A Nurse named Weld
Posted on Thu Oct 23rd, 2025 @ 1:15am by Lieutenant Amy Gordon & Commander Daynah Ral & Commander Rhupert Tyree & Lieutenant Commander Zuub
2,312 words; about a 12 minute read
Mission:
On the Trail
Location: Avan's Colony, Quatal Prime. Dispensary.
Timeline: After Avan's Colony Pt.2
Chief Nurse Weld scrubbed at the hard surfaces of the exam room. With so many sick, she needed something to distract herself for the moment and hope that inspiration would strike.
Or lightning. After the past five days, she’d go either way.
The dispensary by any means was small and only had room for five patients in what could laughingly be called a ward. Those beds were full and the cases grim. Everyone else was confined to their quarters and she was triaging here, but then shuffling them back to their own quarters. She’d been making house calls and running shifts of the sick through only to update if she needed what was left of her dwindling medical supplies. Walking through the all but abandoned station was depressing, eerily quiet and spooky.
Running her sponge over the last of the surfaces, she stepped back into the doorway, shut the transparent door and coded in the cleaning program. The doorway darkened as a cleansing beam played about the surfaces, burning off the solution and any lingering germs.
Hearing a noise behind her, she caught site of the Proctor followed by several faces she didn’t recognize and her tired mind perked slightly. The Grazerite straightened and unconsciously tidied her clothing and patted at her greying golden hair.
Stepping up and to one side, Proctor Dreth said, "Nurse Edina Weld, these are the members of the SS. Adelaide. The freighter that somehow heard our distress signal and actually responded."
"A freighter? Not Federation or Cardassian vessel? How is that possible and what do they bring to help?," asked Weld, the desperation she felt coming out surly.
"Any help is welcome, Weld. You know that," the Proctor tried to tactfully take the bitterness out of the colonies medical staff. Turning to the Adelaides, she said, "Nurse Weld has been awake going on five days with all of this."
"Uh, tell me something Nurse Weld, when was the last time you've had anything to eat?" Amy began. "And we do have skills that will help out. Matter of fact, Proctor? When have you last eaten as well?"
The one thing that Amy didn't recall was what the food supply level was at for those working here. And could the food be contaminated with what is making these people ill?
Weld opened her mouth but the Proctor got there first.
"With the fluctuations in power Bryan is trying to run down, I rationed the use of replicators and interjected some of our emergency rations into the mix to make sure our most at risk people are getting their dailies still. The rest of us are supposed to be taking our nutrients when we require them..."
"As long as you're taking your dailies," Weld interjected then. "Amalien, you know we have to actually take them or.."
"Or we run the risk of making ourselves even more susceptible to becoming sick," the Proctor finished, vocalizing what sounded like something that had been rehashed several times. "I'm fine."
The Proctor coughed into her elbow again and froze as the coughs ripped through her. Turning, embarrassed that the fit wouldn't bend to her will, Amalien rode out the fit and pulled a handkerchief from a sleeve and dabbed at her mouth before turning back.
"Excuse me," she said, a little breathlessly. "But I'm fine, Edina." The pain in her stomach twisted again and she inhaled, holding her breath as if that would help.
Dropping her cleaning rag to the deck, Nurse Weld moved over to put an arm over the Bajoran's shoulder offering comfort as that is all she had right now. "Let's get you to a chair and hooked up for an oxygen treatment," the Nurse said. She was stocky and her hip bump wasn't jut a suggestion but the nudge that guided the Proctor through the Dispensary hatch as it cycled open at their proximity.
Daynah checked her bio field to make sure that it functioned normally. If this was a plague she did not want to become sick herself. "Greetings we are here to help. This woman is doctor and perhaps together we can come up with a solution to what is going on here. What do you know about this illness?"
Zuub's antennae started whirling in different directions. It was anyone's guess as to what they were doing or what Zuub was feeling. Normally, anyone could tell, but this was unusual. In her soft wispy voice she said, "I sense that the air is different in here. Has anyone run any scans of the environment, at all? Did everyone's symptoms all occur at once or at different times?"
"Symptoms," Weld said, busying herself with the Proctor, "Snuck up on us gradual like. There's always something running through even a backwater colony. I had most of these people healthy...or as healthy as they'd been since. Well. Since we all arrived. Then about twelve days ago, more respiratory cases. As it progressed, the patients showed muscle weakness with a few progressing to full on paralysis."
Once she had the Proctor on a treatment bed, she began hooking up an oxygen cannula, adjusting the flow with a bit of her tongue stuck out as her eyes went between the bio-readouts and Amalien's face. "Neurological events bounce around, but center line around dizziness, vertigo, some memory loss. But there are others, but it tends to depend on the species and being."
"Like almost everything," Weld finished as she moved a hand to the Proctor's forehead, smiling as she saw the oxygen helping her patient breathe.
"I'm fine, really," the Proctor huffed, but coughed again.
The Andorian's antennae circled thoughtfully. "Did respiration or any vitals change when patients were put on oxygen? The dizziness and vertigo, has that occurred in all cases, most cases, or just a percentage?"
Weld fussed with the twenty-year-old bio-bed controls, tongue sticking out slightly in concentration as she adjusted the system. Dizziness and vertigo are the major shared symptoms. Especially among the humans and those that share the closest physiologies."
As she spoke, the Proctor shifted and the nurse put her hand on the woman's chest. "Don't make me ventilate you, Amalien," Weld scolded. "Just rest and breathe."
After taking in the Bajoran's color for a few minutes she turned to look at the crew of the Adelaide. "The six that we've lost have been three of our older colonists to stroke and the younger two to heart attacks. Whatever this is, it's chewing them...us...up. Right past the point where everything shuts down."
Daynah stood and glanced around both of her minds being put to the test. She turned to Zuub, "Doctor, would an autopsy of the deceased assist in anything? That is of course if the appropriate permissions were granted. I would like to have a look at the complexes environmental systems. It could be something residual in the atmosphere."
"I agree, that we should check the atmosphere. I have a suspicion that there is something, perhaps radiation or some sort of pollution in the environment. My antennae do not like it. In the meantime, I would like to conduct those autopsies," Zuub answered.
Once she was assured that everything was in the green on the Proctor's biobed, nurse Weld folded her arms and turned. "I conducted autopsies on the first couple of our friends that passed," she said guardedly. "Those complete files are available for your review. I...." she glanced over at the Proctor who met her eyes and nodded. "We would prefer if you maybe start by reviewing that and not have us retrieve bodies from the crypt and stress their friends and families."
"Perhaps I could just do the autopsies in the crypt, then?" Zuub offered.
Weld peered at the Andorian for a moment, her better angels fighting a losing battle. It had been a long few days and she straightened and placed her hands on her hips, "You're thick for someone with a medical degree. Location isn't the problem. It's a matter of disturbing those who have been put to as much rest as they can expect to get on this rock."
"Weld," the Proctor gasped out, pulling her breathing mask aside. "They're..."
"Trying to help? Then they can maybe please help with some respect for those we've lost and those who are still hanging on... Respect and hope are about what we have left," Weld said as she pushed Amalien back onto to the bed and adjusted the breathing mask back.
"Review our work. Then give me a good reason why we should let you desecrate our friends bodies and memories?" Weld said firmly.
During the conversation, Amy moved away while the medical personnel were being distracted, going around a corner to pull out her tricorder and take a reading of Nurse Weld and Amalien, plus the equipment that was there. Now though where would the bodies be kept? Maybe Zuub and Daynah could find out. Or.. maybe the information would be somewhere in the computer files. Or she could ask someone else there were other people around.
Zuub answered simply, "Reviewing your work would only verify your work. If you missed something that I would not, I would not see it. I would rather get firsthand experience and the more time that goes by, the more clues may go. Now, if you would show me to the bodies, I will get on with my work."
Staring at the Andorian, Weld's temper continued to fray at the edges. "Are you that thick? This is My dispensary. My rules. If you can't take a few minutes to review my findings before going madly after our dead friends and family with a knife, then maybe we don't need your kind of help."
The Proctor reached out to put a hand on the Nurse's sleeve, but then put it back down, as she concentrated on her breathing as a spasm of coughing overtook her.
Zuub remained calm but her antennae started to float backwards, a warning sign for anger, if anyone knew the Andorian. "Mr. Weld, this may be your dispensary, but I do not see that you have cured anything. Your patients are not making progress. You called for our help. Perhaps you just want this condition for your patients to continue? Is that why you refuse me access?"
Daynah could actually see Zuub's point although she did not like the words used by the Adorian. Daynah could also see Weld's point. Here they were questioning the one person who had been in the thick of it from the start. "Doctor, I do not see a problem with looking over the data and then performing the autopsies. This way you can learn what was found on the initial exam and not look or discover the same thing."
Zuub's antennae did not touch her cranium yet but lifted slightly at Daynah's words. She knew that she only had the authority granted to her by these folks, so playing nice for now was required. "Very well, I will look them over. I expect that none of the bodies will be disturbed or altered while I am doing that."
Glancing at Dayna, Edina focused back on the Andorian, biting her tongue as she debated. Finally, she said, "I appreciate that." Then to Zuubb she said, "No offense to you doctor, and the fact that you mistook me for male non-withstanding, Accuse me of being an Angel of Mercy for insisting on a little professional courtesy and respect for my patients again and I'll be happy to rip those antennae off your skull and make you eat them." Weld kept an even gaze on the newcomers as she stepped to a nearby console and brought up four records.
In an instant, Zuub's antennae moved backwards and laid flat against her skull. There was no change in her tone, but she looked at Edina and said, "Try it. Perhaps you have forgotten that Andorians are famed for their military skills and might. Your heart would be ripped out before you made it within arm's length of my body and I would have no compunctions about feeding it to a targ."
Amy came back around the corner, her eyes rather round at hearing the confrontation between Zuub and Nurse Weld. She really hoped that those two weren't going to get into an altercation. Especially in the hospital area. Then again, this was escalating rather quickly.
Placing her thumb and index finger in her mouth and gave out a piercing sharp whistle, Amy looked at both Weld and Zuub. "Alright, enough of this, both of you just pull in your horns, and take a step back. Please." She said scoffing, "Look we're to help we just want to know what happened. And it's not really doing Amalien any good arguing here. Look at her readings they are heading to a level that isn't good."
Zuub's antennae came off the back of her head slightly. "My antennae already felt that."
"Very well," the nurse agreed. "And of course. My records," she said gesturing to the medical desk. "As to the bodies, they are preserved in empty lava tube catacombs just below the station. The best we can do if our people don't wish to be cremated or simply sent into the lava, which is what most of us have chosen. This is our only real home now."
Moving to another monitor, she brought up a diagram of the facility and highlighted a section below the station.
END
Amalien Dreth
Proctor. Avan's Colony.
written by R. Tyree
Edina Weld
Chief Nurse for Avan's Colony.
written by R. Tyree
Lieutenant Commander Zuub
Chief Medical Officer
USS Valiant
Commander Daynah Ral
Executive Officer
Chief Science Officer
USS Valiant
Lieutenant Amy Gordon
Chief Of Intelligence
USS Valiant
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