Unfiltered Echo Ghosts

Posted on Sat Sep 18th, 2021 @ 7:14am by The Narrator & Alison Bliss & Chloe Waltz PhD & Kindra Graham

Mission: I Ain't Fraid of No Ghost...
Location: Fortune's Echo - Ghost Surface
Timeline: November 1st - 3hrs on surface

The moment the two women in suits exited Echo's outer airlock they felt it. The bombardment of a myriad of teeny tiny rocks and coarse grains of sand being swept from the planet's surface. Comms between them and the ship was sketchy at best now, Kindra's voice carrying in amongst static and cross-talk that was barely coherent.

The port engine's filter had protested the situation first, and now the starboard chimed in - filter full - with that same cheerful red letter warning on the bridge.

In normal circumstances the changing of both filters was relatively easy, but in a grit-storm there was an extra challenge. With the addition of white noise and scattered sentences from confusing sources, this task was suddenly far more of a battle.

"... milestone twenty holds the bait... situation compromised... Under the wing... Inbound... losing sight..." Random glimpses into previous visitors and passers-by came and went in the suit comms and whispered through the bridge in unison.

"What the ai yah tien ah is that?" Kindra asked the puppy, rhetorically. She had tried to communicate with Alison and Chloe via the comms panel in the cargo bay as soon as the outer door closed behind them, and that... babel... was the only reply.

The puppy cocked his head at Kindra and gave a soft whine, barely less articulate than the sounds erupting from comms.

"Yeah, I'm worried too. Maybe I can do something to filter or boost their signal from the bridge." Kindra hurried across the cargo bay, hesitated to make sure the puppy was following, then sprinted up steps and along walkways to the bridge. The puppy settled onto the floor next to a half-empty bowl of water to one side of the pilot's chair in proprietary fashion.

From Alison's usual place on the bridge, Kindra tried comms again. "Alison? Chloe? Are you all right? What have you found out there?"

"Yeah. We are here." Alison replied walking next to Chloe. "But it doesn't look good, Kindra. Which reminds me. Can you find Tristan? Or at least make sure he is or is not on board?" She looked around letting Chloe to take the lead and followed her with the hand on the holstered pistol.

"Does it make sense to clean filters in this weather? Won't they be full again in matter of minutes?" Alison asked Chloe. The storm seemed to try its best to keep them grounded. The only good thing about it was that if they couldn't fly, no one else could. Including Reavers if they were still here.

Alison's words wrapped another tendril of cold worry around Kindra's gut, to join the worry for Alden, Jonas, and Whit. By the time Kindra had come to the cargo bay after the last exploration of Echo's external skin, Alison, James, the head, and the puppy were already inside. She'd just assumed Tristan had come in with them and gone to his bunk. If he was still out there… "Tristan would be able to hear us on comms if he's still wearing his helmet, right?"

"Hopefully we only need a couple minutes; once the ship is running we should be able to get above the storm. The filters on the Firefly's... Well, they're made to take some beating. It's almost like they knew that the folk running freight wouldn't clean them out as often as they should." Chloe responded to Alison's question, ignoring Kindra's. That she didn't have an answer to, and it probably wasn't meant for her anyway. The woman didn't know Tristan very well, but she wasn't the one who often took responsibility for other people.

"Tristan?!" Alison called and looked around then shook her head. "Nope, nothing." She said somewhat disappointed and worried to no one in particular. Turning her attention on Chloe she sighed and continued. "What you need me to do, Chloe?"

Kindra looked from the comms unit on the bridge, to the door, then to the puppy. Tristan didn't answer, so that meant he was probably on the ship… she hoped. Reluctant to leave comms, she reached out to scritch the puppy along the side of his jaw and ruff. He rolled over onto his side and his tail slapped against the floor. Kindra riffled around the bridge until she found a comms headset, checked the battery, then put it on muting herself but still listening. "Come on, puppy, let's look for Tristan." Kindra headed for Tristan's bunk, the puppy trotting along behind.

"Just... keep an eye out," Chloe responded to Alison, ignorant of Kindra's little search on the other side of the hull. Chloe knew where the filter was, she knew how to replace it. Once they reached it, she might use some helping holding it, but for now, well... Chloe was more worried about whatever might have been out there to send that box than about the filter. "We're almost there."

With the puppy by her side and listening to Alison and Chloe's progress, Kindra hurried back down to the cargo bay, thinking about Tristan. The young man had seemed to keep mostly to himself, and she'd only really spoken to him in passing. She regretted not making the effort to draw him out and learn a little more about him. Now was her chance, she and Tristan could play with the puppy together and wait for everyone to come back to the Echo. Past the infirmary, Kindra stopped at the door to 12-1, and knocked.

No answer. With growing unease, Kindra tried the latch and went in. The bunk was completely empty, as though Tristan had never been there. No, no, no. He must have moved bunks. Kindra swallowed and unmuted her mic. "Uh… Alison? Tristan's bunk... Is it 12-1, port side?"

“Uhmm… Yes.” Alison replied to Kindra. Happy to leave the mechanics of clearing the filters to Chloe, Alison took the position nearby with her hand back on the handle of her holstered pistol. She didn’t expect troubles and from her position she would see any coming from enough distance to react regardless of the little storm they had on their hands. “12-1.”

Picking up the frequencies seemingly at random, Kindra's headset cut across the underlying noise of Ghost's unique composition and grabbed a series of perhaps totally unrelated phrases. It broadcast them to everyone connected to that comms link - Kindra, Alison and Chloe - each one in a different voice and garbled some by static and background clutter.

'... contained... 'tem... from beyond... valuable.... pieces..'

Followed by a louder volume, shorter burst that hurt their ears. '... no gorram clue... Loxley had it...'

And then one just above a whisper that tickled their brains with more mercy.

'... panion jumped in.... 'eavers... echoes... skin?'

Those voices on the comms sent a shiver down Kindra's spine and she sank down to sit on the edge of the bunk. She reached out to the puppy's ruff for comfort and he leaned against her. Tristan was gone - this was bad. Worse than Alden, Jonas and Whit out there somewhere. They were three grown men, able to watch each other's backs. Tristan was out there alone – but why? It made no sense. She wrestled for a moment with whether or not to wait until Chloe and Alison came back in to tell them. Chloe might get distracted from her work, and Alison might wander off herself into danger to look for Tristan. Or, Tristan might suddenly return and get shot. Besides both women were professionals. She had to tell them asap.

"Alison. Chloe," said Kindra into comms. "Tristan's bunk is completely empty. Like, he packed up all of his things and left kinda empty. I'll keep looking for him." With sudden inspiration, Kindra picked up the pillow and held it to the puppy's nose. Maybe he could get Tristan's scent.

"Feh Feh Pi Goh." Alison cursed under her breath. "What is wrong with you people. This supposed to be a crew. Hwen Dan just wanders off without saying anything... again." She glanced at Chloe to assess the progress of the work but since all the engineering aspects of running the ship were somewhat troublesome to her, she couldn't say how much longer would it take. For now, regardless in what kind of troubles or adventures Tristan got himself into, Alison had to guard Chloe.

Kindra was beginning to understand that Alison dealt with worry for the crew by getting angry at them. Over comms, she said, "He's probably okay, Alison. Tristan, if you're listening, come home to Echo, hun. We're worried about you."

The puppy sniffed the pillow, then abruptly snatched it out of her hands and bounced back, front end low, back end high, tail high and wagging. Did he understand what she wanted him to do? Kindra had no idea. Gently, she extracted the pillow – now slightly damp but not torn - from the puppy's mouth, praising and petting him. He barked once and trotted out of Tristan's bunk. Kindra followed.

Her canine guide trotted to the cargo bay, sniffed around the lockers holding the environmental suits, and then sat down and looked at her expectantly. Kindra awarded him with enthusiastic pets and spoke into comms. "Alison and Chloe, how are things going out there, are you almost finished?"

Alison turned her head to glance over her shoulder at Chloe. "I don't know... Chloe?"

Chloe had, at this point, removed the filter. The initial removal had brought out of a puff of dust, visible even in this not-so-clean atmosphere. "I'm working on it," the woman responded with no more definite a measure of progress than they had before.

"She is working on it." Alison echoes Chloe for some reason amused. "Doesn't sounds like 'almost finished'. Something wrong Kindra?"

"Something wrong?" The irony of that question was not lost on Kindra. She chuckled. "If you're keeping a list, I've got nothin' new to add. Let's keep it that way if we can, 'kay? I'm still looking for Tristan on the ship, just in case." She turned away from the airlock and urged her new four-legged friend to follow. "Come on, puppy."

The young canine stumbled merrily in the companion's wake at first, then split off and wandered across the cargo bay towards the infirmary. At the junction between the two spaces, he opted to skid along the decking until he collided with the sofa facing the infirmary door. There he lay on his stomach and shoved his nose as far between furniture and flooring as he could push it. His tail wagged enthusiastically in hope of help.

The click of canine claws following behind then veering away caught Kindra's attention and she paused to watch the puppy's purposeful investigation of the space beneath the sofa outside the infirmary. She turned off her comms microphone and joined him. "I'm pretty sure Tristan isn't under there, but let's see what you found," said Kindra as she knelt next to the puppy and cautiously looked under the sofa.

It looked like something metallic, but the specifics were muddled visually by the addition of an outer coating of peanut butter and the general fuzzy outline of dust bunnies and hair. Nothing spectacularly gross, though it did speak of the fact that clearly no one had moved said couch in a good while.

"Congratulations, puppy, you may have finally discovered alien life," Kindra mumbled, and pulled the thing out from under the sofa. "Huh. Keys. I wonder how long they've been under there. Years maybe." She gently pushed a wet canine nose out of the way and caught the distinctive smell of peanut butter - probably what had attracted the puppy - as she took a closer look. A duck-shaped metallic tag, colored but battered, was attached to the keyring. "Looks like the sort of keys to open a building, or some kind of container – a locker maybe?" Kindra led the puppy to the nearest washroom, and cleaned both the keys and her hands thoroughly, then dropped the keys in her pocket to ask Alden about later. With the puppy in tow, she continued her search for Tristan.

"I think we're about done out here," Chloe said to Alison as she carefully started placing the filter back in to place. Out here with a piece of technology in front of her, no matter how dirty, she seemed practically oblivious to the woman out there with her, and entirely oblivious to what was going on with Tristan and Kindra and the dog. Keeping track of them wasn't her job, after all: cleaning the filter was.

Alison nodded and relaxed. Her hand moved off the grip of the gun and rested freely along her side.
"Let's go back inside." She waved toward the airlock with an invitation.

"You don't have to tell me twice," Chloe chuckled, tightening the last screw on the filter before following Alison to the airlock. Her normally pristine clothes were now covered in a layer of filter dust, and some of it stained her pale hair. Despite that, she had an honest smile of relief that this task was complete.

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