Careful What You Wish For

Posted on Mon Jul 20th, 2020 @ 3:34pm by Lieutenant Leah Bailey & Lieutenant Ausra Danton

Mission: Character Development
Location: Science Labs
Timeline: N/A
1061 words - 2.1 OF Standard Post Measure

Ausra put a few drops of plant food into the base of the giant pusa plant she'd managed to grow from just a tiny root. She was so pleased with the result and how well it seemed to be responding to the new food and pot that she practically sighed with pleasure as she watched it sway a little bit. Suddenly without warning the plant grew several inches, she opened her eyes wide in surprise. "Uh, maybe I shouldn't have done that." On cue the doors to the science lab opened and another person stepped in. Ausra had been content for only a moment that at least this experiment gone wrong would only affect her but that knowledge was quickly dashed with new meat in the room. "Look out!" She called frantically.

Leah instinctively ducked, not really registering what was going-on until something snapped past her ear. "What on earth...?" she exclaimed, looking around for the source of the warning.

The pusa plant was already locked on target. It swung out a vine and tried to grab the woman by the ankle, hopefully knocking her to the ground so it could drag her to it's giant mouth and use it's thorns to incapacitate her for eating.

Ausra's mouth just fell open for a moment before she jumped into action. She wasn't sure a phaser on stun would do anything and she didn't happen to have one on her but she did have a fairly heavy metal container that she picked up and dropped on the plant's runner.

"Ah!" Leah cried, scrambling around on the deck with limited success. "Get it off me!" She grasped the base of a nearby console desperately, trying to fight the pull of the strange plant-thing that was sucking her in.

The plant let out a shriek as the container collided with the runner. It let go of the other woman and Ausra dragged her behind a console which provided some comfort as the plant couldn't actually walk . . . at least she didn't think it could. It was confined to it's pot. "Are you okay?"

Leah scrambled into a sitting position, looking between the plant and the other woman. "What just happened?"

"You almost got eaten?" Ausra replied with only a little bit of shame in her voice. "I'm sorry. It was sort of an experiment. I really didn't realize it would have so much movement. It's a good thing I took out the venomous barbs that i've heard they like to shoot, then you really would have been a gonner."

"Eaten? Venomous?" Leah echoed. She sat upright, alarmed. "I didn't know we had dangeous experiments on board."

"Well technically it probably . . . might not have been . . . maybe . . . approved. I had no idea it could move so quickly or that it would grow so fast. I thought I'd just have a small pot and I'd see what all the fuss was about. Famous last words right? Now I have to figure out how to kill it before it kills us."

Leah blinked. Ausra, she recognised, was the new(ish) Chief Science Officer. She'd met a few mavericks in her time, but this was something totally different. And, weirdly, a bit of fun. She offered a brave grin. "I won't tell anyone if you don't." She ducked as something crashed against the console they were covering behind. "So we need a plan. What about some sort of weed killer? Do we have any of that?"

"That's not exactly something we generally keep stocked and the amount we'd need, not the best option as we'd have to get close enough to put it in the pot. You don't happen to have a sword handy?" She was joking but also thought that would be the best thing to use, she could slice off all it's runners and take off the head quickly. "Or a phaser? Maybe we just throw stuff at it, heavy stuff."

"Something hot?" Leah suggested, equally at a loss. She looked around for anything they might use as a weapon. "There's a weapons locker outside in the hallway. Think we can make it?"

Ausra pursed her lips. "Maybe one of us. I'll create a distraction and you go for it." She was going to need to draw its shoots away from one side of the room. She supposed there was no better distraction than just being bait. "Gosh," she said loudly as if the plant were likely to understand her. "I'm feeling sleepy, I guess I'll just go lie down over by the beautiful plant there." She moved closer to it, still trying to stay out of the way.

Leah wondered if her fellow scientist was crazy, but had no time to think about it too hard as she scuttled her way towards the door as carefully as she could, waiting to see if the plant-thing would respond to Ausra's distraction.

It did. It reached for Ausra, apparently pusa plants had never heard of this technique before. Then again they were native to a very small planet called Marga III where they mostly ate small creatures who didn't know any better about getting too close to these plants. A humanoid would be a feast but the natives there knew to stay far away and also how to kill the plants. Ausra was sincerely wishing she'd paid attention to that part of the article on them as the plant managed to grab onto her foot, sending her sprawling to the ground. It wasted no time wrapping itself around her and pulling her in.

It took Leah longer than she would have liked to prise open the security locker and fumble the settings on the hand phaser. As she turned back she could see Ausra being scooped by the tentacle-like protrusions.

"Put her down!" she yelled, pointing the weapon and firing a burst. She wasn't particularly experienced when it came to marksmanship but the blast struck somewhere in the mid-section of the plant, which made a strange squealing sort of sound. The smell of burning filled the air as Ausra was suddenly lopped several feet across the floor. Leah leapt forward to check on her. "Are you okay!?"

"Uhhh," Ausra said in what sounded a little like a moan. "Now that you mention it, I don't feel so great." She passed out after barely getting the words out of her mouth.