Something old, something new

Given the delays that travel through Queri space would have introduced, Trea’k had somewhat hesitantly raised the question of whether it wouldn’t be faster to just sort everything with Rocky and Clyff out first and then travel onward after a single trip to the Queri colony with everyone in tow. Dustin had contemplated the idea for all of about three seconds before he agreed - he’d had enough sitting for medical scans to last a lifetime. Of course, it couldn’t be that easy. As they were approaching the asteroid station where Rocky was based a communication came through from the Queri government insisting that their full medical team be brought to the hospital colony as soon as possible before they would finalize approval of any of the transfers as part of some kind of press briefing.

Rocky had been surprisingly stoic about the news that his impending wedding would have to be delayed. “It’s not your fault, captain” he’d said as Sola navigated the weave back towards the medical colony. They’d been sat in the medbay at the time; while Dustin had extended an offer to the young Uinn to eat with the senior staff while he was the only junior crewman aboard, Rocky had politely declined. Instead, the virologist was spending the time mostly holed up in medbay - making sure he could give a good first impression to Dr Bleu, if Dustin had any guess.

Traffic control was as frustrating as ever, and then despite the Queri government requesting the conference when they reached orbit permission was refused for them to take a shuttle down. By the end of that call Emely was on the verge of tearing one of her tails off; Dustin ended up bodily lifting the Feliax away from her station before carrying her through the corridors to his ready room in an uneven stagger. After she had been deposited on the mattress floor of the ambassadorial chamber and pampered a little by both Dustin and Trea’k (the insect woman having followed them there), Dustin left the redhead and Vex’ess in a tangle of limbs and tails. Returning to the bridge and straightening his hair, he gestured at the screen. “Call Bleu up, Sola. Let’s see if they have any ideas.”

When the AI raised the Queri doctor, the room they were in looked very different. Gone were the ornaments and the drawings; the walls were bare, although there was a neat pile of packing trunks in one corner. “Ambassador. You’ve caused a right bloody pain in my ass, I hope you know that.” The blue-green slime said, form slowly shifting from a blob into the vague humanoid as it did so. Dustin raised an eyebrow. “I’m not sure how we’ve caused you any troubles, Doctor. We’ve merely got you the staff you requested.” Bleu gave a very human sounding huff at that point, causing the slime cheeks of the form it was assuming to billow outwards in a manner that would have been comical were it not accompanied by a scowl.

“Right, yes you did which is why I’m packed. But you also riled up the useless bastards who are now insisting, insisting I must point out, that I talk to the press like I’m some kind of a success story for their interspecies studies program. I am not happy about being used as a press prop.” Bleu’s tone was aggravated, although it seemed at least like the annoyance was with the Queri government and not with the crew of the Solar Ascent. Dustin tried to be as placating as he could, before steering the conversation to their difficulties in getting to the surface.

Bleu shook their head once Dustin had explained the situation. “Of course you can’t get permission. Left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing. The division for marketing and integration is probably salivating at the thought of your little recruitment drive, while the division for excellence and standards will be fuming that you’re taking so many gifted students. The division for supplies and stockpiles takes issue with anyone using their shuttle pads including themselves, and the division for internal stability is probably having a mixture of mental breakdowns and euphoria at the thought that I’m going to be joining you and going far, far away.”

The slime sighed at that point before shrugging to themselves. “Can’t be helped in any case. Just sit and wait for the idiots to figure out who’s in charge of what and then you’ll get your clearance. Shouldn’t be more than a day or two.” In fact, it was fully three days later that Dustin and Rocky made the bumpy descent through a storm to land on the hospital planet. Ideally they wouldn’t have flown in such rough weather, but the local traffic controller had said the next window would be a week away. As by that point Dustin had half a mind to just fly his entire starship into the atmosphere, politics be damned, he had opted for the bumpy flight and having to straighten his dress uniform on landing as the more professional approach.

Bleu met them on the landing pad, the doctor seemingly all too glad to get away from what they found when they entered a nearby habitation dome. No sooner had Dustin stepped inside than camera flashes half-blinded him. The Queri press corps seemed to have sent every camera operator and holoscan tech they had to record the room as Dustin and Bleu went around and introduced themselves formally to the assorted aliens that would be joining the crew. After the meet and greets there were a handful of smaller talks to be had with the journalists present before all of Dustin’s new crew lined up in a row, Bleu shifting back into the ball of slime that was their natural form and at last the final photographs were taken with Dustin smiling front and centre.

The doctor then joined Dustin and Rocky on the return flight to Sola; the rest of the crew would be taking transport shuttles up to one of the orbitals in the morning - Dustin had wondered why he couldn’t have just ridden one of those down to the planet as he helped the Uinn and Queri load the doctor’s personal belongings into the shuttle’s cargo area. Emely must have been listening in on the comms because her voice came from a nearby speaker. “It’s because you were landing. Leaving the colony via an area where you’ll come into contact with a lot of people is one thing, going planet-side from out of system is another. This is quicker unless you wanted to spend a month in quarantine first.”

By the time they finished loading the shuttle the storm had intensified. Dustin glanced up at the sky with a concerned expression before turning to the other two. “This is a Rabyth built shuttle. It’ll fly through that storm easily enough, but it won’t be a fun trip. We can delay if either of you have any concerns or objections.” Rocky shook his head; Bleu was already moving for the shuttle door. “Let’s go already, captain. I want to be off-world before the system can change their mind and decide I’m too much of a liability to be allowed on a fancy ship like yours.” The Queri’s words made Dustin grin as he and Rocky followed behind.

The ride up wasn’t just bumpy, it was a roller-coaster. Dustin gunned the shuttles engines hard, putting it into a near-vertical climb to minimise the amount of turbulence. The downside to that plan was that every side-draft and gust of wind shoved them around, spinning the craft against it’s dampeners or pushing it away from the arcing flightpath they’d been allocated. When they finally breached the atmosphere Dustin toggled the autopilot with relief, sweat drenching his top. “Not fun.” He said, turning to check on his passengers before starting in his seat. Rocky seemed surprisingly relaxed about the flight, reading something on a tablet but it was the figure in the other chair that made Dustin rub his eyes. Bleu had opted for their humanoid form during transit as apparently it worked better with the harnesses to hold them in place compared to the ball form. But where before they had seemed like a half baked gingerbread man, at some point during the flight they… No, Dustin corrected himself mentally and looking the figure up and down, she had added detail. A lot more detail.