to move it to the wound under her hand, slipping through claret, her attempts in vain to stem what was fatal and already a foregone conclusion to the aftermath of the explosion. Shrapnel would be embedded all over the young woman. Jo didn’t have to be a Doctor to know that.::
:: She watched as Chythar winced, a detraction from his usual calm countenance. The young Ensign turned her attention back to the PO beneath her and gripped her hand again, squeezing it tightly, stroking with her thumb on the back of her hand as the Doctor worked and Jo attempted to stop what she could from the throat wound.::
Marshall: It’s not stopping, it’s not…
:: As she watched, the young woman’s eyes darkened momentarily before the residual energy in her body leeched out, replaced with a cold that Jo had never felt before. She held onto her hand as the PO left them behind, still trying to bring her around, still trying to stem the flow, still trying to keep her alive in the universe that wasn’t their home.::
:: Then, the blood flow stopped and Jo released the pressure she had been holding onto, falling back onto her legs tucked underneath her, looking up at Chythar.::
Skyfire: She's gone, Ensign...
Blair: Unfortunate. Commander Skyfire, see to the others.
:: Vocalising what they both knew. The look that traced across the Doctor’s face was enough to tell Jo that this wasn’t a regular occurrence. Death wasn’t an everyday thing, even on board a starship. She nodded, keeping hold of the young woman’s hand, laying it by her side, reaching up and closing her eyes. Tears pricked at the corner of Jo’s and she fought with everything she had to not cry, instead inhaling and exhaling deeply, running the unbloodied hand through her hair.::
:: This was not the time to fall apart. Emergencies needed to be dealt with and she was the Operations Officer. She slapped her comm. badge.::
Marshall: =/\= Transport for Petty Officer Gren to Deck 7, Morgue. Energise when ready. =/\=
Computer: =/\= Acknowledged. =/\=
:: The blue shimmering light of the transporter gripped hold of the Petty Officer and within a few short moments she was gone, leaving behind the pool of blood on the usually spotless decking. Jo stood up, the sole of her boots crunching. Her clean-ish hand stretched for the Doctor’s arm and she patted it familiarly, despite their brief professional relationship.::
Marshall: Thank you, Doctor. I’ll make a note to reach out to her family when we get home.
:: Chythar moved on to treat other patients in the lower decks of Engineering as Alex took charge of the situation. Decisive and commanding, the First Officer turned to the new addition to their crew, the Counselor, and instructed as required.::
Blair: Counselor, you’ve just become a nurse
Dowupa: Response?
:: And it didn’t stop there either.::
Blair: Mister Stoyer, I think we need to find out what happened.
Stoyer/Shaprio/Larant: Response
Blair: Marshall, we are going to need your help too.
::She nodded.:: Marshall: Yes, Sir. What do you need?
:: He was about to respond when a communication rang through the now quietened decking.::
Reynolds: =/\= Bridge to engineering. =/\=
:: There was a pause, minuscule as it was, as the military hierarchy demanded the Chief of Engineering answer, but Alex was the senior Officer so he took the charge.::
Blair: =/\= Blair here captain. =/\=
Reynolds: =/\= Status report. =/\=
Blair: =/\= We are still figuring things out for ourselves. There’s been an explosion of some kind and one casualty. Skyfire and Dowupa are seeing to the wounded now. =/\=
Reynolds: Response?
Blair: =/\= Stoyer and his team are looking into what happened. I’m thinking it may be related to the intruder alert. =/\=
:: If that was the case, there was going to be some evidence they could collect and it could have been destroyed in the blast. Hopefully it wouldn’t have radiated inside the tubes behind the consoles, instead blowing out externally. Jo wondered this as another voice entered the noise.::
Engineering/Any: Response?
Reynolds: =/\= Do we have warp drive available? =/\=
:: Alex looked to Cory, it seemed like everyone did.::
Blair: =/\= I’ll defer you to our engineer for that one captain. =/\=
Stoyer/anyone: Response?
:: Jo needed to move and do something, other than standing around waiting for the chips to fall. She moved, grabbing her PADD from the adjacent room, washing off the majority of the blood in the heads, and started to look up library files of previous explosions in Engineering. It could be simple. It could be complex. Was it random? A fault in the insulation wiring? A computer glitch?::
Skyfire: Rule 3. Other people's injuries are more important than my own, so treat them first.
Stoyer: Response
:: The majority of Engineers had been filtered out of Main Engineering, ready to give statements to the Security Officers making their way up. What was better, their Engineers had nothing to give them in terms of reasons why this happened.::
Marshall: Larant, is there anything on the Engineering logs that would indicate a problem or malfunction? Anything we can go off?
Larant: Response?
Marshall: I’ll check the records from the Ops systems, see if there’s anything suspicious from our internal scanners. Something must be there.
Larant: Response?
:: She looked for Cory, talking to Chythar in the midst of where the injured Crewman had been beamed out to Sickbay, thankfully still alive and not becoming a name on a plaque somewhere. Those were some heavy thoughts she was going to have to deal with later, in the privacy of her quarters.::
Marshall: I can carry on the investigation with Security if you need, Sir. The probe needs to be completed before we become more vulnerable to attack.
Stoyer/Larant/Skyfire: Response?
==
Ensign Jocelyn Marshall
Operations Officer
USS Gorkon
G239304JM0