The Assignment
Star Trek – Animorphs
C. Lupus. Caninae, of the canidae family. Carnivorous.
Obviously.
Twelve incisors to grip flesh, four canines for disruption of arterial flow, heavy muscle to bite and crush. Lt. Harvard's medical scans remained as a reconstructed dental mold in his office that this doctor would bet matched the yellowed beauties down to native saliva-based pathogens.
A man didn't need a medical license to identify the animal bleeding all over black synth-leather. What he needed shone like rain in a bottle. What he needed could fill several requisition forms.
In the breadth of a career spanning the past twenty-five years, Leonard 'Bones' McCoy fought death and disease to the very brink of human knowledge. To the breaking point. To the bone.
Despite every lesson, training session and actual experience in medicine concocted by Federation specialists, the galaxy still threw him into the unknown at least once a week. Usually kicking and screaming. Always prepared to fight for the lives of anyone fortunate enough to cross paths with him and a handy hypospray.
Really. At times it boggled the mind how very ungrateful the poor ingrates in his sickbay could be.
Then again, if Bones couldn't handle uncooperative crewmen, he'd chosen the wrong profession.
What the good doctor needed was to understand how, exactly, this prime example of terran fauna made its way to Eirin to finally end up in his medbay.
A prickle in the fingertips, heat, flooding through the blood vessels and gritting his teeth. Callous skin under the hair yielded to cautious prods. When a deeper probing touched moving bones, unless he'd lost all sense of where organs should be, unless this thing had anatomy unpredictable as the surface of a star, he took a firm hold to steady his patient.
Seized the limb. Clenched bile down and swallowed, twice, eyes unseeing to let himself think it through. A moment. All he had.
Changing. Harmful? To the animal - no way of knowing. To human life?
As if seeing the room for the first time, McCoy peered over the stricken beast. Shock and intrigue. Faces drawn for the taste of something new.
"Get out. All of you!" Short waves sent medical personnel on the scurry. Security and those of different scientific persuasion paused on a single step. A scowl set into the depths of his face, the wave now a sharp jab at the exit. "Now!"
No-one disobeyed that tone. Soon it was him, Spock and the... the wolf.
Which wasn't looking very wolf-like. It had the basic shape, sure. But if it hadn't just lost the points of its teeth and the whites of its eyes didn't just roll to show a disturbingly shrunken iris, it might suit the CMO of the Enterprise well to serve up his hat and resign.
Leonard didn't need to know just yet what was causing it. For now, it needed stabilising. Then he could yell at Spock until the commander figured out another pressure-formed diamond of a solution.
The legs, boneless, then not. A soft crunch as they slapped on the bed made him wince but McCoy couldn't wait around and hold its hand. Paw.
A call through the intercom, the professional calm of their resident linguist and communications officer met his medical authority to begin quarantine procedures.
That sealed the deal. And the room.
Soft red lights lit the med-laboratory in a warning glow.
Immediate concern for the crew solved, he could focus. On the malformed wolf body and did it just lose a tail?
Teeth, mutated eyes and missing tail. Entire body changing. The fur missing over boneless legs, probably sensitive, probably - eyes wide at the implication - agonizing.
What on earth was happening to the poor thing's central nervous system? Could it feel those changes? Feel the way a slither of something just under the belly moved down, out of place, a ribbed snake of intestine because what else could it be?
No. He didn't want to know. Stabilise it. Keep it alive. For God's sake, the thing could be sentient. This could be a chance at first contact with a new species.
A coffin wouldn't make a very fine welcome wagon to the Federation, now would it?
Not the proper set-up. A hypospray in hand, fingers parting the heavy pelt to find some skin, McCoy cursed. And hesitated.
There was no way of knowing how it might react to a sedative. To a neural blocker. To anaesthetic, in any dosage. But it could be in pain. He rubbed his own chest, the animal's fur dark against pale skin.
Soft footsteps and the presence of the vulcan at his side made the doctor uncomfortably aware of his own indecision. Spock didn't ask, didn't make a point of it but didn't offer an unasked-for answer either. Not quite normal. Hackles up, McCoy answered in a bark.
"What?"
A pause let the matter settle, probably, from the Lt. Commander's perspective. Spock swept his arms behind his back to stand at a relaxed military rest. Bowed neck allowed an unshaken view of the miracle of science going on right before their eyes.
Said miracle, or disaster if you asked him, sighed.
An eye rolled to look at them, the forward-facing neck moving as fluidly as a doctor could like. Leonard's feet tended to be steady as his hands. He stood stock-still.
Human. Cranial orbit to fit a skull made just like a fellow human being. Even as they watched, it melted and reformed to such a distinctive shape the doctor almost - almost - needed a support to keep standing.
Irises the colour of sunflowers, acidic yellow, leeched in milliseconds.
"Hmmm."
Bones' cornflower blues rolled with the terminal velocity of a doomed rollercoaster compartment.
"Is that really all you can say about this?" He spat, a new surge of bile on his tongue. "Just - look, Spock! It could be - it's dying!"
"I think not, Doctor."
He seethed. "Just let the one with the doctorate make those kind of statements, Mr. Spock."
Not to be caught patting his own back, particularly in such rapidly deteriorating conditions, a touch at his estimate for the creature's carotid artery confirmed that he was thoroughly out of known space. Heading rapidly into experimental practice, his unfortunately new realm of expertise to the detriment of a simple doctor's poor adrenal glands.
And secret medicinal stash.
Spock rattled on in his queer unaffected way. "Your diagnosis?"
"How am I supposed to diagnose something turning into something else?"
The vulcan shifted. Expressionless, as usual. Probably enjoying the indecency of Leonard not having an answer in the face of something medically impossible.
And moved. He blinked. Turned.
Back to him, facing the centre of the lab, hands clasped perhaps more tightly then usual. Bones narrowed his glare to catch a pale green thumb press indents into the opposite palm. Huh. The silent observer, not so impartial after all.
"I have come to understand," Spock intoned, his voice projected to the six corners of the room, "that you understand my speech. That there is an intelligence in you, in your compatriot. We do not wish you harm."
Crunched bones moved in a jerk that threw McCoy's hand down to the wolf's belly. Smooth. Hairless. The legs, he'd seen the two forelegs react in a similar way.
But where a fine set of bony canidae forelimbs once stuck into empty space he found reason to jerk his hands away.
The wolf had become far too human for touching anything down there. Unfamiliar to the sense of intruding on the few barriers to privacy in his profession, McCoy steeled himself. It wasn't just skin. A black substance stretched across the being's abdomen, much like the material of his uniform. Careful, face frozen in a wince, the doctor touched the belly again.
Warm. Yielding. A new firmness, unlike the floppy underside of a quadruped. Muscles that flexed under his expert touch. He had to conclude it felt classically human.
Hairless arms, the skin darkened from pale wolf dermis. Well-kept and moisturised. Five phalanges, spread easily under a questing hand, the joints and tendons working perfectly. Settled as to the hands, McCoy turned his attention to the undeniably ugly nakedness of a mutant dog wearing a black leotard.
Funny how hair changes a being's shape. No. Leonard shook the memory of a sucker-fingered monster and pointless wonderings to meet the wolf-thing's gaze.
It clearly wasn't an animal at this point. Genuine warmth pulled his smile to meet its curiosity, if this new being's race had such an emotion. A startled jolt of just the eyes belied its stillness.
"Hi, there."
It blinked at him. Small, he noticed. The head smaller than his own. Much like a child's. Its lips parted as if to say something, metamorphosing chest flushed out for a breath.
And closed them. The breath rushed through a button nose.
Spock nearly made them both jump out of requisite skins.
"Your companion is safe. It - she, if I am not mistaken - has completed her metamorphosis."
Bones wheeled about, a soft grip on the girl's hands held just so as not to yank on them. "Not yet, she hasn't," he groused, "and how do you know that thing understands you? It might not be like her. Could just be a bird."
"Please do not be afraid." The darn vulcan couldn't care less. Bones hunched his shoulders in a continuous shrug, as if to bat the lack of caring from the room. The girl, his priority, didn't need to be involved with that after such an ordeal. The usual sense of calm running under the desperate need to soothe, to act, kept movement smooth. He turned back to her.
"Hey, now." Not so ugly anymore. The spine had become something less medically frightening. Naked dog legs stretched and, as he watched, cracked audibly. The sound shot straight to his heart.
The prim fingers tightened on his own. She looked up, blank-faced and searching. Another squeeze and she let go. He allowed her arms to fall to the black cushions.
Behind him, Spock introduced himself. The bird did not respond. In fact, it hadn't collided violently with the walls of the containment device since the start of this whole episode. McCoy allowed himself a moment to wonder if it ailed at all. Despite contentions, Spock wasn't often wrong. They might have a second transformation taking place soon, and he'd like to be present for it. Prevent any complications.
The girl's head tilted to the side. Her legs curled comfortably on the table, elbow propped under her to sit half upright.
Curiosity. Yes, they could work with that.
McCoy had the stand.
"Hello." A slow nod and twitch of his fingers. Waving might not be culturally appropriate. "My name is Doctor McCoy. This is a Federation vessel, the U.S.S. Enterprise. We're not going to hurt you."
The light of comprehension brightened her dark eyes. Less a shade than the star-struck void, he noticed. Warmer. Like a rich wood, mahogany. But the creature did not respond. She didn't smile, and he dropped his, hoping it hadn't frightened her. Instead she strained and pushed herself up to look around the room.
It took something not to hold her there. A concession he made to himself by resting a forefinger against the muscle of her forearm, ready in case she fell.
The girl looked at him now and the bewilderment furrowed her brows together.
"Not gonna hurt you," Bones said again. "We're friends. Uh - yeah. Friends."
Confusion slid into fear, perhaps anger, a distasteful thing that curled her lip. The girl leaned away and curled in on herself. McCoy didn't let his hand drop but didn't press forward, the back of his palm hovering like he might greet a wary dog. "Friends," he insisted, giving his hand a quick shake.
It hissed. He snapped himself back quick, the thought of a poised snake prickling the skin terribly.
"Liar." Her eyes glittered. "Yeerks don't have friends."
