Posted by Lieutenant Commander Thomas McGregor (COS) in Side Sim: Nothing Good Happens After 2A.M. - SICKBAY

Posted by Lieutenant Edelu (CMO) in Side Sim: Nothing Good Happens After 2A.M. - SICKBAY
The lights in Sickbay flickered once before locking into a steady, pulsing crimson. A half-second later, the shrill klaxon pierced the stillness.

=^= Red Alert. All hands to stations. This is a drill. =^=

Edelu’s eyes snapped open. He sat up with precise swiftness, his breathing already steady. The bedsheets were barely creased—he hadn’t slept much, as usual. Rest was a concept he still approached with caution.

The Mintakan physician reached for the uniform jacket draped over the back of the nearby chair and shrugged it on as he crossed to the Sickbay console. With practiced motions, he called up the medical readiness protocol and activated triage prep. One by one, the soft white panels in the main bay hummed to life, auto-sanitizing as the biobeds calibrated for intake.

He tapped his combadge.

=/\=Lt. Cmdr. Edelu to all medical personnel. This is a drill, but treat it like it isn’t. Report in, verify stations, begin red alert prep.=/\=

The crew would rouse quickly. He had made sure of that when they first came aboard.

Edelu glanced at his reflection in the monitor. The high, sloped ridges of his Mintakan forehead cast faint shadows in the red light, and his dark eyes held steady. A childhood spent watching the stars had never prepared him for the sheer complexity of life among them.

But this—emergency response, readiness, control—this he could understand.

He stepped through the doors of his office into the main Sickbay, nodding to the first responding nurse jogging in.

“Triage Alpha is primary. Assign two for trauma overflow. I want neural scans standing by.”

It was 0433. The drill had just begun. But Edelu had already made up his mind: if this were real, they would be ready.

He would see to it.

He tapped his comm badge again. =/\=Dr. Edelu to bridge, Sickbay stands by ready to receive casualties.=/\=

-Lt. Cmdr. Edelu
Chief Medical Officer

=/\=Understood, Sickbay,=/\= Thomas responded.

COS

As the comm chirp closed with the bridge’s acknowledgment, the controlled hum of Sickbay began to transform. It wasn’t panic—never panic—but momentum. Like a ship shifting from idle to impulse.

Doors opened in sequence.

NE Nurse Elera Voss, sharp-eyed and unfailingly punctual, was first through the secondary entrance. Her dark braid was still damp, likely summoned from the sonic shower mid-rinse, but she was already snapping on gloves.

“Prep stations two and five for critical trauma,” Edelu instructed without turning. “Run a level-three diagnostic on the bioscanners while you’re at it. I don’t want to find out during the drill they’ve gone blind.”

“Understood, Doctor.” Her tone was crisp, with just a hint of adrenaline sharpening it.

Behind her came NE Ensign Tafari, fresh from the Academy, still in the starched folds of his off-shift scrubs. He skidded slightly on the floor plating before composing himself and heading to the dispensary.

“You’re on inventory. Verify antishock hypo stock and prep 3ccs of Lectrazine and 2ccs inoxadrine for the trauma carts. This is not the day I discover Sickbay’s been alphabetizing meds instead of counting them.”

Tafari swallowed hard and nodded. “Yes, sir.”

The environmental lights pulsed low red. It cast the normally sterile white-and-chrome space in unsettling hues, like blood in water. Edelu moved through it like a conductor navigating a symphony of readiness. His eyes took in every shift of posture, every delay in response. Not to judge—but to improve.

He pulled up the emergency intake queue on the wall console, simulating patient feeds based on standard Red Alert casualty profiles: plasma burns, hull breach trauma, compression injuries, neural shock. He adjusted the projections slightly—tightening the timing, increasing severity. The simulation needed to hurt. That’s how people learned.

From one of the side doors, NE EMH Beta flickered to life.

“Red Alert protocols in progress,” it intoned. “Shall I begin prepping cranial cortical mapping arrays?”

Edelu considered. “No, Doctor. You’re on standby until we pass neural load threshold. I want real hands running this.”

“Acknowledged. I will observe until called upon. Judging by Ensign Tafari’s pulse rate, that may be sooner than expected.”

The Mintakan doctor allowed himself a faint smirk.

A chirp sounded from the diagnostic console—beds two and five were online and fully calibrated. Edelu swept over and began adjusting the cortical stabilizer on bed five with deft, practiced fingers.

He spoke quietly, more to himself than anyone nearby. “So much hinges on one heartbeat following another.”

And then, louder, to the room: “Ten minutes in. I want full readiness in five. Assume the next body through that door is real.”

Because one day, it would be.

And they would be ready.

-Lt. Cmdr. Edelu
Chief Medical Officer