Boimler had never been more pleased to land on his face. He did however think this might have given him somewhat of a concussion though, as he didn't recall there being a dog on the ship after Tendi's had left. Yet it did indeed appear to be a German Shepherd that was sticking its cold, wet nose into his face. He hoped to Q that this was not another eldritch nightmare the orion had created.
He shoved the dog away and sat up hazily. Mariner was nearby, also hauling herself up from the floor. She appeared to be equally as sticky as he was. Good, that was fully deserved. The first few rooms they had moved through had been empty, or with clearly visible issues to avoid. Boimler had been anxious about this, and Mariner had done her usual thing of brushing it off and insisting they were fine to just keep strolling along.
It was of course not her but him who had then got his leg wedged up to the knee in some cleverly disguised goop, thinking it was a regular floor. The damn stuff was viscous as hell, not allowing him to reclaim his leg, so he had to sink to his knees in order to avoid slipping in completely. To her credit, Mariner had immediately flipped around to help him out and ran over. She probably should have paid more attention to her feet and worried less about him, as the fake floor he had stood on wasn't the only piece in the room. She had fully sunk to her hips with both feet.
The good news about this was that they had still been close enough to reach each other if they stretched. Collectively they had agreed it would be a fantastic idea if they linked hands, getting a strong grip around each others wrists, so they could both pull at the same time and hopefully manage to move that way. It took them a couple of tries to get the grip right, but on the third time it worked! Sort of.
There was nothing really to brace their feet from, and Mariner was more wedged into the goop. This meant she simply ended up hauling him towards her. Hauling was the operative word, as he only had his face to land on what with her iron grip on both of his wrists. The face gooping was mercifully cut short by the transporter pulling them out. He could only hope the other team had had better luck.
It seemed they had. T'Lyn was already stood up, obscuring his view of Sky, but that was of less importance than what was held in her hands. They'd done it. Thank Q. Sky struggled to their feet looking a little worse for wear as T'Lyn strode off the platform. Nurse Westlake was waiting for them.
"Status?" T'Lyn's question was short and functional.
Westlake made no pithy joke but simply pursed his lips. "T'Ana and Rutherford are working both the science and engineering angles to do what they can. But it's bad."
Mariner had come up behind T'Lyn. "But it's going to be fine right? We've got it!"
The dog barked. Westlake frowned. "Yes, yes we do. Let's head straight to sick bay, come on."
Boimler realised he was yet to actually get up off the floor as the others headed towards the door. Pushing his aching muscles, he jumped to his feet and joined the Westlake led conga line behind Sky. He clocked a strand of dark hair leaking out from the helmet she was somehow still wearing. He couldn't imagine how uncomfortable that was inside. The fact that both she and T'Lyn kind of smelled like smoke was a little unnerving, but they'd got the job done.
T'Ana and Rutherford were glued to their instruments, not turning their heads away as they greeted the group robotically. For a second Boimler's heart soared as he saw an orion standing near them looking perfectly healthy. Unfortunately a second look sent it crashing straight back down as this was not Tendi, at least not their Tendi. This was D'Erika.
He had to force himself to look at D'Vana. Once he looked he couldn't tear his eyes away. She looked horrible, the rash near ubiquitous on her body. He hoped it was just his eyes playing tricks on him, but he thought he could see it moving across her skin. Boimler tried not to visibly recoil. Not that Tendi would have seen as her eyes were fixed firmly on the floor in front of her, avoiding even her sister's eyes.
The dog went to put a paw on her but T'Ana smacked it away with her foot. "Don't touch. Just bring the damn thing over."
T'Lyn obliged, laying the large stone on the bed next to Tendi, carefully slipping it under one of her hands in the process. D'Erika slammed her hand down beside D'Vana's immediately. Boimler was a little worried it would break under that amount of force, but the surface luckily didn't shatter.
D'Erika slapped it again. "It's not working. Why isn't it working?"
Mariner elbowed her way through and placed a hand opposite D'Erika's. "You need us too. Westlake, where's Mum? Is Ransom getting her?"
"That's what I've been trying to tell you. She's not here. We can't reach her, nor your Dad, on comms either. They're trying but…" Westlake let the sentence tail off into silence.
Boimler could hear his heartbeat in his ears as he locked eyes with Mariner. They couldn't panic, not yet, now was the time to think. T'Lyn was staring off into space, eyes gazing sightlessly at Rutherford's hands as they worked. His face was set in a grim line.
Mainer put both of her hands on the slab. "Maybe we can trick it into thinking I'm two people? Quick, Boimler, cut off my hand."
He wasn't sure this was going to work, but he also didn't have a better idea and so looked around for something he could cut bone with. Maybe a focused phaser shot would be fastest? He had only done battlefield amputation at the Academy, but he supposed it was applicable here.
T'Lyn had now moved to aid Rutherford in whatever he was doing, but was clearly still thinking while she did it. "That will be the exact same genetic code twice. It will need to be able to see the variations."
"Okay, right. Right. But what about-" Boimler almost lost his balance as Mariner pressed his hand down next to hers. Nothing. He went to pull his hand back.
"Wait." Sky's voice came from behind him. "Wait, what about if all of us do it? All of the humans I mean."
That sounded much better to Boimler than having to hold Mariner's bloody, amputated hand upright. If they were going to try and trick a machine he'd at least like for them to each have all their usual limbs attached while they did so.
"If there are enough people, it's possible. I think." T'Lyn stood directly next to Rutherford now. "Mr Rutherford, you must help in the attempt. I will take over while you do."
Rutherford was quick to slap his hand down next to Boimler and Mariner's hands. He looked at D'Vana, but her eyes had returned to being firmly fixed on the floor. D'Erika also watched her, eyes following the growing deformation of her skin.
"Three…" Mariner mused. "Sky, you said you're human. Get over here, we need more."
"Yes- yes, I'm coming over." Sky sounded a little shaky, but did start to move in the direction they had been called.
Boimler had a better idea than just four people. He slapped his combadge and prayed to whoever was in charge of this nonsense for comms to hold out at this particular critical time. "All humans report to sickbay! As fast as you can! Uh, no offence to other races, you're just as important but that's for another time right now!"
It worked. Humans began streaming into sickbay - Amadou, Casey and Castro, then Jet hot on their heels. Mariner worked swiftly to organise them all to have part of their hand touching the panel. Boimler still had his finger in place even as he leant out as far as he could to wave people in.
"Where the hell is Ransom? You think he'd be there for his friend, he was becoming so supportive." Mariner tried to look out the door for him but couldn't manage it from her angle. She'd also had to shove the inquisitive dog back from the table with one hand to make room for the ever increasing amount of humans.
Boimler didn't manage to spot Ransom either as the room quickly descended into semi organised chaos. It was becoming difficult to keep his grip with this many people trying to touch the same thing. He could spot some people crouched on their knees down the front to allow others to reach over them. At least one person was stood on a chair, leaning precariously.
Boimler slipped his way back into the centre of the throng, a blessing of his wiry frame. It didn't seem that anything had happened yet, no matter how Mariner and D'Erika tried to press the assortment of hands that had been offered to them.
Looking at all the hands that had run to the call to help their crewmate helped though. They had to be missing something. He felt someone else slip in behind him and was reassured as Mariner's hand appeared next to his own.
His head snapped up like a whip as movement caught his eye. There had been no sound, no lights, nothing to indicate that any change was taking place. Boimler had never seen more of a glorious sight than Tendi's skin gradually transitioning back to its usual green. The relief was palpable on her own face as well even if she still looked like she couldn't quite believe they'd got it to work.
Sighs of relief flowed through the crowd, followed by cheers. Boimler turned to celebrate with Mariner but she wasn't there. No, she was on the opposite side of the crowd wedged just behind D'Erika, beaming over her shoulder as she swiftly checked her sister for any remaining issues. Damn, she must have moved faster than he ever gave her credit for; he couldn't even see any bowled over people.
He moved to stand by the door, thanking crew members for the help as they streamed back to their actual jobs and out of the way of T'Ana. Eventually the room was pretty much what they'd started with: Tendi, sat on a bed with her sister, T'Lyn, and Rutherford gathered around her, Mariner stood nearby watching them happily, and T'Ana and Westlake were now back to putting out other fires from different injuries that had appeared (that or doing paperwork). He smiled with relief as he surveyed the scene. Everyone was safe.
Sky now stood directly to his right. At least, that was his first thought due to what the figure was wearing. But this one wasn't built the same, bulkier and taller. He squinted into the darkness of the helmet, and leapt backwards with a squeak when the faceplate brightened. Mariner was at his side seemingly instantly to join him in narrowing her eyes at the familiar interloper.
Q grinned back at them. "Congratulations, looks like a job well done to me. Why the mean looks?"
"Screw you, Q. Where's Sky?" Mariner had answered for him, but he very much shared her sentiments.
"They're home. I've seen all I wanted, you got what you needed, and they were thanked with the gift of a nice poncho and sent back to where they belong. No hiccups or issues to be seen."
Boimler frowned. "Who did you say the poncho was from?"
"Me, of course! Don't worry, your thanks will be conveyed."
"I'm sure…"
"Oh, and Mariner? I did nothing to your mother, I can hear you thinking it. That was always going to happen, the comms breakdown and all. She will arrive here soon. I'll be sad to miss her, but she's no Picard."
Mariner didn't dignify that with a response, just raising a suspicious eyebrow. Boimler somehow doubted Q would have dared to mess with the Captain in the first place as he knew that Mariner would not let up until his ass had been kicked. He assumed Q had better things to do.
Q rolled his eyes and sighed at them like they were the ones being cryptic and strange. "Anyhow, I think you'd better get back to the bigger issue you have right now. Which I will have you know I also did not cause."
Then he was gone.
Boimler shot a worried look across to Mariner. "Bigger issue? Do we know of a bigger issue?"
"No, but let's sort it fast if it's anything like the other one."
They trotted over to the group surrounding Tendi, but nothing looked amiss there. She was still wedged between her sister and Rutherford with T'Lyn now kneeling beside them, so they briefly pressed into the group for a team hug before turning to the most senior member of the crew in the room.
"Hey, Doc. Q mentioned some sort of other problem we still have now that Tendi seems all good. Do you know what it is?"
T'Ana looked briefly confused, paw coming up to scratch behind one of her ears. "Well…I'm going to keep Tendi here for a little while to be sure she's fully mended and not about to explode or some other random shit. Then I guess we could do with a restock of the hyposprays. Oh, and we need another nurse."
The German Shepherd barked, causing the Caitian to look over to it.
"Oh, yeah. That's Ransom. He got doggified somehow. I'll fix him in a bit but," she leaned in, "I'm finding this kinda funny."
That sounded pretty standard to Boimler to be honest. Ransom would live, and really he thought being a dog for a bit might be a cool experiment? Like, what goes through their heads when they sniff things? He'd have to ask the Commander later.
For now, he joined his friends, all encircled around Tendi. Her still being her was much more important than Ransom being a dog.