Posted by Captain Eela Dasca (Lt. Governor) in Paging Dr. Kale- A New Patient
At the Starfleet Mental Health department on Oed, things were in a bit of flux, but nothing they weren’t used to. Their Head of Mental Health has transferred departments and they had lost one of their key practitioners. But as they awaited new staff, they were juggling case loads and making sure all their patients were covered.

One in particular was an unusual case in practice, not the least for the security requirements required for file access, but also the jurisdictional issues. Starfleet had handled their care, but they were not an active duty officer. A civilian hypothetically could be their practitioner, but they wouldn’t have the needed clearance to access the files.

Thus, a patient transfer request came to settle on the most likely practitioner who could check all these rather complex boxes: Dr. Bryson Kale.

He would have been forgiven if the name and position raised an eyebrow, but perhaps it made more sense than it seemed on the surface. His new patient (unless he objected) was Captain (Ret.) Eela Dasca- Lieutenant Governor of Red, and Commander-in-Chief of the Starfleet contingent on Oed.

Included in the request was the extensive personnel file from her time in Starfleet (forty years worth), as well as her patient files from her therapists here on Oed, both of whom had been active duty Starfleet officers. All in all, it was hefty. Perhaps that could be daunting to a newcomer, but it also showed that Dasca took her mental health seriously. She was not required to have regular sessions and she couldn’t be removed from her job if she stopped going. But she still requested a new therapist. Then again, she was a former therapist herself.

The added notes in her time from Oed included:

• intensive counselling following the aftermath of her ex-husband’s physical abuse: Eela has come to understand her ex is a narcissist and that their 40 year marriage was emotionally and psychological abusive. A restraining order is in place and has only a few months before it expires. A restriction from being in Oed space without prior approval is permanent (signed by the Governor himself).
• The murder of the man she was dating (Ambassador Mathis’ aide Dashiel Jones), and the subsequent life threatening Haliian condition (called Kusaaritz Syndrome). Her mind-body connection was broken, leaving her unable to feel or express any emotions. This was corrected, but in the aftermath they realized that Eela was telepathically connected to Jones when he was killed (the trigger for her condition), and though she could not sense his mind, felt what his body felt. She is still dealing with not only that experience but the understanding that over the years, she as an empath has borne witness to a lot of death and some part of it still resides in her body.
• increased stress due to the high demands of her role, especially given the negotiations happening with the Vren while the investigation into Jones’ murder continues.
• her estranged son has just arrived on Oed (as has her daughter, son-in-law and granddaughter been for the last 2 weeks). This is a wonderful thing but also brings up painful things that need to be worked through.
• a specialist has proposed a drastic surgical procedure that would replace her spinal fusion with a proper spine that would give her full mobility back. Though all surgery has risks, this one seems very straightforward, however the recovery period and rehabilitation will be extensive and require her to be off work (at least out of the office) for a couple of weeks, if not more. The timing will be key should she decide to risk this life-changing operation. She has not told anyone outside of her therapist about this possibility (since last conversation with patient). Her key medical care providers are aware of the option.

Dasca has been off work dealing with her grief while she celebrates a 6-day long Haliian celebration and her return to work coincides with the next stages in the Vren negotiations. Her adult children and her are open to family therapy as well, in order to work through the ramifications of their narcissist family dynamic and all that that has meant for each of them over the years as well as the family dynamic.

Her file notes that while she is willing to meet at the Starfleet Complex or Sacred Heart hospital (where she is there regularly for other medical appointments), most of her therapy has been conducted at her home where she is more comfortable doing this hard work. Appointments were arranged via Dasca’s Executive Assistant, Cort Belanger.

~Eela Dasca, Lt. Gov.

The padd on Bryson’s desk was heavier than its actual weight should allow. Not physically — the brushed duranium frame was feather-light — but with the forty years of career history, the deeply personal traumas, and the tightly woven jurisdictional threads contained within.

Captain (Ret.) Eela Dasca.
Lieutenant Governor.
Commander-in-Chief of Oed’s Starfleet contingent.
Former therapist.

It wasn’t often a new patient file read like a cross-section of a colony’s political, personal, and medical history. The Starfleet security locks on the data were no surprise — they were the same subtle notification pings he’d gotten when accessing restricted xenogenetics logs during his science days. But what lay beyond them was different. This wasn’t lab data. This was a life lived under constant weight and expectation, documented in a blend of clinical detachment and deeply human observation.

He let the document close, the display dimming to a soft blue. The silence in his office was not empty — it was deliberate. He let the stillness work, sifting through his own reactions before shaping them into intention.

He could see why the request had landed with him. Reserve rank meant he could cross the clearance gap a civilian counselor could not. His psychiatric credentials gave him the grounding for the complexity of her experiences. And his own history — the loss, the recovery, the understanding of what it means to have one’s mind altered by injury — might offer a kind of empathy that wasn’t just professional.

It was tempting to start forming strategies immediately, but experience had taught him that this would be premature. First, there would be rapport. Trust. An agreement — not in writing, but in the mutual language of therapeutic work — that this was a space where nothing had to be performed.

He leaned back, gaze drifting to the framed print on his wall — an artist’s rendering of Betazed’s Lendara Plains in early spring. It was there he had first understood the concept of meeting the moment rather than forcing it. The same principle would serve here.

A quick note on his padd:
To: Cort Belanger
“Please let Lieutenant Governor Dasca know that I would be honored to take her on as a patient. I am available to meet at Sacred Heart, the Starfleet Complex, or her residence at her preference. For a first session, I suggest we choose the space she feels most at ease — the work will follow from there. Respectfully, Dr. Bryson Kale.”

He sent the message, the quiet chime of confirmation echoing softly in the room.

Then he set the padd aside and allowed himself a breath — a centering, quiet exhale.

The work ahead would be layered and demanding. But he had come to Oed V for exactly this — the kind of practice where experience and empathy could meet complexity head-on.

Bryson Kale, PhD
Psychiatrist