by Andy Mangels
She found a large bruise on his left side, over the rib cage. He flinched when she touched it. The tricorder revealed a hairline fracture.
“You’re showing another two percent decrease in bone density.”
Vaughn’s response was immediate: “I’ve been on a regimen of Ostenex-D for the last twelve years.”
Girani sighed. “Ostenex doesn’t prevent your bones from becoming brittle, Commander. It only slows the process down. And after a while, it stops working for some people.”
Silence. According to her tricorder, Vaughn’s heart rate was spiking, but his voice remained even as he asked, “Can you prescribe something else?”
Girani hesitated. “There’s a newer version of the drug you might try, but I can’t promise you it’ll work any better.” She reached for her osteo-regenerator, switched it on, and pressed it gently against Vaughn’s ribs for several minutes. When at last it beeped, signalling that the bone had been mended, Girani put the device away and resumed her tricorder scan.
Girani then noticed a raised line of flesh that started on the side of the commander’s neck and disappeared into the white hair behind his left ear. With his uniform on, she realized, it would hardly be noticeable at all. Upon close examination, however, it was quite obviously the telltale sign of an old and serious injury. “Where’d you get this scar?”
“Back home,” Vaughn answered, shrugging. “When I was a kid.”
Girani held the tricorder up to the scar. “There are traces of foreign DNA under the skin, but I’m not finding a match in the medical database.”
“Expand the search to include class-Q life-forms,” Vaughn suggested, “and you’ll find it belongs to the species Draco berengarius.”
Girani’s eyebrows shot up at that. “The original wound was quite deep, though,” she said, noting that her tricorder was showing a re-fused skull and indications of slight damage to the left hemisphere of the brain. “It looks to me as if you were lucky to have survived. You’ve never experienced any side effects?”
“No.”
Strange as the wound was, if Vaughn had gone this long without suffering any ill effects from it, it was unlikely to make any difference now. Girani redirected her tricorder at Vaughn’s heart. “How often do you exercise?”
“I go swimming for half an hour every morning before my shift. And before you ask, yes, I’m watching my diet.”
“According to your medical file, you had a cardiac episode six years ago.”
“A mild one. Nothing since.”
“What about your energy level?”
Vaughn didn’t answer.
“Commander? I said—”
“I get tired more quickly these days,” Vaughn snapped. “I’m a little slower getting up in the morning. Are you satisfied, Doctor?”
Unfazed, Girani said, “That depends. Are you experiencing any other symptoms Starfleet should know about?”
That’s when he turned and looked at her directly. “I’m old, Doctor. And I’m getting older all the time. Starfleet knows that. Putting a microscope on every creaking bone, every aching muscle, won’t tell them anything they aren’t already aware of.”
“And that means what, exactly? I should simply give you a clean bill of health?”
Vaughn’s eyes narrowed. “Is there any reason you wouldn’t?”
Girani set down the tricorder and came around the biobed to face Vaughn directly. She pulled up a chair and straddled it. “Commander, you’re a hundred and two years old. You’re more than two-thirds of the way to the end of your natural life, and while you’re in good health for a human male of your years, it’s still an age when most of your kind has retired.”
“If you check, you’ll see that many centenarian humans are still on active duty in Starfleet.”
“But few of them are in the field,” Girani countered, “and with good reason. Medical science and proper self-maintenance may have lengthened the human life span over what it was a few hundred years ago, but as you yourself clearly stated, you haven’t stopped aging.”
“Come to the point, Doctor.”
Girani sighed. “Don’t misunderstand me, Commander. All things considered, your health is excellent. But at some point, perhaps sooner than you imagine, you’ll have to face the end of your ability to continue serving in your current capacity.
“But I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know, am I? You’ve already had this conversation with Dr. Bashir.”
Vaughn scowled and looked away for a moment, then turned back to her. “Is it your medical opinion that I’m unfit for duty, or that my current health is a liability to this crew?”
“No, but—”
“Then we’re done here.” Vaughn pushed off the biobed and reached for his gray tank and red uniform shirt, folded neatly nearby atop his jacket and trousers.
Girani stood up and shook her head. “Julian warned me you were an impossible patient.”
“Did he, now?” Vaughn said as he dressed.
“Yes. And I feel no reluctance agreeing with that assessment,” Girani said with rising anger. “For someone of your life experience, I expected a little more wisdom.”
Vaughn slammed his hand on the biobed. His emotions were palpable, but he succeeded in reining them in quickly. Nevertheless, Girani was sorely tempted to recheck his blood pressure.
Finally he said, “I apologize. Doctor. It’s just—” He stopped, struggling for the right words. “I’m simply not ready to give up this life yet.”
The forcefulness—or was it desperation?—in Vaughn’s voice surprised Girani. She remembered a lot of aging resistance fighters who’d expressed similar sentiments when advised to slow down. During the Occupation, it was difficult to argue that anyone should scale back their efforts to help free Bajor from Cardassian control. The Federation, however, wasn’t at war anymore. So what cause was driving Vaughn?
“This issue will not go away simply because you choose to ignore it, Commander,” Girani said gently. “You need to face the fact that the time is coming, whether you like it or not, when you will have to stand down. My hope for you is that you’ll recognize it yourself when it becomes necessary. Otherwise, someone will make that decision for you, and I suspect you’re the type who would find such a thing undignified, even humiliating. I doubt that’s how you’d want your career to end.”
Vaughn stared vacantly into the middle distance. “No. I can’t say it is.” His gaze refocused, and he looked at her. “Thank you, Doctor. Your candor is sobering. You’ve given me a great deal to think about. Are you sure you can’t be persuaded to join Starfleet?”
Girani laughed. “After the conversation we just had, you still want me to sign on?”
“Yes,” Vaughn said simply. “Integrity, directness, and persistence are qualities that shouldn’t go unappreciated.”
Girani’s smile was genuine. “Thank you, Commander. Truly. But getting back dirtside is what I really want. And besides,” she went on, seeing the dead face of First Minister Shakaar, “there are things about my time here I want to forget.”
Vaughn nodded, accepting her answer. “Just know, then, that you’ll be missed. By all of us.”
“Thank you,” Girani said again.
Vaughn finished dressing while Girani moved to an interface console and uploaded her tricorder’s readings to the infirmary mainframe, to cross-check later against the master scan taken by the diagnostic array. She was changing Vaughn’s prescription to Ostenex-E when she heard a voice call out, “There you are, Commander! I heard I might find you in here.”
Girani turned. Standing in the doorway was Quark, his hands held uncharacteristically behind his back. Girani was about to deliver a scathing reprimand about a patient’s right to privacy in coming to see a physician, but Vaughn spoke first.
“Mr. Ambassador,” he said, pulling his uniform jacket on. “What a pleasure it is to see you.”
Girani suppressed a laugh. Quark’s diplomatic appointment as Ferenginar’s
official representative to Bajor was still hard to take seriously, especially after it became common knowledge that it had come about purely as an act of nepotism on the part of Grand Nagus Rom, Quark’s brother.
Quark snorted at the commander’s greeting. “Ah, you say that, but you don’t mean it.”
Vaughn looked at him. “How could you tell?”
“I’m willing to overlook your insincerity, Commander, given your situation and all.” From her angle, it appeared to Girani that Quark was holding something behind his back, but she couldn’t make out what it was.
“My situation?” Vaughn asked.
“Another birthday,” Quark said. Vaughn shot a look at Girani, who shrugged, putting on a face with which she hoped to project, Don’t look at me, I didn’t tell him. “At your age, that’s gotta make anybody cranky,” Quark went on. “It can’t be getting any easier. You’re less steady on your feet, less quick with a phaser, less able to remember things, less able to endure the, ah, company of females . . .”
“Less able to endure the company of you,” Vaughn added.
“Commander, please,” Quark said. “Let’s not spoil what should be an occasion to celebrate.”
Vaughn stared at him. “You’re here to help me celebrate.”
“Well, as it happens, I was at the station’s florist signing for a shipment of Kaferian lilies, just as Mr. Modo was processing an order—intended for you. Imagine my delight when I learned it was a birthday present from someone on Bajor. As a good citizen, not to mention the senior Ferengi diplomat in residence, I volunteered to bring it to you personally.”
“Is that right,” Vaughn said, as Quark’s other hand emerged, holding a narrow cone of festive paper wrapped around a single, long-stemmed flower. There was a note card attached, and an isolinear rod taped next to it. The flower, Girani saw, was an esani blossom.
Vaughn thanked Quark as he took the gift, unsealed the note card, and smiled faintly when he read the contents. Quark’s futile attempt to inconspicuously lean over far enough to read the note told Girani that at least he hadn’t scanned the message before bringing it to the commander.
Vaughn refolded the note and detached the isolinear rod from the giftwrap. “What’s this?”
“Compliments of the Ferengi Embassy,” Quark said.
“You mean the bar.”
“Just present it to any member of my staff to receive an hour of holosuite time at our special birthday discount. And two free drinks.”
Vaughn raised an eyebrow. “Top shelf?”
Quark laughed. “That’s a good one. I’ll have to remember that. Oh, I almost forgot to mention: For a small fee, you can get an official proclamation from the Ferengi Alliance declaring this Elias Vaughn Day. It comes with a certificate.”
“Pass.”
“A smaller fee will get you an official birthday greeting from the Grand Nagus.”
“You’re enjoying your diplomatic appointment far too much, do you realize that?”
“Take joy from profit, and profit from joy. Rule of Acquisition Number Fifty-five.”
“My mistake,” Vaughn said. “But I’ll have to pass on that offer as well, I’m afraid.”
Quark made a disgusted noise and shook his head. “No offense, Commander, but your people have no idea how to celebrate a birthday properly.”
Vaughn shrugged. “We’re only human.”
“My point exactly. Would it kill you to spend a little more time in my bar?”
“Don’t you mean ‘embassy’?”
“Quark’s is a full-service establishment,” the ambassador said. “I’m just trying to reinforce that fact among the station populace.”
“And you think having the station’s second-in-command decide to celebrate his birthday there will encourage others to do the same,” Vaughn guessed.
Quark spread his hands. “Well, after all, every day is somebody’s birthday.”
“True enough,” the commander conceded, raising the esani flower to his nose and gently breathing in its fragrance. “As it happens, though, I have a prior commitment this evening. Some other time, perhaps. Thanks for the gift.” He gave Quark’s shoulder a friendly pat, and nodded to Girani as he strode out of the exam room. “Doctor.”
As Vaughn exited, Quark seemed to notice Girani for the first time, a new gleam forming in his eye. “Doctor! When’s your birthday?”
9
Hovath
Hovath awoke to darkness and the taste of blood. Pain nested behind his eyes, its sharp black beak stabbing his brain. His lower lip was numb and felt twice its usual size. His face was sore, and cold on one side. Through his cheek he felt a low vibration, one he recognized: the deckplate of a spacecraft at warp.
Light assailed him through his eyelids, an instant before his mind registered the sound of a switch being thrown, the echo reverberating off metal walls.
“Up,” a harsh voice demanded, just as he felt rough hands grab hold of his vestments and force him into a hard chair. Hovath struggled to open his eyes against the glare, saw that he was sitting at one end of a plain metal table in the midst of an otherwise dark room, a light on the other side shining directly into his face. The stabbing pain behind his eyes grew worse.
Then it all came back to him.
Shards of memory broke through the fog: alien faces, the heat of the explosion, the light of the village burning, screams of agony, the scent of death.
“Iniri!” The wail of grief tore itself from the rawness of his throat, sending him into a fit of dry, painful coughing.
I’m alive. Why am I alive? The crushing knowledge of what had befallen his people was proof that he wasn’t dead . . . unless death was not the thing his faith maintained. Though the concept of an afterlife defined by eternal loss and regret was alien to Bajoran thinking, Hovath knew it was powerful idea in human mythology. They had names for it. He knew one of them: hell.
“Ke Hovath,” another voice said, softer than the first, female. But not his wife’s. Iniri!
Then a different horror seized him: They knew his name! Prophets help him, they knew his name! They had killed everyone, his friends and neighbors, his family, they had burned the village to the ground—but they had taken him, kept him alive. They wanted him!
“Why?” Hovath found the strength to ask before another coughing spasm took hold.
“Let him drink,” the woman said. A second later, a sipstick touched his lips. Cool water flowed over his dry, leathery tongue, bringing some relief from the choking taste of ash. He began to drink greedily, becoming aware of two figures on his right and left, standing over him.
“That’s enough,” the voice said, and the sipstick withdrew.
Hovath looked up, squinting against the light, attempting to see the speaker through the glare. The most he could discern was a dark shape sitting on the opposite end of the table. “What do you want of me?”
“The same thing you want. Answers,” his captor said.
“I won’t help you.”
“I think you will.” The dark figure seemed to turn slightly to one of her henchmen. “Show him.”
The underling on his right—Hovath thought dully he might be a Nausicaan, though he was uncertain—moved to the nearest wall, where a viewscreen was set up. The alien activated it, and Hovath’s heart lifted.
Iniri was alive. She was slumped in the corner of a small room, her red-blond hair in dissaray, her clothing singed. She had her arms wrapped around herself and she appeared to be weeping. She looked as if she’d been beaten, and Hovath’s moment of relief turned to rage.
Then he felt the blood drain from his face as he recognized her surroundings. An airlock.
“As you can see, your wife lives. For the moment,” the woman said. “If you wish her to stay that way, I require your full cooperation.”
“Please,” Hovath moaned. “Let her go.”
“No. Not until you give me what I need. Otherwise Iniri dies.”
Hovath squeezed his eyes shut and
clenched his hands into fists on top of the table, his mind searching for a way out of his nightmare. His teeth bit into his swollen lower lip until he tasted blood again.
“How can I possibly help you? I’m no one.”
“Oh, but that is hardly true.” the woman said. “Until this very morning you were the sirah of Sidau village. But that’s not all, is it, Hovath? You’ve also spent half of each of the last six years as a student in Musilla University, where you pursued what can only be described as an atypical course of study for someone of your upbringing, and published a rather remarkable document.”
From the far end of table, something slid toward him across the surface. His fingers caught it. A padd, but not of a design he’d ever seen before. Its little screen displayed the title, Speculations on the Architecture of the Celestial Temple.
His name appeared directly below it.
“I’ve become quite familiar with your work,” his captor said.
Tears streamed from Hovath’s eyes as he began to understand why all this was happening.
Hovath’s spirit had always been restless, distracted; it was for that very reason, he recalled, that the old sirah had pushed Hovath so hard before his death, seven years ago. Hovath had stumbled during his first attempt to control the Dal’Rok. The old sirah had felt Hovath’s pagh, and found him wanting. Enlisting the aid of two humans from the space station, he crafted a lesson whereby Hovath learned to commit fully to the duty for which he had been trained his whole life.
As the new sirah, Hovath served his people well. But the villagers needed his services as storyteller only for a span of five days each year. The rest of that time he was merely a scholar and sometime spiritual guide. Though he had mastered his role, his spirit remained restless, his mind thirsty for knowledge that had no place in the village. A year after he became the storyteller of Sidau, he announced his intent to spend Hedrikspool’s autumn and winter months each year in secluded study, away from the village. No one, not even his new bride, Iniri, had known where he went, or the controversial nature of his work: a single line of theological and scientific inquiry that had been circling round and round in his mind since the Emissary had first come to Bajor.
