Posted by Lieutenant Commander T’Aria (XO/ Navigation Officer) in PreSIM: Medical Check-In

Posted by Lieutenant Dr. Solomon Kane (Chief Medical Officer) in PreSIM: Medical Check-In

Posted by Lieutenant Commander T’Aria (XO/ Navigation Officer) in PreSIM: Medical Check-In
Posted by… suppressed (4) by the Post Ghost! 👻
One conversation with a simeltaneously composed and frazzled CSO, and a quarters-run later, T’Aria found herself referring back to her check list. She tilted her chin and regarded the PaDD perched against her forearm. In nagging bold font, Physical, Check-in w/CMO, pranced across the screen. T’Aria knit her eyebrows together. Tapping her finger idly against the screen, she clicked the PaDD off and tucked it under her arm. “All right,” she muttered to herself, a faint hint of reservation in her tone. “All right.”

–

T’Aria wove through Chernov’s labyrinthine halls, her feet set on sickbay but her heart demanding she venture elsewhere. ‘Anywhere but here,’ it begged, but she was either too stupid or too bold to listen. It was impossible to determine which.

T’Aria walked up to Sickbay’s foreboding entryway and paused. ‘Last chance-‘ her heart cooed, cut short by the gentle sss! of parting doors. A disgruntled Ensign trudged past, an arm cradled against their chest, but she didn’t offer more than subtle acknowledgement. A tiny, insignificant fragment ached to follow suit. She refrained. With a soft breath, T’Aria listened as their footsteps reverberated until they were a distant pitter-patter against the clamour of her subconscious. When her breath released, T’Aria exerted every ounce of force against her emotions. It burned like hellfire. Every fibre of her being throbbed in protest, but it granted her some semblance of composure. That was enough.

She knew better than to grant emotion power over critical thought, but this wasn’t the kind of problem she was used to. It wasn’t logical. She desperately wanted to rationalise it - break it down into managable little pieces like she’d done for the past year - but it was futile. The only way to progress was to move forward. She had to face this head on. She had to face him. He deserved that much.

T’Aria clung to her composure and pushed herself through those sickbay doors. The hubbub of medical personnel intermixed with all breeds of officers was nothing new, but it was strangely surreal. She didn’t cling to the fleeting thought. “Excuse me,” T’Aria pursued the closest officer she could find. She wouldn’t waste time with formalities - she knew they had work to tend to - so she spoke plainly. “Where is Dr. Kane?”

She refused to prepare herself for a simple answer. ‘In his office’ or ‘performing a physical’, though perfectly viable, didn’t sound entirely probable. There was always some grand mess to attend to, or some foolish engineer to patch up from a date with the warp core.. gone wrong. Never a dull day, as the saying went.

– T’Aria, incoming XO.

The nurse pointed over his shoulder and the wild hair and tattooed hands could be seen, although the man’s back was to her. His voice, terse and callous as it had been when she first met him, came across the Sickbay.

“I don’t care what you think you were trying to do. What you did was break four bones in your hand and strain every ligament in your fingers. I should amputate the hand off at the neck, but there is so much paperwork involved and you just aren’t worth it.” He said something to the nurse and they nodded and Kane stood up straight and turned around…

And he saw her. His eyes opened in shock, then narrowed to slits. He took a step forward and then stopped. “Y… you’re here.” was all he managed before he shook his head and then took a breath. “My office.” he said flatly and then turned and walked off without another word, walking onto the CMO office without looking to see if she followed or not.

Kane, CMO

T’Aria stepped forward, her lips parted enough to respond, but the words died on her tongue. She managed a nod. Her gaze trailed after Kane for a split second before she pulled herself from the comfort of distance and followed.

She knew saying something - a word, a short phrase - was the right thing to do. But what expression could possibly fit? ‘Hi- I know I disappeared a year ago, but I’m not dead!’ or ‘What’s up, doc? It’s been a while.’ Small talk never ended well. Taking in a soft breath, her eyes betraying every ounce of composure she exuded, T’Aria lingered just within his office.

Once the door hissed shut, she flexed her fingers and narrowed her eyes as if ready to produce some magnificent spiel. But a grand gesture gave way to a common phrase. “I’m…” She regarded him with a softened expression, her eyebrows knit with equal ambivalence and conviction “..sorry.” It was hardly two words, but they beat any colloquialism that attempted to sugarcoat the awkwardness with pleasantries.

– T’Aria, Incoming XO

Kane took a seat at his desk and looked at her through the cascade of hair that fell across his face. His look was one of strong emotions. Hurt… confusion… anger… relief… happiness… all of these struggled to take control and for a long period he didn’t say a word. He just… stared. Finally, he blinked and said simply “Why?”

Kane, CMO

T’Aria endured the tumult of his silence. Amid the confusion and anger seeping from his expression, the pain in his eyes hit the hardest. It struck her like a phaser set on kill. She could’ve brushed it aside, offered some pathetic explanation, and gone about her day like he was just another human. But he wasn’t. He never was.

“My transfer was out of my control,” she explained. “But that didn’t mean I had to radio silent.” She could tell him about every half-written message or the one she’d finished and ultimately neglected. She could tell him about the little moments that reminded her of him. Or the first time she’d taken a play from his book and made a rash decision for the benefit of a team, and how it made her.. miss him. But none of that mattered because she never acted on it. T’Aria hadn’t realised what she was feeling at the time - emotions had always evaded her - but retrospection had a way of everything clear. She was afraid. “You deserved an explanation,” she tapered off and lifted her gaze to meet his, “and a ‘thank you’.”

“You advanced from Emergency Medicine to CMO in less time than most people are ensigns.” She could apologise for the chaos or the overzealous ensigns that suddenly went from ‘coworker’ to ‘Kane’s problem’. But those were trivial matters where an apology would suggest he was unprepared for the role. That wasn’t the case. She never doubted Kane’s ability to handle pressure with ‘grace’ - that was the nature of emergency medicine - but ‘ability’ and ‘desire’ were seldom synonymous.

“And though I disapprove of the extenuating circumstances that came of my departure..” she finally found the words “..it is insignificant to the regret I have for the pain I caused you.”

– T’Aria, incoming XO

Kane looked at her again for a long time in silence. Neither person in the room had any doubt as to the volatile nature of the tattooed CMO. An explosion of anger, justified though it may have been, was not only a possibility… it was probable.

So it was a shock to the man himself when he stood up and walked over to the former-CMO-now-Executive Officer and simply…

kissed her.

It wasn’t a long kiss, nor was it indicative of anything further. He kissed her and pulled away and then looked at her. “That was the goodbye you owed me. And that’s all I wanted from you this whole time.” and he shook his head. “But not even a message from you. Nothing. Just poof and you were gone. So, bye… a year later.” and he turned and walked back to his desk and sat down.

This time, it was T’Aria who just.. stared. Dumbstruck, she stood paralysed for a moment, before she mumbled a near-silent “goodbye” and followed suit.

“So you are the new XO. Great. Perfect. Awesome. So before we begin has there been any changes in your health since your last physical? Injuries, illness… well… you know the drill, don’t ya? Answer and we can get you scanned and out of here so I can deal with actual patients.”

Kane, CMO

“I recently completed a round of Erythromycin - 333 mg, once daily, for 10 days - for bacterial pneumonia.” She stuck to the facts. T’Aria’s file would indicate a critical allergy to penicillin and related antibiotics, hence the alternative prescription. “I cleared the infection two weeks ago and have sustained no further ailments, injuries– you know the list.”

“Yep.” he replied flatly.

She hardly missed a beat. “Shall we get this scan over with, so you can..” She recalled the ordeal she’d walked in on. Terse and insensitive as his reprimand was, she doubted the Ensign would be back anytime soon. “..go back to treating the crew’s imprudence?”

“That’s your job, lady. I’m just here to heal ‘em and give them crap for being stupid.”

T’Aria set the PaDD aside so it wouldn’t interfere with the scan. When he got around it, the tricorder would reveal a rapid pulse, slightly elevated blood pressure and respiration – all resulting from the events that’d transpired moments before. It reflected minimal sodium chloride levels and otherwise balanced electrolytes. There was no sign of residual infection. Aside from a minutely elevated temperature and the subtle scarring sustained by lungs ill-equipped for pneumonia, T’Aria appeared in prime shape.

– T’Aria, incoming XO

Kane ran the tricorder scanner over her. It was hard to be close to her again, but he tried to stand firm. Without realizing it, though, his scan went almost twice as long as necessary before he caught himself and cleared his throat, slammed the tricorder closed, and moved back behind his desk. “Everything seems fine. The lung scarring will probably dissipate in a few months. If you notice any stamina or pulmonary decrease, come see me. Otherwise…” and he keyed in a few commands into the PaDD and handed it to her. “You are cleared. Any questions for me, T’A-… I mean… just… any questions?” and he glared out from his hair; but it was obvious the look was for himself and not her.

Kane, CMO