A better place

[Heraklion]

It was relatively quiet in Baffin, even around the skyhook there was barely any traffic except for the Discordia, a decommissioned prison liner which is being refitted to provide asylum and medical help to victims of war. The ship is nearing completion and most of the work that's still to be done is cleaning, with a brand new ship comes a brand new crew, each and everyone of them handpicked by Sister Joanna, the captain and founder of this ship. But shortly after the new crew had arrived, Joanna disappeared. For now the pilot of this liner, Amelia Earhart is the acting captain, a captain with worries as for almost a month ago her captain left with these last words "I'll be gone for a couple of hours"

As she was staring at planet Eris in the distance, something appeared on the screen of the new scanning system and she only gave it a brief look since she didn't expect anyone to attack them here. But she stares at the screen longer the second time, was her sight deceiving her? No... it's the captain! She quickly hailed the incoming bomber but it didn't respond, the automatic mooring system was activated and Amelia hurries to the airlock, calling over the intercom through her walkie "The captain has returned, airlock 2!" She arrives at the door of the airlock, gasping for breath and the other officers, Flint Stone, Lisa Kelly and Doctor Simon King arrived shortly after her. They waited for a while but no one was coming out of the airlock, giving the others a hesitating look Amelia opens the airlock and heads for the ship. Minutes went by when she suddenly yells "By Eris! ... Doc get over here right now!" The doctor runs in after her and couldn't believe what saw, Joanna was in the ship alright, her jumpsuit torn up and blooded, her face scratched and burned, if he wouldn't know it was her he probably wouldn't have recognized her in this state. He stands frozen in a state of disbelieve while Amelia's voice sounds from afar, always louder and louder... "Doc?! ... Doc!!! We need to get her to the infirmiry at once!" Simon comes to his senses and looks at the blooded woman inside the bomber "uh... yes, let's hurry" he mumbles.

*Several hours later*

Joanna was lying in the infirmiry, connected to many different machines to keep her alive, her body completely wrapped in bandage. Doc King was looking at some x-rays he made when Amelia walked in and she immedially noticed the concerned look on his face "What's wrong?" she almost whispered. The doctor sighed and enlarged an x-ray of Joanna's brain, he highlighted some brighter dots in her brain "Do you see that? Those aren't supposed to be there... I'm not sure but they look alot like nanites, I don't know what happened to her but it seems someone tried to take control over her body... and still is right now, she has put up one hell of a fight to prevent it, it seems..." Amelia stares at the dots with a disgusted look on her face she says "You have to get them out!" Simon sighs again and shakes his head "I can't... they already caused alot damage to her brain, if I dig them out I will only cause even more damage, or worse... kill her in the process there's only one option, but even so... Doing this won't make much of a difference for her." He looks Amelia in the eyes and continues "What do you know about hybrids?" Seeing Amelia's confused look, he continues without waiting for an answer "A hybrid basicly is... well, it's human alright, but not entirely... I'll just get to the point... We could try to reprogram those nanites" He tabs on the dots on the x-ray "To... well to make her compatible with the ship..."

For a while, Amelia's face stays completely blank, but then she starts to look as she is going to explode. "Are you insane? What you want to play for god now?! What you are saying is that we enslave her to the ship so she is ours to control!" Simon jumps back out of fear she was going to hit him "Calm down! It's either that or waiting for a certain death! And if we do this there is a small chance the damaged brain tissue will heal, she might get better Amelia!" They argue for almost an hour when Amelia sighs defeated. "Fine... we'll try this experiment of yours... But no one may know, I'm sure as hell that what you're planning to do is illegal!" Simon sits down and facepalms out of frustration for a moment "It's not an experiment, it has been done before and i'm sure docking control on the skyhook has also picked up her ID signature, they know she's back so how do you want to explain she isn't around?" Amelia paces through the infirmiry while she thinks about a solution for this new problem, after a while she stops and quietly says "She died... yes that's it! Her ship arrived her on auto-pilot and when we got to her ship we found her body like that, but she had already passed away before she arrived here... It's the only way... You can write a valid deaths certificate, right?" Doc sighs and nods "I'll attend to it after i've brought her to a secure room... It will take a while to syncronize those nanites with the ships computer" Amelia walks to the bed and stares at the in bandages wrapped face of her captain. "Can you fix her face? I mean... so it doesn't look mutilated... or familiar..." Doc understands what she is implying and nods once while he walks to the door. "I'll get to that death certificate right now... and i'll also let Doctor Holliday know our captain passed away..."

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