When there wasn't ominous alien built structures to explore and figure the mysteries out of, there wasn't exactly a whole lot else to do on the ship. With how sudden the weather could apparently change on the planet, going out was kept to a minimal; even though the previous outing went off fine, weather wise, when it came to casualties however, that was a different story. So, it was for that reason, and the fact that she was bored and without anything else to do, that Alma walked the corridors whistling away to herself. David had gone to wherever. Elizabeth was still shut away. And everyone else was off and hiding away either in their rooms, or doing something. Alma didn't have anything to do; she didn't have any task directly given to her. She had presumed all along she was only onboard to keep an eye on David. Meredith's unwavering distrust couldn't exactly be argued with.
Of course, Alma stopped short when she noticed a shambling figure trying to make its way through the corridor. The flash of auburn coloured hair quickly sunk in and after a moment of standing dumbstruck for another moment, she rushed forwards towards Elizabeth; who by now was more or less almost collapsed against a wall. "Elizabeth!" Alma called out, the poor woman didn't look totally with it. Her dark eyes looked glassy and basically through her. "Let's get you somewhere, yeah?" She hooked an arm around her shoulder, this if anything caused the smaller woman to call out and wince. Alma looked at her worriedly, "I'm sorry." She didn't know what she had done, but she presumed she had harmed her in some way.
Elizabeth bit out a groan while scrunching her eyes shut. She gasped and opened them again quickly and looked up at Alma. "Do you know where the nearest MedPod is?" Elizabeth could just continue blundering down the corridor on unsteady legs. She could try and rummage in her brain to remember where the sleek machine was housed. But why bother? Why try and work through the pain shooting in her mind to remember such a thing when she had someone who knew the ship as well as herself?
"Of course..."
"I need to get there," Elizabeth said, Alma opened her mouth to say something only to get stopped short. "Now. No questions, please hurry." Elizabeth said while gritting her teeth. She didn't have time to argue. She needed to go. She needed to move.
"Fine, okay, come on then." Alma hauled her arm more around her shoulder, readjusted her grip around Elizabeth's waist and pulled her along slowly. The woman had been shed of her suit, leaving her in a simple cotton robe and similar cotton bindings and underwear that Alma woke up in after her hypersleep. But because of the thin layer of clothing against Alma's hand, she suddenly realised how hot Elizabeth felt; she was burning up with a horrible fever. She had no idea what was wrong with her. But she did figure that if anything was going to know, it would be the MedPod.
It was slow going, every so often they had to stop so Elizabeth could reaffirm her footing, her feet were barely picking up from the floor as she shuffled along painfully slowly. Alma didn't voice anything, she just focused on getting Elizabeth to the MedPod. From there she could just stand back and let the machine do its work. Only when they did eventually get to the room where it was set up, the last thing Alma expected was for Elizabeth to attempt to find a surgical procedure which was not programmed in. She was growing more and more frustrated as she pushed at the control panel.
With a groan and doubling over, Elizabeth looked over her shoulder at Alma. "You can get past this, right?"
"You want me to hack a MedPod?" Alma asked, truly shocked and confused over that. Elizabeth just nodded her head and scrambled into the machine, past the clean glass doors and settled on the bed, dropping the cotton robe as she went. "I can't do that exactly. The nearest thing is to scan and see where we can go from there." Alma said awkwardly while the doors closed and Elizabeth injected herself with another painkiller. She wasn't even going to question why she was screaming and shouting for a caesarean, she wasn't going to judge. Considering the agony Elizabeth was in, Alma hated to say it, but maybe it was for the best. Even though logically things weren't piecing together in her mind. She didn't get what was truly going on. If she was pregnant, Elizabeth would never have been allowed onboard, let alone put into hypersleep. Something wasn't right. And as much as Alma loved a good mystery – as much as the next person – she sort of felt it in her gut that maybe, just maybe, this one time she didn't want to know the answer.
"Yeah, yeah, just hurry." Elizabeth said groggily. Alma glanced at her and was certain she was more lost in the effects of the painkiller than being with the here and now.
Alma inhaled, this was the same machine she had been placed in by David when she had that relapse. It wasn't programmed for women, the MedPod stated as such in a very annoying robotic voice. How David got passed that, Alma didn't know. But then she figured she wasn't needing an operation, or rather David wasn't asking the machine to cut into her, like Alma was now doing for Elizabeth. She managed to find something which should do the job, and she stepped back slightly as the machine kicked into life. It whirred and commenced scanning the slightly fidgeting woman on the bed. Alma stood twirling her fingers nervously together. She really didn't have a good feeling about this.
"Surgery procedure begin." Said the ever robotic and neutral voice of the machine. "Running diagnostics." The scan had commenced going up Elizabeth's body, she in return seemed close to hyperventilating. While she was close to passing out, and urging the machine to hurry, something pressed against her stomach; the skin raised and bulged, Alma caught sight of it too and looked from the woman to the machine. She couldn't hurry it up at all, it just went at its own simple pace. "Initiating anaesthetics." A small nozzle moved across her stomach, spraying a yellow orange anaesthetic as it went. "Commence surgical procedure." The inner machine within commenced cutting cleanly and expertly across her stomach, prongs opened the wound, and another retrieved something from within her. All the while Elizabeth let out varied sounds of pain and disgust, while Alma stared truly transfixed and disturbed by the strangely coiled being which hung motionless in the machine's grasp. Suddenly it seemed to almost burst, whatever it was it started to thrash and twist about while the pod stapled Elizabeth up. She screamed and held her hands up to avoid getting hit in the face, Alma almost pried the doors open and Elizabeth slid out with a heavy sigh. She sent a thankful look her way though, Alma just shrugged it off and watched as Elizabeth instructed the pod to gas this thing. With one last look they turned and left the room.
"Here," Alma steadied her again. "I may regret this but...what was that, exactly?"
"I don't know." Was her simple response as she leaned slightly into her. She still looked around with a hazy look in her eyes. She shook her head slowly and inhaled sharply, Alma just pulled her closer, she was slipping slightly. The last thing Elizabeth needed was to collapse on the floor, or rather be dropped.
Alma looked suddenly to Elizabeth when she seemed to pull away from her, or rather she turned to a room and stumbled on in. She fell to her knees, no longer having any strength to stand or walk. She just needed somewhere to sit and recover and then she'd move on, only her suddenly falling pulled Alma down too. And unlike Elizabeth, she had glanced around the room firstly, Elizabeth was only now just looking up and realised why Alma had an awkward, if not distant look on her face. Peter Weyland. The old man was struggling around the room, very much alive, and very much awake.
"You've been asleep here on the ship all this time. Why?" Elizabeth asked while Alma managed to help her up and onto a nearby stool. Sitting on the floor was not going to do her any further good.
"Well, I have a few days of life left in me. Didn't want to waste them until I was sure you could deliver what you promised, to meet my maker." He replied somewhat plainly and stoically, with help he managed to get seated.
Elizabeth and Alma exchanged a look, she for one never really ever got on with her boss, or rather there was an awkward tolerance at best, so she was opting not to talk. She was more than certain that he had noted her presence, and probably even trawled through his memories to try and remember if he asked for her to be here. Alma didn't want to say no, and that in a way Meredith had not only gone about finding a way to tick David off, but also her own father who paid little to no mind of her at all. It didn't feel too good to realise how much of a pawn she was in this, but Alma sucked it up and ignored it.
"Haven't you told him they're all gone?" Elizabeth looked between the android cleaning the old man's feet, to the old man himself who looked troubled by her words.
"But they're not all gone, Doctor Shaw." David said quietly and calmly, he did glance towards them. Alma shook her head minutely, she was pleading with him not to drag her into seeing the sleeping Engineer too. He smiled somewhat ironically. "One of them is still alive. We're on our way to see him now."
"What?" Elizabeth was lost, well and truly. Her mind reeled and couldn't quite catch up with what was being said to her.
"Turn me around," Peter simply instructed one of the medics in the room. His wheelchair simply turned and he looked towards the doctor. "You convinced me that if these things made us, then surely they could save us." He said with an assured tone, he looked to David, "My stick," as if on cue he handed the item to him. With a struggle, he stood on severely unstable legs, yet even through the shaking and shuddering he managed to shuffle forwards a step. "Well, save me, anyway."
Elizabeth frowned up at him, "Save you, from what?"
"Death, of course." As if it was the most blatantly obvious thing in the world. He looked at her like she was stupid for even having to ask.
"You don't understand. You don't know. This place isn't what we thought it was. They aren't what we thought they were. I was wrong! We were so wrong! Charlie, Doctor Holloway's dead. We must leave!" Elizabeth implored with an urgent heavy tone. She looked pleadingly up at Peter, who just returned the look blankly.
"And what would Charlie do now? That we're so close to answering the most meaningful questions ever asked by mankind. How can you leave without knowing what they are? Or have you lost your faith, Shaw?" His words had caused her to start crying, Alma placed a hand on her shoulder. And frowned in Peter's direction, he just looked her up and down and turned away. He didn't even have anything to say to her, Alma didn't know whether to be thankful or hurt by that; not saying she wished to have a verbal thrashing, because she really, honestly could have thought of better things to do with her time.
——
(Edited: 3/March/2021)