19

Medical Emergency

Helen was already working in the medical bay of the ship when the emergency alert came in over the ship intercom. At that moment, four people transported into the medical bay's emergency transport zone. Two of them were Tau Cetian security men, presumably from the guard substation near the colony on the surface, and two injuries.

Helen felt a pang of horror as she recognized both John and the security liaison he had been working with. Both were unconscious, both extremely pale, and both had open wounds, John's bleeding from the neck.

The security officers lifted one of the bodies each and placed them immediately on two of the three available medical beds, making sure there were no entanglements.

Helen immediately pulled herself together and got to work. "What happened?" she asked both officers in Tau Cetian.

"Security Officer Mephicia transported in a few seconds ago with one of your people. Both have been impaled with a sharp object," the first of the two officers replied. "They appear to have lost a lot of blood, and continue to lose more."

Helen was busy grabbing some instruments and bandages as the man spoke. "Understood," she replied absent-mindedly, tapping her communicator. "Emergency medical to the Medical Bay."

She knew human anatomy as well as any field medic would know, and could treat most basic forms of trauma including this one, but she had none of her usual medical equipment. That had gone down with the Tau Ceti when she was destroyed in Earth orbit. Instead, she had instruments whose function and usage she was unfamiliar with, which is why she called on the assistance of the ships' own medical teams.

Thankfully, they transported in via the same method the security people did, straight on to the transport zone. As soon as they materialized, they set to work, one going immediately to Mephicia, the other stepping up to Helen. "What's the situation?"

"Deep puncture wounds," Helen told the medical officer. "Officer Mephicia has a puncture through her chest through to her upper organs, possibly her lungs and heart. John over here has a deep puncture wound through the neck. It's severed an artery and he's critical. I need someone who knows how to use the instruments here."

The medical officer nodded immediately, grabbing more appropriate tools and leading Helen back to John. They set to work, Helen explaining what needed to be done, the medic working quickly and efficiently to seal the wound and stem the blood loss as best he could.

A few minutes after the transport of both John and Mephicia had taken place, the bay door opened, and Stephen stepped in, quickly followed by Janet. "Keep an eye on him and make sure he gets what he needs," she said to the medic, stepping away. "You can't be here right now," she told Stephen apologetically.

By this time, Stephen had noticed John was unconscious and covered in blood. He had turned almost as white as John himself, and struggled to stand. Janet was by his side in an instant, providing him physical support to keep him from collapsing, her face a stony mask, her lips pursed together, but Helen could see she was distressed. "What happened, Helen?" Stephen demanded.

"Right now I don't know," she told him tersely. "I need to get him stabilised, and you're not helping by being here. Now please," she tried to be gentle, which was difficult right now. "Go back to quarters and I'll come see you once I've got them stabilised!"

"She's zeroing," Helen heard the other medic attending Mephicia call out, his tone urgent.

"Shit," Helen cursed under her breath. Stephen looked like he might resist. "I gotta go, they'll need me." She quickly turned to Janet. "Please, get him to quarters. I need to go!"

Janet nodded, her face a stone wall, but her voice as she spoke to Stephen was soft, gentle. "Stephen," she said as she pulled him gently, unresisting, his face expressing shock and distress. "We can't help here, right now. Let's get out of their way, alright?"

Helen was grateful, as Janet pulled Stephen out of the medical bay, leaving her and the medics free to work. Bringing all of her focus back to her job, she turned to Mephicia, stepping next to the medic working to save her life. "What do you need?"

* * *

Stephen was in a daze. He was slowly walked away from the medical bay where both John and Mephicia were being worked on, their lives apparently hanging in the balance, and he had never felt so helpless in his entire life. Helen was right, of course. Nothing that he could do would help, and everything they needed to do for John and Mephicia, he was incapable of doing as well as the trained medical staff already in that room, if at all. Still, he just couldn't help it.

What the hell had happened?

Why was John stabbed in the neck?

Stephen found himself becoming furious. He wanted to exact some punishment, but he had no target, no idea who it was that did this. Sheer frustration caused him to rip his arm out of Janet's grasp, who reacted with mild surprise. "What the fuck did he ever do to anyone?!"

"Stephen," Janet immediately stepped back to his side, but he stepped back, almost batting her outstretch hand aside.

"I'm too wound up right now!" He managed to get out instead of the snarl that welled up inside.

"I know," Janet told him, her voice unusually quiet and softly-spoken. "Believe me," she said in a whisper as she stepped back up to him, her hand outstretched, her expression full of compassion and sympathy. "I know."

He desperately tried to master the angry impulses that were flooding his mind, the cortisol and adrenaline that had been dumped into his system. "Seriously, I wanna hit something-"

"So do I," Janet told him, and he noticed just then, that mixed in with her compassionate gaze, she had an angry tightening around the eyes. She didn't know John as well as Stephen did, but she had spent a significant amount of time with him as well as the others, and so he was certainly no stranger. "John is an honorable man. He is the last person to deserve this-"

"Then do you see why I-"

"Yes," Janet interrupted, voice soft, non-judgmental. "Believe me when I say this. If you find out who did it, and you feel the need to do anything in revenge to them," she paused significantly, giving him a level look as she squeezed his bicep gently. "I'll have your back," she paused to let that statement sink in. "You hear me?"

Stephen nodded, feeling an overwhelming need to go somewhere quiet so he could release these pent up emotions. For the first time in months, he felt the need to sit down and...

"Come on," she gently took his arm again and continued walking, slightly quicker this time, to their shared quarters on the ship. He was grateful, as she stepped inside with him, and called out. "Seal doors from the outside" in English. Thankfully, Miradima had made provision for her when she had assigned quarters earlier, something Stephen was grateful for. He didn't feel he could speak reliably right now. In fact, his throat was so tight with suppressed anger and distress, he felt his control slipping, and as the doors sealed closed, he released them, instinctively reaching out for Janet's small frame, pulling her to him and resting his head against her shoulder as his body began to shudder with great heaving sobs. The idea that anyone could do this to John was too much for him to handle, and the anger that this caused him had no healthy outlet. Slowly, Janet wrapped her arms around him, squeezing him tight, as he did the same to her. He couldn't speak, couldn't articulate the maelstrom of pain and anger he felt at his friend being put in such mortal danger, and Janet said nothing in return, continuing to hold him tight.

After some minutes, he had managed to get the worst of it out of his system, and took a few deep breaths, before slowly releasing Janet and lifting his head to look at her. Her eyes were wet, her face reddened, but her gaze serene as she looked at him with what he could tell was patient understanding. She gently reached up to his face and wiped his eyes, just as he did the same for her. The action elicited a sad smile from her.

"I'll always have your back," she told him again, almost whispering, as she pulled his face to hers and kissed his lips gently, almost chaste. "Always."

* * *

Helen let out an exhausted breath. The last hour or so had been touch-and-go, both Mephicia and John had suffered mild heart failure as a result of their injuries and loss of blood. Mephicia was lucky that the wound had not punctured her heart itself, although it had gone through one of her lungs. John's neck wound had punctured his windpipe, and he was lucky his vocal cords had not been damaged. That was damage she did not have the ability to repair, even with the tools available on the ship. As it was, he needed an emergency breathing tube fitted and the work to repair his throat and neck would take a few medical procedures at least. He would have to be kept in a medically-induced coma for a while.

Both of them had lost a lot of blood, though.

Mephicia was fortunate. Her blood type was on board the ship, easily synthesized by the ships' production fabricators. She had asked the technical staff aboard the ship to take a sample of the blood John still had left in him, and asked them to fabricate something similar. Fortunately, they were able to program a substance that was identical to John's blood in form and function, right down to his DNA. He was undergoing a transfusion at this moment.

Now that both patients were stable, she was going to turn her attention to the matter of who attacked them. Helen had a sneaking suspicion that it would have to do with the move to protect relatives and associates of some of the escaped prisoners from the incident earlier, which meant they had something to do with the underground network that was causing them so many headaches.

She ordered Mephicia and John's clothing to be retained so they could collect DNA samples from them, and stepped out so she could go speak to Miradima about the situation.