Post Wedding Chat - "Do No Harm"

Posted on Sun Jun 19, 2016 @ 3:45am by Commander Amia Telamon M.D.

2,536 words; about a 13 minute read

Mission: Things Past
Location: SB-80 - After the Plumeri-Somers Wedding
Timeline: Recent Past - End of Pangea

POST:

Amia Telamon had a very odd sense of misplaced Deja-vu coming into Mai'ya's Sickbay. It wasn't the same as the one Amia had presided over on the Nimitz and it was only a little similar to the one that Amia now ran on DS5, but somehow, it still felt like Amia had vacated it and left it to Mai'ya.

She explained this strange feeling and was surprised to find that not only did Mai'ya *not* declare her totally mad, but that she too agreed to having a feeling along those lines.

"I imagine it's because most of the crew here are the same patients that I handed you and charged you to take care of for me." Amia conjectured.

That explanation made sense to Mai'ya and she agreed that it was probably pretty accurate.

Mai'ya went to the replicator and asked Amia what she would like to drink. Amia asked for her usual Terran Redbush Tea and Mai ordered her own soya decaf coffee with chocolate sprinkles, bringing both to the coffee table and sitting at one side of it, opposite her predecessor.

"You look well, Amia" she said as she took her first sip.

"Thank you, as do you" came the polite reply.

"Oh dear.... have we become so distant that we have to do this?" Mai'ya asked from the heart.

"I'm sorry... I didn't mean.... it's just so hard." Amia replied, her "doctors' straight face mask" dissolving.

"I miss everyone SO much! I've LONGED to come back and see you all but it's been very bitter-sweet." She admitted poignantly and with unexpected emotion.

"I'm sure it must be very awkward... " Mai began, not totally sure she was expecting to crumble 'the great Amia Soren's' reserve with so little effort.

Amia realised she'd taken Mai'ya a little by surprise and withdrew back into a calmer veneer.

"Awkward" Amia picked up the word and rolled it a little bit. "You could say that."

"I've been to see Seklar but I felt.... I felt he's very distant. It can't be easy for him, I realise." she went on. "I'm about to see the Admiral. Is he much improved? I know his road back to health won't have been easy. I'm sorry I had to drop that in your lap. I felt really bad leaving them both."

Mai'ya looked up and saw the conflict that still raged inside her mentor's eyes. The calm and steady facial expressions were a credit to the careful medical training that all doctors were given and which some seemed better able to adopt and carry off than others. Amia Soren had been legendary at keeping hers impossible to read but now there was a shadow that made her look slightly haunted.

"Is it bad on DS5?" Mai'ya guessed and hoped she wasn't poking her nose in where it wasn't wanted.

"Everyone is very kind and I wouldn't be anywhere else in the universe because it's where my Cade is and that's where I belong." Amia recited. At least it sounded to Mai'ya like a line she had learned.

"Oh of course. But .... "

"I love him totally and without any regrets" Amia cut off the "but...." firmly and Mai'ya let this ride.

"I know." was all she added.

"And Seklar is doing very well, as you say." she answered the earlier question. "You'll be very happy with the Admiral and his progress too"

"Poor James...." Amia murmoured. "I'm glad to hear that. I was dreading what I might find as he never keeps in touch. I shall have to have words with him about that! Bad man!" she smiled affectionately. Any "words" she was going to have with their mutual ultimate boss were going to be respectful of course, but having been his doctor for so long, Amia was likely to get sufficient licence to scold just a little.

She smiled again. "So many memories. Bitter sweet indeed." she mused, thinking aloud.

"I couldn't help but notice a very handsome young man dancing with you at the wedding reception. Is he a permanent attraction?" Amia changed the subject and brightened up with a smile that was much more jovial.

Mai'ya blushed at the sudden and unexpected reference to Wyatt. "I hope so" she said, honestly.

"I remember you telling me you'd had a bit of a rough time, Mai. I'm happy for you." Amia said with genuine empathy.

"I... I want it to work this time. Wyatt is such a sweet, gentle, chivalrous, loving person. I couldn't have been luckier to find him. I don't know what he sees in me but I'm not looking a gift horse in the mouth. I couldn't be happier that he likes me. If onl...." she cut off.

"If only? If only what, Mai?"

Amia did something she could only do randomly. In fact she didn't so much "do" it as that it "did itself" to her... she sensed a problem and slowed. It was like doing a double take, as it were, and it was something only the Baku could do.

Amia, being only half Baku and having a multi-phasal radiation moderator installed in her own neck to make it possible for her to survive in the kinds of radiation that most humans inhabited, she was unable to call on this phenomenon at will.

It hadn't happened to her in years now, ever since she had the life-saving device fitted, she couldn't remember 'the slowing' having crept up on her but today, she distinctly felt it happen. Was this to do with her unborn child? Had the pregnancy changed her physiology so much that the multi-phasic was slipping out of it's settings? She would have to look into this.

Mai'ya felt it too. It was weird. It was as if the wheels that turned time were slipping in their gears and a slowing was dragging at her, weighing her down and making her feel relaxed, calm and in no hurry at all.

Amia shook herself. "Woh. That wasn't meant to kick in." she breathed, a little freaked out. "Mai'ya... please don't tell anyone about this until I can get it looked into?" she begged. "I have to tell you a secret. Please don't tell anyone else.... I'm pregnant. I think it's affecting my multi-phase moderator. I'll have to get to Starfleet Science and have it looked into. I just don't want to worry Cade and I ... " Amia began

Mai'ya held up her hands. "There's no need to worry at all. I won't say a word to anyone." she promised

"But are you sure you're alright?" she was genuinely concerned.

"Oh yes, and I would NEVER risk anything affecting the baby, I promise." she gave her word without hesitation or ingenuity.

"I know you wouldn't, but it's not easy to judge for your own self though... can I help you?" Mai'ya offered.

Amia looked at Mai'ya as if she hadn't thought of that. In fact, until a moment ago, she hadn't thought anything about her moderator and now she had been forced to, suddenly, there were a lot of other questions she needed to ask. Perhaps Mai'ya would be someone she could recruit to help out?

"If you would be so kind?" Amia wasn't going to be too proud to ask for help.

"I could contact my old boss...." Mai began.

"Oh NO.... I couldn't ask you to get back into contact with *him*. That would be awful for you.. I couldn't... I ... " Amia started to protest.

"Actually, he's contacted me recently.... " It was Mai'ya's turn to cut in.

"He HAS??" Amia was very surprised.

"I hope you told him to go forth and multiply..." she began defensively protective of her friend

"Noooooooo" Mai'ya laughed.

"He wanted a favour of me. And I owed him at least this one last debt." she went on, confessing something she hadn't even been able to tell Wyatt.

"He needs a package. Some medication. His wife's condition is deteriorating and she's on the limits of her pain killers." Mai'ya stopped just short of revealing the whole terrible truth.

Amia went white and time slowed again, just a little and just for a few seconds. Another shock causing a ripple in the Baku's physiology again.

"Mai'ya you can't.... you're not considering.... " Amia breathed, disbelieving.

"Amia, stop doing that......" Mai'ya protested against the beautiful, serenity of the slowing washing over her like an opiate.

"I can't help it. Stop shocking me then.... " Amia protested back.

"I'm sorry. And no.... I'm not taking enough for any nefarious purposes, I can promise you that. Not even a mercy killing. Not that I don't feel the deepest sympathy for them both and not that I wouldn't blame either of them if they contemplated that. But it's not like that." she reassured her friend.

Amia looked unconvinced. "Then why can't he get whatever he thinks he needs from his local physician?" she asked.

"Amia, he lives and works on the Border Research Foundation, remember? On DS5.. YOU are his *local physician* and you're Starfleet. Starfleet have banned the drugs he wants. How can he ask you, a total stranger? You might think he wants them to do away with her.... you already do, don't you?" Mai'ya made her point and felt Amia's involuntary reaction.

"STOP doing that, Amm!!"

Amia shook her head again. She reached up and touched her multi-phasal moderator with her fingers, tapping it and immediately regretted the dizziness that brought on. She rushed for the sink and threw up.

Mai'ya came over and mopped her brow, genuinely worried at such a reaction.

"It's just Baku's version of morning sickness" Amia managed to get out once her stomach rebalanced itself again.

"Amia, I genuinely think Robert would be able to adjust this for you. He's brilliant. A real genius."

"He sounds unscrupulous Mai" Amia admitted her doubts.

"Noooooooo! He's not, I promise. I wouldn't be helping him, no matter what promise I'd made, if I thought he was dishonourable." Mai'ya was quite distraught to have given her friend such a terrible impression of her old boss and former love-interest of many years ago.

"So... what drugs does he want." Amia asked, regaining a vertical position and some equilibrium.

"He wants something his grandfather used to take. It's an old pharmaceutical and it's not licensed now (other than for Research) but it used to be extremely effective in the reduction of fluid retention and associated neural pain from Hydrocephoratic damage.

It's an old fashioned concoction of the steroidal family and it's too erosive, over time, for a healthy patient but it has been proven to help with advanced MS and in cases like Sarah's, where the nerve-net is no longer intact but the pain is neurally generated remotely from the actual fluid-filled limbs she is left with.

We used to use it as an anti-rejective for some of our bionics that were being particularly resistant to their new technologies and reformed limbs and muscles. I know what it does Amm, I don't doubt why he's asking for it, but it's not something he can get now he doesn't have the appropriate Research licence any more." Mai'ya explained in full.

"If it's not appropriate to his work any more, and he can't get it because he's not licensed to use it, then you'd be risking your career to give him some, surely?" Amia queried.

"The thing is that *I* do still have the appropriate licence for it and for that kind of Bionics Research" Mai'ya explained. "So I CAN get it"

"Yes but you're not able to prescribe it as she's not your patient. And you're not giving it to her for bionics or for Research, so basically, you're still breaking the rules." Amia argued out her own reasoning to feel this wasn't right.

"I can't prescribe it for her because technically, she's YOUR patient but you could refer her to me and then administer it on my Consultative advice." Mai'ya explained.

"And whilst I was there, I could get him to take a look at my multiphasal balance." Amia finished, thinking this out.

"I can't ask you to take the meds Amm, but I CAN advise you to see him yourself. That way, if you don't want to get involved with the treatment for his wife, I will make the trip myself, as previously planned." Mai'ya suggested.

Amia thought about it but not for long. "Mai, I'd LOVE for you to come visit me on your way to see him but it seems a bit pointless to drag you away from where you're needed here, especially seeing as I'm going to him anyway and I need to get involved in his wife's care anyway....If I see her and I don't think she should have the drug then I'll return it to you but if I see her and it's the right treatment, then I can prescribe it properly. Do you have it here? The drug?"

"Of course, you can never prescribe something you believe is inappropriate and I wouldn't ask that of any doctor but I know that it's right for her and I'm sure you'll feel that way too, once you've seen her and looked into the drug. I've put the details on this PaDD and I've replicated it already - I did have the intention of taking a trip to deliver it myself so it's all ready to go." Mai'ya admitted.

"Okay, let me take it then and we'll confer by Vid-channel. I want to keep this totally above board and fully documented and if we both put in our input officially then we'll be in the clear, not to mention keeping an eye on each other's backs in case anything goes wrong." Amia agreed.

"I don't think it will go wrong but yes, those are good ideas for back up and totally transparent official 'paperwork'."

They were in agreement and each had done the other a favour. It was a good way to part and the two surgeons and friends gave one another a big hug. They exchanged very sincere wishes for all the best for each other and their loved ones.

"You be sure to bring that handsome boyfriend of yours to see me when I get too fat to travel in a couple of months!" Amia insisted, only half joking and mostly serious.

"You try to keep me away!" Mai'ya offered a challenge that was also only half jest.

"I wasn't going to..... I was hoping you're good at delivering babies....." Amia challenged back, grinning.

"Be careful what you wish for, Doctor Soren-Telamon!" Mai laughed.

"I only ever wish for the best" Amia smiled and gave one more hug to her friend before she left, tucking a PaDD and a parcel of prescription drugs into her bag as she walked away, leaving Mai'ya deeply relieved that now she could return to Wyatt and finally tell him that secret she had thought she wouldn't have been able to confide, when she had thought she would be making a trip to DS5, a trip that she now wasn't going to have to make after all.

A JP Between:

Lt Cmdr Mai'ya Weston
CMO - SB 80

and

Commander Amia Telamon
CMO - DS5

 

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