| Reading Material |
| Summary: | Solstice decides to pay a visit to the injured pilot, Hosedown. Offering something to do while she's stuck in bed. What is a rather bland personal visit by the ECO turns into a talk of faith and a rare showing of empathy from Shakes. |
| Date: | 13 Feb 2042 AE |
| Related Logs: | TBD |
| Players: |
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| Recovery Room |
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| A much more quiet area of Medical, this elongated room is also lined with beds. Each is similarly outfitted with privacy curtains as necessary and even the paint on the walls has been lightened in an attempt to help lift spirits. Chairs are readily available all over the place so that visitors can pull one up to talk to the patients during their recovery. Near the entrance, visiting hours are posted with a very conspicuous 'No Smoking' sign. |
| Post-Holocaust Day: #352 |
In her day to day drift between pounding headache and drug addled sleep, Andrea is currently in a mid-point. She occasionally glances over at the button for medication as her headache grows, but usually just closes her eyes for a second and restrains herself. She likes being clear-headed. Most of the time, anyway.
Pausing near the first row of beds, Shakes looks about and then stops a passing medic as she asks something to the woman. There is a motion towards Andrea's bed and with a nod, Solstice heads the way offered. As the ECO draws closer to the pilot's bed she slows and keeps the folder tucked beneath her arm. Rounding the end of it she keeps her hands tucked into her pockets as she gives Hosedown a long study. Awkward as the silence might be, the woman finally speaks up, "Lieutenant." She intones. "You are looking a slight better."
Andrea looks up at Solstice as she approaches and smiles. Her hair is mostly gone, cleared away to make room for surgery, though a dusting of the ginger stuff has started to grow back. "Step at a time, Shakes. Thanks for stopping by. Grab a chair, take a seat."
The cool placid visage of the ECO is never marred, but she gives a nod of her head. Solstice steps to the side, hooking the chair with her foot and pulling it closer to the bed with an audible squeak of complaint against the floor. She settles herself to the chair and subsequently the folder to her lap. "I suppose that is all you can ask for. You are breathing. Can't count that as a loss." She remarks and then looks over the bandages again. Sardine cans. That's what Viper's were. Coffins. "Thought you might be bored." She says. "Do they give you anything to do here other than time to count the ceiling tiles?"
Andrea laughs a little. "Sadly, no. Its not much of an issue so far, though. Drips brought me a book…" she gestures to a bedside table, where there is indeed a book, "But I can't really concentrate enough to read at the moment. Focus too long and I get headaches, medicate the headaches and I go off to fairy land." A hand raises and gingerly touches her bandage, then lowers again. "So whats the word up on the deck?"
A faint smirk touches her lips at that and she nods. "Brought back a prize from the last tangle. No one got hit too bad this time around. She lifts the folder and hands it towards Hosedown. "Here, the report. Thought you might like a copy. Not as thick as a book and you won't need to focus too much. Besides, it's good to be caught up one whats going on. After all when you return you need to be up to speed." She says. Shakes way of being 'kind'.
This time, the laugh is loud enough that Andrea winces afterwards, raising a hand to her head. "Oh, gods, Shakes, you can't make me laugh like that." She chuckles, nonetheless. "You feel that I may be bored and so you bring me homework. I had friends like you in high school." She gets the pain under control and looks back up. "Seriously, thank you. It will be good to catch up. Do we know anything about those wierd slashes, yet? On the new Raiders?"
"Trust me, that was not my intent. You Viper pilots have an odd way of reacting. Has to probably be because of your suicidal tendencies." Shakes still offers the folder over for when she's ready to take it. "Nothing that I have heard. But I was hoping to go get a look with the CAG today. I can write up a report on my findings." She offers. Solstice seems utterly serious on the report end of things.
"Yeah. Us Viper pilots are a pretty strange bunch. Not so strange as, say, sitting in a highly advanced flier and letting someone ELSE fly it, but still quite odd, all the same." Andrea looks Solstice over. "Out of curiosity, Shakes, what did you do when you were in high school? Extra-curricular, I mean."
The question is something that has never really been asked. "I prepped for the Fleet Academy and attended services with my family." She pauses and then seems to remember something, "My last two years I ran track at the behest of my father." She says. Parties? Nope. "My last year I was sent to a prepatory school." Shakes blinks a little and lifts a brow. "Why the interest, Lieutenant?" She asks. She extends the folder over to rest atop the book instead, releasing it from her hands. She gives a turn to the soma braid on her right arm. "What did you do?" She counters finally.
Andrea touches the folder as it is laid down. "That makes sense, I suppose. Just curiosity, really. I was a cheerleader for the Pyramid team. Some modeling… I was Miss Congeniality for the Teen Miss Aerilon Pageant my junior year. Mama was always entering me into those. I ran track, too. 100 meter and 400 meter. Did pretty well for myself, as well. I enlisted after some Viper Pilots on R+R tried to pick me up in a bar and told me about flying. Passed the aptitude tests and, viola, here I am."
"Quite the colorful past, Lieutenant." the ECO says in observation. She shifts in her own seat and smooths her sweats. Despite being dressed down she assumes the position of meticulous care. Solstice actually smiles a little, if strained. "Space jockies.." She comments about those trying to pick up Hosedown in a bar. "Never changes. My father used to tell me stories. Seems the mentality gets handed down from generation to generation." She smirks a little. Shakes then says in a rare sound of empathy, "But you are where you are supposed to be. Everything happens for a reason, no matter the way it takes to get there. You just have to have faith."
"You really believe that, don't you?" Andrea asks, quietly. "Good. I am glad some people still do. Mama always took us to temple, even when Pa was hungover after a night at the bar. All in all, Temple was something you just did… never really paid much attention, beyond thinking the High Priest's son was pretty darn cute." She chuckles. "Good to know people are keeping the faith. I don't have much to keep, myself, but I'll hold onto it as best I can."
Solstice watches Andrea's confession with a sense of being the sheperd watching one of the flock start to wander. Clearing her throat, Shakes nods her head. "Yeah. Tradition, roots…family. It's all part of faith. There are only certain things you can trust with your faith and the Lord's are those that listen and know." She studies Hosedown and then settles the elbow of her right arm to her thigh, turning the soma braid on her wrist with her left hand. Staring at it, she brushes her fingers along the metallic bracelet. "Without something to believe in…why do we fight?" She asks and looks up at the Lieutenant. "Whether your faith is in the Lord's our your wingmates, it is faith all the same. Faith is hope."
"Hmmm…" Andrea says, quietly. "Faith in my wingmates. Yeah, I can see that. In my wingmates and in my Viper. Except…" a glance at her visible bandages. "There probably isn't a lot left of my Viper, anymore. But it kept me alive, even after I was knocked out while RTBing. That's not nothing." Another smile. "Thanks. That's a good way to think about it."
"I have a few areas I feel I know best." She admits and actually smiles slightly. Solstice looks at the bandages as well and ponders over the woman. "Your Viper can be fixed, just put that faith in the deckhands." She adivses and Shakes gives a tug to the metal bracelet she wears, unlatching it and sliding it free of her wrist. She turns it over and then looks at Andrea's good side. "Lieutenant." She starts and attempts to speak in terms of plain and simple but there is a deep belief behind her voice, "I would like you to wear this. Even if you don't hold in the same regard as myself…at least allow it to let you know others believe in your recovery and return. Faith finds it's home in many places. Once you are well enough, you can return it."
Andrea pauses as she looks at the bracelet, then nods and reaches out with her good hand towards the bracelet. "That… that would be nice, Shakes. Thank you."
In that rare display of team comradery and kindness, Shakes reaches out and carefully slides the bracelet onto Andrea's wrist. As she latches the hand made metallic soma braid closed, she turns it so that the glimmer of the inset amber can be seen. She fidgets it a moment till it lays properly and then draws her hands back, if not slowly. "Sure..I mean maybe it will help you find faith again in the powers that are beyond us. They watch and know…they will help you, Lieutenant." Solstice is putting forth that outward calm again as she looks up ato Andrea's face, meeting her gaze. "I know they will. You are a protector of our race." She swallows and looks a bit overspent in the area of personal interaction. Slowly she starts to rise looking about.
Pulling her hand back, Andrea looks at the bracelet with a smile on her face. "Thanks for coming by, Shakes. The visits are really meaningful to me." She touches the bracelet, then grimaces and grabs her head. "Sorry, I think its about time to medicate, again. I will see you soon. Thank you again." She reaches over and hits the medicate button, and almost immediately her body visibly relaxes as the pain (and most of consciousness) dissolve away. "Maybe… later… we can… stay up… braid each others hair…"
Solstice rests her hands at her side, unsure of what to say but there is a nod given. These personal interactions always give her the shivers and but she looks to the bracelet and faintly eases up. "Sure…why not." Sol intones. Shakes won't keep that promise if her life depended on it but the intention is well meant. "Rest well, Lieutenant." She says and lifting the chair quietly, she sets it back for the next visitor. With a look over her shoulder, she starts move to fix the bedside table, straightening it with precision before she nods and steps back. Pulling the curtain closed partially before she takes her leave.