Time Flies Under an Oppressive Sun
In less than an hour, Franklin and Seiji had reached the first cave they were ment to explore, conveniently located under the shade of a rocky overhang. The sun blared down the whole ride over, but once they set in at their work zone things were almost tolerable as far as the dead, dry heat was concerned. In masks and harnesses, they began to set up a tripod that would digitally survey the the cave structure based on readings from their handheld scanners being shot back to it.
Wiping the sweat of the endeavor from his brow, Franklin looked out over the combined flats and mountain ranges and voiced his feelings about what was to come.
"Well, it's raght hot out here, I reckon, but I figure it'll be nice 'n cool in that there cave, Chickenshit." He remarked, grabbing a spare mask and a few extra filters before rigging up his harness and making for the cave.
Northern Skies
Below Akemi and Mako, something other than a wrecked pirate ship emerged in the landscape below. It was a small group of cargo containers, surrounded in the desert by what seemed to be a make-shift fence. They were arrayed in a livable manner, easy access to and from one another, and visibly sealed against the atmosphere. Somebody was using this as a hovel of sorts, and had been here for some time.
Camp
The autopsy results were in. A nanomachine virus had lain quietly inside the dead patient's blood stream. They'd remained deactivated during the previous scans, avoiding detection by simply being inactive microscopic peices of metal. If anything, before their activation, they'd only appeared to make the normal zinc levels in any Nepleslian's blood stream sligthly higher than average, but by so narrow a mark as to seem mere anamoly instead of sleeping killer. Greg was still asleep, and his 'companion' was rocking on his own cot mumbling and quietly crying to himself out of fear.
While Alice Mason finished her dissection of the dead prisoner, Daziel had dragged Sapphire to the Sister Sara's engineering section. He explained to her that the internal communications arrays on both ships had fallen silent, all the while prying off maintenance panels.
"So if you could, my dear," He asked her kindly, "Tell me if there's anything in your expertise to indicate why such a malfunction would befall us. I've taken the liberty of scanning our surroundings with the ship's sensors, but there's nothing nearby-- simply nothing at all."
Above, Niel awoke first. He ran a hand idly across Yori's shoulder next to him, then his eyes widened as he remembered all too well the night they'd shared and this nap. Internally, he cursed himself for coming onto such a young girl while externally he pulled her close once more. The nap had done wonders for his battered ribs, letting the nanogel work overtime at closing up his wounds. He was still nowhere near as cured as a Yamataian would've been or any kind of close to what a Neko could do-- but the throbbing fire in his chest had been reduced to a tolerable dull ache when there wasn't much pressure. And so, he smiled down at Yori and gave her a light nudge to awaken her.
"Well, I feel eight-thousand percent refreshed." He informed her in a soft morning tone, "Though I can't say I feel any urge whatsoever to get out of this bed. You just look so beautiful when you're relaxed and not worrying about anything."