A checkup for Melody

Posted on Saturday 11 May 2019 @ 11:30 by Captain Melody Jones & Lieutenant Michael Ki MD

Mission: The New Collective
Location: Sickbay
Timeline: After An Open Wound
1441 words - 2.9 OF Standard Post Measure

ON:

Melody entered sickbay and went straight over to Doctor Ki. "Afternoon Doctor. Lieutenant Rejal has insisted I get a more thorough checkup after being on the Borg cube."

She hopped up onto closest biobed "Shall we?"

Michael walked over to the biobed while he pushed the tool cart over. "I see and when I said report to Sick Bay when things were under control that didn't matter. So Lieutenant Rejal outranks the Chief Medical Officer of this vessel now. What is this world coming to?" His voice oozed sarcasm as he spoke. When he arrived at the biobed he took an initial scan with the tricorder and had the data fed over directly into the medical computers. "Tell me Commander what happened over there? Did they touch you in any way?"

Despite all that had happened recently and the current situation, Melody laughed. “Come now Doctor. You know that Starship commanders always make the worst patients, besides I hadn’t had a chance to tell Lieutenant Rejal I coming down here anyway. What with Commander Llewellyn’s disappearance and some drama in the ready room. And to answer your other question no, the Borg didn’t get chance. The puppet Master didn’t seem to posses the knowledge that the collective dose on how to defend the cube, adapt to weapons fire and assimilating individuals. Besides, all things considered I feel...... ok.”

"Very often how you feel and what is actually going on are two different things." Michael spoke matter of factly as he looked at the initial scans. They showed that the Commander was indeed in good health. However, Ki knew that Borg technology could often disguise itself and lay dormant until activated. He wanted to be more than sure. "Commander if you could please lay down." When Melody did as she was asked Michael activated the full body scanners. He knew that it would take minute. "The thing that bugs me is I was under the impression that I destroyed the so called puppet master. When he inhabited O'hara's implant. I removed the implant and destroyed it. Then I replaced her implant with one that would be protected from just such a presence. With no place for the consciousness to go how did it not simply cease to be." Michael's curiosity was piqued.

“I’m not sure Doctor. Maybe they were linked somehow? Maybe via subspace? The intelligence onboard the Borg ship certainly had information about O’Hara.” She mused as she lay there. “I know we’ve got to find who created it and why. And what it’s ultimate goal is. The Captain at least deserves that.”

"Hmmmm" the sound escaped Michael as both an acknowledgement to what Melody had said and in response to the readings that were beginning to come back. Something was amiss with the Commander's bioreadings, and it had to do with her cell degradation. This simply does not add up. I mean there should be a lot more dead cells than this. However, if could simply be a glitch I need to investigate more. Michael thought as still the only audible sound was "Hmmmm..." A moment later he realized that he had paused too long and had to continue his new found investigation. Michael decided that perhaps a more familiar approach would be needed so he dropped the ranks. "Melody, I speak to you now as a colleague and a friend. I wonder if Apollo is actually dead. Go with me on this supposition. The Puppet Master, a being that has demonstrated the ability to manipulate consciousness. Suppose it removed Apollo's consciousness, and the Captain is still out there." While he spoke he attached a neural transceiver to the Commander's head, he wanted to get a reading of her brainwave patterns. It was at this point that he noticed she was still wearing the cortical monitor, so Michael killed two birds with one stone and downloaded the data from the monitor as well.

Melody sighed “I don’t see how it’s possible without a physical link into a human brain. They got into O’Hara via her dataport. Speaking of which, can I take this cortical monitor off yet Doctor?”

Michael was already removing the cortical monitor when Melody brought it up. "Yes of course let's see what we can learn..." His voice trailed off as he saw the data on the screen. "You know the Puppet Master did show Borg like capabilities. What if it created a link into Apollo's brain." Ki tossed that idea out as he was milti tasking. A quick succession of button taps on the screen above the bio bed stopped the readout. "Mitsuketa" (I found it) Michael exclaimed. "Melody take a look at your readings here there are some things I want to show you. Perhaps you can shed some light on it. Since I applied the cortical monitor to you, did you remove it or tamper with it in any way?"

“No. Why?” Melody hopped off the bio bed and moved over to the monitor Ki was looking at. She could tell from his expression that something wasn’t right. She looked at the readout of very complex information.

“You’re going to have to give me a hint here Doc...”

Michael stood there and stoked his chin as he was lost in thought, and the data continued to scroll. What was a minute or two but seemed like an eternity passed. "Aha right there..." he said as pointed at the screen. There seems to be some gaps in your brainwave patterns, actually they are more like interruptions. It is confounding, if these readings are correct then you were essentially brain-dead on four occasions for about a minute each. That combined with the limited cell degradation that your body is experiencing is quite the medical miracle." He began to ramble as he continued to stroke his chin.

Melody looked a bit shaken. “Brain dead? How is that possible? Could it be the equipment? As for the cell degradation...... maybe it was the time I spent in a maturation chamber when I was a small child..... could that be it?”

Michael held out his hand "It is not possible, when one goes brain dead one simply dies. That is of course if there is no outside measures taken. The cortical monitor is reading interruptions in your brain wave patterns. It interprets these interruptions as brain death. However, that is a mistake on it's part. I am not sure what these interruptions are, or if they are anything at the moment. It could be technical malfunction. However, that is something that would need to be investigated." He squinted at the screen this was damned curious and a medical mystery. Those were two things that took the doctor's attention. "The maturation chamber is the best explanation for the cell degradation. Would you mind if I took a sample to confirm?"

Melody's eyes went wide. "It depends. A Sample of what? It better not be my brain. I'm quite attached to it."

"No, no brain tissue. Some blood samples and some DNA samples. I am going to approach this from the old fashioned lab method and leave the computers out of it. See what I can come up with." Michael said with a hint of excitement in his voice.

Melody relaxed slightly. "Go on then, but make sure you don't take anything I'll need later." Melody read the Doctors face for a moment. “Is it a serious problem?”

"As of now no... It is not serious it is a damned mystery. We will have to keep an eye on it and continue to see how it goes." Michael replied. He took a small sampling of various tissues from her. He also engaged a brain scan, Michael wanted a complete image of the woman's brain.

"Is this going to take long Doctor?" Melody asked, trying not to move. "I should be getting back to the bridge."

"No I am just about done here. I would like you to continue to wear the cortical monitor. I will let you know if anything comes up. As always I want you to alert me if anything happens, anything at all." Michael said as he disconnected his equipment and affixed a fresh cortical monitor.

Melody sighed "Not another cortical monitor. Well I suppose if you think it's necessary Doctor. Please let me know the moment you know something."

OFF:

●● Lieutenant Michael Ki
Chief Medical Officer
USS Merlin

●●● Commander Melody Jones
Executive Officer
USS Merlin