String Theory_ Fusion (Book 2) - Kirsten Beyer [61]
He barely heard Chakotay call out his name in alarm.
“Tom!”
The flash of light took both Chakotay and Harry by surprise. Harry had all but determined that this was some sort of transporter, but the control system was too complicated for him to make immediate sense of. Harry could sense Tom’s frustration. From the corner of his eye he saw Tom move past him into the darkness.
A split second and a flash of light later, Tom was gone.
Chapter 8
Janeway approached sickbay to find Neelix standing outside, nervously shifting his weight from one foot to the other. The moment he caught sight of her, he rushed toward her as quickly as his short legs would carry him.
“Captain,” he stammered, “I swear to you, I didn’t do this.”
“I believe you, Mr. Neelix,” Janeway replied as calmly as she could under the circumstances. “What didn’t you do?”
“I didn’t break the Doctor.”
Janeway almost smiled. The reality was that there was precious little Neelix, or most anyone else on board, could do to “break” the EMH. They had expended considerable resources over the years supplementing and securing his program. The few instances when his survival had been at risk had forced them to consider the possibility of completing their journey without a dedicated physician, and that had been simply unacceptable. Between the backup modules they had created and the Doctor’s personal holoemitter, he was more stable at present than he had ever been.
“Neelix,” she sighed, “if you could just tell me what happened.”
“After your sister left, the Doctor was deactivated. I couldn’t understand why he would have done that, so I reactivated him and he had no idea who I was, who Samantha was, or who Naomi was. He operated on her brain less than four hours ago,” Neelix said, his voice rising in pitch and force, “and he didn’t remember treating her!”
Janeway’s brow furrowed. This is a problem.
“And that’s not the worst part,” Neelix continued.
“It isn’t?” Janeway frowned.
“No! Once he had examined Naomi and pronounced her well on her way to recovering, he asked me to deactivate him!”
The Doctor had been in control of his activation subroutines since the early days of Voyager’s journey. If he was truly unaware of his program’s parameters, Janeway was forced to conclude that he might be facing another cascade failure.
“Where is he now?” Janeway asked.
Neelix paused, at a loss. “I didn’t want to deactivate him, but he insisted. He’s… wherever he goes when…”
Janeway raised a hand to halt him as she fortified herself with a deep breath and entered sickbay, Neelix right on her heels. Naomi still rested peacefully on her biobed; her mother had fallen into a light slumber, her head resting on crossed arms at the foot of Naomi’s bed.
“Computer,” Janeway called, “activate Emergency Medical Hologram.”
Her initial fear that once he had been deactivated he might not be immediately recoverable was allayed when the Doctor materialized before her. But her other concerns were heightened when his first words were “Please state the nature of the medical emergency.”
Although his standardized programming included this automated activation greeting, he had long ago dispensed with it, unless he was in a particularly peevish state.
“Doctor,” Janeway began, “what is the last thing you remember before you were deactivated?”
The Doctor inclined his head to one side in a gesture Janeway had come to recognize as his body language for You can’t possibly have summoned me here to answer such an idiotic question?, but answered, “I checked the vitals of the half-human, half-Ktarian female in that biobed and asked this rather garishly attired gentleman to deactivate me.”
“Doctor,” Janeway continued, “do you know who I am?”
He paused briefly and said, “Based on the insignia on your collar I assume you are the captain of this vessel.”
“But you don’t remember ever meeting me?” she persisted.
“No,” he said perfunctorily.
“What about my sister, Phoebe Janeway?