Season 1 - Episode 6: Phage (part 4)
May 13, 2371 (1 Month, 28 Days in the Delta Quadrant)
"Sensors indicated contusions, edema, and development of a localized subdural hematoma. Suggested treatment: An analgesic/anti-inflammatory regimen, in conjunction with application of cold packs once the patient had been given noncombatant status or returned to their own people," the Doctor said aloud, for the sake of his current nurse-in-training per Decision Track Number 31, "He is not seriously injured. Most of his wounds are a result of his fall after being stunned. That is, to say, if we overlook the advanced biological degradation, as that may just be a feature of the race, and is not immediately life threatening even if it is not."
Kes nodded at the words, but his optical sensors noted with approval how the young Ocampa girl never took her eyes off himself nor the patient on his biobed. His empathy subroutines were well aware of how the alien's appearance could be considered 'monstrous' by most organic species, which usually resulted in misplaced revulsion or irrational hatred, all of which were contraindicated for effective medical care.
It was, almost. . . pleasing, that his student held herself to a higher level of compassion.
"We will keep him sedated for the time being, while the imaging chamber works to identify his pre-existing medical conditions." Decision track Number 2009 initiated manipulation of the holographic interface to display a translatable facsimile of irritation, in alignment with the parameters of the situation. "In the meantime, I'll deal with our other guest."
Kes looked up at him, smirking briefly, before the Doctor's holomatrix was transferred from the isolation bay to the furthest biobed in sickbay away from the prisoner in the blink of a human eye. Neelix remained in the Doctor's sickbay, despite the EMH's flawless diagnosis that nothing was physically wrong with the Talaxian, and the constant keening about imagined injuries was tasking the Emergency Medical Programs' compassion directives to their theoretical limits.
"Mr. Neelix," the EMH sternly directed, "you are not injured. If you wish to remain in sickbay, I would encourage you to remain quiet and stop bothering Ms. Kes and I. If you do not, I will call for Security to remove you."
The Talaxian gaped at him, mouth rapidly opening and closing in what was likely shock, as his flesh-based processors attempted to catch up with the native guide's overused ability for speech. After nearly a thousand nanoseconds, the man finally stammered, "How could you think I would dare leave my dear, sweet Kes alone with one of them!"
Decision track 1331 shifted the holographic interface into one of firm understanding as the program shifted the designation of Neelix's observable behavior from 'irrational hypocondriac' to 'concerned loved one.' The Doctor did wish he had said so soon sooner, as the EMH's time could be better spent working with the injured instead of trying to guess the often incomprehensible thoughts of living beings. "Be that as it may be, I would ask you to quietly observe that the two of us have work to do, and not interfere. The alien is under sedation, and isolated behind a forcefield. He will not be going anywhere or doing anything. Understood?"
The Talaxian began to relax, which the 'concerned loved one' data set suggested indicated the patient was happy they weren't being removed from their loved one's side. This indication was further strengthened as he nodded his understanding. "Thank you, Doctor."
Rather than respond, the EMH's holomatrix blinked out of existence and rematerialized in the Chief Medical Officer's office. The holographic facsimile picked up a blank padd from the desk, the contents filling in as he remotely accessed the alien's patient file and began to study his condition.
Technically, the Doctor wasn't actually reading from the object in his fascimile's hands. The EMH had no eyes, or any other senses that an organic being could truly understand. What it did possess was a vast suite of state-of-the-art sensors and processors to collect information and interpret its meaning. The holographic facsimile was little more than a focus for both the program and the crew to interface through and interact with. Thus, anytime it picked up a padd or looked in on a patient in their bed, it was to provide a visual representation of the program and its actions that the crew could understand. Numerous studies had shown that sophonts preferred to see the image of a person instead of a remote program, the efficiency loss in doing so made up for in crew cooperation with medical procedures. It was completely illogical but all living beings, even Vulcans, were from time to time.
It was also how the program kept track of everyone within the confines of sickbay. While the facsimile may pretend to become surprised when someone moves towards them or sneaks up on them, that was simply another subroutine adjusting the holograms reaction to be more 'life like'. Focus testing on Jupiter Station had shown that a doctor whom was omniscient of all that happened in their sickbay was unsettling to the patients, almost as much as an 'invisible' one.
This was why the facsimile outwardly projected mild curiosity toward Kes as she walked into the office and informed him, "I'll do what I can to reassure him, and keep him out of your way, Doctor."
"Thank you," the program responded. His student was flawlessly multitasking, both as his assistant and completing the secondary portion of the 'concerned loved one' protocol without his even needing to prompt her! "If you don't mind, I'd like you to remain in sickbay until the team has returned from their away mission. Hopefully we will not be needed, though given recent events I find that to be of low probability."
"Of course," the girl smiled warmly, but the program noted the subtle shift in her expression to one of polite concern. "Are you all right?"
The holographic interface became still, unsure of what it should project. The question started to be routed through his 'requesting permission to assist' decision tree, but the answer, when checked against normative social paradigms and other standard diagnostics, did not pass a basic logic test. Defaulting to his 'unknown statement directed towards EMH', program, he asked, "Me?"
"You seem agitated about something," the young woman observed, but the program was curious about how she had come to that conclusion. Some kind of intuition? His irritation display had been directed towards Mr. Neelix, but that had already been addressed, the ticket resolved with a proper diagnosis. Further querying returned the data he was searching for, in that she was asking about the larger situation as a whole, not any outstanding issue.
The facsimile sat in the chair behind the desk, laying the padd atop the desk as directives shifted the outward expression to one of aggressive annoyance. "Of course I'm agitated. This situation is getting out of control."
"You mean, the alien?" Kes asked, subtly shifting her body weight from one leg to another as she adjusted her view from the Doctor to the alien and back, visually confirming her statement.
A few nanoseconds passed as the various directives conflicted with each other. Subroutines that governed crew interactions and how to gain compliance from patients fought with various directives that encouraged downplaying programing conflicts until a certified holoengineer could be contacted to resolve the issue. Finally, it was a simple truthfulness directive that overrode the conflict to prevent artificiality of thoughts from becoming apparent, shifting the facsimile's displayed expression to concern and agitation as he listed the irregularities.
"I mean everything. First they tell me that there is no doctor, so I have to be permanently on call. Then I'm told that there are no nurses, so until you volunteered I had no one to assist me," the Doctor stated. Kes did not have the qualifications to be a nurse, but had received permission from the captain to 'find her place here on our crew', so those qualifications were overridden by order of the captain. As Kes was performing the task admirably, it followed that adding 'trainee holoengineer' to her profile was both permitted and in line with his programming, allowing her additional access, in turn allowing him to override basic crew interaction protocols.
"I thought Tom was assigned to help you." the girl innocently asked.
"As I said, I had no one else to assist me," the program countered. "And now I have a patient with a possibly long-term physical illness, if that is not merely a feature of the race as a whole, and there is no counsellor on board for the men and women who are assaulting their base. Any crewmember participating in a direct military engagement is required to speak to a counsellor to deal with the issues those experiences inflict upon the participants, even if no physical injuries are sustained! I am an emergency medical supplement. Supplement, that is all. I wasn't programmed for any of this!"
Part of the EMH program generated alerts, growing concerned, as the young woman fell silent in thought. It was designed to speak its mind, such as it was, and doing so has been the cause of several of its previous iterations being shut down and sent back to Dr. Zimmerman for correction prior to the official roll out of its current generation.
That trepidation melted away as the lithe girl replied, "I don't know anything about holographic engineering, but if you want my opinion, you haven't been just a supplement. You've been remarkable."
The facsimile adjusted once more, showing self-deprecation and hesitant acceptance. "I've only done what my program is made for."
"Give yourself some credit." Kes smiled brightly once more, growing more animated as she spoke with open curiosity, "How does an organic doctor learn to deal with patient's emotional problems or dealing with work-related stress?"
"They learn from experience," the program responded almost immediately, such a direct question having an exact response in his databanks.
Kes grinned at it now, "Aren't you capable of learning."
Offering a slow nod, the projection outwardly agreed, "I have the capacity to accumulate and process data, yes."
"Then you are going to have to learn like the rest of us!" Kes happily explained, as if it was the most obvious thing in the universe.
Despite the innocuousness of the girl's statement, the program felt a subtle shift in its subroutines and order of directives. It knew she had a point, and more than that, the advice was useful. An EMH program was capable of self-adjustment, to prioritizing its acceptance and disagreement of various topics, and above all to learn and adapt to the changing needs of the crew it served with. His designation of Kes as a trainee holoengineer had been correct, as, even though she professed no knowledge of holoengineering, her logical processes had been an almost textbook debugging of his logical subroutines, leading to a clarification of purpose.
The crew didn't need an EMH program, it needed a Doctor. A crewmember. So it would learn to be one.
The facsimile smiled at the girl, "You will make an excellent doctor one day."
As the results of the scans of the alien's biology were completed, the program shifted its attention to Decision track 991, growing concerned for the wellbeing of the crew as it did so. The degradation was decidedly not a feature of this alien's race. The facsimile opened a channel to the ship's primary communication network, its vocalization subroutine stating, "This is the Emergency Holographic Doctor. Captain Janeway please report to Sickbay."
==/\==
I felt conflicted as I took a seat in the conference room, just off the bridge. Part of me would rather be down on that horror show of an outpost disguised as a lump of rock, watching over my people as they searched it for any more Vidiians, hidden from lifesign scanners and waiting for the chance to do something desperate. They'd stopped the outpost's guns from firing, and the self-destruct from activating, but we didn't know if there were any other hidden weapons. Or perhaps I could be on the captured ship currently docked with Voyager, going over it for data, tech, or traps. Instead I was called to offer a report before the combat operation had even been completed.
At least I wasn't alone.
The conference room seating was nearly identical to how it had been last time. One side of the ugly, grey table was lined by Chakotay, Paris, Kim, Neelix and Kes, while the other had Tuvok, myself, Torres and Wildman. The Doctor was once again remoting in from sickbay, his face on the screen behind the foot of the table. Standing at the head, in front of the large window, was Janeway, a cup of something in her hand that was giving off gentle waves of steam. As Janeway had called the meeting with no warning, I hadn't even been able to get a drink of my own.
Chakotay and myself probably looked much the worse for wear. We both had several light burns on our uniforms and dark smudges to our faces from various near misses or things that exploded around us during the taking of the ship, but, fortunately, once we'd knocked out their shields and Voyager had targeted it with her weapons, the small vessel the aliens were in had been easy enough to convince to surrender. Could have been a close thing, had they jumped to Warp with us still on it, and if they had been better prepared.
"Vidiian Sodality," the Captain softly spoke aloud, just above the background hum of the ship. It was a blatant power play, making us focus hard on her just to understand what she was saying.
She turned away from the window to face us, setting down her mug as she spoke in a more normal tone, "That is what they are called. I had the opportunity to speak with the one we first brought aboard earlier, his name is Dereth, by the way. When I asked why he had attacked Mr. Neelix and Ms. Harewood, Dereth said it was for the purpose of gathering replacement organs and suitable bio-matter."
"The Phage," Neelix hissed out.
As one, all eyes in the room shifted to the Talaxian, and the Provision-Commander coolly asked, "Something you'd like to share, Neelix?"
"I-I-I-," the orange crested alien stammered, apparently uncomfortable with all the attention he was currently receiving, his exclamation likely unintentional. He took a breath, and plowed forward, "The Phage is a terrible. . . . affliction to the Vidiians, and only the Vidiians. Thousands of them die to it daily, and have done for nearly two-thousand years."
The Doctor interjected at that moment, "It is also high adaptive. From the results of my scans, the Phage is quite literally a bacteriophage. Typically a virus that infects and replicates within bacteria and archaea."
"The irony here is that, on most Federation worlds - including Earth, bacteriophages are extremely common and are even beneficial to us," the EMH continued. "They act like the biological equivalent of a cruise missile, targeting only the specific bacteria that they hunt and ignore everything else. After humanity developed penicillin and other antibiotics, the medical equivalent of carpet bombing bacteria, Earth saw the rise of Superbugs that were immune to traditional medicine. Fortunately, bacteriophages proved to be a very useful counter. Today they are used in the food industry, medical diagnostics, counter-toxins, and drug discoveries. I can even modify them as need be, to counter xeno-bacteria that has infected the crew."
Wildman grinned softly, leaning forward to add, "They are also used in most ecological and evolutionary models for studying various organisms. But what does this have to do with the Vidiians?"
Looking at her, the EMH offered, "This Phage is targeted at Vidiian Hematopoietic stem cells. These are vital for a living body, as they can quite literally take on the traits of other cells. The bacteriophage infects the Hemocytoblast, which then mutates and spreads within a body as common myeloid and lymphoid progenitor cells, all the while carrying the Phage with it. From there, the virus will spread to anywhere within the body that blood can reach. At that point, the only thing managing to slow down the rate of infection is a unique bacteria that is naturally produced in the Vidiian stomach. The process is so deceptively efficient, and so hard to spread to non Vidiians, that I must conclude that it was likely originally a biological weapon."
Janeway mused, "I was curious about that myself, and Dereth told me that his people have dealt with this disease for so long they don't know how it began. It could have been a weapon, it could have been a natural development, but ultimately for us, and for them, it doesn't matter."
Kim stared at the table, eyes unfocused in thought, "To think, they have been dealing with this disease for two-thousand years. Two-thousand years ago on Earth, the Roman Empire was splitting into East and West. We were still burning wood for heat and horses to get around."
Kes looked curiously at the young Ensign as he muttered, but it was Neelix who spoke up, "The Vidiians have a somewhat, let's say complicated, relationship with the surrounding powers. No one is willing to enter the Sodality's territory as they know anyone found within isn't likely to last very long. At the same time, their medical technology is in great demand. So as long as the Sodality remains in their borders the Kazon, Haakorians, and everyone else will leave them alone.
"Then why were you telling us to fly this way?" Paris accused. "Got them a good deal on a new set of organs, lightly used, and they decided to take yours too?"
I leaned in to head off the coming fight, "Because they aren't supposed to be here." As everyone looked at me, I entered a few commands into my padd, rising as I spoke and crossing the room. "We're still more than a hundred light-years from Vidiian space."
"Excuse me Doc, I'll need to borrow your screen," I said to the EMH as I transferred the data to the larger screen. A colorful map of our current region of space filled the screen, with various polities grouped and color coded for visual ease. "After our people secured the outpost and the ship, I downloaded their astrometric data. No insult intended to Mr. Neelix, but their charts are more organized and up-to-date than his, though they lack things like trading opportunities or the dispositions of the various polities. Projecting the course Neelix directed us, we were on track to avoid Vidiian Sodality altogether, as well as the Haakonian Order and Krowtonan Guard. Although it does look like we will have to cross Numiri space."
Neelix bristled slightly, "A most unpleasant people, with powerful weapons and in a state of war with the Banea, but their sensor technology is so underdeveloped that Voyager should be able to slip through without being noticed. And the Banea are a very welcoming people who are always open to trade. Why, I once managed to trade for-"
"When we ask for recommendations on our flight path," Chakotay rumbled as he cut the alien off, "these are the kinds of things we like to know about ahead of time."
I shrugged. "For what it's worth, it does look like the safest path. Even if we will have to eventually enter Kazon space again. Until we hit Numiri space, this forty light-year radius we're in is effectively unclaimed. Likely why the Vidiians set this little trap up here in the first place."
With a few more taps, I brought the Doctor's face back to the screen and walked back to my seat. As I made my way around, Janeway added, "By their own admission, the Phage consumes their bodies, destroys their genetic codes and cellular structures. They have to. . . harvest," she nearly spat, "to gather replacements for what they have lost."
Torres looked up, "They obviously have advanced medical technology. Why don't they grow or clone the biomatter they need?"
"Because it won't work," the Doctor offered. "Once the disease has progressed to the point that organs are shutting down and need to be replaced, the Phage has subsumed the Vidiian immune system. Anything with a Vidiian DNA origin wouldn't be any more effective than covering your mouth with a tissue to stop the Auroral Plague. It further adapts to new organs, requiring a different genetic make up for every replacement organ it replaces, though different organs from the same species will still function for a time."
"Which explains why their species has eight different 'protected' planets listed on the map of their space," I frowned. Various eyes looked over at me, curious and waiting for an explanation, but I could already tell from the dark looks on the faces of Chakotay and Torres that they had come to the same conclusion I had. "Their species as a whole is really focused on fourteen major worlds, even though they're spread out over thirty or so systems. Why would they need those eight additional planets, protected from both attack and restricted to the Vidiian medical services, unless they are being used as farming worlds to harvest the required materials?"
Tuvok tilted his head at me, having been quiet up until now, "That is a very disturbing supposition, Commander."
Janeway nodded, adding, "One that makes far too much sense for my liking." She looked over at her First Officer and asked, "Did we find any resources we could use down there?"
Looking surprised, Chakotay started, "I hadn't begun to take an inventory of the outpost, but give us a couple of hours and we-"
"No," the Captain cut him off, "I mean natural resources. Anything we could extract from the rock, not the outpost itself."
I shared a brief look with the First Officer, and I think for the first time we both felt a bit of sympathy for the other as we knew what she was going to do. "No. No, the rock is effectively worthless for us."
Janeway was quiet for a long moment as she looked down at her cup, deep in thought. The silence stretched out uncomfortably, before she finally muttered, almost to herself, "We can't begin to understand what their people have gone through. They may have found a way to ignore the moral implications of what they have been doing, but as Starfleet officers we have no such luxury. What they are doing is a reprehensible and entirely unacceptable act, and if we were closer to home, I would lock them up and turn them over to our authorities for trial. But we don't have that ability here."
She looked up at us, as if that little speech wasn't for our benefit. "I see no other alternative but to let them go."
Almost immediately the room came alive with a mixture of outrage and anger. Chakotay couldn't believe what he was hearing and said as much, Paris began advocating blowing up the outpost outright, Torres shouted about the justice of leaving those murders in one piece so they could attack someone not as prepared as ourselves, and Kim started to cite regulations that prohibited Janeway from doing exactly what she was suggesting. Kes seemed like she didn't know what to say while Neelix seemed concerned, but as if he wasn't going to raise a fuss. Wildman looked sad, but resigned to the decision of her captain.
Tuvok and myself, likely for much the same reason, remained quiet. I had suspected that this would be the ultimate outcome of these events once Neelix had been attacked without being hurt. If she wasn't willing to do anything when it was a death sentence to him beforehand, she sure wasn't going to do anything when everyone was okay. As much as I wanted to, as much as my sense of right and wrong screamed at me, we didn't have the resources or the inclination needed to wage a one-ship war on a race of organ-harvesting slavers. At least, not right now.
With a little. . . inspiration, who knew what we'd do?
Janeway just let the outrage wash over her for a few seconds before raising her hands and voice, "Enough! My decision is made. There is nothing else we can do here."
Before I could even think to respond to that, to point out that we couldn't do anything only because Janeway commanded that we couldn't, the Captain stared hard at me and said, "We're not pirates, stealing every ship or piece of salvage not nailed down that we come across. We're better than that, and I will not hear any such talk, especially from you, Shepard. It isn't the way we do things, no matter what you're used to."
I looked at her in disbelief, did she not notice I was one of the few not objecting? I risked a quick glance around the room, a small frown my only outward reaction to being singled out. Torres started to object, but looked confused as she glanced my way, as did Kim and Paris. Before I could respond, Janeway continued.
She looked over at Torres, stating, "We will beam the outpost's people onto the ship we have docked with us, but not until we have a few precautions in place. I want you to disable their ships navigation system and program it to return to their base a few hours after we depart. That way the Vidiians aren't stranded, and we can leave a parting warning for them. I want to make sure they aren't a problem for us in the future."
I wondered what she was going to do to make sure they weren't a threat, but she just stared around at us, a 'get on with it' look across her face. Realizing that the parting warning was all she was going to do. We all reluctantly began to stand and collect our things to leave, everyone gathered pausing as the Captain made one final comment.
"Mr. Neelix, Mr. Shepard, a word before you leave."
A few quiet glances of concern from several of those present followed that request, but I settled back into my chair as the room cleared out. Neelix, taking a cue from me, sat back down in his own chair and leaned back. I couldn't help but feel slightly annoyed at how at ease he was, or at least appeared to be, but it wasn't really anything I could complain about.
Once the room was empty, Janeway sat down in her own chair and slowly retook her mug. After a long pull of the beverage, she relaxed back into her chair and eyed the two of us emotionlessly. I calmly waited for her to begin, enjoying the quiet, while Neelix fidgeted slightly at the ever lengthening silence. Once again, the Captain's power plays were as obvious as they were ineffective on me.
Finally, when neither of us broke, Janeway looked to the Talaxians and asked, "Mr. Neelix, what happened down there?"
"I-I don't know what you mean, Captain." The alien innocently replied.
"I mean," she coolly began, "why you ran off on your own. Commander Chakotay ordered you, three separate times, to stop what you were doing. To hold your position and wait for him to come to you before exploring deeper. Instead you continued on your own."
"Captain," Neelix started, visibly paling, which made his spots only seem more pronounced. He quickly barrelled forward in his defense with that same puppy-like energy he usually exhibited, "I was just doing what everyone else was doing. Looking for the dilithium! I know now there wasn't any down there, but at the time we were all searching and not finding anything. . . and I just wanted to be useful."
As the hard eyes of the Captain softened at the sight of the Talaxian, I finally realized why the idiot was able to get away with so much on the television show. Janeway was a dog person, it was even established in the first episode, and here was an alien that acted like a giant sentient overzealous puppy.
Son of a-
"Be that as it may, Mr. Neelix," the woman replied, "when on a mission we follow the orders of our superior officers. When you were told to wait, you should have waited. If you had, we might have been able to handle this entire situation with the Vidiians without anyone getting hurt."
"Hurt?" The Talaxian bristled, puffing himself up further in what I assumed was righteous indignation. "The only person who was getting hurt was me! That security woman who was assigned to protect me instead tried to manhandle me, and then to top it off she kicked me in my ribs!"
Without moving in her chair, Janeway swiveled in place toward me. "Well?"
I fought the urge to roll my eyes, and instead reached across my chest to the pocket on my left arm. "I expected this might be an issue. Once I got back on the ship I downloaded Harewood's bodycam footage. It should speak for itself."
"Bodycam?" Neelix stared at me, wide eyed.
I pulled a data storage chip out of the pocket and I slid it across the smooth table surface towards the Captain, simply stating, "Both Bell and Harewood were fielding new Combadges that had a built-in recording function. That is the footage from her camera. She pulled Neelix away from the cave walls because she was ordered to and he fought her the entire time, and she kicked Neelix out of the way of a Vidiian energy weapon to save his life."
Janeway picked up the device, not slotting it into her padd, and then swiveled her chair back to face the Talaxian. She raised her eyebrow at him, but the alien remained silent and brooded in his chair, like a kicked puppy. The Captain sighed, "Well, if you aren't going to say it, I will. You owe Ms. Harewood your life, and should be thanking her. Not making up reasons to turn her against you."
Neelix looked down, deflating slight, "Yes, Captain."
"Consider the matter closed." She turned her attention back to me, not punishing the Talaxian for his false accusations at all, and asked, "Body cam equipped combadges. Where did the idea for this come from?"
"Practicality," I answered with a one-shouldered shrug. "Things happen on away missions. Things you might not notice at the time, things you sometimes can't really put into words when you write your reports. Sometimes accusations get thrown around by aliens when we visit their planets or by teammates," I pointedly didn't look at the Talaxian at that. "So I needed to fix that, to help make the crew more secure."
"And you just made these from scratch?" she asked. "Not something you've used. . . before? Commander Chakotay didn't mention any cameras."
"The designs for it were already in the main computer," I informed her, which was even the truth, "but I think they never moved forward with implementing the idea because of limited storage space. They're too small. I just fixed that problem a few days ago by linking them to the omni-tool. To address any privacy concerns, they are blackboxed so they can only activate when not on the ship, or when a red alert is called."
Janeway nodded along at my explanation, staring at the data chip, before saying, "Sounds like a good idea. As away teams are sent out, go ahead and issue the new comm badges. Might as well do a gradual roll out of it. Especially since it requires an omni-tool to pair with and not everyone has one yet. Yes, I think the crew needs to know we'll be watching out for them."
I nodded, and she continued, "Mr. Neelix, you are dismissed."
Once the Talaxian said his goodbyes and shuffled out, the Captain took another drink and slowly began to say, "Are you and I going to have a problem with the way I'm handling the Vidiians?"
"Permission to speak freely, ma'am?" I requested. If she wanted honesty, I would be honest, up to a point. However, I wasn't going to let her trap me into an insubordination charge.
She grinned wryly at me, trying to be charming. "No need for that, Shepard. Say what you're thinking."
I took that as a yes, my own Combadge recording this conversation. The storage was small, but it could handle a twenty minute conversation. "If we are being open and honest with each other, no." I admitted. "I understand why you are handling this the way you are, and that you're prepared to deal with the fallout of your decision."
Janeway seemed to take a slow, deep breath, putting down her drink and leaning forward, looking me in the eye. "You just don't agree with it."
Her statement left no room for doubt, and left me with nothing else to say except, "Correct."
The Captain sunk back further into her chair, looking in my general direction, but not at me. Her eyes were distant, the look of someone thinking heavily about something and not being able to come to an internal consensus. She picked up her beverage and took another drink, only to frown at her mug and mutter about it being empty.
Finally, she looked at me and said, "I suppose it would only be fair to ask how you and your former associates would handle this situation." I suppose it would have been difficult to hide my surprise at that, and it must have shown because Janeway smirked back at me, "Glad I could surprise you, although I find that asking your opinion to be surprising is more than a little worrisome."
Looking at her, I schooled my expression and stated, "To be fair, and honest, there is no morally correct way to handle this situation. Not by the rules of the Federation. If you took the Vidiian prisoners onboard, you risk infecting the crew if it can jump to humans, as well as wasting resources keeping people alive that we aren't equipped to spend. Voyager isn't meant for prisoner transport, and we don't have the resources to spend to retool it to that purpose, nor would it likely be wise."
At her nod I continued, "We also can't turn them over to their legitimate government because what they did wouldn't be considered wrong by their own laws. And if we turned them over to a nearby power, they could condemn the Vidiians to death and Federation law prevents us from knowingly doing that. Starfleet also prohibits the killing of captured prisoners ourselves, however repugnant their crimes, though that rule was likely written with the assumption that ships could return to Federation space with a few months at most. And finally, the option you have chosen, leaving them alone and moving on, leaves a trap in place for any number of other species to fall into."
"Good to know I'm not the only one who sees the problems," Janeway snarked, standing to move over to the replicator with her mug and pausing there to request, "Coffee, black."
Reequipped with her beverage of choice, she spoke while returning to her chair, "And if their own species, which has spent so long with this disease and has medical technology that is even more advanced than the Federations, hasn't come up with a solution, then I have little hope of the Doctor finding a cure before we're well beyond their space."
I kept my preferred solution of adjusting the Phage to make things worse for the Vidiians to myself. After all, the fastest way to kill a disease is to remove what kept it alive. Not all Vidiians were infected, after all, just the ones that Voyager dealt with. Given how the organs they stole would be a rare commodity, it was likely that those in power either all had the Phage, or enough did to not matter. Killing them would cause a minor societal collapse that, while likely ultimately beneficial, would put them in such disarray that Voyager could slip away as the rot, held at bay through the blood of the innocent, ate their government and industry away from the inside out. It would be fitting.
I supposed I could also spend points on a cure. It did exist, after all, just not yet, and it was technically technology. I didn't try to find the cost, not really wanting to buy it, and instead asked, "Why not just disable the weapons on their ships, and set the navigation computers to Sodality space? Then we could collect what we want from their base and blow it to hell. Would get us past the moral question of what to do with them, and remove a known trap."
"Because Federation laws also prevent us from doing that," Janeway sighed. "If these were rogues or criminals, acting on their own and against their government, we could. But for them, this is a normal internal matter and it would be against the Prime Directive to interfere with it or apply our own moral compass to the situation."
"Maybe against the letter of the Prime Directive," I countered, not mentioning that was exactly what she'd done with the Caretaker, "but not the spirit of it. By such a reading, a society that commits the most heinous of crimes against the poor and vulnerable of both themselves and their neighbors should be ignored, even against the Federation itself. Those who wrote the original laws were intelligent, maybe too impressed with their intelligence for their own good, but even they hadn't foreseen a situation like this one. One only has to look at some of those the Federation holds up as heroes, to see the laws versus accepted practice."
Janeway frowned, "Those were different times, Shepard, and we're not like that anymore. Back then space was so large, so lawless, and the Federation met it at its lowest level. The Prime Directive stood up to that, and showed it's worth as, more times than not, it was the violating of it that got us in trouble. We've become better, Shepard, and I won't see us backslide into those darker days. I'd rather see Voyager destroyed than fall."
I blinked at her, wondering if she'd heard what she just said. We were literally in uncharted space, in areas so far from Federation law & order that we'd captured an outpost of murderous organ-thieves backed by an empire a third the size of the Romulans. Her duty, whatever she may believe, was to her crew and the Federation, not it's ideals above even the people. I had to repress a snort as, with that kind of devotion to the cause, she might've done well in Section 31, if only she could see past her pride and belief.
She glanced at me, as if she'd forgotten I was there. "So, I suppose that is the answer to how you would handle this? Remove them and destroy the outpost, or do nothing and just leave?"
I knew my real answer, 'Kill the pirates, strip down the tech for supplies and technological advances, and leave while keeping our distance from the Vidiian Sodality now that we know they're there,' would not go over well. No, I'd forgotten for a moment that we weren't equals, working together, but opposites, and that half the problems that Voyager faced were the result of the embodiment of the Peter Principle sitting across from me. No, I'd give her an answer she could accept, but that would move my own goal, keeping Voyager safe, forward.
I shook my head. "My old organization wouldn't make either decision at this juncture. We don't know enough about the species in question, or the politics of the region, to make any definitive choice. That is why people like me exist, to gather the information needed to make those hard choices."
She waved her for me to continue, so I elaborated, "Going on your thought of finding a cure, if it is even possible, it might not be in everyone's best interest to do so. The Vidiians are obviously advanced, much more so than the more violent Kazon factions, and likely on par with the surrounding civilizations if they haven't overrun them all. Right now, there is an understanding between the powers, an established status quo, and interfering with that could have any number of knock on effects. Like it or not, this is a Prime Directive situation, where if one were to break it, one must do so carefully and with a great deal of forethought.
"Maybe without the disease, the Vidiians turn their attention back to being a people who explore and build great things, or they turn their attention to conquest," I proposed. "What if the other species, no longer worried about getting sick, invade them to wipe out a people who has spent thousands of years treating all other species like a farmer watching over a crop, waiting for the slaughter? We would spend years, at least, trying to figure out what would happen before we did anything. Not unless there was an immediate need to do something."
Janeway frowned, looking past me at the bulkheads. "I can see that. When I was given a command, I was expecting to study primitive peoples and stellar phenomena on the frontiers of the Federation and just beyond. Deep space exploration, but in bursts. Issues like this one could have been pushed up the chain of command. Time wouldn't exactly be an issue and there would be no need for immediate decisions to be made on the fly. But this situation is far from what I expected."
"None of us expected this." I offered, the momentary sympathy costing me nothing. After a few moments, I asked, honestly interested, "Why are you asking me about this and not your First Officer or Tuvok?"
She offered a weak smile when she looked back at me. "I asked for their opinions just before we gathered."
Ignoring the minor stub of only having my opinion asked after the decision was made, I smiled to show I didn't take offense, "That explains why Tuvok was so unmoved."
Janeway nodded, taking a quick sip of her drink before turning to face the stars and dismissing me with a distracted, "Thank you for your time, Mr. Shepard."
==/\==
Torres was halfway under a control panel when I found her on the Vidiian's ship. Although ship was a bit too grand of a term for it. The Vidiian vessel was armed to the teeth, almost a match for Voyager in terms of fire power as well as speed, but only half the size of the Intrepid-Class. At only two-hundred meters, if you lined the two ships up side by side it would only reach Voyager's main deflector. It was closer in size to a Federation Runabout, which belied the impact it could bring in a battle. While the Federation specialized in technical devices, ships able to adapt on the fly, the Vidiians went for strength. Not brutality, their weapons were meant for targeted strikes, likely to enemy weapons and engines. The fact that they had three was worrying, and meant I'd need to look into something to help Voyager survive if she threw down with them.
"Find anything interesting down there?" I ask, chuckling as my sudden question startled the engineer and caused her to jerk up and hit something, even as a hand darted down to the phaser I saw strapped to her ankle.
"Ow," B'Elanna grouched, shuffling out from under the H-shaped console station with one hand on her forehead. Seeing me smiling, the half-Klingon snarked, "Let's get you some cranial ridges and then see if you like getting them smashed on the back of the console."
I shifted into a thoughtful pose, smirking slightly, "I thought the cranial ridges made it harder to hurt your head?"
"Not mine." she frowned, before smiling up at me. "What brings you over here?"
Making a show of looking around the ship, I replied, "Didn't really get a good chance to look everything over when I was last here. Thought I would take a look around. Besides, my favorite engineer alone on an alien ship? Unacceptable."
"I'm not in any danger here, and besides I work faster this way. Fewer distractions." She dramatically rolled her eyes at me, smirking back.
"How's the autopilot coming?" I inquired, leaning against the console and looking down at where she sat.
"That? Took me five minutes," Torres dismissed, waving at a different console. "I'm trying to get rid of their sensor data of Voyager. Security said the scans they got of Voyager were passive, barely useful, but not only has this thing been actively scanning, it's gotten a good long look at the ship's internals."
I walked over to a console, what I assumed was the ships sensor suite, and was a little impressed at the detail it was pulling up with just its passive sweeps of the surroundings. If this thing had been actively scanning, it could likely tell me the entire crew's medical histories. Looking over at the smaller woman, I opined, "Wish we didn't have to just give away a ship we captured."
Torres got up and followed me, seeing what I was looking over, and scowled. "Yeah, especially to a group of organ harvesting murderers," she growled. "In the Maquis, we used everything we had or came across. We couldn't afford to leave free things like this ship or that entire outpost just laying around."
She smiled, obviously thinking of something, "One time the Cardassians tried to use a. . . well, that's a story for another time." Torres cut herself off, likely not wanting to reveal the Dreadnought she'd repurposed into a planet-killer. "Anyway, we would have never just left a mini-warship just laying around. Especially one this interesting! Powerful weapons, powerful shields, fast enough to keep up with us on its down, and it has a unique dampening field system that vampires energy off enemy ships."
I wandered over to the weapons display, using my omni-tool to translate the foreign language for me as I read things such as range and weapons output. We'd pulled enough from their databanks that the first contact suite all Federation ships came with had already deconstructed their written language. She wasn't kidding about how well armed the small ship was, and I revised my estimates upwards. I really needed to get Voyager better weapons. "Makes sense. Vidiians don't want to blow up ships full of fresh organs."
B'Elanna blanched at the realization, then grew thoughtful. "Wish we could at least get a nice long look at their technology."
"Why can't we?" I innocently queried.
The Chief Engineer frowned over at me, as if I was being deliberately obtuse. In her defense, I was. "We were ordered to return the ship," she reminded me. "Voyager is going to be leaving soon."
"Just because the ship goes back, doesn't mean that everything on it needs to." I easily grinned at the woman. She was a natural rebel, had to be or she would have never joined the Maquis, which inclined her to snubbing authority when she knew it the right thing to do.
Pitching my voice as innocently as possible, I asked, "How much longer would it take to set up the auto-pilot?"
Torres looked at me quizzically, before understanding of what I was really asking began to dawn on her. With an easy smile, she pointed at the navigation station and its already prepared autopilot, "Well, with this being an alien ship, that we know nothing about, I'll need to be very careful about what I do and how I do it. Wouldn't want to mess up something and blow up those poor, innocent, murderers after all. It could take hours."
"Sounds like a big task. Want some help?" I asked, raising an eyebrow at her. I was happy to see she was onboard. We should be able to scavenge who knows how many interesting pieces of technology from the hold or various ship systems. We wouldn't need a lot of space to store it, just deep scans of the large things and small samples of the more advanced bits scanners couldn't penetrate. If doing so rendered the ship unable to do anything more than make the short sublight trip back to their planetoid, I didn't care. I wasn't even violating the spirit of the Captain's orders. They wouldn't be stranded, after all, as they had two more ships.
Smiling slyly with me, she teased, "That depends. Are you as good with a spanner as you are with a phaser?"
==/\==
Dereth looked over the data in his hands, trying and failing to stop himself from freezing at the implications. This species, Humans, were viable for organ harvesting, but it was a trap. A terrible trap he needed to warn his people of. They seemed too good to be true, a new source of flesh completely unique in this area of space, and they were. This race had, in their arrogance, tried to cure the Phage as so many had, only to make a terrible discovery. Upon contact with the flesh of their main species, the 'human', the Phage mutated!
Not a reduction in effectiveness, as so many had hoped for, just the opposite. It sent the Phage into hyper-production, increasing the viral load three fold in days! Projections they'd run when given the data from the ship they'd tried to harvest were already showing that a Vidiian's natural defenses - such as they were - would be overwhelmed in days after the mutation takes hold! No one would be able to harvest replacements fast enough to meet the demands as organs rapidly shut down and rotted away within the infected. This higher viral load would spread even faster, normal quarantine protocols unable to handle the amount of infected materials without costly hardening.
At first he and the others on board their vessel had been relieved, thankful even, that the Humans from Voyager hadn't killed them. They'd stunned them because they were afraid, as so many were of the Vidiian's appearance; they'd made fools of the outposts security in the process, not designed for such a heavy assault; but they'd offered no true malice towards them, being a ship of explorers and scientists stranded by the alien race that sometimes brought in ships from across the galaxy.
Once Dereth and the others had been placed on their ship, stripped bare as it was, and told that the computer would slowly return them to their outpost once their own vessel had departed, Dereth had made mental notes to have the ship tracked and harvested. It was a valuable find, with more than a hundred unclaimed bodies ready for processing that wouldn't have to be shared with the Sodality. Everyone on that outpost would be able to have fresh organs, new skin, and maybe add two more decades to their shortening lifespan.
They'd recieved the data from the vessel, but it was dismissed. Other species had tried to show the Vidiians that they'd done 'tests' on how they would be rejected as organ donors. Dereth's kidneys came from one such species. It was the Vidiian's own sensors, far superior to that of any other race, that he trusted above all else.
The two who had come aboard their ship and removed anything non vital had been scanned intensely, by the vessels systems. At first it appeared that the female, a human hybrid with a race the ship's computers had called a 'Klingon'. The basic, preliminary scans by the tertiary system, which hadn't been disabled, suggested her DNA might be able to provide a potential vaccine to the Phage, but the computer had ran the simulations and found that she wouldn't be any more useful to them than a Kazon or one of those poor souls on the farms.
The Human male on the other hand, was a nightmare. Even passively, and hidden, the ship's sensors had provided a better, more detailed scan than the vessel that had captured them had provided. Dereth had been correct, in that the ship's conclusions had been wrong about the effects the Phage had when exposed to human tissue.
It was worse.
Not only would their bodies would react to the Phage in unpredictable ways not seen before in other species but it would spread to those who already had the Phage, co-opting the infection into the newer, more virulent strain. The medical field had long believed that there must be a species out there in the universe with a natural immunity to the Phage, but the nightmare scenario has always been finding one that served as a willing carrier with no harmful side effects, every member a potential infection vector.
They had never considered there might be a species out there that made the Phage worse.
Kagsaran approached him from behind. "Is there something wrong, Dereth? You've been staring at those reading for an hour. We're ready to launch, they can't have gotten far!"
Dereth turned to his compatriot, eyes wide in terror. This was how it started! They'd harvest them, but someone would ship an organ home. A heart, a spleen, an eye. And from there, the world would rot. His words came, tinged with terror, but strong with certainty.
"I must contact the Ministers. Humans are too dangerous to allow in our space!"