Lisa Willbanks Personal Log, Stardate 44622.5
A doctor makes the worst patient!
Physician, heal thyself!
Geez, if I end up in sickbay and behave like this, please, someone shoot me!
James sat at the other side of the sickbay from his friend, internally amused at the sight of him imperiously directing his staff from his bed. Intellectually the Commander knew that he should intercede and help Lisa keep Eden in his place until he was certified fit for duty, but it was too good to watch. Besides, Lisa’s tactics against her CMO were becoming increasingly crafty, and he was pleased that for now at least she was winning.
Now the slight Doctor was sitting up, his legs dangling over the side of the bed - even though Lisa had ordered him put into a gown a size too small for him in the hope of halting his wanderings around the Bay.
"Well," Eden said as he leaned back against his pillows, one bare foot swinging. "Apparently I have to be reviewed by the Counsellor before I can go to work." He laughed shortly, full of resigned amusement. "Personally I think it’s all delaying tactics so that the Lieutenant can get all the glory for both the Kingston survivors’ recoveries AND the first mission of the Fairburn!"
"And of course you’re certain of that." James replied, crossing his arms. "Do you feel like lodging a formal complaint, then?"
"Oh, absolutely!" Eden’s smile broadened. "After all, it’s obvious to anyone that she’s a power hungry bitch who would have killed me for an easy promotion if there’d been any way to get away with it!"
"Oh, I’m sure." James replied sardonically. "And I’m also sure you have proof."
"Of course!" Eden laughed. "Her hands are always freezing cold when she checks my arm!"
"No tricorder?"
"She likes to torture me." Eden’s eyes shone as James shook his head in disbelief.
"Well, that explains the breeze I can hear whistling past your back. Sit back before you get a chill in your kidneys, Eden. Otherwise you’ll be at the tender mercy of Lisa longer."
Laughing, Eden shimmied back so that his behind was covered in pillow and sheet.
"Better, Mother?" he asked.
"Much."
"That’s an old superstition, you know." He smiled. "So what can you tell me about this Counsellor, then? Kay Teral, isn’t it?"
James leaned forward to correct him, but instead smiled thoughtfully as Eden continued along the train of thought.
"Word is she’s one of the best in the Fleet, isn’t she? Mind you, I find it strange I’ve never heard of her before this, until I heard she was assigned here. So what can you tell me?"
"Well, she is certainly unique." came the hesitating reply. He leaned forward in his chair. "Eden, I think you should be warned…"
"Are you here again, Commander?" The feminine tone broke through James’ soft words as Lisa came striding out into the room. The First Officer didn’t know whether to laugh or groan when he saw that a second, cloaked, figure was hovering in the shadows outside the door. "I would’ve thought that you’d be giving yourself a vacation from him before he took over from me!" She chuckled nervously. "And what should he be warned about? I’d have thought you’d have told him about everything going on around here by now."
"Not quite." he said, looking towards the door. "K’Teira, why don’t you come in and meet the Doctor?"
"And here I was, thinking you were a subtle, diplomatic, man." K’Teira’s soft alto tones were only slightly amused as she fully stepped in. She was shrouded in her grey cloak and her hood was up over her ridges, but there was still no denying what she was.
Eden stopped lounging and sat up very straight. For a moment he said nothing, just studying the living oxymoron, then turned to his friend.
"This kind of joke just isn’t like you, James. Command has changed you."
"Doctor Eden Pendehar, meet Counsellor K’Teira of the House of D’Jenec." Lisa said into the silence. K’Teira bowed slightly in acknowledgment. "And the Commander isn’t joking with you. She really is the Counsellor here, sir."
Suspiciously Eden looked from one to the other of the group, his hazel gaze finally settling upon the Klingon woman, who was shaking her long ponytail free of the hood.
"Sure." he said with a hesitant smile. "And just how can a Klingon become a Counsellor, Kay Teral of the House of D’Jenec?"
Blue eyes sparkled at him in return.
"And just how can a human still be practicing a religion in these Godless times?" she responded. "There are exceptions to every rule, aren’t there?"
His eyes began to shine, and the rigidity of his stance relaxed. He flopped back against the pillows.
"You raise a valid point, Kay." he noted. "So, when does my assessment begin?"
She flicked a contemptuous hand.
"It already has." she announced. "You’re all right. Just come to me for a session in a day or so - let me know when you’re free and we’ll go through the official rigmarole, okay?"
"I will." he replied, warily amused. "Say, what would have happened if I hadn’t accepted it?"
"Not even Lisa could have saved you."
Her flat, dangerous tone gave him goosebumps and he was almost ready to reassess her in the face of it until he saw her outrageous wink. After she had ensured he had seen that, she turned and sashayed from the room, her cloak whispering seductively along the floor.
Even James openly laughed.
But as the laughter died, Eden asked,
"That was a joke, wasn’t it?"
Berry stepped down the corridor towards the Counsellor’s office, wondering at the summons which brought her here. Over these past weeks, while she hadn’t exactly been excluded from counselling duties, she had mostly been assigned to general setting-in duties, helping coordinate civilian activities and the like. Not exactly mind-blowing stuff, but she had understood when the Counsellor had explained that she had to get the crew accustomed to her presence aboard before Berry could take over some of the counselling. The opportunities K’Teira had given her in allowing her to take over some of her bridge duties had more than made up for the lack.
However, now there was this unusual summons to come to the Counsellor’s office. Apart from their weekly coordination meetings and Berry’s report, there had been no need to meet, and so Berry wondered.
The doors opened for her as she approached, immediately admitting her into the bare black room.
There was no one in sight.
"Hello?" she said into the gloom, sending out a mental feeler to see whether there was anyone in the room. Nothing. "Counsellor K’Teira, Lieutenant Berenár Moggadí reporting as ordered."
There came the muffled tinkle of a tool being put down, then,
"Ah, Berry." From behind the desk a head rose and the shadows resolved themselves into the figure of the Counsellor. "Thank-you for coming so quickly. Lights up a quarter."
As the illumination level of the room rose, Berry noticed that where the Counsellor had been, there was now a section of wall pulled out and away, exposing cables and blinking diodes.
"Now," the Klingon continued, taking a seat behind the desk and indicating the other chair to the Lieutenant, "There are three reasons I’ve called you in here, Berry, and the first has to do with what I was doing behind the desk. You see, this office is holo-capable, but I’ve made a few adjustments to its capabilities, adapting it to our specific needs. It’s only now that I’ve found the time to be able to bring it up to my standards."
"I’m not sure I understand you, Counsellor." Berry replied, frowning slightly. "You say this office is holo-capable, so therefore isn’t it able to do everything an average holodeck can? I would have thought that that was all we’d need."
"I’ll give you a full demonstration of its capabilities in a few minutes, but for now, step outside the room again for a moment. I’ll contact you when it’s ready."
Bemused, Berry got to her feet again and stepped back out the door. This time it stayed shut behind her.
"K’Teira to Moggadí - you can come in now." her communicator instructed, and the doors slid open once more.
No one was in there.
In frustrated confusion, Berry struck out with her mind, seeking some hint where the Counsellor had gone - after all, there was only one doorway in or out - but found nothing. She even went behind the desk and looked into the hole in the wall, but there was no one in sight.
"You would agree that sometimes to one needs to observe a person’s behaviour to properly ascertain their state of mind, I’m sure." The voice issuing from her pin sounded somehow doubled, as though there were two sources of it, but again, Berry couldn’t locate the source. "While I’m still working on blocking out the noise…" Suddenly the desk shimmered, and K’Teira was revealed to not have moved from her last known seat. "… I feel that this could be an excellent diagnostic tool, given some work." She smiled enigmatically at her junior.
Berry immediately began to consider the possibilities in her mind.
"I see!" she smiled. "And I take it that that’s not all this office can do, then?"
"No. I have a number of programs and subroutines I have specifically developed for our line of work. Over the next few weeks I’ll introduce you to their usage as I bring them online, though this one is probably the most immediately spectacular."
"Is it based on cloaking technology?" Berry asked as she re-took her seat.
Again the enigmatic smile.
"Not exactly." she replied. "I can give you the specifications, if you’d like."
"Yes, I would."
"Then they’ll be uploaded to you by the change of shift." Then the Counsellor leaned forward.
"This brings me to the second reason why I’ve called you in here." she said, her voice soft and deep. "Before the Kingston incident, there was a case brought to my attention from amongst the crew, and as was requested by her department head, I conducted a preliminary investigation. Even in the setting of that simple discussion, what I found wasn’t good. Not only does she feel that I, personally, am a waste of space on a starship, but she feels that all Klingons should be killed or at the very least be made to pay for their crimes against the Federation. I have also found that she is coming very close to losing all respect for this crew as they tolerate my presence aboard.
"Unfortunately, this is where you come in. As you can tell, at this point there is no way that I could possibly get any kind of positive reaction from her, and I certainly couldn’t begin to properly diagnose or set up a therapy regimen for her. So it’s going to be up to you to do this. I’m sorry that it’s going to be such a difficult case for you to start off your counselling career with, but right now apart from sending her to a Starbase facility, I can’t see any other way to help her."
"Wouldn’t it be easier to transfer her?" Berry asked, thinking over the options. "For while I’m grateful for the opportunity, it seems to me that…"
K’Teira handed her a PADD.
"This is her psych profile." she explained. "What I discovered in the history files was telling, but not so much as her recent behaviour which prompted her transfer to the Fairburn."
"‘An exemplary crewmember who…’" Berry read aloud, confused. Then she came to the passage and light dawned. "‘… propensity for brawling in Klingon bars…’ Oh, dear."
K’Teira nodded.
"Apparently her previous Counsellor was unaware of my race and recommended she be transferred her on the grounds that Kay Teral, with all her knowledge of the Klingon culture, would be able to slowly ease her into tolerance of the Klingon ways." A slight snort of annoyance.
"…And of course the shock of seeing what you really are has sent her into full-blown bigotry." Berry finished. "Oh, dear!"
"Even with you taking over her case, we may not be able to do much." K’Teira continued. "We may yet have to send her to another, better equipped facility. However, we have to do what we can and try to halt the damage before…"
Berry’s nod of agreement stopped her words.
"As we can’t be sure of how she’ll react to you alone," K’Teira continued, "I’ve been working on getting the hide mechanism up to scratch so that I can remain in the room as an observer and for your safety if something does happen. It will not be a test of your skills, as I am already confident in your ability to counsel. But if you have any objections, I’m open to them."
"When were you thinking of conducting this session? Will you give me time to prepare for it?"
"Of course." The great brow beetled a little, as though K’Teira couldn’t believe she’d even have to ask. "Which leads me into my third reason for calling you in here. As I will be on the away team to Gorin, I have scheduled this session for a fortnight from now. Now, it’s not my first choice to have to wait for so long, but as you can see the mechanism isn’t working quite right and I would prefer to be there."
"And I’d prefer you to be there for the first one, Counsellor, especially once I start probing. There’s no way…?"
"According to reports from the Bridge we’ll be in Gorinni space within twenty-four hours, which gives me about enough time to work out the bugs in the hide as well as my few scheduled sessions before we get there. And if the mission takes a shorter time than expected, we can always reschedule.
"Here are my preliminary notes," she added, handing over another PADD. "Study both them and the psych file and tell me what you think in the morning, before we reach Gorin.
"Do you have any questions?"
"Nothing right now, Counsellor," Berry replied. "However I will after I’ve finished reading these. May I have that full demonstration now? I realise that the office isn’t running up to spec as yet, however I would like to gain some idea as to what it is capable of."
K’Teira smiled.
"Certainly. Computer, run K’Teira program Ambiance One utilizing subroutine fourteen."
The walls shifted from black into the familiar designs of the Betazed Museum of Arts.
Berry laughed.
Captain’s Log Stardate 44629.3
We are approaching Gorin Prime in order to commence preliminary talks with the warring parties there. Both the official government and the rebels are known for their duplicity - we will be extremely careful during our time here."I really wish this wasn’t necessary." James thoughtfully fingered the phaser at his side as he walked alongside the Captain. "Even though there’s no getting around it, but I wish it wasn’t necessary."
"I only wish I could go down there with you." the Captain grumbled as the turned a corner. "This 'captains restricted from away missions' guideline… it’s quite frustrating."
Her tone, however, said extremely frustrating. James stifled a welling smile.
"Once we’ve ascertained the safety of the site and the truthfulness of the parties, I’ll lift the order." he reminded her.
"Oh, you’re just too good to me." she darkly replied. He shrugged in reply.
"What can I do? I’m only new at this, and I don’t want to have to report I lost my Captain on my very first mission."
She glared at him.
"Was that a joke, Mister Grieg?" she asked dangerously.
"Yes, Captain. But with more than a hint of truth to it." He said this without flinching.
Her steps slowed and her eyes narrowed, but a tight smile danced across her lips.
"There’s hope for you yet." she told him.
"Thank-you, Captain."
They walked into the transporter room where the others of the away team waited.
"Geez! About time!" Daniels laughed as he bounded up the steps to join his contingent of three security officers. "What took ya so long?"
"Daniels!" Grieg snapped as Elek turned an icy stare at the erring officer. Daniels immediately fell to attention.
"All present and accounted for." he said primly.
"Right." the Captain said as her First joined them on the pad. "The liaison, Katanish Laria, has signaled she will meet you at the beam-in site and will take you from there to the meeting halls. Once there I need you all to be on your toes. Although Katanish has been affiliated with the Federation for years, she is still known as a staunch governmental supporter and as such can’t be fully trusted."
"Captain, you already instructed us in the briefing. We will not let you down." Elek said primly, poising one hand over her phaser, the other holding her tricorder. Her task was to commence scanning for traps and explosives the moment they rematerialized and intended to be ready the moment she could move once more.
Susan sighed softly. Damn this not going with them. At least if she was she’d feel she had some semblance of control.
"Commander, reminders never hurt anyone. Even Vulcans." she sniffed. "Come back to us in one piece, and perhaps next time I’ll forego them."
"Aye, Captain." Elek became as stone again.
"Planet again signals they are ready to receive." Chief Alacha reported, looking up from his panel. "I’m detecting no jammers, scramblers or deflectors in the area."
Susan looked to her First, who was surveying his team. The Security detachment had their phasers at the ready, whilst the others stood alert and watchful. He nodded to his CO.
"Energize." he said, and the team disappeared.
A dangerous pause as they waited for confirmation of transport.
"They’re down and safe." Alacha confirmed.
Susan was in the process of sighing with relief when the panel chimed.
"This is strange." the chief reported, hitting a few controls. "I’m getting two conflicting reports here…"
Unbidden and unknowingly, Susan found herself by his side surveying the display.
"The computer confirms transport, but it’s also telling me they’re still in the buffer… This is weird!" he continued.
"Get them back here now!" she ordered, resisting the urge to push the Sekkaran away and do it herself.
"I’m… I’m not sure that I can!" he cried, his movements speeding now as he tried different combinations of buttons. "The computer thinks they’re gone, but… Ach!"
"What?!" she demanded, but she could see it for herself. They were gone, and there was no trace of where, or even if they were still alive.
She resisted the urge to swear.
"They’ve gone." Alacha ground out.
Susan stomped a foot as she hit her communicator.
"Captain to Rell! Meet me in transporter room two on the double! Bring a transporter team with you!"
"Aye."
"And Alacha, scan the beam-down site. I want to be sure that they’re not there somewhere. Even if it’s just as dust, I want to know about it."
"Aye."
Then she started to run through the sequence herself to make sure what she’d just seen was real.
