Star Trek - TOS 38 Idic Epidemic (27 page)

“Yes. Jim, have you talked to either of them?”

“Spock, of course. Why?”

“Doesn’t anything strike you as odd here?” asked
McCoy.

“Bones, I’ve been concentrating on some way of
getting those Vulcan rebels out of engineering, short
of explosives.”

“Oh—yeah. I forgot about that problem. Making
any progress?”

“Not yet. Now that Scotty’s out of sickbay, though,
I’m sure he’ll get those doors open. Now, what’s this
about Spock and Sarek?”

“The
time.
You know that damn Vulcan time sense.
Sarek has had nothing to do for the past three days but
worry about his wife. Some of what he said to me the
translator wouldn’t handle, but what he was really mad about is that he’s been cooped up in there for
three days.
Three
days, Jim.”

“What? You mean neither Spock nor Sarek—?”

“That’s right, and I just don’t get it. Spock—well,
who can predict how his system will react to any
thing? But Sarek is full Vulcan, and he’s been exposed
twice now. First at the same time Amanda was, and
then again
by
Amanda. My God, she made a gash on
his face, put the virus straight into his blood, and he’s
not sick.”

“Could it be that weird blood type that they both
have?” Kirk demanded.

“T-negative? It’s rare, but I can’t believe no Vulcan
on Nisus has that type,” said McCoy.

“What about Vulcans on Nisus who haven’t caught
the plague? Bones … !”

“I’m on it, Jim.” He went to the intercom. “Uhura,
put me through to Sorel and Corrigan—emergency
priority.”

There was a short wait, then a cultured voice said, “M’Benga here, Dr. McCoy. Sorel and Dr. Corrigan
are attending patients.”

“You can check this for me, Geoff. I want to know if
any Vulcans with blood type T-negative have had any
strain of the plague.”

“Just a moment. They’ll be in a separate computer
file
…
yes, here are the records. Six in all Nisus’
Vulcan population. One moment while I check their
names against the disease records. T’Ara … Strain
A, recovered. Skitra … Strain B, deceased. Suter …
Strain B, recovered. T’Gra … Strain C, critical—”
McCoy sighed. “Thanks, Geoff. I thought we might
have had an answer, but obviously T-negative’s not
it.”

“So why is Sarek immune?” asked Kirk.
“Let’s get some of his blood and see,” said McCoy.
A few minutes later, Kirk was in the lab with
McCoy, both swathed in protective gear against con
tamination. McCoy showed him on the magnification
screen how the Klingon blood samples destroyed the
various strains of the virus. But Sarek’s blood didn’t;
the very first specimen McCoy introduced to it began to multiply like wildfire.

“He’s
not
immune,” said Kirk.

“But he’s definitely not sick,” McCoy responded.
“Oh, hell—we might as well let Spock and Sarek both
out. They’re not going to infect anyone when they’re
not sick themselves, and I don’t think either one wants to sit in isolation forever just to avoid the
possibility of catching this thing.”

When they were released, both Spock and Sarek
insisted on seeing Amanda, but McCoy would not
allow them into her room. They had to look in
through an observation port, to see her lying pale and
still, only the flashing of the heartbeat indicator
showing she was still alive.

Spock was already speculating as to why neither he nor Sarek had caught Amanda’s illness. “I want to see
those studies Korsal did,” he said. “The graphs that
identified the mutation pattern.”

McCoy explained that Korsal was still in sickbay.
After passing through all the decontamination proce
dures in leaving isolation, they went to where the Klingon engineer was. As Kirk had ordered, the
computer terminals had been set up, and Korsal was
working. Fields of multicolored dots flashed across
his screen as he watched, frowning.

Korsal looked up as the group entered his room. “Captain Kirk, have you started beaming materials
and personnel up from Nisus?”

Kirk shrugged. “Once we had the plague aboard, it
didn’t matter any longer. No one beamed up right
away, though.”

“Not till yesterday,” McCoy affirmed.

“You, Dr. McCoy,” said Korsal. “Who else?”

“Sorel and Corrigan. M’Benga. Some of our nurses
went back and forth too, and several lab technicians.”

“Then … both kinds of the virus may be aboard
by now,” said Korsal.

“There are four strains now,” said McCoy.

“No—not the strains, the … substrains, I suppose is the term. When you told me that our iron-based blood could not provide immunity to those with copper-based blood, I revised the chart, using only red for iron, green for copper, and white for silicon-based blood. People with silicon-based blood have had only Strain A.”

“How many such people are there on Nisus?” asked
McCoy.

“Forty-seven,” Korsal replied, “and
no one
of
mixed heritage combining silicon with either copper
or iron. Look at the spread pattern, then: white to white, red to red, green to green. But just as the mutations to more deadly strains of the virus have occurred in people of mixed ancestry, so have the
substrains developed. Watch. Here is Strain B.”

With only the three colors, instead of the original
host of varying shades, they could see the mutation spread, red to red to red to red to red—until it
reached someone whose dot was both red and green,
someone whose ancestry combined iron-based and
copper-based blood, as Spock’s did. From that person
three patterns spread: red to red to red, and green to
green to green of Strain B, and Strain C, in this case
going green to green to green.

Spock had moved forward to study the screen. Kirk
saw him swallow, very hard. “Doctor,” he said, his voice absolutely flat, “I think I must go back into
isolation.”

Kirk saw the doctor look at their Vulcan … their
half-Vulcan
friend, first startled, then sad. Then, “Yes,” he said, “I’m afraid you’re right, Spock. Let’s
just hope you’re not contagious now.”

Chapter Twenty-seven

Since she was already as exposed to the plague as it
was possible to be, Sorel allowed T’Pina to nurse her mother. The younger woman had been working, like everyone else not sick or recovering, almost without
rest. The healer expected her to show the first symp
toms sooner than forty-eight hours from her expo
sure, but the first day brought no sign of the disease.

T’Kar continued to run a dangerously high fever
and did not regain consciousness. Sorel ordered a cool
bath, for there was plenty of water on Nisus. On
Vulcan such cooling would be done with an environmental-control unit.

There were many, many other patients. Sorel had
not slept since their arrival on Nisus—perfectly possi
ble for a Vulcan, but he was beginning to reach his
limits.

Now that they were able to produce a serum for those whose blood was iron-based, the time of the
doctors and healers was divided even further: patient
care, research into a cure or vaccine for people with
other blood bases, and preparation and administra
tion of the serum.

Their three Klingons could produce only a finite amount of blood. Sorel was especially concerned about the younger boy; his strength should be going into growth, not blood production stimulated by
drugs. But they had no choice. Karl Katasai was sent
up to the
Enterprise
and put on the same regimen as
his father and his brother.

Priorities for the serum were critical patients, medi
cal personnel, people of mixed ancestry with iron-based blood, anyone showing the first signs of the disease, and finally general population with iron-
based blood, beginning with children and anyone else
at high risk. However, their supply covered only the first two categories and part of the third.

At least Daniel is safe,
Sorel thought as he adminis
tered the serum to his friend and colleague of so many
years.

“But you’re not, and neither is T’Mir,” Daniel
replied sadly to his unspoken thought.

Sorel started in shock—Daniel’s ESP rating was
virtually nil. The Human locked eyes with him, then
stared at Sorel’s hand, still gripping his arm. “You are
exhausted,”
he said. “I’ve never known your shields
to slip like that before.”

“You’ve
never known it,” Sorel replied. “Forgive
me, Daniel.”

“For what—proving again that we’re family? You wouldn’t ask T’Mir’s forgiveness if you slipped with
her.”

“You must be retested when we return to Vulcan,”
said Sorel. “Your bonding with a Vulcan appears to
have increased your ESP.”

“Don’t change the subject. If you can slip mentally,
you can slip physically—and that possibility is as dangerous to the physician as to the patient. I’ve
accepted your advice to nap every few hours, but you
haven’t slept at all. You’re not going near any more patients until you’ve had at least six hours of sleep.
Doctor’s orders, Healer!”

Daniel was right. Sorel reluctantly accepted the prescription, used a meditation technique to fall asleep, and awoke feeling rested, although no less concerned. It was warranted: there were seven more
cases of Strain D, all in people of copper-based blood.
They had no cure for them, could only treat the
symptoms.

T’Kar’s fever raged despite cold-water lavage and an ice bath; she had gone into convulsions twice. T’Pina remained at her side, replacing the ice as fast
as it melted, her concern and frustration showing in
her eyes, even though she schooled her face into calm
Vulcan lines. She was pale, but that was a symptom of
weariness, not plague.

All T’Pina’s vital signs remained astonishingly nor
mal. Sorel did not understand how her system could
resist the virus for so long. “The first moment you feel
feverish, you must call for help,” he cautioned her, and reminded the Human nurse who was checking T’Kar’s progress every half hour to scan T’Pina each
visit as well.