Travel Sick [3/5]

Posted on Thu Sep 10th, 2026 @ 12:16pm by Captain Jaro & Lieutenant Elara PsyD

747 words; about a 4 minute read

Mission: Episode 1: The Fissure
Location: Bridge - Deck 1 - USS Amazônia
Timeline: 1 hour before arrival in the Orellia system

Clasping her cup a little tighter, Elara looked down into her beverage. Her conversation with Dr. Verti still played on her mind but at the end of the day, no matter the why; the person themselves still mattered. "I'm genuinely not sure. At the days have passed since the transwarp, the symptoms seems to have lessened but Claude remembers everything that happened which is more concerning. He's psychologically scarred because he knows the danger his actions posed."

A flicker of emotion passed over Elara's eyes as she glanced back up at the Captain. "That's where my biggest worry lies. While the outbursts have lessened, the state of flux of his emotions means that he isn't coping. He keeps having high highs and low lows. I have grave concern over where the low could end."

Jaro slowly set his stemless glass back onto the table, the warm, amber pear nectar sending up a final, faint wisp of steam. The expressive warmth of his face was replaced by a heavy, quiet solemnity. As a Denobulan, he belonged to a species that thrived on community, shared spaces, and collective emotional harmony; witnessing an individual fracturing in isolation—and knowing how thin their support network was out here—pressed on him.

"High highs and low lows," Jaro murmured, turning the words over. "An emotional pendulum. And when it swings back down, the weight of his own guilt acts as the gravity pulling it faster."

He leaned back, his eyes momentarily drifting toward the viewport, where the stars continued their endless, streaking dance outside.

When he spoke again, his voice had gotten noticably quieter. "We are thousands of lightyears from the nearest dedicated psychiatric recovery facility. Frontier medicine is excellent for sealing plasma burns or synthesizing antivirals, but when it comes to the delicate, fractured architecture of the mind... we hit our limits very quickly. Especially when we are dealing with symptoms the cause of which we do not yet understand."

He turned his eyes back to Elara, the Captain's responsibility clear in his look. "My first and absolute duty is to the safety of the Amazônia and her crew. If Ensign Claude experiences another sudden dip, or if his emotional instability triggers another manic episode while we are running silent in the turbulent atmosphere of Orellia IV... the consequences could be catastrophic for all of us. He cannot remain on active duty."

Jaro let out a soft sigh, adjusting the rich velvet cuff of his eighteenth-century Venetian merchant tunic. "Yet, dropping him off at Vanguard Station is not a viable alternative. I spoke with Captain Trelen just before our detour. The station is a pressure cooker—operating at maximum life support capacity, sweltering under unreconfigured Borg environmental systems, surrounded by ten thousand dormant drones with little more than willpower and wet string. Sending a fragile, traumatized young officer into that environment would be actively cruel."

He leaned forward once more, resting his hands flat on his knees and offering Elara a supportive, collaborative look.

"So, we must keep him aboard, and we must keep him safe. Which means, Counselor, we are going to have to get creative. How do we structure an environment of safety and recovery for him here?"

Elara placed her cup back on the table in front of her as she sorted through Jaro's words; in truth stuck herself in knowing what was the right decision and what was the wrong decision. Truth be told, the Ensigns situation had tipped the scale where the safety of others was paramount.

But...Elara didn't want to give up.

"I think he needs purpose and reason. Right now in his head what he did and how he placed lives potentially at risk is all completely overwhelming. We need to replace these shadows and dark emotions with reason for him to cling to that he can turn this around and have reason to rebalance his own emotions."

Elara's eyes focused back on Jaro's. His earlier mention of Vanguard had stirred something in her that she'd had to push down to be able to continue to focus on the here and now. "You know Ops better than I do. Is there light duties he could be assigned? That keep him away from points of danger to him or others? Is there a way we can show him in trusting in him, he can start to believe in himself once again?"

[TBC]

Captain Jaro
Captain
USS Amazonia

Lieutenant Elara
Chief Counsellor
USS Amazonia

 

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