Within the Saint Claire, collision claxons sounded in nearly every compartment, sending crew scurrying to emergency stations. Added to this noise was the announcement coming over the loud speakers for exterior emergency crews to report to the suit room. Matt was running for the suit room even before the announcement was made. He grabbed his cool suit, undressing in the air lock while the system pulled his suit down to rack ten. By the time the system had dropped the gravity and opened the door, he had his jump suit off his cool suit bottom on and began running to rack ten, still pulling the top of his cool suit on. Other members of the outside emergency team began running into the bay to don their suits as Matt stepped out, already radioing the controller to open lock three before his suit had even finished its self-test. He snapped his gauntlets in place as the inner door of lock three cycled closed. He hit the controls to emergency dump both atmosphere and gravity while his suit was still doing its pressure test. By the time he jetted out into space less than a minute and a half had elapsed, record time for any emergency deployment.
“Molter to command. Give me a location on all the suit beacons you have.”
“Roger. Relative to the ship we have four beacons total. Light above the spine of the ship at approximately six hundred meters. Wallace is below and starboard about four hundred meters. Tasha and Jenkins are both toward the bow, below and starboard at four hundred meters and three hundred meters respectively. There is no beacon for Denner.
“Roger, any comm. on any of them?”
“Negative.”
“Roger. I’m going after Light, she’s the farthest. Vector the next out coming to Jenkins and Tasha and then Wallace.
“Roger. Copy all.” They said, keeping transmission brief to allow emergency traffic to flow.
“Hang on Joan, I’m on the way.” He said on intersuit, hoping she could hear him. It didn’t take long to locate her, her pinger showing on his locator once he zeroed in on it. He gave the suit max thrust in her direction, not caring about fuel usage, just time. He gauged his timing to pull to a stop just as he reached her, the total time from the explosion being nearly five minutes. He could see damage to the chest of her suit, a jet of vapor escaping gently, indicating that her pressure was nearly gone. There was also a long shaft of metal extending out of her left leg, which didn’t appear to be leaking significantly. He had his buddy cable ready by the time he reached her, and plugged in within seconds of reaching her. The flow of oxygen to her suit was immediate, the processor in his suit deciding that her suit was low on pressure. The medical readout showed she was alive, but he could see through the dark helmet visor that she was not conscious. Grabbing the emergency pack off his left leg, he quickly laid an emergency patch on the chest of her suit, stopping the escaping gas and allowing her suit to regain pressure.
“Molter to command. I have Light and am heading in. What lock do you want me to return in?”
“We are opening lock two for return.”
“Roger, we will need medical and suit techs. She has a rod of some kind extending through her left leg, still in place and debris that has passed through her suit chest section, and presumably hit her.”
“Roger, will notify both. Also we have two more out, one after Jenkins and one after Tasha.”
“Roger I copied the vector traffic.”
“Also we have a shuttle heading out to help search for Denner. ETA four minutes.”
“Roger, I should have Light in the lock in two. I plan on leaving her in the outer and then going after the Master Chief. I’m going to need the inside teams to transfer her to the inner.”
“Roger. This will follow emergency entry procedures. Notify when you’re out.”
“Affirmative.” Matt said as he coasted down the length of the ship, aiming for the air locks. He gently flipped them both over and hit his thruster to kill the bulk of his velocity. He was still moving several meters per second when he saw the open lock door and hit max thrust to finish breaking and to change his vector into the lock. They hit the wall hard, still moving a half meter per second. He pinned light against the wall, unhooked his buddy cable and pushed off, shoving himself back out into space. “Close lock two.” He said.
“Roger two closed.”
“Ok. I’m going for Wallace.”
“Roger.”
Matt hit his thruster, looking for Wallace below the ship. It took a number of seconds before he saw the master chief, slowly tumbling through space. By the time he made it to the master chief over fifteen minutes had elapsed. The suit had done its job, the hard shell failing, but the pressure bladder self-sealing the micro fractures in the carbon fiber. Matt could tell by the look of his leg that he was in bad shape, even before he got to him. Matt braked to a stop and connected his buddy cable, finding his suit in fairly good shape. The master chief was unconscious, and his blood pressure was low, probably from blood loss in the leg. Matt turned them and thrusted back toward the ship. “Ok command. I have Wallace. What lock?”
“What is your ETA?”
“Three minutes.”
“Roger, two will be empty by then. Tasha and Jenkins are in. Search for Denner is in progress.”
“Roger” Matt said. “Status of Wallace is crushed leg, low blood pressure, and unconscious. Also have the suit team ready for a repack on my suit.”
“Roger.”
Matt slowed them as they came into view of the locks and aimed them more gently into the lock. He stepped in and held the Master Chief as the gravity came up. He carried him into the second lock and cycled the controls, then carrying him into the main suit room as soon as the lock cycled open. He gently set the Master Chief down before the two of them were swarmed, the medical and suit techs working on the Master Chief and two suit techs pulling Matt’s biopack and replacing it with a fresh pack. He received two hard slaps on his shoulder, indicating the change was done before the techs went to work to help pull the Master Chief’s suit apart.
“Molter to control. Set me up for lock three.” He radioed as he started for the small air lock.
“Roger, three coming open for you.”
Matt stepped into the lock and cycled it closed, doing an emergency dump again to get out as quickly as possible. He still had one more man out there to find. He jetted at max thrust as soon as the outer door came open headed for the debris field of the tanker, hoping to find some sign of Denner. Matt spent the next six hours looking for her among the debris that was within reach of five thruster packs he had already consumed.
“Molter to command.”
“Go ahead.”
“Have the suit team ready with another pack, I’m headed in to lock three now.”
“Negative, the Captain has ordered you to return the ship and unsuit. She is calling off the search for Specialist Denner.”
He felt like he was a thousand years old as he unsuited and walked from the suit room. Matt didn’t even bother to change; walking straight through the locker room and on to his quarters, where he sat down in the dark, breaking down at the loss of what he felt was a good friend. It took him long minutes to gain control of himself before he could strip off the cool suit and replace it with a jump suit. He was afraid to go to the infirmary, afraid that more of his friends would be dead. Finally, he got the courage up to head down and see how bad the damage was.
He walked the corridors slowly, feeling like he had somehow failed his people. He turned the corner into the infirmary, and found no one at the desk. He stepped back into the area of the emergency rooms and found things reasonably quiet. Matt found solace in the fact that there were four beds with people still working. That at least meant that the four were alive. He collapsed in the hallway, not able to go any farther, exhaustion taking over his mind and body.
It was several minutes before Jenny even noticed that Matt was there, sitting in a heap on the floor, passed out. She ran over to where he was and checked his vital signs, finding them to be strong and stable.
“Suzi. Give me a hand!” she called
.
“What happened?” Suzi asked as she came over to help Jenny move him from the floor to a bed in one of the rooms.
“I don’t know. He seems to be ok, I turned around and he was just there, collapsed in the hall. He looks exhausted!”
“Well, this has to be hard on him. I’m going to get back in there, and you better too; we need all hands.”
“Right.” Jenny said. She leaned down and kissed her husband on the forehead and covered him with a blanket before slipping from the room.
Matt had no idea of the time when he finally awoke in the infirmary bed. He pushed off the blanket and walked from the room toward the emergency area. It was empty and dark. Matt headed to the first room down the hall, opening the door. There was a body resting in the bed, the monitors indicating heart rate and respirations. Matt walked in, looking down on the grizzled features of the Master Chief.
“Well, at least you made it.” Matt said quietly before turning and walking out of the room. Jenny was coming out of the room next to the Master Chief’s room, and saw him.
“Matt… What are you doing up?” She asked with concern on her features a she came over and put her arms around him, half hugging him, half steering him back to his room. “Come on, you need some rest, your body is still exhausted.”
“What happened to the rest of the team?” He asked as she steered him back to the bed.
“If you don’t stay in bed I’m going to have the doctor give you a sedative.” She said, avoiding the question.
“Jenny, what happened?”
“We lost Tasha, Jenkins is in critical condition, we don’t know if she’ll make it or not. Joan is serious but should recover. We had to do three hours of surgery to remove a piece of debris that just missed slicing her heart open. Chief Wallace had his leg crushed. He’s probably going to lose it. And well, you know about Denner.”
“I should have been out there.” He said; the pain etched in his face.
“NO! You were right where you should have been. If you had been out there you wouldn’t have done anyone any good. As it is you were there fast enough to save Joan and Chief Wallace! No one could ask more than that!”
“But maybe…”
“No. No buts.” She said cutting him off. “There was nothing you could do to stop what happened, all that would be different was you would have been caught up in it too. No, you were where you needed to be and you did everything humanly possible.”
“I’m not sure I’ll ever believe that.” He said, laying back and looking at the ceiling. “I was responsible for sending them out there.”
“Yes, you were responsible for sending them out there, and what did the Captain tell you after the shuttle accident? This is the Navy, people die, and sometimes you’re the one who has to send them out there. Look Matt, this isn’t combat so we think everyone is going to be safe, but the reality is that it’s a dangerous business. We take risks, we try to minimize them, but they’re still risks. Accept that! Accept that you did everything you could to make them ready. Joan shouted out fast enough to save the ship. That was her job. She did it because you gave her the confidence to do it. If she had been slower everyone on the ship may have died. But we didn’t, because you taught her how important it was to always be ready, to always look for the unexpected. You taught all of us, the whole crew, never ever give up. There are people on this ship that owe their lives to you directly. And those that don’t, look at you like some kind of super hero. But you’re not a super hero. You’re just a man that doesn’t know how to give up, doesn’t know how to lie down without a fight. To me you’re a wonderful man who loves me and who I love. No, you were exactly where you were supposed to be. You did all you could to prepare them and you did all you could to rescue them. Be content that you saved who you did. Ok?”
‘Ok.” He said quietly, pulling her down to him and wrapping his arms around her neck. “I love you.” He whispered.
“I love you too. Now rest. You drove your body too hard, let it recover a little bit.”
“Yes ma’am.” He said letting go of her.
She leaned down and kissed him gently on the lips before slipping out of the room, closing the door behind her.
“That was a pretty good speech.” Doctor Clark said to her as she turned from the closed door. “You have an awful good bedside manner.”
“I was only being honest.” She said as they walked to check on their patents.
“Sometimes honesty is what they need. The trick is to know when to be brutally honest and when to just give the bare minimum. That young man was ready to tear himself apart inside because he was blaming himself… You just gave him what he needs to deal with it. You two will go a long way together.” He said hugging her shoulders as they stepped in to check on Ensign Light.
The service for Tasha and Denner was held in the suit room. Most of the crew had turned out for it, the Captain officiating. Many of the crew that worked with the two had good things to say, Matt stood behind the grav sled that had been converted to get Master Chief Wallace to the service, dressed in a light duty class four suit, along with the rest of the honor detail. The service concluded with Matt and the rest of the detail taking the coffin through the main lock and floating it out into space, watching it float away. Matt wondered where Denner was as he watched Tasha disappear from view. The last to turn away, they closed the lock doors and pressurized the lock.
“You wanted to see me ma’am?” Matt said as he stepped into the Captain’s cabin, having been summoned following the service.
“Yes Lieutenant. Have a seat. So how are you doing?”
“Fair I suppose.” He said quietly
“I suppose you blame yourself?”
“Yes ma’am. To some extent.”
“Doctor Clark tells me that you’re to thank for saving Ensign Light and Chief Wallace. Doesn’t that count for anything?”
“Yes ma’am,”
“Let me ask you a personal question Lieutenant. Did you have sex with Specialist Denner?”
Matt looked up at her startled. “Yes ma’am.” He answered after a long pause.
“But not with Specialist Tasha? Correct?”
“Correct ma’am.”
“So do you suppose that has anything to do with how you feel? Clearly you are much more upset at the loss of Specialist Denner than you were Tasha. Why do you suppose that is?”
Fleet Academy Page 46
