Chapter Text
Mirror Universe 2: Corpses Are Not Considerate
by Kelthammer
It was still quite early in the alpha shift. Attendance was down to a minimum as two men walked slowly to Shuttlelounge B.
"You did a pretty good makin' a makeshift sickbay out of this," McCoy approved. His eye had caught a standard-grade poster a helpful technician had put on the wall of several species without their skins and a chemistry table highlighting the major blood groups.
"Well, I didn't think we'd have to need it," Scott admitted. "It's not like there's a bit o' a rush tae yer department."
"Not right now there isn't." McCoy pointed out. He could have said that rather ominously, but didn't. His hands were wrapped around the largest mug of coffee Scott had ever seen. It was obviously a purchase from off-ship. "OK, now that we're alone, what was so all-fired important that it needed my approval?"
"Well th'captain's havin' the B Lounge cleared out for the annual HardMail runs," Scott explained. As "Hard Mail" (nonelectronic) didn't come but once or twice a year on a Standard Imperial ship, and what came tended to be in large volume, it made sense to donate so much space.
"I thought he assigned that to Chekov?" McCoy wondered.
"Aye, he did, but first *I* hav ta have my men clear it out n'prove there's nothing in here already. T'will be hard enough to find a lost piece o'mail when it all comes, wi'out someone screamin' for a left-handed spanner they left in here before the cargo came in."
"Sounds absolutely thrilling," McCoy offered. "Chekov thinks the captain's going to kill him anyway. Should be fun to work with him."
Scott paused, ever so slightly. "Is the captain wantin' tae kill him?"
"No more than he does anybody else," McCoy shrugged with a stoicism to impress Brutus. "I think he taeks the rumor mill a little too seriously."
"He used tae work in Covert; I imagine he'd be paranoid on principle." Scott mumbled.
"Ah, don't worry about it," McCoy offered jadedly. "He's the best astrophysicist on ship next to Sulu & Spock. If he just understood Kirk didn't have any immediate replacement lined up, he could relax a little." He looked around. Scott had stopped them in the center of a large wall of cardboard storage bins.
"Doctor, do ye know anything about these kind o' bins?"
"Well, when I was a kid they made dandy hideouts. I made an escape pod out of one in my back yard. It worked great until a flock of Muscovys decided it was great pre-feb housing. Why?"
Scott stopped in front of a particularly large canister made of compressed pulp-fibers and re-inforced with strips of aluminum. He looked at McCoy, looked at the container. As McCoy watched, the CEO pried open the lid, looked inside the canister (It was almost chest-high), and looked again at McCoy.
McCoy took a step forward. He read the MEMORY ALPHA label on the outside. He looked inside.
"Woa."
Scott was relieved that McCoy sounded (fairly) calm. "It's from Memory Alpha," he pointed out.
"Yeah, I noticed." McCoy said seriously. He took a drink of coffee. "Isn't that where Mira is?"
"Thot's the problem." Scott admitted.
"What is?"
"Mira's in Memory Alpha."
"I fail to see the problem."
McCoy privately wondered what they must look like, two grown men patiently trying to make each other see another viewpoint over a tin stuffed full of skeletalized remains. Eventually, Scott was able to make a breakthrough in comprehension.
"Lemme get this straight." McCoy swallowed the last of the sludge hanging to the bottom of his mug, coughed loudly, and continued. "You don't know if Mira had anything to do with this. But, she could because she's one of the 3,000 members of the Empire staffed to Memory Alpha."
"There aren't thot many crewmembers on Mem'ry Alpha who've been on the ENTERPRISE," Scott pointed out.
"Have you thought about co-incidence?"
"McCoy, twasn't it you who said, "only a fool can afford to believe in co-incidence?"
"I was trying to get Spock's goat."
"Well, you got it. But think about it. She could have something to do about this."
"You're wanting to cover this up in case Mira killed him?"
Put in that context, it wasn't the smartest thing Scott had ever come up with. But it was the only thing he could think of.
McCoy realized the silence was speaking for itself. He sighed. Looked again into the canister.
"I dunno. I'd be really surprised if Mira did kill this guy."
Scott normally hated to take a flying leap at hope. This time, there was no holding back. "Aye?"
"Ayeh." McCoy drawled back. "For one thing, that's a Vulcan."
Scott didn't know how the devil McCoy could tell a species from a jumble of dry bones, and said so in no uncertain language.
"Human bones are more gracile." The doctor explained patiently. "It's because of our lighter gravity. Vulcanoid skeletons, due to their lifespan on heavier-grav planets, are rough and almost pebbly to the touch. To translate it into engineering terms, Mr. Scott, that's what enables all that extra muscle tissue to lock on to their skeletons."
Scott looked again in the dark well of homicide. "Och." He said. "I was wonderin' if there was a telltale bump where th' ears would be or something."
"I'm glad I stopped drinking before I heard that."
Scott looked sour. "Well now what?"
"Now what? This is your department!"
"You're in better wi'th'captain than I am, mon!"
"Yeah, for the next two hours!" McCoy snapped back. "Oh, for..." He exhaled and briefly closed his eyes. "Look, you wanna believe your lady-fair dispatched a seven-foot-tall Vulcan and stuffed him in a very small box after de-fleshing him, you--"
"Seven feet tall?"
"The thigh bones," McCoy said with great patience.
"Doctor, if I ever maun hide a corse, I'll be goin' straight tae ye."
"Thanks ever so." McCoy began rubbing his forehead. "My mother would be proud. She always wanted me to have a secondary line of work to fall back on."
"I cannae get Mira implicated in all this! Chekov's comin' in here first thing tomorrow tae start preparin' for the mail!" Scott waited worridly.
Finally, McCoy exhaled--a universal sign of defeat. "I'll see what I can do." He muttered all the way out of the store room.
TBC