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Pandora's Box #90-91 - "The Riddle... The Cure..."-={On}=- [Sickbay, Deck 6, USS Pegasus] In his office in sickbay Russell sat at his desk comparing the results from the samples he had taken from several crew members. Then the computer chirped when the message from the Science Lab came in. "What's that? I'm busy!" Russell mumbled a bit annoyed. He found it hard enough to concentrate anyway when someone's talking, especially when it was himself all the time. He accessed the nearest console to bring up the results from the Science Lab. "Lab's been busy." Russell reacted out loud. "Now let see what they have found out about that damn... something that's causing us say things we don't want." He quickly read the results from the Lab's testing. "A peptide chain?" he said. "That's all they found? Hmm..." Jennifer walked into the sickbay with Alexandra by her hand "Please wait here while I talk to the Doctor..." she said to her daughter who immediately activated the Emergency Medical Hologram, that way he would at least get some exercise. Jennifer put her head around the corner of the Doctor's office "Lieutenant." Russell looked up and saw a familiar face. "What can I do for you, dear? Ehrm.. dear Ensign?" he stuttered. "Phew, nice save..." he mumbled to himself. "I need help... you seem intelligent enough..." Jennifer blushed a bit "...I mean you're old..." she sighed "...I mean you have a lot of knowledge perhaps you could solve this darn thing before it gets worse..." she looked around the office a bit "...oohw that's cute" "Glad you think that of me." Russell simply stated, smiling a bit. He almost got used to the fact everybody said what they thought. "It seems you're infec.... Eh, cute? What's cute?" he asked. Jennifer snapped back and placed a PADD on the desk and sat down "nothing... never mind..." she was referring to the painting on his wall. "There were hieroglyphs on the bottom of the box and I translated them partly... but they make no sense..." she sighed "...to me at least" "So the Lab found more than just a peptide chain. That's reassuring." Russell said, but that was of course not what he meant to say. "I mean, what have you translated so far?" "Just bits and pieces... some of those things make no sense..." Jennifer rubbed her head a bit "...it's so annoying..." she sighed a bit as she placed a second PADD, "the Hieroglyphs" she pointed at the first PADD "what I translated" she pointed at the other PADD. "Line one, The Answer is something something. Line two, something something need not lie. Line three, Seek your Answer something truth. Line four, Only then something your thoughts. Line five is all riddle to me..." "Hmm, I thought you actually found something." Russell mumbled to his own shock. "Argh, I mean, looks like this is just the beginning of the riddle. This could be the clue we need. In the whole it seems to describe the symptoms. 'Not lie', 'truth' and 'your thoughts' pretty much sums up what we've all been doing lately." Russell looked back at his console with the animation of the peptide chain spinning in the screen and pointed at it.. "This has got to do something with it. But is it the cause or the cure?" he said to Jennifer. "I'm not a doctor, Lieutenant, I'm a linguist..." Jennifer rubbed her eyes, she had been staring at it for hours now and somehow she couldn't make heads or tails out of it "...but I have some of my personnel take samples from the other hieroglyphs on the cargo, so we have more reference" she leaned way back in the chair and sighed heavily. "We'll have to wait and see what they come up with." Russell replied. Finally able to focus on something he noticed he talked less nonsense by speaking his thoughts. "I'll try to do some tests with that peptide chain. I'll need to synthesize more of that if it turns out to be the cure to this... madness." he said followed by a soft "So I can finally make myself useful around here..." "Need any help with that?" Jennifer asked "'cause we all feel pretty useless at this moment... I'm just waiting for my team to report back in... which might take a while" "By all means." Russell said. "I hope you're any good with medical stuff." He walked over to T'Rell to check on him. He treated the Vulcan with a neural stimulator to repair the damage to his neural pathways. "He's gonna have a serious headache when he wakes up. Kinda like a tequila hangover." Russell smirked. "Tequila? wasn't that the stuff you and Caelen drunk on that starbase?" Jennifer followed the Doctor and heard what he was probably thinking to himself "he was in such a rotten mood the day after" she smirked a bit, at least he was enjoying a drink with other guys again. Russell looked back at Jennifer. "Yeah, we ran into Evans in a bar. He had been drinking the stuff like water. We joined him for a couple of glasses. Powerful stuff." he replied. "But it's the aftermath of real alcohol that can spoil the fun the day after." he said with a smile on his face, knowing all to well why Caelen had been in a rotten mood. He wasn't at his best either the next morning. Jennifer leaned on the counter Russell was working on "how's your wife and kids?" she then asked "that was random..." she added in whispering afterthought. Russell just had the computer analyze the peptide chain. It would take a little while to complete it's scans and comparing it with all the known chains in the medical database. While typing command into the console he replied "They're fine. I sent them a message when I learned that we were headed for Earth. They would love to see the ship. My son Peter wants to join Starfleet too. He's gonna be 16 next month, so he'll have to wait a few years." "I am sure Caelen would be glad to show your son around the boat a bit..." Jennifer smiled warmly, "...and otherwise I will" she then figured something "off course you could also do it yourself... I'm sorry... you would like to be with your son a bit when you have the chance and now I try to take it away from you..." she sighed at her ramble "...you could also ignore me" Russell smiled a bit. "First we have to deal with this so called infection, or there will be no tour of the ship. We don't want this to reach Earth. The consequences could be disastrous." Then he laughed and added "Maybe it would be good if the politicians had this disease for a while. Just to find out if they really say what they think." The computer chirped and showed the results of the analysis. "Finally something other than 'unknown'." Russell reacted. "It appears that we have found the cause of the disease." "So we know the cause... the effect... and now how do we so-" she was interrupted by her combadge. =/\= Ensign LaBrie, this is Chief Ranel, you should check your PADD ma'am, I hope you can make any sense out of it=/\= a communications Chief Petty officer relayed the message over the comm. Jennifer lightened up a bit "Now let's hope it helps us find the cure..." she said almost jogging to the office and pick up the PADD. She walked back to the main sickbay with a puzzled look going over the translation once or twice more. "What does it say? Has your team of slaves... ehm... hieroglyph experts found something more interesting?" Russell asked hopefully. Maybe they were finally able to get rid of this madness with the help of the complete ancient rhyme. "Or is it still just a riddle?" "I don't know... it might've been a poem but being translated so crudely like it has been we can't be sure... it does have some rhythmic sounding to it..." Jennifer sunk a bit into thought again "...maybe it was a bitter poet who made the virus because nobody would understand his thoughts..." she then shook her head and looked at Russell "...off course that would be silly" she smirked and before turning to the PADD again and read the translation out loud. "The Answer is with Them, With those who need not lie. Seek your answer in the truth, Only then will your thoughts Return to the place they belong…" "That's exactly what that stuff's been doing." Russell said while pointing at the view screen where the image of the peptide chain was shown. "But does it say what to do about it? Our thoughts Really need to go back to where they belong." he said on a decisive tone. Alexandra came and distract them at the exact right moment "Mom, why can't I take the EMH around the ship?" she had been talking to the EMH, like she always did, mostly about the rest of the ship and that he should lighten up a bit and walk around the vessel with her and have some fun, playing with ponies. "I'm sorry sweety, mom's a bit busy right now..." Jennifer gave a friendly smile as she gently stroked her hair "...the EMH can't get out of the sickbay, I explained that to you didn't I?" Alexandra nodded knowingly "but I forgot..." she admitted "Well maybe you can ask the EMH to explain it to you" Jennifer pushed her in the direction of the EMH again, it was always fun to see how the EMH was so out of his element trying to solve the situation with Alex. "The answer is with them who need not lie..." Jennifer overthought it a bit again "...any species on board that don't lie... I mean... like are incapable of lying?" Don't lie or can't lie, that's a big difference." Russell stated. "For instance, Vulcans don't lie, but I'm sure they can." he said smiling while looking at T'Rell. "That goes for Betazoids as well..." Jennifer added to this train of thought... "we have to think broader... no matter what species... what people don't lie?" "You're weird..." they heard Alexandra tell the EMH, as she always did, in conclusion. "...why wouldn't you want to play with ponies? I can't imagine somebody who doesn't like ponies... even Evans likes ponies..." Russell looked at Alexandra when he heard her say that and thought out loud. "Evans likes ponies? He hasn't told me that." He laughed a bit. "But if you say so it's probably true." Then he looked back at Jennifer just like something hit him. "That could be it. Kids just seem to speak what they think no matter what." he said. "And as far as I know it's always true what they say." he added. "My daughter Hanna had a knack for creating embarrassing moments when she was her age." he said pointing at Alexandra. "Why didn't I think of that?!" Jennifer sounded, all at the same time, surprised, relieved and hopeful "just one way to find out I would think..." she turned to Alex and walked a bit closer "...Alex can Doctor Floyd run some tests on you again?" she asked. Alex her smile disappeared a bit "is he going to make me hurt again?" she asked not having forgotten last time the Doctor scanned her. Russell still felt sorry for that painful, but necessary treatment, so he wanted to reassure her. "No hurting this time, I promise." he said to Alexandra with a big smile on his face, extending his hand. Alex grabbed his hand and her smile re-appeared "Will you do the flashy thingy?" she asked already getting excited. "Of course we'll do the flashy thingy." Russell replied. Then he looked back at Jennifer and shrugged. There were so many flashy thingies, he had no idea what she meant. He led her to the biobed and picked her up to let her sit on it. Then he got a medical tricorder from the cabinet under it and took the remote scanner in his hand. It started flashing in it's trademark way. "Oh, you mean this flashy thingy?" Russell said as he was scanning the little girl. An even broader smile, if it was even possible "what does it say?" she tried to peer over onto the hand held read out end of the tricorder, off course she had No idea what it meant but that didn't bother her. "It says that you could help everybody on this ship." Russell said with enjoyment. "I've set the tricorder to scan for anything related to that peptide chain at it looks like you developed something against it." Mumbling he added. "It almost looks like you had a flu shot." "I wasn't shot..." Alexandra hopped off the bed and turned around with arms wide "...see!" Jennifer smiled a bit "I am not sure what you mean by that Doc..." she couldn't quite make out what he had mumbled. Russell smiled when he saw Alexandra prove she hadn't been shot. He looked at Jennifer and explained "In the late 20th and early 21st century it was common practice to inject people with very weak flu viruses so their body would create antibodies against it. Those people would not get sick." Adding a soft "Most of the time." Then he continued "It looks like Alexandra developed some form of antibodies against our 'blabbermouth-disease'. I should be able to create an antidote with her help." "That's the best news I've heard since some idiot opened that box..." Jennifer sighed with relieve "...Caelen will be very pleased, good work Doc" she tapped him on the shoulder as some sort of thanks. "I'm gonna stay with you Doc!" Alexandra her enthusiasm never seized to expand over this "can we have a pyjama party?!" "Maybe we could." Russell laughed. "I'll invite everybody anyway when I have a cure. I'll make sure Evans brings his ponies." -={Off}=- A "finally, we're getting somewhere" breakthrough JP by: Lieutenant (jg) Dr. Russell D. Floyd Chief Medical Officer "At last, I can make myself useful..." & Ensign Jennifer LaBrie (Acting) Chief Communications (NPC by Caelen LaBrie) & Alexandra LaBrie Civilian and 'The Cure' (NPC by Caelen LaBrie) "I have more NPCs then Kristiana!"
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