Chapter Four
Trauma
Jonathan Archer strode into Sick Bay, doing his very best to hide a towering fury. When Lt. Reed had contacted him minutes ago he had just set down Porthos' dinner plate, and he'd listened in monumental disbelief to his Security Chief's report. That report had filled him with rage. He'd spent the entirely of the fast walk just trying to get his expression, his manner, under control. It would do no good to let anyone see his emotional response or to give vent to that response, but inside his feelings were volcanic.
When he'd passed two Crewmen on the way and they'd actually withdrawn a step as he passed, he tried even more strongly for an outward control. Now, as he arrived, not slacking his pace as he strode in, he had to admit to himself that he did not yet have it.
He found Phlox alone in the main room. "Phlox." His voice was low; the loudest he could make it was just barely audible. If he tried for any louder, he would start shouting.
The Denobulan looked up at him, his expression grim. "She's in my office. I've asked Ensign Cutler to sit in with her." Archer knew they both worked in Life Sciences, so he considered it a good choice.
"How is she?"
"Her injuries are considerable, but she is unwilling to let me touch her, or even get near her."
"How badly was she injured?"
Phlox hesitated, uncomfortable. "Aside from the injuries sustained in trying to fight off her attacker, there are, well… On your world they used to say 'size doesn't matter'. Believe me, Captain, it does."
Archer did not answer; there was no need to. As he tried to bury the mental image the Denobulan's words created, he also tried to bury his mounting anger.
He succeeded at neither.
"How is she now?"
Phlox shook his head. "Unresponsive." His eyes flickered to a door, as much as to say he had given all the answers he had. He led the way, Archer working harder at getting his expression under control.
When the door opened, it was to a small office, just enough room for a desk with a computer terminal and two chairs. The one from behind the desk had been brought out, close to the other, and in that far one Elizabeth Cutler sat perched on its edge, her manner solicitous yet non-invasive.
In the chair closer to the door sat Dina Samuels, her body completely enshrouded in a large blue blanket that was held clutched tightly about her. She held her gaze downward, determinedly not looking at anyone. She did not seem to be breathing, holding herself totally motionless, her entire body silently screaming. Her face, from what they could see from the profile turned to them, was bruised and swollen. Cutler had managed to clean the blood from her mouth, nose and cheeks, but had been unable to do more. Dina had barely allowed her touch in doing that much.
Liz looked up at them long enough to give the smallest possible shrug. She turned her attention back to Dina, her voice so soft they could barely hear her. "Dina?" There was no reaction at all, and she tried again just as softly. "Dina? Captain Archer is here." The woman's only reaction was a quick quarter-gasp, instantly silenced. She bit her lower lip between her teeth, not releasing it, using it to keep silent. A fine trembling enveloped her body.
"Dina?" Archer said, taking his tone from Cutler. Very slowly he entered the small room, dropping down to one knee beside the woman. She did not move, but when Archer's body came into her field of vision only her eyes shifted as she sought a new spot in the room that had no one in it. She started to tremble even more, her soft breath shuddering. Archer backed away a bit, allowing her to look into her original safe spot. He looked at Cutler, then Phlox, seeking some clue to guide him.
When he'd knelt beside her, he'd finally seen her full on. Both her eyes were blackened and swollen, and though the blood had been washed from her face her lower lip and cheeks were both cut. She looked so different from when he'd seen her barely more than an hour ago.
"Dina?" Cutler said softly. "Captain Archer will not hurt you. He's here to help you." She paused, finding no reaction, except that the trembling had diminished as he'd withdrawn. "He's your friend."
Archer cast a surprised look at the Exobiologist. Cutler was treating her colleague, an eminently capable scientist, as though she were a child. But reflecting on the experience the woman had suffered, he decided this was probably the best course to ease through the walls that shock had erected around the woman.
"Dina? Can you talk to me?" He asked softly. Her eyes flickered further away. Heartsick, he remembered the last long conversation he'd had with the woman. "You once told me that you do not run." He reminded her gently. "That you would stand and fight, and that you would kick the balls of any enemy if you could."
She closed her eyes tightly, and her body trembled more. She made a soft sound that might have been a sob if she'd permitted it to take form. But then when she opened her eyes she looked further away from him.
"You're a strong woman. You need to tap that strength." He put his hand out, reaching for hers. Both Cutler and Phlox exclaimed an urgent warning just as his hand crossed into her vision, almost touching her.
Dina's earsplitting screech deafened everyone in the small room as she launched herself out of the chair, her fist slamming into Archer's face. Only the fact that she was almost cocooned in the blue blanket dulled the blow, but then the blanket fell from her bare body and she was free of it, screaming wildly as she attacked him with a whirlwind of punches and kicks that drove the astonished man back before Liz Cutler grabbed her! She threw her arms about the wildly raging woman's naked body, trying to pin her arms to her sides as Archer withdrew out of range to where Phlox stood in the doorway. He was astounded. For all her distress, Dina had managed to land quite a few strong blows.
Liz tried to keep a desperate grip on the unclothed woman as she continued to scream cries of murderous rage, trying her best to kick her Captain, her bare foot coming only inches too short. "Get out of here!" She urged the men, barely managing to hold on to the wildly struggling woman. As they withdrew out the door, Dina's murderous fury was frustrated, and in a few more seconds her mad strength faded. Her legs gave out and Liz did not have to hold so tightly, changing her grip to one of support as the woman slowly sank to the floor. Liz knelt, holding Dina as she wept, her body wracked by torrential sobs.
Liz stretched her hand out for the blanket just barely in reach as she glanced up, seeing the two just beyond the doorway, distressed concern etched on their faces. "Captain, please, won't you two just get out of here?" She drew the blanket over the weeping woman's nude body, holding her and rocking her gently as Dina clung to her, pouring out her wounded grief. They backed away, Phlox pressing the button to close the door. The outer room was utterly silent.
"Come, Captain, I'll get you something for those bruises you're going to have."
xx
In the twenty minutes that passed, even while Phlox was working to prevent the results of Dina's 'defense' from becoming too apparent on Archer's face, Malcolm Reed had arrived to give his report.
Archer did not comment on the bloodstains near the shoulder of his uniform.
"Sir, he does not deny it. In fact, near as I can tell with Capellans, he seems to feel nothing is wrong. He says he thought she was his 'receptance'. Apparently, when she put up a fight, he was sure she was. Apparently it was implicit in the orders you gave her."
Archer felt an icy hand grip his heart as he reviewed his words here so short a time before! He could find nothing in them that would have led to that conclusion – that would have led a human to that conclusion. But inside, the horror grew as he realized that in dealing with a new culture…
No! He had not sent her off to this fate! These Capellans might try some type of doubletalk, but…
"I have him locked in his quarters under heavy guard. If it were up to me he'd be in the brig, but I figured that should come from you." There was heavy restraint in the man's tone.
Archer looked at him closely. He'd known Reed far too long. "The brig?" He asked, knowing that had not been Reed's first choice.
"An airlock." Reed admitted, not wanting to have been found being less than regulation, but pleased to be able to admit an honest answer.
The main doors behind him opened again and a woman entered. This one, rather than being clad in the regulation Starfleet uniform, wore black trousers and a royal blue shirt, the high collar of which was a round band of white about her throat. From a short 'V' of blue which matched the shirt hung a conjoined red Roman, white Malta and black and gold Temple cross. "I felt under the circumstances…" Reed began, not even having to look behind himself. Archer raised his hand to cut off the unnecessary explanation.
"Thank you for coming, Mother McCabe. I was, in fact, just about to send for you. We're going to need your help on this."
"I'll do what I can, Captain." Seeing the work Phlox was doing, she allowed the question to be read plainly in her eyes.
"It appears Miss Samuels is still quite capable of handling herself." Archer explained. He glanced at Reed. "A testament to your training."
"I only wish…" He began, but had no words to finish it.
Phlox turned from his work on Archer's face. "Mother McCabe, have you had much experience in dealing with rape trauma?"
"Far too much for my liking."
x
She was spared any explanation as the door to Phlox's office opened again. Elizabeth Cutler stood in the opening, her body blocking any view within. She was not unduly surprised to see that the number of people had doubled. "Captain?" Archer stepped up to her, pitching his voice low in hopes he could keep it from carrying back into the room.
"Is she …"
"Lucid, sir. She's asking to see you." Her eyes flickered to the others. "Alone." She was well conscious of the fact that as a Life Sciences Ensign only peripherally a member of Phlox's staff she faced down the ship's Commander, Chief of Security, Chief Medical Officer and Chaplain, none of whom she could bar. "It's a small room." She told them by way of 'explanation'.
"Quite right, Ensign." He was about to step past her, but stopped. "I'd like you to keep yourself available." He told her softly, his meaning clear. She had already been performing her service as an 'Advocate', even to properly throwing them out of the room earlier, and he wanted her to continue doing so.
"Aye, sir. I'll be there." She stepped aside, letting him into the room.
x
When the door closed behind him Jonathan Archer stood looking at Dina. She was once again in the same chair, swaddled about with the voluminous blue blanket; but this time her eyes, when she looked up at him, showed that she was in the room with him.
"Captain, I am sorry!" She said feelingly. "I just couldn't control myself. I'm sorry!" Archer was sure there were no marks upon his face to fuel her guilt.
"Nothing against you, En – Dina. Put it completely out of your mind."
"Thank you, sir."
The silence seeded, took root and grew.
"Are you able to talk about this?"
She pressed her lips together tightly, holding back her answer. Finally; "I know all too well I'll be talking about it a lot in the next few days." She hung her head, her brown hair curtaining her face. "A lot."
The silence came to full bloom, and it was all too clear she was not ready to begin. He did not push her. He knew that, once begun, it would be a long time before the ending. He let her choose her own time. Finally, when she met his eyes again, some of the fire he knew was back.
"Captain, tell me why we're here. Please. Tell me why we're dealing with these people!"
"Starfleet has found this planet is rich in topaline."
She nodded, but it was a resigned gesture. "Life support systems use a lot of topaline. It's an excellent filter for almost any organic and inorganic matter, but oxygen passes through like it's not even there." He knew then that she was still partially in shock; her summation had been almost right out of a textbook, as if she were remembering the words without thinking about them. She sat quietly for a long moment, looking at her clenched hands even under the blanket as they clutched the material closed tightly about her. Finally her eyes came up to him. "Is Starfleet satisfied with the price?"
x
He did not answer her bitter question, knowing it would do no good. The question did not come from the better part of her, the part that knew Starfleet would never consider such a 'price'. There was no way to answer it.
Personally he felt that the 'price' was already far too high.
The silence grew painful, the fruit it was bearing bitter indeed.
"Lt. Reed, Phlox and Mother McCabe are all outside. I've asked Ensign Cutler to also be available for you twenty four hours a day."
"Thank you, Captain." She said very softly, staring at the floor.
"Is there anything you need?"
"Captain, there's only one thing I need. Only one thing I want!" She shook her head, not raising her eyes. "And you and I both know Starfleet is never going to give it to me."
"What is it?" He asked, determined that if it was in his power to give, she would have it. She looked up at him, her eyes deadly.
"I want his penis in Chef's meat grinder!"