Rising warrior rising th.., p.11
Rising Warrior-Rising Threat,
p.11
***
The familiar ding of the autocook rang through the medical suite. Marda turned towards the device, Blazer’s replacement heart waited within.
“Nurse, the heart please.” Marda looked down at the charred remains of Blazer’s burnt heart. There wasn’t much to see. The nano-assemblers within the nutrient bath had done their best to rebuild the heart. Without a framework or stem cells to guide them though, it had turned into a malformed mess.
The nurse walked over with the new heart, but while it was the right shape and size, the texture of the skin was off.
“Gokhead?”
“Best I could manage.”
Marda nodded, with the limited equipment at their disposal, there was little else he could do. Please just last long enough to get us out of here. She set to work laying the heart in place within Blazer’s chest. Once ready, she began the painstaking process of reconnecting it to the circulatory system. Gokhead waited beside her, the cardiac stimulator and regulator on the tray beside him. When she indicated, he reached in and assisted her, cradling the heart as she knitted the blood vessels into place. As she began to reconnect the last vein pings of plaser fire rang off the hull. The nurse recoiled in fear.
“It’s okay,” Marda said in as calm a tone as she could manage to console the nurse before turning back to her work and keying her micomm.
Marda scowled beneath her surgical mask. She couldn’t afford to lose control right now, to lose her focus. She had to complete the surgery and save her squad leader—no, her husband.
Marda looked down at the heart and finished connecting it to the body. It lay there motionless, the secondary heart still beating away harder than normal beside it, trying to compensate for the lack of blood-flow. She opened up the clamps closing it off from the rest of the circulatory system halfway and massaged the heart, forcing blood in and out. It refused to pump on its own. She looked up at Gokhead while she continued to massage the heart with one hand. “Give me the cardiac regulator.”
He handed her the round device. She took a quick look at it then attached it to the heart, embedding the electrodes as her micomm indicated. Once in place, she activated it via her micomm. The heart began a slow beat for a pulse before it stopped. Gokhead stared in disbelief.
“I followed the instructions to the letter, what happened?”
Marda held up a hand. “I turned it off. Now, give me the other one.”
The nurse handed the internal defibrillator to Marda. She affixed it to the other side of the heart from the regulator. Pulling her hands free she motioned everyone away. “Clear!” she called and activated it with her micomm. The heart jumped and pumped for a few centipulses before stopping. “Good,” she replied, holding back tears of joy. She activated the Cardiac regulator again and they all watched for several pulses as the heart pumped away in a slow rhythm. As it continued Marda noticed something odd. At the point where the electrodes of both devices attached, Marda noted discoloration on the heart. “Damn, it’s burning the heart.”
Gokhead shook his head. “More like cooking, I thought something like that might happen.”
Marda stared up at him and had to resist grabbing Gokhead, despair almost overwhelming her. “Why didn’t you say something earlier?”
Gokhead motioned to the autocook. “That isn’t an organ printer. It’s designed to produce easily digestible foodstuffs, not sustainable organs. This was a long bet to begin with.”
Marda sighed. “I know, it’s not your fault, you did the best you could with what you had.” Swallowing her emotions, Marda opened the clamps on the veins and arteries the rest of the way before she removed them. She continued to watch the heart to ensure that it was working. She checked the smaller heart beside it as well; its beating had slowed and the skin patch she’d placed upon it looked intact. Satisfied, she began closing up Blazer’s chest, sealing in the heart that was little more than a bad piece of meat. She knew that the heart wouldn’t last long. It was already beginning to deteriorate and burn under the low voltage stimulation.
Marda looked up at Gokhead as she resealed what was left of Blazer’s sternum. “Get me a rescue pod. We have to prepare in case the heart gives out again.”
Gokhead nodded and ran out of the surgical suite. Marda continued to suture Blazer’s chest closed and for the first time since she’d brought him aboard, looked at his face. It was paler than she’d ever seen it before, but she could see color returning to his cheeks. His weak pulse would sustain him, and she very well may have just saved his life.
She checked the scans of his chest. The heart was destabilizing. They had a cycle at most before it would fail him, disintegrating in his chest. Still that might just be enough.
Gokhead ran back in a moment later and wheeled the sarcophagus looking escape unit next to the surgical table. The three of them lifted Blazer’s limp form into the rescue pod before Marda placed the remains of his old heart, still sealed inside the nutrient bath between his legs and closed the lid over him. Marda set the controls on the side of the rescue pod. Her hand paused over the activation switch. How will the artificial coma the rescue pod induces affect the cardiac stimulator and regulator? In his current condition the hibernation might kill him. If I do nothing though he’s just as dead. This is his best chance.
Taking a moment, Marda activated the pod and breathed a sigh of relief as a light winked to life atop it. “That’s the best I can do. Now get back out there,” she ordered Gokhead.
Gokhead nodded. Taking one last look at Blazer he stripped off his surgical gown and gloves, gathered up his armor and ran out of the medical suite.
Marda then turned to the nun beside her as she looked in at Blazer’s face through the translucent window. “Thank you for your assistance.”
“I will pray for him child.”
***
Gokhead skidded up beside Zithe a few pulses later, his exit from the dropship met by a hail of plaser fire. His chest armor still hanging off on one side, Gokhead turned to Zithe, as he snapped it shut. “What’s our status?”
Zithe looked back at him as he primed his rifle. “We can hold this position.”
Gokhead surveyed the scene and dropped back down as a shot rang overhead.
“How’s Blazer?” Zithe asked.
“He may... I don’t know.”
Zithe nodded. “Keep your focus.”
Gokhead swallowed hard and tapped into Bichard’s BIRD feed. Arion continued to harass the troops and tank. Then, in the distance he spotted something. Taking command of one of the BIRDs, he focused the optics on the object and gasped. “Gunship.”
Zithe returned a rueful smile. “I wondered when they were going to show up.”
Gokhead stared at him. “You wanted them to show up? In case you hadn’t noticed we’re a little exposed here.”
“I’ve been planning for them to show up.”
The gunship reached them a few pulses later and rained fire down on their position. The Blade Force retreated under the cover of the dropship. Its armored hull would take the brunt of the onslaught, but shots soon began to pierce the hull.
Arion replied, the fatigue in his voice noticeable even through the micomm link.
The constant maneuvering had stressed the AT-APT’s damaged de-grav generator to the point of collapse. The others still functioned, but were unable to compensate fully for the loss. Sparks flew from the back corner as it dragged on the ground. Scorch marks of heavy weapons covered its skin, and blistered armor from where a particle beam had gotten too close adorned its rear hatch.
The dorsal heavy turrets opened fire, launching plasma rounds skyward. The damaged turrets couldn’t track the gunship and despite piercing the shields, the gunship escaped unscathed. It moved to a position over the ramp and Arion’s AT-APT. Zithe stared at the scene, measuring the energy spike building in the tank’s main gun as the gunship bore down on Arion from above.
Grumbling over the link, Arion did as ordered and the AT-APT dropped to the dirt. The tank continued to roll for a moment then slammed on its own brakes as its cannon discharged. The particle beam speared out, tearing away the top of the AT-APT’s armored roof. Arion cursed as his now exposed armor began to sizzle from the heat. Then the beam began to rise higher and higher.
Arion looked up in disbelief. The beam continued its arc up and away from him as the ground beneath the tank gave way. A cent later the tank slid down the crumbling ramp and the beam cleaved the tail off of the gunship.
Arion’s hoots and hollers echoed up as the two halves of the gunship crashed to the ground around him. Behind the AT-APT, the tank tumbled down the cliff face as the particle beam dissipated. “I can’t believe that worked. Was that your plan all along?!” he shouted, too excited to use the micomm link.
Zithe let out a happy growl as the rest of the team cheered and watched the tank flip down the cliff face before it crashed to the ground upside down.
The team did as ordered and running up to the edge of the shelf, opened fire. They took out the exposed federation troops and forced the survivors into full retreat.
Grinning to himself, Zithe watched the scene.
Acknit came over the link a moment later.
Neurosimulation Bay 3, UCSBA-13, Star System: Classified
Marda emerged from the simulator just under a hect later, and had never felt so relieved to see the cool darkness of the interface helmet. She had stayed with Blazer while waiting for the corvette. With each passing moment her dread mounted, Blazer’s vitals deteriorating as the improvised heart they’d fashioned disintegrated in his chest. As the time passed she knew that the chances of his surviving decreased and the risk of neurological damage increased. Until she saw that cool darkness, she felt sure that her husband would return from this mission brain damaged at a minimum.
Her physical and emotional energy spent, she couldn’t even remove her own helmet. Someone soon helped her. Opening her eyes to the dim light she found Blazer smiling back at her and she leapt into his arms. She kissed him, a new energy filling her before she pulled away and slapped him as hard as she could. The strike sent him reeling to the floor.
He laid there rubbing his jaw as she jumped to her unsteady feet and leveled a finger at him. “Don’t you ever do something that stupid again!”
Everyone else in the room just stared in silence. No one was willing to risk Marda’s wrath, though a few stray giggles escaped a certain set of lips.
“Rudjick, knock it off or your next!”
“Yes Ma’am,” the elf squeaked.
She turned to Blazer as he climbed back to his feet, his hands up in defeat. “I’m sorry, I…”
“No, you never expose yourself like that! You know better than that! You got cocky!”
Blazer nodded.
Before he could say anything Matt stepped between them. “Marda, scale it back a couple ticks. That shot was damn near impossible.”
She met the older man’s eyes, defiantly. “You made it no problem.”
Matt cocked his head to the side. “Yeah well, I’m being trained by Tadeh Qudas and if I don’t do something impossible every mission he gets upset. You know that.”
Her glare still rage-filled, she turned her fury back on Blazer. “You never leave yourself exposed like that! Do you understand me?”
Blazer nodded. “Yes ma’am.” Blazer knew better than to argue with his wife when she was mad like this. On a mission he had to be the leader and he would never back down to anyone. But now, he was her husband and he knew she needed to vent and also that she was right.
Marda pushed past Matt; embraced Blazer in a long passionate kiss. “You are in serious trouble.”
“I’ll take trouble,” he replied and kissed her again.
Pulling away, Marda gave him another, lighter smack to the cheek.
“You don’t want this kind of trouble.”
Blazer swallowed hard and nodded as Rudjick began to laugh again.
“Rudjick, I can make your conception blocks permanent.”
“Yes Ma’am,” he squeaked out again and most of the team laughed.
“That goes for the rest of you too.”
Dr. Sares and Tadeh Qudas strode into the chamber a moment later. Marda could only stare in surprise. Dr. Sares never came to the simulations. The two officers reached the middle of the room and the team gathered around them. “Before we begin our formal debrief, Dr. Sares has something he would like to say.”
Nodding to Tadeh Qudas, Dr. Sares stepped up and offered his hand to Marda. Stunned Marda accepted his hand and shook it. “Cadet that was quite possibly the most stupid and yet ingenious thing I have ever seen a cadet undertake in these simulators.”
Marda wasn’t sure what to say so she shrugged and said “Thank you sir?”
“What you did in there should have been impossible. What you ended up doing was about the limit I was going to allow the system to do.”
“Um, thank you.”
“But, the principle is sound.”
Everyone looked over, curious. Did I just stumble upon something revolutionary?
He motioned towards the round pedestal of the simulation station. “A standard organ printer is about the size of one of these.”
Marda knew that to be true. Beyond the size, the power requirements of the nano-forge that fabricated organ tissue were more than a standard dropship could afford.
“You could have made it work though, think about it. What tools did you have?”
Marda thought long and hard. She thought about everything she done with the autocook, Blazer’s old heart, the nutrient bath, and her eyes went wide. “Oh my god!”
Dr. Sares returned a knowing smile.
“The nutrient bath, those nano-assemblers, they can rebuild simple nerve cells and strands, but…”
“Enough to make an organ viable again, yes.”
Marda let her head fall back as she rubbed her face. “Oh my god I could have made it work.”
“Actually no you couldn’t have,” Dr. Sares went on. “You could have made a better heart, but it still would have broken down, just not as fast. What you did do was just get yourself assigned as my new research assistant.”
“Sir?”
“You are my new research assistant. I want you and Cadet Gokhead! I want you two to figure out what hardware and software we need in order to produce temporary field-cloned organs.”
Marda and Gokhead exchanged nervous yet excited glances. “You mean it could work?”
He nodded, his tone serious. “I believe so. I think you stumbled upon the most potentially lifesaving device any team could have at their disposal.”
Marda looked back at Gokhead and he nodded. “Yes sir, you will have our support.”
“Good, then I want a full copy of your schedules before lights out. We’ll get right to it.”
UCSB DATE: 1002.331
Splicer 5000 Deck, Main Hangar, UCSBA-13
For most pilot crews the melding of pilot and WSO proved seamless. Each crewmember did their job to the utmost to accomplish the mission. Sometimes however conflicts would arise, with crews arguing until they’d find a common resolution. Other times however there would be no such resolution. At Mendrick’s the duwn before, the growing rift between certain pilot/WSO teams had come to a head. A band of pilots had begun to wonder aloud just how useful their WSOs really were.
It came as a surprise to none that Torgen, a pilot in Chertsin’s Commandos, was the one to poke the explosives-filled balloon. “I mean come on, what really be a WSO’s job? I be managing the power, flying, fighting, targeting, firing missiles, and all that just fine without a WSO onboard.”
From across the table his WSO Gendic, tired of his constant harassment in the cockpit, decided he’d had enough. “You really be thinking it be that easy? Let us be seeing just how well you be flying without us working back there. Face it you jokers be needing us.”
From the next table one of the Nip Tails pilots jumped to Torgen’s aid. “Whatever, you guys are just deadweight.”
Deniv facepalmed in response to his fellow pilot’s remarks.
From there the momentum sped up until Belitor Quien, the Lodran lead WSO of Black Stinger squadron jumped on his table, drawing all eyes to him. “Okay then. If that’s the way it’s to be, let’s see how you fly with us just acting as ‘dead weight’. Starting next cycle, and for all upcoming training flights, all WSO will be on strike until you fools realize that you can’t fly without us.”
