Chocolate and a Plan - Part 1

Posted on Sun Sep 8th, 2019 @ 9:55am by Lieutenant Commander Carolyn Corrigan MD & Lieutenant JG Ilan Rol

2,612 words; about a 13 minute read

Mission: Episode 100 - A Hatred of Atonement
Location: Walking to Rol's Office (Memory portion: Carolyn's Quarters)
Timeline: MD1 0715 hours

ON:

Rol had just finished his physical hating himself for being so formal with Carolyn. He was all about helping her but he realized that he was so closed off from getting help himself that it was almost automatic. She'd trusted him with a lot in the last few days. Now he kept her distant as if just a few nights ago they hadn't talked as friends would talk.

He sighed as he headed for his office. He had a full day today. Although his feet took him towards his office his mind took him to days ago....


A Few Days ago--after the wedding


Bring chocolate and a plan....please.

The cryptic handwritten note was scrawled on a piece of textured white paper. The last word seemingly added in, almost an afterthought. There was no name, no further clue. The note lay undesturbed for well over an hour on top of Lieutenant Rol’s desk, when Ensign Halloway, yawning and half asleep, delivered a stack of reports in preparation for the appointments scheduled that day.

She did not see the note, now mostly hidden from site. Only a tiny corner still visible, a little white flag.

Rol accepted the files feeling a bit overwhelmed. Ariana was on light duty still so he had taken the brunt of the files. He would have another late night promising himself that he'd make it up to the person he'd be standing up for dinner yet again. He sighed sent off a note about working late and started sorting the PADDs, morning, afternoon, early evening...and then a paper. He picked it up and read the note.

Bring chocolate and a plan....please.

There was a familiarity about this note yet his foggy mind couldn't make sense of it. It took him several minutes an a tea later until it hit him. "Carolyn." He said. Scrubbing his hand down his face he checked her work schedule. Thankfully she was off duty just as he was getting off duty. He noted the appointment as Chocolate and Chat in his planner and proceeded with the day. Once done he hurried to the shop of sweets picked up enough chocolate to feed the station and hurried to meet Carolyn in her quarters. He rang the chime and waited.

It took a moment for the door to open. Sitting almost in the dark, Carolyn was curled up on the far corner of the sofa. “You didn’t have to bring all the chocolate on the station,” she chided him as she stood. “You didn’t need to come. You must be off duty by now.”

He smiled, "Well for you to ask to see me I figured it would have to be big and chocolate helps with big." He put the chocolate on the table and noted the darkness. "Carolyn two things, one let's get a drink going, two why is it dark?"

“Computer, lights to normal,” Carolyn called out, wincing slightly as the sudden brightness assaulted her eyes. “What would you like to drink?”

He sighed, "With my love life hanging on threads something strong." He studied her. "I have a feeling you could use it too."

“Maybe. Please, sit. Anyone I know?” She asked as she ordered him a drink, setting it down on the table. “If you have plans to be somewhere...”

He smiled, "Nope. I am where I need to be. I got your mysterious note." He held up a piece of paper. "The chocolate and I are here. Now, again I ask, are you okay?"

Her eyes fell on the piece of paper. Torn from a sketch book, she had written it in the dead of night. It had somehow seemed a good idea at the time. She hesitated, sitting down in a seat opposite, seeming to sink into it. “No.”

Just saying that one word seemed like an effort. She reached in to the pocket of her hooded top, producing a hypospray that she sat down on the table and pushed towards him. “Can you throw this out an airlock or something before I give in and take it,” she asked quietly.

He didn't hesitate. He scooped up the hypo. "The sedative?"

She nodded, drawing up her knees so she could wrap her arms around her legs and rest her chin on top of her knees. “Yes,” she confirmed before adding, “thank you.”

"Okay now, that is a great sign. Tell me what made you want to get rid of this?"

Want. Carolyn smiles ruefully at the choice of words. “I’m not sure I want to but I need to. The last few weeks, God, the last few days have been ... I feel like I can’t breathe sometimes.”

"Oh? Tell me what's been going on." She was describing the classic signs of anxiety.

She rested her forehead on her knees for a second, closing her eyes. Thinking. She turned her head to look at Rol, “you better open the chocolate, you’ll need the sugar."

While he did that she fell silent, trying to pick a place to begin. "You know I was going home. Something I won’t be doing again... I think it went wrong in every way possible. I shouldn't have gone. If I had known Kalani was so bad, I wouldn't have stayed away so long. It's like that one choice, that one bad decision, just spiralled.”

He sighed, "I know all about bad decisions and spirals, trust me. But I also know that sometimes we need others to pull ourselves up from those spirals. This decision that you made to not take the sedative to change these are strong decisions and they speak to your character and hunger for change." He held out the chocolates. "Now let's start on these and you can talk to me about anything you want. Or we can just sit an eat the chocolate." He smiled at her.

Offering him what was close enough to a smile to count as she picked out a chocolate. They sat in companionable silence for a long time. And then Carolyn spoke up, “I went home to see my mother... but by the time I got there, she had two, maybe three good hours and then her condition deteriorated. Things were said, arguments really. So by the next night I had booked transport to Vulcan."

He smiled. "Was Vulcan as hot as Hades?" He waggled his eyebrows at his pun trying to elicit a giggle out of her.

“That.Was.Bad.” She told him. Biting down on her lip so she didn’t encourage him by laughing. She was only partially successful. So she picked up a piece of chocolate, eating it as she shook her head. She appreciated his efforts though, especially when her head was aching again.

Picking up another bit of chocolate she held it, staring at it and making no move to actually eat it. A silence fell that he didn't break and she appreciated that just as much.

"You know, being a doctor," she said with a small, rueful smile, "you see a lot of things. Death is a part of the life we chose. We deal with it pretty much every day in all of its guises. You would think... that it wouldn't hurt so much. But it does."

She took a deep, shaky breath, staring at her hands as she dropped the chocolate. "She was … she was pronounced dead just before midnight last night. And I can't figure out if I'm sad or relieved. Or guilty. I wanted them to turn off her life support. I argued with my father for hours. I know it is the best for her. But now... now she's really gone -"

Rol sighed, He put an arm around Carolyn. "Oh Carolyn. I'm so sorry." He sighed. "Let's back track a little. So you were home, your mother was ill. Tell me what the doctors said to you about her illness."

"They said that her initial improvement was due to a clinical trial. Something my father kept a secret from us all..." she paused, trying to reign in her anger at him. "I arrived just after the second round of treatment had finished and by then they said there was nothing that could be done. The same treatment meant to help her was attacking her body and would start a cascade of neurological failure. It was just a matter of when."

"Did you verify this yourself?" He asked knowing that she had.

"I studied her file, I called specialists, I may have prayed a little as I held her hand," she shook her head in frustration. "I couldn't save her. Nobody could. The one consolation is that I got to say goodbye in the few minutes she was awake. My father and I... that ended just as badly."

"Tell me about that." He said munching on a chocolate.

“My mother was gone. Only machines are keeping her alive. Them and my fathers stubbornness. He hates me for accepting the prognosis, for supporting them when they said nothing could be done. He was holding out for a miracle.”

He sighed and took her hand. "I'm so sorry Carolyn. I can see both your sides. You are a doctor, you knew what was happening and that must have been the worst torture in the world. Your dad...he was about to loose the woman he has loved his whole life. He knew you were right but he can't let go. That's probably why he picked a fight with you."

He sighed. "I am so sorry you are going through this." He paused a moment. "Isn't your dad a doctor? Are you sure he knew of her full prognosis?"

“My dad is a doctor too, and yeah, I’m sure,” she said quietly.

"Tell me how you feel about all this with you parents."

“Guilty. I argued for him to let her go. He wouldn’t. Just like he didn’t with me.”

"What do you mean with you?"

“When I was hurt I was in a coma for a long time. He fought for them to continue my treatment, and for them to use experimental treatments at times. He just never gave up. He was never there for birthdays or suchlike but wanna die? Then he steps up.”

"Your father sounds like a man who loves a lot. Maybe this was his way of letting go. He was fighting for her because he loved her. He was preparing but trying to give one last fight."

“Perhaps,” she conceded. “I’m not his daughter anymore so not something I need to worry about. I should have stayed here, Rol. He already hated my decision to come back to Starfleet and then this.”

He sighed, "You are his daughter. He loves you he is just lost in his own pain now. You are always going to be his daughter. I promise you that."

“Ha!” She laughed, “You don’t know him, Rol but thank you for trying to make me feel better. Honestly it’s okay. We always fought. My grandmother said we were two sides of the same coin. Too stubborn to admit we are wrong.”

"He still loves you." He squeezed her hand.

Carolyn stared down at his hand for a moment, frowning. "Rol?" she asked quietly, sounding unsure. "Can I tell you something?"

"Of course you can! Anything." He smiled reassuringly. She was making so much progress.

“Before, when you asked about the weather on Vulcan,” she began. “I don’t really remember. It had to be, right?”

"What do you mean you don't remember? If it was hot?"

“I mean as in I don’t remember any of it,” she clarified, sounding unsure. “Not just the weather.”

His eyes bugged out. What do you mean you don't remember?" He sat up suddenly on full alert.

She didn't answer at first. Instead she stood, ordering a hot chocolate from the replicator before taking her seat. She ran a hand through her hair.

“You’ll lock me up for this ... but I know I was there. I distinctly remember getting on the transport ship. But when I try to think of what I did, what I saw, who I met it is like chasing shadows or having the ghost of an image that you can’t focus on. I’m sorry, I'm explaining it badly.”

"No...no you are not. Someone put a Vulcan memory block on you." He sighed, "Trust me I know what that's like."

Carolyn stared at him with her glass half way to her lips, “run that one by me again? And what do you mean, you know what that’s like?”

He sighed, "I've had that happen, my memory erased. A block, a wall I could not see through that gave me a headache when I tried."

“But ... why? And how can I get rid of it?” she asked, trying not to let her imagination run wild. “What did you do?”

He sighed, "I don't know why but we need to figure that out. We need to know what happened. We'll need another Vulcan to break the block. A powerful one. I met one on Vulcan while recovering from my injuries. There is only one that is that powerful here. Admiral T'Lar."

“I have never spoken to her beyond the wedding ceremony so that’ll be a fun conversation,” Carolyn commented. “I don’t know where to start other than I had always planned to go. I’m not clear on the why though. It feels like everything about the trip is just this mess in my head. But I was sorry worried about home, and then Hades and Kalani … and if I didn't think about it then it didn't hurt, it was fine."

He was worried. "Okay we'll need to figure this out. I'll help."

She flashed him a tired smile, “thank you. I had no right to even expect you to come over let alone listen to all of this. Be glad Ariana listened to the rest.”

"Carolyn I'm always here to listen to you. I know I can be annoying but it's only because I care about you. I don't want to see you hurt."

“You? Annoying?” She teased him lightly. “Maybe just a teeny bit.”

She sighed, “I’m going to have to speak to Hades too, aren’t I? Unless I could bribe you with chocolate to do it?” She knew it was useless but it was at least worth a shot. Especially when she was using his own chocolate as the bribe.

He laughed, "No can do but I will go with you if you wish."

“I think I’d like that,” she told him.

He smiled. "Good. So now we gorge on chocolate...if he's worried about getting our sugar levels down he won't really be listening." Rol grinned and winked at her.

Carolyn laughed, reaching over to pick another chocolate, “you know, for a counsellor, you are a really bad influence.”



Present Time

Rol snapped back to the present just as he reached the turbo lift that would take him to the level where his office was. He had to smile at the comment she had made about him being a pad influence. He was determined now, more then ever, to help her and to not only be a counselor but a good friend. He had few of those and it was time that he stopped hiding and started living.

A new relationship, a new friend. Perhaps a new start?

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