The sounds of beeping and pumping filled the Medbay of the IA base on Polus. Three of the beds were filled with the bodies of the crew of the escape pod. In the corner of the room was the Medbay scanner and the bags that the crew brought with them during their escape.
"Will she be alright?" A male voice spoke.
"Just let her rest,"a female voice replied "We won't ask questions until she comes to."
The two left the Medbay and Rachel began to rub her eyes as the noise of the unfamiliar figures had awoken her. She had been undressed, given new undergarments, and put into a hospital gown. She looked at her hands and saw a medical wristband that had information printed onto it.
PATIENT: RACHEL JUNO
RANK: ASSISTANT MECHANIC-CADET
NOTES: INOCULATED
"Inoculated?" Rachel wondered. She then took a whiff of the air around her and turned to where the odor was coming from and shrieked at what she saw.
To her left was the mutated body of Gary, deformed and drenched in blood. His eyes had retracted and fluid bled from the sockets.
"AHH!"
She scurried off of her bed and into the bed that was next to her, where a red gloved and wrist-banded hand slumped off the gurney.
Catching her breath, she looked at the wristband.
PATIENT: DR. HENRY MCKIDD RODMAN
RANK: CHIEF PHYSICIAN
NOTES: INOCULATED
The cadet then looked up at Henry, and gasped when she saw that his face had been covered with the gurney blanket.
"Did you hear a shriek?" The male voice asked.
"Maybe she's awake…?" The female voice replied.
The doors swung open and two figures entered. The first was an asian woman with glasses, black hair, and a red suit; the second figure was a white man with red hair in a dark blue suit.
"Rachel! Are you ok?" The female doctor asked as she helped Rachel up.
"I-I'm fine, I just got startled by t-that…" Rachel replied as he pointed to what was left of Gary.
"Him?" The male security officer asked "Oh don't worry, he's completely dead."
"Dead?" Spoke a familiar voice as Henry's body began to rise.
"AHHHH!" Rachel shouted as Henry uncovered his face.
"Easy there Rachel!" The security officer spoke, holding her hand "My are you jumpy…"
"Well considering what she had to deal with…" The female doctor began before turning to Henry "Hello Doctor Rodman, how do you feel?"
Henry peeled off the blanket and revealed that he had bandages wrapped around his arms and legs. He gave each of his limbs and fingers a bend to check if they were in working order.
"They're alright doctor."
"That's good. I'm Doctor Ellen Lilly and this is head of security Danny Peterson."
"Pleasure to meet ya and welcome to Polus!" The blue suited member greeted, extending his hand out.
Henry was reluctant to shake Danny's hand.
"Y-you're gonna have to kill me… aren't you?"
Ellen and Danny looked at each other in confusion.
"Why do you say that?" Danny asked with a nervous chuckle "It's not like you leaked government secrets or something. News of the dangers on Omega Psi 5-5.2 has begun to rapidly spread throughout the Intergalactic Alliance. You won't be forced to keep your mouth shut."
"It's not that" Henry replied as he shook his head "I-I'm one of them now. Captain Gary…or what was him rather… he attacked me. Stabbed me. Injected me. Infected me. A-all the work I did to try to get back safely was for nothing."
Rachel's eyes widened in shock as Henry hung his head.
"Well Henry," Ellen spoke as she pulled up a chair and sat in front of him "You…and Rachel were both infected."
"W-what?!" Henry shouted.
"W-we're both gonna be killed?!"
"No!" Danny spoke "You two are perfectly fine!"
"We are?!" Rachel asked "But if…"
"The thing is…" Ellen began "We looked over the blood samples that Henry collected and we found out something rather unusual."
"And that is?" Henry asked.
"When the crew of The Skeld first landed on the planet, it would have been inevitable for the crew to be exposed to either the Omega strain or the Psi strain. After analyzing the blood samples, we found out which of the crew members were exposed to which strain."
"Sal, Scottie, Tommy, Eleanor and Captain Gary were all infected with the Omega strain." Danny explained "Dr. Max, Louise, Charlie, Sam and Alice were all infected with the Psi strain."
"What about us?" Rachel asked.
"You got infected with both." Ellen replied.
"BOTH?!" Henry and Rachel shouted simultaneously.
"That's right, both" Ellen spoke with a nod "We analyzed your blood samples and saw evidence of both strains."
"So what does that mean for us?" Henry asked.
"According to looking at the documentation that Rachel found, it means that the infections didn't do anything to your genetics."
"But why?"
"Well according to the photos of the planet that Rachel brought, it seems that the Omegas and Psis were such bitter enemies that their animosity towards each other continued at a genetic level. Because the Omega and Psi strains both infected your bodies and rather early during your exposure to the planet, instead of taking over your body as a host the strains instead focused on trying to eliminate the other. The consequence of this is that the battle gave your body time to produce antibodies to defend against both strains of the infection and neutralizing them."
Henry scratched his chin as Rachel looked increasingly relieved.
"So…Rachel and I are safe?"
Danny and Ellen nodded.
Rachel grinned and raised her hands in joy but she got startled by the corpse of Captain Gary.
"W-w-w-what are you going to do with the body of the captain?" Rachel asked.
"We're gonna put it in a body bag and bring it to the Laboratory" Danny spoke "We'll keep a special eye on it just in case it isn't truly dead."
"It should be dead," Rachel spoke "I beat the hell out of it with a fire extinguisher and then shot it several times."
"Well we can't be too careful!" Danny replied.
Henry and Rachel smiled as Ellen prepared a body bag for Gary's corpse.
"You two must have used a lot of energy." Danny spoke "I'll have the cook prepare something nice for you two."
Danny left the room as Ellen printed out a label for Gary's body bag.
PATIENT: GARY WILLIAMS
RANK: CAPTAIN
NOTES: DECEASED-PRESERVE FOR RESEARCH
Ellen then detached the Medbay gurney from the wall and moved it out of the room as not to disturb the remaining crew of The Skeld nor the crew on Polus.
Henry got off of his bed and carefully got his footing before making way over to his bag to pull to grab something. He pulled out his deck of playing cards but also noticed a bottle of J&D whiskey sticking out of Rachel's bag.
"Where did you get this?"
"I found it in the kitchen after Sal died." Rachel sheepishly replied.
Henry chuckled as he grabbed the bottle along with a pair of fresh dental cups and brought them over to Rachel and poured each a glass.
"Say," Henry began "What happened to the Mini Pavolas?"
Rachel looked at their bags and saw that the desserts were gone.
"I don't know, maybe Ellen took them away to make sure they weren't infected?"
"That's exactly what happened." A new voice spoke from the entrance of the Medbay.
A young asian man in a brown uniform rolled a cart into the Medbay with several trays of food covered with cloches and a few bottles of Don Dew and water.
"Doctor Lilly put the treats into the analyzer and found no trace of any infectious materials on them. I gave them a brief touch up and made them presentable."
The cook lifted up the middle cloche and showed off Sal's final creation to Henry and Rachel, the food looking as good as it did before it was going to be served. The pair each reached for one of the treats as the cook lifted the other cloches up to reveal servings of pasta with meatballs and salads.
"I hope the food is to your liking."
"It's fine" Henry replied with a smile.
Rachel smiled as he took a salad and began to munch "Thank you for making us food mister…"
"Trussing, Lee Trussing" The chef said with a smile "Anyway, enjoy your food! I gotta get the captain his coffee."
Henry and Rachel waved goodbye at the chef as he exited the medbay. Henry dug into his spaghetti as Rachel sipped her glass of J&D.
"Well then…" Henry began "What should we do now?"
Rachel sipped her whiskey "I dunno, lets just wait here for a little while and see what happens."
Henry smiled as they sat in their beds and enjoyed their meals, happy with the fact that they knew that they were themselves and no one else.
The End
