"Wounds"
March 13th, 2363
On the edge of her consciousness she was aware of voices, overlapping, hurried, panicked, serious. Lieutenant Motoko Kimura tried as hard as she could to open her eyes, but no matter what she did, her body wouldn’t respond to her commands.
Is this it? Am I dead? she asked herself.
The last thing she remembered was being onboard the Galileo, sitting at the controls, Ensign Yopshi-Krral next to her, every sensor display screaming at her. She had only glanced at them before the Type-7 shuttle had been thrashed around, but from what she’d gleamed it looked like they had been in the path of a quantum filament. I must be dead. No way could a shuttlecraft withstand a filament.
From far off in the distance, one gruff voice cut through all the others. “Lieutenant Kimura, can you hear me? Lieutenant?”
Why is Doctor Grav here? He wasn’t on the shuttle, she pondered in her dream-like delirium.
“Lieutenant Kimura, if you can hear me, please make a noise.”
“Doc?” she croaked, though to all those listening it sounded more like, ‘Dllorrk’. She wanted to say more, but her mind felt heavy, her thoughts jumbled, and her body willed her to drift off into blissful slumber. She succumbed to it, and soon she wasn’t aware of anything.
------
March 19th, 2363
She opened her eyes a crack and winced at the blinding lights above her, groaning at the dull throb of pain that crept up every nerve in her body. She became aware of the beeping of a medical monitor, the faint hum of the sterilisation field that enshrouded Starfleet medical facilities. From the middle distance she heard someone speaking, though not to her.
Kimura tried to open her eyes once again, slower this time. When she was able to look around once again, Doctor Grav was standing next to her biobed, running a medical tricorder over her torso.
“How do you feel?” he asked, his voice uncharacteristically soft.
“What…what happened?” she asked the Tellarite physician.
“The Galileo was hit by a quantum filament. You managed to avoid the worst of it, but she still took heavy damage. You were severely injured.”
She looked at the Nautilus’ CMO, her eyes boring into him. “My team?”
He held her gaze as he said, “Including yourself, there were only three survivors.”
Tears pricked her eyes, and she unashamedly let them roll down her cheeks. There had been eight on her team—a simple repair job to an unmanned communication relay. “Who…?”
“Petty Officer Samson and Crewman T’Loe.”
Though not a religious person, Kimura closed her eyes tightly, and uttered a silent prayer for the five men and women lost under her command. Hopefully some benevolent deity would hear her and guide them to a place of rest.
When she opened her eyes again, she noticed a deep look of sympathy of Grav’s face. The usual gruff scowl he wore was nowhere to be seen. He had lost his share of patients, and though it would never be easy, he always handled it well—all things considered. There was something else…something that had affected the cantankerous Doctor Grav.
“I have some bad news, Motoko,” he began. “During the accident, you suffered some severe internal injuries. If we had been able to get to you sooner, I might have been able to do something.”
Part of her mind knew what he was going to say, but she blocked it out, not willing to hear it, not willing to admit that it might be a possibility.
“I’m sorry to have to tell you, that you’ve lost the baby.”
She stared at Grav for a long moment. That was it. It was out in the open. There was no way he could take it back, or cover it up. The tears she shed for her dead shipmates increased, coming heavier, blurring her vision. A guttural wail escaped from her throat as she sobbed. Her hands rested on her bandaged abdomen. She felt Grav’s supportive hand on her arm. All around her, everyone and everything in sickbay stopped, as all the medical personnel, and the two injured engineers from her team, looked at her. The gut-wrenching display of grief touched everyone, even T’Loe.
But Kimura wasn’t aware of their sympathy. She focused on the emptiness inside, the life lost to her.
------
March 21st, 2363
The news went from bad to worse. During her six day coma, a memorial had been held for Ensigns Yopshi-Krral and Purcell, Chief sh’Sohka, and Crewmen Weir and Oii. She hadn’t been able to say goodbye to them, the men and women she had worked with for two years, people she had enjoyed working with, gossiping with. They had shown her the respect the Assistant Chief Engineer was due, but treated her like one of the gang, made her laugh, asked her for help with professional and personal problems. They had been her friends, and she had let them all down.
As hard as that was, it paled in comparison to the other news Doctor Grav had delivered to her the day she regain consciousness. Her injuries had been extensive—not surprising given that her stomach had been impaled by a support strut—with perforations to her bowel, liver, and kidneys, all of which had been repaired. But it was her uterus that had taken the brunt of the damage, resulting in the loss of her developing child, and the news that the injuries were so severe that it was unlikely she would ever be able to become pregnant again.
She had spent most of the last two days, curled up on the biobed, crying. The nurses had made sure she was alright, Counsellor Tundi had come in to offer her support and comfort, and of course there was Michael. But she had barely acknowledged any of them.
How could she begin to share with the Ship’s Counsellor her loss, and what it meant for her future?
And Michael? He had been as excited as she was at the prospect of a baby, and a family together. It was the one thing he had wanted most in his life, more than his rank or position. But she couldn’t give it to him. As much as she loved him, as much as she wanted a family of her own—like her sister Reiko, who had three kids already—it had been denied to both of them now.
When he visited, Michael just sat beside her, his eyes red rimmed. They just sat their in quiet reflection, having him close made her feel a little better—knowing that he felt some of what she did. But he would never know the emptiness.
------
March 29th, 2363
Motoko Kimura, formerly of the U.S.S. Nautilus, sat onboard the interstellar transport heading back for Earth. Doctor Grav had taken her off active duty and put her on medical leave, so she was heading back to the apartment she had in Manhattan to rest and recuperate, and try to decide what she would do next. Her whole life had involved Starfleet to some degree, due to her mother being an officer. She and her sister had spent years going back and forth from ship to station to planet, between their parents, occasionally together, but mostly apart. When she was thirteen, she knew she wanted the adventurous life her mother had, and really began to focus on getting into the Academy as soon as she could. Four years of hard work at high school saw her get her wish. Another four years of intensive study and she graduated in the top five percent of her class.
Her whole life had been open to her, and thanks to her parents, she knew that she could have a loving husband and a family of her own even with the demands a career would place on her. But now that big part of her life was closed to her. She could still marry Michael, but she knew that it would be a constant painful reminder of what she had lost—not that she could ever forget. But seeing him and knowing that, like her, he too had wanted a spouse and kids, and would now have to settle for one without the other, was just too hard.
So she had ended it. She had handed back the ring he had given her, a family heirloom, told him to find someone to share what he wanted with, and left before he could say anything more. What she wanted more than anything was some time alone.
Time to think. Time to heal.
END
March 13th, 2363
On the edge of her consciousness she was aware of voices, overlapping, hurried, panicked, serious. Lieutenant Motoko Kimura tried as hard as she could to open her eyes, but no matter what she did, her body wouldn’t respond to her commands.
Is this it? Am I dead? she asked herself.
The last thing she remembered was being onboard the Galileo, sitting at the controls, Ensign Yopshi-Krral next to her, every sensor display screaming at her. She had only glanced at them before the Type-7 shuttle had been thrashed around, but from what she’d gleamed it looked like they had been in the path of a quantum filament. I must be dead. No way could a shuttlecraft withstand a filament.
From far off in the distance, one gruff voice cut through all the others. “Lieutenant Kimura, can you hear me? Lieutenant?”
Why is Doctor Grav here? He wasn’t on the shuttle, she pondered in her dream-like delirium.
“Lieutenant Kimura, if you can hear me, please make a noise.”
“Doc?” she croaked, though to all those listening it sounded more like, ‘Dllorrk’. She wanted to say more, but her mind felt heavy, her thoughts jumbled, and her body willed her to drift off into blissful slumber. She succumbed to it, and soon she wasn’t aware of anything.
------
March 19th, 2363
She opened her eyes a crack and winced at the blinding lights above her, groaning at the dull throb of pain that crept up every nerve in her body. She became aware of the beeping of a medical monitor, the faint hum of the sterilisation field that enshrouded Starfleet medical facilities. From the middle distance she heard someone speaking, though not to her.
Kimura tried to open her eyes once again, slower this time. When she was able to look around once again, Doctor Grav was standing next to her biobed, running a medical tricorder over her torso.
“How do you feel?” he asked, his voice uncharacteristically soft.
“What…what happened?” she asked the Tellarite physician.
“The Galileo was hit by a quantum filament. You managed to avoid the worst of it, but she still took heavy damage. You were severely injured.”
She looked at the Nautilus’ CMO, her eyes boring into him. “My team?”
He held her gaze as he said, “Including yourself, there were only three survivors.”
Tears pricked her eyes, and she unashamedly let them roll down her cheeks. There had been eight on her team—a simple repair job to an unmanned communication relay. “Who…?”
“Petty Officer Samson and Crewman T’Loe.”
Though not a religious person, Kimura closed her eyes tightly, and uttered a silent prayer for the five men and women lost under her command. Hopefully some benevolent deity would hear her and guide them to a place of rest.
When she opened her eyes again, she noticed a deep look of sympathy of Grav’s face. The usual gruff scowl he wore was nowhere to be seen. He had lost his share of patients, and though it would never be easy, he always handled it well—all things considered. There was something else…something that had affected the cantankerous Doctor Grav.
“I have some bad news, Motoko,” he began. “During the accident, you suffered some severe internal injuries. If we had been able to get to you sooner, I might have been able to do something.”
Part of her mind knew what he was going to say, but she blocked it out, not willing to hear it, not willing to admit that it might be a possibility.
“I’m sorry to have to tell you, that you’ve lost the baby.”
She stared at Grav for a long moment. That was it. It was out in the open. There was no way he could take it back, or cover it up. The tears she shed for her dead shipmates increased, coming heavier, blurring her vision. A guttural wail escaped from her throat as she sobbed. Her hands rested on her bandaged abdomen. She felt Grav’s supportive hand on her arm. All around her, everyone and everything in sickbay stopped, as all the medical personnel, and the two injured engineers from her team, looked at her. The gut-wrenching display of grief touched everyone, even T’Loe.
But Kimura wasn’t aware of their sympathy. She focused on the emptiness inside, the life lost to her.
------
March 21st, 2363
The news went from bad to worse. During her six day coma, a memorial had been held for Ensigns Yopshi-Krral and Purcell, Chief sh’Sohka, and Crewmen Weir and Oii. She hadn’t been able to say goodbye to them, the men and women she had worked with for two years, people she had enjoyed working with, gossiping with. They had shown her the respect the Assistant Chief Engineer was due, but treated her like one of the gang, made her laugh, asked her for help with professional and personal problems. They had been her friends, and she had let them all down.
As hard as that was, it paled in comparison to the other news Doctor Grav had delivered to her the day she regain consciousness. Her injuries had been extensive—not surprising given that her stomach had been impaled by a support strut—with perforations to her bowel, liver, and kidneys, all of which had been repaired. But it was her uterus that had taken the brunt of the damage, resulting in the loss of her developing child, and the news that the injuries were so severe that it was unlikely she would ever be able to become pregnant again.
She had spent most of the last two days, curled up on the biobed, crying. The nurses had made sure she was alright, Counsellor Tundi had come in to offer her support and comfort, and of course there was Michael. But she had barely acknowledged any of them.
How could she begin to share with the Ship’s Counsellor her loss, and what it meant for her future?
And Michael? He had been as excited as she was at the prospect of a baby, and a family together. It was the one thing he had wanted most in his life, more than his rank or position. But she couldn’t give it to him. As much as she loved him, as much as she wanted a family of her own—like her sister Reiko, who had three kids already—it had been denied to both of them now.
When he visited, Michael just sat beside her, his eyes red rimmed. They just sat their in quiet reflection, having him close made her feel a little better—knowing that he felt some of what she did. But he would never know the emptiness.
------
March 29th, 2363
Motoko Kimura, formerly of the U.S.S. Nautilus, sat onboard the interstellar transport heading back for Earth. Doctor Grav had taken her off active duty and put her on medical leave, so she was heading back to the apartment she had in Manhattan to rest and recuperate, and try to decide what she would do next. Her whole life had involved Starfleet to some degree, due to her mother being an officer. She and her sister had spent years going back and forth from ship to station to planet, between their parents, occasionally together, but mostly apart. When she was thirteen, she knew she wanted the adventurous life her mother had, and really began to focus on getting into the Academy as soon as she could. Four years of hard work at high school saw her get her wish. Another four years of intensive study and she graduated in the top five percent of her class.
Her whole life had been open to her, and thanks to her parents, she knew that she could have a loving husband and a family of her own even with the demands a career would place on her. But now that big part of her life was closed to her. She could still marry Michael, but she knew that it would be a constant painful reminder of what she had lost—not that she could ever forget. But seeing him and knowing that, like her, he too had wanted a spouse and kids, and would now have to settle for one without the other, was just too hard.
So she had ended it. She had handed back the ring he had given her, a family heirloom, told him to find someone to share what he wanted with, and left before he could say anything more. What she wanted more than anything was some time alone.
Time to think. Time to heal.
END
