Emergency

<snip>
"Fuck you Queeg. We Win"
She grabbed the poles. Rippling currents of pain arced through her and the door closed. She was frozen in place, unable to let go, the current contracting her muscles. She screamed.
It all went dark.
</snip>

"Oh... smeg" Cass breathed, her eyes narrowing as she gazed up at the damaged and spasmolytically twitching figure in the control room, high above them
"That’s not good" Katrina murmured, slowly shaking her head "Not good at all"
It was Cass who recovered from the shock of what they were observing first and clapped an arm around Katrina's shoulders
"We need to get up there!" she urged, dragging the other woman along with her for the first few paces, as she dashed across the hangar, making her way towards the emergency ladder up to the control room

Scrambling up the rungs as quickly as she was able with her cut and still bleeding fingers, Cass barely managed to contain her gasp of shock at the horrific sight of Jade's injuries when she reached the top
The doctor had slumped forward as she had lost consciousness, her weight and momentum fortunately pulling her free of the electrodes to collapse in an ungainly heap on the floor; her ravaged body a mass of contusions, blisters and lacerations
The very fact she had even been able to make it up to the control room in the first place, was, in Cassandra’s opinion, something of a minor miracle

<snip>
Jaxx took a deep breath and quickly stopped as he grabbed his chains and turned around to see Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Chrysler trying to look through the broken window. Jaxx sighed with relief as he said, “I am like so glad to see you ladies. Hurry and get in here the Doc is messed up.”
</snip>

Heedless of the shards of plexi-glass still protruding from the window frame, Cass quickly swung a leg up over the sill and hauled herself into the control room, trying hard not to gag at the overpowering stench of burned flesh as she slid across the control desk and down onto the floor at Jade’s side
Grunting softly with the effort of manhandling the prone physician over into the recovery position, Cass pushed herself up to sit back on her haunches and checked Jade’s pulse while she frowned up at Jaxx
“You see what happened to her?” she asked as the station around them made some weird creaking and ticking noises
“Nope” Jax shook his head “It was like totally Queeg that did this”
"How is she?" Katrina asked as she clambered through the remains of the window, into the control room
"Still alive" Cass reported, her fingers still monitoring the doctors pulse "Just"
"She’s a real mess..." Evelina murmured, shaking her head in disbelief
Cass glanced up at this but said nothing, her gaze instead returning to the Jade’s scorched and ruined body, wondering what the hell would be best the best course of action for her
"You know, we had better hope that those really were medical nanites that Phil was waving around" Katrina murmured "She's smegged without them"
"Yeah, they were" Cass waved a dismissive hand "I'd recognise the carrier serum anywhere"
"Well, thank smeg..." Evelina breathed
"Yeah, we still need to get hold of them" Cass scowled "I can't see Phil or Queeg, or whoever the hell he is, being all so willing to give up a major bargaining chip like that"
She paused to glance down at Jade's multitudinous injuries and shook her head
"I just hope there's enough of the damn things left for Jay after I'm finished here"
Katrina grimaced at this and momentarily closed her eyes, an almost inaudible sigh escaping her lips
"Jay would rather die than deny treatment to anyone in Jade's condition" she murmured
"Yeah, I know" Cass grumbled, shaking her head as she clambered to her feet
She was about to say something else, but she was interrupted by the stations ancient PA system crackling to life
<snip>
"Everyone!" Jamie said, his voice booming out over the comms system around the whole ship. "If you can, get to the bridge of this station. I need someone to use the thrusters to spin the station 30 degrees clockwise, on the same axis as the sun. I can restore our altitude from that."
</snip>
“Altitude?” Jaxx’s frowned quizzically
“It’s how high we are above the planet” Katrina explained patiently “That must be what all those creaking noises are about – Queeg must have set the station on a dive into the gas giant’s atmosphere”
“Okay, we all head for the bridge” Cass said decisively, turning to peer at a fire evacuation schematic, stuck on the wall near the door and jabbing a finger at it “That’ll be where we’ll find Queeg, the nanites and everything else we’ll need to sort all this shit out”
“Yeah, agreed” Katrina nodded and turned towards Jaxx “We need you to move the doctor – Gently – Think you can manage it big guy?”
“Sure” Jaxx shrugged, his features, after a moment, twisting geologically into a frown “Won’t moving her be bad?”
“She’s smegged if we don’t get her some treatment soon” Cass scowled “We might not have time to get there and back for her”


The group hurried through the corridors towards the bridge, eventually arriving some ten minutes later, with Katrina and Cass in the lead and Jaxx moving more slowly, mindful of the doctor's injuries, bringing up the rear

Slapping the door access panel Katrina strode onto the darkened bridge with Cass following closely behind, her eyes suspiciously scanning the gloom around them
“Ah, here comes the cavalry!” a deep voice rumbled as a light went up, illuminating Phil, who was standing in the middle of the room, wearing a broad smile and holding up a faintly glowing phial of medical nanites in one hand
“Is this what you’re looking for?” he smirked “It’s the very last batch...”
Katrina stalked into the room to come to a halt some ten metres or so from him
“Have you been drinking again Phil?” she snapped, as Cass continued on into the room, moving around Queeg in a flanking manoeuvre “Because if this is all just down to too much cooking larger, you’re in big trouble mister!”
“I’m not Phil!” Queeg rumbled indignantly “I am Queeg!”
Katrina shrugged, unimpressed
“So who or what is a Queeg?”
“I think he’s one of Holly’s old backups” Cass said from nearby “I recognise the filename – Must’ve got corrupted when Pancake pulled his latest shit; although I’ve no idea how the hell it got inside Phil’s head”
“Very good Ms. Jones” Queeg half turned to favour her with a cold smile “But I’d expect nothing less from our creator”
“Yeah, whatever” Cass shrugged dismissively, as Jaxx edged into the room, gently carrying Jade “We survived all your stupid little tests, so hand over those nanites and let us manoeuvre this station back into a stable orbit”
“Ah, yes... I was getting around to that” Queeg smiled “There’s been something of a change of plan”
“What a surprise” Katrina muttered under her breath
“You see...” Queeg continued brightly “Having a physical body for the first time is rather ...exciting, so I intend to continue my possession of it and take full advantage of all the various pleasures and vices you Humans seem to enjoy so much”
“Phil...” Katrina warned
“Sounds like you’ll be needing some ...company” Cass smiled, as she prowled towards Queeg “How about you and I blow this joint and go someplace else?”
“Cassandra!” Kat snapped, aghast
“So what do you reckon?” Cass continued, ignoring her, as she moved even closer in towards Queeg “It could be fun...”
“You know...” Queeg mused, momentarily glancing out of the corner of his eyes towards Jaxx and Evelina “I don’t think I want any of Chrysler’s cast-off’s – I think I’d much prefer someone with a little more...” he paused to quirk his eyebrows “muscle”
“Oh, that’s okay” Cass soothed, smiling back at him “I only wanted to get close enough to do this!”
Everyone else in the room winced as she kneed him hard in the balls; instantly dropping him in a watery-eyed, gasping and wheezing heap on the floor
“I take it you weren’t expecting how much that could hurt?” Cass asked coldly as she stooped to pluck the, now forgotten, phial of nanites up from the floor
“Kat” she continued “You’re on helm; Evelina: Help fly this crate, and Jaxx...” she paused to glare down at Phil and the feeble moaning noise he was making “Watch this smegger – If he so much as moves: Kick him in the nuts again! I’ll see to Jade”

The Dwarfer’s each hurried to their allotted tasks, Cass rifling through several storage lockers until she found the armload of equipment she needed to control the nanites
“Cass...” Katrina called
“Busy, busy” Cass murmured, scanning Jade and the nanites to begin setting the force-feedback mechanisms up
“No, honestly Cass” Kat snapped urgently “These controls aren’t responding”
“You what?”
A low chuckle emanated from Phil, still curled prostrate on the floor
“There’s one test left for all of you” he began
“Jaxx!” Cass snapped, suddenly standing to point at Phil “Kick him in the balls!”

<tag>
Jade will be back up and running in a bit; anyone got any ideas about what we can do about Phil and to get the station back online?
</tag>