Lt. Commander Doz Finch - Heads or Tails (Part II)
Doz Finch
((The Underbelly, Tanglewoods, Gateside Dimension))
She craned her helmet up to the latticed sight of creatures swimming across one another, the surface of the water lit up by her sizzling flare. Could the other two see it? Were they already there? Perhaps it was more danger than it was worth, and it was tactically better for them to leave her behind. It wouldn't be so bad, would it? She was terribly diplomatic when she wanted to be, and could probably corral a pod-person or two to start a new village there, hold weekly festivals and fairs somewhere in the trenches of the Tanglewoods.
If she didn’t drown to death, that is.
Espinoza: …there! There! I see it! It’s on your side, but I don’t see Commander Finch. Commander! Can you see her?
Neathler: Response
Like angels from above, their voices danced into her helmet again, a tad fuzzier than normal but clear enough to make sense of. They were trying to find her, but they weren’t going to have a lot of luck if she continued to float there in the depths. And there was the matter of the village mob swimming above and around her, who she’d rattled with a phaser shot — great thinking, you silly old cow.
Espinoza: I think she’s under the water. Your side, Commander, right below the flare. Atlas!
Neathler: Response
She tried to swim upwards at an angle away from the ferocious creatures, but felt the sting of another tail slap against her body just as rapidly. Their own version of a warning shot, perhaps. Don’t even think about it, human. We’ve got you surrounded, and we’ll have you turned into a flower mutant if you don’t pack it in.
Rather frustratedly, she squinted in other directions. Could she swim sideways? What would she gain from that? Not a whole lot. What about downwards? Was there anything there she could hide in, another tunnel maybe? She was quite talented when it came to traversing Jefferies tubes, so how different could it be?
Finch: Samira, Mister Espinoza, can you hear me?
Neathler / Espinoza: Response
Finch: I don’t want to worry either of you, but I’m underwater. Deep underwater, loveys. I was dragged down here by a school of…something or other. They’re circling above me near the flare! And, surprise surprise, they’re not very friendly.
Neathler / Espinoza: Response
Time.
There never seemed to be enough of it, and yet sometimes there really was too much of it. It was a thought that played in repeated cycles, tagging itself onto every idea that sprouted out of the sponge in her skull. Fiddle with the tricorder and cause it to explode, give em' a shock. Use the weapon to create a localised heat surge, boil and bubble em' up. Stab one of the creatures with her wrench.
Did she even have the wrench with her?
Don't be so utterly ridiculous.
As schemes moved through the plafond's of her mind, her body drifted slightly in the water, as if there had been movement nearby.
Another one of the creatures?
She turned.
It was the figure of a man slowly swimming past her, his cottony hair flowing gently under the crepuscular rays beaming through the surface of the water.
He gestured for her to follow him, his smile gentle like home.
Neathler / Espinoza: Response