Wyrdysm Games

Though her expression didn't signify it, Ariel was bot extremely sour and nervous.

Sour, because right out of port they were having problems. She noticed another crewman had traces of blood around his face, though whatever was bleeding appeared to have stopped. She'd have to get a look at it later. And for that matter, she still had the arduous task of either looking through records, which weren't always up to date on these things, or asking them directly, which she didn't enjoy doing, about allergies and other medical problems. Oh, joy, Ariel thought at the prospect.

Sour because she now had to show up in the lounge without time to finish cleaning up in the medical supply cabinet, so she had a huge mess to return to. Further more, she was not happy at all about showing up with questionable stains all over her shirt and skirt, her hair was totally messed up and needed to be washed, and she had minor lacerations on her right temple, right arm, and left thigh. So much for a professional appearance. This is not exactly a reassuring look for medical personnel.

Nervous, because someone was after this ship. Unless she had a bounty, which she doubted (Ares would much prefer her alive) there was someone else looking for this ship, which meant chances of Ares Corporation relocating her would probably shoot way up. Still, she pitied whoever was the instigator of this, but the type of infraction that would cause weapons fire, which is the only thing that could have caused this ship to jump like that, save an idiot pilot, meant that this wasn't a small offense. Assassination? Terrorism? Did someone higher up have a vendetta against someone on this ship?

Despite the speculation, Ariel said nothing. There were enough fighters on this ship to take care of it. Of course, they seemed kinda weird and shady, but Ariel didn't think that she was exactly unsuspicious either. Barely 17 and on her own? She didn't like them, but she understood the stares she was getting. Some of them, at least.

Wow, that's a ton of text for exactly zero dialog.

bien4500 wrote:"Excuse me Ma'am, I had seen this while I was stargazing, it may give us a clue to why the police were trying to kill us"
Jacob activated his computer and loaded the video, on the upper left corner, an overlay was displayed, showing his position inside the ship, he was inside his room, then the video played, it showed a glob of frozen blood floating across the screen, then switching to the IR spectrum, inside the glob, was a human figure, just 10 degrees hotter than the glob of blood. Jacob said "Either this guy committed suicide, or he was murdered. The police might have spotted this."
One of the seats was empty, so he said "One of our crew seems to be missing, he might be the victim if he was murdered.".

I don't think you were paying attention. That was a joke, silly, and Auriak was never even on the ship. I just decided to get rid of his character. Not actually part of the story at all, since he is supposed never to have existed. Furtherore, when somebody is spaced, they vaporize. There is no body.

*Ben sighs heavily at the folly of the world . . . *

OOC IS GREEN!!! And people don't vaporize in space, their blood boils, their veins and organs burst and they freeze solid.

"There were no other applicants. It wasn't one of the people requesting to crew with us." Rain looked at the cloud of volatilized blood in the video.
"Did any of you have anything to do with this? I doubt that they would kill us without an explanation over one murder on the dock but its the only lead we have."

Richard decided it was time to push things into motion.

He stepped forward and started to speak loudly:

"Listen up! I don't really know any of you, but there is one thing I learned doing freighter security jobs - people who are after easy living and good cash go after established trade routes and bigger companies.
A unknown ship, doing odd jobs in the back of nowhere, very few questions asked - one doesn't have to be a genius to figure out people go after these jobs for only a few reasons...either they are desperate, either they want to dissapear or they are running away from someone."

He paused for a second, just long enough for the words to sink in and then continued:
"I won't lie that I'm not here for the same reasons. Yes, there are people after me, but they left me for dead months ago, and if I though for a second this attacks fits their modus operandi I would have told you.
Now we're all gonna be on this ship for a long while, so let's not start this trip with deadly secrets..If you got skeletons in your closet, it's time for everyone here to know...not the details mind you, just the fact that there are some we should all worry about is enough.
So start talking!"

As he was talking and gesturing, he noticed most people followed his right hand with their eyes. It occured to him that he forgot he was holding a M-10.

***

"Easy? you underestimate the police, they'd scream bloody murder if their ship was stolen. and the station just stood by. No this has to be some sort of inside job, they might have been bought out."

"Wait..." Rain said suddenly worried. "What kind of gas? what did it look like?"

Ariel quietly reached into her shirt pocket and switched her analytic computer on in observer mode, hoping not to attract attention to her glasses. She wiped the blood from her forehead and leaned in to try to get a glance at the screen.

"Ex...excuse me, sir, what gas is it? I need to know if it's biological or otherwise harmful..." Dammit Ariel, this is no time to be timid! "I mean, it's for our own safety."

"Purplish..." Rain's eyes grew wide. "Shit get him into quarantine!"
Ariel raised an eyebrow, "You don't think..."
"Yes I do." Rain said looking at Ben with fear. "Polyform."