Neurology ((Chalice/Jaz/T'Prise/t'Tamarak))

[Jaiysa t'Tamarak 0]

Sickbay continued to be a flurry of activity. Chief Mele worked in the wings, giving the other doctors specific assignments, while supervising the general care of the four who had been removed from the alien computer array and were just barely out of critical care. Dr. Chalice had finished going over the reports with Doctors Sloan, Jaz and Mele, before being assigned to review T'Prise's situation in detail as the attending. She questioned the Chief's decision to give her this assignment, as she wasn't the neurological specialist, but with Dr. t'Tamarak indisposed, it fell on her shoulders. Mele knew what he was doing. He didn't have to explain it, especially since he had assigned Eva to Jaiysa's case, aware that Vilanne was too emotionally tied to her friend, and that treating the Romulan doctor would keep Eva from over worrying about Hilee.

 

Mele had assigned Dr. Sloan to take over with Hilee, and kept a hand himself in the regeneration process being performed on Commander Precip. He would soon need to wake the Commander and begin the intense therapy required to actuate the regrown parts of the Bolian's leg.

 

Vilanne went into the private room where T'Prise and t'Tamarak were being monitored and, seating herself on an examination stool near the Vulcan's biobed and began reviewing the patient's chart out loud. Attempting to diagnose the problem, she input various routines into the medical computer against all of T'Prise's scans, but the familiar LCARS voice continued to intone "There is not enough data to determine a match," or "The central nervous system is not responding correctly." Vil, with equal frequency, could be heard to respond with annoyance, "I know it's not responding correctly... duh!" Luckily, the computer did not respond back asking why she had asked in the first place.

 

Jaiysa lay slightly to her side, her eyes half-shut. She had been dozing in and out of consciousness for several hours now, listening to the bustle of the lloann'na maenekir moving in and out. Vilanne's voice now and then cut through the noise, louder as it was closer, tones of frustration as she dealt with the yyaio in the next bed over.

 

"If we keep the neural transducer on at these levels, she's bound to respond to treatment. These convulsions bother me. Computer, correlation between these convulsions and any other changes in T'Prises' symptoms." Vilanne waited for a response to this, but the computer only returned, "There is not enough data to determine any correlation. The periods between convulsions differs in each segment between 31 seconds and 19.6 minutes."

 

"Great... this is just great. Ok then, continue the transducer and 10 millisecond intervals. Computer, continue to monitor the frequency and strength of the convulsions as compared to the synaptic activity," Vilanne instructed, hoping that T'Prise would react positively to the stimuli.

 

Something rang false with those words, Jaisya thought, as she once more attempted to clear her head. Her brain, still disordered from the trauma it had undergone, was slow to speak and to comprehend – speech center damage, she knew, though she could not have phrased it aloud – and could not at first pin it down, could not identify the reason why Vil's instructions jarred so strongly. Slowly, over the hours, though, the comprehension came...

 

Yyaio...gemaenir...hiafvar... The Vulcan mind...Jaiysa knew how it worked. Of course she would not respond to those treatments...

 

"Rokhinu..." she rasped, trying to get Vil's attention -- and for a moment that was all she said, as her abused speech centers fought to catch up with her understanding.

 

Vilanne gave orders to infuse adrenaline to help speed up the onset of treatment for T'Prise just as she heard the rasping behind her, and spun on her stool to look at Jaiysa with a smile. "Glad you could join us again. Do you need anything?" she asked, tapping a button on the console to call Nurse Nancy to attend to the Romulan.

 

Jaiysa shook her head roughly, as if the movement could shake the fuzz that seemed to be coating her thoughts. "Your...treatment..." she began, then paused, rephrasing. Her eyes traveled to the biobed console next to T'Prise's body and she gestured at it vaguely. "Her...mind...not..."

 

Vilanne pushed her stool closer to Jaiysa, and patted her forearm. "Don't try and talk yet... just let your mind relax while you heal. You are responding wonderfully compared to when you first got here." Looking up at the vitals, Vil did a quick once-over of her colleague's status.

 

"Transducer…no need…" A low growl of frustration escaped Jaiysa's throat as her words dried up again. Though the phrases hung inside her mind, clear and certain, couched in medical knowledge honed over years, her speech centers flatly refused to deliver them to the outside air in any coherent form. "Fvaaaadt!" she hissed.

 

"My, my... you are stubborn," Vil chuckled, giving Jaiysa a warm smile as Nurse Nancy entered. Hearing the rasping noise, the nurse quickly retrieved some water and handed it to Vil, who lowered the straw near Jaiysa's mouth. "Just wet your whistle, it'll help ease the dryness in your throat."

 

"Na adrenaline!" Jaiysa finally got out, slamming her hand down in emphasis and knocking the cup aside. "Na transducer, na ketaenir! Vulcan...she...Vulcan healing... she... will... rebuild... herself..."

 

Nothing like the way she would have actually wished to phrase it.

 

After a quick peek through the other suite door to assure herself that Hilee was in good hands with Dr Sloan, Eva walked into the private suite just in time to see a glass go flying past her. Vil quickly guarded her from the wet floor while Nurse Nancy went to get a © Scam-Wow to mop up the mess.

 

"Jaiysa was trying very hard to talk and bumped the water," Vil explained. "Her throat is very raspy; I wish she'd just relax it." Vil turned her eyes back onto Jai while Eva looked the Romulan neurologist over.

 

Ignoring Jaiysa's dark look, Eva turned to Vil. "I can sedate her, that would make her relax her throat alright," she replied, grinning.

 

"On a more serious note..." she continued before anyone could respond, leading Vilanne away from their colleague-turned-patient. "I've noticed too that Dr. t'Tamarak seems to have difficulties expressing herself. She clearly knows what she wants to say but is somehow incapable." She stopped for a second , thinking before focusing back on Vilanne. "I think we might have missed a lesion to her frontal lobe that might be affecting her speech patterns. I will be running some more scans on her brain. Hopefully, we can pinpoint and repair what's causing the aphasia."

 

Eva patted Vilanne's shoulder. "And don't worry I'll keep you informed," she added sympathetically. "In the mean time you might want to listen to her concerning T'Prise's treatment. She's still a neurologist."

 

Turning to help Nurse Nancy, Eva watched out of the corner of her eye as Vil cautiously reapproached Jaiysa's biobed, listening as the Romulan continued to attempt to explain Vulcan neurobiology with a visible effort. "You might want to double check the information though; after all, she did suffer brain damage," she added in a low voice as she passed Vilanne on her way to Hilee's room where she planned to spend her short break in between her double shift.

 

Unnoticed by all in the chaos, T'Prise's neurological readings had begun to steady themselves to normal levels. Blinking rapidly, she opened her eyes, bringing her vision into focus, noticing the soft overhead lights as she tried to determine what the voices around were saying. One was agitated, the frustration in it patently obvious, while the other was soothing, apparently attempting to calm the tirade.

 

Long moments passed as the Vulcan took in her surroundings and assessed the situation. Clarity returned slowly, but at a steady pace. It was evident that they had been rescued and were now back aboard the Manticore. Memories came rushing into the forefront of her mind, but T'Prise pushed them aside, not wishing to examine them quite yet. Aside from the steady, dull ache of her head, she seemed to be recovering well physically.

 

The voices continued and T'Prise quickly ascertained who they belonged to and what was being said. "Dr. Chalice," she rasped, her throat parched, but her voice clear, "I believe what Dr. t'Tamarak is trying to inform you that neural transducer stimulation treatments are unnecessary for a Vulcan in a healing trance, as our minds are then engaged in their own reparative functions and will receive no additional benefit from the treatment."

 

Jaiysa scowled, shutting her eyes in a pantomime of exasperation as the yyaio, as expected, emerged from the trance and spoke up in her usual confident monotone. I knew that first, she thought with the irrational petulance of injured pride. "Ie…" she murmured, sinking against the biobed. "Ie…trance…healing…fvadt…"

 

****

 

fvadt -- damn

hiafvar -- heal

gemaenir – minds

ie -- yes

ketaenir -- medicine, medication

lloann'na -- Federation

maenekir -- doctors

na -- no

rokhinu -- "troublesome one" (here a nickname)

yyaio -- Vulcan (lit. "dead one")