LT Gila Sadar - I Tried to Hide and Something Broke
LT Gila Sadar
(( Captain’s Ready Room – Deck 1, USS Artemis-A ))
Captain MacKenzie hadn’t made this easy for Gila, and with the knowledge of the human woman in front of her, she wasn’t going to make it any easier going forwards either. Especially not once Gila informed her, to be absolutely certain that nothing was missed or omitted, of her crimes.
Sadar: I-I-It’s... I-I... ::slow, deep breaths:: ‘Failure to disclose relevant and p-potentially d-d-dangerous medical information’, ‘I-Intentional endangerment of fellow crew’ and... And... ::voice breaks:: ‘F-Falsification of Medical Documents’.
The last one was especially hard to say, especially because she knew that Doctor Addison MacKenzie held her medical officers to a high standard. The speed with which the redheaded human looked up at her, her eyes suddenly sharper than Gila was used to.
MacKenzie: Falsification of Medical Documents?
Gila fought to not recoil at the question, but it was almost impossible. It felt like a physical slap.
Sadar: I-I-I... ::swallows:: I-I report to t-turn myself in, Captain.
MacKenzie: Falsification of Medical Documents?
‘I won’t let you get out of this one’. The message couldn’t be more clear. Captain MacKenzie demanded that she make her guilt clear, beyond any doubt. It was an aim that Gila shared, but by the Wheel, she’d hoped that her saying it out loud the first time would’ve been enough. Clearly that had been a naive hope.
Sadar: Y-Y-Y... Y-Yes Sir. S-S-S-Specifically, m-my own m-medical journal.
Captain MacKenzie turned her chair away from her, and Gila felt her shoulders start to fall, her head turn down, her eyes cast away. The fact that Captain MacKenzie had to turn away from her made her even more afraid than she’d anticipated. She’d expected to come in here, confess her guilt, get yelled at and get sent away. Probably to the brig, where she’d remain until her sentence had been more clearly defined.
Granted, all of that could very well still occur, but if there was one thing that scared Gila more than a yelling Addison MacKenzie, it was a quiet Addison MacKenzie.
MacKenzie: Explain it to me.
Gila looked up, a ruminant ungulate trapped in a focused light cone, and she raised her hands before her stomach as she twisted her anxiety ring back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, processing the request.
Sadar: C-C-Captain? I-It’s all d-detailed on the PADD, s-so if-
The Captain swung her chair around at breakneck speed and Gila took a physical step backwards at the intensity in the Captain's expression.
MacKenzie: I’m a doctor, so explain it all to me. What did you notice, and when? (beat) ::waving her finger:: And then your choices.
Her choices. The choices she’d made to pretend that she could be anything than what she was. Had she had other choices available to her? Yes, of course she had. At any point, she could’ve went to Commander Adea or Lieutenant Morgan or Sil-net or Lieutenant Commander Dakora or Lieutenant Commander Jovenan - any of them - and confided in them. She could’ve sent a subspace message to Vai-net - she would have taken leave to come be with Gila if Gila had expressed a need of it, she was sure - and yet she hadn’t.
Which was also a choice. She’d chosen to ‘confront’ - which in Gila’s vocabulary obviously meant ‘avoid to the best of her abilities’ - this terror alone, and even in that, she had failed.
Sadar: ... D-During Frontier Day... I-I... L-Lieutenant Gnai’s suit was assimilated... I-It was chasing u- ::shakes head:: me on the Bridge. I-It c-caught me, a-and I was... I-I d-don’t know h-how or why, b-but I... I attacked it.
The word was foreign in her mouth, like it was an impossibly big and impossibly sad word. A Mizarian didn’t attack things. A Mizarian wouldn’t and couldn’t attack anything. A Mizarian would accept the death it was given. So why couldn’t she just have died back then?
oO But if I’d died, what would have happened to Lieutenant Gnai? Oo
MacKenzie: Response?
Gila took the PADD to find the real X-Ray, the secret she’d tried so hard to hide away, to pretend that what it showed didn’t exist. And this is where it got her. Her fingers trembled as she located the proper X-Ray, but she did, and placed it back on the desk.
Sadar: Th-These... ::twists anxiety ring clean off of finger:: Th-Th-These are... E-Extendable bone-like appendages that are housed in the h-hollow ramial bones that line my skull, a-and they can in t-times of great duress be expelled from the p-palate as a v-v-v-v- ::clears throat:: as a d-d-defensive m-mechanism.
She couldn’t yet admit it. That she contained violence.
MacKenzie: Response
Sadar: N-No Sir... I-I attended e-every physical check-up in the Academy, a-a-and... Th-They didn’t exist. A-At that time. ::wrings her hands:: I-I was scared. I didn’t w-want people to know. I-I wasn’t r-ready to accept that I... That I... That I... oO That I am a monster Oo... I-I’ve b-been p-purposefully avoiding m-my check-ups for the past 11 months, adding f-fake X-Rays to my medical journal for the past three... T-To prevent them from being... D-Discovered.
MacKenzie: Response
TAG/TBC
LT Gila Sadar
Assistant Chief of Medical
USS Artemis-A
A240006GS1