Very short, but seemed best by itself instead of joined to 34, ...and apologies about the 'T'. Will go back and fix...

33

Endurance, in the Medlab-

The mental firewall was down, and everything hurt, to a degree and extent he would not have believed possible. Light stabbed, noises shrieked, harness straps jerked and tore, and everything else burned.

Two thoughts..., that the woman he kept glimpsing was trying to help, and that he might be dying..., came and went like stray cats. Not very conspicuous or demanding; just there. Altogether, he would rather have gone back to darkness and peace.

"No, you don't!" Dr. Bennett snapped, as she struggled to prevent almost total systemic crash. Her young patient, who (other than being underweight) had entered suspended animation in perfect health, was now close to complete cardio-vascular, renal and hepatic collapse. On top of which, he didn't want to stay conscious. Not that she blamed him. The cryoprotectant was everywhere, and his body had decided to attack it, treating the substance as a foreign invader.

Cytokines, prostaglandins and other savage alarm chemicals were ripping through the young man's shuddering body, triggering necrosis, shock and, if she didn't do something quick, death. It was situations such as this one that the term 'agony' had been invented for.

Roger, too, was in a bad way, semiconscious and dehydrated. The Marine writhed feebly in his harness, wracked with pain and freezing cold. Pete was seeing to him, with Dr. Kim's help. Alone among the three frozen astronauts, Cho had come through the process unscathed. Besides slurred speech and a bit of disorientation, she seemed to be doing fine. Maybe women were better able to cope...? Whatever, the exobiologist was doing her best to comfort Roger, as the mission commander medicated him. And all this in zero-G, which complicated everything.

In the meantime, John's convulsions had eased (a good sign, probably), but his temperature had spiked to 105 degrees. Much higher, and he'd suffer permanent brain damage. Injecting another load of 'capture molecule', Linda used every trick she knew to keep the pilot awake and fighting.

"C'mon, Sunshine, stay with me. I can't do this without your help."

One eye on the biomonitor, the other on his face,

(pupils dilated nearly to the edge of the iris, making his normally purplish eyes look almost black... dry skin... breathing irregular and shallow... she was going to have to intubate, if he didn't turn around, fast)

she continued,

"I want to learn a new language, John. Something exotic. Say something to me in..."

The doctor drew a blank, able to recall only Pete's joking phrase: 'Lower Slamdunkian'. Then a blurry, delirious voice from across the medlab said,

"Klingon...! S' the new lingo franco..."

Roger, evidently coming around a bit. Perplexed, Linda scratched at her head. Klingon was an actual language? People spoke it?

At this point, holding to a bulkhead bracewhile administering intravenous aspirin to lower John's fever, Dr. Bennett was willing to try anything.

"Say something to me in Klingon, Sunshine. I want to expand my cultural horizons."

It worked. Linda wasn't sure that the resultant collection of grunts and snarls was a real language, but whatever he'd said to her...

"...Hab SoSll' Quch...!"

...got a woozy grin out of Roger, who then launched into what sounded like a drinking song, as rendered by a gargling wolf with a severe personality disorder. By the time Thorpe sloshed his way through the fifteenth verse, John was much better (had joined in, even, though he seemed to be making up his own lyrics), and Linda wanted to return both of them to critical condition with her two hands and a baseball bat.

Oddly enough, though, when her grandson dragged her to a Star Trek convention many years later, she heard that same exact song, had a good laugh, and then cried.