Oblivious

Posted on Sun Feb 19th, 2017 @ 3:38pm by

Mission: Another Day in Paradise
Location: Hopper - Medical
Timeline: Post Borg Attack

Sally removed the hypospray after the gentle hiss finished. He picked up the PaDD and made a quick notation before setting it down next to the hypospray.

“Not sure I can trust a doctor who can’t even fix himself,” the petty officer said as he leaned back on his elbow. The strain of the pain he was feeling still evident on his face, but soon the pain reliever would be working its magic again.

“Not my turn yet,” Sally said, holding up his wrist with the off-green tag. Granted, he’d given it to himself after wrapping his arm in bioplast to help immobilize the fracture. He knew there were others with much more serious injuries than himself, such as the petty officer he was currently seeing with a compound fracture in his leg. Thus far the only treatment he’d received was a periodic shot of pain reliever and, once, something to help him sleep for a bit.

“Looks to me like it’s not been your turn for a bit,” the man said. Sally picked up the PaDD to see what his name was. Charles Wrothing, operations department. Prior to today he had been hale and hearty, no major illnesses reported since he enlisted in Starfleet. This would be his first bone break in his life. Sally put the PaDD down. It was reported he was married. Thus far Wrothing didn’t ask about his spouse but Sally was sure it would be coming. Just like many others.

Sally didn’t know how to answer that question. He couldn’t even answer it for himself. Did Tiffany survive the attack? Why had her thoughts suddenly cut off from him when the station rocked that time? He was sure she wasn’t on this ship otherwise he was sure he’d sense her. Unless she was unconscious. He had to hope she was unconscious. Or out of range. That she survived and the Neptune made it past the Borg invasion, finding themselves somewhere safe, preferably back in the Alpha Quadrant.

He wouldn’t be able to answer Wrothing’s question about the location of his spouse. He knew that a team from operations was working to compile a list of who was on the ship, a database the passengers could begin checking for loved ones, friends, associates. For those who may find matches on the list, it would be a blessing. For those that didn’t, however, it was still the curse of not knowing.

Not knowing was the problem.

“You gonna be able to fix my leg now?” Wrothing asked, cutting through Sally’s momentary lapse.

“I’m gonna make you a bit more comfortable, but one of the doctors is getting to you soon,” Sally said as he glanced over his shoulder to the makeshift surgery centers. It wasn’t the best and they didn’t have the normal equipment. They scavaged what they could and were using it. If the break was just a fracture, like his own, he’d probably be working on fixing it. But the compound nature of it meant it had to go to a doctor.

“Just a nurse?” Wrothing asked. Sally didn’t detect condescension in tone vocally or mentally, just a question. Most people didn’t understand the complexities of the medical field. Most didn’t even know there were complexities, despite their own departments being tiered like Medical.

“Not a nurse, but more than a corpsman,” he answered as he was gathering up his tools and making the final notations to send off to the computer so that Wrothing’s medical file would be updated before the doctors got to him. Just as he was about to stand and move to the next patient, Wrothing grabbed his arm.

“I want to ask, but it looks like you already understand the pain,” the petty officer said.

Sally stared at the man’s face for a moment before nodding. “I don’t have anything I can tell you. I know that’s not a comfort. I can’t even offer you hope at this point.”

“No, I don’t suppose you can,” Wrothing said as he lowered himself, trying to making himself comfortable. His wince was more out of reflex than from actual pain. Still, Sally scanned him again, then satisfied he’s done what he could at the moment, he stood and prepared to move to the next.

“You gotta take a break,” one of the RNs said to him. She’d introduced herself when Sally first started and he recalled her name was Suzanne or Suzette or, something like that, he thought. She laid a hand gently against his arm. “Get some rest. We’ve all been working far too long and it’s not going to help if we burn out.”

Sally shook his head. “I will when I’m ready but…until then…I’ve gotta keep moving. Until there’s news. I don’t understand why there’s not any news, why aren’t the ships communicating with each other?”

Suzanne or Suzette or whatever her name was leaned in closer to him, “I spoke with a security officer earlier. He’s saying that the ships have been taken over by the computer, some sort of Federation protocol. Nobody knows where we’re going or what’s happening.”

Sally shook his head as he glanced at his PaDD for the next patient. “Let’s hope that’s just a rumor. Who the hell would set it up so that an entire fleet is blind like that?”

“Medic!” he heard called by one of the charge nurses. Sally raised his hand while he responded.

“Security is requesting a medic in the primary cargo bay, apparently someone else got stunned and needs to be checked out.”

Sally sighed. Another one. Stunned by security. This was getting out of hand. Tempers were getting high and, if what he was just told was going around the ship, a ship packed way over comfortable capacity, he wasn’t sure he could put the blame completely on security. Their job wasn’t pleasant most times, but now? But they were also facing the same frustrations and stresses as everyone else and those feelings of frustration and helplessness in the situation may be coloring their responses as well. “On it,” Sally said as he grabbed his pack and headed out the door, watching his PaDD for the relevant information that they may already have.

But, if the ship continued to go the way it was going, how long until security’s weapons were taken off stun and shipmates were getting hit with phaser blasts?