Commodore Wallace put the PADD he'd been reading down for a moment on the table in front of him. Rising from the sofa where he'd been sitting, he walked across to the replicator and ordered a drink.
Taking the glass from the replicator, he returned to his seat and picked the PADD up again....
USS Enterprise-E -- Sickbay (2375)....
"Let's start with the alien, maybe if we can work out his origins, we can piece together where the shuttle may have come from," Doctor Crusher announced.
The body of the dead alien was brought over to the body scanner.
"Let's start by looking at his anatomy," The Doctor announced, operating the console for the body scanner.
"Doctor Crusher, I think this alien may still be alive," Nurse Alyssa Ogawa announced. "I'm sure I just saw the chest move as if he'd just taken a breath."
"Don't be stupid. If Commander Data's right then he's been in that shuttle for eighty years -- no-one could survive that long," Beverly replied.
Undeterred, Alyssa started to run medical scans of the body using her tricorder.
"Doctor Crusher, he is alive. I'm reading very slow cardio-vascular movement each of his hearts appear to alternately beat, once every five minutes," She announced.
"Get him across to a biobed and let's do a full work-up on him," Crusher replied.
An hour later, Captain Picard and Commanders Riker and Data arrive in sickbay and all stood in Doctor Crusher's office.
"How is the alien?" Picard asked.
"He appears to be doing well," The Doctor replied. "From what we can tell, his body is in some kind of deep hibernation. He's suffered damage to both his livers and one of his three kidneys. He's also suffered a severe head trauma, whether this is the reason for his state I can't tell. Until I can understand why he's in this state, I daren't make any attempt at repairing the damage to his brain."
"What about the rest of his injuries?" Riker asked. "Can you work on them."
"I don't have to, Will." Beverly replied. "The damage to his kidney is almost totally healed and the two livers are going the same way. I've not had to do anything, he's doing it all by himself. I think what triggered this spontaneous recovery is bringing him into an environment with more oxygen. Before, all the oxygen was being used to keep him alive, now with oxygen to spare his body has started to heal itself."
"What about the head trauma? Are there any signs of that being repaired?" the Captain asked.
"I'm afraid not. The livers and kidney started to show signs of healing almost immediately, but we've detected no such signs with the head trauma. If we can't fix the problem soon, he'll suffer some memory loss, he probably already has," Doctor Crusher reported. "I'm still running scans of the alien's brain and I'm hoping that I can cure the head trauma soon."
"What about the other three crew?" Riker asked.
"All three died from starvation, pure and simple, around seventy-nine years ago," Doctor Crusher replied. "Had they had enough food, water and oxygen, they'd probably still be alive, although well into their hundreds. From what Commander Data has told me about the shuttle, I would guess that they had about three month's rations aboard, more than enough to keep the four of them fit and healthy whilst they attempted to reach a safe port," The Doctor reported. "I have also managed to identify the three bodies as Commander Peter Jones, the USS Columbus's first officer, Commander James Masters, their chief science officer and Lieutenant Sarah Robinson, the second helm officer."
"Mister Data, have you been able to get any information from the shuttle's databanks?" the Captain inquired.
"Very little Captain," Data replied. "As I suspected, the shuttle's memory files have been seriously damaged by both power fluctuations and the effects of the Briar Patch. However, I can tell you that the USS Columbus actually started to explore the space on the far side of the nebula, for almost ten years."
"How can you tell all that?" Riker asked.
"The least damaged logs were those made by the shuttle crew after they got trapped in the nebula. They act as a sort of diary and give an account of being attacked by an unknown enemy close to the nebula. The logs also speculate that the attackers may have been the one's who attacked and destroyed the USS Columbus," Data continued. "From other logs, I have determined that the shuttle was on some kind of long-range away mission and returned to find the Columbus adrift. It appears that they took what remaining supplies they could find and headed back to the Federation."
"Anything on our alien friend?" the Captain inquired.
"Not a great deal Captain," Data replied. "His name appears to be Axeline and his injuries seem to have happened during the attack. Commander Masters was also injured during the attack and suffered severe electrical burns, whilst Commander Jones and Lieutenant Robinson appear to have escaped with only minor injuries."
"There's no indication of any burns on Commander Masters's body, Data," Doctor Crusher stated. "Are you sure about the burns? There should be some indication of the use of something like a dermal regenerator. More so then than now, because those kinds of instruments were still in their infancy. There's no way his body could have healed naturally from burns."
"The logs do not lie, Doctor. The Commander suffered burns when the main console exploded. The explosion also injured Axeline, and the logs state that he went into some kind of deep sleep/meditation/healing phase soon after," Data replied.
"Do you have anything else on the attackers, on the location of the Columbus?" Captain Picard inquired.
"I'm afraid not, Captain. Most of the logs before the attack were damaged, we've only got logs in the ship from after the attack, plus the tricorder readings from the away mission," Data replied.
Just then Captain Picard's comm badge beeped.
"Picard here."
[Captain, we've run an analysis on the hull of the shuttle,] Geordi LaForge stated. [There is a slight trace from the weapons fire, but it's like no weapon I've every seen before. Phasers would have 'burnt' the hull plating, disruptors would have shown traces of molecular displacement, but this is something different. It's like whatever hit the shuttle made it 'step' out of time.]
"What do you mean?" Picard asked.
[There's a section of hull that's missing on the rear starboard side, about a meter square, the plating is gone, but I can still see it because of my implants. We've run various tests and it's still there, only three microseconds later. If I had to take a guess, I would say that the weapon that was used was chronoton based. It either pushed the hull plate back in time or held it 'out of time' for three microseconds.]
"Captain, such weapons are possible, and this kind of effect is predicted. Plus, such a weapon would be able to penetrate a vessels shields easily," Data stated. "Geordi, have you made any attempts to re-align the hull plate with our time frame."
[We're just about to try that now, Data,] Geordi replied. [We're bombarding the plate with a high-energy tachyon beam and a phase inverted. It seems to be working.]
Just then the comm link went dead. Then the ship went to red alert.
"Picard to LaForge. Come in Commander." Picard almost shouted. "Number one, Mister Data, go down to the shuttlebay, see what happened."
Data and Riker both acknowledged the Captain's order and headed out of the Doctor's office and sickbay.
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