Chapter Text
Ch 1- Wakey, Wakey
Ilyukhina
The lights were bright to her eyes. Why were the lights so fucking bright?
“Eye movement detected. What is 2+2?”
What was that?
“Eye movement detected. What is 2+2?”
Wait, she knew the answer to this.
“Fffffffff”
“Incorrect. What is 2+2?” Fuck. Let’s try that again.
“Ffffffooooooorrrrrr” Close enough?
“Correct” She opened her eyes to see robot arms flying at her. Flinching, she relaxed when she realized that they were just removing the tubes that were in her arms and legs. And nose. Why did they have to have so many tubes for a coma?
“Please state your name.” The robot was talking again. Why was it talking?
“Olesya Ilyukhina.” Why did it want her name? She knew what her name was for crying out loud.
“What is your role on the Hail Mary.” Seriously?
“I am Engineer for ship.” She rolled her eyes and muttered “Stupid robot.”
“Cognition check completed. Good morning, Engineer Ilyukhina. Please use caution when exiting your bed, motor functions are still returning after your coma.”
Olysesa nodded at this before slowly sitting up. She sat there for a moment, letting her feet dangle from her bed. What to do. She was programmed to be woken up first, in case there was anything urgent that needed to be repaired. She trusted the engineers on the Taskforce, but still. It had been four years ship time, and anything could have gone wrong in that time.
Finally feeling up to it, she made to push herself off the bed. Her med-bot flew down beside her and rested next to her.
“What are you doing?”
“Programming states that locomotion on the first day after waking requires assistance. In the absence of any other crew to assist, the med-bot will assist.” The med-bot wiggled it’s ‘fingers’ in a semblance of a wave at that. Olysesa giggled at the wave and wondered who on Dr. Lamai’s team had programmed it to do that.
The med-bot assistance was a good thing she admitted after a few steps. She felt anxious as she went to check on Yáo and DuBois. They had the coma resistance gene, but again, anything could happen when unattended for four, long years.
She arrived at Yáo’s bed first. He was still in his bag, and there was condensation on the inside. Oh, thank goodness! Condensation meant breathing. Breathing meant alive. She bent over to examine the vitals screen.
“Yáo, Li-Jie, Status: Stable. Days until wake: 1”
Okay, good. Yáo was supposed to wake up after her so that they could then check the flight path. They should be close to Tau Ceti. The med-bots were programmed to wake them up roughly two weeks before arrival. That way they could recover from their comas and adjust to their final stage of life before getting to work.
No, let’s not think about that just yet. It’s not time.
“Come on, Medi, let’s go check on DuBois.” She had decided to call her med-bot “Medi”. If she was going to be alone with it until Yáo woke up, it was getting a name. Medi helped her get around to DuBois bed.
She sighed in relief when she saw the condensation on the inside of his bag too. Medi helped her lean down again and she checked his vitals screen.
“DuBois, Martin, Status: Stable. Days until wake: 2”
Good. Right on schedule. She was awake, Yáo would wake up tomorrow, and then DuBois. Everything was good. Medi helped her back to her bed where there was a tube laying. She read it and it said: “Day 1, Meal 1”. Oh good, food. She opened the tube and squeezed a little in her mouth. It may have been gravy, but oh it was good gravy. Sighing when it was empty, she held it out and Medi took it and put it in storage.
It felt like it was time for a nap. Curling up in her bed, she pulled her blanket over her and fell asleep quickly.
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“Medi, how long was I asleep for?”
“Engineer Ilyukhina was asleep for five hours, twelve minutes, and fifteen seconds.” That was a pretty good nap.
“Thank you, Medi.” As she sat up, Medi flew back down to offer assistance. She did not feel like attempting the ladder yet, it was better to rest and recover. And wait for the boys to wake up. They made their way over to the control panel for the med-bots and she was thankful to see that they had included a stool. She wasn’t fully confident in her ability to stand for too long.
Logging into the computer, she was able to access all of the mechanical logs from the flight. Thank you Stratt for that. She was so grateful that she would not have to go all the way up to the control room to do her job. Stratt was always practical that way. Looking over the main logs, she didn’t see any major issues. There had been some temperature fluctuations and some course corrections due to objects in the flight path but that was it. Wait. What was that? Why were those entries highlighted in that shade of red. Shit, what had happened?
Hail Mary Maintenance Records
Time since launch: 6 months, 3 weeks, 2 days
Issue: Coma slurry pump for Commander Yáo, Li-Jie has become inoperable due to clog in system. Vitals for Commander Yáo, Li-Jie approached “critical” standing and alert was triggered.
Solution: Coma slurry pump for Commander Yáo, Lie-Jie replaced with spare pump 1/6. Commander Yáo, Li-Jie’s vitals have returned to “stable”.
End of log
Olysesa felt sick. That was a fucking critical failure. Yáo almost fucking died. She wanted to teleport back to Earth right that second and kiss Ryland Grace. He had seen that there was an issue right before they launched and had raised quite a fuss about getting some extra pumps on board. She remembered walking in on him yelling at Stratt about it.
“Stratt, what is going to happen if something clogs a feeding tube? The med-bot can replace the tube just fine. But what about the pump? If something clogs the pump, the medbot needs to be able to replace the pump.” Dr. Grace was truly upset about this. Stratt looked at him with that even look she had to have practiced.
“Dr. Grace, fine. If it will get you to stop annoying me about this, you can add two spares per crew member. Will you leave me alone now? I have a lot of things to do in the next three days. That error that DuBois caught this morning alone has caused no less than seven emails.”
The memory was a funny one. Dr. Grace was the only one who could yell at Stratt and get away with it. Mr. “I’m not second in command” sure acted like he was. Olysesa laughed to herself as she continued scrolling.
Her head fell off of her fist though when she saw another red bar warning. Shit, what now?
Hail Mary Maintenance Records
Time since launch: 2 years, 3 months, 2 weeks, 5 days
Issue: Coma slurry pump for Engineer Ilyukhina, Olysesa has become inoperable due to clog in system. Vitals for Engineer Ilyukhina, Olysesa approached “critical” standing and alert was triggered.
Solution: Coma slurry pump for Engineer Ilyukhina, Olysesa replaced with spare pump 2/6. Engineer Ilyukhina, Olysesa’s vitals have returned to “stable”.
End of log
Nope, this was it. She was going to be sick. And then she was going to find a way to fucking teleport back to Earth and hug Dr. Grace. She almost died. Holy shit. She almost died and Dr. Grace had saved her.
“Elevated heart rate detected”
“I’m okay, Medi. Just saw something that scared me is all.” She took several deep breaths in and out to calm herself. Medi would go crazy otherwise. Dr. Lamai had gone over how the med-bots worked and that they could be persistent. Once she was calm, she had to finish going through the logs.
Fuck. There was another red bar.
Hail Mary Maintenance Records
Time since launch: 4 years, 2 months, 1 week, 5 days
Issue: Coma slurry pump for Scientist DuBois, Martin has become inoperable due to clog in system. Vitals for Scientist DuBois, Martin approached “critical” standing and alert was triggered.
Solution: Coma slurry pump for Scientist DuBois, Martin replaced with spare pump 3/6. Scientist DuBois, Martin vitals have returned to “stable”.
End of log
All three of them. All three of them had experienced a clogged pump. And it was only thanks to Dr. Grace that they had survived. Wait. DuBois time looked a little off.
“Mary, what is the current ship time since launch?” A calm woman’s voice answered her.
“The current ship time since launch is 4 years, 2 months, 2 weeks, 4 days.”
“Thank you, Mary.”
“You are welcome, Engineer Ilyukhina.”
She felt ice in her guts. Six days. DuBois had been in critical condition only six days ago. DuBois would have been very close to starved to death by now if Dr. Grace hadn’t insisted on those pumps. Thank you Stratt for allowing two pumps per person.
If anything had caused them to not include those pumps? She was going to be sick.
Video Diary, Day 1- Olysesa Ilyukhina
Holy shit. Dr. Grace, Director Stratt. You saved us. You saved all of us. All three of us had failures with our coma slurry pumps. Yáo’s was just six months into the flight. Mine was at two years. DuBois only had his pump replaced six days ago. We would have all starved to death without the replacements. Well, maybe DuBois could have survived. It was only six days and the IV does keep water in you.
But still. Thank you so fucking much for getting the replacements in.
Yáo is scheduled to wake up tomorrow, and DuBois the day after that. I have had two meal tubes so far and they have been delicious. Cannot wait for solid foods though. I have not climbed ladder to control room yet. I am waiting for boys to be awake first.