Lieutenant JG Mercedes Carpenter [NPC] Assistant Medical Officer USS Chimera NCC 96899 = Sickbay “The count is up to five now,” MaiKai called from a biobed a few meters away from Mercedes. “That’s five engineers, and I expect we’ll lose some more.” Sickbay was a grim vision of confusion and death. Never before in her life had Mercedes experienced this. What she saw the moment she entered Engineering would stay with her the rest of her life, and she would never be able to forget it. It was disturbing and unsettling, and reminded her very much of her own mortality. She wasn’t used to this kind of thing. Accidental wounds, yes… combat wounds, yes… people maimed and deformed by temporal anomalies, no. On the biobed in front of her, an eight year old boy lay comatose and still. She glanced up at his vitals on the biobed; it didn’t look good. Shortly after they brought him to Sickbay, he went into a coma. He was a Petty Officer; there hadn’t been time yet to find out just who exactly he was. The human body was not designed to withstand the kind of trauma these people suffered, some of them aging almost forty years in mere minutes, or in this case growing younger. Moving over to the bed next to her, she looked at the young Bolian woman lying on it. Her left arm had completely turned to dust before her eyes when it came in contact with one of the anomaly bubbles. Tears were streaking from her eyes, and she wiped them away with her other hand. “How are you feeling?” Mercedes asked, laying a hand on her shoulder. They had given her something for the pain and sealed the wound, but the Chimera didn’t carry any prosthetics and they would have to wait until they returned to a Starbase better equipped. “Much better, thank you,” she nodded, offering a small smile. “I think I’m just in shock still. I’m lucky to be alive.” Mercedes nodded grimly. “As soon as we get back to a Starbase, we can fit a prosthetic for you if you’d like one. Prosthetic technology has advanced greatly over the last few years. It functions just like a real arm would.” “Thank you, Doctor, you’re very kind.” Offering a smile to her patient, she said, “If you need anything just call someone. I need to check on some others.” As she turned around, she saw Scott pulling a stretcher towards a bed where an elderly man lay. Walking over to him, she offered to help him lift the body onto the hovering stretcher. He accepted silently and they lifted the old man off the biobed. Mercedes couldn’t help but notice the rank of Ensign on his collar; he must have been a young man. She tried to catch Scott’s eyes, but he was too focused on what he was doing. There had been an unpleasant distance between them since their last argument. It was a silly thing. Scott’s ego had been bruised by her flirting with the new helmsman, and she had been offended by him thinking she would act on it. They didn’t discuss their feelings honestly, and now suddenly a few weeks later they were hardly talking. But now, more than ever after what had happened, she just wanted to hold him. Wordlessly they moved the body into the small morgue. They shifted the body into the large drawer and closed it. “I don’t trust that Palmer woman,” Scott said out of the blue. “Neither do I,” Mercedes replied calmly. She looked up at him and his eyes met hers. “I love you, Scott.” The surprise on his face showed her he had expected the opposite of this, and suddenly she felt very childish for the way she’d been acting and the hurt it had caused him. “I love you too, Mercedes,” he said, stepping forward and giving her a warm kiss. She pulled him close and held him for a few moments before releasing him. “I’m sorry about everything. With everything that’s happened today… I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you.” “I agree,” he smiled at her. “Next time, we should talk it out before it gets this far.” Mercedes nodded, then looked back into Sickbay. “We should get back. How’s Gwen?” “Not doing too great. Very shocked,” he replied rather solemnly. “I’ll miss John.” Taking her hand, Scott led Mercedes back into Sickbay and they resumed their duties, trying to save who they could. =