Post 158: Answers?
Posted on Wed Oct 23rd, 2024 @ 10:04pm by First Star Admiral Dakota Olvera & Admiral Christopher Bradley & Lieutenant Marty Stokes & Lieutenant JG Maddy Dale
Edited on on Wed Oct 23rd, 2024 @ 11:37pm
1,189 words; about a 6 minute read
Mission: Secrets
On:
Pulling Admiral Bradley's physicals for the last eight years had been fairly straightforward for Maddy, she'd also pulled one from nine years ago to use as a baseline for comparative purposes. She knew why V'Lar wanted her to run the tests first it was to see if they could pin down the nature of whatever it was that plagued the Admiral's mind, given the context that was a pretty wide field, and it would be important to know what they were dealing with before attempting to counteract it. True to form she stepped into the medical bay in her midnight blue scrubs and smiled as she saw she'd managed to time it right, Marty was doing a check up on the Admiral and Olvera was there by his bedside where she'd probably been since this had all started. "How's he doing?" she asked
“Still delusional,” Marty whispered as the Admiral started to mumble something to himself. “What did you find out?”
"Nothing yet." Maddy said "I'm hoping a fresh round of tests will give us something to work with."
Marty nodded. “He’s all yours,” she said with a grin.
Dakota watched their exchange with exhausted eyes, wondering what the hell they had to smile about while her husband was in his current state. As sedated as he was, he was hardly mumbling loud enough to hear anymore...which worried her almost as much as his yelling had.
As Chris lay there his mind was going in millions of directions, it was starting to break him down physically and mentally. He didn't know what was real anymore and what was made up.
Maddy walked over to the wall mounted console and brought up a holographic representation of the Admiral's body, it was based on the physical from nine years ago "Computer." she said "Conduct a full scan of Admiral Bradley's body."
Marty stood back while the computer conducted the scan. Siding up to Maddy, she looked over her shoulder while the information from the scan started to turn up on her padd. “Anything new?”
"We'll see soon enough." Maddy said as next to the already existing holographic representation another one, this time of the current scan began to materialise. "Admiral" she said looking at Dakota "Is there anything that's going to show up here that isn't disclosed in your husbands medical history?"
"Nothing I am aware of." Dakota said. "All of his physicals have never had a concern. And he hasn't complained of anything that required another doctor. He's been quite healthy."
"Ok then let's play spot the difference." Maddy said looking at the two holograms "Computer overlay the two holographic images and highlight any discrepancies."
The holographic images were almost exactly the same, except for one small difference in his blood.
"How long has the Admiral been having these hallucinations?" Maddy asked "Weeks? Months? Years?"
"I have only known about it over the past few weeks," the Admiral said, glancing down at her husband, "but he isn't the most forthcoming person," she admitted.
“What are you thinking?” Marty asked as Maddy showed her the comparison of the two scans.
"Assuming that's a blood infection or equivalent put there by whichever alien beings he's seeing." Maddy said "Then why is it only showing up now, it's not like Starfleet Medical is incompetent, the Admiral has had eight physicals since the events in question a blood infection or anything like this would be seen. I think we've got the what but not the how."
"The better question is what can we do about it." Dakota said
"If it is as simple as a blood infection, then a full blood transfusion will flush his system of the infected blood and he'll be fine." Maddy said "But this wasn't in his physical last year which makes me think we're missing something. Marty get me a hypospray."
Marty quickly retrieved a hypospray for Maddy and gave it to her. “What are you going to do?”
"Take a sample." Maddy said putting the hypospray against Bradley's arm and drawing a blood sample into the vial of the device. "Understand the nature of the puzzle and you can theorise its shape. So let's get an up close look at his blood."
“Good idea,” Marty said as the admiral continued to mumble to himself. “He’s not getting any better.”
"I know." Maddy said as she slid the sample under the nearest microscope and brought it up on the screen "Computer increase magnification by degrees slowly." at the moment everything indicated a blood infection and if that was true then the blood cells themselves would appear abnormal in some respect. A few moments passed and there was a gasp followed by gritted teeth as they got an up close look at a blood cell "Well that isn't natural." Maddy said "This makes the Borg look like children."
“What is it?” Marty said watching the computer screen.
Maddy's hand took a cylindrical object about eight inches long from her belt, it was smooth and was made of silver and gold in a double helix pattern as they wrapped around each other, at the tip there was a light that was an icy blue and a small screen on one side with some buttons "That." Maddy said using the blue light like a laser pointer to circle an area of a blood cell "Is exhibiting behaviour consistent with Borg nanoprobes but they aren't Borg, I'd say it's definitely a form of nanotechnology. Oh that's clever, very clever."
Dakota cleared her throat. "I'm sorry you two, but this is my husband we are all taking about. What are you saying?"
"These little critters are the problem." Maddy said "It's not unheard of for blood infections to cause hallucinations but it's not something we think of but program something like this, have it replicate at a very slow rate so as to avoid being picked up in medical scans and then when they flow through the brain have them cause trouble, would explain a lot... I'll need to talk to an expert on cybernetics to get an idea of how to proceed, but in the meantime I see no reason stopping a mind meld being entered into."
Dakota nodded. "Well at least we know..."
As she spoke the base suddenly shook. She watched as in front of her Admiral Bradley suddenly disappeard. She looked at the doctor and the counselor.
"All hands, this is Captain Pontmercy. Battle stations, we have an unknown hostile enemy attacking the base, and it looks like they are going to try and take one of our members by force. Lock it down, and prepare for a fight."
Dakota hit her comm. " Admiral Olvera to Captain Pontmercy."
"This is Pontmercy," Marius said aloud.
"Captain, Admiral Bradley is gone. When the base shook he disappeared." Dakota said.
Fleet Admiral Dakota Olvera
Fleet Commander in Chief
USS Arcadia / Starbase Obsidian
Admiral Christopher Bradley
Director of Research and Development/ Director of Intelligence
USS Arcadia / Starbase Obsidian
Lieutenant Junior Grade Marty Stokes
Chief Counselor
USS Arcadia / Starbase Obsidian
Lieutenant JG Maddy Dale
ACMO Medical Officer
USS Arcadia/USS Obsidian
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