Awhile after Ballroom Blitz
Soundtrack: With or Without You by U2
-=USS Serendipity=-
Pacing around his quarters frantically, Keiran was beyond a state of panic.
His body was in crisis. Combating chemicals with opposite intended effects battled in his bloodstream; the sedative effects of the alcohol he'd consumed counteracted by the stimulant that Breaux had administered under orders from the Captain to bring him as close to sober as he could, as quickly as possible.
His hands shook and his breath was short-side effects from the stimulant, so they told him.
Somehow, Keiran had his doubts about that.
His mind so far beyond what any sane man would call 'crisis' that he couldn't believe that he was still conscious of anything going on around him at all anymore.
He ached for sleep.
The sort of sleep where the body is so completely spent that it refuses to allow the mind any chance of forming dreams.
Or nightmares.
Hearing the door chime, Keiran looked up. Someone was requesting entrance into his quarters. He knew it was unlikely, but still he silently pleaded with whomever would listen that it not be Zanh Liis on the other side.
Someone apparently was taking some sort of pity on him tonight- the Ship's Counselor was the one who walked inside a moment later. Clad in uniform, it was hard to tell what Vol's mood at the moment as he looked at the Chief of Security.
"Ello, lad."
"Hello, Lt. Commander O'Sullivan." Vol showed his respect for both the man's years and his rank.
Keiran laughed a little.
"How formal can you be when you already know what's going on in my head? No rank. Name's Keiran."
"Keiran, then." Vol tried the greeting again, a second time.
"Tell me," Keiran asked hoarsely. His hands fidgeted as he seemed to be trying to figure out just what to do with them at the moment. He was, in fact damning the fact that he'd given up the unhealthy, antiquated habit of smoking cigarettes years ago.
He considered the irony of the fact that he really only gave it up because it drove Zanh Liis up the wall, and he got so tired of her dousing his packs of smokes with cold coffee leftover in her cup so he couldn't light them that he just threw the last pack out and never replicated another.
"What exactly?" Vol wondered if the man realized that he hadn't finished his sentence. With the torrent of emotions that was flowing from the man, he doubted it.
"Did you bring my new wardrobe with ya then?"
"Wardrobe?"
"My new jacket, yeah? The one with the extra long sleeves. Buckles in the back."
"Do you think that's necessary?" Vol asked, "For you to be restrained?"
"I may need to be before this is over," Keiran's voice was deadly serious, and so were his emotions.
"Are you a danger to yourself or others?" Vol asked the standard psychiatric question that he was obliged to.
"Counselor, I have never been a danger to anyone, save myself."
Vol frowned.
"That may be so, but I don't think your own safety is what you have on your mind at the moment. You're Chief of Security Mr. O'Sullivan, your duty requires you to make the protection of others your highest priority. That's still true now, of that I have no doubt."
"You asked me if I thought the straight jacket was what I needed," Keiran growled. "I could tell you exactly what I need. The problem is I can't ever have. . ." he held up his hands in a hopeless gesture.
"Need is a strong word Keiran," Vol pointed out. He moved to where there was an empty chair, and turned it so that he would be facing Keiran, and sat in it before continuing.
"Your needs consist of a steady supply of nutrition, shelter, and clothing. All of those you have, so perhaps you'll choose your wording more carefully,"
One moment passed, before the expression on Vol's face changed from false certainty, to wonderment. Keiran may not have been able to tell, but Vol had made the somewhat false statement purposefully. Socratic method; indeed.
"However, I wonder if perhaps I've spoken too soon. As said before, you have an instinct to protect others, perhaps that could be a need. Tell me Keiran, do you feel that that need is being fulfilled at this moment?"
Vol sensed a sudden shift in O'Sullivan's emotions, and the man who had been determined to keep up a brave front faltered. The last shreds of the battlement began to crumble; revealing itself to be a castle built on the sand too close to the shoreline. With each successive surge of raw heartache he was eroding, grain by grain lost to the sea.
"Can I read ye something, Counselor?"
Vol's curiosity was piqued. He noticed for the first time that there was a PADD sitting on the armrest of the chair O'Sullivan occupied.
"Please."
"Personal log, Chief of Security USS Serendipity, Stardate 80502." Keiran's sights locked on the text, struggling to focus on the words with bloodshot eyes.
"Some are called upon to make the ultimate sacrifice for their duty.
For some, like me, that ultimate sacrifice is not the giving of the lives that we have.
It's the giving up on the lives that we know we might have, if we could but stretch our arms wide enough to outreach the grasp of the Fates, just once. "
Vol thought the piece was touching, in a sense, but with some flaws.
"Why trouble yourself over things that you have no control over?"
"Because, lad, the one thing a man should always have control over is himself."
"There have been times you didn't?"
"Aye."
"And someone was hurt because of it."
"Aye."
Vol was concerned. . .had Keiran committed some sort of crime in the past that he was about to confess to? It wouldn't be the first time someone did so in a therapeutic setting, and for the moment, Vol couldn't recall this ever happening in one of his sessions before.
"What did you do?"
Keiran retreated into silence. How could he formulate the words to describe what he'd seen?
Zanh Liis lying cold and blue on the shelf in a morgue.
Zanh Liis twisted and broken beneath the rubble that had once been their home.
"What did I do?" Keiran murmured as he pressed his eyes tightly shut against the images flashing before them. Sadly, the darkness only amplified the sights he was desperate to escape.
Vol decided maybe taking another tack was the way to go. "Let's talk about what happened earlier in the lounge."
Keiran set the PADD aside and looked down at the still fading bruises on his knuckles. Dermal regeneration worked to be sure, but he'd been in too big a hurry to get out of Sickbay to let the medical staff do a proper job of fixing him up tonight.
He reached up and touched the tender flesh of his neck, where TC Blane had grabbed hold of him and mercifully stopped him from doing something that would have truly been a mistake.
He made a note to himself to speak to Blane later- and to buy him the best bottle of wine in London's private stock and the biggest steak dinner that MacDougal could prepare as thanks.
For a moment, he only wished the Second Officer had been a little less careful, and that he'd have wrung a lot harder and put Keiran out of his misery.
"Aye, I've a lot of explainin' to do. I just wish that I could explain it to myself." Keiran knew better than to blame his rampage on the alcohol. It was so much more than that.
"You insulted the Vedek," Vol stated, quoting the information that had been provided to him based on eye witness accounts of what had taken place. "And on a very personal level. Why?"
"Because I had her first." Keiran muttered under his breath, but Vol couldn't make it out.
"Pardon?"
Keiran realized that was wrong, though. He didn't have her first, ever.
According to her memories, Jariel had been a part of her life since early childhood. Keiran had come onto the scene late, into her twenties. Every time.
No matter what he did Keiran found that in the matter of Zanh Liis Jariel always, always had the upper hand.
Vol had caught only one word of what Keiran had said, and it was the word 'her'. There was only one 'her' where the Vedek was concerned, and that was... "Zanh Liis?" Vol ventured.
"The Captain," Keiran didn't know where Vol was going, but for the sake of what was left of his composure, he was very careful not to speak her name.
"Yes. You know her. Tall woman, wrinkled nose. Wears four pips and an earring."
"Yes, I know her. That is the trouble, Counselor," Keiran rose and ambled toward a bookshelf nearby, which displayed one of the only items showing anywhere in the very, very sparsely decorated quarters that O'Sullivan called his own.
"There was a time,"
He paused.
He was about to cross the line into highly classified information, and he knew that it could be dangerous for Vol to hear anything he was about to say. He realized though that he was out of control, and if he wasn't honest with the man that his stay on the Serendipity if not in this life itself would likely be coming to an abrupt end soon.
He couldn't let that happen.
He couldn't let his fears of what the information might do stop him from confiding in a man who he happened to know had higher security clearance when it came to hearing classified information than many Starfleet captains because of the very nature of his assignment.
Vol was charged with shepherding the unique flock that dwelled aboard this work in progress, the Serendipity. He must have been warned that there were a few black sheep in the fold.
Keiran picked up a small, dark object from the shelf. He examined it carefully a moment before holding it up.
"Seen one of these before, have you mister Tryst?"
Vol had not. His expression of curiosity answered O'Sullivan's question for him.
He walked over to Vol slowly, still moving like a man who'd been in a fight and lost. He handed the item over.
"Go ahead, take a look."
Vol flipped open the lid. It seemed to have some sort of dial with elaborate markings on it. The face of the device was black and it made no sound.
"Tis a Temporal Compass. All Jumpers have them, and keep them, after they retire. Unless they're completely resequenced, memory wise." Keiran explained. "See how 'tis silent?"
"Yes."
"Tis silent because things in this timeline are progressing as history dictates they were meant to. If there was a major error in the line, one that demanded correction for the sake of the good of the majority, that thing'd be lit up like a fecking Dabo wheel."
"Well, that's a good thing isn't it? That it's dark? That means that things are as they're meant to be."
Keiran turned away and returned to brooding in his chair. Vol allowed him a few moments silence before he rose and gently set the compass down on the shelf where Keiran kept it, and then pressed on.
"Keiran, things are as they are meant to be, still something is causing you such great pain," Vol could sense that the depth of O'Sullivan's grief was a serious threat to him. He worried the man might do something desperate - even suicidal.
"What if you didn't want them to be the way they were meant to be?" Keiran's eyes filled with tears, but did not spill them. "One man's gain is another's loss."
Vol began to put the pieces together.
Zanh Liis, Vedek Jariel, Keiran...and the timeline. A classic triangle with a twist. It may have three people, but it had four sides, and Time would always win.
"Once she knew me better than I know myself," Keiran admitted. "I wasn't supposed to be able to remember that. But science can only do so much for a man."
Based on recent experiences, Vol understood that completely.
"God," Keiran whispered, hanging his head, "I wish I was dead."
It was like a silent kill, no one was around to hear it or witness it, except for the Counselor. Vol closed his eyes as he checked in with himself, had he just heard Keiran say what he thought he had. There was no doubt about it, and that was something he wished he could change.
"I wish you hadn't said that," Vol frowned. He held his PADD still and close to his body, as he looked down on the man.
"You will have to be relieved of duty and remain closely monitored Keiran, in order to be sure that you do not hurt yourself. This will remain in effect until the Captain, or myself, deem it no longer necessary."
Keiran said nothing more. Vol sighed, as he looked up and spoke again.
"Computer, access security monitoring controls."
The computer beeped in response.
"Initiate protocol for suicide watch on Lieutenant Commander Keiran O'Sullivan, authorization Tryst Epsilon 707."
^Acknowledged, monitoring has commenced.^
Vol looked down again at Keiran, who still hadn't said anything. He returned to his softer tone, to speak to his troubled patient.
"Try to get some rest," Vol said, knowing he had pushed O'Sullivan as far tonight as he dare. "We'll speak again first thing in the morning. In the meantime, you'll be on camera." Vol stepped over to O'Sullivan's computer and executed a security lock on the surveillance system that would prevent O'Sullivan from turning them off.
Then, with much to ponder before they met again, Vol Tryst took his leave of O'Sullivan's quarters, with a new understanding of, and sadness for the Sera's Chief of Security.
Keiran O'Sullivan
Chief of Security
USS Serendipity NCC-2012
and
Vol Tryst
Ship's Counselor
USS Serendipity NCC-2012