Starfleet Hospital
Kevratas City
Stardate 57054.8
Doctor Beverly Crusher waved her medical tricorder over the ailing Kevrata and then sighed, pulling the sheet over his head as his heart stopped. She did not even try to bring him back because there was no use in doing so. Kevrata hearts might be overly large, but they were so fragile and this damned plague was doing nothing helpful. Since she had arrived just under five weeks ago she had lost more than five thousand patients and learned that hundreds of thousands more were contracting the disease. Kevrata soldiers were being ordered to raze the smaller villages around the city where the plague appeared to prevent it spreading and there had been no sign of a Romulan on the planet for the last two weeks. As soon as they learned that they could not be infected, they left in droves. She glanced around at the hospital and saw her people performing triage and separating the most severe cases for isolation, not that it did much good. The plague, which the locals had given the name jaceta – meaning hot blood, had a one hundred percent fatality rate. And it would continue to do so until she found a cure, which didn’t seem likely.
‘Doctor Crusher, Doctor Crusher,’ a young med tech exploded into a run from the makeshift lab and came to a skidding halt beside her.
‘What have you got, Denise?’ she asked, appreciating the eager tech’s dedication to duty.
‘I followed up on a hunch,’ Denise Sakuro replied, handing Crusher a padd. ‘Not sure why I didn’t think of it sooner.’
Crusher stared at the information and then looked up at the young woman. She appeared to be waiting for some kind of comment. ‘Denise, you just found a cure for jaceta.’
A grin stretched across her face. ‘I’ll start synthesising.’
‘We’ll need the Pasteur’s lab for this,’ Crusher said and reached for her combadge as an explosion sounded outside. ‘What the hell? Go and start synthesising, I’ll find what’s happening.’
‘Yes, Doctor.’
Crusher peered through a window to see a trio of Romulan Scorpion-class fighters descend through the cloud cover firing at nearby buildings. As she watched each building crumble, she realised that they were firing at anything larger than three storeys, like the hospital.
‘Everybody out now, the Romulans are attacking,’ she yelled and the more experienced doctors grabbed patients as they ran.
Soon, both doctors and patients were escaping through every available exit as the Romulans got ever closer.
Crusher tapped her combadge as a number of Romulans materialised in the street. The Starfleet security officers and several able-bodied Kevrata immediately fought back but more Romulans beamed in. ‘Worf, this is Crusher, we’re under attack down here. I need security reinforcements.’
‘We have a Romulan warbird up here, Doctor. I will send reinforcements when I can. How long can you hold out?’ Worf asked, sounding none too pleased about the present situation.
‘I’m not sure, but the security forces are keeping the Romulans at bay for now.’
‘I will send help, Doctor, Worf out.’
Crusher sighed and signalled to her medical personnel to fall back into single-storey buildings. Romulans, Starfleet security officers and Kevrata were all falling under phaser or disruptor fire and she had nothing to do, except fight. She scooped up a phaser rifle from a dead officer and fired at any Romulan target that presented itself. As one went down she saw that the setting was on a low kill setting, not enough to vaporise, and looked up at the carnage. Ducking and rolling from a disruptor blast which would have killed her, she shook off the regret and began firing again.
After what seemed like an eternity, the hovering fighters withdrew as did the remaining Romulans. The dead littered the street and Crusher watched as the surviving Kevrata appeared as one to remove their dead. Their generous souls were being destroyed by the Romulans, and the plague, if the two weren’t connected. She whirled at a sound and saw twelve Starfleet officers with their weapons, including the insufferable chief of security, Zelik Leybenzon.
‘Ok gents, spread out and check our people. Tag them for transport if they’re dead and hand them over to the medics if they’re not,’ he said and his people hurried off. He turned to face her. ‘We’ll take over, Doctor. You should get back to your patients.’
Crusher was about to say something when she caught a flash of light above. ‘Was that...?’
Leybenzon followed her gaze. ‘It could have been the Romulan ship,’ he said just as more fighters tore through the clouds. ‘Or maybe not.’
‘We need to dig in,’ she said as Leybenzon opened fire.
‘Is there anywhere that’s remotely safe on this world?’ he retorted.
Both fired random shots as they retreated behind a building. ‘There are catacombs under the city, perhaps we can hide there. We’ll be safe even if the Romulans raze the city to the ground.’
‘I guess we head for the catacombs.’
‘...’ Crusher’s combadge sputtered with static. ‘escape pod...water landing...Romulans...’
‘That was Worf!’
‘He must have evacuated before the ship was hit,’ Leybenzon replied in an accusatory tone. ‘Coward.’
‘Lieutenant, you don’t know what happened up there,’ she admonished. ‘Do not brand him a coward until you learn the truth. Worf is the most honourable man I know. If he evacuated the ship then he did so in order to continue the fight, not because he is afraid to die. Let’s get to the lakes, the most likely place outside the city for them to set down. We could have enough people to mount a resistance.’
Leybenzon didn’t believe her but his features had returned to their usual cynicism. ‘As you say, Doc. You’re the boss.’
‘This way,’ Crusher led the security forces away from the hospital and the war zone and only then did she think about all those lost.
The medical personnel were carrying or assisting the Kevrata and she saw Sakuro among them, dirty, bleeding, but still alive. There was hope for them all yet, if they could find Worf and the other survivors, assuming that everyone got off the ship. Leybenzon kept pace with her, occasionally moving ahead to make sure the coast was clear, and it looked like for the moment, the Romulans were not pursuing.
) that the Rommies kept the specs to use in their own way. Worf obviously knew how dangerous the weapon was and decided to save the lives of everyone aboard rather than risk dying a dishonourable death.
Talk about being between a rock and a hard place.
That's just crazy-talk! 
