Stand By Me, a startrek: voyager fanfic

Stand By Me

By Laura Schiller

Based on: Star Trek: Voyager

This is not what I signed up for, Dr. Annika Hansen thinks, diving under a biobed as a explosion hits Sickbay. A fragment of the bulkhead sails right over her; one second later, and she'd be dead.

The U.S.S. Voyager was supposed to be on a simple two-week mission: track the Maquis ship, fetch the Starfleet agent back, and go home. She's been expecting trouble, of course, but more along the lines of a Cardassian warship or dangerous conditions in the Badlands. Not being thrown into the Delta Quadrant.

One of her medics is dead, burned by an exploding console. Another crawls over to her, bleeding from the side. More wounded people are crowding in through the door, some being carried. The floor is still unsteady.

She staggers to her feet, fighting back the dizziness and nausea that threatens to grip her. Never mind what quadrant they're in, she's still a doctor.

She needs backup. Now.

"Computer, activate EMH."

The hologram appears at her elbow, reaching out a reassuringly solid arm to keep her upright.

"Please state the nature of the emergency," it says, in the haughty tone of an aristocrat wanting to know why he's been dragged out of bed.

Some strange part of her finds that funny. She chokes down a laugh.

"See for yourself," she said. "Our ship's been attacked. We've got wounded." She catches Crewman Telfer by the shoulders before he can collapse on her, and heaves him onto the biobed with more urgency than gentleness. "Help me triage them, okay?"

The EMH watches the blood run along the young man's uniform, hazel eyes going round.

"My God," the hologram exclaims. "I've never … I mean, my programming explains all this, but I've never seen … "

He's not supposed to react like that. He's supposed to be reliable, damn it, not panic like a first-year medical student. He's not supposed to feel the same way she feels right now.

Annika is so frightened, she can't breathe.

She only graduated from medical school a few weeks ago. Serving on a starship was supposed to be a stepping-stone to Starfleet Medical, to a career in pure research, fighting diseases while having as little contact with people as possible. Battlefield medicine wasn't even remotely on her list.

If the Emergency Medical Hologram can't handle this emergency, how can she?

"I know you're scared, it's okay to be scared," she says, to herself as much as to the wide-eyed machine. "But you can do this. Tricorder. Now."

The EMH swallows hard, swoops down to grab a tricorder that tumbled off the shelf, and gets to work scanning the patients. Annika takes the other side of the room, and soon enough they're working together as if they'd been doing it all their lives.

Somewhere behind the force field of her professional composure, she is still afraid, but she can breathe now.

Because someone, even if it's only a hologram, has her back.

"Computer, deactiv - "

"Don't!" The EMH catches Annika's sleeve before she can finish the command.

"What's wrong?" She looks around at Sickbay, which is finally cleaned up, all the patients either treated or resting (although she wishes she could give a piece of her mind to whoever designed this place with so few beds).

"Don't make me disappear," he says, still holding on to her arm. "I won't even exist until someone activates me again. It's terrifying. At least give me control over my own program."

Annika tries to brush off his hand, but despite herself, ends up holding it instead. She remembers a camping trip with her parents, how she cried when her father put out the fire because the darkness was going to eat her. How she cried again, a few months later, when her parents dropped her off at her Aunt Irene's, flew their shuttle out into the darkness and never came back.

"But what can I do?" She shakes off his touch and drags her thoughts back to reality. "You take up a lot of energy, isn't that right, Captain? He can't just run continuously. If his program were self-sustaining, that would be different - "

"I have a suggestion, Doctor." Captain Janeway, who's been circling the room and reassuring the patients, considers the problem. "I hear one of the Maquis is a brilliant engineer," she says in her deep smoky voice. "Speak to her about it. I have the feeling we're going to need all the medical expertise we can get out here."

"Thank you, Captain," says the EMH. "If you weren't the one to get us stranded here in the first place, I'd consider that an excellent suggestion."

Janeway's eyes narrow, and her voice is at its smokiest. "Computer, deactivate EMH."

"Captain, was that necessary?" Annika is torn between laughter and the urge to swat her CO upside the head. She chooses the safer option. Janeway responds with a tired, crooked smile.

"Sorry, Doctor. He hit a nerve, that's all"

Annika, who knows her chances of seeing Aunt Irene again are minimal, bites her lip and looks away.

"He needs a name, you know. We can't keep calling both of you 'Doctor'."

Perhaps because she's been thinking of her childhood more often today than she has for years, Annika remembers Astrid Lindgren, a classic Swedish children's author she used to like. There was one story about a little boy living on a nineteenth-century farm, who always wanted to help, but ended up making a mess, irritating his parents and getting locked in the woodshed as punishment.

"I'm calling him Emil," she says. "Emil Svensson."

Several months (and a few more medical emergencies) into their long journey home, Annika catches Kes and the EMH chatting together in an empty Sickbay.

"Am I interrupting something?" she asks, rather amused. Kes reminds her of herself when she was little, talking to Flotter and Trevis in the holosuite as if they were real.

"Emil was just telling me he's never seen the stars," says Kes gravely.

"Ironic, isn't it?" The hologram waves a hand around the windowless white walls. "Living on a starship and all."

"Can't we take him to the holodeck?" Kes looks up at her teacher with pleading blue eyes. "We can show him that beautiful nebula we passed by earlier today. He'd love that."

"I don't know … " Annika feels awkward, for reasons she doesn't want to admit. "Why would he be interested in astronomy? That's outside his programming. Are you sure he's not malfunctioning somehow?"

"He is standing right here and doesn't appreciate being talked over like furniture!" Emil huffs. "And why shouldn't I be interested in whatever I feel like?"

"Don't you think there's something wrong," says Kes, "About creating a sentient being, with the same abilities to learn and grow that we all have, only to keep him confined to a single room?"

Annika remembers how the Ocampa's short lifespan and innocent face belie her wisdom. She is not a child at all, and deserves to have her opinions taken seriously. Could she be right about the EMH?

"I guess it can't hurt to drop by the holodeck," she says. "I'll transfer him – you, Dr. Svensson, I mean – and Kes, you go ahead and start the program, all right?"

Emil's face when he sees the rose-and-purple nebula floating around him on the holodeck is, to Annika's mind, a more fascinating sight than any stellar phenomenon. His slow smile of delight seems to belong to an artist, not a machine. He spins around and around, drinking it all in, and she catches herself smiling too.

"Beautiful," he sighs.

Yes, she almost says. Yes, you are.

"Would it kill you to join the party and enjoy yourself for once?" Emil asks, shaking his head.

Annika is standing in the corner of an elegant reception hall, fiddling with the buttons on her dress uniform. She knows she should be grateful for the rare chance of a peaceful First Contact, but she can't help it. The glittering clothes of their hosts, the loud laughter, the strangely syncopated music, they all put her on edge.

"I'm a doctor, not a diplomat. I never know what to say at these things."

"Well, you should meet the Minister of Health. He's fascinated to hear about how you and I work together. He says he's never met such a sophisticated hologram as I am."

Emil adjusts the shiny new mobile emitter on his sleeve, showing it off, and Annika rolls her eyes. "No, thanks."

"At least sample the buffet. Our colleagues tell me everything's delicious."

He loops his arm through hers and pilots her through the crowd, which is not quite the appropriate way for a junior doctor to treat the CMO, but she doesn't feel like protesting. Truth be told, it helps her nerves to have someone familiar to hold on to.

"You look stunning, by the way," he says. "If a little severe. You don't do yourself justice sometimes."

"Don't tell me Kes is trying to give you social lessons again. What's this – Flirting 101?"

"No, really. All you need is - " He plucks a many-petalled flower, the same teal blue as her science uniform, from one of the bouquets decorating the buffet table, and tucks it into her pinned-up hair. "There. Perfection."

"Go practice on someone else," she says, but her face betrays her by turning pink.

Most men are too put off by her personality to flirt with her, and the ones that do are usually idiots who can't see past her blond hair and curves. (If she's honest, she must admit that she deliberately puts up a force field to repel attention. Love can get you hurt; she learned that when she was eight years old.)

Emil is not an idiot.

He's also a hologram. And her direct subordinate.

She picks up a plate and loads it with hors d'oeuvres, some of which look more like jewelry than food. She picks up a steel toothpick loaded with what appears to be diamonds and rubies, sniffs it, and takes a bite.

"So how does it taste?" Emil asks eagerly.

"Not bad."

"Details, details!"

She laughs; his habit of living vicariously through food has broadened her palate quite a bit over the years. "Okay, okay. It's sweet. Really sweet, I think it must be pure sugar. But there's an aftertaste … I don't know … "

It's creeping up her tongue, bitter and sharp, and suddenly her tongue feels swollen in her mouth, and she can't speak.

"Dr. Hansen?" Emil's voice seems to be coming from far away. "Annika!"

There's a roaring in her ears. Everything she sees is blurred around the edges, folding in on itself, like a tunnel becoming narrower and narrower as she passes through.

"Svensson to Voyager - two to beam directly to Sickbay!"

Someone is holding her.

The tunnel closes in.

She wakes up on a biobed, feeling limp as leftover noodles from Neelix's kitchen, and sick to her stomach when she even thinks about food. Emil and Kes are standing beside her. The affectionate relief on their faces when they see her awake is somewhat humbling. She had no idea they thought that much of their grumpy commanding officer.

"What … happened?"

"You had an allergic reaction to the food at the party," says Kes, handing her a glass of water. "You passed out, but Emil had you beamed up before anything else cold happen. We gave you an anti-allergen, but you should rest for a bit and drink lots of water."

Her throat feels drier than the Vulcan Forge, so that's one piece of advice she can take. Emil helps her sit up, his hand on her back, so she can drink.

Kes glances between her two colleagues, an odd look on her face, as if she's bursting to say something but holding it back. "Uh … Dr. Hansen, what's that flower called? It looks pretty on you."

Emil backs away from the bed at once, like his fictional namesake caught in mischief.

"You're the botanist, Kes, you tell me." Annika pulls the alien plant out of her hair. It's a little crumpled, and some of the petals have fallen out. At least one is stuck to her uniform collar. But it's still fragrant, with a spicy sweetness nothing at all like the fake jewels she ate.

She hands it to Kes, meaning to tell her to recycle it.

"Take it to Aeroponics," she says instead. "Maybe it'll grow."

Kes holds the flower up to her face, but not fast enough to hide a grin. She hurries out of the room, golden curls bouncing as she goes.

Emil pulls his office chair, the one with wheels, over to Annika's bedside and settles into it with a padd, probably to write his report to the Captain. He sits there in complete silence, leaning into the cushions as he types, and she hasn't felt this peaceful in months.

Until it occurs to her just how unusual this is, Emil being quiet.

"What, no lecture?" she says. "No scolding me about how I should always scan alien food before eating it, even if our hosts tell us it's safe?"

He looks up. If he weren't a hologram, she would say he was in pain.

"It's my own fault. If I hadn't nagged you to eat that thing … "

"Calm down, Svensson, all right? It's only an allergy, we've been through worse. Remember the Macrovirus?"

"Don't even mention that. I could have - " He puts his hand on his forehead, shading his eyes, as if to hide tears, though as a hologram, he couldn't shed them anyway. "I mean … we could have lost you."

He has a point, and for a moment, she shivers under her standard-issue blanket at the implications. But if there's anything serving on Voyager has taught her so far, it's how to live with danger.

"I'm not lost," she tells him firmly. "Not this time. You saved my life – again - and I'm grateful. I'll be even more grateful if you stop being dramatic and get me another glass of water."

"Aye, aye, sir."

Annika cannot believe that Captain Janeway would form an alliance with the Borg.

Logically, of course, she can see why it's necessary. Circumventing Borg space would mean decades, maybe centuries, added to a journey which is already much too long. Also, Species 8472 as translated by Kes really does sound terrible: The weak will perish is not Annika's idea of an acceptable motto.

Still, having a group of Borg drones on the ship makes her skin crawl.

Kes is on the bridge, ready to be a conduit for the creatures from fluidic space in case they speak again, so Annika and Emil have Sickbay to themselves. They are working on a way to weaponize Borg nanoprobes – at least they would be, if she could only concentrate.

If only Emil would stop humming twentieth-century music while he works. He's nervous too, she understands that, but for God's sake, there are less disruptive ways to work off tension.

He starts singing out loud. And trying to imitate a Southern accent.

"No, I won't be afraid … just as long as you stand, stand by me … Oh darlin', darlin', stand by me … "

"Will you please stop that? I'm trying to concentrate!"

He glowers at her from behind his microscope. "It's called 'soul', Doctor. Honestly, sometimes I wonder which of us is the artificial life form around here."

"Knowing you, I'll take that as a compliment."

"Hmph. I know you're scared, but that's no reason to take it out on me."

"I am not - " Her glance falls on the padd in front of her, showing a long list of failed attempts to control the nanoprobes. Devilish things – just when she thinks she's found the key, they change the locks on her. If even one got past the biohazard gear she's wearing, it could multiply and assimilate her within minutes, and she'd be powerless to stop it.

Just like her parents.

The last transmission Magnus and Erin Hansen sent was a distress call on all frequencies, saying the Borg had boarded their shuttle. Aunt Irene hadn't told Annika this until she was eighteen, old enough to understand. Her fears of the darkness eating her parents had some truth in them, after all.

The Borg are that darkness.

"All right, yes, damn it. I'm scared."

"Because of what happened to your parents?"

She told the story, quite emphatically, at their last staff meeting in an attempt to dissuade Captain Janeway from her crazy idea.

"Yes, but it's not just that. I just … I can't stand anything that looks like a person but isn't. It's uncanny."

Annika met the Borg "ambassador", Three of Nine, briefly in order to take a nanoprobe sample. The drone was covered in armor and had skin as greyish-white as a corpse's, but still had the face and voice of a Bajoran woman. It was like speaking to the undead.

"Is that what you think of me?" Emil asks, sounding hurt. "Am I … uncanny?"

"What? No!" She has never once thought so, not even when they first met. Even when he was "only" a hologram, she trusted him.

"You have more … " What is that word he used earlier about music? "More soul than some organics we've met, including all the Kazon sects put together."

"You don't know what it means to hear you say that."

She's afraid he might get emotional again (or hoping he will), but then he takes a look through his microscope and waves her over, professional pride lighting up his face instead.

"Come here, Doctor, I think I found the key!"

"Show me."

Annika's stasis pod slides open automatically.

Where's Emil? is her first thought.

The crew went into stasis in order to survive a thirty-five-day journey through a radioactive Mutara-class nebula. Even Lieutenant Marika, the ex-Borg, couldn't have withstood the radiation, since she was assimilated as an adult and most of her implants could be removed.

Emil was supposed to pilot the ship and keep them safe. He must have succeeded, because everyone looks healthy, if a bit stiff … but where is he?

"Computer, locate Dr. Svensson."

"The EMH is inactive."

"Specify reasons for inactivity."

"The EMH is not functioning according to normal parameters."

Annika and Captain Janeway catch each other's eye. The Captain looks concerned, which Annika should be as well. But concern, she finds, doesn't quite cover it. She feels rather as if the bottom had dropped out of her universe.

Which is ridiculous. It's hardly the first time his program has been in danger. There was the time he experimented on himself and developed a Jekyll-and-Hyde complex, for example. But it never seems to get any easier to watch.

"Computer," the Captain orders, "Are we clear of the nebula?"

"Affirmative."

"We need to get to Sickbay," Annika says. "Find out what happened to him - "

"Slow down," says the Captain, not unkindly, stepping out of her pod and coming over to give Annika's arm a reassuring pat. "You should scan the crew first. Just in case."

"Of course. Yes. I should."

Mortified to forget her duty like that, she pulls her tricorder out of her pocket and begins scanning everyone, starting with the Captain, checking the recorded history of the pods, and trying not to scream with impatience.

Everyone is, in fact, healthy. Except Tom Paris, who has a few radiation burns from sleepwalking out of his pod, but nothing she can't fix.

"What can I say, Annie?" He strikes a pose. "I'm a man who can't be tied down."

"I heard that, Flyboy," says B'Elanna over his shoulder. "I'll tie you down if you don't let her treat you right now."

"Hmm. Is that an invitation?"

"Give him something that stings, won't you, Doc?"

"I will," says Annika, making both of them laugh. "Can you come too, Torres? I - " She hesitates; saying it out loud makes it seem a little too real. "I think something went wrong with … with Dr. Svensson. He should be here."

B'Elanna frowns. "Yeah, I warned him about that. Thirty-five days of radiation were bound to affect the ship's systems somehow."

"You knew he'd be risking his life and you didn't think to tell us?" Annika's ferocity surprises them both.

"What choice did we have?" B'Elanna snarls back.

"Ladies, please," says Tom, rubbing his burned arm in an exaggerated way, "Need I remind you that each of you has a patient to take care of?"

The doctor and the engineer march down the corridor at top speed without another word, making him jog to catch up.

They find Sickbay empty, as perfectly neat as Annika last left it. Only the computer screens reveal a mess, at least judging by B'Elanna's grunt when she sets eyes on them.

"Looks like he set up a makeshift command center in here," the engineer mutters. "Maybe he couldn't reach the Bridge. Some problem with the mobile emitter?"

Confined to a single room. Just like the early years. Annika can feel Kes's reproachful eyes on her as if it were yesterday.

She concentrates on Tom, getting him into a biobed, then behind a force field so she can surround him with a gas that counteracts the radiation. He gives the diagnostic arch above him an irritable push, and she knows just how he feels.

"Hold still, Mr. Paris. Not much longer."

"C'mon, I've been holding still for thirty-five days."

B'Elanna mutters as she works through the console, like a mother going through her teenage son's room. "What did he think he was doing? Power transfer here, another there. Life support off, life support on. And what's this? Oh, he set the stasis pods to open automatically … but only if the sensors showed we were out of the nebula?"

"Pretty smart," Tom comments from behind the force field. "Don't tell him I said that."

"You know what this means, don't you?" B'Elanna rubs her forehead ridges, looking more worried than her bravado will admit.

"It means … he was afraid he wouldn't be there to wake us up." Annika sits down hard in the office chair, almost grateful for the stasis fatigue that gives her an excuse.

She monitors Tom's lifesigns, double-checking for any ill effects from the radiation. Satisfied there are none, she vents the gas, takes down the force field, and lets him out.

"A dermal regenerator should take care of the rest. If you feel pain, nausea or any other side effects, comm me."

"Always a pleasure," Tom drawls, strolling over to kiss his girlfriend. "I'll see you later."

And he's out the door.

"You know, Annika … " It's rare for B'Elanna to call her by her first name, but when she does, it's usually something important. "You're wearing pretty much the exact look Tom had on his face when the Vidiians split me. Is there something you need to tell that hologram of yours?"

Yes. No. Maybe. Damn it, Torres, why can't you stick to your computers?

Annika never told Emil how the novel ended, the one she had named him after. One of the family's servants fell ill, and since the farm was snowbound – this being a time before transporters, comlinks or even radios in rural Sweden – they had no way to send for help. The little boy bundled the dying man onto a horse-drawn sleigh, and rode with him through the blizzard all the way to the clinic. And the man survived.

Since I was a little girl, I always wanted to cheat death, but's just as hard as the author said it would be. And, Emil, I don't know if I can do it without you.

"Can you bring him back online or not?"

B'Elanna flashes a glare that would have done honor to her Klingon ancestors. "Do I look like an amateur? Of course I'll bring him back!"

Annika could hug her.

"Oh, wait. There's a message for you, Doc. It's marked 'private', I haven't read it. But you should – there might be a clue about how to fix him."

Annika picks up the padd and logs into her account while B'Elanna sinks her teeth into the complicated repairs.

The message takes a long time to load, because of the attachments: photographs and log entries going back to four years ago, all across Emil's lifetime. But the message itself is short.

To: Hansen, Annika/CMO

From: Svensson, Emil/EMH

Subject: In case of decompilation

When you reach Earth, give these to my creator.

You told me once I have a soul. Now I believe it.

I love you.

The padd slides through her fingers and lands on her knees. She catches it before it clatters to the floor.

As a scientist, she's had this feeling before, or something like it, when the data she's been poring over finally fits together into a pattern. It happened when Marika taught her how to use nanoprobes in medicine, and despite her reluctance, the things actually saved Neelix's life.

It's a tiny click, like a camera shutter: This makes perfect sense. This could work. Followed by: Dear God, please let this work, because someone's future depends on it.

Two futures, this time.

She has never thought of herself as a lovable person. She is too cold and calculating, always has been, ever since she was a child and her Aunt Irene worried about her not making any friends at school. But maybe all she needed was for someone to strike a spark in her.

Maybe she's the one who needed to be convinced she has a soul.

"Doctor? Hey!" B'Elanna snaps her fingers to recall Annika's attention. "So what did he write? Is there a clue?"

"Hmm? No." Not a clue for fixing Emil's program, anyway. "No, it's … private."

"Figures."

The most recent memory in Dr. Emil Svensson's database is of being about to die. He had just enough power left to reprogram the stasis pods and send his message to Annika. Before he went offline, his last thought was of her.

He comes back online eye to eye with a tired, cranky Chief Engineer, who stretches her fingers until the joints crack and shakes her hair out of her face.

"There. Now try to keep intact for at least a few more days."

"Really, Lieutenant, you'd think I almost decompiled on purpose. I take it we're out of the nebula? Is everyone safe – even Mr. Paris?"

"Yeah. You did it."

He doesn't need to breathe, but it's a relief to let out a sigh. Tom's sleepwalking is what worried him the most. If it had happened while Emil was trapped in Sickbay, Ensign Baytart would be getting a very sudden promotion, and contrary to his remarks sometimes, Emil does not want that.

"And ... Dr. Hansen?"

"Honestly, the two of you … "

"What's that supposed to mean?"

B'Elanna points to the office chair which, for once, has been wheeled over to its proper position beside the desk, because Annika Hansen is sleeping there with her head pillowed on her arms.

"I tried to get her back to her quarters, but she insisted on staying until you were okay," says B'Elanna. "Except when she brought that thing over from Aeroponics. I don't know what it's for, I thought maybe you guys need it for some experiment. Unless she's just tired of all the gray in here."

With a final, bemused look, the engineer tells Emil goodnight and leaves the room.

"That thing" is a potted shrub bearing many-petalled blue flowers, which he would recognize anywhere, even without his holographic memory. Maybe it'll grow, Annika said, handing that one flower to Kes more than two years ago. It certainly has. Dear Kes, how she must be smiling, whatever plane of existence she's on.

Next to the plant is a padd. It contains a response to the message he sent, the one he came so close to deleting.

A dying confession? You are such a drama king.

I love you too, so much it scares me a little.

But it's okay to be scared. We can do this.

He wakes her up by lightly brushing a stray lock of hair away from her cheek.

"Hello, Emil," she says, blinking up at him, giving him a slow warm smile as if she woke up to his face every day. Which she has, often enough, but never quite like this.

"Hello, Annika. Aren't you uncomfortable, sleeping like that?" He runs one hand along the back of her neck, feeling the tension there. She sighs.

"Hmm … I should get back to my quarters." She stands up slowly, stretching like a cat. "See you tomorrow? We have a lot to talk about. Once I'm awake."

"See you tomorrow."

Commonplace words they've said a million times before. But this is the first time the Chief Medical Officer and her assistant have accompanied those words with a kiss.