PLOT

[christine e. chapel]

Starfleet. A "peacekeeping humanitarian armada" was the tagline that had been pushed around by the big brass the last few years, and it was pretty much spot on. In keeping with the immense mission of Starfleet there was an immense handbook, full of statutes and commissions, provisions, rights, clarifications and a growing number of applicable examples.

One such was the need for psychological review of senior staff following an extended or planetary-scale threat. With the Enterprise having undergone both, Starfleet had made a special point to request these reviews from Ensign Chapel. This meant that she'd need to meet with several people. Most of whom should be a breeze, or interesting or fascinating.

Leonard McCoy, however, loomed as a point of trepidation. Not that she was intimidated by the man, per se. He was rough, but he was definitely dedicated to his job, and especially in this capacity, suggested he cared quite a bit about people, even if it didn't show so clearly. Or at least, that's what Christine hoped, she really wasn't sure, and seeing as he was significantly older, she'd have to be aware of the pride factor that comes when a younger junior officer is reviewing an older senior officer. It was an opportunity she had wanted, however, in the face of it, she wasn't quite sure it would be as fun as she had imagined.

But... maybe it would. She had set up the Counselor's Office with just a few references, a large Rorschach painting, as a nod to previous generations of psychology and psychiatry and tried to capture an open airy countoured feeling, even in a limited space.

Even as she prepared, her door beeped. Her heart stopped for just a moment. She shut down McCoy's file from her datapad and took a deep breath. "Come in." She called.

"Doctor McCoy, thanks for joining me." She beamed her widest most genuine smile she could muster as she looked him over for body language and nonverbal cues. "Take a set where you like, I'd like to ask you a few questions, if you don't mind..." She gestured to the blue soft-looking couch, office chair by the desk or to a Vulcan-styled low table with three chairs around it. Her shoulders shrugged slightly, and she couldn't help but feel a little excited at her first big review as Counseling Officer.

[leonard h. mccoy]

McCoy had been walking around the Enterprise with a nearly permanent scowl the last few hours, ever since Starfleet Medical had informed him that not only was the ship getting a counselor, but that he would actually have to pass some kind of evaluation before he was allowed to assume the position of Chief Medical Officer fully. Not only that the examination, and the role of ship's counselor would be taken by the former Nurse Chapel who had served on the ship during the Romulan encounter. She had done exceptionally well helping care for the wounded, but he was not sure if that should mean she should be put in charge of deciding if he was fit for duty. Having to pass medical exams were one thing, those were a science. Psychology in McCoy's view was half superstition and half best guesses about how the mind worked. That and in the space they had put her office they could have fit at least two more diagnostic beds, which were almost surely going to be needed.

"Take a set where you like, I'd like to ask you a few questions, if you don't mind..."

McCoy sat down, nodding. There was not point in being angry with her, though since it really was not her fault for the situation. However he was not much of an actor, so while he was not openly hostile if she was anything of a counselor she would have noticed that he was far from pleased at the current situation. Leaning forward he put his elbows on his knees and reached up to rub his eyes. He was tired, doing inoculations of each and every crew member had been making for some very long shifts. "So what do you need to decide that I'm fit and proper for duty? Do I need to tell you about my relationship with my mother?"

As with anyone passing through Starfleet Medical McCoy had taken a number of pyschology courses, though he had never really done that well in them. At best they were common sense lessons to be learned that any human should have already figured out on their own (such as people wanted to view themselves as respected and crew who did not feel that they were valued performed poorly) and a great deal of it was speculative hoo-doo. It was like using leaches to cure things, it offered no real medical or scientific beniefit since it could not be tested or studied in a lab.

He knew that made him sound almost Vulcan, but he liked real things. Things that he could hold in his hand, or at least see on a scanner. Feelings were all fine and good, but pretending that medical science had a good way, beyond drugs, to sold the problems was annoying.

[christine e. chapel]

"So what do you need to decide that I'm fit and proper for duty? Do I need to tell you about my relationship with my mother?"

Christine laughed a bit, just slightly above a chuckle, as she nodded slowly, folding her lips inside out. It was a pretty common misconception, that psychology was all about daddy and mommy issues, and truth be told, that was the easy part, the part anyone could do, honestly. The fun part was application. The problems are the same, and people had control over what they did with their upbringings, and that was where it always got interesting. Always.

Still, McCoy didn't seem to take this seriously. It could be possible that he didn't take her seriously, or he just didn't take to kindly to counseling. That seemed odd coming from a medical officer, who assuredly had taken some Counseling courses. Christine would make a point to check into that, but in the meantime, she should at least make it clear that this was serious business.

"Not really." Christine gave a small concentrated smile as she shrugged and raised her eyebrows. "But if you'd like to talk about your ex-wife, that might provide some insight." Christine raised her eyebrows again as she picked up her datapad and put it into entry mode.

"I already know you're fit for duty, Lieutenant Commander. You handle pressure well, you're quick, decisive, and dutiful, if not outright compassionate. I'm just going to ask a couple questions to complete your psyche profile. Less painful than a hypo-spray, promise." Christine waved her hands as she spoke earnestly with the Doctor.

His cooperation was obviously necessary, and on a deeper level, she kind of wanted his respect. She was pretty sure her respect for him had leaked out in her assurance of his fitness, which made her want to be viewed as an equal just that much more.

An ensign equal to a lieutenant commander? Maybe not in rank per se, but she couldn't do her job to its maximum effectiveness without his cooperation. Some psychoses required medical treatment. Some illnesses required psychology.

[leonard h. mccoy]

McCoy had promised himself he would not argue with this entire process, but the suggestion that counselling was less painful than a hypo-spray set him off on a rant, "Less painful, but at least we know a hypo-spray will actually do anything. You were a great nurse, your work during the Romulan attack was outstanding. I was looking forward to working with you, but instead I've lost you to this half-baked goobley gook pseudo-science that's about one step up from faith healing and voodo."

"Fixing broken limbs, curing diseases, that's the work you should be doing," he said pointing a finger at her. The Chief Medical Officer did not add that instead she would be listening to crewmembers whine about how unfair their duty roster was, or how they missed their girlfriends/boyfriends/mothers. Sure the crew needed someone to vent their frustrations at, but why did it have to be a talented nurse when it could easily have been a bartender or possible a hologram or automated droid of some kind.

"Damnit Chapel you're a nurse not a shrink," he declared, then having said his piece settled down. Not for the first time he realized that he was getting close to being an overbearing jerk, and forced himself to back down. As much as he believed that Chapel was making a mistake, there was nothing that he was going to be able to do to convince her otherwise. She had made her mind up already.

"Sorry, I'll behave," he said by way of apology for his rant.

[christine e. chapel]

Christine swallowed hard, as McCoy spoke. He wanted his Nurse back, it seemed. He wanted, like so many others, for her to stick to the business of saving lives in immediate danger and forget all the 'mumbo jumbo' of counseling. She had heard it before, often, and wasn't sure why she hoped for different from this man, but she had supposed that he may have enough respect for how radical her decision was. Perhaps he had and she had shattered it with her big mouth. Who knew? She did have to take control of the conversation back.

Closing her eyes for a moment with a wide smile as she paused to process and clear her mind was all McCoy needed to apologize for his rant.

"Sorry, I'll behave,"

And in the blink of an eye, Christine decided to play it light. There had been a million clever prods and leading questions spinning in her mind, especially after reading his case file, but he had apologized, and in that instant he went from myopic blowhard to codgy traditionalist. Traditional was something she understood, even if she wasn't so into it herself. He wasn't going to be on board for counseling anywhere in the near future, but perhaps he would put up with it long enough to see its value. Perhaps.

"Of course you will..." she laughed before closing her mouth, her smile irrepressible as she noted his practicality on her datapad. "You've already answered my first question... I just have two more and we'll have you all set to go, if you don't mind of course." She nodded to him with a knowing smile. Of course he did indeed mind, but that didn't change what was going to be done, really.

"I'd like to know about this phobia you have..." Christine glanced down at her pad for a moment as she crossed her legs casually, her smile faded, mostly because it was perhaps the most important aspect of her meeting with the doctor. "... is there something about space that you are afraid of? Have you had any contact with it during your first mission on the Enterprise?"

She decided to be daring and stack two questions, perhaps getting a broader answer... perhaps none at all. She'd have to see what happened... and start formulating a backup plan.

[leonard h. mccoy]

McCoy looked at her as if she had grown a pair of Androian antenna. Afraid of space? Of course he was afraid of space, any rational person was afraid of space. The number of things that could kill you on Earth was high enough, but out in space that number jumped up by the power of several thousand. At least on Earth there was rarely, if anything, unknown anymore. Things had been discovered, from the deepest seas to the heavens above and even the molton core had been studied and mapped out. If he was going to die on earth it was going to be through something that humanity understood completely. Being hit by a car, or shot with a phase rifle. That he understood, and accepted as a part of life. But they could also be avoided, if one knew how to do such a thing. Space though, that was the great unknown. That was the final frontier and on this frontier there were not just cowboys and Indians, there aliens, diseases and other things that could kill him without anyone even knowing how that happened.

"Of course I'm afraid of space," he said, "You took xeodiseases 101 at the Academy, you must have. Out in space there's a few hundred new ways to die horribly, and that's just from the Federation worlds. The civilized worlds where they have doctors and scientists who have met humans. Where we're going, we're going to fill an entire bank of medical computers just cataloging the new and terrible ways to die," he said, "Have you heard of the Denoblian Runs? You literally poop yourself out of yourself, nobody knows how it's passed but it can spread through a starship as quickly as a simple cold and unless it's caught in time..."

He shrugged. Afraid of space. That was like asking him if he was afraid of sharks. Of course he bloody well was afraid of space. Things out in space wanted him dead, even if they did not even know he existed yet. Klingons and Romulans were almost comforting thoughts, at least they could be shot at or raised shields on.

And I thought you were on our first mission," McCoy said, "Don't you remember almost dying, several times? We only survived because of time travel and the fact that Jim Kirk was born with a horseshoe grafted onto his DNA."

[christine e. chapel]

"Don't you remember almost dying, several times? We only survived because of time travel and the fact that Jim Kirk was born with a horseshoe grafted onto his DNA."

Christine smiled and nodded at the question. McCoy was definitely accurate. They had almost been killed several times, though half of the time, she hadn't even known how much danger the ship had been in. Honestly, she only recalled hearing two announcements during the entire ordeal, one from Ensign Chekov, the other from Acting Captain Kirk. But she had read the reports, with gasps and bug eyes and heart palpitations. They had been excessively fortunate, there was no denying that.

Perhaps the most groan inducing thing about his whole treatise in space was the lack of an definably irrational phobia. There had been a note in his admission file about astrophobia or aerophobia, based on some fleeting conversation. He certainly had been vocal about the dangers of space, she had just sort of put two and two together. It was a rookie move, though, picking up a self-diagnosed phobia and running with it. It wasn't fitting for a Chief anything to make rookie moves, despite her lack of experience or provisional rank. He was here, most obviously of all... by choice and even after the whole Narada incident. How scared could he really be?

This brought a small smile to her face just before she began speaking. He seemed to want to drown in his Astrophobia, if he had it. Was he more scared of something else? "And yet here you are, running the Medical department headed into the wild black yonder. I wonder what kind of person flies headlong into one of their biggest fears?" She put down her pad and clasped her hands together as she listened. It was an open, if not leading, question, but in light of his vocal nature, it seemed likely to catch. "What compels a person to do something like that?"

[leonard h. mccoy]

"I needed a job, my wife got my medical practice in the divorce and building a new one from scratch seemed like too much work," McCoy explained, rather honestly. He was getting annoyed again, as the conversation was veering into his personal life which he figured that Chapel had no business inquiring about. Rather he would have much preferred to end this entire thing right then, but he had gone this far he might as well sit through the rest of it. How much longer could she go on? Eventually she would need to sleep, and then he could escape back to the safety of the other side of the room.

Shaking his head again he was not quite sure what else to add. It had seemed like the only option during a hopeless and bleak period of his life. Granted traveling in space was a very frightening way to live his life, but what other option did he have? He had to sit here and talk about it, because that's what you did in Starfleet you talked about your feelings a lot. Maybe he should have been a Klingon, at least then he would have been sure that he was going to die a grisly death in space, because all Klingons seemed to die grisly deaths in space. "Is your therapy tactic really to talk the whole crew out of going into space, one at a time? I'm not sure the captain would approve."