Wiskey Lullaby

Posted on Friday June 19th, 2020 @ 15:11 hours by Mayterial Droz

Mission: Safe Passage
Location: Sickbay, Deck 2, S.S. Fawkes
Timeline: MD01 - 0500 hours
1268 words - 2.5 OF Standard Post Measure

[ON]

It was early, and her head was pounding. It had been a day since her fall from grace, but the effects lingered. Now that she had been going 24 hours sober it was starting to become clear that there was a bigger problem than just a hangover, she was having hot flashes, cold sweats and tremors in her hands. There was a dependency that she needed to address. It took Mayterial a lot of willpower to make the walk to the Sickbay rather than the mess hall or a bar on the Starbase. She had thrown out all of her liquor yesterday, and now was regretting that decision. She pushed her access code into the sickbay door and it slid open. She knew what she was looking for, but didn't know where Lorpax would've stashed it so decided to just start in one of the cabinets and start looking.

There were vials and hypos and pills. None of the words on the labels made any sense to her, but she had looked it up and was only looking for one specific bit of medication. She pushed aside some analgesic gel, some anti-histamine, some coagulant. There was a vague understanding of those things due to her first aid training all those years ago in Starfleet. She'd always had the tricorder instruct her on what to do though, so there hadn't really been any practice ever since. Another vial, Cyalodin, she didn't recognise the container but it wasn't odd for a doctor to bring some of their own supplies.

Meanwhile in Lorpax was awoken by an alarm sounding in his quarters. It meant only one thing, someone was tampering with his private stash of medications. Quick as a flash he dressed and headed directly to sickbay, disruptor in hand.

When he arrived he slipped his own way through the door, disruptor at the ready. There she was, the intruder, sifting her way through any draw of cabinet she could find. “Looking for something?” He asked aloud, in the hopes that he would glimpse the intruders face before putting a shot into a potential friendly.

Mayterial startled and turned on her heels to face the voice that had just come into the room with her. She had been keeping a mental eye out, not quite taking into account that Ferengi were impervious to her Betazoid mind games. She stood face to face with Lorpax, two vials in hand, they weren't the right ones, but she hadn't put them back when she had heard his question, "Eh. Ehm. No. I mean. yeah." She turned and placed the vials back where she had found them, "I have a headache."

Lorpax holstered his weapon and made his way at running pace across the room to check on the vials the skipper had been clutching. He entered a fit of rage, “so you have any idea what these are? How valuable it is? How deadly? One drop of this and I would have been scraping you off the floor!” He had said too much and he knew it. He gave a nervous chuckle before he could be questioned and changed the subject. “A headache you say?”

The vials were clicking together in her hands, due to the slight tremor to them, "What? Why the fuck do you have that in a sickbay?" She looked down at the vials. She ignored the question of her headache, she knew a distraction when she was faced with one.

Lorpax stumbled in attempt not to give the real reason but had an answer in seconds, “I am testing it. Trying to find a way of slowing the poison down, or treating a victim. My intentions are harmless, I ensure you.”

Of course the real reason was that he intended to sell the Cyalodin to the highest bidder, or else use it, should the wrong person come looking for him.

Were it not for the headache and other signs of the alcohol in her system wearing away she would've easily picked up on the unease and lies. For now it seemed reasonable enough to her alcohol deprived mind, "So. Headache." She was really not in any mood to have a lengthy discussion with her Ferengi physician.

"You're shaking too," the doctor observed. "Any other symptoms? Fever perhaps? Shitting liquid?" He started scanning May with a shining medical tricorder, that he had acquired at his last place of residence. It happened to be the latest iteration from the Vulcan science counsel. It would have cost him more if he hadn't have bought this prototype on the black market.

Mayterial bit the side of her mouth a little, "No." She answered quietly, "Headache, dry mouth, cold sweat." It was clear to anyone with even a slight medical background, or even someone that just liked a drink or two, what that meant.

The Ferrengi lowered his tricorder, realising it was only able to tell him exactly what he could figure out for himself. "Alcohol, or another narcotic?" he asked plainly, as if it didn't matter to him one way or another.

It stung, the blunt question, the lack of empathy. May didn't expect anything else from a Ferengi, still it hurt, "Currently.." She swallowed a lump in her throat, "just Alcohol."

Lorpax grunted to show he had heard and understood, and scurried to open the draw, to the left of where May had been searching. Producing a hypospray seemingly from nowhere he loaded it with a vial. “On Ferenginar, we would prescribe more alcohol,” he said. “Encourages customers to return for the solution to bigger issues. Seeing as here, I am paid the same either way, might as well just give you this.” He proceeded to push the hypo to the woman’s neck.

Mayterial took in a deep breath, held it for a moment as the substance injected into her neck started to take hold. Letting out her held breath slowly but surely through her teeth, "Thank you, doctor," she took a step in the direction of the exit, "I would appreciate your medical discretion on this matter."

“Ah, Doctor patient confidentiality,” the doctor smirked. “Surely that must be a luxury I can charge for? On top of my usual wages, I mean.” The word ‘wages’ had a certain disgust to it. The Ferrengi loathed being lowered to little more than an employee.

"I think we've had this conversation before, Doctor," the term doctor left her mouth with such a sour taste that it was clear she held the title in very low regard when it came to this particular member of that profession, "unless you want me to go and check whether the vials I found earlier are properly documented and reported to the authorities."

"Go ahead," the man replied, waving his hand around dismissively. "I am permitted to have it on board for medical research. So that just leaves the question of how much MY silence is worth to you?"

Mayterial doubted it but she didn't have the presence of mind to really push it, "Fine," she plucked a couple of slips of platinum from one of her leather jacket's pockets and threw them on the bio bed, "will that cover your professional ethics, Doctor?" She wondered why she had brought a Ferengi doctor on board and made a mental note to start looking for a different one. There was definitely something fishy going on with the vials of liquids he had stashed in the bay and that was really not something she wanted to deal with ever again.

[OFF]

Mayterial Droz
Captain

&

Dr. Lorpax
Ship's Physician

S.S. Fawkes