Chapter Text
Part One (Cont’d)
“The Son’a?”
Jirel stared back at Klath and Denella with a distinct lack of credulity as they stood side by side in the doorway of the medical bay.
“Makes sense to me,” Denella shrugged, “We need medical assistance, and who better to ask than a bunch of people whose lives are one long medical procedure?”
“Yeah,” Sunek quipped from next to Natasha’s unconscious form, “But isn’t their field of expertise more in the, y’know, facelift area? I know you’re getting on a bit, but we haven’t exactly got time to stop for a nip and tuck.”
Denella patiently ignored the Vulcan’s predictable comments and persisted with her dubious pitch. “You know what their ships are like. Huge sickbays, trained staff, medicines, drugs. Plus we can be there way faster than we’ll get to Beta Ramis. Or anywhere else.”
Jirel reluctantly forced himself to consider the facts.
It was true that, when you needed as much treatment as the Son’a did, their ships would be filled with the most advanced medical facilities in the quadrant. They would be hard pressed to find a vessel better equipped to deal with their emergency this side of a Federation hospital ship.
But it was also true that the Son’a were not exactly the most friendly and understanding of people to deal with. Decades of increasingly desperate efforts to extend their lifespans and treat their ailing bodies meant that they could never be entirely trusted. And whatever their ships possessed in terms of treatment facilities, it was usually matched by what they possessed in terms of weaponry.
In summary, he definitely had some issues with Denella and Klath’s plan.
“What kind of ship are we dealing with here?” he asked eventually.
“It is a small cruiser,” Klath reported, having diligently completed a tactical analysis as soon as he had identified the ship as a possible destination, “It will be heavily armed, but we will be able to signal our intentions before we enter their weapons range.”
“Plus, we should have enough spare parts onboard to bargain with,” Denella added, “Even if we’re a little short of latinum right now.”
Jirel still didn’t look convinced. He itched his spots thoughtfully. “And this’ll all put us further off course for Beta Ramis?”
“Yes,” Denella admitted with a tight nod, “But, even if we keep on that course, you know there’s a good chance that she won’t…”
She didn’t finish her sentence, but she didn’t have to. The implication was clear.
Jirel looked down at Natasha, suddenly feeling the pressure of every set of eyes in the room waiting on him to make the call.
Sometimes, he hated being in charge.
“Ok,” he nodded eventually, keeping his focus on the patient, “Alter course. And signal the Son’a ship as soon as we’re in comms range. If they’re not gonna play ball, I wanna know right away so we can get back on our old course.”
Klath and Denella both nodded back at the Trill.
“And in the meantime,” Sunek piped up from the other side of the bed, “I’ll see if the doc has any other ideas up her sleeve.”
He theatrically cracked his knuckles and lined up his fingers across Natasha’s face.
“Boy,” he muttered to himself, “I hope that Caitian’s still there.”
The others in the medical bay glanced at each other. None of them really wanted an explanation for that particular comment.
* * * * *
Starfleet Medical Academy, San Francisco
Stardate 45459.8
Natasha Kinsen felt stressed.
She could feel her heart pounding inside her chest, and the sweat beading on her brow. There was a sense of isolation hanging over her, a feeling of choking, restrictive pressure building up around her with every passing second.
She licked her lips and tried her best to keep her hands from shaking, as she looked down at the body on the operating table in front of her.
Despite every rational part of herself knowing exactly what she was in the midst of, she found herself having to remind herself that this wasn’t real. The body in front of her was merely a holographic representation of a patient, specifically designed for her final practical exam for this course.
As a general rule of thumb, Starfleet didn’t let even their final year medical students operate on live patients.
“Cadet Kinsen,” the man at the head of the operating table motioned, “We are ready to begin.”
She looked over and managed as confident a nod as she could muster, despite the turmoil of worry that raged inside her.
Doctor Rahman had been her teacher throughout the duration of this intense final year course on non-humanoid surgical procedures. Under the stern tutelage of the grouchy but brilliantly gifted grey-haired man, she had learned how to successfully identify, diagnose and operate on a myriad of common ailments from species all across the galaxy.
“This examination will count towards 33% of your final grade on this course,” Rahman continued.
She had repaired a ruptured bile duct in a juvenile Gorn, reset a damaged Tholian exoskeleton while inside a specialised pressure suit, and even performed emergency surgery on a female Horta to remove a blockage in her cloaca and save an entire clutch of eggs.
Doctor Rahman’s course was considered to be the most difficult course in the entire Academy prospectus, and given the rarer lifeforms covered in it, it was not a required section of any cadet’s path to graduation. Indeed, almost everyone who graduated and went on to serve in the fleet could go their entire careers without once having to treat a single one of the species covered in the course.
But Natasha had signed up for it immediately. Out of a sense of confidence, given how high her marks in all of her other classes had been so far, and also out of the need to be challenged.
But, deep down, there was another reason she had jumped at the chance to take part in this most taxing of courses. One that she didn’t entirely want to admit to herself. Ultimately, when all was said and done, she was actually finding life as a cadet far less interesting than she’d been expecting. And more than anything else, taking Doctor Rahman’s course was an attempt to alleviate that growing sense of boredom.
Right now, given the stifling panic she felt inside, she had to begrudgingly admit that she’d been successful on that front. Of all the things she was feeling right now, boredom was certainly not one of them.
The operating room, just as fake as the patient in front of her, was empty save for Rahman and herself. He was in position to assist with the procedure, and ultimately to grade her work. It was a holographic facsimile of a standard Starfleet operating area, all antiseptic white and meticulously clean, efficiently laid out and stocked with all the supplies and equipment she would need for the forthcoming surgery.
It was far from the best facility that the fleet had to offer on the latest ships or starbases, but part of Rahman’s philosophy throughout his course was to drill into his cadets that, in the real world, things will never be perfect. All the better to prepare them for their long careers in the fleet. He knew that, from more than twenty years of service on a variety of transport ships and border cutters, that doctors in the field never had the perfect conditions, or the perfect patients, at their disposal.
“The patient requires a triple heart bypass,” Rahman explained, continuing his briefing for the upcoming procedure, “He is sedated with 20 ccs of diphenylmethane, administered ten minutes ago, and has been prepared for the procedure. You may commence with your initial incision.”
Natasha nodded back at him, taking a moment to try and calm herself and let her heart rate settle before she turned her attention to her patient.
The Bzzit Khaht male lay in front of her. An amphibious species, the body was still slick with water from the preoperative soaking to maintain skin moisture. Or, at least, that’s what would have happened had this not all been a projection.
She reached for the small laser scalpel that had been prepared for her, and carefully checked the detail of the readings on a computer screen to her side to locate the correct entry point. Just as she had practised and rehearsed.
It was set to be a long procedure. A triple bypass for a Bzzit Khaht wasn’t a reference to the number of heart vessels to be operated on, but the number of hearts themselves. But she had been preparing for this for weeks. She could do it.
She took a deep breath and flicked the scalpel on, bringing it down towards the damp skin of her patient.
And then she paused, just before starting to cut.
This didn’t feel right.
She had an unerring feeling that, not only wasn’t the patient or the room around her real, but she wasn’t real either. Nor was Doctor Rahman.
There was a flicker of something in her mind. A memory of being somewhere else. Of being on Wrigley’s Pleasure Planet. Which didn’t make sense, because from Cadet Natasha Kinsen’s perspective, she’d never been there.
Or had she?
“Please proceed, cadet,” Doctor Rahman intoned from her side, entirely oblivious to whatever existential crisis she had stumbled into.
She felt her heart rate quicken again. Licking her lips, she brought the scalpel back down to the incision point.
And then she felt something else. A memory of being onboard a Ju’Day-type raider. And Cadet Kinsen was definitely sure she’d never been onboard one of those.
She shook her head to clear her thoughts, and tried to focus on the procedure. She gently cut along the pre-planned entry point, making the first incision into the Bzzit Khaht’s damp skin. And then, as she finished the incision, she happened to glance back up at the patient’s face.
And she saw, to her horror, that his eyes were open. And, more importantly, that the patient’s face was no longer that of a Bzzit Khaht.
Sunek looked down at the fresh incision in the chest of his latest newly adopted body and winced.
“Gotta be honest, doc,” he managed, “I preferred being the other guy.”
End of Part One