The Tales Told By Death

Posted on Sun Mar 29th, 2020 @ 1:09pm by Lieutenant JG Siobahn Fallon & Captain Michelle Bartlett & Major Hailey Weston

Mission: Present In The Past
Location: Sickbay

The call from the other vessel had been intriguing to say the least. Orders to prepare for an autopsy was not something that Siobahn had expected to be dealing with, yet it was something that was being requested, and under biohazard containment conditions to boot.

Walking back into the main sickbay area, Siobahn smiled wearily. "I think we're ready. We're using isolation bay four, but isolation bay three has been set up for prep and decontamination up with the internal doors unsealed and an airlock established between the two. I think we should be good from a containment perspective. Commander Tang has said the body is being held in a transporter pattern buffer so if you're all ready, I can notify Operations to complete the transport?"

"Proceed." Michelle said. "Might as well get this over with."

Hailey nodded in agreement, "Mind if I stand in on the autopsy too? I'm not a forensics expert, but I'm sure if we have more eyes on what's being uncovered, we may see things others don't."

"By all means." the Captain replied, eager to see what had happened and how. There were so many unanswered questions about this ship. She was a bit shocked initially that one had been ordered, but.... For as long as this ship had been out here, it was time to see what was up.

Siobahn decided that the best way to move forward was to simply ignore the fact that they were standing there watching everything that was going on. Instead, she turned her attention to the body on the metal table in front of her. "The body appears to be that of a humanoid male, cause of death as yet undetermined. No obvious signs of bruising, punctures, lacerations or other external injury," she used her fingers to probe gently around the lower jaw and throat of the body. "There are two instances of scar tissue visible on the body. One in the center of the left shoulder, approximately one inch below the clavicle, approximately two inches in length. The other on the right side of the abdomen, approximately four inches in length. Both instances of scar tissue appear to be well healed and extremely unlikely to have attributed to death."

Picking up a laser scalpel, Siobahn cast a slight glance toward Michelle. "I hope you aren't too squeamish Captain," she offered softly.

"Not my area of science that I studied, but... I'll have to give a report to the Commodore, so... let's proceed." she added.

With a nod, Siobahn activated the scalpel, making a Y shaped incision, across the torso and down into the abdomen. "Forgive me," she murmured softly, almost inaudibly, to the corpse before she set the scalpel aside, sliding one gloved hand into the incision she had made. Working methodically through the process, assisted by two nurses, Siobahn detached organs, isolating each into its own tray to be weighed, examined and sampled before being returned to the body later.

She wasn't entirely sure how much time had passed, but Siobahn finished documenting the organs, returning to physically assess the body once more, using a scalpel to take smaller tissue samples from external body parts, setting them aside and taking a deep breath. "Captain, I'll need to run some more tests to rule things out, but at this stage I'm quite confident that it was simply exposure that caused his death. Life support failure most likely. Environmental controls would have made the temperatures on the bridge frigid, which explains why the body is so excellently preserved. He would have simply fallen asleep and no woken up again."

Michelle almost sighed some relief. If there was any way to go down with the ship, it would be that... "I hope the Commander checks in soon so that I can see what they've determined as far as what all took place. But... I'm relieved he didn't suffer. Do we have his name? Starfleet will likely want to notify any of his descendants."

"Captain, preliminary DNA requests confirm that he is exactly who he said he was in the distress call, Captain Geoffrey Hawthorne from the Earth Starship Nelson. I checked with the computer, they were reported missing in action and presumed dead 240 years ago," Siobahn said quietly.

"I see." Michelle replied before looking at the body... "Sorry we arrived so late." she added. "Was a bit of a drive."

Unable to help herself, Siobahn giggled slightly before she stifled the sound by covering her mouth with her arm. After taking a moment to regain her composure, she drew in a deep breath. "I can have a more comprehensive report prepared for you Captain, but it will probably take me a day or two."

Hailey smirked at the humor as well, eyes having been scanning the body as Siobahn had been taking the body apart in a picture perfect autopsy. The ones she'd worked on before were rarely in this sort of condition and cause of death had tended to be immediately obvious, but peacefully dying? That was definitely easier or at least nicer of a way to go, "I find myself in agreement, I don't think it was a lack of oxygen."

"There are clear signs that cyanosis may have been a factor, the slight discolouration in the furthermost extremities, I suspect though, given the condition of his lungs, that death happened before he succumbed to complete lack of oxygen. It seems most likely that it was environmental factors that took precedence." Siobahn and shook her head. "I don't understand why he would just sit there and die..." her voice trailed off as she turned away from her audience, moving a tray of instruments to the side before returning to the table. "I'm sorry," she murmured softly to what was left of the body as she covered the body with a cloth. "I'll do a more thorough and detailed report Captain, but my immediate conclusion is that death was caused by life support failure which would be consistent with the initial reports of the away team."

Michelle nodded... "Without having access to his logs yet, it's hard to say what the attitude was. But... There's always been a sort of unspoken tradition that the Captain goes down with their ship in a crisis. It's just a matter of us determining at this point what that crisis looked like. Hopefully the away team can sort that bit out for us. I certainly hope it's the captain going down with the ship and not a certain stubbornness."

Siobahn nodded slightly. "i'll let you know if the detailed reports show anything more," she said quietly.