NSAIDs - An Interlude

[Crash Calestorm 0]

Interlude was the nice way of putting it, but her current situation was more along the lines of needing to haul ass; Calestorm ducked into a one floor housing unit. Immediately outside, the urban section of The Maze was lit up with the sounds of skirmish and battle as the Black Kris guards fought to regain control of the area.

 

She was getting too fraggin’ old for this…

 

No, no, scratch that. What she needed was to stop acting like a wild ass, fly girl cadet…single handedly taking on a guard infested hover car? You jumped out a window and landed on the flitter?! Twenty stories up! What if you missed?! And that seemed like a good idea at the time because...?

 

Then again, if she didn’t insist on the hands on approach and hop all over the place like a Chihuahua on caffeine, she wouldn’t be Calestorm. A starship CO needed to be in the field with her people, not leading from behind a desk or from the bridge like some of those yahoos back at Starleet Command were proposing…

 

She was still getting too fraggin’ old for this stuff…

 

She hurriedly fished in an inside jacket pocket, biting down on her lip. She yanked out a stim-analgesic hypo and jabbed the spray applicator directly into her neck. The medicine immediately took effect, her system reacting to the boost of energy and the painkillers. Specifically tailored to Crash, the hypo needed to be signed out of the medical bay by the attending physician.

 

Not normally a fan of stimulants*, it was more a necessity then choice for Cale right now. In the ten minutes since all hell had broken loose, she’d gotten clocked figuratively upside the head - twice - by Kris guards and her energy had gotten sapped.

 

Twenty years ago, hell, ten years ago she’d have shook it off and then walked it off. Now, she just had to roll with the punches. In this case literally…

 

“Jumper to Crash!”

 

The young Caitian had an excited edge to her voice, laced with a little bit of fear; over time and with experience, that would be tempered down to a flat vocal intonation.

 

She spoke into her ear bud mic pickup. “Crash. Go.” See? Like that.

 

“I may have eyes on Greenie, Doc and Sparks…”

 

Weapon held at the ready, the captain bolted out of the housing unit at a run, using the surrounding structures for cover. “Copy that. On my way, what’s your twenty…”

 

= = = =

Note: While I’m sure the concept of battlefield stimulants has been used in other novels, my inspiration comes from the Confederation of Valor military sci-fi series written by Tanya Huff:

• Chewable stimulants are authorized for use by ranking personnel in a battle zone.
  
• Other members of the Confed Military (such as vacuum jocks who want to keep their flight time reflexes fast) may employ these stims more liberally.
  
• Excess use of stims will turn teeth/gums an orange color (I’m guessing this is Ms. Huff’s PSA on stimulant chew usage).