While they waited for the crew members to return with the food, the others were given some of the medical attention that they desperately needed. Ira was amongst the last to be examined as he had suffered the least amount of injuries. By the time that the highest-ranking medical officer of the ship got to him, her arms were covered in blood all the way up to her elbows and she walked with a noticeable limp. Ira looked her over and asked, "Are you right?"
She startled. Looking at him over her silver glasses, she frowned and quietly shook her head. There wasn't any use in arguing with her so Ira let the subject go and docilely allowed her to examine him. They finished just as the other crew members returned with the food.
Ira sat up straight at the prospect of eating. He looked over at his Host whose arm was in a sling and whose lacerations had been covered with bandages. Ira's Host was frowning and talking quietly to another crew member with their heads close together. It looked like they might be planning something.
Ira had no intention of getting in the way of whatever plan that they were in the process of concocting. He wasn't in the business of sabotaging his Hosts.
Besides, it would be much more fun to watch him self-destruct.
The crew members who had gone to get the food were the ones with the least injuries, even fewer injuries than Ira. Once they returned, they quickly sat up the storm kitchens and started cooking. The scent of the food was appetizing and Ira licked his lips. He slowly stood up, stretching out his stiff body as he went. The medical officer had already left him behind and had approached the captain. They were once again discussing something heatedly. What, Ira didn't know. And he wasn't all that interested.
Shamelessly, Ira moved to the front of the line. He got a bowl and spoon made of metal and held out it in front of himself. The crew member in charge of handing out food quickly dumped a ladle of soup into Ira's gleaming metal bowl. Ira didn't bother arguing with the amount of soup and simply moved out of the way, sitting down by the crate that he had been sitting by before. He picked up the spoon and got a spoonful of soup, blowing on it so that he wouldn't accidentally burn himself. After all, there weren't an infinite number of bodies here for him to take over.
Ira didn't pay attention to anyone else as he ate his meal. By all accounts, it was a fairly good meal and it did its job admirably. He was kind of sad that he only got the one bowl, but figured that once the crew members started dying, he could take control over the food himself and eat as much as he wanted. After all, they wouldn't be dying of starvation here. There was more than enough food to last them months.
It was everything else that would kill them.
So Ira decided to be patient.
Once he was done eating he put the bowl next to himself and leaned back against the crate. It was harsh on his back but he elected to ignore it in favor of observing the humans around him. His Host had ended up at the back of the line to get food and was only now getting some. The Captain was frowning and glaring at the medical officer as they argued passionately about something. But there were other crew members too. Crew members that weren't as important as the core crew that so often spend time on the bridge of the ship. Those were the crew members that would die first, simply because that was the way that stories worked.
His Host was occupying one such body. Originally, Ira's Host was going to be amongst the first to die. It was simply a matter of being at the wrong place at the wrong time. But Ira had watched him enough during the last mission that he thought there was a fairly high chance that his Host would last longer than the original. Not long enough to get off this planet and escape, but still. He probably wouldn't die right away.
It was interesting, Ira decided. Watching the less important crew members stay away from the core crew and congregate into smaller groups that exchanged hushed information. Maybe they knew that if it came down to it the Captain would elect to save one of the core crew members that he spent so much time around, even if it meant someone else dying. Maybe it wouldn't be his intention, but it would still be the result.
And at the end of the day, it wasn't the intention of an action that mattered. It was the result.
When everybody had finished eating, the Captain called a meeting. He asked everyone to stand around a collection of metal crates that could function as a table in this crisis. Ira moved closer because he usually didn't have the chance to see things from so close up and with his physical body, so he decided to take the opportunity. He already had a feeling that this mission would be entertaining; after all, it was a survival story.
Ira found himself standing between two bulky men as the meeting started. Neither of them paid him any attention. His Host was standing on the other side of the table with his arms crossed over his chest and his spine straighter than an arrow. The Captain started the meeting by saying, "Let's make sure we're on the same page. We have crashed on an unknown planet we have no previous sensory data on. Our ship cannot fly off this planet. The only thing we can do is send out drones to broadcast our distress signal and wait for rescue. In the interest of making sure that we can last however long it takes them to get here, we immediately need to start rationing everything. Any questions?"
The medical officer stepped up. She glared at the captain and said, "It could take years for anyone to get here. We don't have enough food to last that long, much less medical supplies or fuel. What are we going to do when the ship can no longer protect us?"
The Captain was standing with his hands on the crate in front of him and he leaned his body over it as he frowned and answered, "Some exploration will need to be done of the surroundings, but we need to assume that there is nothing here that can help us survive. We must plan for the worst-case scenario."
"Bullshit!" the medical officer exclaimed, clearly not pleased.
What the medical officer was so against, Ira didn't know. What the Captain said was perfectly reasonable. Naturally, they needed to prepare for the worst-case scenario. Space was incredibly, incredibly big. The chances of anyone even picking up the distress signal, let alone finding them in time and rescuing them, was so low that Ira wanted to laugh. In this situation, the Captain was right.
And yet, for some reason, the medical officer kept arguing with him. It made no logical sense, but then again, Ira thought, humans made no sense.
The meeting continued. It was just about to end with the Captain winning whatever argument it was that they were having when Ira's Host stepped up and opened his mouth. His Host said, "We could send out drones to explore the surroundings."
The Captain looked properly at Ira's Host for the first time since they had come to this world and after a brief silence, he nodded. "Good idea, " he said. "you can get started on that."
His Host smiled, smugness rolling off of him. His chest puffed out as he basked in the fact that his proposal had been well received. Again, Ira was forced to come to terms with the fact that this Host was not as useless as the others and seemingly had a functioning brain. He wondered why he would be assigned this Host. There would usually be something wrong with the Hosts that he was assigned and he had gotten well used to it by now, so he wondered. What was wrong with this one?
Well, this was a harsh world. He expected that by the time this mission ended, Ira would have his answers.
With the meeting concluded coma, they scattered. Everybody had their own duties to perform and they were, after all, trained officers. Nobody wanted to waste time. The downside of being on the location of a mission meant that Ira needed to play his part. Again, it was a matter of probability.
Ira whistled as he walked through the long, dark hallways. Most of the place was still filled with smoke and a lot of doors still didn't work. Now, this wasn't an issue for Ira, and he walked toward his destination without hindrance. Apparently, he had done a really good job inventorying the food supplies. Tomorrow, Ira would take inventory of the medical supplies. But for now, they all needed some rest.
Ira kind of like this Captain. The man was smart enough to realize that right now, people needed to grieve and rest. Obviously, some people had gotten stuck on patrol duty but Ira wasn't one of them and he didn't worry about it.
As he walked, he searched his map for Silas. The man wasn't anywhere near close. Scowling, Ira harrumphed and crossed his arms over his chest. The aliens were en route to the planet, but they hadn't yet settled down on it.
A restless feeling rose in Ira's legs. His finger tapped on his arm and his gaze landed on his map again. For some reason, he was feeling unsettled. Like something was missing. It was something that should be here that wasn't. A nagging itch that made him curl his toes in disgust. And Ira didn't like that feeling.
He scowled harsher, furiously thinking over why he felt this way. He didn't like lying to himself, that way lead to lots of delusions like those his Hosts' had.
So. For some reason, Ira wanted to see Silas. It couldn't be for the food, even a good chef as Silas couldn't work miracles with the ingredients they had here. Just because they were tolerable didn't mean that they were at the level that Ira had gotten used to, living with Silas. So if it wasn't the food, what was it?
When he saw Silas again, Ira would investigate. For now, he had things to do. Namely, to sleep. His scowl smoothed out as he came to a consensus with himself. It wasn't like they were pressed for time. There was no reason to rush.
It was probably just that he had gotten used to Silas being close. Habit, probably.
Habit was a powerful thing.
Squeezing his way through the doorway into his room, Ira performed his duties admirably and checked in on his Host. His Host wasn't dying (unfortunately) so Ira didn't pay him any more attention and focused back on what was in front of him. Ira got out of the uncomfortable uniform he was wearing and crawled under the covers of his bed.
He would see Silas soon. The alien ship was in orbit around the planet and would soon make contact. So really, it was only a matter of being patient.
Closing his eyes, Ira evened out his breathing and slowly let himself fall into slumber. Even as he slept, lots of programs ran in the background and he had a mess of alarms rigged for certain events and people; most notably for his Host. He continued his automatic recording while he dreamt.
Five hours later, Ira woke up due to an annoying alarm.
His Host was in deadly danger. Ira zoomed in and managed to catch the tail end of an attack by a gross-looking monster. The plot was officially starting to advance.
