Where no women have gone before

Posted on Sat Apr 1st, 2023 @ 9:34am by Lieutenant JG Sol & Lieutenant Helena Wells

988 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: The devil wears tripolymer
Location: USS Wolff Sickbay
Timeline: Not mission critical

HG made her way to sickbay to get her hands properly treated. They were starting to hurt like she had stuck them in a fireplace, which she had almost done the equivalent of.

"Heya Chaps, got a pair of burned hands!" she yelled as she sauntered in.

Sol had been midstep when the call went out across the bay. He actually paused in that midstep, perfectly balanced with one foot in the air for a moment before he neatly turned to make his way to her. "I can help," he assured, motioning for her to follow him to a biobed. "What happened, Lieutenant?"

"Ah I was testing a bit of a device and made a mistake. I had to physically reach into a plasma stream to disconnect things." She waved the bandaged hands. "Starting to hurt like the devil."

"I am not surprised," he replied, his tone as even as any other Vulcan's but his eyes betrayed intrigue as to why someone would risk such a thing. He took his tricorder, scanning across both hands to see how bad the damage was. "It must have been dire to require such action."

"Hmm....yes it was. Who knows where we would have gone to." She cocked her head. "Hurts like the devil in the less burned spots. I'm guessing pain receptors in the skin in the rest seared off. I am not one for medications very much, but a little something would be appreciated, doctor." She craned her head to peer at him. "Not sure I have run into you before. Helena Wells, everyone simply calls me HG."

"HG," he repeated, as if to commit the name to memory as he loaded a hypo with a painkiller for her, pressing it swiftly to her neck. "I am Sol, just Sol..." he held up a finger for her to excuse him for a moment, pulling a trolley over. He urged her to put her hands under the small, arched device that sat on the top of it, palms up. "But you are HW," he finally added, with a note of confusion.

HG winched at the hypo. She hated her name but figured it would clear up the confusion. "Helena Grace Wells, HG Wells, like the old Earth writer." She chuckled. "He was a long-distant ancestor." What ever Dr. Sol had given her felt pretty good.
"On Earth, he was the first to talk about aliens, things almost like phasers, atomic weapons well before anyone there knew anything about them." She laughed lightly. "He even wrote a story about a time machine, so I had to do him one better."

"How does one do 'one better' than time travel?" Sol asked with genuine curiosity, interested in the story she was weaving. He pressed a second hypo to her, to help stabilise her and improve her own healing. He started the dermal regeneration in the small arch over her hands, keeping an eye on the readouts.

HG craned her head around. "How about travel to another galaxy as fast as you can blink. Time travel has been done; interstellar travel has been done; intergalactic never until I did it. Of course didn't mean to go that far..." She trailed off. "Why I got burned hands."

"You burnt your hands with intergalactic travel?" the doctor asked sceptically, and not entirely sure if she meant what he thought she did. Maybe it was the ever so slight slur she had to her words from the medicine.

"Yeah the limiter burned out and Ash and I ended up in the Amdromeda galaxy. Then the Kelvans showed up and we need to scoot back here before they captured us. Got the fold drive working but still no limiter and had to stop us by manual means which meant sticking my hands into the plasma." She giggled. "Who knows where we would have ended up next? I mean doc, if a second got us to Andromeda how far before the whole thing melted down would we have gone?"

Sol watched her as if she were talking Greek for a moment, and then with a wary glint. He took the tricorder and scanned around her head, just to make sure. "No head injury..." he murmured. "The Andromeda galaxy?"

"Huh?" HG was definitely feeling the effect of whatever the doc had given her. "Yeah, Andromeda. I guess that was the general direction the shuttle was pointed toward." She giggled a moment. "Galactic travel, the final frontier. To go where no woman, no scratch that, women have gone before." She looked up at the Vulcan doc. "Yes....it worked. Worked too well and had to destroy the whole thing." She hung her head a moment. "You know doc. This is all between you and me."

"I...am not sure anyone would believe me if I did say anything," Sol replied, quite serious with it too. He wasn't entirely sure if he believed it either, but he couldn't see the usual markers of deceit. "The Captain must be pleased with your work."

"Oh the captain probably would toss me out the air lock for taking a shuttle, let alone almost losing it and her top pilot off to parts unknown." She craned her head around to fix the doctor in her gaze. "Anyway, ask Lieutenant Rowe, over a cup of tea. I gave her some mementos. Getting a little sleepy."

Sol moved around to switch the small arch off, taking her hands to check. "I may just do that," he replied, an admission of curiosity from the usually aloof Vulcan. "These may be tender, but they are healed," he assured, giving her a firm nod of certainty. "You should get some rest."

HG nodded. "Don't mind doc, think I'll lay down here. Really sleepy." HG did just that and as her eyes closed. "Damn bloody hell, it worked."


--
Lt. HG Wells
(semi-mad) Scientist
USS Wolff

Dr. Sol
Medical
USS Wolff

 

RSS Feed