In Motion
Posted on Mon Jan 4th, 2010 @ 4:58am by Commander Curtiss Drake
871 words; about a 4 minute read
Mission:
Balowlli System
Location: Briefing Room
Timeline: En Route to Balowlli System
Doctor Fox leaned casually against the support strut of the window looking out into space, lost in his own thoughts. It felt good to be on the move again, to feel the gentle thrum of the engines at Warp and to see the stars streaking past as they went on their way to the Balowlli System. Fox didn't usually spend too much time out of his Sick Bay, but today he felt like changing things up.
Behind him, flashing on the computer presentation terminal, was the various information regarding the new Polaron torpedoes. He was by no means a Tactical Officer or even more than vaguely familiar with the tactical system. He was only interested in its biological properties; more importantly, how it would interfere with the crew should one be turned loose. It wouldn't be the first time Starfleet deployed a device that wasn't exactly as safe as they pretended it to be and it was his job to make sure that the health and safety of this crew was seen to. If that meant crawling through endless polaron related data and becoming an expert on the torpedo, so be it. He'd read too many reports of lax Medical Officer's who let the crew of their ship experiment with new weapons and technology that ultimately claimed their lives. He'd be damned if it happened on his watch.
The data, on the surface, seemed harmless enough. The torpedoes created a tactical window of opportunity for the attacking vessel by disabling shields systems using dense particle radiation thought to be mostly harmless to any sentient species on either end of the torpedo. The only thing that bothered him was the sheer amount of radiation that the torpedoes emitted.
Radiation in of itself wasn't necessarily a bad thing, in low level doses. But when you subjected any life form to massive amounts of it, strange things were known to happen. Everything from major biological deformities and health issues to simply death. That was what he wanted to determine. How much of this stuff would be lethal, not just to the human crew, but to any of the crew. It was that data that would drive the Science teams in determining what effect it would have on the species within space that weren't sentient or weren't yet.
Despite the overwhelming amount of data that he needed to go through, and had gone through already, he found his mind drifting away. So much so that he'd ended up staring out into the heavens following his own mind as it drifted away. Amy was the main topic of his thoughts, though he wasn't sure how someone he'd known only a short time had managed to completely disengage his emotional barriers and cut him straight to the heart. Not that he was upset, but he wasn't without his own baggage.
It had been years since his wife and children had passed, leaving only Constance for him to raise. Yet he'd never remarried, or dated for that matter. There had been a handful of women over the years that he'd considered, one or two that he might have dallied with after Constance had left. But he'd never, ever let anyone in the way he'd somehow let Amy in.
Amy, for her part, seemed equally as smitten. She'd opened up her life to him on almost every level. She was comfortable with him, and he with her. It was as if they'd known each other for years and that this was just life as it normally was. At least, that's how he felt when he was with her. Lately, when he wasn't, he was plagued by the same nagging thoughts currently dancing across his mind. How did this happen?.
It wasn't a simple question to answer, nor one that he expected to make any progress on for some time. So he resigned himself to stare out at the heavens, letting his mind wander where it may. It was surprising, but from the chaos of his own mind, he was often able to find clarity. Just letting his thoughts battle it out almost always yielded good results; so who was he to try and change it.
As if his thoughts were being projected out into the world, his commbadge chimed followed by Amy's voice.
=^="Hargrove to Fox.=^=
"Go ahead." he replied, tapping his badge.
=^="Are you busy?"=^= she asked.
"I could use a break." Fox replied, smirking slightly as he glanced back at the mountain of data on the screen and on the PaDD's that littered the table.
=^="How about a croissant in Paris."=^= Amy replied, =^="My treat."=^=
Cailean chuckled to himself and smiled broadly. "I'll meet you on the holodeck in a few. Got a few things to clean up."
=^="See you there."=^=
Cailean sighed to himself as he turned back to the table and began gathering his things. He still hadn't quite come to terms with what exactly was going on, but he was happy to continue as he was until he did. After all, he did enjoy her company, and that was what mattered.
Cailean Fox, M.D.
Chief Medical Officer
USS Archimedes
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