Snagged from sidewinder
Post a little bit of each WIP you have (or as many as you want to pick). No context, no explanations.
Jeff put his face mask on as the airlock quickly filled with water. “Jeff to Thunderbird Two. Is Sealink ready to be lifted?” “Yes, it is,” Virgil stated.
“Then get it out of the water and take it to Scrutiny. Gordon, get me as close to her as you can, and give Scott a heads up and have Scrutiny stop where they are until we can get this gal back.”
“F-A-B,” the boys replied.
“Airlock is ready. Are we close?”
“Just a moment...” Gordon said. There was a half-minute of silence, then, “There! Go get 'er!”
“F-A-B. Opening airlock.” Jeff pulled down on the manual lever that opened the airlock's bottom hatch, then he swam down and out. The sea looked gray-green from his perspective, and as he surfaced near the prow, the swells threatened to push him away from both Thunderbird Four and the figure he saw floating just a couple of meters away. She was conscious, and making an attempt to swim towards the bright yellow watercraft, but her flotation vest was half unfastened, and hindered her movement. Jeff pushed off from Thunderbird Four and swam towards her as strongly as he could. It seemed to take forever, and every swell threatened to thrust them further apart, but finally Jeff was able to grab her arm and pull her to him.
“What's a nice gal like you doing in a place like this?” Jeff quipped, shouting to be heard over the rain and the roll of thunder overhead.
“The crawl,” she replied, spitting out sea water.
Brains opened the closet in his room at Lady Penelope's, and shook his head. I've never had this many clothes! So many choices!
Shopping with Lady Penelope had been an adventure. He'd had no idea that one could visit as many stores as they did in the few hours they had allotted for the trip. The salesclerks at their first stop, Harrods, had been helpful about what fabrics would wear well in a tropical climate. Fortunately, since it was January, a lot of the new spring fashions were available, a phenomenon that had always puzzled him. He purchased a few sweaters because since he was staying at Foxleyheath for the week. One of the items he insisted on was a brown tweed jacket with leather patches at the elbows, a piece of clothing that Brains had always wanted, but never purchased for himself. He suggested to Penelope that perhaps he should buy a pipe to complete his image of a “professor” but she gently talked him out of it.
“Hiram, dear, you are planning to fix your smile, are you not? Then you will not want to sully it with nasty tobacco stains.”
He had to admit she had a point.
Now, what to wear... what to wear? The unfamiliar question delighted him as he eyed his new wardrobe critically. He chose a collared shirt, simple and plain, in a medium blue, and a pair of well-pressed black trousers. To this he added a burgundy colored sweater vest, and a coordinating paisley bow tie. Lady Penelope had tried to get him to change over to the more traditional four-in-hand tie, but on this point he had been adamant.
“It's p-part of my 'endearing and, uh, singular sense of style' that you m-mentioned.”
She had chuckled and said, “Touché.”
Alan's face furrowed behind his helmet. "Do you feel a... shaking, Alpha?"
Scott stopped and stood still. "Yeah, I do. In my boots. It's continuous and feels rhythmic, like somebody's got a boom box on loud with the bass too high."
"Maybe we've crashed a party," Alan quipped.
Scott groaned, and shook his head inside his helmet. "We're proceeding down this pylon. Nothing out of the ordinary. There are several stacks of opened and emptied tote boxes along one side, and a couple of biohazard containers that look like they are full. When did they last have a supply run?"
After a moment, John's voice cut in. "Last week," he said, consulting his data pad. "So they should be fine for foodstuffs and replacement parts, including those for their communications system."
"Hmm. Then equipment malfunction is pretty much ruled out," Alan said. "I'm sure if something burned out on their communication equipment that there'd be at least one person available to fix it."
"A s-safe assumption, S-Sigma," Brains said. "And if there, uh, wasn't, we can f-fix it for them."
"That pounding is getting stronger the farther we move in," Scott observed. "Look, Sigma. There's the emergency airlock. I hope the same access number will work on it."
"It won't," John said with a sigh. "But I have the code for that lock, too." He gave it to the boarding party, and Scott clumsily entered it on the keypad. The airlock door swooshed open, barely heard by the suited astronauts.
They entered the airlock, closing the door behind him, then opened the inner one without running the decontamination cycle. The pounding was stronger now, and Scott pointed that out. "Rho? What could cause such a shaking?"
"A f-fault in the backup, uh, power generator?" Brains suggested tentatively. "But that would b-be more like, uh, a thrumming."
"We're moving into the interior corridor," Alan explained. The interior of the central cylinder was set up rather like a cored pineapple. Most of the living quarters were arranged around the outside of the second level while more general public areas, such as kitchen/dining facilities, sickbay, and entertainment center were found in the core of that story. The control room was on the upper floor. The power and gravity generators were found on the lowest level, as well as storage rooms and the emergency docking airlock. There were two labs in each spoke; the outer one was usually kept in microgravity and the inner one had a variable gravity control. The cylinder's gravity was set at as close to 1G as possible to make the scientists comfortable and make the transition back to Earth easier on them.
"Here's a door and it's locked," Scott said. "Any ideas on how we get in?"
"I was given the access code for this one, too," John answered. Scott punched in the numbers as John read them off, and the door slid aside.
"Holy...," Alan breathed after a moment.
"Sigma! Report!" Jeff's voice cracked across the airwaves.
"Looks like I was right. We are crashing a party."
That's what it looked like to Alan's experienced eye. About a dozen people in various stages of undress were dancing to music that was being piped over the internal intercom, the words rendered nearly unintelligible due to the volume and the underlying bass beat. A few couples, both opposite and same sex, could be seen on either side of the circular corridor, entwined in each other's arms, kissing, groping, and in some cases, going a lot farther.
Scott let out a low whistle. "This isn't a party. It's an orgy."
Jeff put his face mask on as the airlock quickly filled with water. “Jeff to Thunderbird Two. Is Sealink ready to be lifted?” “Yes, it is,” Virgil stated.
“Then get it out of the water and take it to Scrutiny. Gordon, get me as close to her as you can, and give Scott a heads up and have Scrutiny stop where they are until we can get this gal back.”
“F-A-B,” the boys replied.
“Airlock is ready. Are we close?”
“Just a moment...” Gordon said. There was a half-minute of silence, then, “There! Go get 'er!”
“F-A-B. Opening airlock.” Jeff pulled down on the manual lever that opened the airlock's bottom hatch, then he swam down and out. The sea looked gray-green from his perspective, and as he surfaced near the prow, the swells threatened to push him away from both Thunderbird Four and the figure he saw floating just a couple of meters away. She was conscious, and making an attempt to swim towards the bright yellow watercraft, but her flotation vest was half unfastened, and hindered her movement. Jeff pushed off from Thunderbird Four and swam towards her as strongly as he could. It seemed to take forever, and every swell threatened to thrust them further apart, but finally Jeff was able to grab her arm and pull her to him.
“What's a nice gal like you doing in a place like this?” Jeff quipped, shouting to be heard over the rain and the roll of thunder overhead.
“The crawl,” she replied, spitting out sea water.
Brains opened the closet in his room at Lady Penelope's, and shook his head. I've never had this many clothes! So many choices!
Shopping with Lady Penelope had been an adventure. He'd had no idea that one could visit as many stores as they did in the few hours they had allotted for the trip. The salesclerks at their first stop, Harrods, had been helpful about what fabrics would wear well in a tropical climate. Fortunately, since it was January, a lot of the new spring fashions were available, a phenomenon that had always puzzled him. He purchased a few sweaters because since he was staying at Foxleyheath for the week. One of the items he insisted on was a brown tweed jacket with leather patches at the elbows, a piece of clothing that Brains had always wanted, but never purchased for himself. He suggested to Penelope that perhaps he should buy a pipe to complete his image of a “professor” but she gently talked him out of it.
“Hiram, dear, you are planning to fix your smile, are you not? Then you will not want to sully it with nasty tobacco stains.”
He had to admit she had a point.
Now, what to wear... what to wear? The unfamiliar question delighted him as he eyed his new wardrobe critically. He chose a collared shirt, simple and plain, in a medium blue, and a pair of well-pressed black trousers. To this he added a burgundy colored sweater vest, and a coordinating paisley bow tie. Lady Penelope had tried to get him to change over to the more traditional four-in-hand tie, but on this point he had been adamant.
“It's p-part of my 'endearing and, uh, singular sense of style' that you m-mentioned.”
She had chuckled and said, “Touché.”
Alan's face furrowed behind his helmet. "Do you feel a... shaking, Alpha?"
Scott stopped and stood still. "Yeah, I do. In my boots. It's continuous and feels rhythmic, like somebody's got a boom box on loud with the bass too high."
"Maybe we've crashed a party," Alan quipped.
Scott groaned, and shook his head inside his helmet. "We're proceeding down this pylon. Nothing out of the ordinary. There are several stacks of opened and emptied tote boxes along one side, and a couple of biohazard containers that look like they are full. When did they last have a supply run?"
After a moment, John's voice cut in. "Last week," he said, consulting his data pad. "So they should be fine for foodstuffs and replacement parts, including those for their communications system."
"Hmm. Then equipment malfunction is pretty much ruled out," Alan said. "I'm sure if something burned out on their communication equipment that there'd be at least one person available to fix it."
"A s-safe assumption, S-Sigma," Brains said. "And if there, uh, wasn't, we can f-fix it for them."
"That pounding is getting stronger the farther we move in," Scott observed. "Look, Sigma. There's the emergency airlock. I hope the same access number will work on it."
"It won't," John said with a sigh. "But I have the code for that lock, too." He gave it to the boarding party, and Scott clumsily entered it on the keypad. The airlock door swooshed open, barely heard by the suited astronauts.
They entered the airlock, closing the door behind him, then opened the inner one without running the decontamination cycle. The pounding was stronger now, and Scott pointed that out. "Rho? What could cause such a shaking?"
"A f-fault in the backup, uh, power generator?" Brains suggested tentatively. "But that would b-be more like, uh, a thrumming."
"We're moving into the interior corridor," Alan explained. The interior of the central cylinder was set up rather like a cored pineapple. Most of the living quarters were arranged around the outside of the second level while more general public areas, such as kitchen/dining facilities, sickbay, and entertainment center were found in the core of that story. The control room was on the upper floor. The power and gravity generators were found on the lowest level, as well as storage rooms and the emergency docking airlock. There were two labs in each spoke; the outer one was usually kept in microgravity and the inner one had a variable gravity control. The cylinder's gravity was set at as close to 1G as possible to make the scientists comfortable and make the transition back to Earth easier on them.
"Here's a door and it's locked," Scott said. "Any ideas on how we get in?"
"I was given the access code for this one, too," John answered. Scott punched in the numbers as John read them off, and the door slid aside.
"Holy...," Alan breathed after a moment.
"Sigma! Report!" Jeff's voice cracked across the airwaves.
"Looks like I was right. We are crashing a party."
That's what it looked like to Alan's experienced eye. About a dozen people in various stages of undress were dancing to music that was being piped over the internal intercom, the words rendered nearly unintelligible due to the volume and the underlying bass beat. A few couples, both opposite and same sex, could be seen on either side of the circular corridor, entwined in each other's arms, kissing, groping, and in some cases, going a lot farther.
Scott let out a low whistle. "This isn't a party. It's an orgy."