Peeling Back the Layers

Logan and Rahel arrived in Sickbay with the three stretchers, two carrying stunned Security guards and the third the body of Jessica Moss-West. The medical orderlies placed the two stunned Security guards onto two of the biobeds and carried the third into the other room, where Rahel could examine the body in more detail. But first she had to deal with the living.

Rahel stepped over to the Security guards and immediately began treating them, and making sure they were stable. Once she was sure they were fine, she let her nurses handle the rest of the treatment and release and continued onto her next patient. One that would not be getting up and walking out.

As the Security officers came around, Logan looked on. Eventually Rahel announced that they were ready to be questioned. Logan spoke to them for over ten minutes, then left to interrogate Lieutenant Moss.

As she proceeded into the other room, Rahel took a deep breath and released it. She walked into the room and saw the dead body of Jessica West-Moss.

*So young . . .* Rahel thought with a soft sigh escaping her.

She pulled out her tricorder and scanned her. All the readings came up just as predicted, but something seemed wrong. Not that anything was indicated by the scan, but as she looked at the body, she almost saw shimmer. For a moment, she thought she was just tired. It was no surprise she hadn't been sleeping well. She hadn't been sleeping well for weeks! But then, she saw it again, and it was followed by a strange buzzing noise in her ears. She put the tricorder down and approached the body.

"Lieutenant Kahfre to Private Dyson." Rahel announced, realising that she might need some help with the body.

[Dyson here Doctor, how can I help ?] The voice of the Marines Medic replied.

"Could you come to Sickbay and help me with the examination of a body ?" Rahel requested.

[I'll be there in five minutes.] Eliza said.

The Marine arrived four minutes later, in casual clothes and found Rahel totally motionless in the medical lab.

Rahel nodded toward her. "Thank you for coming…" She said. "I need you to tell me what you see and what you hear for a moment . . ." The first thing Rahel wanted to establish was if she was the only one to see and hear what she was.

If she was, it was only merely another piece in the huge jigsaw puzzle that was her life. But it was still something else she knew about herself. If she wasn't the only one, then she knew for a fact that whoever was trying to make themselves look like Jessica didn't do a good job all the way around.

"I can't hear anything unusual." Eliza announced. "What is it that you think you can hear ?."

Rahel sighed softly. "Believe it or not, I hear a mild buzzing. Like an electrical field is being emitted . . . and I've seen the body's image flicker. The scans aren't showing anything other than what's before our eyes. But what if that's a lie?" Rahel replied. "I think we may need to do a more hands on approach with this autopsy. Get an internal DNA sample. Get it tested. If it's Jessica West-Moss, it will come up in the Starfleet Database. If not . . . who knows . . . we might get lucky. We might not."

"Could it be your hearing that's causing the noise ?" Eliza suggested. "I could check if you like."

Eliza reached for a medical tricorder, but Rahel protested.

"I don't think it's my hearing or my eyesight." She remarked. "The noise started as I came into the lab and approached the body. The closer I get, the louder the noise."

"I think it stands to reason that the body is the cause. And really . . . A DNA test will prove whether or not, I'm right," Rahel added, her green eyes looking at Eliza.

"Agreed." Eliza stated, walking over to the equipment table and picking up a tissue probe from one of the drawers. She walked back towards the table and for the first time recognised exactly who the body was.

"Jessica…." She remarked.

As the only two female Marines onboard the ship, they had been assigned the same quarters. Which had meant they had plenty of space given that all the Marine junior officer quarters were designed to sleep four. They hadn't had much time to get to know each other and now they never would.

"How ?… Why ?" Eliza asked, more in shock than looking for answers.

"Eliza . . ." Rahel said, doing her best to make sure she got the young girl's attention. "Let's even see if this *is* Jessica. I have my doubts at the moment and looks can be deceiving . . ."

Eliza passed Rahel the probe and pushing back a tear watched as the Doctor examined the body for a suitable entry site.

Rahel picked one and carefully, to do the least amount of physical damage, grabbed the sample she needed. Immediately, she took and looked around for her DNA scanner. She found it. It wasn't as advanced as the one in Science Lab 2, but it would do. It would at least tell them what they needed to know for the moment.

She placed the sample within the device and within a few moments it was analysed. She transferred the data to the computer. "Computer, check DNA against DNA for Jessica Moss-West. Is there a match between the two DNA samples?"

Rahel looked over at Eliza and smiled. "Looks like Jessica is still alive somewhere . . ."

"Then who's this ?" Eliza stated. "And why do they look like Jessica ?"

Just then Logan came back to speak with the Security team. He had a Padd with him and showed it to both officers, who identified the image as the person who had walked past them just moments before they dropped unconscious.

Having got what he needed, he stepped into the medical lab to speak to Rahel and see if she had any news.

"I have some news . . ." Rahel said as she looked at him. "Enough to clear Moss of killing his wife. That is not Jessica in there."

"Then who is it." Logan asked.

"I don't know." Rahel admitted. "Yet."

"Keep on it and let me know if you find anything new. I'd better get back to the Brig and start the interrogation." Logan said, leaving the two Doctors alone once more.

"Rahel !" Eliza said. "Do you think we could be looking at someone who's been altered to look like Jessica or something else, something mechanical. Maybe that's what's causing the sounds you can hear."

Rahel nodded. "I'm thinking mechanical, definitely . . ." She replied. "In fact, we might get a little messy, but we'll have to do a little searching for some kind of device on this person . . . But I think I'll let my ears guide us. What do you think ?" She asked with a conspiratorial smile.

She figured, she would use her heightened sense of sound and find the spot where the sound seemed the loudest.

*That would be the more reasonable place to start the search.* She thought.

"It's worth a try." Eliza admitted.

Rahel started to lean over the body and listen for any sounds.

The sound grew quieter the further down toward the legs she got and also the farther toward the top of the head she got . . . But then, around the neck, it seemed to emanate the strongest. So then, she concentrated on that area and one spot stuck out more than any other. Rahel asked for a scalpel and carefully cut away the skin. To her surprise, she found a device.

As she took it from the body, the body changed shape into that of a Romulan male. Just like the DNA had suggested. Rahel looked at the device and then at the dead man on her table and sighed as she looked at Eliza. "Surprises just abound today, don't they!"

"What's that ?" Eliza asked as Rahel wiping the green blood off the cube and placing it in a sample dish.

"It looks like some kind of holoemitter." Rahel admitted. "Now that we have the correct body, let's take a closer look at our friends DNA. There's something about the DNA that I don't like. The DNA scanner is Science Lab two is much more sophisticated than the one here in Sickbay."

They quickly headed for the science lab, finding it empty. Rahel placed the sample in the scanner and they waited for the results. As they waited, Rahel thought about how easy it would be to take a sample of her own tissue and put it through the scanner. But she'd promised Logan on Mirisam V that she wouldn't until the time was right, but everyday the urge to discover her heritage grew stronger and stronger.

So caught up in her own thoughts that at first she didn't notice that the scan had been completed. Eliza gently interrupted her and got her back on track. As she transferred the information to the computer for them to look at, she was surprised. She immediately tapped her combadge.

"Lieutenant Kahfre to Commander Rashad." Rahel announced.

[Rashad here.] The Bajorian-Romulan replied.

"There's something about the body of Jessica Moss-West you should see." Rahel suggested. "Could you bring Logan with you ?"

[We're both on our way.] Rashad confirmed.

Both Rahel and Eliza headed back to Sickbay to meet with Logan and T'Kul. Whilst Rahel waited for them, Eliza decided to re-examine the tissue samples and the data they had collected together.