The Box of Not So Delights (Part II)

Posted on Tue Jan 31, 2017 @ 6:34pm by Commander Caleb Ryan & Second Lieutenant Emily Ransom & Civilian 'Key Holder' Dorian Gabriel & Commander Amia Telamon M.D. & Lieutenant Liam Reynolds & Lieutenant Annora Tessaro & Lieutenant Benj Amoran

1,865 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Rumours
Location: DS5/Sickbay
Timeline: MD 4 0245

Security to Sickbay, medical emergency transport incoming! came the call over the intercom system moments before a shimmer of energy deposited the bloody body of a Ferengi on the deck along with a paramedic.

"Multiple stab wounds to the thoracic cavity, collapsed lung, perforated aorta, multiple contusions, concussion..." the medic began the laundry list. It was bad. Very bad.

Benj had come back with the body and began to scan, medicate for pain relief, and bark orders for Theatre to be prepared and Ferengi blood and plasma to be replicated. He arranged an inflatable neck brace and was still instructing and organizing when the hover gurney was brought and inflated around the diplomat's damaged body.

***

Meanwhile Liam had been fast asleep when the call came through that one of the chief diplomatic staff was in sickbay. He threw on a uniform and got down there. "What's happened?" he asked one of the staff on his arrival. "I got a call to come down. One of the diplomatic staff has been brought in."

"Not sure," the nurse said, not appreciative at being delayed. "Talk to Security. They know more. All I know is I have a Ferengi beaten and stabbed to save." She hurried away.

Liam shook his head as the annoyance of the nurse hit him. She was in a hurry, in which case why not just say that. His eyes looked round the room until he found a yellow shirt. A familiar one. "Lieutenant," he greeted Annora. "What's going on? I got pulled out of bed and asked to come down here." The fact nurse had said Ferengi made him concerned. He hoped this was not going to turn out to be Nazl.

***

She was beginning to seriously dislike the night shift. While Annora knew it was all arbitrary, there was something about the off hours that attracted the riffraff. Things had been fairly quiet that night up until the call about a stabbed diplomat.

Giving a weak smile to the diplomatic officer, Annora briefed him on what they knew so far. "Well, Mr. Nazl was found stabbed and beaten just outside the Box of Delights. He was last seen in the establishment with a human female, whom we are still trying to identify. Excuse me a second."

Noticing Commander Ryan walking in, she paused so she wouldn't have to repeat herself too much.

Caleb strode quickly into Sickbay. He was alert, but his mussed, dark hair and wrinkled uniform showed he had been awakened and dressed hastily. He looked around at the haste with which everyone was moving and stepped out of the way. He spotted Lt. Reynolds speaking with Junior Lieutenant Tessaro and quickly strode over.

Annora was still briefing Lt. Reynolds when Commander Ryan arrived. She gave him much the same information she gave Lt. Reynolds. Then she moved on to more security related details. "He was found by some civilians who called for Medical and Security. The knife appears to be of Ferengi design. Either he was stabbed by another Ferengi or someone used his own knife against him. I've already dispatched extra security teams to the diplomatic areas of the station in case there's more attacks planned. Obviously we can't enter the embassies themselves, but we can patrol the corridors outside."

"Good thinking, Lieutenant," Caleb said. He looked over to where the doctors were furiously prepping for surgery. Caleb's emotions were conflicted. Nazl was a bug, or worse, slime that deserved to be stepped on and discarded. If he was honest with himself, Caleb would gladly have beaten the Ferengi himself. But he was a security officer, sworn to uphold the peace and protect the people -- even the people he despised.

"I assume you have officers securing the crime scene and getting witness statements," Caleb said to Annora.

"Yes sir. Ensign Deborah Kato is leading the forensics team. It doesn't sound like there's any witness to the attack, but those in and around the Box of Delights are being interviewed just in case."

Annora had more to say, but was interrupted by her comm badge chirping. "Ensign Mayhew to Lt. Teassaro."

Knowing the ensign was leading the extra patrols, Annora hoped there wasn't a second attack.

"Go ahead, Ensign."

"We received a report from station Ops of a brief disruption of sensors in the diplomatic lift shortly before the alarm was raised. Upon investigation we found evidence of an attack. A second forensics team is on their way, but it's looking like the ambassador was originally attacked there."

"Understood, Ensign. Continue as planned until we're certain it's an isolated incident. Tessaro out."

She turned to the two gentlemen. "That certainly changes things. We could be looking at two separate attacks, or one person who wanted to ensure their target would be found in a timely manner. Send a message of sorts."

Caleb frowned. "What message?" he wondered. "Is this related to the Humans First nonsense goin' on around the station?" he asked. "They never killed anyone before. Even the violence tended ta be minimal. Certainly nothin' like Attaché Nazl suffered." He looked to the operating theatre again. "And Ah'm really gettin' sick an' tired of our security sensors bein' scrambled," he said with a growl. "Can we find out what's causin' that?"

Those were all very good questions, none of which Annora had answers to. "I don't know, sir. This does seem extreme even for the Humans First movement. It's certainly an angle worth exploring, but they tend to be pretty tight-lipped about their actions. Legal or not. Do we know if the ambassador had any enemies, political or personal?"

It was an old standby, but one that still sometimes yielded results.

Caleb ground his teeth. Audibly. “Anyone who met ‘im?” he suggested. “Ambassador Qinee certainly never seemed fond of ‘im,” Caleb said. “An’ he hated her. Seems she took his job. He was a slimy slug.” Caleb paused. “An’ then there’s me,” he admitted with reluctant duty.

Liam had been following both security officers’ discussion. He looked at Ryan after that statement. The other man’s emotions were a mix of anger at the Ferengi and anger at the situation in terms of the job that they were doing, keeping the station safe. "Was it you?" he asked.

Hopefully the chief was smart enough to see he was giving him a way to eliminate himself from that list immediately, allowing him to concentrate on the real suspects, as Liam would know if he lied to that question and could state it on record. The part-Betazoid didn't think for a moment Ryan had been involved. He seemed to be blindsided by the events.

Caleb shot Liam a look. “No,” he said. “But Ah won’t deny Ah would have loved to,” he admitted. “That what ya lookin’ for, Lieutenant?”

"It’s enough for me to be able to say to Lieutenant Tessaro that ‘your boss is telling the truth and you can eliminate him on that list of suspects,’ yes," Liam stated simply. "And in terms of what you would love to do, you’re a better man than that, Chief. One doesn't need to be empathic to see it."

Caleb raised an eyebrow. “Ah’m not so sure, Lieutenant,” he said with a shake of his head

***

The Ferengi's vitals were dangerously low. He had lost a lot of blood and the quick patch on the aorta wasn't going to hold long.

In theatre, Benj had already set to work. He put the Ferengi onto life support via a bio-bed with the med-arch raised and functioning well. There was a light force field providing oxygen enriched air, and the bed itself was providing scans and readings which scrolled over the monitor behind it on the wall. Taking a regenerator first, Benj put a much stronger mend onto the hole in the Ferengi's chest and blood supply. Once that was stopped, his vitals should have begun to stabilize a bit, but they didn't stop dropping. He needed to work out what else was damaged, so he went back to the scans for a second look. There was massive internal damage and no matter how much they did, another wound broke open or torn tissue collapsed. A whole team was fighting a losing battle.

Benj decided to call for reinforcements and sent for Amia. Woke and drowsy at first, she was soon on the scene, scrubbed and in theatre to help. Benj updated her and she surveyed the patient's condition and the furious work the team were doing. Still the Ferengi gradually slipped away, from the weakest of faint life signs, he had continued to lose the battle. No matter how hard the team worked, his organs began failing one by one. They struggled to mend and regenerate each, but there were too many failing at once now. Finally his heart stopped.

Amia allowed one more attempt to restart it, but the internal blood loss and lack of blood pressure because of it, was starving the brain of oxygen. Benj had already put up a small force field around the Ferengi's head and filled it with oxygen enriched air, but with all of this the neurons and cerebral fluids were leaking away and diluting down. Gradually the brain functions faded to nothing and the heart spluttered on for just a few more beats before responding to the whole body's attempt to resist resuscitation.

Amia put a hand on Benj's frantically working arm and stopped his attempts with the paddles. "Enough, my friend. You've done all you can; we've lost him. His brain has shut down and his BP is annihilated. Even if you can get his heart pumping artificially, it can't keep enough pressure within so many ruptures of his arteries and veins all over. Everything has failed, all his organs, everything Benj. You've done a heroic job, but it's time to let him go," she said softly as she tried to lower the adrenaline levels in Benj's system and switch him back off from frenetically doing his job to calming down now it was over.

"I'm sorry," she said, keeping the softened tone, but now speaking to the whole team. "Great job everyone. You've all given this a hundred and fifty percent, but it was out of our hands in the end. Everyone take five and get a warm drink, chill for a minute or two, and I'll get a fresh team to prepare for autopsy."

True to her word, Amia, the most recently arrived and therefore the freshest, set about organizing the next part of what had to be done and prepared herself to answer any questions while her team took themselves into the staff room to wind down for a few minutes, and once she was cleaned up herself she went back out into the Main Sickbay to answer questions and/or ask some herself.

TBC

Lt. Cmdr. Caleb Ryan
Chief of Security/Tactical

Nazl
Ferengi Diplomatic Attaché
NPC Caleb Ryan

Lt. Liam Reynolds
Chief Diplomatic Officer

Cmdr. Amia Telamon
Chief Medical Officer

Lt. Amoran Benj
Assistant Chief Medical Officer
NPC Amia Telamon

Ltjg. Annora Tessaro
Assistant Security Chief

 

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