The Garden - Melissa Scott [44]
Still holding her coffee, she turned back to her desk, flipped on her screen, and touched keys to call up her secretarial routine. "Computer. Any word from either Tuvok or Torres?"
"No, Captain. I have flagged any such transmission for priority interrupt. Do you wish to maintain that status?"
"Yes."
"Status confirmed."
Janeway nodded absently, her attention already caught by a report from sickbay. She skimmed through it, a frown deepening as she absorbed its significance. The scurvy was getting worse, and other deficiencies were beginning to make themselves felt as well. "Janeway to sickbay."
The deskscreen lit, and Kes's pointed face appeared in the monitor. "Sickbay here, Captain."
"I want to discuss his most recent report with the doctor. Is he-" Janeway paused. No, neither "in" nor "available" were quite the words she wanted, "-active?"
"He's with a patient," Kes answered. She glanced over her shoulder, then stepped slightly to the side, so that Janeway could see past her into the main diagnostic chamber. In it, the holographic doctor was bent over a young man-one of Chakotay's people, Jane-way added, automatically, but couldn't match a name to the face-who was looking away, his face screwed up in visible pain. Janeway winced in sympathy, and Kes went on, "Mr. DeShay slipped in one of the Jeffries tubes, and cut his arm rather badly. The doctor has had a little trouble stopping the bleeding."
Beyond her shoulder, Janeway could see the hologram frowning over what looked like a twenty-centimeter gash in the young man's-DeShay's, she corrected herself, trying to fix face to name- forearm. DeShay's uniform was bloodied, and a second technician, a dark man a little older than DeShay, hovered in the background, holding a bloody towel. The doctor's hands were perfectly clean, however, the forcefields that created him repelling the organic molecules, but no one in sickbay seemed aware of the anomaly. As she watched, the doctor reached for a second probe, ran it slowly along the edges of the cut. In its wake, DeShay's arm showed a ragged pink scar, the skin around it hot and red where it wasn't bruised. The doctor nodded, apparently satisfied, and reached for a hypospray. He injected DeShay with it, saying something, and then turned to face the outer office.
"I'll be out in a minute, Captain."
Janeway nodded, as always not quite sure how to deal with the doctor's attitude. If nothing else, it was hard to think of effective sanctions against someone who did not have a physical existence. To her surprise, however, the doctor was as good as his word.
"You wanted to speak to me, Captain?"
"I've seen your report," Janeway said. Over the doctor's shoulder, she could see the two crewmen preparing to leave, DeShay grimacing as he tried to roll down his torn sleeve, the other man listening soberly to Kes as she handed him a hypospray, gesturing to DeShay as she spoke.
"Ah. Not good news, no. I hope conditions on the planet are half as good as they say."
"The situation looks promising," Janeway answered. "Certainly the Kirse have the food we need, at least according to the preliminary analysis. Whether we'll be able to trade for it still an open question,
which is why I wanted to talk to you. Your report's clear, Doctor-things are getting worse-but I want to know why."
The doctor snorted. "Because deficiency diseases are progressive, that's why. Plus of course this crew is under abnormally high stress to begin with, which leaves them no reserves when things get worse. I'm not at all surprised to see it."
"So where does that leave us?" Janeway asked, though she suspected she already knew the answer.
"Exactly where we were before," the doctor answered. "Either we take on healthy food here, or we won't make it to the next source of supply."
Janeway sighed, and nodded. "Thank you, Doctor. Janeway out."
She stared at the empty screen for a moment longer, then reached for her datapadd to study the doctor's report again.