They stepped off of the transporter pad and into the empty room, phasers in their holsters. Everyone on this ship was already dead. There was nothing to be afraid of. Two men and a woman adjusted their masks to keep the virus from affecting them. One of the men kicked over an empty canister next to the pad and made a noise of disgust.
"This place is nasty." The other man answered while the woman took some samples from a kind of sludge clinging to the wall.
"Nick, this ship has been sitting here for a year with a rampant disease that offed all of the-" He drew his weapon, "Did you hear that?" A scraping noise stopped his thoughts as he drew his phaser. He went into a protective half crouch and aimed towards the half open door.
Nick also drew his weapon and pointed it at the door slowly walked towards it. He leaned up against the wall, doing his best to shield his body from the open corridor. "Jed, there's nothing out here," he looked back towards his friend, lowering his weapon. Jed threw a suspicious look towards the hallway but also started to relax. "I guess I've just got an itchy trigger finger," he turned to speak to the woman who was still examining the sludge. "Mana, you getting anything over there?"
Mana turned her head just barely catching a glimpse of a hand grabbing Nick's hair and probably breaking his neck as it snapped him into the hallway. "NICK!" She pulled her phaser and aimed a quick shot at the thing in the hallway. Nick's body hit the wall as the thing screamed at her. Jed's head snapped towards the entrance. He threw a quick, practiced shot where Mana's had missed.
The monster's head almost made a one-eighty on it's deteriorated neck as it spun to the ground, out of commission. Mana ran past Jed, hurdling the monster and grabbing her med kit. She knelt next to Nick in the dark hallway, not bothering to check her surroundings before she attended him. Bad idea.
Jed moved towards the creature and knelt down to examine it. "Mana…I thought everyone on this ship was dead…." His horrified face looked up to her as she dropped Nick's hand.
"They are. Including Nick. He didn't have a chance, that guy broke his neck…not a chance." She closed Nick's eyes and grabbed one of his legs. "Jed, help me put him on the transporter pad."
"What? Mana, he's dea-"
"Help. Me." She pronounced each word solidly making sure that she got her point across. Jed just nodded and grabbed his other leg, shooting cautious glances down either side of the hall and listening. They moved Nick's body to the pad quickly and tapped their com links. "Nordic, this is Roland. Ready to beam back."
No answer.
"Nordic. Come in, this is doctor Roland. Beam us up. We've got a man down and apparently there's still something alive on this ship."
Nothing. Jed tried his communicator but got the same result. "What do we do?"
"There's nothing we can do. We might as well grab some more samples, and apparently there are survivors of this disease."
"Mana, you're not worried that our ship's not answering? Nick is dead, and what do you mean survivors!? That thing almost snapped his head clean off and you want to collect samples?" He gestured towards Nick's unnaturally twisted neck.
"Jed, we read no signs of life on the tricorder but that guy was obviously alive. That's worth checking out. Plus if that guy's here, that means there have got to be others."
"Did you even look at that thing? It's rotted. I'd say a years worth of deterioration at least. That was death…like…living death or something." "Living death? Do you have any idea how stupid you sound?"
"Mana! What if this disease somehow can like, reanimate dead tissue or something? I've heard stories about that kind of thing…like, y'know…zombies."
"Zombies." It wasn't even a question. Just a statement of mockery. "Ok fine. Zombies, but we're still collecting samples."
"Mana, please!" he was almost willing to kiss her feet so that she wouldn't make him go. "Listen, what about Nick, we can't just leave him here." Mana gave Jed a look he knew very well. The look that meant, how did you ever get into a security detail?
"C'mon. We've got work." Mana peered out into the hallway, holding her tricorder in an awkward fashion almost as if she were unsure of its integrity in this particular situation. Jed drew his phaser and crept up behind her. "Sometimes I think you're not human. You didn't even flinch at Nick's death, and that thing doesn't freak you out?"
Mana knelt next to the body of the monster. "You're right. This man's human, and he's a Fleet officer, and…he's dead. If I were to look at him, I'd say almost nine months worth of contained decomposition."
"See what I mean? It's this disease, and if everyone on board was affected, we're gonna have our own private zombie horde on our hands." Jed looked nervously up and down the hallway, keeping his voice low as to not attract attention. Mana stood up and also looked around the corner down the hallway.
"Well, we won't get anywhere by standing here. Let's try to find the med quarters. They're built for situations of quarantine, if there are any survivo-…living survivors they'll be there." She walked off boldly down the grungy hallway occasionally side stepping a spatter of suspicious looking liquid, with Jed quietly in tow.