They found Fagan unconscious and bleeding badly. Opoku reached inside the drone and hit the button to open the hatch and slapped it. It didn’t work, “It must have been damaged.” She said to Dinah.
Prestmon arrived and took in the situation. “We can’t get him out!” Dinah shouted.
He left, but returned shortly to find Dinah and Opoku trying to pull the hatch open. “Back off” He commanded. He looked at Dinah, “This swings up, right?”
“Yeah.” She answered. The room became very quiet as everyone stood still except Prestmon.
He got on his back on the deck and in the process felt several pieces of debris cut into his back. He slammed the prybar he had retrieved into the bottom of the hatch and started pushing. It wasn’t moving.
He stood up and Dinah noticed his cuts, which were bleeding profusely. He stepped back, rushed at the drone, and slammed his feet and full weight onto the prybar, lodged into the gap of the hatch. It sprung loose and Prestmon landed on his back and shouted in pain. Opoku reached down to help him up. Dinah went to the hatch and pushed it upward. She took in the scene inside the drone, Fagan’s arm was on the floor and he was bleeding badly from that and his right leg.
Prestmon was making his way out of the room and Dinah and Opoku lifted Fagan out of the drone as gingerly as possible.
“Get the arm.” Dinah barked at Amatucci, as they started out with Fagan.
She reluctantly fetched Fagan’s arm from the drone and held the bloody end away from her. She caught up to the others on their way to the infirmary.
“I have it.” She said from behind them.
Dinah told her to go ahead to the infirmary and start up the Doc, which she did.
All spacecraft and un-automated long distance sea ships were required to carry one of the two models of Auto-Doctor. Welhaven made one of them, which was the one they had on board.
Amatucci entered the small infirmary and set the arm on a table. She started the Auto-Doc and stepped back as the machine came to life and main examination chamber opened up, waiting for a patient.
A minute later, Dinah and Opoku appeared with Fagan. He was still unconscious. They lugged him over to the Doc and laid him on the waiting table. Amatucci hit the button to send the system into motion and as the cover slid over Fagan, she remembered the arm.
She jumped to grab it and in the process of swinging it into place where it would hopefully be reattached, she splattered more blood on Dinah and Opoku. She got the arm in place just before the cover closed fully and sealed.
The Doc immediately scanned Fagan to determine his status. Since he was alive, it flooded the chamber with 100% oxygen. That clouded the clear cover they were looking through for a minute.
From out of the bottom of the table, a tourniquet was strapped over the remnant of Fagan’s arm. His clothing was removed and another tourniquet was secured above the deep cut on his leg. A breathing tube was inserted through the nose and into his lung and an IV was started with a heavy painkiller and sedative drip.
The small indicator panel on the Doc changed from critical to stable a few minutes later.
Dinah exhaled and almost smiled. “He should be ok.” She said turning from the room. “Let’s go clean up guys. And where the hell is Prestmon?”
Dinah found Prestmon in Engineering, Norrie was looking at his cuts. “These are not too bad buddy, no convalescent leave for you.” She said with a smile, and he smiled too. She was putting patches (these seal the wound and contain a time released antibiotic) on the worst of his cuts and simple bandages on the smaller ones.
Dinah walked up to them and said, “You are quite a hero Prestmon, I will try to do something special when we get back. I am sure Welhaven can up your bonus at least.”
He looked at her dryly, “When we get back?” He paused. “Don’t you mean IF?” He winced as Norrie pulled another fragment out of his back and then applied a patch.
She didn’t answer him and left Engineering, seeming a little smug. Dinah headed to the Control room. She knew this would work, it had to.
She got to the main deck and called on the intercom, “All hands report when ready to try this again.” She ordered flatly.
“Go get cleaned up Dinah.” Kelley told her. She left and Kelley went back to Opoku’s NAV station to check their location and try to work on the best trajectory for their next attempt.
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