*** CO's Quarters * USS Quashqai
***
Rangi bent her head forward and rubbed the towel over her
wet hair.
She had showered and changed into casual clothes, using
Shanes quarters as her own. He, she knew, was in his Ready
Room no doubt pondering over the latest developements as
Qashqai sped home towards Unity. They would arrive within
the hour and then, she hoped, they would have at least a
little time to relax.
She had spent the last few hours completing the postmortems
and writing a report and expected that Shane would be
reading now.
The seventeen bodies were all cleared to be returned to
their familes, each identified from DNA with their cause of
death carefully detailed.
Malnutrition had featured widely but it was the brain damage
caused by the implanted devices that accounted for most.
Some of the victims still had the devices in place and Bren
Ohmsford would be staying with the Quasar to investigate
them further.
Rangi dropped the towel into the recycle bin and lifting the
damp hair with her fingers, walked into the bedroom and
picked up a hairbrush from its place in front of the mirror
and sat on the edge of the bed.
She was sure that Bren had been avoiding her although to be
fair, he had a huge amount to do.
{It must be hard for him to be in the place where Liev died}
she thought, beginning to stroke the brush through her hair.
She had thought he might have asked about it but in a way,
was glad that he hadn't. Instead he had buried himself in
work from the moment they arrived and had not spent more
than a few minutes in her company at any one time.
She shook her hair back then paused, seeing her reflection
in the mirror. She slowly lowered the brush until it rested
on her knee then looked away, frowning in thought.
Shane had agreed to take the three bodies back to Unity.
Two had been found on Padassa in stasis chambers and the
other Shane had held on Qashqai. There were two Nicholas
Harkers and one Samantha Palmer.
It was a mystery because the two Harkers were both 'real'.
Tests had proved it.
Finding Samantha Palmers body had been a second surprise,
for the woman had died aboard Chimera some time ago.
{Two identical couples?} she asked herself and began to
brush her hair again with slow strokes.
She had found only one difference in the two bodies of
Harker....age.
At first Rangi had suspected that time spent in the stasis
chambers accounted for it but that didnt prove to be the
case for the other Harker, the one Shane had killed, had at
some point received some sort of cell regeneration therapy.
It would need more detailed scanning but at the moment,
Rangi believed him to be at least six years or possibly even
a decade older than the body found on Padassa.
He had been the one who had held Martin and herself captive.
Major Kinn however had found data that showed the other
Harker had been dead for just over four years and that
Samantha had been dead for three.
Rangi intended to run her own analysis on Unity and compare
it with the data that Giella had found.
One thing was certain, the pair had died in the same way.
Something had caused a fast cessastion of higher brain
function, though what remained unclear.
Rangi stood up and, laying the brush back in its place,
glanced at her overall appearance pulling the neck of her
shirt straight and flicking at her hair on the left side.
Once back on Unity she would search out Samantha Palmers
case and read the report Mercedes Carpenter, the then CMO,
had detailed. The answer might lie in there.
*** End Log ***
Commander Rangi Summers
Med. Adv 1st Task Force
CMO SB Unity
