Visting Hours

[Cptn Corizon 0]

Fiona Weber stepped carefully into Republic's brig, monitoring her steps. She had not gone far without her cane since the Oest incident -- only as far as the replicator outside her office to get a raktajino, on a good day... but she'd be damned if she let the damned Dameon see her limping in on the thing.

 

She nodded to the security ensign on duty. "I am here to see Doct-- Captain Corizon," she said, forcing a slight smile.

 

Corizon heard the voice and lifted a ear, though he remained in a quasi-lotus position on the small bench of the brig. The ensign also lifted a brow, but it wasn't as if he cared. No one had told him the Captain wasn't allowed visitors. "Um, sure," he said, motioning her towards the cell block. "There you go, Doctor."

 

"Thank you, Ensign," she acknowledged, turning the corner into the row of cells.

 

It wasn't hard to find him. Oh, no. They only had one bad little dog in their pound. She slowed as she approached his cell, arching an eyebrow as she came to a stop in front of the Dameon. Fiona stared for a long moment in silence, crossing her arms as she regarded him.

 

"Doctor Corizon, I presume."

 

He didn't bother opening his eyes, nor did he move. "Captain," he corrected, coolly. "What can I help you with?"

 

"Old habits," she said, dismissively. "You'll always be Doctor to me, whatever rank they paste on your collar..." She smiled, her eyes glittering. "Or take off. Pips are fleeting after all, aren't they?"

 

"You'd know, I suppose."

 

Her smile fell in an instant. "Really, Corizon," she snapped, dropping into a stronger British accent than her voice usually bore. "I don't think you're in any position to make such snide remarks. Look at you. You're in the bloody brig. Run by a crew you left high and dry while you went off... God knows doing what."

 

"I have no intention of explaining myself to you," he said, finally opening his eyes. "So whatever you've came down here for, I suggest you get on with it."

 

She smiled again. "Why, I thought you'd be happy to see a friendly face during your darkest hour. Did I need another reason?"

 

"This hardly compares to being held prisoner by the Cardassians." He didn't mention that if it didn't compare to his imprisonment by just the Cardassians, that his imprisonment by the Cardassians and Vorta blew it out of space.

 

Fiona dropped her voice, taking another step closer to the forcefield. "You're sitting in a Caitian admiral's brig, on a Starfleet starship, you're about to be disgraced before the whole fleet, and you're not at all upset. Why, do you have another conniving little plan to get out of all of this?"

 

"I knew what risks I was taking," he said, burrowing his self-doubts beneath a sheen of calmness. "And I knew that there would be a price to pay for them as well."

 

"Really, did you? Did you know you'd be on the verge of sacrificing your damned career, and everything you've worked for? You're a damned captain, and you're throwing that away. You know the kinds of things you can do for the Federation when you're in a position like that. Now who's going to? Not someone with your experience, that's for sure." She snorted indelicately. "Tell me, Ah-Windu. Were you even thinking when you left us floating in space, moments away from having life support fail?"

 

"Your situation wasn't that desperate," he corrected. "And yes, I'd rather intended for the Jamestown to pick you up."

 

He took a breath, pushing the annoyance out of his mind -- the claim that he'd abandoned still bristled him. "As for the rest of that," he said, "my career is less important than the safety of the Federation. If you think I would put my career before that, then you don't understand what my career has been built upon."

 

"I'm not talking about your career. I'm talking about the fact that wherever you go from here, you're not going to be saving the Federation anymore. I think you reacted and went boldly forward without considering the consequences. I think you got cocky. I think that you got so damned confident in your own abilities to get out of anything that you went rogue without even considering all of the consequences. Hell, any of them." She jabbed a finger forward, millimeters from the forcefield. "I think you got sloppy, Corizon."

 

He actually laughed.

 

"Well," he said with a grin he couldn't help, "I appreciate your assessment of me, but we all know how accurate that's been in the past."

 

"Extremely accurate," she snapped, face falling quickly into a scowl. "You can stop your sarcasm at any time. You're the one sitting in a cage right now, not me." She smiled again, without a trace of sweetness. "I've had a... misstep here and there--"

 

"We all have our own cages," he said as the grin faded. "But if you must know, I did know full well I'd more than likely be sacrificing my career when I gave my orders. There's a reason they give cadets Kobyashi Maru you know."

 

"We always have choices, Doct... Captain. You've made yours. I don't know what was going through your mind at the time. Was whatever convoluted mission you...Captain Courageous... were destined to undertake so damned important that it couldn't have waited a few days? Or that your contacts couldn't have provided a cover for you?" A slow smile started to spread again. "Assuming, of course, you still have friends in the industry."

 

He gave her a puzzled look. "Of course I do, not that I care. Besides, I couldn't risk someone finding out I had a damned cloaking device sitting in my engineering office." He also wondered how many times he was going to have to explain himself before they understood that throwing away his career was the least of his worries.

 

She barked out a laugh. "Oh please, I highly doubt that..." She stopped.

 

"That you had a what?"

 

Now rather proud of himself, he leaned back into the wall. "Oh," he said, slyly. "I suppose they wouldn't tell a simple doctor now would they?"

 

"Don't you dare call me that, you treacherous little canine," she fired off, bristling. "You actually. Truly, had a cloaking device." Fiona snorted again, which proceeded to turn into a laugh, then another. Laughing hurt, though, and she stopped fairly quickly, putting a soothing hand on her side. "Oh, God. That's priceless."

 

He smirked. "I hear my chief engineer put a pink case on it, too."

 

"Let me see if I can get this right. Let me," she said, biting down on her smile and looking at the Dameon.

 

"You have a fracking cloaking device. God only knows why you have a cloaking device. But you have a cloaking device. On your ship. And you have some secret mission, that's safety-of-the-Federation worthy, Captain Canine must go and save the day. And since you have this cloaking device, which the Romulans would skewer you for if they knew about, you decided to go... bloodhounding around the damned Neutral Zone."

 

"Why else do you think I had the cloaking device in the first place? You can't exactly cross into Romulan space without one, now can you?"

 

Her back still throbbing from the laugh attack, she pressed a button from the wall running along the side of the cell, taking a seat on the bench that emerged. "No, I know you can't. But..." She nearly started laughing again. "Ah-Windu, darling. That's precious." The smile fell. "Did you consider the fact -- your own worthless career aside -- that you could have started a war?" she inquired, mildly.

 

"The thought had occurred to me," he said honestly. "However, the war that could have been started had I not was going to be far worse, and far more likely."

 

"Oh, really?" she asked, leaning forward and propping her chin on her hand.

 

He leaned back again. "I am not going into details because I certainly don't trust you, but just take me at my word -- the alternative was far, far worse."

 

"I"m hurt," she answered. "If you told anyone it should have been me."

 

"I'd tell the leader of the Dominion first." Not that he wouldn't, or that she likely didn't know everything he knew if not more, but Fiona certainly didn't know that.

 

"Sticks and stones, Corizon. It isn't as if I've ever betrayed you, exactly. But no matter. Such things bore me anyway," she lied.

 

"Now," he said placidly. "What is it you came down here for?"

 

"I'm chief medical officer," she said, leisurely, thinking she'd finally started to get under his skin. "And it's my duty to conduct a proper psychological and psychiatric evaluation of our pet rogue." Fiona had received no such directive, but initiative never hurt a woman. "I'm going to see if there's a mental deficiency to cause you to act in such a shameful manner.'

 

"You're not even a psychologist," he pointed out. "And you should know by now that I am going to pass every psych evaluation given to me."

 

"I generalize, and I did cross-training in psychology," she reminded him, and gave him a slight smile. "And yes, Captain. I do know that all too well."

 

Fiona pulled out a padd with a sigh, activating it and its record function. "In the past six months, have you started taking any new medications or been diagnosed with..."