The Way to Eden (pt1) 1995-1997 Annette Webster His place was not in a cabin, he'd decided very quickly. Inactivity didn't really suit the slender doctor - he was far too used to being the head of the Belarius’ medical division for the enforced nothingness to mean anything but boredom. Yet here on the Kingston en route to his new posting on the Fairburn, what choice did he have?
He paced around the empty, soulless room. All of his personal possessions were packed away, save for the small bag of travelling clothes he'd kept with him. Even his shrine was carefully placed in its antigrav container awaiting their arrival at the rendezvous co-ordinates, so there wasn't even the sanctuary of prayer to be had here.
Feeling like a tiger in a cage, he paced, his thoughts keeping time with his steps.
I could always visit the Sickbay again, he considered, though before he'd consciously thought the words his mind was rejecting the idea. "Nah!" he said aloud, nose wrinkling. "Ljubica enjoys having me in her sickbay too much, and I'm not going to add to her ego by playing subordinate again!" So what do I do instead? Holodeck’s in use… arboretum's one tree and a few blades of grass - "My office was bigger!" he snorted, not realizing he was vocalizing the thought. Go for a walk? Visit the officer's mess? Stare helplessly out of a window?
"Go mad from boredom?" This time he meant to speak, cutting off the rambling of his mind with sharply enunciated words. His pacing slowed, and he reached out a hand to snag the PADD sitting on the table by the bed.
With a sigh and a mental, Why couldn't the Belarius take me the full way? At least I’d have had someone I knew to talk to!, he settled himself on the wide window sill and began reading his medical journals again.
He was beginning to nod off to sleep - after all, no matter how interested one is in polyurthemic oedema in Betazoids, there is a limit to the number of times one can read about it, particularly if one has an eidetic memory - when he felt the jolt. Then it was as though a giant invisible hand had mistaken him for pull taffy, for the gravity in the room switched violently and he felt as though his left side was being pulled away from the rest of him. The scream was torn out of him - he couldn't help it - but grimly he gripped at the window frame, hoping to pull himself clear…
Then just as quickly as it had happened, there was another jolt, and it was all over. Abruptly he found himself bashing up against the transparency of the window.
Bewildered, concerned and more than a little frightened, for a moment he considered contacting the bridge to find out what had gone wrong, but realized that was what everyone else around the ship would be doing. So, after a quick check of his aching left side and bleeding right hand, he decided on another course of action.
"Pendehar to Sickbay - could you use another pair of hands?"
"Pendehar!" The female voice sounded harried, and a multitude of sounds came over the link - those in Sickbay hadn't come off so lightly, seemingly. "Are you all right?"
"Apart from a bleeding hand and feeling like I've just been replicated, I'm fine. I asked if you needed any help, and as you do, I'm on my way." In fact he was making his way to the door as he spoke.
"Pendehar, you're an angel." came the immediately grateful reply. "It's so hard to hear in here that I thought you were asking for help like everyone else. But we definitely could use you."
He was about to reply when he emerged into the corridor, the sight there stalling the words momentarily. Dotted along the hallway were prone bodies - thankfully they were all moving, but most were having trouble getting to their feet. There were quite a few squeals of pain.
He moved to a nearby panel and pulled out an emergency medical kit, almost unthinkingly activating a tricorder from it to scan a nearby victim.
"I’ll be there as soon as I can - there are casualties here I've only just found. Pendehar out."
"We've reached the rendezvous co-ordinates, Commander." Ensign Takahashi reported from her position at the Conn. "No sign of the Kingston."
At his position in the Command chair, the dark eyes of the First Officer became hooded by a frown.
"And no further word from them?" he asked flatly. He heard rather than saw the shrug the sandy bearded Daniels gave.
"Nothing since their first notification they were gonna be late." The Chief hit a few panels. "I've started a scan of the area, but no ships so far except a Yridian trader and a Ferengi Marauder. Nothing even remotely resembling the Kingston."
"Continue to scan, and hail those ships; see if they've seen anything." he replied thoughtfully. "Chiharu, we'll stay here for now, in case they're just running behind schedule."
"Aye, sir." Grieg tapped the controls at his side. "Captain to the bridge."
The Kingston might simply be running late, he reasoned, but it was the Captain's decision as to whether they should wait for them or continue on with the mission. Eden's probably hijacked the ship and gone off to save another disease ridden planet! he thought, the fond memories of his old friend warming him once more. It'd be just like him to do that - except the hijacking, of course. More like he'd bore the Captain into complying with his demands; the Captain doing anything to shut him up!
Grieg was almost smiling when his Captain appeared on the bridge. He stood as she swept over to him, and smoothly stepped away to give her access to the centre seat; but she didn't take it yet.
"The Kingston isn't here yet." she noted, standing regally before him.
"No, Captain." he agreed. "We've initiated a sensor scan and begun hailing surrounding ships for any sign of them, but all indications are that they are nowhere in the area."
"Oh, well." the woman said expansively as she took her place in her chair. "We can afford a little time, so for now we'll wait."
Some time passed before Eden made it to the Sickbay. The further through the ship he went, the more injured he found. It was strange, too, for the closer to the interior of the ship he got, the more serious the injuries became, until finally he was treating full cellular disruptions and high gravity crush injuries instead of the broken bones and contusions he'd seen further out.
When he saw the woman who'd been compressed into the bulkhead he knew how lucky he'd been. There was nothing he could do for her except cover what was left of her face with his uniform jacket and alert rescue teams to her presence.
Sickbay was more like a scene from a nineteenth century madhouse than a twenty-fourth century hospital facility. He noted immediately upon entering that none of the monitors were working, and the majority of the biobeds were so badly warped by the gravity increase that it was safer to bed the huge number of casualties on the floor.
The only reason this place survived at all is because of the buffers around it. Eden thought, feeling an ache in the pit of his stomach.
A woman dressed in teal limped over to him. Her face and hand showed distinct signs of cellular disruption, but she ignored the pain to grip his exposed arm.
"Doctor Pendehar? Doctor Dominica needs you in cargo bay three to set up a triage unit."
"I’ll go, but you…?" The nurse knocked his tricorder filled hand away. "There are worse off than me. I have work to attend to and so do you."
She limped away before Eden could stop her.
And you're going to be my work if I see you! he thought, craning his head over the milling, moaning crowd. She was no longer in sight.
Field triage is one of the worst duties any doctor, especially one as sensitive to pain and as desirous to heal as Eden Pendehar, has to perform. Deliberately selecting who was going to live and who would die ate away at him, though he didn't let it interfere with his work except in the quick benedictions he gave to those who would have to wait for treatment. In his heart he promised each of them he would make up for his lack of help if not in this lifetime, then in the next.
He and his nurse were alone in a sea of groaning bodies; no matter how many they sedated to give relief to, there were always more being brought in from all over the ship. Eden no longer had the luxury of being able to think about what had caused this; he just had to cope with its consequences.
He worked quickly; his gentle square hands providing comfort with a soft touch to an agony wrenched brow just as often as they provided treatment, but neither this nor his soothing words to his patients impeded his progress amongst them. He directed the rescuers where to put the new arrivals, he kept track of how much of each mendicant was being used so that he could order someone to get more if needed; and he tended to all with tender compassion.
Yet in the one brief second he allowed himself to breathe before the next group came in, he couldn't help but think of his previous ennui and his devastatingly ironic desire for something to do. Looking around at the pain-filled bay, he considered that boredom was an infinitely more desirable state.Waiting is one of the worst duties a Captain must face, for while she may be desperate to do something - anything - to relieve the tension and actually be acting, she had to be a living symbol of patience and decision.
Thankfully she also could determine when the waiting had passed into futility.
"Still no signal, Matthew?" Captain Randall asked, half turning to her Security Chief, but not bothering to complete the movement as she needed no answer.
"No, sir." came the grumble from the stocky man. "And there's still nothing o…" The Captain turned fully when she recognized the sounds of surprise and panels being activated. "Hang on," Daniels’ voice echoed hopefully across the bridge. "I'm getting a weird gravitational flux at the edge of sensor range, right along the line the Kingston’d be approaching on."
"Confirmed." Elek, at Ops, agreed as both Captain and First called up the display on their own monitors. "The flux is concurrent with a mass the size of an Excelsior class vessel, but I cannot determine at this distance what would cause such a disturbance. It is too faint."
Randall turned again, this time to look at Grieg. Her Executive Officer was still too new for her to know how he was about to respond, but she trusted him better now she had had the time to see a little of how he worked.
His dark-skinned face seemed pensive, as it had increasingly become during the waiting period, but she couldn't read anything else into his expression. Grieg kept his voice low as he made his recommendation.
"Suggest we investigate, Captain. We aren't doing anything here, and even if that's not the Kingston, it's along their projected flight path and we might spot them on sensors."
"Agreed."
At the Conn., Chiharu was already poised, ready for the order before the Captain gave it.
"Mister Takahashi, set a course for that gravitational disturbance, full impulse."
"Aye, Captain."
"Engage."
Eden knew something serious - well, more serious - was happening when he saw the expressions on the faces of Doctor Dominica and a large man in cranberry he assumed from his three pips to be the Kingston's First Officer. Both doctor and officer made their ways toward him; both had trouble wending through the narrow pathways between the injured, so Eden swiftly concluded his examination so he might meet them part way, keeping both the beefy officer and the very pregnant doctor from further discomfort.
Waving for the nurse to continue without him, he turned to the two.
"Doctor; Lieutenant Commander." he greeted them. "Can we make this quick? I have patients to see…"
"I’ll be taking over for you here, Doctor." Dominica told him bluntly. "We need you elsewhere."
"Access to our Engineering section is almost completely cut off." the First continued, a little diffidently, as though he remembered that Eden was only offering his services because he wanted to. "There were a number of crew members down there, including our Captain, who was overseeing the refit when the accident occurred." He swallowed nervously. "Normally we'd have been safe from it, travelling at impulse and all, but it reacted badly with the phase variants given off by the refit, and, well, you've seen the results.
"Our systems are still pretty much off-line, so we don't know for certain whether anyone is still alive down there. But we need to get someone down there soon if they're to have any chance at all." He swallowed, reluctance evident in his mien. "There's no guarantee of what you'll find down there - I cannot stress the dangers enough - but will you volunteer to do this?"
"There wasn't any need to ask." Eden replied candidly, clasping his hands together. "I’ll go willingly, but will I be going alone? There are sure to be problems there that I won't be able to surmount alone, and how will I get the injured out if turbolifts and transporters are down?"
"I can't answer your second question; we're hoping the Fairburn or some passing ship will come to our aid. But as to the first…" He looked at the ceiling uneasily. "…well, you'll see when we get to the access point."
"All right." Eden sighed. "I’ll need a medkit, a survival pack, a palm beacon…"
"I've already arranged for everything you need to be there!" Dominica objected. "Just go, will you?"
"You will be all right with this?" Eden indicated the huge bay with all its attendant problems.
"I've been overseeing the hospital in Sickbay, so yes!" she spat, then planted a dry kiss on the Indian's cheek. "Be careful."
"She means ‘thank you’." the First told him as they started off down the warped corridor. "She's just worried."
"I know." Eden smiled thoughtfully to himself. "I take my ‘thank-yous’ in any form, even if they aren't said outright, and she's got a lot of reasons to forget social niceties right now."
"Right." The First sounded unsure at that.
When Eden reached the site of what tricorders had detected as the only accessway leading to the lower levels, he abruptly understood why they'd been so desperate for his cooperation. The increasingly twisted and tortured corridors terminated in a huge knot of metal, where Eden knew from previous duties on Excelsior class ships, there should have been the main turbolift shaft servicing the Engineering levels.
All that was left was a seemingly tiny hole.
Aghast, he turned to the grave First.
"And that's all there is?" he sputtered. "None of the auxiliary shafts are still intact?"
Helplessly the huge man spread his hands.
"We've already tried them. What isn't strangled is cut off by plasma arcs. This has the clearest chance of getting you down to Engineering. We've scanned it as far as we can; it's as stable as anything on this ship. At this time it's our only option.
"We won't hold it against you if you don't go."
However, Doctor Pendehar was already stepping into an environmental suit, whilst mentally judging the hole's size to calculate how much might pass through without jamming himself immovably.
"I’ll need an engineering tricorder." he noted, shrugging into the suit and fastening it as he reviewed the supplies.
"We've jury-rigged the medical tricorder in the pack to act as one." the exec told him.
"Right." Eden replied, bending down to arrange his equipment into long bundles. "Well, I guess that's everything I hope I’ll need. It looks pretty tight down there. I can see why you need me." The packs having been secured to his satisfaction, he wandered over to the hole and dropped them into it. "I’ll keep in contact for as long as I can." he promised as he squeezed himself into the entry, then gasped as some unseen protrusion caught him in a sensitive spot.
He grinned, looking at the less slender-than-he people around him.
"No," he decided aloud. "You wouldn't have fitted in here." Then he slipped out of sight.
"Godspeed, Doctor." the First sighed, running a hand over his brow. He regretted for the first time in his life his overtly muscular body. If he hadn't been as bulky, he wouldn't be endangering the life of a passenger. Yet what choice did he really have?
Assigning a few of the less injured to monitor Pendehar’s progress, though he doubted they'd be able to for long, he moved out to see if he could get inter-ship communications back online - they could use the help.
