GHOST SHIP

by Diane Carey

  “Dr. Crusher has been reviewing up-to-date medical policy and debate on the rights of the terminally ill and all current hospice psychology and the thoughts of terminal patients in every sentient species—”

  “That’s my profession, Captain,” Troi said, a twinge of defensiveness creeping into her voice.

  “I didn’t think it wise for you to be doing research right now. However, I’ll need your expertise to collate the information the doctor is bringing in with her. Fair enough?”

  She managed a thin smile, but one that conveyed genuine gratitude, and she said, “You’re very gracious, sir. I didn’t think of that myself. I might indeed be inaccurate at the moment.”

  Picard slid into his chair and said, “I’m not worried that you will be. You seem perfectly in charge of yourself, at least for the moment. I haven’t noticed any aberrations in your personality, Counselor.”

  “But it may come, sir,” she admitted softly. “I’m fighting even now to maintain my individuality. I don’t know how long I can deal with the pressure from them. It’s beginning to affect me physically. I feel weak and nervous, as you might feel after exerting too much energy.”

  At her solemn tone, even Picard had to stifle a wave of concern. His doubt began to stir. This made him uncomfortable, this inconcrete business, and he steeled himself to accept what she had said and what she would be saying over the next few minutes. He’d had to do that before—depend on those whose talents were other than his own. He would tug the cord of instinct and insight if he had to, but as he looked at her and saw her effort to remain in control, he knew guesswork would be only a last resort. Starfleet had surrounded him with people of various abilities, and it was his duty to make use of them.

  “Yes,” he murmured. “I’m depending upon you to hold your ground against them. It’ll be up to you to tell me, as nearly as you can estimate, what those entities want.”

  “I have told you.”

  “And we’re going to examine that.” He pressed the intercom and said, “Come in, plea—”

  The door opened.

  Picard leaned back in his chair. “Well, that was subtle, you two,” he said as Beverly Crusher and Will Riker strode in. “Sit down. I’ve explained the situation to both of you. According to Counselor Troi, the life essences inside that phenomenon have asked unconditionally that we destroy them. They want their existence to end. Death is their choice rather than formless life, apparently. When I leave this room, I want as clear a picture as the four of us can provide of what exact action this ship is going to take. I tell you now that I would much rather face an enemy with eyes I can look into and whose intents I can read. If I’d wanted to be faced with these pale ethical problems, I’d have become a priest. I don’t like this. You know what these entities have asked of us, according to Counselor Troi’s translation of their wishes. It’s up to you to help me decide if this is euthanasia,” he said, “or butchery.”

  An unwanted silence blanketed the ready room, broken only by Will Riker, who had finally had enough of it. He slid one thigh up onto the captain’s desk and settled there, the toe of the other boot still planted on the floor, and folded his arms. “We’ll do our best, sir.”

  “I know. Dr. Crusher, you’ve reviewed all the material on current medical ethics.”

  “Well, all is an inappropriate term for a half hour’s study, sir,” the doctor said, “but I’ve done my best. As a matter of fact, I had to refamiliarize myself with the subject upon accepting the post as chief surgeon.”

  “Luckily,” the captain commented. “On with it.”

  “Just remember you asked for this,” she warned, and adjusted her narrow hips against the back of her chair. She looked like she was settling in for a long time, which made both Riker and Picard wonder what they were getting into. “The word euthanasia doesn’t mean what most people think it means. It’s an intransitive concept, for one thing. It’s something you get, not something someone does to you. Its true meaning is simply a gentle, quiet, good death, usually just a matter of luck. Society has come to take it as ending life painlessly so as to end suffering. What we’re really dealing with, however, is the point at which the only chance left for a person to have euthanasia is for someone else to kill him. That’s the closest to what we’re facing.”

  Troi gripped her hands tightly together and said, “This is not a case of our deciding to terminate their lives. They’ve decided it for themselves. I don’t think that can be minimized.”

  “I’m getting to that,” Crusher patiently said, and she started ticking things off on her long fingers. “There are complications, believe me. We get into the questions of suffering or not suffering, rationality or not, direct or indirect killing, killing by providing pain relief, the difference between personhood and potential personhood, capability of expressing a rational desire to die, death of biological organisms as opposed to persons, the distinction between ordinary versus extraordinary means of keeping a person alive, that ever-elusive phrase quality of life, failure to supply help versus active harm with kind intent, sanctity of life, obligation to live, freedom of choice versus deific property, being and not being the cause of a death other than one’s own, avoidance of giving euthanasia for selfish reasons—keeping one’s conscience clear, for instance—”

  Picard rubbed a hand over his eyes and wearily groaned, “Cut my losses, will you, doctor? If you’ve already run the process of elimination, might you just give me the upshot of it?”

  She dropped her busy hands and said, “It’s not a simple subject, Jean-Luc.”

  He leaned forward. “No one’s asking for simplicity, doctor. Just brevity.”

  “Well, there’s the medical definition of death. Will that help?”

  Before the captain could say anything, though he started to, Riker said, quietly, “It’d help me.”

  “Okay,” Crusher said with a toss of her hair. “Unless you’re into horror stories, we all basically know what death is. We start with dying—as a recognizable physiological process, one that medical science can pretty easily recognize. We know the difference between a living body and one that’s being kept alive. Any intern worth his salt can spend ten minutes with the readouts and tell which is which. But the clincher has always been brain activity—the flat electroencephalogram. As far as current medical consensus goes, the only absolute criterion for death is its irreversibility. That’s not the only criterion, mind you, I didn’t say that. Death is a cluster concept and requires several criteria in a lump, but irreversibility is the only absolute one.”

  “Dying is irreversible in my estimation,” Picard said. “At least I thought so until now.”

  “They’re not dead,” Troi said. Her steadiness was wearing thin. She felt it pull and strain against the crushing pressure of a million identities. She heard it in the sudden flatness in her voice, and knew it showed in the immobility of her body. She tried to force her legs into a more social position, but they remained tightly knee to knee, and soon she gave up trying. This discussion was time wasted, chewing at her, frustrating her. She knew what the decision had to be. Over and over in her mind echoed her own words: They’re not dead. They’re not dead.

  “I accept that,” the captain said. “They have yet to experience their deaths. I may be old-fashioned, but to me death is final. Death doesn’t have degrees. Suffering does, but not death. This isn’t a matter of betting one way or the other. It’s a matter of deciding to intervene.”

  “Or deciding not to,” Riker plowed in.

  They all looked at him, and discomfort entered the room.

  “Yes . . . ” Dr. Crusher murmured, eyeing him. It took her a moment to return her full attention to the captain. “Well, there’s also an additional problem; over about the past century and a half, medical doctrine has had to include some very strange lifeforms and all their habits, customs, physiologies, and abilities.”

  “I can’t decide for the whole galaxy, doctor,” the captain said. “Let’s stay with humans, sh
all we?”

  “I thought you’d say that, so I did. And I agree with you on that point.”

  “That’s heartening, but could you give me a bit more?”

  “Oh . . . a bit.”

  “Oh, God . . . ”

  “You did ask, sir.”

  “Yes, I did. Go on.”

  “Where was I? Oh, yes. There are the mythological and religious concepts of death, which involve the soul leaving the body—”

  Picard’s finger shot forward. “Now, we’re not going to get into defining the soul, are we? I unconditionally refuse.”

  Crusher looked surprised. “Well, I’m certainly not. What you’ll have to do before this is over, I can’t predict. Anyway, there’s that concept, and there’s the medical concept, which is a process. It’s the difference between a door being closed and the whole building disintegrating. Medical science believes there’s nothing to come back to. And there’s also a veritable blur of platitudes from the religious sector, which I’ll bet you don’t even want to hear.”

  “I’d be so grateful,” Picard said with a fatigued nod. “I’ve been trying to demythologize this from the start. I intend to stay with policy regarding the terminally ill and use that for a fulcrum.”

  “But these people aren’t terminally ill,” Riker interrupted, somehow feeling he’d have to be holding the rudder on this conversation. “For all we know, they could go on like this indefinitely.”

  Silently Troi nodded, not looking up. When she spoke it was with absolute conviction in those voices she heard in her mind. “That,” she said, “is their biggest fear.”

  “Counselor,” the captain addressed her, since she had drawn attention back to herself, “you say you feel a unanimous opinion. Can you guarantee you’re picking up on all the feelings, all the life essences?”

  Cool sweat broke out on her palms. She felt her control begin to slip. “No, I can’t. The opinion is unanimous among all those who still retain a solid consciousness.”

  “Hold it right there,” Riker said. “That qualification bothers me.”

  Troi shot him a glare. “Yes, it’s true that I’m perceiving massive insanity among the minds who’ve lost control of their personhood. That is also what the others are afraid of. Do you blame them? They’ve made a decision for themselves and the others who aren’t able.”

  “What do you mean by ‘aren’t able’?”

  Troi took a deep, cold breath between clenched teeth and forced herself to be clinical, no matter her tattered emotions. “I would classify it as dementia praecox.”

  “What’s that?”

  She gave him an intolerant look and said, “Dementia is irreversible deterioration of mental faculties with correspondent degenerative emotional instability. Praecox is simply prematurity.”

  “Which brings up the question of next of kin.”

  Troi gripped the arm of her chair and continued glaring at Riker. “Don’t you think they’re better able to judge their companions’ wishes than we are?”

  Riker had to nod a reluctant agreement. “I suppose if you and I had been sharing eternity, we would qualify as each others’ next of kin.”

  He suddenly found himself held tight in Picard’s gaze. He hadn’t meant to say anything profound, yet they were sharing eternity. The two of them, perhaps more than any other pair on this ship, were most likely to make that decision for each other, that life or death choice. As first officer, Riker’s first responsibility was Jean-Luc Picard’s well-being. As captain, Picard’s most valuable and needed commodity was his right-hand man. Together they had to be guardian angel for each other and the whole ship. They were—or should ideally be—each other’s family . . . next of kin. Ironic that on a ship full of families, the bridge had somehow gotten itself stocked with people who had nothing, no one, but each other.

  “And the others are like accident victims,” Picard said to him as they shared the moment. “Completely dependent upon a machine for sustenance.”

  “Yes,” Dr. Crusher agreed. “They’re mentally competent and nonterminal, but they want to die. Modern medical history since the twentieth century has had to deal with that, and it hasn’t gotten any easier. Medicine took a tremendous leap forward during that period and has improved exponentially since then. The only constant is the idea that each euthanasia case has its own variables and should be considered individually. Then there’s the problem of active versus passive euthanasia. Do you cut off intravenous feeding, or do you just let it run out, and what’s the difference, and what are the moral implications of each—”

  “You’re piling up questions,” the captain observed. “I asked you for answers.”

  “There aren’t any,” she said broadly. “That’s the problem. We regard it as inhumane to let animals suffer, but we’ve always had difficulty applying that to our own species.”

  “But historically,” Riker said, “isn’t it true that this whole problem has been one of deciding whether an organic body without a mind is still alive? What we have here is the other way around. Minds . . . no bodies.”

  Crusher cast him a glance. “No, you’re wrong. There’s nothing new about minds without bodies.”

  When Deanna Troi spoke up, though her voice was weak, all turned to listen to her. But this time she didn’t speak of the entities who pressed upon her, but of the question they were actually wrestling with. “That’s how physically crippled people see themselves. Minds without bodies. At least for a while. It’s often not true at all and they often change their opinions about themselves with time and therapy.”

  For a few seconds, nobody said anything because they expected her to keep going. When she didn’t, Dr. Crusher shifted uneasily, turned back to Riker, and added, “But there’ve also been plenty of cases of conscious, rational people wanting to decide for themselves, and not changing their minds, Mr. Riker. Some people don’t want to live if they can’t function independently. Some can commit suicide, which is its own problem, but for those who can’t, the problem takes on the special complication of bringing in another person.”

  “Who also have rights,” Riker argued. “The right not to commit murder, for one.”

  With an impatient huff, Picard gripped the edge of his desk. “Yes. We do have the right to consider our own consciences. Is there a definitive answer, doctor? Even one of general policy from the Federation Medical Standards Council? Or do you have a ruling that we could consider ship’s policy?”

  “Me?” She shook her head and blinked. “This is one subject I nearly failed at medical school. I never found a single case that fit into the grooves of any other case. There’s just no grounds for comparison.”

  “And Federation policy? Doctor, I need a precedent and I need it now.”

  She paused, thought about it, her mouth twisting with contemplation, then shrugged. “A line was finally drawn, clinically speaking, between animals with memories and animals with memories who were also able to imagine a personal future and have desires for that future. Even that had its faults. Babies, for instance. They simply don’t care about the future.”

  Now it was Picard’s turn to sigh. He pressed his mouth into a line and groaned, “Beverly, you’re making me tired.”

  She appeared sympathetic, but admitted, “There’s just no streamlining this issue. Which is why there hasn’t been any law passed regarding it. Some things should simply never be legislated.”

  Riker straightened his back and folded his arms tighter. “Leaving us on our own.”

  “Consider it a privilege,” she shot back at him.

  “But these people, these ‘souls,’ if we have to use that term,” Riker continued, “are not dying. They could go on forever like this!”

  “Yes”—the doctor nodded, not very patiently—”the real question is not one of someone who is dying choosing when the end should be and we as society forcing him to live until the last moment, but rather . . . what is it that makes life worth living?” For this, a thick and weighted question, she turned d
irectly to Picard, and held out an empty hand to him as though expecting him to fill it.

  The captain stared back at her, entranced neither by this woman’s beauty nor by his own feelings toward her, but by this question she asked of him, this question that was poised on the threshold between life and death.

  What makes life worth living?

  Beside Crusher, Troi stirred. “A person who is dying does ask if his disease has taken away everything that makes life worth living, as you say. There will be no more moments that resemble life as he has known it. When pain takes away any enjoyment of sight, scent, sounds, touch—”

  “But we’re not discussing pain, Counselor,” the captain snapped, his voice growing rough. “These entities have communicated no pain whatsoever of a physical nature, is that not correct? If not, you’d better tell me now, because this is a damned precipice we’re walking over here.”

  “I wish they had,” Crusher said dryly. “The question would’ve been simpler. My realm of the physical is much simpler to manage than Deanna’s realm of mental anguish and confusion.” She turned to the counselor and said, “I don’t envy you.”

  The captain got up and paced around the desk. “Doctor, I had hoped you’d be more help than this.”

  Beverly Crusher shifted her gaze for a moment, settled back, crossed her long straight legs, and looked up at him again. “I can be more help,” she told him. “But you have to ask for my personal opinion.”

  “Oh, damn it. Of course. I’m sorry.” He reached a requesting palm toward her. “Please.”

  She sighed and thought about it. “They’ve expressed a well thought-out, reasonable desire to die.”

  “And?”

  “And I think that should be respected.”

  “Does that mean acted upon? Come on, doctor, don’t make me grill you.”

  “You mean, would I do it? Captain, let me put it this way. I’ve found that suffering can be mental and that it does no one any good.”

  “Would you,” he repeated, “do it?”

  She straightened her shoulders. “Yes.”