Lt. Commander Foster - Group Hallucination
Jamie LeBlanc
(OOC – the: ~dialogue marks~ indicate telepathic conversation not audible to non-telepaths OR thoughts made audible to telepaths. ~This is me thinking~ )
((Main Medical Meeting Room - Starbase 118))
Wyn just watched as the Bolian orderly delivered a set of brain scans and then rushed away. And then the door took matters into its own hands and shut before Mr. Drex could escape.
Wethern: Now do I need to sedate you for a quiet life or will you take a stylish new suit and some tea?
Wyn hiked one brow and one antennae in unison. That sounded like something his father would say, and now he decided he rather liked Mr. Corey CMO Guy.
Wethern. The Bolian said the same. Dr. Wethern. Hah! Take that magic PADD!
Drex: Sedation will not make this situation quieter. ::He lowered his hands, meeting Wethern’s eyes.:: I will sit. But I will not be treated as a problem to be managed.
And then there was a bit of a switch. The Denobulan Drex sat down and the Betazoid Ensign Science Lady Voss got up and started a sickbay shuffle. At this point Wyn had already figured out that getting involved was only making things worse, and perhaps the best and most honorable course of action was to sit down and shut up.
Neither were things he was very good at.
Voss: ::whispering to herself:: Just wake up, just wake up, just wake up…
Wethern: Voss, you feeling ok?
She did not appear to be feeling OK.
Then again he wasn’t feeling OK either. But the headache was rapidly subsiding, and in its place there was a nasty sense of disorientation that made him queasy. Like putting your brain on a merry-go-round and cranking it to the fastest it could go.
Drex: Looks like she needs your assistance, Doctor.
Voss: ?
Wethern: Play nice you two. Doctor Foster could you assist me please.
Which two were supposed to play nice? Immediately he supposed it was a dig at him, and his demeanor shifted pretty quickly into one of stubbornly silent observation, and a flat expression carefully chiseled to remove any hints of weakness.
Foster: I can.
He rose, letting Dr. Wethern take the lead (see? Now he knew the name: Dr. Wethern. None of this first name basis madness.) and clenched his jaw to keep his mouth shut.
Wethern: Ensign, do you remember the last few minutes? Or even where you are?
Drex: There are excellent doctors on Denobula. Perhaps you should transport her planetside. We could all go… a ship can’t offer the same resources as a full planetary facility.
Wyn jerked his head to the side, casting Drex a side-eye as chilly as the Kalthon plains.
~How do you know this is Denobula? How do you even know it’s a planet? We could be locked inside a Cardassian torture chamber and hallucinating all of this for all we know!~
But he didn’t say anything. He just thought it with the force of a drunken Klingon barreling to the last keg of bloodwine.
He thought it in a split second and immediately dug a medkit out of a fashionably concealed wall cabinet. A cabinet that he could not remember knowing was there and yet he knew where the kit was on instinct. Muscle memory. His body just moved and did.
Voss: ?
He looked up, with an expression of utter dismay, antennae curling downwards until the tips disappeared in the tufts of his snowy white hair.
Foster: I didn’t say anything! ::He protested::
He looked at the others, confused. But everyone else was focused on something else, so like a cat that just slipped off a table, assuming no one saw, he closed his mouth and sauntered forward as if nothing at all had happened.
Wethern: I'm Corey I'm the Medical Officer here, this is Wyn. How you feeling? Mind if I run a scan?
Voss: ?
Kneeling down, if Dr. Wethern was boing a brainscan, standard procedure stated that the assisting medical officer do a bioscan to check for any complications.
Foster: Elevated heart and breathing rate within Betazoid ranges.
Clinical, efficient. Fix problems. He was good at fixing problems.
Unless those problems were people. Then he was very bad at fixing people problems.
Wethern: Drex, pass me that neuro synaptic scanner?
Drex: Doctor, I believe there has been a misunderstanding. This is a geode hammer.
Once again Wyn cast a glance at Drex, his mind running forward even as he forced his expression and actions to be outwardly calm.
~What is a geode hammer? How the heck do you have a geode hammer in sickbay? Why the heck do you have a geode hammer in sickbay? Where did you get it?~
Voss: ?
He kept his mouth shut. If he kept his mouth shut maybe he would get away with only one of the three people in here realizing what an insane rat’s nest of mangled thoughts and unprocessed emotions rested in his mind behind a façade that was one part cool, one part talking back – or talking smack – about everything and just enough medical genius to get away with it all.
Just don’t speak, Wyn. Mitigate the damage.
Wethern: That would be a geode hammer......where did you even get this?
~See, I’m not the only one!~
The thought was triumphant.
Drex: It was on the table with the survey equipment. I assumed you were asking for something durable. ::A beat.:: I am glad I did not swing it.
Images ghosted past his mind. A sickbay, a small one, memories that were close to where his mind was. Prying an attacking crewman off a Vulcan orderly. Fending off attackers that had breached sickbay from some sort of anomaly. Fighting with a half crazed Half-Vulcan who was bent on attacking one of his patients. His friends.
His patients? He didn’t have patients… we just had whoever he was working on. Otherwise they were the CMO’s patients. Like Dr. Wethern.
His friends? He didn’t have friends. No use in getting close if you expected to be transferred every six months. That just brings heartache and pain.
And yet the memories were there. Fighting to protect names and faces that slipped away from him like a fish in a river.
Slowly he turned towards Drex and spoke softly, firmly.
Foster: Please don’t swing that thing in sickbay.
Voss: ?
And then Mr. Drex … just fetched the thing. Well, that was a lot less dramatic than the scary images in his brain. And probably, he was loathe to admit, the most likely outcome.
Wyn, catastrophize? Actually, he would be shocked to learn that his mature self had learned to stop that. But at this mental age? Yes. Oh yes.
Drex: This should be the neuro-synaptic scanner.
Wethern: ?
~Great, now Dr. Wethern can tell us how crazy we all are.~
Voss: ?
Foster: I’m guessing we all need to get them done. ::Said professionally enough.::
Wethern: ?
Drex: If it is required.
Wethern: ?
As Dr. Wethern stepped forward to complete the brain scan Wyn looked over towards Voss.
Foster: There’s no physical brain damage showing on the scan. Are you still in pain?
Voss: ?
His antennae curled together, mind immediately jumping to the rolodex of medical information the size of a moderate planet. Telepathic inhibitors were not his expertise, but he was well versed enough in the pharmaceuticals to know they were available.
Foster: Indrantimone and Polarus root are both developed on Betazed as mild telepathic inhibitors. They are options to give you some relief.
He stated, knowing they could be replicated. An offer, but not a forceful one. He was trying to fix problems.
He was also feeling oddly intellectually naked around someone with sensitive telepathy. He didn’t want his own biases to come into play, but they lurked in the background.
Voss: ?
The neural synaptic scanner gave a pleasant chirp
Drex: Then we are done.
~Are we?~
He bit his tongue again. There was literally nothing he could say that would make this situation any better. So he bit his tongue and just watched.
Wethern/Voss: ?
Drex: I understand your need for caution, Doctor, but this is becoming a bit... excessive. ::He met Wethern’s gaze, steady and unyielding.:: You cannot keep me here against my will. I want to speak with the Commander of this vessel, and my brother on Kalus.
Wethern/Voss: ?
Finally he stood back up and came back to the table.
Foster: It’s going to take minute or two for the computer to parse your brain scan results Dr. Wethern. So in that time, humor us. Maybe humor them. ::He lifted his Magic PADD:: I have figured out we’re on StarBase 118, biggest spaceport in the Trinity Sector and we all report to Captain Gogigobo Fairhug.
~and apparently me? Which if that isn’t the biggest red flag that we’re all experiencing a group hallucination in a Cardassian torture chamber, I don’t know what is.~
Because Wyn couldn’t fathom himself ever being in command. Oh sure, he liked working with people, but he had a hard time understanding people. And they had a hard time understanding him. So he put walls up and pretended to be a cool medical genius who never got scared and never needed help.
It worked pretty good until it suddenly didn’t work at all in the worst ways possible.
Wethern/Voss/Drex: ?
Foster: Alright and let me guess. We were all totally normal until something happened and then in quick succession we all… went nuts?
He would go for the most general version of that.
Wethern/Voss/Drex: ?
Foster: Now, barring the very real possibility that this is actually a group hallucination because we have been captured and are being tortured for information, though what kind of information they would want from a useless moron like me… ::he held up one slender blue finger:: Though I am the best microsurgeon in the quadrant, I’ll stake my life on it. ::a pause:: Barring all that you say that we have … regressed. Or lost a portion of our memories.
Sometimes the thoughts just came out of his mouth unedited. He might wonder when he hired an editor for those thoughts.
Wethern/Voss/Drex: ?
~*~
tags/tbc
~*~
Lt. Commander Shar’Wyn Foster
Executive Officer
StarBase 118 Ops
~Julian Beck
E239010ST0