Bones entered the briefing room in a hurry, flustered; he claimed his seat and laid his scanner in front of him. He wasn't even sure why he had brought it to the briefing, it had seemed important when he'd left Sick Bay. Jim and Spock were sat around the table. "What have you got?" Jim asked.
"Nothing new Jim, except the next phase of the disease is as explosive as the last," he said, "What was on Beta Crypt? Did you find anything at all?"
"There was nothing but sand there." Spock said, "There was evidence of an ancient civilisation as we found some ruins. Evidence showed that they had been extinct for five thousand years."
"Any idea what it was that drove them to extinction?" Bones asked.
"There was no evidence to suggest anything. There was nothing on the walls that told of a disease or slow ending duration. There was an extinct volcano in the immediate vicinity so the logical conclusion as that it wiped the species out." Spock explained.
"There has to be something else," McCoy said.
"Well whatever it is needs to be found," Jim said, "And quickly."
"I'll come to the lab Doctor," Spock said. McCoy nodded, he hated to admit it but the Vulcan may be able to see something that he missed.
"Keep me informed gentlemen," Jim said. Dismissed, the three men rose and returned to their relative stations. Spock moved silently to the station where the organism virus was located. McCoy tended to Chekov, the boy burned with fever and barely aware of what was going on around him. He administered a tranquilliser in the hope it would bring the fever down. The monitor told McCoy all his signs were normal yet a check of the pulse in a more conventional way said otherwise. His heart was pounding faster than it should but it was the temperature that concerned him the most.
"Doctor, have you seen it divide?" Spock asked.
"I saw it do something earlier. Broke in two and began feeding from some matter barfed out by one of them." He said walking over to where Spock stood. "What do you make of it?"
"You have it isolated in blood?"
"Yes."
"It appears it is using the plasma within the blood to divide and reproduce. To what end I cannot foresee." Spock said.
"Yeah, that' the problem. It's chewing through our guys like wildfire and there's not a damned thing I can do to stop it." McCoy said. Spock straightened from the station.
"Do not despair yet doctor, there is still plenty of time to learn how to deal with this organism." McCoy rolled his eyes but failed to retort when the ensign on the bed nearest jerked suddenly to an upright position. His eyes rolled back in his head and he began convulsing.
"Looks like our time is getting shorter." McCoy said as he rushed to the side of the bed with a sedative. Spock nodded and followed him with a scanner.