Post-Mission Eleven: A Difference in Experience

club24

Well-Known Member
YSS Kaiyō II
Medbay


Sacre worked quickly at the terminal to finish putting in her shift notes for Miles who was going to be coming in at any moment to take over the Medbay from her.

As if summoned by her thoughts Miles strolled through the door of the medbay expecting his collegue to be finished and gone already and showed his slight surprise at seeing her still at the terminal. "Hey didn't expect to see you still here, had a patient?" he asked moving over to take his seat.

Sacre nodded, "As always, it wasn't anymore serious then an issue with satan's monthly waterfall not showing up yet. It shouldn't be a problem. Everyone who's still here has been here since you were last here and nothing of any significance has happened." Sacre explained.

"Well that's good, hopefully I wont need to call you back down here then." He sat down and checked through the report checking over the list before turning back to the separa'shan, "Actually on that thought I've been meaning to ask you, would you be able to give me some training for advanced surgery at some point? There's been more than one incident where it would have been handy and it is something I was planning to do in the Star Army academy but didn't get a chance before we came here."

Sacre had offered earlier to help, "Are you sure that's a good idea? I'm fairly certain that you can learn all you need to pass the tests without involving a ill tempered snake in it all.

"While you might be right about my ability to learn what I need for the test, unfortunately we aren't in Star Army territory now so I can't actually be properly evaluated. Since you have that training and skill I thought it would simply make sense to ask you." While it was true Sacre's personality and mood often made interaction a little more, interesting, the minkan wasn't showing any signs of doubt with his gaze fixed on her.

Sacre considered this, and nodded. "Fine, read this, try not to draw all over the pages with your crayons." She said chucking a book at Miles' head as she started to head towards the door.

"Aha well I think I might be able to keep it between the lines at least, but thanks Sacre, it means a lot that you're willing to help me become more useful." Miles reached to catch the book but instead took the object straight to the face, falling sideways off his chair with an audible "owch".

Sacre looked to make sure Miles wasn't too badly hurt. "Looks like we'll have to work on your dexterity too. This is going to be like teaching a walrus to paint holding a brush between it's flippers." She muttered as she left. Twelve hours later, after Care relieved Miles, Sacre was waiting for him outside sickbay.

Miles wandered out and almost into the other medic managing to avoid her before a collision at least, as Sacre had said the couple of members in the medbay didn't need much checking on during the day and he was able to thoroughly study the text he'd been given. "Woah sorry Sacre, my bad there." he hurriedly apologised, "Anyway I finished the manual you gave me, some pretty interesting theory work in there."

"I'm sure you absorbed it like a rock. Let's see if at least something managed to stick in your head." Sacre said, turning and heading down the corridor to the VR room.

Miles was going to open his mouth about the rock comment but decided against it, although it sounded like an insult he could just as easily take it as a compliment but had no idea which it was intended to be. "Ah sure... lead the way." He said following after her.

Entering the VR room, Sacre said, "Activate Program Sacre Theta Seven." She said clearly, and the room transformed into a Amor Bay. There were two suits of Mindy armor. A Shepra'Shan one for Sacre, directly in front of the door and Miles's suit, off to the left. Sacre stepped into hers. "I created this program when I was studying for the qualification that you want." She mentioned.

Miles looked around as the room suddenly changed into an exact replica of their armour bay, he'd used it before of course but no where near as much as some and the changing always interested him. "Oh, well that's handy then, you certainly are prepared for anything it seems." he commented stepping into his own mindy.

Sacre nodded to acknowledge the comment. "I try to be." Once they were in the Mindys the scene shifted to a battlefield. They were a few hundred feet behind a low rise where a line of Mindys held combat positions. Using the heads up display, Miles could tell that they were the other members of the Kayio's complement, except for Miles, Sacre, and Care. There were red dots starting to approach the line. Sacre didn't say anything but she was watching Miles.

Unlike his counterpart, Miles was not prepared for the abruptness of the scene he now found himself in, seeing the line of his crew mates and the line of red dots approaching he could only assume they were about to be attacked by, something. Checking his suit he found that he did have his weapon, or at least a projected version of it and quickly took up a position of his own, "even in a simulation it's good to act as though it's real." he thought to himself.

There was some loud shots off to the side as the left flank started to engage first. The enemies were L'Kor, familiar from their previous deployments. There was a flashing yellow, indicating that the holographic William was down, something having gone through their suit and hitting their spine. It was freakishly similar to the injury that he had taken several months ago at the L'Kor station.

Miles' breath caught in his throat, it was just like the last time he'd tried to help someone who got injured. Same person, same injury, different place, he physically regulated his breathing and tried to calm his thoughts as much as he could, it would be different this time. "William is hit, cover me!" he spoke to no one in particular expecting the simulated Kaiyo members to react, he fired several shots as he moved seeing the digital versions do the same.

As he dropped to the floor next to William his head filled with images from the incident on the station, he shook them away promising himself he could help this time. Checking over the damage to the mindy he found similar wounds to the internal organs and muscle as last time and quickly took out the medic pack he was equipped with. Once again he started by giving the injured simulation an injector full of pain suppressant followed by sealing the largest of the arteries to staunch internal bleeding.

All too soon there was a second injury, this time on the right flank, Leeta. A Neko NCO. The explosion had destroyed her armor and taken her right arm off. Nora had also been caught in the blast and had been thrown into a rock formation, causing massive blunt force trauma before that suit went dead as well.

Miles didn't see the injuries happen directly but his HUD told him everything he needed to know, two more down and he'd barely had time to help William, his stress rose and he almost yelled at Sacre that this was all too much. But he knew in battle you couldn't simple restart it over and kept working, doubling his efforts.

The book he'd spent the last 12 hours studying didn't apply to every situation but the concepts behind each chapter were applicable anywhere, he finished sealing the worst of the bleeding organs before filling the wound with a little hemosynth to help stop anything from reopening. Looking back he noticed Sacre watching him intently and wondered if she expected him to do all of this by himself, "Sacre, you have the improved teleporter. Can you take William beyond the combat area, I've stabalised him and stopped the lethal bleeding but there is two more injured." he spoke treating it like a real situation once more, surely he wasn't expected to do it alone.

"The simulation is for you." Sacre said, not moving from her hover out of the way. That was the moment that Laura got hit, not as serious as the others, but the bones in her leg had been shattered by the round that penetrated her suit.

"...Wah?" his face became a mask of confusion and terror beneath the helmet as he looked around him seeing the injuries seeming to endlessly pile up, there was no way he could do this what was this crazy lady expecting him to be able to accomplish after only reading a book?

It was that moment that on his monitor Leeta's life-signs vanished. "The clock is ticking." Sacre observed.

Miles' hands shook as he tried desperately to process what was happening, people were dying and he'd barely been able to finish stabilising one person, with a dejected sigh he stood and faced her, "Stop the simulation, I can't do this, I'd personally praise anyone capable of such an impossible task."

"Very well." Sacre said, and there was a phasing of the world. The words 'Spectator mode' appeared on his screen. Sacre blinked out of sight, teleporting away, as another casualty appeared. Miles was dragged along with her, and they appeared next to Laura. There was a fifteen second timer, the recharge time for the teleportation unit that started to count down. Sacre slapped painkillers into the wound, and then closed it and splinted it in a blur of motion. Then the moment the counter hit zero, she teleported again.

When they reappeared next to Nora, Miles realized that two more casualties had happened. The next hour was a parade of blood, injuries, some of the wounded Sacre didn't even try to help, but when that happened, it was because she returned two or more to the fight. The pace was punishing and the problems difficult. There was not a single second wasted.

Every member of the Kaiyo's crew received some injury, and Miles was able to quickly realize that some of the injuries were nearly exact duplicates of battle injuries the crew had sustained in the past. Most of them seemed to be randomly generated by some formula he could only guess at.

When it was over, they stood back in the power armor bay. There was a sort of a score, a 87%. There were exact statistics on how Sacre had done further in the background. At each of the armor stations was an analysis on how she had done on each of the injuries that the crew had suffered.

"Not my best run," Sacre commented, finally speaking to Miles again.

Throughout the whole simulation all the minkan could do was watch dumbfounded at the speed and skill Sacre possessed, not only thst but her decisions to leave some and treat others in order to get the best battle outcome. "That was, unnatural. How many times have you practiced this?!" he couldn't help but look at her with a mixture of awe and fear at the clinical way she'd completed the sim.

Sacre wasn't sure how many times she had run the simulation. "It's randomized, so every time is a little different. Computer, how many times have I run this program?" She asked.

"This program has been active for twelve months. In that time, it has been run a hundred and fourteen times." The computer responded.

Sacre nodded, "That sounds about right for this one. There are a couple others that I use as well."

"A hundred and fourteen... that's one every few days at least, on top of that you have others. To think I thought I had a chance at getting anywhere near as good as you before this, I must have been crazy." Miles was staring at the stats displayed still, only now realising the true extent of Sacre's ability and skill. "Although, I would still like to practice and at least learn how to do this, while I can't hope to match you I can at least get some new skills and help you."

Sacre considered Miles for a moment. When she spoke her tone was serious. "I'm not good because I'm special. What I do is a skill, a very carefully honed one. One that you could acquire if you put the time and effort into it. You probably wouldn't be a medic if you couldn't." Sacre slid over to the door into space and looked out at the stars. "I remember when I didn't take my job as seriously as I do now. The simulation is based partially on the moment it changed for me."

Sacre turned back to Miles, "If one of the grunts screws up, their generally the ones to pay for it. Step out of cover, get shot. It's simple enough. For us though, it's diffrent. We screw up and other people die. People like your brother, William, Shasse, or Gravity. We owe it to them to be the best we can possibly be because it's not just our lives that are on the line. It's one thing to lose someone when you weren't there. When there was nothing you can do, but when their blood is on your hands, when it's your fingers in the dyke. When their life slips through your fingers and there is nothing you can do. That's something else." Sacre said passionately.

"I'm not a good teacher. but if you want me to help, I'm going to push you almost as hard as I push myself. Why? Because that's how I know how to do it. That's the way that I know works for me and will work for you too if you let it." Sacre finished.

Miles was stunned, he'd never heard her speak with so much meaning and, emotion. The minkan knew what she said about the difference between the failure of a soldier and a medic were true, they were responsible for keeping everyone alive and fighting if possible. As she recited the names each one hit him, his brother, his friend, the person he couldn't help. But then she called out Gravity, he hadn't had anything to do with her so why then, he decided not to ask her about it, some things are better spoken about in better moments.

"Well after hearing all that, It's enough to put me off the whole career..." Miles looked at his hands which had finally stopped shaking then back to Sacre, "But I won't let it, I humbly ask that you teach me how to become a better team member, so that I can help everyone." His response was no strong willed movie line, but rather the plea of a regular person who just wanted to do what he could to help those around him.

"I will." Sacre assured him. "Besides, it's not all doom and gloom and everyone dying. When you lose, you lose hard. However, that makes victory all the sweeter. That life it's self is in your hands. Knowing that not only have you withstood the best that your enemies can throw against you, and said 'not today'. Other soldiers merely fight men who live and die, we fight death it's self. It is the specter that haunts all life, a force of nature that draws all inexorably towards it. You have personally done great and terrible battle with it and emerged the victor. That when it mattered you faced off against the fundamental essence of the worst that the universe can throw at you and that you were victorious over it. It's a feeling like no other."

Miles listened as she gave her pep talk and wondered how he'd never seen this side of her before, although he reminded himself she usually stayed secluded at least from him anyway he didn't know about anyone else. "That was, really uplifting in a strange sort of way, I've never seen you this passionate before." Miles commented in his usual cheery yet timid tone, "So is the point where I ask when do we start and you say right now?"

Sacre shrugged, "We started thirteen hours and some change ago. Now that we're done with the boring book work and the exciting field work, we get to do more boring analysis work. We're going to go over every case that the sim presented us with and see how we could have done better. Perhaps even do a couple practice runs on a specific piece were we could do better. Shouldn't take more then a couple hours."

Miles nodded, like many people who see something that inspires them he wished for an easy way to get there but knew that this was the only way, through hard work and dedication. "Alright Sacre, you're the expert which one do we start with first."

 
Back
Top Bottom