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Episode 02: Cosmic Imperative / Epi: S [Day 03 | 0145] By these wounds...
Last post by Ellen Fitz -The fighting had been over for nearly an hour.
The corridors of deck six were muted now in the way only aftermath ever was—too quiet, systems humming where weapons had roared, the air still thick with the acrid tang of burned conduits and coppery blood. Ehfva moved through it slowly, her steps measured, deliberate, as if forcing her body to remember restraint.
The Savi’s work clung to her in muscle and bone, trapping her between states that refused to settle. Patches of coarse timber wolf fur bristled along her arms and spine, breaking through torn sections of what was left of her uniform, while exposed humanoid skin pulled painfully tight elsewhere. Her jaw remained elongated just enough to bare fangs when she breathed too hard, her voice a garbled, fractured thing whenever she tried to speak. Neither fully Vulpinian nor Vulcine. Neither truly feral nor fully humanoid.
Her body ached with every movement, the pain constant but oddly… manageable. Familiar, even. Combat had done that. The violence—brutal, necessary, unrelenting—had forced her fractured physiology into alignment through sheer demand. Old instincts, drilled into her during the Vulpinian civil war, had overridden the fog the Savi had left in her mind.
For the first time since the experiments , she could think clearly. Though, that clarity came at a cost.
Romulan blood stained her hands, dark and tacky now where it had dried into the creases of her claws and the fur along her forearms. More flecked her muzzle and jawline despite her attempts to clean herself afterward. She could still taste it—metallic and sharp—lingering at the back of her throat. She had killed at close range. Too close. Close enough to feel bone give and bodies go slack beneath her weight. She did not dwell on it.
An Andorian voice echoed faintly behind her from an intersection she’d already passed—orders being issued, damage assessments underway. Security had things well in hand now. Boarders accounted for. Survivors beamed off. The ship bruised but breathing.
She had been relieved of responsibility. That, more than the pain, had left her feeling unmoored. There were so many emotions she had yet to process, without the freedom to process them yet, and besides that, she had no place to BE here.
Ehfva flexed her claws reflexively, then forced them to retract as much as her unstable physiology allowed. Her discomfort remained, a constant grinding sensation beneath her skin, but it no longer threatened to overwhelm her. If anything, she felt present—as if part of her mind that had been muffled and distant since the Savi experiments had finally been dragged back into focus by necessity.
She turned toward Sickbay. Doctor Leux had been short on time before the battle, but she needed answers—needed to know if there was any way to bring her back into a single form. Or at least closer to one. Even a partial solution would be something.
Her gait remained uneven, her center of balance shifting unpredictably as she walked, but she adjusted without thinking. Adaptation was second nature.
By the time Sickbay doors slid open ahead of her, the smell of antiseptics and ozone bleeding into the corridor air, Ehfva had already pushed the blood, the violence, and the pain into their proper mental compartments.
Biobeds were occupied faster than they could be cleared. Medics moved with clipped urgency. The air felt heavy with pain. Doctor Leux was there. She saw him immediately—across the room, sleeves rolled, hands already deep in work she knew better than to interrupt. Whatever time she had hoped he might have for her… it was not now.
Ehfva paused only a moment. Then her gaze shifted. A female android stood near one of the diagnostic stations, cranial lens bright with layered readouts, arms moving with precise efficiency as she coordinated intake and prioritization. If there was judgment in her movements, it was purely clinical. Ehfva approached her instead.
“I have corpsman training,” she said, voice rough, distorted by the uneven structure of her throat and jaw. Words came out with a faint harmonic undertone—too many shapes trying to share the same space. “I can assist. Until this…” She gestured vaguely at the room. “…is less chaotic.”
The android's primary lens focused on her. For a fraction of a second, Ehfva wondered—not for the first time—what the android saw when she looked at her. Not revulsion. Not curiosity. Assessment.
“Training verified,” she replied calmly. “Physical limitations acknowledged. Assignment appropriate.” No hesitation. No pity. “Follow me.”
They moved to a biobed newly wheeled in from the hangar bay. The patient was a pilot—flight suit cut away, lower body immobilized in a temporary field. Even at a glance, Ehfva could see the damage. Crushed legs. Multiple fractures. Vascular trauma. Burns.
Can we fix that? she wondered. Really fix it.
Starfleet medicine was miraculous, yes—but piloting was unforgiving. Even the slightest permanent gait deviation, reduced proprioception, or residual pain could ground someone permanently. She pushed the thought aside.
Her hands moved with practiced familiarity, activating the triage scanner, reviewing vitals, confirming stabilization protocols. She had done this before—on the Cayuga and before that the war and before that…it seemed she’d always been picking up some trade or another. The tools were always different. The principles were (typically) the same.
Ehfva hummed as she worked, calling on the therapeutic singing she’d used to calm and center Sasch in their prison cell. She doubted V-Nine or even Doctor Leux would concur with the reality she’d lived, that of healing found through communal singing. But that didn’t stop her from emitting the rhythmic beat from her chest, her strained vocal cords not able to push the soung further than this man’s biobed.
She was just finishing her assessment when the pilot stirred. A sharp intake of breath. Fingers twitching. His eyes opened. Ehfva froze for half a heartbeat. Then leaned into his field of view deliberately, refusing to retreat from the moment.
“You are safe,” she said quickly, gently, aware of how her voice fractured the words. “USS Theurgy. Sickbay. You were transferred from the hangar.”
His gaze locked on her face. On the fur that did not belong where it was. On the shape of her eyes. On the way her jaw did not quite move correctly when she spoke. The exposed fangs, and likely, the blood still caked on the bits of fur she had on her face and neck. She did not know how he would react. She had no control over that.
“I am assisting with triage,” she continued, steady despite the tension coiling in her chest. “Your injuries are being treated. Please remain still.”
She waited. Whatever came next—fear, confusion, silence—she would handle it. She always had
