itstopped | Re-Entry 08: Video/Spam

Help!

[The cry goes out while the video is still turning on. The picture, when it appears, is chaotic: Felix Gaeta, ashen grey and soaked with sweat and tears of panic, but only for a second before the shaking camera turns on what looks like an empty Western ghost town, caught from a high vantage point, shingles visible at the bottom of the screen.

Not empty. There are snarls and yowls and a terrifyingly organic sound coming from below.

Felix's voice cuts in again, tight with fear. He's not a hero. He's not a fighter. He's the one at the controls, and for all that he's usually good at staying calm in a crisis, it's a lot frakking easier when there's a console between him and it. He sounds a little hysterical.]

SOS! SOS! I'm pinned down in the-- oh, gods-- [There's another furious roar from below; his voice hitches, the camera shakes.] --the CES. Something attacked us. I think Dean is dead. I--

[There's a scream from underneath, unmistakeably human. The communicator drops against the shingles--] Dean? [--and cuts out.]

[Open Spam for Level Two/Infirmary, Later]

[After it's all over, after they've done what they can with Dean's corpse and patched up whatever needs to be on the survivors, Felix is set adrift into the aftermath. He should get cleaned up and then stay with Dean, he knows, or else he should get back to work and keep something like this from happening again. But he can't seem to make himself go to the latter just yet, not with Dean dead less than an hour, and the former...

He's always known that the death toll exists here, but he's never had to really confront it before, not in a way he couldn't brush off and ignore. The truth is that it scares him more than almost anything else about the Barge, even here, even now. It's not ignorance; it's not that he's never seen anything like it before. It's that he has.

The pull to sit by Dean's side and wait is powerful, but in the end, he winds up haunting the door to the infirmary, still red-eyed and disheveled, constantly peeking inside.]

((Right after/congruent with this, obviously.))

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

That's not-- [He grits his teeth, exasperated.] What about when you die? Will you care then?

I'll be dead. And I think, if I had a choice, I wouldn't be coming back.

[Then why are you even arguing with me? he wants to ask, and looks like he wants to ask, but doesn't.] But say you do. You're here.

If I do come back, I'll...try to think of it as a gift and not a curse.

And say it happens again.

Then I'll have to take a hard reexamination of my daily habits and figure out why I'm dying so frequently.

And that would be the major takeaway from your untimely death.

[The marquis just stares at him. He could continue this conversation (and probably win it; it's easy to beat down a grieving man) but he doesn't actually care that much.]

[So after a moment he shrugs and steps into the infirmary. If Felix doesn't care to be helpful, he can gather what information there is on his own. And Felix can follow, or not. It's a free Barge.]

[(Ha ha.)]

I know I'm one of the lucky few who gets to come back. I'd...make sure that second chance wouldn't be given in vain.

It would have destroyed us if it had the chance.

[ She can't manage to feel that bad about it. She has a million other things to feel bad about, and those are taking up most of the room. ]

No-- Resurrection, I mean. The Hub. [Please, even he's not so far gone into moroseness that he's going to care about some Raider.]

[She sees the message too late to do anything. The least she can do, then, is visit the infirmary.

When she sees Felix her chest tightens, and it's a moment before she speaks, voice soft and concerned.]

Hey.

[ She nods, once. ]

Yeah. [ Second best move they ever made against the Cylons. ]

Maybe we should stop thinking of ourselves as 'alive' here. Maybe it's just some frakking cosmic waiting room.

[ Stephanie chooses not to answer that question. It's for the best, really. She couldn't be more relieved that Chromie is here, and it gives her an idea. ]

Chromie, Racetrack, I can keep them at bay but you two have the real firepower. Can you manage for five, ten minutes while I get Felix back on deck?

[ There's definitely relief, knowing that Iris is okay and Steph's not just abandoning her because Felix can't keep his cool. But there's also a very cold dread. ]

Well that can't be good.

Tell me about it. You lot got it 'andled?

Would definitely not say no to an extra hand or six, but we're holding our own.

I think so, yes!

[It turns out it's hard to breathe fire and talk at the same time. Chromie does manage to spit some more plasma at the far edge of the pack, though for the most part it misses.]

Frak. [He sighs and hides his face in his hands, heavy and exhausted. He should have known this would be the conclusion regardless. Dealing with Ned really is like dealing with himself.] Naturally.

[He hasn't actually thought of it that way before, it's clear from the way he blinks at her now, brow furrowing. It makes more sense, though, than Ned's save point metaphor, or at least he finds it less troubling.]

Then... what's all this? [He nods towards the infirmary.] Why die at all? Why bother with this resurrection crap?

Sorry, Felix, just got the one.

[ To Steph: ] Done. Go.

[ She is going to keep shooting and not waste time on words. ]

[Barbara means more to him than most of the people here, but that makes it harder, in a way, to keep it together. With Riddick, with the Marquis, it was about information, pure and simple. He's good at handling information calmly when he's not on the verge of death. With Barbara and Racetrack, though... he's just not used to being on many people's priority lists, to have people checking in with him for something other than business, and there's about half a second where he kind of just wants to break down at her.

But she's still his boss, and he's made enough of a spectacle of himself today, so he takes a deep breath and flashes her a tight smile.] Hey.

Gods dammit... [Not that he's an especially good shot, because he really isn't -- even if he's been practicing lately -- but he really doesn't like being the only helpless one here. He stares at the dragonfire out of the corner of his eye for a second, then shakes his head and makes for the edge of the roof, addressing Steph again:] I'm not hurt. I can get down. Can you cover me?

[ She nods at the others before aiming her grapnel gun at Felix's roof. ]

No, don't go down! I've got a much better idea.

[ She fires, and in a matter of seconds she's swinging through the air safely above the teeth of the crazed hounds below and launching herself up onto the roof next to him. ]

Unless the dogs learned how to fly. Then we're totally screwed. How's your grip?

[Barbara smiles back, a little, but then she's shaking her head.]

You really don't have to do that.

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Re-Entry 08: Video/Spam

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