Rock Bottom
Rock Bottom
Summary: As the pilots discuss Kalypso's demise, death comes to visit.
Date: 97 ACH
Related Logs: None
Players:
Micah..Bayless..Dynames..Phelan..Shem..Sloane..Jocasta..NPC'S..

Ready Room Genesis - Deck 11
97 ACH 23797 Souls


The Ready Room is for pilots to get their assignments for the daily CAP. Rows of seating line six deep and back to the wall. At the front of the room there is a whiteboard, star maps and a podium for the CAG or Squadron Leaders to address the room. The flags of the colonies stand along the starboard wall as well as plaques of recognition. One plaque stands above those who have lost their lives and reads:
Captain Ide 'Screamer' Kolis
May he rest in peace among the stars.
So Say We All.
'Star Screamers' - Fighting 58th


Cornbread looks to them. Some of the Viper pilots might have heard a girl sobbing in his bunk a few nights ago. Finishing his water, he takes a deep breath and looks across all of their faces. "They…found Wide Load." He says, blinking slowly. "She's not going to be coming back."

Bayless's jovial mood falls into shock and then silent anger at Sloane's news. The CAG makes her way to the group of them, and doesn't look a damn bit happy. "What happened?" she asks Sloane in a hushed voice.

Micah clicks his teeth together when he hears that, jaw tightening by reflex. He glances from Sloane, to Bayless, expression one of burgeoning anger. It's always anger, or some variant on it, where Micah's concerned.

Cornbread breathes inward, showing his teeth in a frustrated visage, looking to the floor. He tenses up a little bit at the shoulders, clearly not too happy about it. Scratching the side of his head and retreating back to having his arms across his chest, he looks across their faces. "They um…" He nods a few times, making a bitter face. "…she was murdered. They found her on the Destiny." He lets out a deep sigh. "They uhm. Yeah…she uh…" He nods his head a few times, apparently there's more. He changes subjects. "…Chione's really busted up about it guys if you can simply not mention that she's crashing in my bunk I'd be grateful…"

As the pilots talk, the hatch opens slowly to admit a tall young man in olive fatigues. Around his waist he wears a toolbelt as an engineer might, a few tools shoved into the loops. His fatigues jacket is rumpled, the collar undone with one side sticking up and the other smoothed down. He begins walking towards one of the walls without seeming to take any notice of the group of pilots in here, feet shuffling.

Dynames's forward momentum comes to a halt. So do most of her autonomous responses, momentarily. 'She won't be coming back.' There is the outside chance that he means she was- and then Sloane keeps talking. Something in her legs send messages to her shock-numbed brain as she falls to her knees. There is a quavering gasp through gaping lips as her lungs try to restart, with arguable success. Murdered… Not just dead… not accidental, or in battle defending the fleet, but…. The world starts to swirl incoherently in her vision moistness rolling down her face as the first true breath passes her mouth with the choked whisper of, "Leto…!"

The man's entrance gets a momentary notice from Bayless before she places a comforting hand on Dynames shoulder. She just shakes her head and frowns. "Hedonistic frakkin' sons of bitches…"

Micah has neither momentum, nor the penchant for crying as a means of expressing grief. He simply continues to glare back and forth between Bayless and Sloane for a moment or two.. before turning and shoving his way past the toolbelt-wearing young man, and out the hatch. Yep, Cornbread was right about bad news and party crashing. St. Germain's off to break something. Like the bulkhead outside the door, which can be heard to receive a stiff kick as he pulls away.

"FRAK!" Cornbread spits, frowning after Jailhouse rushes out of the room. Throwing the empty water cup in the direction of one of the garbage cans, he slumps down into a chair and runs his hands over his face. "…I'm sorry, Jail…" He calls out, way too quiet for the soundproofing. "I didn't mean to…" He growls, resting his forehead on the chair in front of him exhaustedly.

Phelan listens intently, trying to take everything in.. "Does someone know how it happened? Or who did it?"

The young man continues along towards the wall, his feet brushing the ground as he walks. It's a jittery gait, almost stumbling towards the plaques on the walls and the colony flags. Lifting his eyes to the walls, he begins muttering. "…a rhyme. Call me true and I'll trust you. Not like the others. Can't trust the others…" His hand lifts, straightening one of the plaques. Carefully, precisely. As Micah shoves past him, it knocks the picture askew again. And then again he straightens it.

Bayless looks over at Micah's departure and shakes her head. "S'not your fault, Tony… just…" It's clear she's fighting tears at this point. "Brass better find the sick frak who did this. And hand him over to us."

Cornbread looks over to the man and raises an eyebrow. Looking rather drained, he glances across their faces and slides so that his back is against the chair. "It um…wasn't quick." Sloane offers, looking to them. "No idea what the status of the investigation is. I've been keeping Chione company in my off hours so I haven't peeked for much information."

"Not quite right…not quite right…" The engineer, if that's indeed what he is, delivers those words in an off-key singsong. He moves the picture frame again. And then again. His fingers have a slight twitch, his eyes wide. Moving very, very slowly his hand reaches inside the front of his fatigues jacket.

<Trait Roll> Dynames rolls Awareness and achieves a degree of Mediocre (2).
<Trait Roll> Phelan rolls Awareness and achieves a degree of Good (4).

Bayless frowns. "Excuse me, I need to go check on something. And break something on the way." Bayless then storms out of the room.

Bayless leaves for Corridor 11D [O].
Bayless has left.

<Trait Roll> Sloane rolls Awareness and achieves a degree of Great (5).

Dynames sits there in grief-stricken obliviousness, muscle memory in her spine the only thing keeping the utter lack of strength in her body from dropping her facefirst to the deck.

"Tempo…" Cornbread says softly as he stands, pressing a palm softly against her shoulder and urging her towards one of the chairs. Eyes on the shifty man, he glances to the door and then back to the would-be custodian. Apparently he sees it too.

Phelan looks around at all the pilots remaining, and raises a brow as he makes eye contact with the pilots.. he makes a pistol motion with his hand and motions his head to the only other person in the room.

"Not right…" The young man repeats himself. His voice is high-pitched, unnaturally so, and he seems to be sweating profusely. His hairline is damp, as is the rumpled collar of his fatigues. He licks dry lips, staring at the picture with wide eyes. "…not right." His hand slides from his jacket, wrapped around something small and black, and it makes a smooth motion as he sticks the barrel deep into his mouth. The metal clicks loudly against his teeth.

"What the fra…" Sloane suddenly rushes forward to try to stop the man from doing it. Trying his best to get alongside the man to get his hands on his trigger finger and yank. Cornbread bellows as he moves forward. "Woah! WAit! DONT!"

Phelan says as he starts to move towards the man, "Awwww fraaaaak…" he reaches for anything close to throw it at the gun in the man's hand.

The young man stares at the two pilots. His eyes are wild, pupils huge in the blue. They seem hazed out, focused on the space between them, except for one second. One second where they suddenly fight the fog and sharpen, stricken with sudden, abject terror. His words are muffled around the barrel of the gun in his mouth, saliva dripping from the corner of his lips as his teeth scratch the metal. "Save yourselves…" His hand shakes as though trying desperately to let go of the gun, at the same time that his eyes glaze again. Then, just as Sloane gets close, he pulls the trigger.

The bang is deafening, echoing in the room and in ears. It happens fast, the man's body crumpling as blood sprays the wall behind him. Droplets spatter over the plaque he'd been so intent on fixing.

Sloane is standing there with blood over half his face. There's a body on the floor near Sloane and Phelan covered in blood. The wall and the plaques on it are similarly caked with blood. Looking to his hands and then down to a pistol with a smoking chamber on the floor, Cornbread takes a step back. "What the … who the hell was that?!?"

Phelan shakes his head and stops moving towards the man, "I'd like to know how the frak he got a pistol. Shouldn't they be locked up?"

The young man who'd wandered into the room earlier lies on the ground in a heap at Sloane's feet. On the floor by his right hand is a pistol, fingers now loose and holding it no more. His blue eyes are open and staring at the ceiling as blood pools thickly from under his head, spreading over the floor.

Bayless yanks the hatch open and runs into the room, her eyes wide and going wider at the sight of the carnage. CAG instincts take over. "You two okay?! What the frak happened?!"

Phelan looks back to the Cap, raising a hand, "yea, all clear cap.. this guy just punched his own ticket out."

"I'm fine!…fine…" Cornbread takes a step back, blinking and looking himself over. "The guy he just pulled out a gun and popped himself…he just…" Cornbread growls. "The selfish son a bitch just shot himself…" He says, partially in disbelief.

Bayless shakes her head in disbelief. "You've got to be frakking kidding… okay, okay…" She takes a couple seconds to regain composure. "Okay. Neither of you touch anything. I'm gonna call the marines down here, and sickbay afterwards. Grab a seat, relax…" She looks at the corpse, then makes her way over to the wireless.

Someone answers your wireless call. You can now use the 'private' wireless channel to talk to them.

[Private] Shem says, "Marine office, Lieutenant Shem."

The corpse lies there. Those blue eyes remain open, pupils so large it seems there's only a small ring of blue left of the irises. There's just something about his face in its motionless expression. Some people look peaceful in death…this man looks terrified.

[Into the Wireless] Bayless says, "Lieutenant, this is Capt. Bayless. I'm in the Deck 11 ready room…. Someone just committed suicide in front of two of my pilots."

Cornbread turns his eyes away from the body and simply sits on the floor away from it. Not wanting to get blood onto the chairs, he sighs and runs a hand through his hair. "Great…" He smirks, shaking his head.

Jocasta comes in from Corridor 11D.
Jocasta has arrived.

[Private] There's a ponderous pause. "Yes, sir. I'll be over with a team in a moment."

[Into the Wireless] Bayless says, "Thanks, we'll wait here for you."

Shem comes in from Corridor 11D.
Shem has arrived.

Blood and brains. It spatters the walls in an ugly spray that cuts up the middle of a framed plaque and one of the colonial flags. The source of it lies on the floor, crumpled in a heap mostly on his back. A tall young man, dressed in rumpled fatigues. A gun is in his open right hand, mostly having fallen to the floor. Blood pools in a thick lake from the hidden wound now pressed against the floorboards. His blank eyes are blue and opened very wide, pupils dilated almost to the point where they're completely black. His expression, though softened now in death, is unmistakeable. Fear.

"Gods!" That profound and wordly exclamation comes from the newly-returned Jocasta, who have frozen abruptly just inside the doorway upon laying eyes on the grisly scene. "What the frak happened in here?!" Bayless… Sloane… new guy… somebody.

Cornbread looks to Jocasta, covered with some of the blood spray from the new cadaver. "Someone offed himself." He says flatly in Jocasta's direction. "Adding bad news with worse news and I ruined Jailhouse's wedding afterglow. How the frak are you?" Cornbread grunts, pulling out a pack of cigarettes.

Bayless shakes her head and sighs, arms crossed over her chest. She looks over to Jocasta. Sloane answered her, so she simply adds, "Marines are on the way so steer clear of the body."

The sound of multiple, rapid bootfalls waft in from outside, growing louder and more persistent.

Right. Because Jocasta's first impulse after cursing would have been to run right over to the fresh kill and give it a good hump. In actuality, Jojo just tries her best to remain nonplussed. Combat casualties you expect; consider yourself a corpse the moment you climb in to the cockpit, they tell pilots at flight school. She remembers it well. Even when she was in the Marines, they made you sit through film after film of terrible things, but nothing hits home quite like a suicide and the countermeasures office can't help but to gawk in disbelief for a few shattered moments until reality settles in and she ceases being a mouth-breather.

Lighting the cigarette, Cornbread smokes it quietly on the floor. Shaking his head bitterly, he keeps the corpse out of his field of vision. Looking up at the sound of incoming footfalls, Sloane looks to Bayless. "We haven't touched him…by the way. He did it before we could get close enough to try to get the frakking thing out of his hands."

Bayless just shakes her head, allowing Phelan to depart to get some air. "Did he say anything besides all that weirdness he was spouting? Anything that sounded like he had a reason for this?" This directed to Sloane.

There's a shout outside, "Make a hole!" And then, a moment later, Shem hurriedly enters from the corridor. His cheeks are flushed - it looks like he high-tailed it over from the office. The lieutenant's eyes fall to the body after a couple of steps in. He mutters a curse; it was true. There's more approaching bootfalls from outside.

"That something was not right and to save ourselves." Cornbread replies, looking from Bayless to Jocasta. "Whatever the frak that means. He was fixing everything up in here like he wanted it nice. Apparently he forgot that shooting his head off would dirty it again. Then he pulled the trigger." He says loud enough for the incoming S2 to hear.

The dead man, of course, is saying no more. His sightless, dilated eyes stare at space. A droplet of blood trickles slowly down the glass pane of a plaque on the wall.

Bayless glances over to Shem and his team aarive. "Lieutenant." As if she had to, she cocks her head in the direction of the body.

Jocasta inches over to one side, insinuating herself in between two rows of seats in order to allow Shem and his posse easy access to the room and the lifeless body therein.

Shem presses his lips together. He pulls out a notepad and pen from his breast pocket. He seems to be moving with an almost unsurprised, disaffected ease — what with the way morale has been going these days. He starts writing, ostensibly what Cornbread said. "Anybody know this guy?"

Another pair of bootsteps brings in a Marine with an MP brassard and a black kit. After a few wordless gestures between the Marines, the MP sets the kit on some clean ground and gloves up, eyeing the dead body.

The S2 takes down the names of the witnesses and arranges to interview them soon. As the appointments are made, they're joined by a pair of Naval corpsmen with a fold-out stretcher. They wait for the MP to confiscate the gun and take pictures of the body, making note of the placement and surrounding areas, before removing the body down to the medical deck. As the body, corpsmen, and MP shuffle out, Shem stays behind. His eyes linger on the blood-soaked flag, and for the briefest of moments, he shows a crack of sadness. And then, he's gone, shutting the hatch tightly behind him.

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