CHAPTER ELEVEN
Tammas had been provided one of the luxury suites offered to traveling diplomats. It was all very comfortable, but it wasn’t what he wanted. He wanted a piano. Not an upright, or a keyboard, or even a baby grand. What he wanted was a full grand. Even more specific, he wanted the Schimmel Grand Piano-Pegasus, designed by Professor Luigi Colani of twentieth century Earth. He had always been in love with its sleek, rakish look; it appeared as if it were floating in mid air. It had a slightly curved keyboard, making it ergonomic as well as functional, an electronically operated top lid, and a stool that could be adjusted in six directions. It was 311 centimeters long, 162 centimeters wide, 112 centimeters high, and weighed in at only 580 kilograms. The problem with that was, when added to the weight of his already existing furniture, it put him well over his room’s weight allotment. Consequently, the computer wouldn’t allow him to replicate it because of this personal mass restriction.
Garcia did a few calculations and found if he reabsorbed every pieces of furniture in his quarters, including his bed, he would only be marginally over his allotment. Since most crew members never came close to approaching their limits, the computer might allow some exceptions. It did. He executed the command, and the furniture was instantly beamed out of his room. All of it. Gone. It wasn’t beamed anywhere, it was just absorbed back into the energy stores. Some of the energy probably turned around and came back into his quarters refigured as his Pegasus piano.
The door chime was barely audible over his pounding the keys in frustration. It was just enough of a clash with his song that he stopped playing, listened to the silence, waiting for it. The door chimed again.
“Come,” Tammas said, standing up.
Ensign Miles O’Brien entered, the person that had been assigned to care for Garcia. “I was just checking…” Miles began, taking in the room. “That explains the energy and the mass allotment.” He peered into the bedroom. “Where do you intend to sleep?”
“On the floor,” Tammas said.
“I see,” Miles said, chewing his lip. “Perhaps you would like a hammock? I’d be glad to hang one for you. Might be more comfortable than the floor.”
“Thank you, Ensign,” Tammas said.
“Not technically an Ensign. You can call me Miles,” Miles said. “Figure we might as well be on a first name basis. Might make it easier.”
“I’m not here to make friends, Mr. O’Brien,” Tammas said. “I’m just merely passing through. Against my wishes.”
Miles nodded, holding his tongue regarding spoiled kids and dignitaries. “Is there anything else I can get you?”
“A holosuite would be nice,” Tammas said.
Miles laughed. “On a Starship? Not likely. At least, not in my life time. Too much power consumption and the holographic emitters need to be much less bulky if they ever intend to put them on a ship.”
Tammas sighed. “I’m sorry, Miles. I’m just out of sorts. Vulcan is the longest I have lived anywhere. I’m homesick. I guess. I’m something. I don’t know.”
“I can understand that,” Miles said. “Perhaps later you’d like to meet me for a game of darts? Or racquetball. We do have a nice recreation room, or an exercise room is you wish. It’ll make the time go a lot more quickly than locking yourself up in here for the next month.”
“Alright,” Tammas said.
“Also, Captain Maxwell has asked me to extend an invitation for you to dine with him,” Miles said.
“Sure,” Tammas said. “Whenever is fine.”
“There are some other kids on board,” Miles said.
“I know it sounds snobbish, but I prefer adults,” Tammas said. “Don’t worry about me, Miles. I’ll figure this out.”
“I’ll swing back by later with that hammock,” Miles said.
Two weeks out and there was a sudden course change. Instead of heading towards the Fabrin system, they turned towards Andoria and accelerated to warp seven point six. Detecting the course change was easy enough, since he had been looking out the window when it happened. Judging the speed was impossible. Miles had to relay the news in order for him to get the full story.
“The Captain sends his compliments. He regrets to inform you that we’re going to be bit late getting you to the Fabrin system. There was an alien incursion on Andoria, some people were abducted, and we are being sent to investigate,” Miles said.
Tammas blinked. What could he say? Throw a fit? People’s lives were at stake and he was just one person. He nodded. “Whatever,” Tammas said. After Miles left, he pounded on the piano for a couple of more hours. Then he paced. While he paced he tried to access the IS-Net, but discovered it was too slow to get a reliable download for his homework. Probably because they were at warp, or they were limiting subspace communications. What he wanted was a holosuite.
“Computer, list the components I would need to construct a holographic projection with tangible qualities,” Tammas asked, watching the information scroll across his neural interface. “Alright, try again but let’s try a smaller scale. What would I need to produce one holographic image? A person and perhaps a few miscellaneous items. Specifically, I want to create a holographic patient to practice surgical techniques. So, I’ll need a bed, a body, and surgical tools. List the minimum requirements for such a device. Okay, that seems more reasonable. What’s the size of the assembled components? No, that’s too large. Can we get it down to the size of at least a coffee table?”
The next time O’Brien came to visit, he found the piano gone, and Tammas laboring over a box the size and shape of a torpedo casing. There were parts strewn about the floor, along with wires, tools, and isolinear chips. Tammas didn’t even look up to see who had entered.
“What the devil are you doing?” Miles asked.
“What does it look like I’m doing?” Tammas asked.
“Making a bomb,” Miles said.
Tammas looked up. “Don’t be stupid. I’m building a holographic projector.”
“It’s too small,” Miles said. “You’ll never get anything out of that.”
“Oh yeah?” Tammas asked. “Watch this.”
Tammas touched a button and the power came on. A cat appeared and walked up to Miles and brushed against his leg. It was a very realistic cat.
“I don’t believe it,” Miles said.
“Its projection radius is limited to five meters,” Tammas said. “That’s the alarm clock cat. It’s for people who hate getting up to music or alarms. The cat comes on at prearranged times and then starts walking on you and rubbing against you. The longer you stay asleep, the more aggressive it gets. It’ll paw at your face, meow louder, and knead you with its claws. It won’t stop until you get up and pet it.”
The cat’s solidity weakened and it became a true hologram and then faded out completely. A few sparks erupted from the torpedo casing. Tammas threw the wrench down and rubbed his forehead.
“Power issues?” Miles said.
“The modified transporter coil has a limited duration for being energized. I think it’s overheating from trying to sustain the Omicron particle field. It’s the third coil I’ve had blow on me,” Tammas said.
“Let me take a look at it,” Miles said, getting down on the floor.
Miles peered inside while Tammas held a light. He reached into touch the coil and jerked his hand back.
“Hot?” Tammas asked.
“No, just doesn’t take long to examine a fried coil,” Miles said.
An alarm Klaxon sounded. Captain Maxwell’s voice came over the intercom: “Yellow alert, people. This is not a drill. All hands, battle stations. Our colony on Setlik Three is under attack. Medical teams prepare to receive wounded. We got six hours till our arrival at Setlik Three at best warp. We won’t know the scale of the emergency until we arrive, but let’s prepare for the worst.”
“Got to go,” O’Brien said.
Tammas nodded and followed O’Brien into the corridor. People were busy hustling about. Tammas frowned. He felt useless, everyone having jobs to do. Of course, he didn’t have to be useless. He took the lift down to medical and presented himself to the chief Doctor, Matsuda Chu. She was busy and didn’t look up at him to acknowledge his presence.
“What can I do for you?” she asked, checking off the list on the PADD she held. She nodded to the nurse and moved to another station.
“I’d like to offer my services as a surgeon,” Tammas said.
She lowered her PADD. “You’re thirteen years old,” Chu said, scowling as if he were playing a practical joke. “And I don’t have time for this.”
“I have a class four medical rating, accredited at the Vulcan Academy of science,” Tammas said. “Which is the equivalent of a Nurse Practitioner.”
“I know that,” Chu snapped.
“And I’m only six months shy of getting my Doctorate in Veterinarian Medicine, and though that doesn’t necessarily qualify me to work on humans, with those two rating combined, the least you could do is allow me to assist in rendering first aid,” Tammas pointed out.
Chu put a hand on his shoulder. “Thank you. I’ll have to run it by the Captain first. Get a communicator badge from the replicator and have it assign you a code so I can call you.”
Tammas did as she instructed him. An hour later he was summoned to sickbay to meet with Doctor Chu and Captain Maxwell.
“The Doctor has informed me that you would like to volunteer your services,” Maxwell said. “I understand that you’re qualified. I’ve also been in touch with your guardians. Ambassador Sarek has responded and given me the green light to use you. I need to ask you, for my own assurances and to fulfill Star Fleet protocols, one question: Are you sure you’re up to this?”
“No,” Tammas said. “But it sure beats the hell out of standing around in my quarters doing nothing.”
Maxwell chuckled. “I appreciate your honesty. Put him to work, Doctor. I’ll make sure Star Fleet compensates you appropriately, Garcia.”
“No worries,” Tammas said.
“I’m going to want you to stay on the ship,” Captain Maxwell said.
“The wounded are on the planet,” Tammas objected. “And since you’ll probably be beaming only the most serious cases immediately up to sick bay, it makes more sense that I’m planet side, rendering first aid, while expediting the more critical cases up to the ship for Doctor Chu to deal with.”
Doctor Chu frowned at the Captain. “He’s right, of course. His skills and experience are limited, so, consequently, he would be best suited for work in the triage. I’ve got to go planet side and set one up. Doctors Pont and Jackson are going down with me, as are ten nurses. We can keep an eye on him.”
“I don’t want to be the one to have to explain it to Sarek how his foster child was killed,” Maxwell said.
“Whether it’s here on the ship, or on the planet, I’m still a target,” Tammas pointed out. “A battle zone is a battle zone.”
“Fine,” Maxwell said, grudgingly. Never argue logic with a kid raised on Vulcan, he told himself. “I’ll assign Miles as your body guard. And I want you fully decked in medical gear. I want it clear that you’re a non-combatant. That means no handling any weapons.”
“And if I need one?” Tammas objected.
“I’m not giving in on this one. No weapons. Now, go get changed,” Maxwell said.
“Yes, Sir,” Tammas said, grumbling as he departed: “Just hope whoever it is that’s attacking us recognizes Federation Rules of Conduct for non-combatants.”
Captain Maxwell shook his head. “He’s a smart kid, but perhaps a bit arrogant. Are you sure you can handle him?”
“I can handle him,” Chu said.
O’Brian, Doctor’s Chu, Pont, Garcia, and Nurse Anthony Carlin were the third Away team to arrive planet side. Garcia was surprised by the coolness of the breeze and the brightness of the sun. Somehow he had expected the world to be a dreary place, with over cast skies and shades of grey. The only marring of the sky was from the numerous fires burning. Sunlight glinting off a fragment of metal in a pile of rubble that used to be a wall got his attention. A surreal reflection of the landing party upside down and backwards could be seen on closer inspection.
An ensign ran up to Doctor Chu. “Some of the colonist have established a hospital in the school cafeteria. It’s this way.”
“Garcia, you’re with me,” Chu said.
O’Brian, Garcia and Chu followed the Ensign back to the school cafeteria. As soon as they were there Chu called the Rutledge and ordered the rest of the medical team to beam down to their current location. Garcia tuned out the sounds of the distressed and wandered over to the first person he found, drawing the medical tricorder out. It was his first, real live “human” patient.
The patient scoffed. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Examing your condition,” Tammas said. He set his pack down to pull out a bone tissue generator, while telling the patient his diagnosis. “You have some edema and some superficial ecchymosis due to a simple fracture to the left tibia.”
Chu came up to Garcia. “Garcia, we have more serious things to treat than broken legs. Give him something for the pain if he wants it, but move quickly to identify the more seriously wounded.”
“Yes, Doctor,” Tammas said.
“You’re really a Doctor?” the patient asked.
“No, I just play one at a holosuite,” Tammas told him. “Can you cope, or do you require an analgesic?”
“I’m fine. Run along and do as your mother asked,” the patient waved.
“She’s not my mother…”
“Garcia!” Chu yelled.
He grabbed the medical bag and moved to the next patient. The next person he evaluated was unconscious due to a head injury. He called the Rutledge to have the person beamed up.
“Sorry, Garcia. We’re in a combat situation and shields are up,” came the reply.
Garcia looked to Chu. She heard. “Do what you can for him,” Chu said.
An explosion outside the school shook the building and out of a reflex he had gained from playing Doctor in the holosuite, Tammas leaned over the patient. After the dust settled, he treated the head injury, stabilizing the patient and then moved on. A child was crying next to its mother. She was dead. Had he not been quick enough? Could he revive her? She had been dead perhaps four minutes, due to a loss of blood. If they could beam her up, she might have a fighting chance for life. If he had portable stasis unit, she might have a fighting chance. If he only had the right equipment, artificial blood, a surgical kit…
Chu came over gently closed the woman’s eyes. She touched Garcia’s face. “She’s gone, Tammas. Take the child across the street. There’s a bomb shelter. Then get some water and come back.”
Tammas led the child by the hand away from its mother. He was still crying, and resistant, so O’Brian picked the child up. “I’ll take him. You stay here.”
Tammas hesitated. Someone nearby was crying. Another woman. She was rocking a dead child. He didn’t have to scan it to know it was dead. Chu cried out for a nurse. Apparently they were all busy, so he went to her aid.
“Hold his arm down,” Chu instructed.
Blood squirted from a wound, drawing a line across his face. He held the patient down while Chu administered a drug to knock him out. The patient went limp.
“Hold this open while I get the fragment out,” Chu said. “Thank you.”
“There’s another piece, right there,” Tammas said, pointing out an obscure fragment.
“Good eye,” she said. “Can you close this wound? Make sure you run a scan for foreign microorganisms. This was not a sterile procedure.”
Tammas nodded. He closed the wounds with a tissue generator, working from the inside out, repairing the artery first. Once the wound was healed he used another device that would look for foreign organisms and destroy them. He was tempted to wash his hands with the same devise. Instead, he pulled out a saturated tissue to clean his hand and disposed of it by tossing it to the floor, forgetting about the blood on his face. He moved to the next patient. The next person was burned over seventy percent of his body. He was already tagged as DOA. Tammas felt light headed. He saw O’Brien had returned. He saw Doctor Chu. He saw an Ensign helping to bring another patient in. He saw the door. Sunlight streaming through a broken window. The curtain fluttering in the breeze.
Tammas ran outside, turned to the left, and threw up. O’Brien was suddenly behind him, patting his back.
“You okay?” O’Brien asked.
Tammas wiped his mouth with his sleeve. Turned to go back in, but staggered.
“Hey, let’s take a break,” O’Brien said.
“They don’t get to take a break,” Tammas said.
“Help! Someone help me! My child is wounded,” came a cry from the window across the street, two buildings down.
It was a woman and she was waving at O’Brien. Tammas answered the call.
“Wait a minute!” O’Brien said, running after him.
Tammas was halfway up the stairs when he realized the stairs were unstable. He staggered but made it up. O’Brien followed, sticking closer to the wall. Garcia knocked on the door, and he heard what sounded like heavy furniture being moved. The door opened. “Please,” she said, looking to O’Brien for help.
Tammas went right to the child sprawled out on the floor. There was another woman, perhaps the first’s woman’s sister with her back against the wall, holding a phaser. On closer inspection, the phaser she was holding was just a practice weapon. It wouldn’t kill a roach, much less a human. A Cardassian probably wouldn’t even stop to scratch. Her hands were shaking. Did she know what she was holding? Two other kids looked out at him from underneath their bed. The first woman seemed confused.
“What? You? You’re just a child?” she stammered.
“What is it?” O’Brien asked.
“Stressed induced asthma attack,” Tammas said, guessing about the stress part. He gave the kid a hypo-spray dose of eppy, and then blew two rescue breaths into the patient’s mouth. The kid gasped and sat up. “Whoa, easy. Breathe slowly.”
A noise from another room scared the two kids under the bed and they screamed. The woman with the phaser turned and pointed her weapon at the other door. O’Brien went to investigate, drawing his weapon. Tammas stood, drawing the child he had just saved a little further from that door. The front door burst open and a Cardassian entered, fired one shot at the woman with the phaser, and then another shot at the first woman. She fell ungracefully to the floor. Tammas put himself between the child and the Cardassian.
The Cardassian turned his phaser rifle on Tammas. Tammas squinted at the sound that a phaser makes when being fired and surprisingly felt no pain. He opened his eyes when he realized he wasn’t hurt, and watched as the Cardassian’s knees buckled under him and he collapsed in slow motion. Tammas saw O’Brien standing there, weapon ready to fire again at the downed Cardassian. Tammas checked the woman. She was dead. So was her sister. He then checked the Cardassian. He was dead. He didn’t have to say anything to O’Brien. O’Brien suddenly seemed much older.
“We need to get out of here,” OBrien said. “If they got troops on the ground, we’re in serious trouble. I’ll check the hall. Get the kids.”
“Come on, kids,” Tammas said.
The two under the bed weren’t budging. There were the sounds from another exchange of fire out in the hall. Tammas held his breath, tempted to go and get the Cardassian’s phaser rifle. The kid who had asthma stood behind Tammas, gripping his leg.
O’Brien entered. “I said, get the kids, let’s go.”
“What’s your name?” Tammas asked the boy.
“Jacob,” he answered.
“Tell your siblings to come out. We need to leave,” Tammas said.
Jacob yelled at the two and they crawled out. O’Brien picked one up, and Tammas picked the other up. It was awkward carrying the child and his medical back pack, but he did so.
“Stay close,” O’Brien instructed.
“Stay close,” Tammas repeated to Jacob, who couldn’t get any closer without breaking the laws of physics.
O’Brien led them down the stairs and across the street back to the school cafeteria. Their situation was worse than O’Brien had imagined. As soon as they hit the middle of the street, they began to draw fire. Their own side fired a few rounds on them, but as soon as they recognized O’Brien, they turned their focus back to the Cardassians. They arrived at the entrance to the school lunch room and an Ensign approached.
“The ship called,” the Ensign reported. “The transporters are out. We did get everyone from the shelter beamed up. There are several wounded over left, and thirteen of our crew. Doctor Chu was looking for Garcia.”
“We went to help some people,” O’Brien said. “I didn’t hear the report over my comm.”
“Our com badges are down,” the ensign said. “They’re jamming them. There’s a communication laser dish on the roof which we’re using for direct communications to the Rutledge.”
“A communication laser dish? That means there ought to be a field transporter around here somewhere,” O’Brien said.
“It’s in the basement,” Jacob said. “But it doesn’t work.”
“How do you know?” O’Brien asked.
“I was messing with it the other day. I got grounded and they accused me of breaking it, but it was already not working. Ask the transporter’s computer, it will tell you the same thing,” Jacob said.
“I’m going to go check it out,” O’Brien said, handing his kid off to Doctor Chu.
“Check what out?” Chu asked.
“O’Brien, we can’t hold this position long,” the ensign said.
O’Brien looked about. There were three entrances to the cafeteria. Seven if you counted the windows. He sighed. “Here’s what I want you to do,” O’Brien said. “Get everyone to the center of this room. Flip the tables up on the sides and get behind them. Fire your weapons at each of the doors, and collapse enough of the structure to block it. Then all you have to do is concentrate on the windows.”
“You got to be kidding,” Chu said. “That might bring the whole building down on us.”
“Would you prefer to surrender now?” O’Brien asked. “I just watched them kill two women. What do you think they’ll do to us? Alright then. I’m going down to the basement and see if I can’t get that transporter up.”
“You won’t be able to come back up if we collapse that part of the roof on the door,” the Ensign said. “You could be trapped down there for months before someone finds you.”
“Then, I guess you’ll have to tell someone I’m down there,” O’Brien said.
O’Brien departed. Everyone else gathered together at the center of the room, and the ensigns fired at the ceiling at strategic places, bringing a good portion of the building down all around them. Sun light poured into the building from the two remaining windows. The dust stirred by the collapse of the building sparkled in the shafts of light. Jacob began coughing again. Chu told him, and everyone, to breathe through their shirts.
“I told you humans were crazy,” came a voice from outside. “They just killed themselves.”
The owner of the voice peered in from the window. His silhouette made a nice target. Ensign Sanders took him out. There were shouts in Cardassian language and the sounds of weapons powering back up. A volley of phaser fire hit the outside wall, some streaks filtered through the windows and hit the pile of rubble behind the huddled mass of Federation people. Only two shots hit the upended tables. They would have to come up to the window to actually do any damage to the tables, and no one was willing to do that again.
The firing stopped. “You in there. Surrender now or we’ll blow the place up.”
Jacob’s siblings started crying. Jacob clutched Garcia’s arm.
“Think of the children,” came the voice from outside. “Do you want their deaths on your hands?”
The ensigns looked to Doctor Chu who was now in charge. She put a finger to her lips, indicating that they were going to remain silent. She rocked the child O’Brien had handed her. An object flew in the window and stuck to the pile of debris directly behind them. Tammas pushed Jacob away and threw himself on top of the devise.
The next thing they knew was that they were all alive and well on the Bridge of the Rutledge. Chu immediately walked over and grabbed Garcia’s arm and shook him. “You ever do that again, I’ll kill you.”
“Where’s O’Brien?” Maxwell asked, and turned to the materializing form of the man he sought.
“Sorry, I’m late, Captain. I had to come on the second wave,” O’Brien said. He sat down on the floor, exhausted. Chu did a cursory medical exam just in case it was more than fatigue.
“Any other survivors down there?” Maxwell asked.
“Not that I could ascertain,” O’Brien said. “I believe we got everyone.”
“Helm, get us out of here. Warp factor eight,” Maxwell said.
Tammas didn’t care about his pet project any longer. He sat against the bulkhead, staring at nothing in his dimly lit quarters. Directly behind his head and beyond that wall was space: black, cold, and the nothingness normally associated with a vacuum. He wished his mind could mirror that emptiness, but the dead were walking that space. He stared at the parts and tools littering his floor. He ignored the door chime three times, after that, the would be guest used their security over ride to open the door.
Doctor Chu entered. She wasn’t surprised by the conditions of the room, because she had heard he had done some remodeling. She carried with her a meal and some drinks, as if she intended to have a picnic. She sat down next to Tammas, putting her back to the wall. She didn’t say anything or ask anything. She just started unpacking food. She placed a share in front of Tammas and then in front of her. She then poured them some tea.
She took a bite of her sandwich. It was peanut butter with banana and honey mixed in, and grape jelly, on toasted wheat. For a side snack she had brought prunes with peanut butter on them. She would have brought milk to wash it down, but she knew Tammas was lactose intolerant. At least, that’s what he had told her. She suspected that it was more probable that he just hated milk.
“So,” Chu said.
Tammas didn’t bite, either the sandwich or the invite to be social.
“The Captain is going to put you in for a medal,” Chu said.
“I don’t deserve a medal,” Tammas said, a bit of anger in his voice. “My performance as a medical professional was pitiful.”
“Everyone you treated survived,” Chu said.
“I didn’t even treat half of the patients you did,” Tammas argued. “How do you know that someone didn’t die because I wasn’t moving fast enough, or I because I…”
“Stop,” Doctor Chu said. “You can play that game the rest of your life and you’ll never win. You did what you did. You now know what you know. From here, you move on and endeavor to improve upon what you know. That’s the way it is. Do you like peanut butter? Try one of the prunes. I love peanut butter and prunes.”
Tammas looked at her as if she were an alien. She shrugged and ate one of the prunes, smiling with delight.
“Ever been to Andoria?” she asked.
“We’re still going there?” Tammas asked.
“It’s the nearest Star Base. The ship needs repairs and the crew needs some R and R,” Chu said. “Plus, we still have an investigation to do over that abduction.”
“We’re still two weeks away from Andoria?” Tammas asked.
“Roughly,” Chu said.
“I got sick,” Tammas said, his mind returning to his performance on the planet.
“I know,” Chu said.
Tammas stared at the food. The front corner of the torpedo tube that he was making into a holo-emitter reflected the streaming stars shining in through the window. He saw this in his peripheral vision. Chu touched his shoulder compassionately.
“I remember the first time I performed surgery,” Chu said. “It was a heart patient and I was to assist the Doctor. I thought, on my own, that it would be nice to get to know the patient before the surgery. So I visited him in his hospital room. I spent an hour with him each morning, for about three days. On the day of the surgery I was there with him before they sedated him. He was in his usual good humor mode and making jokes. He died on the operating table. After ten minutes of trying everything, the Doctor in charge coded him. Six minutes before