[I-QTRS] JP- LCDR Core & Lt. Moonsong: A Helpful Mind Part 2

[Deliera Jay]

((Deck 3-Quarters: Moonsong))

Moonsong: It’s not a silly question, Tristam. Would you have come if I had been a stranger?

::He sighed, finally sitting down onto the floor - legs having become cramped from crouching for so long - and scratched his neck. He really didn’t want to end up embarrassing himself with his lack of word-creation - he was 30 years old, for Artist’s sake, and he was having trouble saying things a 2 year old could master. Regardless, the counselor’s eyes bore into his own - he had to look away again to come up with a suitable, verbal answer.::

Core: Don’t come off as . . . a caring person - six years ago, didn’t care.. Alone. In . . . my head. Felt . . . ::he sighed.:: . . unworthy of Rodul. So stayed, became selfish. Then Rahman happened . . . again. Guess she turned me around.

::He frowned at himself, a headache forming at the back of his skull. His words had become increasingly slower as he tried dictating his sentences. It was frustrating, to say the least. He can begin a conversation with little problems after a period of no attempts of speaking, but when he got half-way through said conversation, speaking became a chore. He was trying to say so much, but he was just unable to.::

Core: Two years ago, no. Wouldn’t have come. Now that started living up to name? Yeah. Stranger or no. And, ::he took a sharp breath in.:: . . right now, trying to help where can, before helpless myself. With this? ::He tapped his temple.:: Won’t be, uh . . . Chief Engineer . . . for long. “Med-ic-ly un-fit”. ::He gave a small laugh, having utilized what little he knew of a Terran language to try and force his point.:: Ra- uh, Roshanara . . . amazing, but no patience as claimed, so . . . concerned about that. Too.

::Raissa frowned a little. The intimate contact she had on his arm allowed her to see how his mind worked. The echo of words from his directed thoughts in comparison to the words he was actually able to speak aloud showed a disconnect.::

Moonsong: Has the doctor completed your neurological exam? There is a disconnect. There is nothing wrong with your mind.

::He narrowed his eyes, grin still on his face.::

Core: You reading my mind again? ::He huffed.:: Thought I told you that . . . was . . . der- er, dangerous . . . to both of us. Impossible for . . . :::It took him a few seconds to come up with the rest of the sentence.:: Every telepath . . . in ex-existence.

::A normal Rodulan was like a Betazoid - they could be powerful telepathic-wise, but not readable to your typical telepath. They couldn’t read other Rodulans minds without really trying - but that normally resulted in a headache for one, if not both Rodulans in that situation. Rodul was quite a quiet planet in telepathic terms, though visitors tended to keep away from the large cities - a Terran in a city filled with Rodulans meant that they’d all be able to read the Terrans mind. It also meant that there weren’t that many tourists - not many people were open to the idea of someone else “accidentally” reading their most inner thoughts.::

::He was tempted to take Roshanara to Rodul, simply to give her a break from the constant changes of emotional state (like all regular telepaths/empaths, she couldn’t get a fix on a Rodulan’s emotional state), if it wasn’t for the fact that she’d be susceptible to her thoughts being heard by every local.::

Moonsong: I’m not… I’m not trying to.

::She frowned. It was true. It was rare for her to ‘try’ to read someone. She had learned to read what was passively directed toward her.::

Moonsong: It’s just there…. One of the voices… strongest right now near me. I shouldn’t be able to read you at all. The Community is gone from my mind. They could read you. But, right now, your voice and your thoughts echo. The words in your head isn’t connecting properly to the part that speaks. That’s what I’m…. feeling.

::Raissa closed her eyes for a moment.::

Moonsong: Not your emotion or inner thoughts…. Just that echo. I get it from everywhere. It never stops. Everyone. Some with emotion batters at me until I don’t know what is me anymore….

::The Rodulan frowned, shaking his head. He wasn’t close to being an expert like his father was when it came to telepathy - sure, he knew the occasional tid-bits of helpful information, but he wasn’t a walking telepathic/empathic textbook.::

Core: Go to Sickbay. ::There was a pause.:: Seek proper doctor.

::Raissa actually snorted. A proper doctor? There wasn’t one for something like this. At Saveron’s request, she allowed him to map her DNA. Hopefully to find out when she would be getting back to normal.::

Moonsong: I had some tests… waiting for result. ::she lifted an eyebrow.:: Did you get your neurological tests.

::He hadn’t actually answered when she asked earlier, though he shook his head. He’d had general scans, indicating some problems after his little bout of kidnapping, but nothing quite extensive. He was planning to get them, though. Besides, his position had still yet to be confirmed - for now, he was just an officer aboard the Invicta, but when that was supposed to change, he had no idea.::

Core: Tomorrow. ::He sighed.:: Report will go to Kells . . . . not mer- medically fit. For duty. ::shaking his head:: Chief Engineer can’t talk? Won’t work. Uh . . . Best case scenario, be bumped back as Components Expert. Worst case - medical LOA.

::The made Raissa frown. That just didn’t sound right.::

Moonsong: Was it Ven Demar?

::The civilian doctor was not well liked and Raissa personally thought he was an idiot. He may have been a neurologist, but when it came to telepathy, the Bajoran was… uninformed.::

Core: Not yet.

::He hadn’t had it yet, though he was struggling to make that clear.::

Moonsong: Request Saveron to do exam. He knows much more than that…. than Dr. Ven. Especially about telepathic races.

::Tristam frowned. Why was everybody convinced that this was somehow connected to his telepathy? His telepathic lobe was dormant - no activity. Raissa was lucky she could hear Tristam - everyone else couldn’t due to his Rodulan brain - and Tristam sure as heck couldn’t hear anyone at all. Yes, he knew a great deal about telepathic activity, but it all came from his father.

::Not to mention that Tristam highly doubted that this had anything to do with the useless lobe in his brain. If it did, why can’t he still not hear anything telepathically? And why was it affecting his speech, of all things?::

Core: Not telepathic.

::Her mouth tightened a little.::

Moonsong: If you do not do this, then I will do it for you.

Core: Not a child..

::There was a pause.::

Core:::mumbling:: . . . would be helpful . . .

::It wasn’t as if he was entirely comfortable with the idea of going up to some stranger and trying to strike up a conversation with them. Yes, Saveron bore witness to the first couple of weeks of Tristam’s downward spiral of verbal problems, but Tristam had had trouble conversing with *everyone* over the last few days, and it wasn’t exactly a confidence builder. He felt inadequate just by talking to Moonsong, and she was his counselor. Tomorrow he may not be able to speak properly at all - Tristam could only imagine how that was going to go down with Roshanara. He’d all but ignored her over the last couple of days, claiming work - though since the Kriosian was FO, he highly doubted that that story was going to hold up for very long.::

::Raissa nodded to herself. The echo she was getting told her more than Tristam could say aloud. She would put in a call to CD and Saveron the minute she could sit upright without her head splitting open like a melon.::

Moonsong: Tristam…. just because you are not currently telepathic, doesn’t mean that part of your brain is not doing anything. Your brain is like a machine. Different parts are different components all connecting in different ways to allow you to communicate.

::She paused, tightening her fingers on his arm. Her mind was clearer now that she was focused on him.::

Moonsong: Normally I’m a T4. I should not be able to read you at all. But I did when I was hosting the Community. They could read you without a problem. I was hosting them when we last talked and this might be an after effect that will fade.

::That’s what he was afraid of. When that happened, and his condition was only set to get worse from this point, he’d run out of ways to communicate. He sighed, and gave a nod of his head.::

Core: Uem.

::He looked down. The more the conversation went on, the more he just wanted to talk less and less. He couldn’t even say “okay” without jumbling up his pronunciation, and thus mucking up the translator.::

::She smiled faintly.::

Moonsong: I believe that part of your brain is doing something. We need to find out what it is and see if that particular…. component… can be adjusted to stop interfering.

::He frowned. He’d worked with medical technology on Rodul long enough to know that that was something his own people couldn’t do. Though Starfleet was a few decades ahead with medical tech, Tristam was skeptical that “repairing” any damage to his brain was something they could pull off. They did their best with him when the accident occurred - those doctors said that nothing more could be done.::

::So, at a loss at what he should say, he shrugged.::

Moonsong: Although it would be a great excuse to step down from being Chief of Engineering… You’ve indicated that you are not happy with that role.

::The Rodulan winced.::

Core: Was’t happy . . . with Evr- Chief . . . Engineer. But . . . engineer . . . is . . . is my life.

::Working with technology is all he’s ever really known. It was the reason he was here in Starfleet. Others join Starfleet for the stars, for the exploration - Tristam joined because he was consciously aware that Rodul was behind in technological advances, and he wanted to work with something more suitably challenging than what his home planet could provide. Mix that feeling as though he had no other purpose in his life after a rather significant failure in attempting to get a higher degree, Gamighan (and Medledore) suggested Starfleet. Sure, he flunked out on a few classes, and he was lucky he scraped through admission tests, but here he was.

::A medical, *forced* leave of absence meant that he’d be shoved back into a situation he’d been in before. His recovery from the accident on the Pioneer saw him in a hospital bed for many weeks. And during those weeks, his boredom saw him playing with plastic cups, stacking them in a number of different ways for hours on end (they’d refused to even give him a PADD for whatever reason he didn’t know or understand). Three months passed before he’d managed to fix something after that accident - a nurse had been having troubles with her communicator despite having been to the Operations department for prior repairs. In actuality, the person that had “fixed” the communicator had gotten the wires crossed. It was a five minute repair job (he’d been groggy due to pain medication for his knee), but Tristam had brightened considerably after handing it back to her.

::Yes; no one had said he’d have to give up technology altogether, but he liked repairing systems, building new things, coming up with new theories for anything to better Engineering in some way, and he didn’t want to be forced to stop doing that simply because he couldn’t give a verbal order. He could hear perfectly, his cognitive ability certainly hadn’t diminished, his sight (and reading) had been unaffected by whatever was going on and his hands were still as steady as ever.::

Moonsong: Trust me, Tristam…. I’ll help you through this. I won’t let you down.

Core: Mai know.

::Tristam gave another sigh, rubbing his eyes. He was overthinking things again, and he was supposed to be here for Moonsong, not the other way around. Add the constant struggle of creating words to the headache that’d been building in the back of his head for the last few minutes, and he was exhausted.::

Core: You euret? Er . . . ::he cringed.:: Are. You. Okay?

::He’d curse the translator for not being advanced enough to understand his nonsense, were it not for the fact that he was already cursing himself.::

Moonsong: ::she nodded slightly.:: I’ll get through this. ::pause:: Thank you… for helping me…

Core: Pleasure. ::He sighed.:: Should rest.

::Her voice was quiet as she released his arm. She was exhausted.::

Moonsong: I hope… someday you will consider me a friend…

Core: Need time, Raissa. Bor . . . process everything. But . . . will.

Moonsong: Good night, Tristam… I won’t forget my promise….

Core: Night.

::He gave another smile before he let himself out, headed back to his quarters. The next few days were going to be interesting.::

==============

LtCmdr Tristam Core

Chief Engineer

USS Invicta

and

Lt. Raissa Moonsong

Chief of Counseling

USS Invicta