by David Smith
Behind them O’Mara crouched, whispering updates from her tricorder. ‘Room on the left, seven life signs including one human.’
‘Ok, we go in easy, set phasers for stun, but keep them holstered.’ Taking a deep breath, Dave opened the door and peered in.
No-one stirred. In the small dimly lit room were six neatly arranged camp beds, each covered with a plastic canopy and surrounded by intravenous drips and scanning machinery. Under each canopy lay a tall Sha T’Al, each of them stirring restlessly from time to time, but without gaining consciousness.
In between the two rows of camp beds at the far end of the room sat a tiny figure slumped on a simple chair. A young woman sat in a white nun’s habit snoring gently, swaying slowly from side to side, but doing just enough to remain roughly upright.
Stepping into the room, Dave cleared his throat. A couple of the Sha T’Al stirred uneasily, but the figure at the end of the room only rubbed her nose and carried on snoring.
She bowed further forward, and Dave worried that she might nose-dive off the chair, but just as Dave was about to intervene, she caught herself, straightened up and leaned back in her seat before starting snoring gently again.
Dave couldn’t help but notice how pretty the young woman was, the beautiful, even features of her face framed by a nun’s wimple and veil.
He cleared his throat again, more loudly, but this didn’t seem to make any greater impact. He was just about to give her shoulder a gentle shake when one of the unfortunate Sha T’Al broke wind. Her eyes popped open and she sat bolt upright.
Suddenly realizing she was faced with a stranger in an environmental suit she let out a small shriek of alarm: ‘Please don’t hurt us! Have you not inflicted enough suffering on these poor creatures already??’
Dave stood back and held his open hands up ‘Calm yourself, sister, we mean you no harm, we come . . . ‘
Her beautiful blue eyes were filled with panic, and there were no tattoos or piercings visible, but Dave was hit with a sudden bolt of recognition: ‘SKYE??? Skye L’Amour??’
She looked shocked, and tried to lean away from him, cowering into the little chair; ‘Who are you?? How do you know me?? What do you want with me??’
Having got over his surprise, Dave realised the rest of the away team were now peering around him and over his shoulder, all looking as confused as he felt.
He turned and backed them up, knowing the poor woman was massively intimidated by seeing six strange faces staring at her.
He turned back to the little nun. If she had survived here with no visible side effects, he figured it was safe to remove his environmental suit and he took off the helmet whilst smiling his very best ‘we-mean-you-no-harm’ smile. ‘I’m Commander David Hollins of the Federation Starship Tiger. We’re here on a reconnaissance mission to discover what’s happened to the Sha T’Al population in this star system.’
She looked around the group, still looking like a scared rabbit caught in the head-lights. ‘But . . . you did this. This is all your work.’
Dave stood up and backed away to give her a little more comfort zone. Her words left him in little doubt as to exactly what had happened. ‘I believe you may have us confused with the Imperial heavy-cruiser Tiger. Please be assured that we have no allegiance or tie of any sort to the Empire. In fact we have come here to escape their attentions.’
He could see the confusion on her face and pressed on. ‘We are willing to assist where we can. Lieutenant Chen is a medic and Lieutenant-Commander O’Mara and Lieutenant Selassie have both worked with the Sha T’Al before.’
She still looked uncertain.
‘What happened to everyone? We believed there were twenty million Sha T’Al in this system’ said Dave fearing the worst.
Cautiously she answered ‘The vast majority had evacuated before the first invasion of the Terran Empire. A few hundred thousand remained, but they were cruelly oppressed, and when the Sha T’Al pushed the Empire forces out of the system, even more took flight. The Empire had destroyed much of their art and they saw little point in staying.’
Dave could see tears welling in her eyes as she spoke. ‘How many are left Sister?’
‘There are less than twenty thousand on this world, all of whom show some aspect of the disease visited upon them by the Empire.’
‘By the Empire?’ Dave asked gently.
She answered uncertainly, still not trusting them ‘Yes. They’re dying from a bio-genetic disease. We believe it was brought here by humans. It’s genocide. These poor souls have been abandoned by their own leaders as they won’t risk the disease spreading.’
‘And why are you here?’
‘I am Sister L’Amour of the Order of the Latter Day Saints’ she said proudly. ‘We are opposed to war in all its forms and do what we can to redress the evils wrought in the name of the Empire.’ She paused before admitting ‘Our missionary work has not been well received by the Emperor and many of the sisters have been taken into custody on charges of sedition’.
She seemed to lose heart. ‘There are so few of us left, but with so much to do. The Sha T’Al are a single-minded race. They love art in any form, but in starting a war with them the Empire has found they are completely single minded in that respect too. They believe they can do nothing more for these few they’ve left behind, and will not help them in any way, so it’s down to us few missionaries to do what we can to ease their suffering.’
‘I believe we may be able to help them’ said Dave.
‘They are beyond help. More die every day and nothing we do seems to even slow down the effects of the disease. We have already buried twenty-thousand souls and will stay until the last of them are gone’ said the nun sadly.
‘We can’t just give up on twenty-thousand people sister’ contested Dave.
‘But we do not have the resources or expertise with which to help them . . . ‘ she protested.
‘We may not have all the resources we need, but we do have the expertise. We’ve captured one of the creators of the disease’ said Dave grimly.
Sister L’Amour gasped in horror: ‘You’ve brought one of those . . . murderers . . . here?!?!’
‘I would consider it providential that we’ve come upon the one place where she might actually be of worth. If anyone can help the Sha T’Al it’s her’ said Dave.
‘And how do you intend to force her to help?’ asked the nun bluntly.
Dave hadn’t really thought about that, but after a pause said ‘I know someone who seems to have a knack of getting things out of her.’
--------------------
Commander Mengele blushed. ‘I would prefer to discuss this in private, Commander Hollins.’
She led him to her small office at the side of the Sick-bay and closed the door behind them. She sat behind her desk, trying very hard to look professional, but looking incredibly defensive. ‘So you need me to force my doppelganger to talk?’
‘Well, “force” is a harsh word, Commander, I’m good with “cajole” or even “persuade”?’
Katrin Mengele was clearly unimpressed. ‘I believe you may be over-estimating my ability to extract information, particularly when my counterpart will undoubtedly regard divesting such information as an act of treason.’
‘But you did find out the status of this area and come up with useful intelligence when she was supposed to be questioning you?’
The Doctor’s face flushed visibly. Taking an audible breath, she explained. ‘It would appear that much of what we take for granted is reversed in this universe. My counterpart here is distinctly . . . submissive. I did not have to interrogate her, she freely divulged what information I passed on when I . . . that is, we . . . er . . . well . . . ‘
Dave tried not to smirk ‘So it was all pillow talk when you had sex????’ Dave couldn’t help himself. ‘That is wrong on soooo many levels. Is that some sort of incest??’
The Doctor sat bolt upright and folded her arms tightly across her chest ‘As it’s effecti
vely sex with myself, I regard it as masturbation, nothing more, nothing less. Masturbation is a perfectly natural and healthy bodily process.’ The Doctor was clearly annoyed by Dave’s amusement: ‘And she was rubbish anyway.’
Dave had tears in his eyes, but managed to keep a straight face, as this was really a serious matter.
‘Ok, I’m sorry Commander, I apologise if you’re uncomfortable with this, but I have greater concerns.’ He cleared his throat and suppressed the giggling schoolboy inside him.
‘Your counterpart may have been instrumental in an act that amounts to attempted genocide by the Empire. Either way, her actions have been a contributing factor in the deaths of tens of thousands . . . maybe hundreds of thousands . . . of Sha T’Al.
Dave watched the Doctor to try and gauge her reactions, but for the first time since he’d met her, she couldn’t meet his gaze.
To his amazement a large tear rolled down the smooth skin of her cheek, splashing on her house coat and breaking up into smaller, shiny blobs of sadness.
There was an extended silence as Dave desperately sought to understand what he’d done to provoke such an extreme reaction, and what he could do to put it right.
More tears fell, running down her coat and after the faintest of sobs, she took a deep breath and composed herself. ‘What my counterpart did, and by extension myself, was unforgivable. It goes against every value I hold dear, and shows a side of me I cannot abide.’
Empathising, Dave tried to console her. ‘Commander . . . Katrin . . . It wasn’t you who created the weapons. It may not even have been her. . . she has claimed that her input was largely technical. Even then, you don’t know what pressure she was under.’
‘It doesn’t matter. She is me and regardless of circumstances I . . . she . . . we . . . are clearly capable of doing such unspeakable acts. Her actions have held up a mirror for me, and I am ashamed of what I see.’
‘It’s not your fault. How could you possibly know what effect such a horrific universe would have on your counterpart. How could any of us? My counter-part is the leader of a blood-thirsty rebellion, whose actions have probably also led to hundreds of thousands of deaths’ Dave said, offering her some mitigation.
‘But you are an Operations Officer, and of extremely limited intelligence . . . ‘ she retorted.
She may have been upset, but she’d lost none of her legendary tact and diplomacy thought Dave.
‘ . . . where my counter-part and I have failed to uphold our Hippocratic oath, the cornerstone of our entire professional lives.’
‘Then do something about it!’ urged Dave. ‘Do what you can to save the rest of the Sha T’Al. Even if you don’t find a way to engage your counter-part, I believe you personally can make in-roads to solving the problem.’
She straightened herself and discreetly wiped away a tear. ‘Of course Commander, it goes without saying that I will do my best. But you are undoubtedly correct that my counter-part would be best placed to right these wrongs. I will do what I can to persuade her.’
--------------------
Over the next few days, the Doctor spent more and more time visiting the ship’s Brig.
Chief Belle reported that they’d decided to give the two Mengele’s some privacy, and had started guarding the Brig from outside. On pressing though, Chief Belle admitted that this was not so much about putting the prisoner at ease as it was about putting the Security team at ease: they were uncomfortable with the obvious and virulent sexual tension between the two Doctors.
While one (or possibly both of the Doctors) were getting de-briefed with respect to the Empires advances in bio-genetic weaponry, Dave turned his attention to the matter of the apparently abandoned Tana battleship orbiting the planet.
‘ASBeau, any sign of life on the Tana ship?’
‘No, sir, not a thing. We tried some passive scans and the whole ship’s still as cold as the grave. With no response to that, we tried active scans which were conclusive. There’s no-one left alive anywhere on that vessel, sir’ replied the Tactical Officer.
‘Shearer, any comms traffic?’
‘Nowt o’nawt Commanda. I did read an incoomen signel that ah beleev was for that vesl, but it was hevilee encrypted liek. Cryptaw team ar still woorkin on it’ she replied,
Dave took that as a no. ‘Ok people, we’ve got a team on the ground trying to find out how we can help the Sha T’Al, now I want to find out what happened to the Tana. I’m taking an away team over to the battleship. ASBeau, watch us like a hawk, Crash, hold station two clicks astern, Shearer, notify me of any comms activity.’
He called the Sick-bay. ‘Lieutenant Chen, I need a medic and an orderly for an away team. I would prefer to have volunteers, even if there are no active threats, I’m expecting the visit to be . . . unpleasant. Get them to meet me in the Transporter room please.’
Changing channel, he called the Engineering Deck and was answered by Commander Romanov. ‘Commander, I’m going to investigate the Tana battleship. Can you spare Chief Deng for a few hours?’
‘Of course First Officer, I’ll get her to meet you. Do you need any other assistance?’ asked the Engineer.
‘Possibly from PO Park, but I imagine we’ll have to recover the memory core of the ship and bring it back rather than take Park over there.’
‘I’ll make sure he’s available on your return, sir’
‘Thank you Commander.’ Dave’s last call was to PO Sorenson of the Security team, and after requesting three bodies, he headed to the Transporter room, leaving ASBeau in command.
In the Transporter room, the team was already suiting up. The two volunteers from the Sickbay were Nurse Benjani, a slightly deranged Ugandan with a breast fixation, and Ivor Bigfoot, who was possibly the oddest person aboard USS Tiger.
Ivor was a Neanderthal, and not in the figurative sense used to describe most of Chief Money’s heavy gang. Ivor was a genetic reconstruction of a Neanderthal man, illegally created as a side-show attraction for a travelling carnival.
He was eventually freed from what amounted to slavery, but quite obviously didn’t fit in anywhere in the entire galaxy, being the only living member of his species. He had been desperately lonely, and was close to suicidal until he was accepted into Starfleet.
Out on the fringes of the Federation he didn’t feel like a freak of nature: he was just a different type of freak from the rest of the crew. He was happy to be aboard Tiger, and as well as being positive and helpful, it transpired that the Neanderthal brain was far more developed than was expected. Ivor was studying hard and would soon become a fully fledged paramedic.
‘Ok team, we don’t know what we’ll be dealing with, and it’s possible there could be traps, or even hostiles we haven’t detected. Stay sharp, any signs of trouble, we all bug-out. Let’s move,’
--------------------
Chief Carstairs transported them over to the Bridge of the Tana Battleship. As Dave had suspected, this vessel was completely identical to the vessel they’d fought and disabled at Joran Dal many months ago.
Back then they’d managed to defeat the ship by linking its computer to their own, which had instantly turned it into a gibbering neurotic wreck. That hadn’t actually been their plan, but it had won the day.
As they materialised, they stood in total darkness. Their environmental suits registered this and automatically turned their suits external lighting on.
There were gasps of horror all around. In several seats dotted around the Bridge, the corpses on the Tana crew still sat, silently following their last orders. They were emaciated desiccated husks, freeze-dried as the ships systems had shut down and cut off life-support.
Nurse Benjani approached one of the unfortunate Tana. It was slumped over a console and its clothes were soaked with dark and worrying stains. The same stains seemed to have run across the console and seat and onto the floor too, and there were small spots and stains, spattered all across the higher parts of the console.
Benjani did a pre
liminary scan with her tricorder. ‘No signs of external trauma . . . hmm . . . considerable internal bleeding and tissue damage consistent with extreme organ failure.’
‘What organ?’ asked Dave.
‘That’s a bit of an oddity, Commander. It looks like all of them had shut down’ she replied, still scanning the corpse.
‘How is that possible? Surely someone with such serious health issues would never have been passed fit for service aboard a Starship?’
Nurse Benjani had moved to scan a second corpse. ‘I don’t think it was an issue when he joined their fleet. This corpse is showing the same form of total organ failure, and when I say failure, I don’t mean the organs just stopped working, I mean they seem to have almost dissolved.’
‘Have they been poisoned? Or is there some kind of biological agent involved?’ Dave asked with a hint of panic in his voice. Were they being exposed to some form of Terran Empire germ warfare?
Orderly Bigfoot had been scanning the atmosphere. ‘There are no biological or chemical agents in the atmosphere, sir.’
‘And the corpses appear clean, although I couldn’t be certain as I don’t know enough about their physiology’ added Nurse Benjani. ‘Whatever disease killed them almost certainly burned itself out by killing them all very, very quickly.’
‘Well I suppose it makes no difference to them now. We stick with the plan. Deng, take Sorenson and go to Engineering, see if the ship is physically intact. Nurse Benjani take Orderly Bigfoot and Crewman Larkin and find the sick-bay. See if you can find out what happened to the crew. I’ll stay here and see if I can find any clues from their log system.’ Dave cast a nervous glance at the nearest Tana who seemed to have bled horrifically from every orifice. ‘Keep tricorders scanning for pathogens at all times. Any sign of a virus or bacteria, and we’re all out of here immediately. Check in every ten minutes, we meet back here in one hour. Let’s get this done and get gone guys.’
--------------------
On the planet’s surface, Lieutenant-Commander O‘Mara had started trying to track down the source of the illness afflicting the Sha T’Al.
She’d stayed on the surface with Lieutenant Selassie, Chief Belle and Running Deer, but to improve their chances of success she decided to add to the team.
