STAR TREK - The Brave and the Bold Book One

by Keith R. A. DeCandido

  CommodoreMatt, are you sure

  Thats an order, Number One! Decker barked. Then he took a breath. Hiromi, believe me, this way is best. Kirk and Ill stay down here. Youre in charge of the Constellation. Ride herd on Rosenhaus and McCoy to find a cure for this thing, and I want Masada and Spock working round-the-clock to find that damned artifact.

  Understood, Commodore, Takeshewada said in a tone that Decker recognized as her were-going-to-talk-about-this-later tone. Well, at least shes not giving me a hard time now.

  Indicating the doorway back into the building, Kirk said, We need to tell Chief Bronstein, then inform the general population.

  And wont that go over like a lead balloon, Decker muttered. I doubt most folks even know that the governments been laid low by the virus.

  With a small smile, Kirk said, Its a challenge, Commodore.

  Chapter Four

  L EWIS R OSENHAUS could barely contain himself as he beamed over to the Enterprise. He had copies of several notes and papers with him, including case studies hed done at the Academy that he thought might be relevant. This was the moment hed been waiting for since Admiral Fitzgerald had first given him the assignment to the Constellation last month.

  And not waiting very patiently, either. He had graduated at the top of his class at Starfleet Medical, only to find himself languishing in a research position on Earth. Rosenhaus distinguished himself as much as he could in so dreary a place, but what he longed for was to be out in space, exploring strange new worlds, seeking out new life and new diseases, and coming up with brilliant methods of curing them. That was his whole reason for joining Starfleet in the first place.

  Finally they put him on one of the twelve Constitution -class vesselsthe elite of the fleet. These were the massive starships that were spearheading the Federations expansion, making first contacts, making history. The Constellation 'sCMO had retired, and Fitzgerald himself had contacted him and cut him his new orders to report to Commodore Decker.

  So howve I spent my first month on the job? Doing physicals. Not a single new world, not a solitary biological phenomenon. Instead, theyd spent almost two weeks studying a neutron star. Of what possible benefit could that be to humanity?

  Now, though, he had a virus he could sink his teeth into. Better still, hed be working with Leonard McCoy, a Starfleet veteran, who had already pioneered several revolutionary surgical techniques. This was a colleague, not those sycophants on the medical staff of the Constellation lab techs with no brains, nurses with no good sense, and a junior physician with all the skills of a twentieth-century suturer.

  The instant the transporter fully materialized him onto the Enterprise platform, he was down the stairs and ready to run out the door. He was stopped by a blonde woman in a blue uniform. You must be Dr. Rosenhaus, she said in a pleasant voice. Im Nurse Chapel. If youll come with me, Ill take you to sickbay.

  Ah, thanks, Rosenhaus said, surprised. But, uh, I already know my way there. Our ships have the same design, yknow.

  Perhaps, but Dr. McCoy thought it would be best for you to have an escort.

  Rosenhaus shrugged. Fine, if thats what he wants. Its good manners, I guess, if nothing else. As they exited the transporter room, he took another look at the nurse. Waitasecare you Christine Chapel? The one who cowrote that paper on practical applications of the records found in the Orion ruinsoh, hell, what was that called? He started racking his brain.

  That was a long time ago, Chapel said quietly.

  Not that long. You wrote it with Roger Korby, right?

  Uh, yes, but

  You both did some great work. What are you doing serving in Starfleet as a nurse? The work you and Korby did was years ahead of its time.

  Thank you, butDr. Korby has been missing for several years. II really dont want to talk about it, Doctor, if its all the same to you.

  Open mouth, insert foot. Nice work, Lew. Oh my God, Nurse Chapel, Im so sorry, I had no idea.

  Thats quite all right, Chapel said as they turned a corner and entered sickbay. Her tone of voice belied her words, but Rosenhaus decided it was best not to say anything further.

  They entered the laboratory area, where McCoy was already working, looking over a bio sample. Dr. McCoy, I see youve started without me, he said with what he hoped was his best smile.

  McCoy didnt even look up as he snapped, Under the circumstances, I didnt think waiting would be such a good idea considering people might die in the interim.

  Rosenhaus blinked. Im sorry, Doctor, I was just trying

  Looking up from his sample, McCoy waved his hand. No, never mind, Im the one who should be apologizing. Been a long day. Let me show you what weve gotten from the surface.

  They started going over the data, which McCoy had called up on the lab desk monitor. Rosenhaus sat in front of the monitorMcCoy, for some reason, preferred to stand.

  What the virus does, McCoy explained as he paced back and forth on the other side of the lab desk, is attach itself to the adrenal medulla and starts causing it to generate epinephrine and norepinephrine, independent of the usual stimuli. As far as I can tell, the damn thing actually consumes some of it, but only a minuscule portion of whats generatedmaybe ten percent.

  Rosenhaus nodded as he peered at the screen. He was grateful for the more clinical analysis. McCoy had translated the diagnosis into lay language for the briefing on the Constellation a necessary survival skill when serving with nonmedicos, as Rosenhaus had learned early on in his Starfleet careerbut that gave it an imprecision that irked the younger man. So the rest of it gets pumped into the system, and eventually the heart rate increases and the heart muscles constrict.

  McCoy nodded.

  Frowning, Rosenhaus asked, Have there been any other causes of death besides heart failure?

  Cause of death is the virus, not

  He waved a hand. I realize that, but there are other side effects of pumping epi and norepi into the system. I mean, lipolysis and pupil dilation isnt usually fatal, but what about constricting of blood vessels? Just from a purely mathematical standpoint, some of these people should have died from a burst blood vessel rather than their heart giving out.

  I see what youre saying, McCoy said with another nod. Some people do have stronger hearts but weaker blood vessels. He rubbed his chin. Computer, call up the autopsy reports from Kurkjian Memorial Hospital and Sierra City Medical Center.

  Working.

  Are any of the specific causes of death not heart failure?

  A brief pause, then Negative.

  Rosenhaus snorted. The odds of that are real slim.

  McCoy gave him an annoyed look. Thank you, Doctor, for stating the obvious. Computer, were any of the people autopsied checked into the medical facility prior to dying?

  Affirmative.

  How many?

  Two.

  Put their records on screen at this station.

  Rosenhaus moved his chair over so McCoy could stand next to him and they both could see the monitor screen.

  Look at this, McCoy said, pointing to one part of the screen. The norepi count is fifteen percent lower than the epi count. That accounts for why its always been heart problemsepi is what contracts the heart muscles and increases the rate. Norepi constricts blood vessels, but that isnt in as high a concentration.

  The virus probably only consumes norepi, then. Rosenhaus leaned back in his chair. Can we inject norepi directly into the virus itself, maybe?

  McCoy shook his head. Thats already been tried. Do me a favor, sonread over all the reports before giving me diagnoses?

  That was the third time McCoy had snapped at Rosenhaus, and he wasnt even apologizing anymore. Maybe working with a Starfleet veteran isnt all its cracked up to be, he thought sourly.

  Over the course of the next several hours, they continued to pore over the data. On several occasions, Rosenhaus had a breakthrough, only to have McCoy shoot it downeither as something already tried on Proxima or as not practical.

  I still think that
a kerylene solution would do the trick, he insisted.

  McCoy closed his eyes. Kerylene turns dopamine toxic

  In only five percent of the cases. Its an acceptable

  Slamming his hand on the desk, McCoy shouted, There is no such thing as an acceptable lossnot in my sickbay! Is that understood?

  What if the alternative is death?

  My God, man, weve barely scratched the surface! Maybe maybe Id accept kerylene as a last resort, but were nowhere near that yet!

  Rosenhaus took a deep breath. He tried to keep his voice as calm as McCoys was hysterical. Fine, but I think we may want to consider synthesizing some just in case it becomes a last-resort situation. If you wont, Ill have the Constellation lab do it.

  You want to waste your peoples time, be my guest. He got up.

  Where are you going?

  Before McCoy could answer, the computer beeped. Rosenhaus turned to see a status display on the monitor. Finally! Weve now got all the medical records from the planet. Their computer must be at least three or four decades old to take this long.

  Im sure theyll be heartbroken at your disapproval, McCoy muttered. To answer your question, Im heading down to the planet. I need to take a look at some of the current patientsmaybe see if one of em can be brought up here.

  Are any of them stable enough for transport? Rosenhaus asked.

  Even if they were, I wouldnt go scrambling a sick persons molecules all over creation. But thats what shuttles are for.

  Thatll take hours. Doctor, weve got all the reports, and we can do simulations here without disturbing a live patient.

  What the hellre they teaching you at Starfleet Medical these days, boy, medicine or computer programming?

  They teach us medicine, Rosenhaus said, standing up, and Im really getting tired of your attitude, Dr. McCoy. Im a certified physician, just like you. Im a chief medical officer on a starship, just like you. Id appreciate being treated with something other than condescension. Or, at the very least, not being called boy. I think Ive earned that much at least.

  McCoys face did soften a bit. Im sorrythat was uncalled for, Doctor. Crises tend to bring out my unprofessional side. Theres a commanding officer and a halfbreed Vulcan on this ship that can quote you chapter and verse on that. He took a breath. As for the rest of itthe computer models we can build are based on guesses and hundred-year-old archaeological digs. Call me old-fashioned, but I prefer to work with the real thing. Besides, anything we do come up with will need to be tested on a live patient eventually, and Id rather do that here, seeing as how down on Proxima theyre having riots and all.

  Rosenhaus found he couldnt argue with that.

  After McCoy left, Rosenhaus went over every single patient, every single treatment that was tried (and failed). He was proud of the fact that everything that had been tried was something he had thought of independently. In addition, several things he did think of werent tried at all, though McCoy had rejected each for a different reason.

  The obvious solution was to starve the virus of norepi, but all the usual methods of suppressing the adrenal gland didnt workthe virus fought past them or prevented them. The one exception was the most general method sedation. Unfortunately, people couldnt just be kept sedated forever, and as each dose wore off, a higher dose of the sedative was required to achieve the same effect. Eventually, the patient would build up an immunity and sedative would be useless. Worse, the virus didnt starve as such. Even without norepi, it continued to live on in the adrenal gland, in as sedated a state as the rest of the host body.

  What was more bizarre was that there was no obvious way to track how the virus got into the patients systems. All indications were that it just materialized in the adrenal gland as if transported there.

  Maybe it was, he thought. Computer, call up all existing records of the Malkus Artifacts. Rosenhaus spent the next hour reading through the dryest scientific report hed ever seen why do they let Vulcans write these things? he wondered plaintivelyand found that his analogy may have been apt. From studies of the Zalkat Union records found on Beta Aurigae a hundred years previous, beaming a virus right into a person was definitely within the realm of possibility for one of the Malkus Artifacts.

  They need to find whoevers doing this, and fast. Then he sighed. Thats Masadas problem. Mine is to figure out how to stop this.

  Another possible solution was to poison the norepi in such a way that consuming it would be fatal to the virus. The problem was that every known method of doing so was equally fatal to the person hosting the virus.

  Then it hit him. Vrathev. Im such an idiot.

  He dug through the notes hed brought over from the Constellation. Cmon, cmon, he thought as he riffled through the not-as-organized-as-he-wanted-it-to-be pile, I know youre in here somewhereaha!

  Reading through the notes he now had called up on the screen, he smiled. Damn, youre good, Lew.

  Back at the Academy, in his final year, Rosenhaus had aided in the treatment of an Andorian cadet named Vrathev zhEthre. She had been suffering from psychotic berserker fits that had no discernible cause. It turned out that her own adrenal gland equivalentwhat the Andorians called their parafra was being hypercharged in a similar way to what this virus did to humans.

  Computer, he said, excited for the first time since he came on board the Enterprise, create a new program. He immediately had the computer run a simulation to see how the treatment used on Vrathev would work on the virus. When he was done, he asked, Time necessary to run program?

  Two hours, fourteen minutes.

  For some reason, that prompted a yawn in Rosenhaus. That, in turn, prompted the realization that he hadnt gotten a good nights sleep the previous night, having been awakened by the Proximan distress call. Might not be a bad idea to take a nap.

  He checked the time, and saw that it had been four hours since McCoy left. Shrugging, he called out to Chapel.

  Yes, Doctor? she said with an air of both demureness and professionalism for which Rosenhaus was grateful, since it meant she wasnt holding his dopey comments from earlier against him.

  Ive got a program running thats going to take two-and-a-quarter hours. Im gonna grab a quick nap. Wake me if Dr. McCoy comes back, okay?

  Of course, Doctor.

  Rosenhaus hesitated as he got up from the chair. Uh, is there any word from McCoy?

  He reached the surface safely, but he hasnt checked in with me since. I can double-check with Lieutenant Uhura on the bridge, if you like.

  Shaking his head, he said, No, dont bother. Im sure hes fine. Is there a free bed in sickbay I can sack out on?

  Of course, Doctor. Help yourself.

  Nodding, Rosenhaus exited the lab and went two rooms over to the exam room. He lay down on one of the two beds.

  The biomonitor immediately fired up. Sighing, Rosenhaus said, Computer, discontinue bioreadings.

  Disabling of medical functions requires authorization by chief medical officer.

  Authorization Rosenhaus-426-Gamma.

  Authorization not recognized.

  Again, he sighed. Youre not on the Constellation, Lew. Computer doesnt know you from Schweitzer.

  This was a quandary. The only bed that didnt show bioreadings was the exercise bed across the room, but that was too small to lie down on. Computer, can you at least mute the noise?

  Negative.

  A third sigh. Nurse! he called out.

  After a moment, Chapel came into the exam room. Yes, Doctor?

  Im going to beam back to the Constellation until the programs run. I need some familiarity for a bit.

  Chapel actually smiled at that. I understand completely, Doctor. Ill have Lieutenant Uhura contact you if Dr. McCoy comes back before the program finishes running.

  Viewing that smile as a good sign, Rosenhaus returned it. Thats very good of you, Nurse Chapel. Thanks.

  As he walked through the sickbay doors, he had a mild spring in his step. Im willing to bet that the Andorian treatment will do the trick. And th
en, once Ive saved the day, maybe I can convince the lovely nurse to let me make up for my gaffe with dinner.

  I can assure you that we are doing everything we can to ensure that a cure is found quickly, and that your lives can return to normal operation. I repeat, this is a temporary measure. For now, we ask that people stay in their homes unless they have sanctioned duties. A list of those duties is readily available on the information net. Please carry identification with you at all times.

  She stared at the image of the young man in the golden Starfleet uniform in something like shock.

  Theyve declared martial law. Amazing.

  She hadnt thought that her oh-so-esteemed former colleagues would do such a thing.

  But then, maybe they didnt. Maybe Starfleet just waltzed in and took over.

  Not that it mattered. They could impose curfews, restrict movement, quell riotsnone of it could possibly have made the tiniest difference.

  Because she had the power.

  She walked over to her gift. It sat on her kitchen table, pulsating with the green glow that she first saw on Pirennes Peak.

  She still didnt know where the gift came from or who built it. Images had flooded her mind of strange alien beings who died in odd ways, thanks to this gift, but ultimately the images had no meaning to her, no context.

  It didnt matter. It provided her with deliverance. It provided her with vengeance.

  She loved the irony. Not only did it instantly make people fatally ill, but the illness also had hard-to-identify symptoms. Nobody would even know there was anything wrong until they were dead.

  Dead by her hand.

  The only drawback was that it could only do so much at once. She had hoped to destroy everyone on Proxima in one shot, as it were, but that had proven beyond the gifts capabilities. Only a few hundred had contracted the virus before the green glow dimmed.

  At first, she had been furious. Killing a random group of people in Sierra City hardly satiated her need for revenge. Everyone had to die. More to the point, everyone had to suffer.