Lost in thought about what had transpired on the Bridge a bit earlier with Ensign Spangler, Bane stepped around the corner and smashed into someone. Catching him completely off guard, he stumbled backwards before losing balance and crashed to the deck, flat on his back. “Oof!” came the involuntary utterance from his lips.

Ravi was hurrying – she needed to get to Sickbay but had been delayed in her quarters when she had taken an incoming call from her parents, who were checking if she had got to the Calgary alright, knowing hers would have been a journey with lots of changing ships and so on.  She had known she would be tight for time but she missed them both and knew how difficult it was likely to have been to get through on the Federation Channels ship to ship and to get the time changes right as well, being as they were so far away by now, in the opposite direction of the Universe themselves.  She couldn’t have imagined they would have been able to get through but they did and the least she could do was spare them a little while to at least say hi and exchange reassurances that all was well on both sides.

Inevitably it had taken longer than the time she had to spare, which had been very little to start with but she was happy to have spoken to them and now was half-running (she knew it wasn’t allowed but didn’t want to be late either.  She hadn’t met the CMO yet and she didn’t need this first impression to be a problem. 

As she hurried around a curve in the corridor, she looked back as she thought she heard someone behind call out, so by the time she glanced back, dismissed the idea and turned to face front again, the split seconds this took had landed her into the path of someone who was clearly even less focussed that she was.  

Staring in disbelief for a moment, Ravi leaped forward to the man she had collided with, leaning over him to see if he was okay and holding out a hand to help him  up, spluttering apologies.  

“Are you okay?” she asked, trying to help the tall man to sit up.  “I am so sor……..” her words died in her throat as she recognised who it was she had literally floored.  “Spirits defend me!” she exclaimed involuntarily and once she realised those words had escaped aloud, she clapped a hand over her mouth in double horror!  

Looking up at the person that had plowed him into the deck, “Sweet Prophets,” he exclaimed. “I’m honestly not sure if I’m ok. Certainly had the wind knocked out of my lungs. Help me up,” he asked holding his hand up to her. He didn’t want to be seen on his back by anyone else.

“Should you get your breath before getting up, Sir?” she asked, instinctively checking his pulse and pupils as she carefully took the insistent hand he was holding up and helping him up anyway.  “I mean medically, Sir.  If you’re winded and perhaps shocked?” she ventured, struggling to retrieve her medcorder from her first aid kit which had swung itself to the floor in the collision and was now a little out of reach since she couldn’t let go of her impatient patient in case he might not be stable on his feet yet. 

Bane blinked for a moment, the time needed for him to recognize that the person over him was the half-Cardassian Assistant Chief Medical Officer from the briefing yesterday. It took him a moment longer to figure out what he wanted to say. The best he could come up with, “You’re the Doctor, Doctor. You tell me.” Something else that occurred to him was how warm and soft her hands were. It was exactly opposite what he knew of the Cardassian people. They always had cold, clammy hands.

Ravi couldn’t tell what it was that the CO was wondering about but it did seem like he was hesitant, perhaps surprised about something and she wasn’t seeing that as any foreseeable advantage going forward.  She got him as far as sitting and then was able to reach her med-kit.  She ran her checks and found he wasn’t suffering from any after-effects medically so she confirmed this to him and offered to help him up to his feet.

“I can’t find anything lasting wrong Sir, and apart from the odd bruise which might appear, I feel happy to help you back to standing without causing anything untoward”.  She confirmed and stood, offering him her hand, linking her forearm with his to the elbow, allowing a full and stable assisted tug to balance him as he rose.

“This really isn’t how I wanted our first meeting to work out Sir.  I am so sorry.  Do you feel okay?”  Ravi asked as the CO rose and became his tall, impressive vertical self again.

Bane smoothed out his tunic and slacks, rubbing his hands from his chest down to his hips, then around to his backside, making sure that it was presentable (and also checking out to make sure his body wasn’t battered, not that he didn’t trust the Doctor. “I’m, fine thank you. I am sorry too. My mind was on the Away Team down on the planet and I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going. Are you ok,” he asked?

“Oh yes Sir, Thank you, I’m fine.  Are the Away Team in any trouble?  I probably shouldn’t be asking things like that but I was wondering if you might need a medical team to go to help them out?”  she volunteered, immediately concerned for the medical welfare of their team. 

“As far as I know, they are fine, Doctor. Commander Larsen took Doctor Elodin with the team. I suppose that makes you in charge of Sickbay and the welfare of the entire crew while they are down there,” he said, rubbing his bum and feigning injury, though with a smile and a twinkle in his eye.

Looking shocked, Ravi paled.  “I wasn’t told Sir.  I would have been there for the first shift if I had known…..” she spluttered.  “ … and then I shouldn’t have been here to harm you at that moment.  Very regrettable, Captain. I see you are still hurting?  Can I offer some pain relief?” she asked, so distracted by this news that she hadn’t seen the twinkle in the CO’s eyes.

Bane had to laugh. “Honestly Doctor, relax a little. I am not hurt. I was just joking a bit with you.” He chose to ignore the part about coverage of Sickbay. Had it been an issue, he is sure that Dr. Elodin would have taken measures to ensure said issues were taken care of. “Anyway, I shouldn’t keep you from your duties and your patients. Plus, I have to get back to the Bridge. I had to take a walk for a short bit to clear my head. The people, all plant life and all animal life, all the way down to the single-celled organisms seem to be missing from the planet below. As you know, we had reports of a rather large space-faring civilization from this region of space, and they are, well, gone.” 

Ravi’s eyes widened.  “Even down to the single cell organisms?” she repeated unable to fathom any planet without at least that level of life suddenly having changed from a very advanced development.  “Are we talking about the Planet having been un-naturally Scoured?  Nuclear Winter? Or is it possibly Planet core death?” she asked, her curiousity overtaking her common sense which shouted silently from within ~don’t chatter at the Captain!~ it tried to tell her but the idea of a sudden Planet Death for whatever reason was too horrifying and darkly fascinating to hold her into suitable ‘keeping her nose out of it’ mode. 

The Captain shrugged his shoulders.  “Not sure at this point, to be honest.  Ensign Spangler showed me the data before he went down to the planet. Everything that used to be alive is just gone. If the planet were scoured, all the buildings and infrastructure of an advanced civilization would have been wiped clean as well, and that isn’t the case. In fact, the Away Team is now in the middle of one of the cities now.” He paused, then continued. “The atmosphere is still there, so whatever happened must have happened extremely rapidly,” he said, furthering his thoughts to her. “If the core went solid, that would be an event millions of years in the making, and as it cooled and solidified, the atmosphere would have lost pressure and dissipated into space, so I cannot imagine it would be that. Well, unless there is something about geological events that we don’t understand yet, that is,” he stated.

“Oh I see” she said, thinking through what the CO had just explained. 

“I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what they find.  It’s very strange but thank you for updating me, Sir, that’s kind of you.  It was nice meeting you at last, although not the best way I could have gone about it but if you’re quite sure you’re unhurt then I must repeat my apologies and let you get back to whatever you were going to do next, Sir.”  she offered, realising she had no useful suggestions to add and that she was keeping him after he’d already said he’d got to go. 

She began to repacked her medkit and stood slightly aside, deferentially, expecting him to send her on her way.

While he had not planned on updating her, it was good that he got the word out to the crew. With any luck, she would share the information with other crewmembers, and it would then spread through the rest of the ship. “Anytime, Doctor. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I should get back to the Bridge. Prophets know I’ve been gone too long as it is. Poor Lieutenant Lisald may be about to burst at the seams with sitting in command of the Bridge.” He smiled at the thought of that, knowing what it felt like when Commander Montgomery tapped him for Executive Officer when he was the same rank as Mr. Lisald. “Have a good day, Doctor.” He disappeared around the corner, presumably headed back to the Bridge of the starship.

“I will Sir, thank you and I hope your day gets better.”  She couldn’t imagine it getting any worse than to be mown down by one of the Newbies on board.  In fact, come to think of it, she’d been very lucky that he hadn’t put her on report!  She felt very pleased that he’d been so nice about it though.  She had liked him on sight and his manner seemed to be every bit as good as as his looks promised.  Ravi felt a good connection and began to already develop loyalty to her new CO.  He was going to be worth making lots of effort to impress but also lots of reasons to be one of his star players, if she could achieve that.  She resolved to try and went back to hurrying for Sickbay, feeling a lot better about this posting already.  

A JP between:

Lt. (jg) Raviran Dattek-Winters MD

ACMO – USS Cygnus

and

tag for sign off pls}