The Doc sighs and heads back out to the cargo bay. That cargo person with the silly accent had told him there was a list of incoming gear somewhere, so he searches for it and wastes his time for a while. After rummaging around looking for the Vilani’s list unsuccessfully, Saro shrugs and keys up the inventory he had been running on his handcomp. He decides to just jump straight into the cargo, and starts opening boxes.
As he starts to lose himself in the process of open/review/list/close/repeat, the Doc starts to unconsciously hum little snippets from various space operas he’s listened to. After a while he slips into singing Vargr power ballads to himself as he works.
Darishun opens the port inner cargo door to the oddly melodious sounds of something dying in agony. After a brief bit of confusion, he recognizes the Vargr power ballads with a sad shake of the head.
"Excuse me, Dr. Saro?" he softly interrupts before the really bad part of this particular ballad begins, "Martha asked me to move some of these supplies in the port cargo lock area into one of the lower staterooms, and I was wondering if you wanted to look at them before I moved them? I wasn’t sure if we should put things like emergency rations or particular medical supplies into the stateroom."
"Hmm? Wha. . . ?" Doc looks up distractedly. "Oh, let’s see . . . I haven’t finished everything yet, but . . . " he waves at some crates "these don’t contain anything too vital, maybe start with those, and I’ll see what else I can sort out in the meantime."
Doc smiles at the large sophont as he turns back to inventorying the crate he has open.
Darishun responds, "I will move these first," and sets about moving the indicated crates into the first cabin. Once he fills up the cabin, he then sets about moving the cargo that is in or near the corridors into the cargo bay. Once finished there, he’ll head up to the lounge to grab a snack.
Vasilii acknowledges the huge sophont with a brisk businesslike nod as it ambles past him into the lounge. Then again shortly after as it ambles back to work.
"It is going to be interesting if we ever do emergency drills with that huge thing acting like a plug in the corridors, Vasilii thinks. He watches out of the corner of his eye while Darishun casually bounces a 2–ton imaging table out onto the cargo lifter. "On the other hand there were some definite advantages."
A thought strikes him and he has a quick look in the lounge register. "Godsteeth," he thinks, "the beast’s ‘small snack’ consumed two full days of marine rations. That was 8,000 calories, what is it going to be like when it has time for a big meal!" Hastily he checks the level of rations. At this rate, their amount of consumables would be down to three months before they even left. High calorie foods would make a big difference, but the Virushi still made a big dent.