The biobed situated next to hers is permeating with a frenetic chaos: a mask of oxygen hastily placed upon the cold mouth of the still form; the charging of a defibrillator; the barking of a single word by the attending physician, a word all medical staff utter with the use of the device.

"Clear!"

With that, there is the twitching of the Vulcan's lifeless figure upon the instrument's activation onto his ghastly skin. Time and again, the same action is performed, each attempt gaining an increased voltage to the instrument. Each time woefully yielding the same result: the heart still does not beat. And all during this, there finally begins a feeble cry of a new life. The tiny form at last emerges, a story made anew in the wake of death.

It is with those tiny cries that something is caught by the ears and eyes of M'Benga: a monitor begins to beep, weak and irregular in its rhythm. The screen activates with a slightly fluctuating pattern of a single line in correspondence. That very monitor, with its image of this lone pattern, holds the purpose of reading brain activity. The physician takes close heed of this happenstance, utilising his vast knowledge in contemplating its cause.

"He can sense the baby...", the physician murmurs, his eyes fixed onto the screen.

With a nod, he gestures to a nurse, who relieves him of the defibrillator in his grasp. That same instrument he had utilised in his urgent attempts to revive their fallen shipmate. Those attempts had nearly been in vain, with "nearly" being the key word; the good doctor and crewmate that he is, M'Benga has not yet relinquished his hope. The defibrillator currently in her grasp, the nurse now continues that very task the physician had just performed a moment ago, with a bark of that same word...

"Clear!"

Hope, it seemed, had begun to dwindle, the souls housed within the ward almost yield in defeat; now, with the infant's first breaths, M'Benga at least can sight hope reborn. Within his mind, there forms an idea, a proposal borne from hope's final sliver. In a single moment, he paces a step closer to the bed of the Lieutenant.

"What's that, Joseph?", McCoy queries, placing the child in the weary arms of her mother.

"Vulcan parents can form telepathic links with their unborn children.", comes the hurried reply, "Spock's body may be in death, but his mind is showing signs of activity. I think he can feel the presence of his child. He's trying to fight for her."

"You have an idea...", a glance is made toward M'Benga.

"For his revival, a telepathic link is one thing, but a more tactile form of contact is something else... As soon as the cord is cut, we'll place the baby on his chest. I know it's unorthodox, but my hope is that this method might just work."

"Right now, we'll try just about anything...", a glance back at the exhausted Lieutenant, "This okay with you?"

"Yes...", begins her sobbed reply, "anything to bring him back."

And so, after sufficient time is the cord severed; that vital line connecting mother to child. Not too soon, yet not too late; there is still a need for those nutrients to travel into the infant. As the moistened eyes of the bereaved mother observe, the tiny unclad form is gently cleansed by a cloth, and carried in the safe arms of McCoy. Whilst a nurse tends to the mother, and the delicate repairs thereof, the child is carefully placed upon her father's lifeless chest. The mask veiling his mouth is now removed; temporarily, of course, to save space for the infant.

For those few seemingly endless moments, the tiny form rests upon the unclad chest of her father. Moments painfully lengthened for those surrounding him. In that ghastly silence, and the air that bears it, they await. With all of their hope suspended by the most frail of threads, they wait. And then, at last, like a drowned man breaking the surface waves, he breathes once more, his heart beating its rhythm of life.

Yes, at last, with all monitors chirping once more, the deathly patient is restored. There lies beneath his cool skin the pulse and breaths of life. A life pulled from death's grasp, renewed by the presence of one so fresh; that tiny infant in the initial moments of her own existence. Behind those sunken eyes, he had sought her; from the last desperate impulses of his mind, he had grappled. Fought death itself, for her...his cherished daughter.