Open Space and Hyperspace

Adrien was more than a little surprised by Silas' revelation that Erly was gone, Adrien wondered if she may have possibly been taken when even Trent didn't know she was missing having been the last person seen with her at the spaceport. He turned to Silas, a little confused himself, "Are you certain? Did you see her leave?" Asking the question was merely a formality at this point, had Erly been somewhere on the ship surely she would be standing here with everyone, or someone would have spoken with her along the way. He looked around to see who was present at this meeting, "Anyone seen the doc or the kid?" If they were gone too then he could mark out being taken and all that would be left is that they abandoned the crew in the commotion with Isabelle. It seemed uncharacteristic of them but what other explanation could there be?

Silas seemed to be the only one on the ship with a clue at the moment, which Adrien found to be quite amusing considering how out of his element the man really was. But since Silas by his own admission wasn't certain that Erly was gone nor had he seen the other missing crew members Adrien had to at least make an effort to locate them though he was fairly certain that Silas was right and they were gone. He looked at Neassa first and then to Silas again. "The two of you do a thorough sweep of the ship to see if we can find any of them. Take Isabelle if you need an extra set of eyes." He turned and looked at Isabelle, "That ok with you?"

The question was rhetorical of course, he didn't really care if that was alright with her or not and so he didn't give her time to answer, instead he turned back to Silas and the others. "To answer your question, Mustafar is a hellish, volcanic wasteland with little to offer in the way of comforts. We're headed there for a quick stop so that we can pick up a shipment of ore and I can get some information from a contact. We won't be there long."

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The search yielded no results, it appeared that the three had taken a few provisions and abandoned the crew on Naboo. Trent seemed to take the reality particularly hard but this wasn't an unusual thing, there are just some people in the galaxy who aren't cut out for the smuggler's life. The unfortunate reality is that it left them vulnerable without a doctor on board and again Adrien was left without a first mate. It seemed he was destined not to have one at this point. He needed to remedy the doctor situation, perhaps when they arrived at the Run there would be someone with medical knowledge looking for a job, though he found that to be unlikely. Nonetheless, he knew that he could find a few more crew to fill in some vacancies that he had had for quite some time when they arrived.

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Nearly and hour later the crew arrived on Mustafar, Adrien set out on his own to gather some intel on Fel, there wasn't much to dig up but he did come across a few useful pieces of information. Silas and Neassa were in charge of procuring the shipment of ore that needed to be delivered while Isabelle and Trent remained on the ship. The entire trip to Mustafar only lasted a few hours but it was enough, everyone was ready to leave almost as soon as they had gotten there. Adrien suspected that Neassa knew the shipment was just a diversion to the real reason they were actually there, possibly Isabelle knew as well, though it was doubtful that they knew what the real reason was. Adrien had never gone this far out of his way to help another smuggler, let alone his biggest rival, but he knew what it would mean to Karana to have Fel back and of course that meant a lot of Adrien. There of course was the little known fact that Adrien considered Fel a friend despite their rivalry and missed having the old rodder around, without him there hasn't been much in the way of competition. It wouldn't be long now, Adrien had what he needed to find Fel and all that was left was to hand it over to Karana when he made it to the Red Shift, the Run was just a quick hyperspace jump away...

Continued in the Smuggler's Run

As the Blasphemy entered hyperspace, Amy stabilized the passage and double-checked the course she had set. BB-Drunk still functioned well enough when it came to ship duties, but she didn't want to take chances. “Melia, get up here, please,” she called on the intercom in the Engineering section, “Need ya t'keep an eye on our flight path for a while.”

As she got up, she turned to look at Janos, “When you've got the time, and if it gets bad, come look for me in the sickbay. We should get you looked over as well, 'less you fancy ya can wait until we're at the Medical Center.”

She didn't need long until she found Ellie, unarmoured, and Amy could see far more of the extent of her injuries, “Ferglutz, looks worse than I thought at first. Mebbe ya better head on down with me now?”

She stepped back, tilting her body sideways, then with her hands shoved into her pants pockets, she walked towards the sickbay, expecting Ellie to follow her.
She entered and prepared the spare bed next to Fel. The place was clean, and clearly fully stocked and functional, though the medical droid was stuffed in a corner, its severed head lying on the ground at its feet. She put on a breath mask, and after washing her hands, slipped a pair of disposable gloves on, ready for patients.

Amy honestly didn't know what it was she did that made people seem to feel like they were obligated to do her a favour. At least, that was what she felt like she was doing to Ellie, who sighed audibly and trailed after her. It was her that was injured after all, and Amy just wanted to help take care of it to ensure an amputation wouldn't become necessary. But she kept her feelings and thoughts buried deep inside, focusing instead on getting the job done right. She wasn't the best doctor around, but she had been in enough battlefields, administering triage often and long enough to consider herself competent, maybe even good. But she didn't want to assume anything with herself or the lives that was entrusted into her care.

“Amy or Millie would be fine,” said Amy, her eyes crinkling into a smile, though her nose and mouth was covered by a hard mask, and the air filter's respiration made a soft hiss with each exhale, “doc's a little formal.”

She brought a large bioscanner supported by a mechanical arm around to float over Ellie's legs, “Lie flat and try to keep still. Let's have a look at the extent of the damage.”

She studied the scan's results quietly, and then turned to look at Ellie, “Shrapnel did this? Some sort of ordinance? I've seen this kind of damage before.”

“Some...yes,” said Amy, mildly correcting the woman, and she turned the front of the bioscanner to Ellie so she could see for herself. Ellie's form was in a transparent blue hue, with her nerve clusters visible, and there was a glowing yellow mark on her rib, and a pulsing red mark on her thigh. “See those red dots on your thigh? Trouble with shrapnel is, the material's already broken, and it don't take much to fracture 'em some more. You've been movin' around a lot since gettin' blasted, an' your armour kept rubbing against the wounds. Take a wild guess what wonders that did.”

Amy's eyes reflected her feelings. Reproving, but not unkind, or not without a sense of understanding. “Musta been one hell of a situation you lot were in,” she said as she turned the bioscanner back to herself, “won't ask you for the details, but it helps sometimes when people talk while I work, take your mind of the pain.”

She retrieved a pressure spray and filled it with some dark liquid from a labelled bottle. The Aurabesh writing said "Anti-Coagulant". “Gonna stop the bleedin' first.”

She placed the spray above the wounded area and with a sudden hiss, the spray's contents were pressured in painlessly save for a sudden sensation of something being pressed down very hard against the flesh, but that sensation left quickly. She followed up with a numbing agent that would stop the pain from being felt for what came next. Once the anti-coagulant got to work, the bleeding slowed down, and Amy used a powerful magnetic rod to slowly draw out the remaining shrapnel. She was impressed by Ellie's pain threshold, the scanner suggested the wound's age, and most people would have run screaming for a doctor or at the least, a painkiller within the first hour. Once the metallic bits were out, the Corellian applied butterfly stitches and covered it with a bacta patch.

“Heh,” was all Amy said to Ellie's reference to a battle being just a day in the office. She definitely wasn't from Coruscant. “Do go on.”

She had made sure to clean the wound after the shrapnel had been removed, and once the stitches and bacta patch was in place, she dressed the wound in a new wrapping of gauze. It wasn't strictly necessary, since the combination of coagulants, stitching and bacta meant there wouldn't be any bleeding, and in a few short hours, there wouldn't even be much in the way of a scar left to indicate that here had ever been an injury on the woman's thigh, but Amy felt there was no need to aggravate the area of the flesh with any excessive movements. Plus, better to be safe than sorry. The painkillers would have worn off by now, along with the numbing sensations, but the pain ought to be gone. The worst she expected Ellie to feel from the thigh wound would be a dull ache, since the brain would still think the leg was injured, and it would need time to catch up to the fact that it was healed. So the theory went on rapid healing.

“Well you're Mandalorian, if your armour's anythin' to go by,” said Amy, who was paying attention to the woman's conversation, but kept her eyes focused on the task with the leg, “I'm not surprised ya get inta more hair-raisin' moments'n most people do in a hundred years. As for me...”

She rested her palms on the bed surface near Ellie's legs, looking thoughtful, “Got tired of the "good fight", I guess. Never was interested in it to be honest. Just that it wasn't my choice.”

She turned her attention to the bruising on the ribs now, “Here, sit up. Was a rancher on Corellia mosta my life, lived with my uncles, 'rents kicked it fighting the Empire. 'Cos o' that, I guess, Imps wouldn't leave us well enough alone, and eventually, officer who had it in for us went and falsed up some Sithspit or 'nother, came to arrest us. By then it was jail or run and fight. Then it was the First Order, 'n' the Galactic Alliance.”

She sighed audibly, even through her mask, the sound was like a rush of water. “Heart was never in it. I blame the Rebellion and the Alliance as much as I blame the Empire and the subsequent First Order for everythin' messed up that's led me up to this point so far.” She looked at the woman squarely in the eyes, hunching her shoulders and leaning heavily against the scanner's support strut, “They did me a solid back on Tatooine, gettin' me outta there in return for my medical expertise; reckon I've long since paid back my debt to them, and that's how I ended up on Varonat. Was a sight better than Tatooine, more options, until that new group or whatever came in. Was like the worst end of the First Order on spice.”

She gave the woman a wan smile as she retrieved a vial and a power syringe from a desk, and returned to the bedside, “Betcha wish ya didn't ask, now, right? Okay, fer that bruisin' on your ribs, got a few ways we can tackle it: bacta wraps, or nano-medication. I can go with the nano, they work wonders, much faster, and they even help reinforce your bone structure over time.”

She nodded at Ellie in answer to her question about her ancestry. “Don't I know it...” she muttered.

Amy's state of mind was one of melancholy and weariness, but a iron resolve not to just cave in. She wasn't ready to just yet. She arched an eyebrow when Ellie mentioned a twin sister, and then the mention of being a Jedi and a slave, amongst other things. It seemed strange for a Jedi to leave the Order and then strike out as a bounty hunter and a mercenary...but what did she know? Jedi were a strange semi-mythical lot with as much rumoured abilities as legends and tall tales. “Nanites it is,” said Amy, getting the syringe ready, and prepping the area of skin just below the ribs for injection. “you'll feel an itch, might even hurt a bit, and then maybe a tickle, or a kinda electrical throbbing sensation, sort of varies from person-ta-person. As for my careers, I learnt what I had to to survive. Picked 'em up as I went along. Herding animals back on the ranch, takin' care of 'em, sorta helped make it a li'l easier to learn how t' take care o' folks. All right, here goes.”

She applied the injection, and then turned to check the bioscanners, the microscopic nanites surged through Ellie's body, applying themselves to the injured bones, spreading out and replicating as necessary to instantly restore the fiber to full health, running along and fusing into the bones, doubling the strength and durability. “Feelin' all right?”

“I'll see what I can do 'bout that. They ain't easy to get.” said Amy, putting away her equipment and peeling off the gloves when she was finished, disposing of them.

She watched Ellie practice her movements and feelings, and nodded in approval. The nanites seemed to have done their job. “Easy on the drink for a while, heh, and as fer my social skills...ya can blame my uncles. My medical skills...as I told ya, carin' fer animals ain't all that different from carin' fer people. I got better at it th' longer I was with the Rebellion and then th' Alliance. Most of it was done on the field, but I gradually sat down with other docs, watched, learned, practiced, 'till I'm good enough not to get soldiers killed if I had to do the surgery myself. Luckily I've got very steady hands. One good thing I got out of runnin' with that sorry lot.”

She leaned back against an empty bed, regarding Ellie thoughtfully, “Look, normally, I'd recommend some bed rest at this point. The Force knows you might not get enough of it, but I don't like t' be unprepared for anythin', an' this ship's weaponry is sketchy at best. When the Alliance techs were fixin' it, they didn't seem to give a blast about it's defenses and armaments, you any good with ship weapons and figurin' 'em out? Far as I can tell, we've got one working turbolaser on the dorsal section. If it's all we've got, I'd like t' make sure it works. Think you can do that? Then you grab some shut eye. I'll be headin' back t' the bridge.”

Amy's lips curled up on one side when Ellie defiantly took another swig from that flask, the contents of which the Corellian was fairly confident was not water. And she found the Mandalorian woman's remarks a bit ironic, given the present situation, “Don't I know it.” said Amy, her tone a little snide, but patient.

“It's more like they didn't do a darn thing.” She grumbled on with regards to the weapons, “Whatever they wanted the ship to do, they didn't care for it t' have workin' weapons, an' jes' fixed up engines and essential comps, barely gave life support much thought either, in case you're wonderin' why it's nearly below freezin' 'round here.”

That was the main reason Amy still had her duster on inside the ship. “So have at it, then rest. Th' healin' takes as much out of you as it gives. I'll have somethin' for you to eat when you wake.”

She would need the sustenance, was Amy's thought, since the medications, especially the nanites, drew from Ellie's body to sustain themselves, and she would be feeling plenty hungry soon enough. So would the rest of them too, all things considered.