SoS B1 C6 X6: Decisions
The crew rode out the rest of the daylight and a good chunk of their charge before coming to a stop in a copse of trees. Tskhan and Dmitri were on watch, ready to fire up the grid if needed.
Morkun, Immuena, Allarah, Tyodor, Narissa, and Synna were all gathered in the cramped space of the first cab. The door to the next cab was closed, and the only warmth in the room was that generated by their own body heat and the surprisingly low output of the engines.
"What happened back there?" Morkun asked, voice soft.
"He was attacked by parasitic creatures that burrowed through his legs. As I told him, depending on the extent of the damage, even walking could be difficult. I can't imagine he's taking it well." Allarah said, resting her elbows on her knees to support a heavy head.
"Any way we could have seen it coming, maybe had Synna or another psiolic scan it first?"
"If they had gone with him, it may have been prevented. Synna hadn't noticed them when we brought him aboard. They aren't meta based like the rest of the things we've seen here. I only knew about it because I made a div connection to see if Laemon was even still in himself. He wasn't in good shape when we retrieved him. How did things go with the engine? Heard Stenem took a bit of a risk with the heating system."
Narissa looked over to Morkun. "He can explain it better than me."
Morkun bobbed his head. "He noticed that all of the systems aren't very isolated, and so re-routed some of the conduits from the heater to the engine to get more power running to it at once. In doing so he fried a couple heaters when some of the power arced back through them. He could have started a fire in any of the cabs, and for all we knew of the engine could have blown it out as well."
Narissa cut in again. "I trust his judgement on the engine, but the heaters are a major concern, especially as we head north towards colder climates. I have Em trying to fix them now."
Allarah nodded. "Maybe it was rough, but if I were in his situation, I'm not sure I would have done anything differently. Narissa, have him take a look at the heaters as well, see if he can't fix the ones he blew, or if we're going to need to start looking for parts. Thankfully he didn't blow the engine. We should look into safer ways to route power in another emergency. How are your teams looking? Agata seemed a bit rough last I saw her. Has she settled at all?" She looked into Tyodor's eyes, allowing her concern to seep into her tone. She didn't expect Tyodor to give a pleasant response, but she needed to know.
If anything, Tyodor seemed confused that she cared. His expression registered his surprise for the most brief of moments. "She's fine," he said, the old glacial coolness creeping back into his gaze. "She was just shaken up a bit."
"That's good to hear. I'd like to prevent further stress on her if possible. At least to that degree." She nodded lightly to Tyodor. "Morkun, how are Gruist, Nashu, and Sorja? Gruist didn't hurt himself barreling through the door in Dessir did he?"
Morkun chuckled and shook his head. "Not at all. They're all fine. Concerned for the crew but fine. How is Tskhan, and Immuena?" He turned to her and frowned. The Faecha wasn't looking great.
"Immuena was wounded, but she'll be fine. Tskhan also took a few hits. Thank you, by the way, Morkun. I wasn't expecting you to send your whole team to retrieve us. That may have ended poorly. I do apologize for having not shown up during the attack. I couldn't leave Laemon like that." She bowed her head. "We need to decide where we go from here. We're very close to Gorshi, but I'm certain it's dangerous. Less than Vien, more than Dessir. Out of our way there is a city that is supposed to be standing. We could get supplies and treatment if it's still there. We could take a short rest. There;s also the chance that the city has fallen, and it could end up being a waste of our time. Is it worth the time and the risk?" Allarah looked at each leader to gauge their reactions.
Morkun inclined his head. "Us Pact members prefer to stick together. It increases odds of survival, and we're not afraid to die together."
"Every risk we've taken has come back at us," Tyodor interjected, moving the topic back to center. "We have food, we have beds, we have water, I refuse to waste time stopping for supplies we don't need and risk our lives once again."
Narissa fidgeted. "We need medical supplies, though. Laemon needs attention."
Tyodor shook his head. "Last time we stopped for supplies it was your man that got hurt. Do you want to risk Ijin next time? Maybe yourself?"
Immuena chimed in at Tyodor, "How long do you think we'll be down here, Tyodor? Long enough for our supplies to last? Even if by chance that were true, what about survivors willing to join us for survival's sake? More importantly, what about all the injured to come from the crew? We won't scrape out of every fight unscathed, we already go through every fight with people partially injured. I can hardly sleep at night anymore, whether it be from physical pains or mental." she gritted her teeth, the physical pain wasn't really what kept her up at night.
Taking a deep breath and assuring her back was straight, she continued, "Realistically, we shouldn't send anyone alone here on, but what's happened doesn't change our mission goals or our long term needs. So, I think we should hear what each of us believes we should do from here and why. Maybe discuss the pros and cons of individual ideas, then prioritize from there."
In turn, she prodded the various leaders for acceptance, disapproval, or thoughts with her gaze. Except Allarah, Immuena rested her eyes on Allarah lastly, hoping she approved of what was said.
Allarah stiffened. She hadn't known the extent of Immuena's suffering. She was familiar with night terrors. It took her 15 years to finally calm her own. Looking to Tyodor, she finally spoke. "I want as many people to survive this as possible. When I make a decision, I think of every person's chance at surviving, not just the people I came here with. I care that you, Dmitri, Agata, Misha, and Lev live as much as I care that anyone else does. Each of you represent a life I am responsible for. I have made mistakes, but I'm thinking about everyone. When you consider our food, water, and medical supplies, are you thinking of rationing them for 21 other people, or 5?" She looked at each person in turn, resting her eyes back on Tyodor.
"I do respect your reservations about this, I have a few of my own, but everything we do comes with a degree of risk. Taking the right risks is the only thing that will keep us alive. This isn't about whether or not we are taking a risk, it's about whether or not this is the right one."
"It's not!" Tyodor said flatly, puffing himself to his (to Allarah) relatively unimpressive height. "We go west then we'll probably lose at least a week and a crew member. You want to talk about rationing then ration out another week of food. If you want to hit Gorshi... fine, we will probably find supplies there, but beyond that is a great big nothing and then a bunch of villages that also probably have supplies. There's no need to go west. I don't care about other survivors, if we get rid of the ghost generator then they'll all be better off anyway, we help more people but surviving."
Synna's expression could have cut glass. Tyodor made an effort to not meet it.
"Gorshi will have a hospital," Morkun offered. "Given the nature of the monsters I'm sure a hospital would be a deathtrap, but there will be supply depots somewhere that we can swing by. I'm sorry Immuena, but if we found survivors... what would you do? Would you invite them aboard? Would we travel to the heart of darkness with them in tow?"
Narissa lit a cigarette and leaned against the wall. "Good lord in heaven"
"If that is what you believe Tyodor, I won't try to change your mind. In your own way, you are right. It’s too soon after we've taken a hit." She looked to Immuena with a pained expression. "The best we can do for survivors is offer them a choice. If we find this city still functional, we can tell them to go there, or we can give them the details and see if they would rather take their chances with us, but they aren't the priority. Do the rest of you feel that this city isn't worth it. Are you willing to risk yourselves to better our chance of survival in the long run? I'll not force you to go on some fool's errand if that is what you believe it to be."
"Narissa, your thoughts?" Immuena spoke plainly. She hadn't really formulated a solid opinion on everything that's been thrown around.
She tamped out her cigarette and puffed out the rest of her smoke. "No matter what, we're going to need medical supplies. Food and stuff would be nice, but they'll probably be easier to come across. Other than that, I elect for minimal risk."
Allarah glanced at Narissa's cigarette. "We may have a better chance finding luxury items in the city as well. You and Laemon are running low if my memory serves." She cast her eyes to Morkun. "What do you think is best? I've been wrong not to heed you in the past."
Morkun broke from his consideration to regard the room. "So far, everything bad that's happened has happened near places of habitation. Out on the open planes it's been difficult for the ghosts to keep up with us because of how long day is, and at night we can outpace them from the full charge of the day."
He rolled out the map and switched it to topographical and natural modes. Hologram land rose from the cloth.
"The further north we go the more difficult that will be, and the road from Gorshi to Doni is a long one which appears to cut through woods and mountains,which means longer nights and harder charging. I figure it could take us a week, maybe two to push through. Water's not an issue because there will be plenty of snow to melt, and while we could survive on our rations we'd probably be weak by the time we hit, Doni, which worries me because we've got a rapid succession of towns and bridges right after. Sounds like prime deathtrap to me."
He sighed.
"Sorry, I don't have an answer yet, but it did just occur to me that Voshurr is bound to have a port. Let's see..."
He prodded the town and pulled up its info. His expression was somewhere between exasperated and excited. "It does, as does..."
He prodded Lorkim.
"Lorkim..."
He looked around, sheepish. "I can't believe I didn't think of it before. It's a risk all its own but we could skip all these towns if we managed to find a working ferry to cross the sea with. It'd be a long journey, but just as long as Gorshi to Doni, so might save us a lot of time in the long run instead of weathering Doni to Ventsh. The downside would be that we'd be leaving the rail, and so couldn't power it up as we go, which means that the journey back would have the same perils."
This pulled a small tired smile from Allarah. "Sometimes I wonder if you're trying to show off." She leaned in to study the map, the smile falling from her lips. "If we go there, and we are lucky enough to find a ferry, what sort of perils may we face on the water? I doubt we will have absolute quiet." She mumbled almost to herself. The horde of ghosts wasn't far behind them, and she could almost imagine the carnage that would follow should they get trapped in the forest without power. Laemon wouldn't even be able to run away.
"Would there be a ferry large enough for this beast? What if it sinks?" She mused, tracing a line through the water with her eyes. Allarah glared at the map. "It does seem a great deal safer than the tracks. If need be, we can attempt to power the rails on our way back."
"It wouldn't do us any good unless the cities along the way have power as well. The point of fixing the rails at each juncture is to restore their connection to Karim's power grid. No connection to the power grid, no power to restore. We've been good about connecting them so far, but I don't doubt we're going to have trouble either way."
He rubbed his brow. "Cutting through Vien was good for that, at least. If we'd skipped it we probably wouldn't have powered up the track. Speaking of, we need to cut over and power up the local station. Won't take more than a few minutes once we're there, I hope."
He returned to the subject. "As for a ferry... well, I'm thinking more a boat, honestly. I doubt they used a meager ferry to get goods from Voshurr to Lorkim, and as we've seen they don't have air either, so there's probably some very large vessels in Voshurr, maybe even some intended to carry a trundler. If it sinks... I'll assume we die. Better to be pessimist in this scenario."
Tyodor opened his mouth to speak against it, then closed it.
Synna peered the map over. "I kind of like it. I don't know if we'll find a working boat, but we've got some good engineers here so maybe we could get one working. I mean..." She traced a finger up through the river leading to Abisk "Look...we might be able to skip everything. There's bound to be unmarked towns here, I don't see why they wouldn't have ports between Voshurr and Abisk."
"Ocean might be dangerous," Narissa chimed in. "Been on many Reclamation planets before? Many of them have pretty chaotic fauna to help rapidly develop an ecology on the planet. Who knows what's in the water."
"My concern exactly." She looked at the map a moment longer and cursed in Feao. "No, we can't necessarily do that. We need to restore Ymiro and Ymira... to do that we have to restore Gorshi." She leaned against the table, resting her weight on her palms. "This was one of Venistasia's main locations. We aren't prepared for this. We would need a few days at least, and we don't have that time with the horde behind us."
Tyodor hissed. "Forget the other objectives. The point is Abisk, right? If Abisk is dead then the other towns don't matter, do they? Not point in connecting the lines back to a dead town."
"Though if we connect them we might power the rails all the way to Abisk," Narissa said.
"And still have to cut through all those towns and cities and risk ourselves!" Tyodor was getting worked up now. "We hit Abisk, fix the terraformer, see if there are survivors, and if there are follow the rail backwards home. It makes our journey there less fraught and it saves us from spending extra time on possibly useless towns."
"You just want to get to the terraformer so you can hold the planet hostage or find the Heart," Synna spat.
Everyone fell silent. Allarah and Immuena suddenly got the impression that there was a larger conversation that they were missing out on.
"Don't project your aims on me, filthy Hedonist," Tyodor said, taking a step toward Synna to stand chest to chest with her. Synna's hands flexed.
"Enough!" Allarah pushed the two apart putting her back to Synna. She wavered a bit, still feeling the effects of her blood loss. "We need to power these lines, end of story. Abisk may not have power at all so it's pointless to rush there regardless of motive. Honestly I don't believe Venistasia meant for any of us to make it back, but these lines are our best fucking chance! I don't take any of this lightly, and if it weren't part of the mission or absolutely necessary, I wouldn't even consider Gorshi as an option. I don't enjoy watching people die!" She placed a hand on Synna's shoulder to steady herself, removing it a moment later. "We're going to Gorshi in the morning. We can make a final decision on the port after Gorshi is powered." Ice crept into her eyes and tone, leaving little room for argument.
The night brought with it a deep silence pregnant with all the horrors the crew's minds could provide. No animals. No bugs. The copse of trees they were parked by held a bated breath, as though as loathe to summon the ghosts as the crew was. Those who couldn't sleep sought companionship with each other, as Banners allowed. Hedon in particular did not sleep well, and took shifts tending to and entertaining Laemon as he slipped in and out of fever dreams.
Morning brought a thick and bright fog and the merciful sounds of hesitant birdsong, which an optimistic Lysjho exclaimed over. "Good! The creatures of the woods will know when the ghosts have come and gone, and their song means we're safe." The revelation earned more than one sigh of relief, and cracked smiles were seen here and there.
Dimmu insisted on everyone resetting with a good breakfast and a shower, and rallied his fellow Hedonites to help cook. When there were protests over rations he pointed out that the best time to have a full belly and fresh outlook was before approaching a city as large as Gorshi.
While they cooked he privately apologized to Immuena and Allarah. "If I hadn't sent Synna in my stead yesterday the conversation would have been more peaceful. I was more focused on Laemon but now that I see he's in good health I kind of wish I'd gone to the meeting instead."
The Hedonists had dug through the more easily spoiled goods, the impractical luxuries that Lady Venistasia had packed into the rations: eggs, ham, and so forth, and produced a filling, if small, breakfast that put everyone in high mood. Even Agata came and grabbed a plate, though Dmitri lurking at her shoulder discouraged anyone from interacting, even/especially a bubbly Mir, who instead entertained herself by making friends with Stenem under Em's watchful eye.
Thus filled, thus happy, they packed up their panels and moved on.
To Gorshi.
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