The Pon T'Keshtan

CHAPTER TWO

Because of the late hour, the huge circular Medical Bay was nearly deserted. Only a few nurses and orderlies loitered there, some going through old case files in an attempt to find "the weirdest thing ever," while others sat cross-legged on the scanning biobeds eating snacks or playing Jibbet (1). None of this impressed Spock as Nyota led him there by the hand from her quarters. He came to a standstill at the door, refusing to go any further.

"The hallucinations have ceased," he said. "I can wait until morning to address them."

"It is morning," Nyota responded, "and you may be able to wait for an answer, but I can't."

Spock bristled slightly at her tone, but did not resist further. There was no point in arguing when she was in such a state, and complying with her request would come at no great cost to him, so he allowed her to tug him into the Medical Bay by his wrist. Once inside, however, he quickly extricated his arm from her control as gently as he could. She didn't seem to notice however, because as soon as they were inside the bay, Nyota turned her attention on the staff.

"Hey!" she said brusquely, commanding attention but at the same time cognizant of the fact that she sometimes appeared too "pushy" and "loud" to some crewmembers. She didn't want to be seen as someone who barged into other people's space and then started figuratively pissing on everything as though she was marking her territory. "Does anyone here know where Dr. McCoy or Nurse Chapel can be found?"

The orderlies and nurses startled at the unexpected sound of her voice. Some jumped to attention, others stood or sat staring at them with their mouths agape. One snatched up the Jibbet cards and flung them into a nearby trash receptacle, while another quickly swallowed what was left of a cookie in her mouth. It seemed to take a moment to sink in that Lieutenant Uhura and Commander Spock stood in the Medical Bay.

The nurses and orderlies all knew them by sight, of course; everyone on the ship knew them; they were part of the command crew. But several of the medical staffers had never actually seen them in person before, and had certainly never expected to see them in their current state of... disarray.

Lieutenant Uhura, wore a brightly-colored, exceedingly short kimono and sandals, and her was hair loose, and somewhat askew, around her shoulders. Commander Spock stood slightly behind her to her left. He had fared better in the thrown-on-attire department, wearing dark blue pajama bottoms and a robe. The staff recognized the pointed ears and slanting eyebrows immediately, along with the signature rigid posture with which he normally presented himself aboard ship, but they were surprised to see that his feet were bare. That alone, quite oddly enough, made him look unexpectedly "Human" to them.

Nyota crossed her arms over her chest... and something prickled inside Spock; an odd, electric response he had never felt before but yet somehow seemed "familiar," like a d j vu. He retreated a step, feeling his heart rate accelerate, along with an overwhelming desire to turn-tail and flee the room. Spock blinked against the sensations and fought to command his heart to return to a normal rhythm. He was only partially successful, however, as he was also uncomfortable with the fact the female staffers were staring at him; at his chest, at his abdomen, and at what else he could only imagine.

Spock closed his robe to stop their goggling, frowning against a sensation that was something like nausea but did not exactly make him feel sick; an internal roiling, more like fear... He had felt something akin to it when he was a child, walking alone in the mountains just before he caught sight of a le-matya (2) on an adjacent cliff face. It was though an internal warning mechanism had gone off inside his body prior to the danger itself being seen. But he had nothing to be afraid of here on the Enterprise, so the feeling seemed odd and out of place to him.

Unaware that Spock had backed away from her, Nyota kept focused on the medical staff. "Hello?" she said, sounding far more irritated than she was actually feeling. She bit back some of her annoyance at the staffers' slow response, and tired to keep her voice level and calm despite her feelings of urgency. "Doctor McCoy or Nurse Chapel -? Anyone?" One of the nurses, an un-joined Trill named Lloran, finally found his voice and answered her. "Dr. McCoy is in his quarters, and he's not actually on the rotation roster until day after tomorrow, ma'am. But, um, I think Nurse Chapel might still be in the Hematology Lab..."

"Well... Go get her," Nyota said. "And don't call me 'ma'am'."

Lloran nodded once and rushed off with a hasty, "Yes, Lieutenant." The other orderlies and nurses then quickly turned away, and found more appropriate projects with which to occupy themselves. Without looking at Spock, Nyota muttered, "I was being kind of snarky, wasn't I?"

"Yes, you were," Spock replied. Then it occurred to him that her question may have simply been a rhetorical one. Stepping back up toward Nyota, he filled the vacuum in the conversation left by his apparent faux pas with, "This sort of lackadaisical approach to one's duties never occurred among my trainees at Star Fleet."

Nyota chuckled as she uncrossed her arms to give Spock a playful swat. "Oh, please. At the Academy, when you were out of the classroom, we sometimes had Triple Crown races (3) with the engineering cadets, riding the length of the lecture hall on roll-away chairs."

Spock's eyebrows arched in disbelief.

"I won both the Derby and the Preakness twice," Nyota said. "But I always got beat out by Marjorie Glynt in the Belmont. I hated her. I swear she greased her chair s wheels."

"Tell me you are joking," Spock said. If she were, he could dismiss it.

"Nope." Nyota drew a cross over her heart with her finger. "God's truth. She was a total cheat."

"No, I mean about the races. Tell me you were joking."

Nyota smiled at Spock but didn't answer him. She knew that his imagining that she had somehow orchestrated and run gambling exhibitions in his classroom at the Academy might keep his mind going for hours, and she figured anything that could keep his thoughts from his nightmares and tonight's hallucination would be a boon.

"Are you terrorizing my staff, again, Uhura?" Nurse Christine Chapel, dressed in her white uniform, asked with a grin as she entered the Medical Bay. "Only a little bit," Nyota said, as Christine gave her a warm, sisterly hug. Actually, Nurse Chapel gave just about anyone who would let her, a warm sisterly hug; it was just her way of interacting with people.

"What can I do for you kids?" she asked. "Something get stuck somewhere it shouldn't?"

Spock cringed on the inside but, externally, he only responded with a lifted eyebrow and a succinct, "No."

Christine touched Spock lightly on the forearm. "Just joking, Commander." She felt the heat of his skin through the robe's fabric and admitted to herself once again that if Nyota ever let the Vulcan go, she herself would be more than happy to step in as his paramour. To her, the Vulcans were the most damnedly handsome race in the Universe. And, she thought to herself, if that stupid Ek'tevan Prerogative hadn't banned Vulcans from marrying and mating with Humans, she would have willingly offered her services to help propagate their species.

"Must you put your hand on me?" Spock asked.

Both Christine and Nyota looked at him, their eyes wide with surprise. His tone had not be rude or demanding; in fact, his affect was quite flat - which made his comment seem all the more incongruous.

"Sorry," Christine said awkwardly, pulling her hand away immediately. "Sometimes I'm just too huggy and grabby. It's the 'nurse' in me. Always wanting to kiss everyone's boo-boo's and make them all better, you know?"

Spock gave her a slight frown in response.

Christine smiled at his apparent puzzlement and tried a different tack. "I understand coming to the Medical Bay isn't one of your favorite pastimes, Mister Spock, so, I'm assuming something serious, or at the very least 'fascinating,' (4) has come up. What can I help you with?"

Spock glanced around at the other medical staffers, then returned his gaze to Nurse Chapel. "If it is possible, may we retreat to a more private area?"

"Oh, sure," Christine said. "Come with me."

Christine lead him and Nyota out through a pair of sliding doors and into a curving perimeter hallway that lead to the exam rooms, private suites, intensive care unit, and maternity ward. She picked an exam room at random - they were all unoccupied - and turned on the lights. Then remembering that as a Vulcan Spock's eyes were sensitive to bright lights, she dimmed them down a few notches. (5) Spock entered the room after her, and then put his hand out to stop Nyota from following him.

"No. I'm staying with you," Nyota said.

"There is such a thing as doctor-patient confidentiality."

"Christine isn't a doctor."

"But, she is still bound by the same rules of discretion."

"Spock - "

"Besides, it would be helpful if you would record an entry into the medical database regarding my behavior before and during the incident which is not adulterated by my own recollection of the events. You may have noticed things I, in my altered state, did not, but which may be valuable to the medical team when formulating a diagnosis and treatment regime for me later," Spock said. And it was his tone, not his words, that asked her to please, simply comply with his wishes. He wanted his privacy and he wasn't up for an argument.

Nyota pursed her lips. "You know I hate it when you get all logical, and commanding, and stuff on me."

"Yes," said Spock.

Nyota let out a heavy sigh. Then she grasped the waistband of Spock's pajamas and pulled him close enough so that she could rise upon her tiptoes and kiss him on the mouth. She felt his neck stiffen at the contact, so she kept the kiss a brief one. She then rubbed the kiss delicately into his lips with the pad of her thumb as she said, "All right," which was her code to him for, I'll do what you ask, but I don't like it.

"Thank you, Nyota." Spock said, his mouth forming the words against her thumb before he tilted his head slightly and kissed the pad softly. It was his way of apologizing to her for his pique.

To that Nyota nodded, and tapped his lips twice with the thumb before finally removing it from his face. Then she said, "But I'm not leaving the Medical Bay. I'll be here when you're finished."

"As you wish - " Spock replied, which Nyota also knew was his code for, I'd rather you didn't, but I know I can't talk you out of I, so... there we have it.

Nyota resisted the temptation take his hand and give it a comforting squeeze of support before she left him to Nurse Chapel. Instead, she instead stepped back so the door of the exam room could shut, separating her from Spock. She noted that his eyes left her before the door closed. After contemplating the idea of loitering around the door to find out if she could hear any bits of his conversation with the nurse, Nyota admitted to herself that Spock would never approve of eavesdropping, so, she returned to the main bay.

Nyota pulled one of the stand-alone MRU's (6) over to a biobed, sat down, extended the MRU's adjustable keypad and started typing in her memories. She could have just as easily spoken into the unit and it would have recorded whatever she said, but she respected Spock's privacy enough not blab the story of his hallucination all over the Medical Bay. Besides, writing the report made her focus on it, made her ensure each word was the one she wanted in order keep the report as factual and accurate as possible.

As she typed, Nyota became aware of a male nurse inching out from behind one of the other beds to look at her. She could see him on the periphery of her vision and allowed him to leer for a few seconds before whipping around to face him angrily. The look in her eyes was enough to send him scurrying off like a jackrabbit.

"Now, that was terrorizing Christine's staff," Nyota said to herself with a chuckle. Then she admonished herself with, "God, sometimes I am such a bitch..." before she refocused her attention on her report.

LIEUTENANT NYOTA UHURA REPORTING: IN MY QUARTERS, ROOM 505, DECK 5, AT OR AROUND 01:20 HOURS THIS STARDATE, I OBSERVED COMMANDER SPOCK EXPERIENCE WHAT HE REFERRED TO AS A HALLUCINATION...

In the exam room, Spock was reluctant to lie on the biobed. However, he did deign to sit on the edge of it, allowing Nurse Chapel to engage the bed's sensing units while she also checked him over with a hand-held medical tricorder.

"Can you tell me what precipitated the event?" She asked as she swiped the tricorder around his head.

Spock responded to the professional question with his normal simplicity and honesty. "I am not certain."

"What were you doing right before the hallucination began?"

"Is telling you that a necessity?" Spock asked.

Considering his mode of dress, Nurse Chapel assumed that he and the lieutenant had been engaging in some not-so-professional extracurricular activities, and she knew the Vulcans generally didn't like to speak to others about such things, so she tried to reassure him. "Any facts you can give me will help formulate a diagnosis. At this stage, I need you to give me as much information as you can because we don t know yet what could be significant and what isn't."

"Very well," said Spock. He looked past Nurse Chapel's head and focused on the wall behind her so he would not have to meet her eyes or be subjected to any judgment that might lie inside them. Then he sighed shallowly and answered her previous question. "I was lying on my back in bed. Lieutenant Uhura had moved to straddle my body between her legs. We were engaging in foreplay... "

He spoke with a frankness Nurse Chapel appreciated in her professional capacity, and found somewhat amusing as a woman. Only Spock could talk about copulating and make it sound as chaste as knitting, she thought.

He continued, "I had closed my eyes and could feel her kissing my mouth. I put my teeth against her bottom lip, and when I opened my eyes... Everything was different..."

"Different how?"

"It seemed that I was no longer in Lieutenant Uhura's quarters, nor was I in a bed."

"Where did you believe you were?"

"I was in a desert with small dunes all around me, and there were people buried in the sand. I could see glimpses of their bodies. Females. They were unmoving, and I feared they were dead. But something inside of them, under the skin, stirred. I wanted to investigate, but then a maelstrom appeared. A long funnel cloud of sand and debris; black; howling, almost as though it was screaming at me. I could feel a sentience in it; a targeted thought, all anger and violence. It meant to destroy me."

"What did you feel? Emotionally, I mean... Anything?"

"Overwhelming fear. Disgust. A sense of powerlessness... It came upon me and I could not move. I called out to Nyota - to Lieutenant Uhura - and I heard her answer me but I could not see her... Then something touched my hand, and it felt as though the skin were being abraded away. The pain was so intense; so real that I... I pulled my hand away, but something grabbed at it again and I heard Lieutenant Uhura say that she was there... I still could not see her, and I asked her if I were awake. She said, yes, and I told her I was having a hallucination..."

"You were able to speak to her in real time, even while you were hallucinating?"

"It seems so, yes. Is that unusual?"

"Hallucinations are always 'unusual', Mister Spock. But there are occasions when the mind can be, in effect, two places at once; sort of like having one foot in reality and one in fantasy. Usually, that sort of thing is associated with spontaneous abreaction, an intrusive recall -"

"A 'flashback'?"

"Sometimes, yes."

"But... How could I 'flashback' to a place and situation in which I had never been before?"

"Well, we don't really know that you did, yet. There is a possibility, however, that what you saw was a manifestation of your unconscious mind, not your conscious mind, and maybe you had been in that situation in a dream or other state of altered reality before. You did mention you had been having nightmares."

"Yes - "

"Were they anything like the hallucination?"

"Not exactly."

"What do you mean?"

"The feelings generated by the dreams and the hallucination were very much the same, but the scenery and action were different. In the dreams, underground homes were being destroyed by monstrous machines. The mechanisms were so huge that they blocked the sun, and when they rolled over the landscape, they crushed everything beneath them. I am in one of the homes, and I can see the machine coming, but I cannot open the door to escape..."

"Were you ever crushed by the machine?"

"No. I always awakened just before it reached me..."

"And you haven't been sleeping well as a result of the nightmares."

"Correct."

"Sleep deprivation can cause all sorts of problems, even for Vulcans, Mister Spock. I know your people can go for days without it, but you still have limits." Spock cogitated on this for a moment, until Nurse Chapel pulled him away from his reverie with the question, "How long did the hallucination last?"

"Only a few moments longer," he said.

"Do you remember any other sensations or discomfort of any kind?"

"I remember, the maelstrom being upon me, and it was difficult to breathe. It was whirring over me, into me like a drill; and my skin was raw and bleeding. I was being pummeled by sand... Then the sand was in my clothes, tearing at my skin like thousands of miniature teeth, trying to get inside of me through any orifice... It was horrifying... Then it was if the whole scene shifted to one side of my brain. That was such a curious sensation that it seemed to bring me out of the vision. I could then see the Lieutenant and her quarters, but I could also see the funnel cloud. It lifted away, into the ceiling, and... and then I was back in bed... Lieutenant Uhura was holding my hand..."

"Were there any physical manifestations of the hallucination?"

"None of which I am aware."

"Could you remove your robe for a minute?"

Spock opened his robe and shrugged it from his shoulders. It fell down around his lap and hips on the biobed. Nurse Chapel looked him over without touching him, and then asked, "Are you experiencing any pain now?"

"Only slightly, along my pelvic region - "

Nurse Chapel directed the scanner to his abdomen. "Here?" "Slightly lower and to the left."

"What kind of pain is it?"

"Like a dull ache; nothing substantial."

"But it wasn't there before the hallucination - "

"No. Is that meaningful?"

"We don't know yet," Nurse Chapel answered honestly. "But I don t see anything anomalous in the readings."

She finished the scan and closed the top of the tricorder unit to contain the data. "Okay," she said. "You can cover up again."

Spock gratefully pulled the fabric up over and around his body.

"Well, physically, you seem to be fine for the moment, Mister Spock, so I won't be admitting you tonight. All of your traces are within the normal range for you," Nurse Chapel said. "You were right to report this aberration, however, and I'll be preparing a report for Dr. McCoy's inspection so he has it first thing in the morning. Even though he's not on the duty roster tomorrow, this is something he should be made aware of."

"Agreed," said Spock.

"I'm also going to pull the past few scans we did on you as a comparison to the ones done tonight, to see if there are any obvious discrepancies between them. We need to rule out a biological or chemical reason for the hallucination before we look into other types of causation. In the meantime, I'll get the on-duty physician to prescribe a sedative for you to help you sleep. If the visions were caused by sleep deprivation, getting some shuteye may be just what your body and mind needs."

"What if it is less than a medical condition, but more than sleep deprivation - ?"

"We'll cross that bridge when we get to it. I know you re anxious for answers, but... coming to a hasty conclusion now may do more damage than good in the long run. And besides, as a nurse I'm not qualified to make a diagnosis. That's for the doctors to do."

"You are more than qualified, Nurse Chapel. Your doctorate degree simply lags behind your abilities."

Although her inner feelings soared at his praise - praise which she knew was never gratuitous when it came from Spock - Christine simply smiled and said, "Well, thank you, Commander. You wait right here, and I'll get you that sedative."

"If possible - "

"Yes?"

"I would prefer a somnetic inducer (7) to a chemical sleeping agent."

"- Because the inducer doesn't require the on-call doctor to sign off on it, and medication does?"

Spock didn't answer her, but she knew she had guessed his reasoning accurately. He didn't want anyone else to have access to his medical chart that didn't absolutely need it. That sort of thing wasn't unusual for command-rank officers, so, she didn't argue with him or ask for more from him, and simply said, "All right. I can accommodate you with that." "Thank you, Nurse Chapel."

A few minutes later Spock reentered the Medical Bay carrying the small somnetic inducer device and joined Uhura where she sat on the biobed. She was now playing Jibbet with a female nurse, and beamed at him when he approached them.

Spock scowled at the cards in her hand. "Oh, you caught me - " she quipped.

"Are you enjoying yourself?" Spock asked her.

"Way too much, I'm afraid. You probably find that shocking?"

"Not entirely. This one goes here," he said pulling a card from her hand and laying it on the bed next to the ones that matched it. "I believe that is a 'Jibbet', is it not?"

Nyota laughed out loud. "I thought you told me you never engaged in 'erotic distractions' like this."

"I do not," Spock said. "But I am aware of the rules of the game, and of the number of cards available to players in any given hand."

Nyota grinned at him and slid off the biobed. She looked back at the nurse and said, "Thanks for the game, Cherrie."

Cherrie, who was looking at Spock, seemingly captivated by him, nodded mutely in response. Nyota chuckled at that, too, then took Spock's free hand between her own. She glanced at the inducer but didn't make mention of it. Instead, she asked, "Are we set?"

Spock was frowning, distracted by Cherrie who continued to stare at him.

"Spock - "

He turned his face to Nyota, but it was a second or two before his eyes met hers. "Pardon?"

"Are we done here? Have you been 'released to your own recognizance'?"

"I am free to go, yes. Nurse Chapel will forward her report to Dr. McCoy in the morning."

"Good. Then let's get out of here - "

"Yes," said Spock. "Let us."

Back in Nyota's quarters, Spock lay on his side, on top of the blankets, with Nyota at his back. One of her arms was draped over his now naked midsection and she was already under the somnetic inducer's spell, sound asleep. He could feel her breath against his spine.

The little inducer was sitting on a nightstand beside the bed, humming at a pitch Humans could not hear, but which was somewhat distracting to his Vulcan ears. He could feel its effect pushing at his brain and knew that he required the sleep it could bring him, yet he resisted it.

In the months since leaving new Vulcan, he'd had the distressing impression that his self-discipline and mental acuity were being slowly gnawed away, little by little, as if by psionic termites. Spock now feared - as illogical at it seemed to him - that if he went to sleep, he might awaken to some new horror that would steal the last threadbare bits of self-control remaining to him. And if that happened, what would become of him? Where could he go? Who would want him then?

Those beleaguering thoughts that were the last thing he remembered before sleep finally overtook him.


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(1) Jibbet: A card game originating on Risa that uses sexually explicit imagery. The game s point is to collect enough body parts and points to reach a "climax!" or "Jibbit!" [Author's note: This is NOT Trek canon; I made this game up.]
(2) Le-matya: an animal indigenous to Vulcan that looks something like a huge cat with a green-and-white diamond fur pattern on its fur. The animal's claws are poisonous. Spock's sehlat I'Chiyi was killed by such an animal when he was a child.
(3) Triple Crown: Three thoroughbred horse races including the Kentucky Derby (at Churchill Downs), the Preakness Stakes (at Pimlico) and the Belmont Stakes (at Belmont Park). The term "triple crown" was first used in 1930 after a horse named Gallant Fox won all three races in the same year.
(4)Throughout Trek history and canon, "fascinating" is a word Spock uses when faced with something both interesting and unexpected.
(5 ) According to the "Introduction to Vulcan Physiology", Vulcans, despite their inner eyelids, find the bright lights in Star Fleet vessels somewhat uncomfortable. The entry reads in part: "...Vulcan vision is less acute in bright light, while their night vision is more acute. This is thought to be due to the fact that the Vulcans descended from nocturnal predatory "cat-apes". As in most very hot and arid climates, most life on Vulcan was and is nocturnal, sheltering from the blistering heat during the day and only coming out during cooler temperatures at night. Because of their eyes, Vulcan living accommodations or vessels are much more dimly lit than those of most other species. Most Vulcans find the lighting of standard Star Fleet vessels on the bright side... It has recently been discovered that many Vulcans serving on mixed Star Fleet vessels wear a type of tinted, polarizing contact lens to enable them to work without unnecessary and unhealthy eye strain... " For more information see .com/wiki/Introduction_To_Vulcan_Physiology
(6 ) MRU: Medical Recording Unit, [Author's note: this isn't part of Trek canon]
(7) Somnetic inducer: a medical device that when placed next the bed can help the patient sleep without the used of chemical sedatives or other mechanical inducements (such as the delta-wave inducer). A device similar to the one used in this story was once used by Geordi LaForge in the STTNG episode "The Mind's Eye."