Routine Scouting Mission (Erosvigne & Torch)
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		<h2 id="linktree">Play-By-Post: Bondage, D/s, S&amp;M =&gt; Bondage: Human Solos =&gt; Topic started by: erosvigne on 22-06-2009, 07:43:47</h2>
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				Title: <strong>Routine Scouting Mission (Erosvigne &amp; Torch)</strong><br>
				Post by: <strong>erosvigne</strong> on <strong>22-06-2009, 07:43:47</strong>
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				Darkness. He was aware of it, so that meant he wasn't sleeping. Darkness that pushed in on his eyes, muffled his hearing, his feeling. The thought caused him to become aware of the fact that his tongue was too large in his mouth, his right knee was throbbing, and there was the distinct taste of blood oozing in from his lips. It was dark, and it should not be.<br><br>Joshua drew in a breath. It stank of fuel. Of fuselage. Of burning. His stomach twisted. Slowly, slowly, he opened one eye. The light fell upon the blue of his eye, the pupil painfully wide. A grunt pulled itself out of the back of his throat, vibrating along the delicate tissue of his soft pallet. Work-worn fingertips pushed through the short cropping of his hair, feeling out the edges of tenderness and swelling in the once-golden gleam of it. They came away sticky and red. Nothing too serious. A bump, bit of laceration.<br><br>His other eye opened, and he blinked slowly. Up.. he was staring up at his chair. Gravity was in full effect. Clearly it wasn't being generated by the ship, though the lights shone wanly, a few gaseous tubes flickering here and there. It was supposed to be clear sailing for another three days. He set his bloodied hand to the ground, pushed himself up to sit, and chanced to glance to his side. Joshua's stomach gave another turn, and he forced himself up to stand. Half of Cooper was there beside him, barely recognizable for the metal that had wrapped around and through him like gift paper.<br><br>"Routine scouting mission," his voice came out gravelly and rough. "That's all. Nothing special. What could go wrong? Just do this little mission, earn yourself some credits, and then take a vacation."<br><br>Joshua growled quietly, filling the relative silence, speaking over the horrible sound of air leaking. He didn't want to think about it. Couldn't. His head hurt too much. Besides, there were the others to check on. The door off of the main deck was decidedly stubborn, but after a good deal of cursing, shoving, and sweating, he'd managed to make a gap large enough to slip through.<br><br>"Report!" His voice was loud, gruff. His mouth still wasn't working properly. He was half afraid that there would be nothing but himself echoing back along the battered interior of the ship.<br>
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				Title: <strong>Re: Routine Scouting Mission (Erosvigne &amp; Torch)</strong><br>
				Post by: <strong>Torch</strong> on <strong>22-06-2009, 18:55:43</strong>
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				It all happened so fast. One second he was joking with Davis through the com in his helmet, next the screaming klaxon of imminent hull breach was all Rylan could hear. Rylan knew Davis, the pilot, from when they were both based at Grissom IV, USIC military outpost at the outer edge of the Andromeda system, and the pilot was an okay guy as far as Rylan was concerned. Competent, efficient, but he didn't walk around with a stick up his ass like most officers. Not that it mattered now, anyway, what with Davis getting sucked out of the cockpit and all. <br><br>Rylan didn't know enough about major component failure to have a clue as to what went wrong, but whatever it was caused massive malfunction to every system; as the shuttlecraft hurtled to its inevitable conclusion on the surface of the planet, all Rylan could think about was he hoped someone told his parents in person instead of by satlink. They deserved that at least, to be told in person their son bought it on some uncharted planet, a mission he took for the sole reason to pay off a nasty gambling debt...okay, they didn't need to be told quite <strong>that</strong> much. In the two minutes that it took for the ship to blister through the atmosphere, the old adage of watching one's life flash before the eyes took root, and Rylan's memory was flooded with countless images; fishing with his father when he was eight, a math test in high school, getting hazed his first week of basic training, blasting through zero G for the first time (and the accompanying nausea), the satisfying crunch under his fist from a bar fight on Saluria 8 during some well deserved R&amp;R, the last time he got laid which was six long months ago at the legal brothel at Mars Gateway Station. <br><br>For some inexplicable reason Rylan began to focus on the young blond twink he bought for the night, the one who smiled through it all, no matter how hard Rylan yanked at the restraints and no matter how viciously Rylan pounded the tight, pinkish ass cheeks. The thought made him want to laugh, even as the screaming of Davis entered his ear, and parts of the ship began to rattle and disintegrate all around him. He had no clue if the other men on the ship were doing the same as him, reliving memories, dredging up regrets, asking forgiveness...and all Rylan could think of was the smile on the twink's face. Christ, he was sick.<br><br>Other than Davis, he didn't know the other two men, the navigator and the mission leader, the usual no-fun, no personality, I-left-my-sense-of-humor-back-in-my-locker types, which annoyed Rylan to no end. But not enough that he would have turned down the pay. He needed the credits, to get Quint off his fucking back. Huh, Quint'll probably think he set this whole thing up to get out of paying.<br><br>Although Rylan didn't know it, two things saved his life. One, the hull ionization plates still worked, which meant that despite the rapid descent into the planet's atmosphere, the ship didn't turn into a giant microwave oven and fry everything inside. And two, the ship's Hail Mary chutes managed to deploy, probably a last ditch effort from Davis before getting sucked out. The resulting decel from the chutes would have broken Rylan's neck if he hadn't still been strapped in, but it was enough to smack him into unconsciousness for the pitiful excuse for a landing.<br><br>The stink of the aftermath woke him up, and he blinked and sucked in oxygen before wishing he hadn't. Coughing loudly, he hit the release for his straps and promptly fell on his helmeted head. <br><br>"Fuuuck." He groaned, rolling over and trying to orient himself. Looking around, he was in a mess of components, most of which belonged in the belly of the craft. Electrical sparking gave brief glimpses, lighting the interior, but what Rylan could make out wasn't exactly heart warming. If the rest of the ship looked like this, they were well and truly fucked. Then somewhere behind him, toward the main cabin, he heard a voice. Brushing debris off himself, he stood, somewhat shakily and with a massive headache, determining that he had all four limbs, two hands, two feet and as far as he knew, his head was still bolted onto his neck. He'd worry about the rest later.<br><br>The voice yelled again, and and Rylan heard the distinct word, "Report." <br><br>Report?&nbsp; What the fuck?&nbsp; How about "We're shit out of luck, sir?" Sighing, he yelled back. "Sargeant Matthews here, sir."<br><br>Rylan began to make his way through what was left of the craft towards the Lieutenant, wondering if they were the only two left alive.<br>
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			<dt class="postheader">
				Title: <strong>Re: Routine Scouting Mission (Erosvigne &amp; Torch)</strong><br>
				Post by: <strong>erosvigne</strong> on <strong>23-06-2009, 19:22:41</strong>
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				Good God his head hurt. Joshua probed again at the edge of the swelling, as if it would somehow make it feel better. His mouth contorted in a grimace, lips peeling back along the even, white faces of his teeth. He raised his voice again into the horrible echo of not-silence that followed his first call. This time there was an answer. Matthews. While not unwelcome, the reply did not inspire the utmost confidence. There should have been one other.<br><br>Becoming aware of the sound of footsteps nearby, Lieutenant Stiles schooled his expression into one of order. His hand fell from his head, swept along his uniform sleeve in a blood-smearing trail, and then returned to his side. He ran an appraising gaze over Matthews, the stern schooling of his expression unchanging. His mouth thinned only after he looked away, the split pad of his lower lip turning inward. He walked on, limping just slightly, as he surveyed the damage.<br><br>"Cooper is down." He stated in a dry, matter of fact way.<br><br>It was the sort of thing that some in his line of work expected to say often. The long stretch of relative peace, however, had kept these incidences to a minimum. Joshua certainly wasn't near the minor skirmishes when they did erupt, and there were enough men with combat experience that the brass wouldn't feel the need to send in someone so relatively untested. Command was one thing. Command was easy. You with talent A, go do task A. You with talent B, go do task B. Take the reports, make the necessary conclusions, send in more people if needed, and then report back to command. He was, in essence, the middle man. An information filter.<br><br>Now, however, he was grateful for all of the seemingly unnecessary training. He knew the protocol on a cerebral level, but also on a physical one. Still, his thoughts were spiraling. Circling. No navigation. No pilot. Maybe they could get the com grid working. Even if not a vid-link, some basic transmission might at least get them a pick up. Opting for full disclosure, he shot a look over his shoulder even as he tore at an access panel.<br><br>"Navigation is scrap. There's no accessing the memory banks for cords." His voice was still raw from the dryness of his throat. His vision blurred as he turned his head back around. Joshua gave himself a shake and frowned at the cell readouts.
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				Title: <strong>Re: Routine Scouting Mission (Erosvigne &amp; Torch)</strong><br>
				Post by: <strong>Torch</strong> on <strong>24-06-2009, 00:40:20</strong>
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				"Cooper is down." <br><br>Well, no shit Sherlock. Rylan glanced at what was left of the navigator and swallowed down a healthy dose of bile. Stiles didn't look all that good himself, he musta took one in the head the way his eyes were bouncing around like that. Or maybe the man was just scared, out of his element. It didn't take a military genius to figure out that USIC command didn't waste their best men on a shit assignment like this one. <br><br><em>Swell. I'm stuck here with some paper-pusher. Christ.</em><br><br>Rylan kept his thoughts to himself as Stiles began to rip at an access panel, to get a look at the cells. He picked his way over, debris crunching under his boots as he helped yank the panel free, sending a shower of electrical sparks across the cabin. "We should try and access the cockpit, see if the emergency beacon was activated...cause if it wasn't..." Rylan tried to lick his lips, but his tongue was dry. "How long before we're reported overdue?" He asked as the Lieutenant tried to get a read on the cells, but the man kept shaking his head, like he couldn't see.<br><br>"Sir, you don't mind my saying so, you might wanna sit down before you fall down." Rylan reached for the panel to take it out of the man's hand. "You're bleeding and from the way your eyes are dilated, you probably got a helluva concussion." As much as Rylan thought the officer was probably going to be as usefull as tits on a baseball, he sure as hell didn't want to be stuck here alone if the man suddenly keeled over from a brain injury.
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				Title: <strong>Re: Routine Scouting Mission (Erosvigne &amp; Torch)</strong><br>
				Post by: <strong>erosvigne</strong> on <strong>25-06-2009, 20:27:19</strong>
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				Blurry and fuzzy. He'd almost rather have the dark. Stiles rubbed at his head again, giving it a shake. He should have put his helm on, really, but he hated wearing the damn thing. Everything had been clear, and it felt good to get up and move around without the weight of it on his neck. One minute he'd been stretching out his legs, pacing about to ensure that everything was alright, the next he'd been racing for his seat and struggling with his harness. There hadn't been much time, really. It felt like an eternity as he thought on it. An eternity of staring through his fuzzy vision at something that wasn't there.<br><br>Focus. Focus. His mind ran over the words that he'd taken in, struggling to put meaning behind the sounds. Three days to get there. Two days after that to send in his initial findings. The planet they'd been going to was good sized. Promising. According to the charts, there shouldn't have been anything sizable between them and it. Certainly nothing with gravity. This was too substantial to have been something so simple as a stray meteor. It was still too early to have arrived. His ears were ringing. Joshua shook his head again.<br><br>"Five days, at least. That's assuming anyone notices that my report is late and decides to make anything of it." He muttered with a vague twist of his stomach. His tongue probed briefly at his lip before he went on. "The power's there, but it looks like large sections of the computers are fried. I thought," he paused, shaking his head again. His eyelids crashed against one another. "I thought I heard an air leak earlier. We'll need to patch that first. We'll have to check the bay to see if any of the gear is salvageable, at least get some atmo readouts." His voice trailed with the slight sway of his weight. His knees bent, long legs folding beneath the deliberate lowering of his weight. "Go check that beacon. I'd rather not wait it out."<br><br>That said, Joshua braced his elbows to the tops of his knees and curled forward to drop his head between them. This was bad enough. Like hell he was going to pass out in front of anyone, least of all some sergeant he was going to be stuck with for the next week.
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				Title: <strong>Re: Routine Scouting Mission (Erosvigne &amp; Torch)</strong><br>
				Post by: <strong>Torch</strong> on <strong>25-06-2009, 23:56:58</strong>
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				The Lieutenant sank down to his haunches and looked like he was seconds away from puking. Rylan tried to be sympathetic, but it was the man's own damn fault for not wearing his helmet. Sure, the thing was hot and uncomfortable but it was better than having your brains scrambled. <br><br>He started looking around for an O2 mask, since the cockpit was open to the atmosphere, and Christ only knew what kind of noxious gases this planet harbored. While Stiles sat with his head between his knees, Rylan finally dug one up from underneath a pile of damaged electrical conduits. He also spied a first aid kit and pulled that out as well, seeing as how the other man had blood all over him. He carried over to where Stiles was squatting and laid it on the ground next to him. <br><br>"Sir?" Rylan crouched down next to the man, until his head raised and the man managed to look him in the eye, the pupils still widely dilated. Stiles' color was awful, a slightly grayish tint to his complexion that was enhanced by the blood trails on his face. Rylan frowned and opened up the kit, fishing out a gauze pad and none too gently pressed it against the man's head wound. "Hold this, sir, while I check the cockpit beacon." The man blinked and shook his head slightly, so Rylan grabbed one of the man's hands and placed it on the gauze pad. "You got a head wound, sir, nothing to mess around with, you know?"<br><br>Standing up from his crouch, Rylan checked the O2 mask. The readout said said ten minutes, and Rylan hoped the display wasn't corrupted. He didn't want to get into the cockpit, take a breath and not have anything come out. Gingerly, he began to make his way across the debris filled cabin to the pressure door. He slipped the mask over his face and yanked at the handle. The door opened with a hiss and Rylan slipped inside, closing it quickly behind him. 
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				Title: <strong>Re: Routine Scouting Mission (Erosvigne &amp; Torch)</strong><br>
				Post by: <strong>erosvigne</strong> on <strong>15-07-2009, 01:55:55</strong>
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				The cockpit was nothing short of disarray. Twisted bits of metal leered at Rylan upon his entry, wire guts spilling out to the open air. Auxillary lights cast a sickly yellow hue over the toppled chairs and warped paneling. A red light to the fore of the com station flashed, the display dark and dead. <br><br>The main computer screen flickered and rolled, stabilizing for snatches of seconds at a time. The system itself was not particularly accommodating, though it provided a readout of the relatively breathable air content of the local atmosphere, the exceedingly hot temperatures, and the fact that there were signs of life reported before the scanning hardware went off line. Life support was in reserves, the integrity of the ship was questionable at best, and the distress beacon was engaged. There were no reports of communication with it or outside sources, however, given the fact that the system was reported as non functioning. All of this could be ascertained through frustrating intervals of instability on the display, and some round about navigation.<br><br>Stiles, in the meantime, cleaned his wound as much as he had the patience to endure. He continued to press upon it with a fold of bandaging, attempting to reduce the amount of bloody stain to his hair. Once the world had stopped spinning enough for him to manage it, he achieved his feet once again. Long steps carried him through the ship to the cargo hold. It was warped and battered as well, with supplies cast through the bay and containers toppled to the walls. One of the drums of water had bled across the floor, and this fact left him cursing as he surveyed the damage. Most of it, at least, was intact. Turning then, he went to check on the status at the cockpit.
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				Title: <strong>Re: Routine Scouting Mission (Erosvigne &amp; Torch)</strong><br>
				Post by: <strong>Torch</strong> on <strong>23-07-2009, 06:09:03</strong>
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				The loud echo of the O2 mask reverberated in his ears, but the cool oxygen flowed into his lungs, and Rylan began to look around the cockpit. Heat was the first thing Rylan noticed; a wet, sticky heat that reminded him of Talos III, a jungle-covered planet he'd had the misfortune to spend a long month on security detail. He'd hated every minute of it. <br><br>There was a giant hole where the pilot used to sit, and Rylan wondered if Davis had any conscious thought as he was sucked out into the atmosphere. "Poor bastard." He muttered, then put it out of his mind forever. Davis was dead, and Rylan was alive, and the sergeant intended to stay that way. A quick glance at the battered control panel showed that the emergency beacon had been activated, but that was where the good news ended. Rylan turned his attention to the ship's computer system after a quick check of the O2 readout. He had seven minutes left. <br><br>The screen was corrupted, rolling and flickering, and Rylan resisted the urge to punch it with his fist in frustration. When the screen did stabilize, he managed to get readings on the ship's vital systems, as well as scans from the planet's atmosphere and surface. The information he managed to obtain put a scowl on his face, and for the umpteenth time, he cursed the gambling debt that put him in this shit hole in the first place.<br><br>With a final glance around, Rylan crunched his way back to the pressure door and gave it a yank, the pressured steel sliding open as the sergeant stepped through and shut it behind him. His face sweat dampened, he yanked off the O2 mask just as the readout turned an angry red and a series of zeroes appeared on the screen. He dropped the mask to the floor and looked for the Lieutenant, and saw the man making his way back from the cargo bay.<br><br>"Sir?" Rylan called out, getting the man's attention. "Emergency beacon was activated, but we got no way of knowing if the signal is even getting through, all communications are offline." Rylan unhooked the chin strap on his helmet as he was speaking and yanked the uncomfortable piece of equipment off, dropping it to his feet with a clatter, revealing short cropped dark hair and dark brows over fiercely blue eyes.<br><br>"The atmosphere is viable...barely. O2 readings are at 19%, and density levels are at 2 kilos per milimeter..." He paused, letting that information sink in. "It's gonna be hard for us to breathe...but if we stay in the cabin and don't move around too much, we should be okay until a rescue team arrives." He observed Stiles keenly, and noticed that his head wound seemed to have stopped bleeding. At least the man's eyes weren't bouncing around like a tennis ball anymore. "You check on provisions yet?" Rylan nodded back to the cargo hold.
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