EDIT: GUYS! I messed up, big time. I posted two chapters at once, which is good, but now the other one isn't getting any views and people must be confused a bit about the plot at this point. So, before you read this chapter, go back and read chapter 24 (A Man with a Plan).
Stine and Steve had somehow printed off two suits, get a meal, grab food for the other two, sleep for three hours, make knives and flashlights for everybody, AND get to Laura and Ned just a bit after the sun came back up.
"Ned! Laura!" Stine said after his helmet was off, shaking Ned's foot.
Ned woke with a small start, realizing what was happening he woke Laura up before Steve or Stine had to.
"Got some food and water for you two, knives and flashlights all round, and Laura, we got a suit for you," said Steve, as Stine passed out the suit and he passed the flashlights and knives.
"Alright. Who's staying-" Laura sleepily started.
"I thought we agreed it was me," interrupted Steve.
"Dammit! I forgot," Stine whined.
Ned scoffed, obviously in a bad mood from sleeping badly. Laura had already finished putting on the new suit, and Steve had climbed up the small ladder onto the platform. Laura put on the helmet and dived right into the water. Ned jumped off after making sure his helmet was secure.
"Alright, you know how to operate the pump, right?" Stine asked.
Steve nodded, sitting down cross-legged in front of the controls. After that, Laura dived down with a flashlight in hand. Stine sighed, then followed. Ned nodded to Steve, then dived with them.
"Oh, SHIT!" yelled Ned as they reached about fifty meters, "the pump isn't complete!"
"Did I just actually hear that?"
"I'm afraid so, Steve. I have the parts, just give me a few minutes. You guys, come back."
Ned had started to swim up as soon as he started to talk, and broke the surface very quickly. He climbed up and placed the missing parts into the pump.
After that, the sun was about twenty degrees up, and everybody was praying nothing was missed.
They dived back down, this time reaching the wreck, and Stine and Laura were very surprised at how far down the wreck was.
"A hundred and eighty-nine meters? Dang, this is deep. If we fuck up, we are so dead," Stine said, his voice shaking with fear.
"It's fine, the pipe is right here, the pump works, and the pipes for SURE won't break," groaned Ned, grunting as he pulled a handle for a door.
Stine helped, and the door popped open. Immediately, each of their visions was filled with white bubbles. Stine and Ned were thrown back, while Laura was just moved a foot. The room still had a lot of air in it, probably a bit compressed.
"Well shit, that was scary," Stine stated after the bubbles faded.
"Uh, I think you're going to find this a bit scarier. Try not to throw up," Laura said, after taking a peep inside. There were bodies.
There were bodies.
Lots. Most quite rotten, bones showing, but some still resembled a human. Now, they were floating about, some now floating away from the wreck.
"Well, who has the strongest stomach, we still need to get in there, no discussion," ordered Laura, looking away from the mess.
"Guys, are you all okay?" Steve butted in.
"Yes. Why?"
"It's just that there is a FUCKING arm and empty shirt just floating up here. Honestly, I think I might have to get lunch early, I just lost my breakfast," Steve's voice quivered heavily, and it sounded like he threw up again at the end.
"Yeah, we just found a more than unpleasant surprise. I, I can count ten bodies from here. And I can't even fucking see in there, it's so dark!" Laura said, slowly drifting into the room, turning on her flashlight. "Oh, FUCK!"
Laura swam out so fast, she whizzed past Stine and Ned, and only came to a stop about ten meters behind them.
"What?" all of them asked.
"Just, I saw something I'd rather not see. I somebody got crushed between a support cylinder and a desk. Just-" Her voice failed at this point, and all of them heard her give a small yelp of disgust.
"Well, I guess I'll go in. Shall I count the bodies, or just find the next door?" Ned asked.
"Whatever," Stine said. "Just go and try and find something like a storage room while I refill my tanks. Actually, you two should as well."
Laura nodded, obviously still shaken. They all went to the end of the pipe, where some tubes and valves were set up. All of them refilled their tanks, then Stine held by the door in case of trouble, and Ned went in.
"About fifteen, guys. Also, there is a door, but Stine, I'm definitely going to need your help with this one," Ned reported.
Stine went in, clenching his stomach. He got to the door and saw the problem just about instantly. Ned had aimed to slam his knife into the crack to slowly open the door as it was broken but had hit the side of the door.
"There must be air on the other side, and the pressure difference is sucking the knife into the door. So hold onto something," Ned said, his voice now starting to give a tone of fear and disgust.
Stine grabbed the knife, then a locker door. He pulled on the knife, but only managed to raise it a bit. It didn't matter, and now the escaping air shot the knife across the room, stopping near a locker. The air kept rushing out until finally, it was all out, and water had rushed in.
"Alright, try opening the door, I'll get my knife," Ned said.
And, indeed this is what happened. The door opened quickly now and revealed a white room, devoid of damage, crates floating about.
"Jackpot."
Ned pushed off the door frame, and into the room. He grabbed one crate and took a look at the label.
"Damn! We are going to drink this memory away tonight," Ned said, shoving the crate to Stine.
Stine read it and laughed, "ah, thank God. At least we can forget about this for a few hours."
Ned found another four. To be fair, each was rather small and looked as though it only held four each. He got to another. It was just one labeled, 'luxury meals'.
Another was silverware, and as Ned got to the next, Laura cried out, "Watch out!"
Stine was able to get away with the luxury meals box, as the ceiling fell in. But, Ned was not. Instead, he was trapped.
Ned screamed in pain.
"Signal lost. Last known location shown on maps."
Silence fell upon each of them. Then, Stine started grabbing at the rubble, trying to get to him. Laura joined him, and they only stopped for oxygen when the suits told them. Both of them could see, using the hud of their helmets, that he was only a meter away. Stine grabbed a large beam, pulling it up. Ned was revealed. He wasn't good, let's put it at that. Laura grabbed him, and Stine dropped the beam, following her out to the pipe.
They put an oxygen mask on his face, and Steve started the pump. After thirty seconds or so, Ned started breathing again.
"That's not fucking natural. He just, like, came back from death. What the fuck?" Stine said, obviously relieved, even if he wasn't fully showing it.
After that, they took the mask off Ned and rushed him to the surface as fast as they could without suffering decompression sickness. Steve jumped off the platform when they surfaced, and helped then put him up on the platform. Since they couldn't really do much, each of them went down and collected the crates.
They used two alcohol bottles to pour over Ned's cuts, trying their hardest to keep bacteria and viruses out. Luckily, each human registered on the Aurora took a rather expensive pill that made their immune system capable of adapting to a new problem within seconds. So, they didn't have to worry about any new bacteria proving an extremely hard to fight off.
It was sunrise, and they had gone through the first crate of 'alcoholic drinks'. Ned had, at many moments, seemed to wake up and try to say something.
After a bit, they came up with the idea of a raft. They disassembled the pump, and using the minds of two engineers and one pilot, they managed to make a raft that was powered not by hand, but instead by solar. They used the tank, compressor, and a valve to create a source of thrust.
They loaded Ned onto it, all with tears in their eyes. It only had room for one over, which was decided to be Stine. The other two carried the crates home, trailing about five meters behind.
"Turn a bit right. Now a bit to the left," Steve guided, trying to avoid a Stalker that was tugging around a bit of scrap metal.
It went on like this for a while, Ned's breathing slowly fading, becoming shallow.
Once they arrived at the base, Laura made a plan, and they put into action. Stine took off his suit and put Ned into it as gently as he could. He cranked up the oxygen percentage, then they went through the airlock, Laura and Steve following.
"Fuck, Ned is heavy! Hurry, help me to his bed," Stine grunted, speed walking to the ladder.
Steve went up the ladder, and they carried him up together. Then he was put in the bed.
"Computer! Scan for injuries! Now!" Stine hurried the computer on, fumbling with the first aid kit Laura had thrown up the ladder.
"Multiple broken bones. Low blood pressure. Minor HAPE. Infected foot, and major bruising. Minor open wounds. I require advanced medical equipment, and fourteen Earth days, and ten kilowatts of power per second," the computer listed.
"Steve, could you install two power generators?" Stine pleaded.
He nodded and left immediately. Stine made sure that the thing was turned on, and that the suit was still working as it should. Then, he connected the tanks directly to the oxygen supply of the room, to make sure the suit filter didn't overheat and fail.
After that, there wasn't much he could do but wait for Steve to finish the generators. Steve heard at that very moment, the airlock opening. He started the procedure, then slid the metal cover over him.
"Do you think he'll be able to still work as usual? Like, go through wrecks?" Stine said, looking off into the distance.
"Uhmm… hard to say. It depends pretty heavily on not only what that machine can do, but how Ned took the incident." Laura shuddered a bit, just of the memory of it. "It's possible that Ned just won't be able to ever look at a corpse, or go near a wreck like that."
Stine nodded, taking a mouthful of the strong beer that was in the crates. The base was calm, only a few lights on. Stine had sealed off Ned's room and was going to leave it like that for a day. After all, the generators were only barely enough to run the medical procedure, so instead, they were shutting off everything they didn't need. And, after a day the power cells would be near empty. So, they would feed Ned during a five minutes break, and then he would be back in for half a day, and then the cycle would continue until he was fully healed.
But, first, they had to wait a day.
And, so will you! Though, it's for a good reason. Not just me bein weird. I've been on vacation with no way to post anything, but with a surprising and sudden passion for writing more. So, the last chapter and this one have been created while I was on vacation, BUT! I did start a decent amount of the next chapter, and it should only take a day to finish. I hope I did this rather major chapter right- it was meant to go back to the fact that the Aurora was a big ship, and a big ship has to have tons of people aboard.
Oh, and the minor fact Ned is out of it for fourteen days, and possibly permanently scarred.
Hope you enjoyed!