Seeing Double

Posted on 11 Oct 2014 @ 9:47pm by Commodore Harvey Geisler & Lieutenant Commander Thaddeus Quint M.D.
Edited on on 31 Dec 2014 @ 4:19pm

1,399 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: Razmena
Location: Sickbay
Timeline: Shortly After "Afternoon Stroll"

Harvey wasn't sure how long he'd sat in that corridor. Twice more he saw that woman showered in sparks, screaming for help. It was obvious the situation wasn't real.

Then why did his ears ache? Why could he still smell the stench of burning carpet and plasma?

It didn't help that it took a passing ensign to notice the distraught and distracted CO on the floor, staring at the blackened and scarred bulkhead, intentionally left behind from the Dominion War. Harvey was slightly embarrassed, having the young Vulcan assist his captain to returning to his feet.

In fact, Harvey had no real reason why he was entering sickbay. Had the Counselor been aboard, he likely would have gone there first.

Aside from the intermittent beeping of fingers working a console, Sickbay was quiet as a tomb. Thaddeus Quint was busy drawing up a list of overdue physicals on the main console on the wall, several people were behind and quarterly reports were due soon. He idly wondered how many cases would have to involve security dragging in the negligent officers.

As the doors hissed open, Quint idly glanced up at the sound. "Captain," Quint acknowledged the Black Hawk's master tonelessly, "What seems to be the problem?"

Harvey did not immediately reply as he had no idea how to properly respond. He wasn't sure if it was wise to just come out and say what he had just experienced. The least of Harvey's concerns was his image, but the last thing this ship needed was her Captain to be incapacitated without a proper XO to fill the void.

Not that the doctor would do that, would he?

Sighing, Harvey took his chance. "Not quite sure. One minute, I'm seeing something. And the next..."

That caused Quint to look up and set his PADD aside. This was the first time he'd seen Geisler seem hesitant, in their limited meetings. Command officers in the fleet tended to be confident no matter the situation, even if they were dead wrong, so that was a red flag that something was the matter.

"Seeing something." Quint repeated evenly, his flip nature seeming to fade as he reached into a nearby drawer for a tricorder, "What was it you saw, Captain, and what happened next?"

"Ever been to the ship's museum?" Harvey asked, holding still for the tricorder reading.

As Quint opened the tricorder and removed the hand scanner, his eyes flicked up to briefly meet the captain's gaze with a questioning look of his own.

"Can't say I have," Quint replied, as he began scanning the captain. It was some sort of war memorial from what he had gathered, and the last thing the doctor wanted to be reminded of was the war. Not that there wasn't a day in his life that he didn't brood on all he had lost during those two years, "I take it you have?"

Harvey sighed. "Strange place." He tried one glance down at the tricorder to see what, if anything, the doctor was reading, but decided it would be best to leave it to the doctor's expert opinion. "Just before I went in, I had a flashback... I think it was a flashback... to a skirmish during the war. Watched a petty officer get caught in an explosion."

"Curious," Quint remarked though didn't state if it was in response to the reads on his tricorder or to Geisler's story. He studied the readings a moment before asking, "A flashback you say? So this was something you witnessed once upon a time?"

"I saw a lot of stuff in the war." Harvey shook his head, still trying to figure out what exactly he saw. "I remember having to evacuate the Saber in the heat of a battle with the ship being blown to pieces all around us. But I don't remember anyone in particular."

Frowning, he added, "But I was smelling... things. Just now. Burnt metal. Burnt flesh. It was surreal."

Quint grunted to himself at Geisler's description. He recalled the smell of both burnt flesh and metal all too well having two ships blown from out under him during the war.

"For some reason, your activity in you're showing odd synaptic potentials and your neural pathways are showing signs of excitation," Quint admitted glancing down at the tricorder again with a frown, "You didn't recently suffer a shock or some other form of head trauma recently by chance did you?"

"Not since my last spat with that Karemma Captain," Harvey said, looking towards the doctor now. "I swear just talking to D'rimo will make anyone's head feel like it was hit by a bulkhead..."

"Oh yes, mister I had no choice to be a slaver so why bother feeling bad about it?" Quint retorted with a roll of his eyes as he recalled his one encounter with him, "Somehow I doubt he's the cause of your problems being he's quite far away by now."

Setting his tricorder aside, Quint walked across Sickbay and returned with a small black instrument, which he affixed to the side of Geisler's neck. "This is a neurocortical monitor, it will monitor your brainwave activities, and inform me should you experience another episode," Quint explained, "I would need to get more precise readings, rather than just the aftereffects, if I'm to diagnose this properly. Are you experiencing any other symptoms?"

"None," Harvey honestly replied. "At least, nothing a cup of coffee won't cure. Or getting the Away Team back without a scratch and with some good intel."

The captain reached up to brush his fingers over the cold monitor. "I don't have to wear this for too long, do I?"

"Until your neural readings return to normal," Quint answered before arching an eyebrow, "If you find that undesirable your other alternative would be to remain in Sickbay. I find most choose the monitor."

Even as he was finishing the sentence, he retrieved his PADD from the counter and was beginning the process of updating Geisler's medical file and syncing the monitor's readings to Sickbay.

"The cup of coffee I could probably do something about if you wished," Quint offered, somewhat uncharacteristically, "Though I suspect the proverbial ship has sailed on the away team."

Harvey chose the monitor without further hestiation. "Coffee it is then." What he didn't say is that that cup of coffee would be followed by a long night on the bridge. It was likely he wouldn't relax until his crew was safely back aboard.

"How do you take it then?" Quint asked as he set aside the PADD and walked towards the replicator.

"Black," Harvey answered. He'd gotten used to the taste a long time ago, having served aboard the Delaware. It was amazing how little troop transports relied on replicators, and it was even more amazing how quickly cream or sweeteners disappeared. For the short time he served aboard the transport, he learned how to take his coffee without additives. Once in a while he'd sweeten it, but those days were becoming few and far between.

Quint ordered the requested beverage from the replicator and a double strong, double sweet coffee for himself as well. Carrying the two cups he returned and handed one to the captain.

"Thank you, doctor," Harvey replied, taking a sip of the dark, hot liquid. The drink surged through his body, already doing its work to improve Harvey's mood. "Hopefully the rest of your day will be uneventful."

"One could only be so lucky," Quint replied taking a measured sip of his own beverage in turn, "It's the younger generation that wants eventful days, why you see so many young faces on starships. People our age have figured out eventful days often aren't good ones, those of us who survived the process anyways."

"And yet we..." Harvey pointed a single finger from the hand that cradled the cup of coffee to the doctor, "seem to be stupid enough to continue living this process."

Harvey took another sip of the drink, letting his body relax a little more. He nodded towards the doctor, saying, "Not that I'm urgently needed elsewhere, but I should check on our status." As if that were a cue, the doors parted, and one of the nurses entered sickbay. "Afternoon, doctor."

"Captain," Quint acknowledged before turning his attention to what is was the nurse wanted.

JP by

Cmdr. Harvey Geisler

&

Dr. Quint

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