He was small, and very old. His body lay on the bio-bed like a bundle of sticks, clad in ill-cured hides.
His hair was mostly grey. As Katherine prepared whatever medication she deemed necessary, Crewman Asenzi gently smoothed the tangled locks back from the withered face. It had some Asian features, but the high fine cheekbones were Caucasian.
He was so old that it seemed laughable – or pitiable – to have put him in restraints; however, if he struggled he might injure himself, so he was strapped down quite firmly. The outlines were visible under the soft blue covers lending him additional warmth.
Deanna had arrived, and stood beside the captain. Her large eyes gazed sorrowfully at the stranger. "All alone! How long has he been down there?"
"Who knows? Perhaps when he regains consciousness we may find out. We may even be able to arrange for him to be returned home."
"Wherever 'home' is," interjected Katherine, applying the hypospray to the base of her new patient's neck. "He may not even be capable of communicating with us."
Jean-Luc looked at her with concern. "The psychotropic?"
She nodded. "However long he's been down there, I see little prospect of meaningful recovery, Captain. I'm not even sure we did the right thing by bringing him up here. This will be traumatic for him."
"But we may still be able to win his trust," Deanna argued. "And at least we have the possibility of finding out who he is. There may be family, distant relatives, who've never known where he went. At least if we can give them closure..."
Katherine sighed. "I'm keeping him sedated while I run some more tests. I'll give him some medication that may help him when he wakes, but he's very frail. To be honest, I doubt if he'll survive much longer."
"Then maybe all we can do for him is to let him die in comfort," said Riker soberly. "And at least he won't die all alone."
"I leave it to your judgement, Doctor. Call me when you have any news. And – Counsellor Troi has a point regarding his relatives. If we can trace them via his DNA, they may well be glad to have word of him."
"I'll get on to it straight away, Captain."
As he and Will left Sickbay, Jean-Luc contemplated how his XO had matured during the course of the voyage. Time had been when Riker wouldn't even have thought how much it mattered for a man to die among his own. It was yet another confirmation that he'd been right to choose him to be his second aboard Enterprise, and a pointer to the fact that the time surely couldn't be far off when he'd be ready to have a command of his own. He had an enormous affection and respect for Will, who stood to him not perhaps in the light of the son he'd never had, but at least in that of a younger brother, a fine, strong man who he was sure would one day rank among Starfleet's finest captains.
"Do you think there's much chance of discovering relatives?" Riker asked presently, as they stepped into the turbo-lift to return to the Bridge.
"We can but try." The captain shrugged. "It shouldn't take long to map his DNA, and then the computer can do a search. Sixty years, seventy perhaps ... surely somebody from even one side of his family should be contactable."
"And we solve a family mystery." He smiled at the thought. "Not exactly the sort of discoveries I'd imagined us making out here."
"There are worse achievements, Will." The reports were still beckoning; endless reports. With a sigh, Jean-Luc headed once again for his Ready Room.