Jai's Anatomy, part 4
Posted on Sat May 27th, 2017 @ 1:18pm by Lieutenant JG Jai
Mission:
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Timeline: 2388
Tags: Jai
1501 words - 3 OF Standard Post Measure
Shadows on the wall
In the thunder's call
Something haunts us all
- Sting
The United Federation of Planets.
Not long after he’d discovered Jai’s homeworld, and the dying orphans that time had forgotten, James Kirk had gone on describe the Federation as “a dream that became a reality, and spread across the stars.” An interstellar cooperative of more than 150 member worlds, it benefitted from the shared knowledge of innumerable races throughout the galaxy. The so-called “Old Ones” of the First Federation, who had explored the galaxy when the empires of the Iconians and the Orions had been at their height. The wisdom of the Kohlinar monks of Vulcan, whose had been out on the cosmic frontiers while humanity had still been in its infancy. The chain of memories possessed by the enigmatic Trill, passed through the ages host by host. Each of these culminated into great wisdom that came to be enjoyed in places of learning spread throughout the Federation.
The Vulcan Science Council.
The University of Betazed.
Starfleet Academy.
It seemed a golden age of galactic peace, one in which the superfluous flow of knowledge supplied more answers than there seemed questions. Information recall was instantaneous. Technology had fostered a hubris -- arrogant belief that the answers were all there.
But there were lessons that no class could teach.
There were questions that begged no easy answer.
He had access to technology the likes of which could bring people back from the very brink of death. Knowledge to prolong life and improve its quality. The Federation had ended disease across countless worlds.
But now, as Jai stared at the tissue scan results on the display, he learned the most valuable lesson a doctor could.
He learned what it felt like to be powerless.
The USS Discovery was a Nova-class science vessel that had been undergoing refit at Utopia Planetia. Captain Amaen had convinced the Starfleet Corps of Engineers to pull it out of drydock several weeks ahead of schedule. The accommodations were far from luxurious. Most of the livable space aboard the ship was still under reconstruction, but the engineering and medical overhauls had been completed. So, it was complete enough for the purposes that they needed it for.
The girl’s name was Jan Mika, and she had a condition known as Orkett’s Disease. It was, essentially, a pediatric cancer of the blood. Which meant that it spread quickly throughout the body and was invasive as it attacked the tissues and major organs.
A call back to her primary physician on Bajor revealed that she’d been diagnosed with some symptoms recently, but the diagnosis had been anemia. So a total blood screen hadn’t been completed, or the initial stage of the disease might have been identified.
It was difficult to say that it was a mistake. Jai looked at the files and could easily arrive at the same conclusion. What was it then, an error in judgment?
When doctor’s made mistakes, erred in judgment, or overlooked the slightest nuance... the price to be paid was in human lives. But, was it not also true that when a doctor did everything to the letter, everything by the book, and no mistakes were made... people died.
It was the ultimate mystery of medicine, of what it was to practice medicine. He couldn’t save anyone. At best, he might prolong life just one day more.
Three years of medical school. A year of residency at Starfleet Medical. And now, suddenly, Jai felt real doubt about what he was doing. Taking a deep breath, the boy slid off the stool and jumped down from where he’d been working at the lab table. Hypospray in hand, the young monk crossed the threshold into the main Sickbay of the small vessel.
...and tried not to get nauseous at the familiar, acrid taint of hospital sterilizer lingering in the air.
Crossing through the biobeds, it took a small effort on the boy's part to steel his nerves and not run in terror of too many memories sitting far too close to parts of his life he didn't wish to revisit. And then he was there, standing across from a green eyed Bajoran girl who was withering away into the sterile white wrappings of her hospital gown.
She had a few locks left of stringy, brownish hair, but had otherwise gone bald to one of the treatments that Doctor Amaen was given her to suppress the disease affecting her blood. A padd was sitting on her lap, the child folded up as she seemed lost to a world of imagination brought about by whatever she was reading.
Taking a haltering set of steps closer, it seemed as though Jai were trapped between a decision to move in or step further back. The corners of his mouth tugged awkwardly in an attempt to smile through his nervousness, as the Tibetan boy offered a quiet, "Hi."
Looking up from her book, the girl seemed surprised at the sight of the boy. "Are you playing dress up?" the Bajoran asked pointedly.
To be fair, he got that a lot. "Are you?" Jai quipped back at the other child.
"No," the girl answered flatly, clearly of the belief that such was a stupid question. "I'm sick."
A wan smile ghosted across the boy’s face. The sentiment that she’d expressed, and the tone with which she’d said it, were all too easily recognizable to him. "Yeah. I'm sick too," Jai answered with a shrug. It did nothing to answer her question, but it wasn't really necessary for a conversation. A lot about kid's conversations had nothing to do with anything. It was what made them so much more fun, and random, than adults.
"I have to stay here," the girl remarked sourly.
"I've had to stay in hospitals before," Jai offered in sympathy. "It's not very fun."
This brought him under the girl's scrutiny again. "You don't seem like you're sick."
"My disease is different than yours. Yours makes you ill. Mine makes people around me ill," Jai answered, surprising himself at how so simple an answer he could find to so complex a situation as had governed his life for the last four hundred years. "So, like, the doctors have to make sure I'm not making people sick or anything."
"Do you live on this ship?"
"Uh, right now, I suppose I do." the boy answered with another shrug. “Usually, I live on Earth, though.” Inclining his head toward the girl, he asked, "You live on Bajor?"
"We used to. My parents just got jobs on Deep Space Nine, so we're going to be living in space," the girl stated, changing topics as she asked, "Are your parents on the ship, too?"
That one was another difficult question to address. Shifting from side to side a moment, the young monk finally answered, "Uh, I guess you could say that Starfleet’s my family now.” That was probably as good as it got in terms of answering truthfully without getting into the complicated details. "So, I move around a lot."
"I don't like moving," the girl stated in answer. "I was supposed to go to the summer star festival dance at my school, but now I'll be going to school on the stupid station."
"'Dance?'" Jai echoed, his nose wrinkling with the disgusted expression on his face. "Ewww."
"I was going to get to wear my new dress though," the girl lamented, throwing her hands up in the air before planting them back in her lap. "I don't guess I could wear it now though. I don't want anyone to see me."
"Why?"
"My hair's gone!"
"So? You look like a little Deltan girl," Jai remarked with a shrug.
"I'm Bajoran!"
And that gave the boy too good of an opportunity to pass up, even when conversing with a girl. Sticking his hand out, the Tibetan boy said, "Nice to meet you, Bajoran, I'm Jai."
The girl just looked at the boy as though he were stupid. Which was very possible, but hadn't stopped him yet. "My name's not 'Bajoran,' my species is Bajoran! My name's Mika," the girl said, giggling as she took the boy's hand and added, "You're really silly for a human."
"Oh, I'm not human. I'm Miran."
"What's a Miran?"
"Only the greatest lifeform in the known universe!" Jai boasted proudly. "We're from a planet in the Beta Quadrant."
"Well, you look like a human to me," Mika fired back at the boy.
"How do you know humans don't look like Mirans?"
The question caused the girl to stop and think for a moment, before a series of giggles erupted at the ridiculous question.
Eventually, he got the blood sample that he’d come to collect. But he stayed with her until she fell asleep.
