The captain had ordered his senior staff to the Observation Lounge, after broadcasting a ship-wide message telling everyone "not to panic." They sauntered in one by one; Dr. Giovanni and Lt. Reiv briskly as their bodies were roughly 13 and 6 years old respectfully. Commander Yilaan looked about 25 as she confidently helped a 60 year old captain to his seat. One of the medical staff helped a blinded 70 year old Lt. Ivanovna to a chair near the edge of the room, while Commander Jevor and Ensign Gates helped each other, their hair pale white and their faces somewhat wrinkled. The captain had a pained expression on his face as he surveyed the changes among his officers.
Jevor noticed his melancholy and spoke up, his voice a little raspy but still retaining most of its strength, "It's not quite as bad as it looks, Captain. Us Andorians live longer than you Humans; I'm as strong as ever!" He pounded his chest and immediately started into a hacking cough.
"You should save your strength and your pontifications, Commander," the young girl's voice of Giovanni suggested. She sprung up out of her chair and did a tricorder reading, all the while making hand motions to encourage the instrument to hurry itself along. "Captain, it would seem that our minds are basically unaffected by this physical change," she blurted out. "However, who knows how long we'll be able to stand the strain? See, take Commander Jevor here; he's got a nasty problem, even though he's being brave and not showing the rest of us. My tricorder indicates symptoms of deterioration of the lungs," she continued rapidly. "The minds of those of us who aged significantly should begin to deteriorate just as the bodies have." Jevor rolled his eyes at the fact that the Bristol's hyperactive doctor was now an even more hyperactive teenager. Ignoring him, Giovanni went on, "My advice as Chief Medical Officer on board this ship is to get us out of the area of this effect as soon as possible. It'll kill us all if we don't."
The officers assembled, minus Ivanovna, looked at each other with worry. Ivanovna merely looked straight ahead and said nothing.
"Thank you Doctor," the captain replied to her monologue in an increasingly weary voice. "Well then people, our task is clear," said the captain. Yilaan looked at him expectantly, so he blustered a bit and then continued. "I want anyone with the skills necessary to restore the engines and the sensors. We've no idea how far this phenomena extends around us, and we need to find the way out." The captain smiled to himself, as if he'd just come up with a brilliant plan.
Yilaan made a face and then added, "I'd like to have those personnel too elderly to work to be assigned advisory roles or rest under Dr. Giovanni's supervision."
The captain nodded his assent. "Let's get to it then!" The assembled officers began to leave the room, when the captain said, "Yilaan remain for a moment." She did so, and the remainder filed out.
"What can I do for you sir?" she asked.
"Get me a heating pad for my back," the captain said dryly with a grin on his face. Yilaan smiled faintly at his jest, while his mood quickly turned more somber. "Cecilia, if I show signs of inability to think or act with my full capabilities, you're to relieve me, understand? Don't wait on sentiment or the like. If Giovanni's right, my mind could go, and then you'll have to take command. At least one of us must maintain themselves and try and get us out of this, and it looks like you drew the short straw, becoming younger and all."
Yilaan put her hand on the captain's right arm. "You can count on me sir. We'll get out of this, don't worry." She forced a pleasant smile as she wondered if indeed they would get out of their current predicament, and left the room.
An hour later, the captain was sitting in his Ready Room going over ship specifications, when his door buzzer chimed. "Come in," he said, looking up at the door. The door opened and a young girl entered. Captain Freeman had to blink twice before he remembering that she was Dr. Giovanni. "Yes, Doctor," Freeman said.
"I ran some tests and compared them with those I did awhile ago," Giovanni began quickly, pacing back and forth as she spoke. "The aging is continuing at an accelerated rate. I estimate within 12 hours we'll all be dead, or worse."
"Worse?" Freeman asked inquisitively.
"Well," Giovanni replied, drawing out the word. "Those of us getting younger will eventually cease to exist as conscious beings. That's kind of worse to me."
Captain Freeman got up, one hand on his back, the other on his desk for support. He sauntered slowly over to the food replicator in his wall. "Care for anything?" he asked his chief of medicine. She shook her head no, as she grabbed the chair back in front of her and unconsciously used it as a brace while she lifted her feet off the ground and back down again, repetitively. "Computer, apple cider, laced with cinnamon, 35 degrees Celsius." The computer produced the item quickly. The captain paused in surprise, then merely shrugged his shoulders and sat back down again. He tapped his comm-badge, "Jevor, how's it coming?"
"This is Lt. Andy Perriman, Captain. Commander Jevor is, well, indisposed," an old man's voice responded.
"Indisposed!? What does that mean? When I call for my Chief Engineer, I want to talk to him!" Freeman said angrily.
"Er, well sir," Perriman stammered.
"Come on man, out with it!" Freeman retorted.
"I'm afraid he's here, stretched out on the floor, taking a nap."
Freeman was about to respond angrily, when he noticed Dr. Giovanni barely containing a fit of raucous laughter. His own irritation then left him, and he burst out laughing. With the captain's polite veneer gone, Giovanni joined him in the mirth. "Very well then, Lieutenant," Freeman said after a few moments. "Update me on our status."
"We still don't have engines restored sir, or sensors, though we're closer on the latter. What we're finding is that various parts of the ship have aged so much that many circuits have crumbled. Other parts of the ship are in as good a shape as when the Bristol was first commissioned. However, I think a new problem we have to worry about is hull integrity," Perriman reported.
Freeman frowned as Giovanni distractingly continued to push herself off the floor, using the chair for leverage. "Doctor, would you stop that please?" he said. She pouted and acceded to the captain's wishes, while he continued his conversation with Lt. Perriman. "I agree, Lieutenant; in fact I've witnessed this effect on our systems myself. I want you to make getting the sensors back online your top priority; once that's done, we can use the internal sensors to scan for weak points in the hull. Pull any personnel that you need."
"Aye, aye, Captain," Perriman responded somewhat wearily.
"You're dismissed, Doctor," Freeman said to Giovanni.
She gave him a big, obnoxious smile. "Thanks!" she replied, and skipped out of the room. Freeman rolled his eyes after her, as he thought about relieving her of duty. 'And replace her with whom?' he asked himself. 'At least her mind is still mostly clear.' He shrugged and went out onto the Bridge.
As he exited his Ready Room, he was nearly run into head-long by Reiv. Trailing not far behind was Commander Yilaan, who was yelling at Reiv, "Give me those back, dammit!" At the sight of the captain, Reiv quickly placed both hands behind his back and darted behind the old man.
"What's going on here?" Freeman asked, trying to look at the six year-old Reiv, who in turn squirmed around behind his back.
"I was working on rewiring the communications station, when he came up, grabbed a handful of my tools and ran!" Yilaan complained.
Freeman frowned. "Give them back, Reiv," he ordered. The boy pouted and didn't budge. Freeman raised his voice, "Now!" Reluctantly, Reiv handed the tools back to Yilaan, as tears welled up in his eyes. "Now, go to your room....er...quarters!" Reiv didn't budge; instead he stood his ground and began to rock back and forth on his heels, his face screwed up as if he would cry at any moment.
"Come on, honey," a soothing female voice said to Reiv from behind the captain. "I'll take you to one of the play rooms, okay? You'll have fun!" Reiv choked back his tears and smiled at his benefactor, while the captain turned to see who was speaking.
As Reiv walked over and took the woman's hand, Freeman asked her, "Excuse me, but who are you? I'm afraid I don't recognize you."
"My name is Melanie," the woman replied. She appeared to be in her middle twenties, with long blonde hair. "I'm Lt. Hathaway's daughter."
"Lieutenant....," Freeman started to say, then he went slack-mouthed. "Didn't you just celebrate your seventh birthday a few days ago?"
"I did."
"How many more of you are there?" the captain asked.
"Of me?"
The captain made a face, "Children that are now much older."
She paused, "Several, I believe."
The captain turned to face his first officer, "Yilaan, get someone to get these 'ex-children' working. That ought to compensate for some of our losses in personnel."
Melanie interrupted, "I don't think that would help. Though our minds have matured somewhat, and many of us can speak better, we lack all the skills your training has given you."
"Nevertheless, I'm sure there's a big heavy bulkhead somewhere that needs replacing. Get those people together Yilaan," he said irritably. Commander Yilaan eyed Captain Freeman for a moment, before giving the necessary instructions via her comm-badge. Melanie ushered Lt. Reiv off the Bridge. "What are we running here, anyway?" the captain mumbled under his breath, as he walked unsteadily over and took his seat in the command chair.
Go back to the list of Trek stories, go on to the next chapter, or go back to the previous chapter.