Posted by Lieutenant Commander Gravel Mardusk (Chief of Security) in Concurrence of Jurisdiction

(snip)

It took a moment, but start swaying he did. In fact, the sedatives kicked in fast. A few sways and he fell forward… only to be caught by a large arm. “Easy there, my guy.... I got ya.” Mardusk said softly and picked up Potlier and gently laid him on the biobed. His turned his head to look at the nurse, but kept one hand sitting on the center of Potlier’s chest. “Ok, unlock the doors and let everyone back in. And you can check out our friend here.”

OOC: leaving room here for medical

As the nurse opened the doors and came to examine Potlier, Mardusk watched but said quietly to Cara “Nicely done, Doc. I guess we’ll keep ya around.” and grinned slightly.

Mardusk, CoS

Cara turned to the nurse, “Call me afore he wakes up. If medically possible, I strongly suggest ya keep him sedated until yer finished. The behavior will repeat, the only unknown is the intensity at which it repeats.” Cara moved away from the biobed to give the nurse and medics room to work. The smile she cast Mardusk way was sad. “Nay, that was the easy part.” She bent down and picked up the PaDD she’d been using off the floor and glanced at the screen and then swore softly in Irish. She looked over at Potlier, who was well and truly out from the sedatives and the sudden release of tension. She tapped the PaDD against her leg a moment and then turned back to Mardusk. “Any chance I can see the video feeds?”

O’Farrell, CNS

(snip)

Cara was not her normal flirtatious self, concentrating totally on what was going on. She did pause however; though not ready to explode she could feel her temper beginning to simmer. Gravel was putting some lightness into the situation and she appreciated it. Cara glanced up at him through her lashes and smiled knowingly, “I told ya it wasnna just your muscles that kept the wolves away.” She looked back at the screen and zoomed in on Potlier. “And I can work with ya too! Comin’ ta Atlantis is the biggest non-what-if so far.”

She started the replay again, even slower. “Yeah that’s the whole problem in a stem-bolt. He experienced traumatic emotional trauma as a child and it was left untreated, compounded by intense grief. What I’m tryin’ ta see here is when he noticed the burn, and observe his reaction. I’m trying ta determine if he punched the medic out of instinct because he’d been ‘attacked’ or because of the repressed trauma. It’s a fine line, but tells me how severe each of the issues are that we’re gonna be talkin’ about.” Cara tapped her hand against the PaDD in her lab, a soft metalic click sounded as her ring tapped against the edge of the PaDD.

O’Farrell, CNS

Gravel looked at the feed, lightly brushed her hand from the control, and in a few seconds had a slow motion capture of the time needed. “Here, this will make it clearer.” and he tapped a few commands.

In the center of the room, the scene began to play out ina 3D holographic image.

Mardusk, COS

Okay that was really cool. Cara turned in her seat to look and then got up moving around the image. There was no obvious stimulus that brought Poltier around, but it was obvious the moment he was aware of his surroundings. There was a brief second of confusion, marked by scrunched eyebrows and pinched lips. And then shock and instinct, marked by the tensing of muscles, the flair of nostrils, and his eyes widened and dilated. Then Potlier had jerked up right and punched the medic. The poor medic had simply been conducting a scan. “The body reacted out if simple Survival instinct. It had been attacked by a stronger force and lashed out to protect itself. But he punched the medic with the injured hand, bringing his attention to the burn.”

“He only hit him once, so thats what I figured. If it was a rage reaction, he wouldn’t have stopped.” Mardusk said, watching with his arms crossed on his chest.

Slowed down it was easy to see the glazed unfocused gaze look, the immediate pinpoint construction of the pupils, and the strange working of the throat before the body decides if it will scream or go silent in panic. Potlier visibly shook and then threw himself off the biobed and curled up as far away as he could get. The screaming started when the nurse tried to approach him.

Cara kneeled down watching the image and then stood up. “Thank you. That’s all I needed to see.”

O’Farrell, CNS

Gravel tapped the command panel and the image vanished. “Ok, Doc. While he is in Sickbay, I’m gonna have a guard outside just in case he gets triggered again. And I’m gonna pull him from duty till he is cleared by you. No charges, no disciplinary action to be taken. This is obviously a mental health issue, not an outright assault. That work for you?” Mardusk said matter-of-factly.

This is where Gravel differed in his approach to many Security Chiefs. A significant number of individuals in his position tended to the ‘hard-ass’ approach. Mardusk believed and practiced that there was no formulaic approach to situations. Each one had to be dealt with as it presented, and there were almost always extenuating circumstances at play. This led to him having a much lower arrest record than many in Security leadership positions, a fact brought up many times by his detractors. But his supporters were just as quick to point out that his ships and stations had a significant decrease in trouble from the time he arrived to his departure. And people tended to interact favorably with Security far more often under his command than under the vast majority of others. Mardusk called it ‘Community-Based Enforcement’. He had even written a widely-read paper on it.

Mardusk, COS

Cara expected nothing different from him. Gravel was different than most security she’d worked with. His understanding and compassion didn’t stop at the security door. “It does. Right now I’m thinkin’ he’ll be stayin’ in sickbay for a few days. You sound like ya read that paper on Community based enforcement.”

She reached for her combadge, =/\=O’Farrell ta NE Shan. Yvonne I need you ta reschedule or reassign my next two appointments, and then everything after lunch for today.=/\= =/\=No problem Lt. What about Lorvak?=/\= Oh she couldn’t miss that one. =/\=Ask him if we can schedule it for after he gets off shift at 2300.=/\= =/\=Okay Lt. I’ll send the changes to your PaDD.=/\= =/\=Thank ya, Yvonne.=/\= Cara tapped her combadge to close the link.

O’Farrell