As synthesised adrenaline rushed through my veins, my eyes snapped open and my brain screamed. It wanted to be asleep; it had been asleep and now it clawed at unconsciousness in the same way that you claw the covers back over your face to shut the daylight out when so rudely awoken.
There was also confusion as the light blinded me. I shut my eyes again quickly and then opened them slowly, squinting at first to allow them to adjust to the brilliance.
I was in the Academy medical facility lying on a bio-bed. I was near the window, a huge plate glass thing that dominated the wall. The sun was shining brightly through it, and silhouetted against it was my captain.
T'Roc had her back to me and gazed across the splendid Academy gardens, with her hands clenched behind her back. Usually, T'Roc always seemed more Klingon than Vulcan to me, but today her tranquillity was most definitely Vulcan.
She spoke. Her voice was calm, clear and devoid of emotion. She did not turn to look at me, but continued her study of the gardens.
"Where is Elizabeth Buffalo?" she asked.
I paused before answering. Firth's words were echoing in my ears ... you're through with Starfleet.
"I don't know ... and even if I did, I wouldn't tell you. My career is over if I tell you where she is and it's over if I don't."
I felt sick as I said it. I loved Starfleet. It's the only thing I've ever done that had any meaning, anything I was any good at.
T'Roc did not reply immediately. She stood pensive but raised her head to gaze at the clouds in the sky.
"So you know you were wrong," she finally said.
"No. I was not wrong. What Steven Firth wanted to do was immoral. It's tantamount to murder."
"Can you murder an android?" she asked, turning to me, her chocolate brown eyes neither cold nor warm, just mysterious, mischievous even.
"Yes. Lizzy is sentient. Destroying her would be the same as murder."
"Starfleet doesn't engage murderers," she replied, a discrete, almost invisible smile played at the corners of her mouth. She knew it and turned back to the window, but I could see it still there in her reflection.
"Well, he didn't actually commit the crime, did he? I stopped him. Without committing the crime, he can't be convicted."
"But he was going to."
"Yes. You know that."
"I do, but unless Lizzy was sentient, there is no crime."
"She is sentient. She laughs, she cries, she sings ... I think she may even have a lover."
"Interesting ..." T'Roc dragged the word out and clasped her hands in front of her mouth as though in prayer. She was definitely getting at something ... something she couldn't say as a Starfleet officer, but something that she wanted me to know. My face screwed in query but T'Roc said nothing more. She waited expectantly.
"If Lizzy was sentient, would Firth's actions be considered an attempt at murder?" I asked.
"Indeed, but Lizzy is not sentient."
"Data is sentient."
"Lizzy is not Commander Data."
I sat up, pushing at my pillows to prop me up. I scratched my chin and ran my fingers through my matted hair and thought hard. My brain was fuddled as though stuffed with cotton wool, but I needed it to work. This was important.
"But if I can prove that Lizzy is sentient ...?"
T'Roc drew a long, deep breath and I saw her pout a smile in the glass.
"Indeed." There was a quiet satisfaction in her voice.
"Then I have to fight this. If I want to keep my career, I have to prove that Steven Firth's actions were immoral by proving that Lizzy is sentient."
She turned to me, her poise one-hundred percent Vulcan.
"It would seem to be the most logical course of action."
"But how do I do that?"
"That will be for you to determine," and then, having completed her objective, T'Roc turned and left. My eyes followed her and stared at the closed door after she had gone. Then they drifted to the table beside my bed. A datapad lay there. It was T'Roc's. I recognised it by the intertwined IDIC and Klingon crests that she had emblazoned on the back of it. I picked it up, reaching towards the door and opening my mouth to shout after her, but stopped. T'Roc didn't do things by accident. If she had left it there, it was intentional.
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