Lt. Kim Stapledon - The Welcome Arrival of the Light

[John Smith]

((Int - Main Reactor Enclosure ))

There was a sickening thud against the transparent aluminum and Kim recognized the brownish spots.

Lim: ::Aggravated:: Are we ever going to get a break?

ch’Clex: Bring the dampening field down Lieutenant, we will cover you.

Kim forced the hatch open the rest of the way and realized she would need to crawl inside the chamber, underneath the main assembly.

ch’Clex: Commander didn’t you kill and cripple that thing?

Lim: Given what happened to your leg I don’t think killing or crippling does much here.

Her stomach churned at that.

There was a loud crash and a throaty roar and she dove down through the maintanenace hatch and under the reactor's main assembly.  She heard another howling sound, felt something grab her foot and twist as she scrambled to get inside the unit.  Pain lanced up her leg as she instinctively curled, pulling herself the rest of the way inside the hatch.

ch’Clex: We got to hold it of Kim…

She crawled deeper inside, as the maintenance hatch slammed closed behind her.  For a brief moment she panicked.  She was trapped inside of a massive fusion reactor.  Not only was the hulking machine running at ten times capacity above her but it was filled by horrific veins and vessels with Goddess-knew-what coursing through them.  

Lim: Keep going, it’s weakening!

Williams:  Response

Kim forced open the intermix chamber housing, retrieved her hyperspanner, and got to work.  There was another thud and a crash, a roar and some phaser fire.  What if their voices stopped?  What if--

More phaser fire, more crashes, more shattering glass outside.

She forced herself to ignore it, to unfasten the intermix connectors.  Having done so, she crossed the connections.  The reactor shook.  Was that the bear again?  Or something else?  Something inside.?

The generator above her made a loud banging sound.  The pressure valves of the runoff from the fusion reactor were failing, and the innermost safety chamber had been compromised.

She heard a sickening sound from above and all all around her -- something like a squeal.  She scrambled to pull herself out of the reactor but she couldn't turn around.  Pain shot up her leg as she tried to press against the now-closed hatch.  In the glint of her flashlight she saw a red tendril slide down along the wall, toward her face.  It swelled up and a flower emerged, just like the flowers outside, the ones that had exploded and--

ch’Clex: =/\= Eagle! Lock on our signals, Emergency beam-out, now! =/\=

Williams:  Response

The voices barely registered.

The flower expanded, its bulbous centre swelling.  She gritted her teeth, squeezing her eyes closed as she waited for the end.

Suddenly there was a brilliant light.  At first she thought the reactor was exploding and this was what it was like to die in a fusion reactor explosion.  And yet, something wasn't quite right.  There was something familiar about it all.  And then the part of her brain that had actually paid attention to the voices outside -- to ch'Clex's hail of the ship -- caught up with her.

Cautiously, she opened her eyes.

The walls of sickbay appeared around her.  She could hear people milling about above.  Her legs slid straight again as she looked up.

((Sickbay - USS Eagle-A))

Lim/Williams/ch'Clex:  Response

Stapledon:  ::Reflexively::  Is everyone alive?

Lim/Williams/ch'Clex:  Response

--

Lt. Kimberly Stapledon

Chief of Science

USS Eagle-A

I238601KB0

Pronouns:  

Character:  She/Her 

Writer:  He/Him