To Dream a Little Dream... Part Two...

Posted on Mon Jun 22nd, 2020 @ 1:48am by Cailus Griffin & Captain Nycolas Temple & Commander Owen Nash & Lieutenant Kalin Brennan-Griffin PhD & Lieutenant Mera Richmond MD
Edited on on Tue Jul 7th, 2020 @ 2:16pm

Mission: Into the Wild
Location: Sickbay
Timeline: After recent events and before divided we fall

A Mission Post by Lieutenant Katniss Wakefield & Captain Nycolas Temple & Lieutenant Commander Owen Nash & Lieutenant Kalin 'Shae' Brennan PhD & Lieutenant Mera Richmond MD & Lieutenant JG Cailus Griffin
Mission: Into The Wild
Location: Sickbay
Timeline: After recent events and before divided we fall
Mon Mar 12th, 2018 @ 10:47am

Owen sat as comfortably as he could on the biobed and nodded carefully to the nurses and medical staff as they finished their examinations of all three officers in Sickbay. He looked over at Brennan who seemed to be unsuccessfully hiding a scowl as she looked over at Wakefield, whom herself was in a different area of the location and behind a force field. Once he was given the all clear Owen would need to file a report with the Captain and that was something he wasn't looking forward to doing.

He wanted to understand why Wakefield had done this and why she had felt as if there wasn't another way to deal with whatever issues or difficulties she was having onboard. He'd had a run in once or twice with her before however there wasn't anything that suggested this could have escalated so far in the recent situation now resolved. Which reminded him...

Owen looked over at Brennan and decided to be honest with her. "Lieutenant, I know we're going to be here for a while," he started. "However I realise that I've not had the chance yet to say thank you to you...you saved my life in the lab as well as Wakefield's and yourself."

He paused for a moment, noting her still hostile demeanour towards the forcefield. "I don't know how you managed to shut down the locks and also the experiment that was in progress but you in doing so, you saved the lives of everyone on board," he clarified. "I just wanted you to know that when I file my report with the captain, I'll be putting a clear recommendation in there that you be recognised for your heroic act in this situation."

Still seeing that she was focused, Owen then simply added, "But above all else, I just wanted to say thank you."

Shae's expression softened, her low rumbling growl ceasing for a moment. "It's nothing you wouldn't have done for me, I'm sure," Shae replied softly with a humble smile playing at the corners of her lips. "I'm just glad we didn't have to jettison the lab. There's no telling what kind of a risk that could have been, especially if another Ravager ship decided to show up; one well-placed torpedo on the empty bay-" Shae shook her head with a sigh. Then her gazed hardened as she looked to Katniss once again. "Yeah, that's right, we were going to jettison the whole lab with you in it if we couldn't shut down your experiment. I don't care what you think you were doing in there, it wasn't worth it to endanger the crew like that," Shae said to Katniss, her voice laced with another growl. "Not to mention the innocent civilians and the children you put at risk... My child, you could have hurt my child!" It was so hard to remain impartial and to not take things personally when children were involved.

Katniss raised her head and looked at Shae, then she looked at Nash, she showed no regret. "As I said, my actions did not pose any risk to the rest of the ship and crew. If you take a look at the logs and procedures I had in place, only the occupants in MY lab would have been exposed to a lethal radiation dose, the experiment would then have shut down and a full decontamination cycle would have run, then unsealing the lab, allowing access." she paused for a moment before continuing. "It is not my fault that those with a lesser mind wanted to eject the whole section into space, therefore it wasn't me that endangered you, or your child."

With that Katniss signalled that she had finished speaking, by laying down on the bed and looking at the ceiling, she didn't wholly feel the forcefield was necessary, but then again she understood protocol.

Owen looked over at Wakefield and was still puzzled and concerned as to why she had taken the step to perform such an experiment. Whilst as XO he could point out with authority that anyone who cared about their shipmates and colleagues would still have acted in the same way that he and Brennan had, he got the feeling that it would fall on deaf ears.

Minutes later the ever-stern Chief of Security arrived, although his usual gruff demeanour was somewhat softened with Aoife in his arms. Cailus’ eyes immediately found Shae and stayed on her as he beelined for her biobed, his face etched with worry.

“How are you?” he asked immediately, eyes flicking up at her lifesigns even though he barely understood them.

Just when Shae needed a calming influence, there was Callus and Aoife, though her happy little bubble was burst when she tried to reach for Aoife and a nurse stopped her.

"No contact!" the nurse said abruptly, then quickly recomposed. "Sorry, minimal contact is fine with anyone else, but given your daughter's size and the fact that she's still building her immune system, she can't afford to be exposed to any residual radiation."

"Oh...." Shae said with a droop of her ears as she drew her hands back; the joy bled from her face as she gazed at Aoife with a sad longing. "I'm- I'm alright," she finally said in answer to Cailus' question. "I mean, I'll be fine, just have to stay here until I'm clean. I'm sorry if I worried you," she added meekly, recalling the sorrow she heard in his voice over the comms.

“Not your fault,” Cailus said, shaking his head. Aoife strained to reach for her mother, and Cailus sighed, hating that he had to hold her back. He glanced over at Katniss, then at the security officer standing guard, and Cailus’ eyes grew terribly cold. “Any problems, Ensign?”

The crewman shook her head. “No sir. She’s been cooperative.”

Nyx entered with the glower of a man that was equal parts repressed rage and panicked urgency, pulling at his plaid dressing gown like a King flourishing his cape.

“Somebody!” Temple exclaimed as he entered, “Any news on my cup of tea?"

Mera burst into Sickbay with her briefcase in hand and gave a proud nod to her fellow officers. "It's lovely to see you all, but I wish it didn't keep happening under such circumstances," she said with a snarky smile and pushing her auburn bangs out of her face.

Owen grinned as best he could. He still hadn't forgotten the recent conversation that he, Richmond and Cailus had enjoyed in the Pandora's Box and knew that she was a like-minded crew member. "Well, I do normally like to try and make an entrance Counselor, however, I'd say that Lieutenant Wakefield beat me to it in this case," he offered.

"Counsellor Richmond," Nyx gave a grim grin to the Doctor, "When it is safe to do so, I'd like your analysis of Wakefield. And another cup of tea."

Mera smirked at Owen before opening up the metal briefcase containing her medical tricorder. "Of course, Captain. Give me a few moments to make some preparations." She turned her attention to the nurse and began making adjustments to the sensors. "I'm going to attempt to boost my tricorder so that I can monitor her brain waves and nervous system without entering the force field myself. We should know it's safe quickly as long as Wakefield continues to be cooperative."

"And some one get the Captain a cup of tea please." she shouted to no one in particular. "Actually, make it two."

Owen looked over at Nyx as he finished speaking with Dr.Adaestron to see how the patients were and he could tell already that he was angry and would be looking for answers as to why three of his crew members where in sickbay after this incident.

"My apologies for not being on duty sir," Owen started. "Unfortunately the small matter of safeguarding the ship and crew security against this experiment got in the way of me reporting on the bridge..."

"I understand, Nash," Nyx replied with a nod. Someone handed him a small white mug of tea and he drunk it hesitantly. "I have enough marmalade for the rest of the day but I will need more tomorrow."

Owen smiled as best he could without aching...which wasn't a lot. "Thats good to know," he began. "Now if you could tell the rest of the Iconnu Expanse to keep it quiet for the next 24...48 hours, that would greatly help the recovery of myself, the courageous Lieutenant Brennan and Lieutenant Wakefield for a little while."

"Please, I'm not courageous," Shae said with a hint of shame. "If anything, I feel somewhat responsible for this mess; I knew Lieutenant Wakefield was... troubled... she said she had experienced a- a loss, and it was clear to me that she was still grieving, but I honestly didn't think she would do something so reckless! I tried to be accommodating, and I didn't want to force her to seek help if she could cope on her own; I guess I was hoping that she would make some friends, develop a network of support." Shae paused with a sigh. "Or barring that, I hoped she would voluntarily submit to counselling so I wouldn't have to tarnish her record by relieving her of duty." After all, nothing that Shae had seen thus far had indicated that this lethal dose of radiation, or at least as it was intended, was anything other than a cry for help, but if pressed on the matter she could concede that she hadn't had a chance to review Katniss' research logs to see what, if anything, Katniss was trying to do with this experiment.

'troubled' Katniss thought and nearly laughed, it wasn't her fault that they overacted to this situation, it wasn't as though she posed any risk to the ship or crew, she had made sure of that. And what poor bedside manners these people had, she was laid right there and they were just talking amongst themselves, she would show them troubled.

"Readings, scans. I think not Lieutenant, you would need my informed consent, same as with any treatment, and you don't have it. Unless of course, you are saying I am mentally unfit, but that would require the CMO and yourself to do a full assessment, and I'm quite confident, I'm still in control of my faculties and am quite sane."

"And all it takes, Lieutenant, is the recommendation of your superior to relieve you of duty pending a full assessment," Shae said sternly, narrowing her eyes at Katniss. "You failed to follow protocol in scheduling any sort of experimentation, I was not informed as to the nature and safety risks of said experiment, you disabled key safety features and refused to cooperate when confronted, and to top it all off you raised the radiation levels in your lab so far that it penetrated the radiation shielding and irradiated a large portion of that section of the deck and Commander Nash and I have some rather lovely radiation burns to show for it! Without knowing what the end result would be other than exposing yourself to, and I quote, "a lethal dose of radiation", then I say our reaction was warranted. And now you're being combative about letting the Counselor tend to you?! As your superior, I highly recommend that you are immediately relieved of duty until a full psychological workup can be completed because you clearly are not in sound state of mind!"

“I'm sure that we all know the regulations." Mera interrupted. “Lieutenant Wakefield, I'd like to make short tomographic scan to make sure that you are not experiencing any haemorrhaging or overstimulation requiring emergency treatment. Then we can talk about dropping this field."

“You may proceed, Doctor,” Nyx nodded to Mera, indicating that he was giving his permission for a full assessment. He sat down on a nearby chair and his dressing gown fell open slightly, revealing particularly hairy knees. "Well I better get a wax while I'm here." He called out to the Sickbay crew.

Katniss's eyed narrowed as she glared at Shae and then at the Captain than to the Counsellor, if she made this hard it would only work out bad for her in the long run, she could face a court-martial or anything. "Very well, my apologies. You may run your scans."

Mera nodded and turned her attention to the scanner console. “Nurse, start the scan. Boost signal strength and keep an eye on it. We will need to keep it stable for at least two minutes to compensate for background noise. I want to get this right.” She furrowed her brown and got to work.

Owen quietly admitted to himself that he was also concerned about Lieutenant Wakefield's activity recently and the fact that she wasn't seemingly bothered by her actions and the result they could have caused was even more worrying as well. Whilst he was glad that Mera was investigating the situation, he still wanted to know what possessed her to go through with this experiment.

"Lieutenant Wakefield, what the hell was that experiment about anyway? What was its purpose and why didn't you follow protocol before initiating the experiment?" Owen asked calmly. He wanted to know as much as the rest of them did but tried a different approach.

Side-by side, Mera and the nurse diligently worked at the monitoring equipment. After a couple of minutes, Mera placed her hand on the nurse’s shoulder. “That’s enough, great job.” She stepped away from the console, taking a thankful glance at Katniss before delivering her diagnosis. “The PET scans and encephalographic readings indicate no unusual neurological activity and full-range synaptic use. She’s no more dangerous than she is any other day of the week.” she said with a smirk.

Looking across at Mera, Owen smiled for a second after her announcement. "Oh goody! Does that mean we can all go out and play in the backyard, building sandcastles and having a picnic made of mudpie cakes and tea?" he asked.

Mera laughed as she swiped through the rest of the data. Suddenly the EEG began to jump and the holographic brain image lit up red. Mera laughed again, "I spoke to soon. She's experiencing a prolonged focal seizure. The entire left hemisphere of her brain may be compromised."

Katniss looked around at everyone, she wasn't having a seizure and why was the Captain in a dressing gown, asking for a cup of tea and to get his legs shaved, something was definitely not right here.

"Well that settles it." Nyx sighed as he stood again. He nodded appreciatively as a nurse walked past and took away his empty mug, and then another nurse appeared to hand him a new cup of tea. As he sipped, he looked gravely to the others, "We have to decide how we're going to deal with Katniss."

"Airlock," Cailus said with a shrug, poking Aoife's fox-like ears. "She really needs some fresh air."

"Oh...," Owen sighed. "I was going to suggest loading her into a Torpedo and firing her out of a Torpedo Tube..."

"We could use her as a target to test that new torpedo we've been working on!" came Shae's reply from tiny little Aoife as Shae ate cookies that seemed to have materialized out of nowhere.

Owen smiled at that idea. "Hey, now that would provide an epic amount of data to work on!" He agreed.

"Too much paperwork." Nyx complained sullenly. He spied Aoife's cookie and decided to produce one himself from his dressing gown's pocket, and he dunked it enthusiastically into his tea. "I say we just take the oxygen out of the room to teach her a lesson. We'll be fine because we're androids and don't need to breathe."

"We could use the other half of her brain and develop our own cyborg. I've heard Huyo mention that she needed some extra help." Mera offered.

Owen thought for a second and realised something. "Hey, share the cookies!" He said. "Oh... How about we use the transporter to turn her into cookie dough!" He offered.

"WHERE'S MY TEA!" Shouted the Captain, banging on the force-field.

Katniss was even more puzzled, this wasn't right, but then her attention was distracted by a pink bunny rabbit sat atop one of the consoles, it was speaking to her.

"You know this is all just a dream, it's about time you WAKE UP." said the rabbit.

Suddenly Katniss sat upright in bed, her eys shooting open, her head turning around trying to gauge where she was, "Computer lights." she shouted out as her hair was wet and her nighty damp, the lights came on and she relised she was in her quarters, what on earth was that perculiar dream all about?

OFF