Guilt

Who: Trisees, Keto
Where: On board ship
When: As Keto is looking for the captain
===========================
<<SNIP>>
"It's good to see you again, Lawrence."
Lawrence Valcavia Trisees, Chief Mental Technology Specialist and
Scientific Guru, raised his eyebrows and partly bowed. It was as
close to a smile as the Scientist was wont to give.
"And you, Charles."
There was a slight pause before Keto spoke up again. "Now if you'll
excuse me Lawrence, I am going to see the Captain to hand in my
resignation."
"Resignation? From the Medical Department?" queried Trisees.
"Correct."
"OK," the scientist said, unfazed. "I'll join you."
Keto nodded and continued forward, Trisees by his side.
<<END SNIP>>
The pair walked on in silence for a while. Eventually, as they
walked, Keto spoke.
"So, what's it like being dead?"
"An improvement," replied Trisees levelly, "Over this place, at least."
"Right," replied Keto. When he didn't elaborate any further, Trisees
glanced at him sideways.
"Well well," he murmured, "Who died?"
"Cleavage," said Keto dully. Trisees paused for a half second,
causing him to quick-step to match strides with Keto again.
"Seriously?"
"Yes."
"No, I mean, seriously? Cleavage died?"
"Yes."
"As in, she *died* died?"
"Yes."
"Oh," said Trisees, thoughtfully. Then he shrugged. "So, you're
upset because you're short-staffed, then?"
And Keto stopped walking.
Slowly, he turned to face Trisees, who had raised one eyebrow. As he
took in Keto's blank and dull-eyed expression, however, the raised
eyebrow lowered into a frown.
"...you're not just upset because you're short-staffed, are you?"
Trisees said, light slowly dawning in his eyes.
Keto stared at him wordlessly.
"You're actually upset that she died. You actually CARE about one of
your staff."
For a few seconds, Keto held Trisees' gaze. Finally, he looked away.
"...my fault," murmured the doctor. Trisees' frown returned in full
force.
"What?"
"It was my fault," replied Keto sharply, looking back up at the
scientist with some fraction of his usual glare, "My fault she died."
"What, did you pour the wrong ointment over her or something?" asked
Trisees.
"No!" snapped Keto, "She was...minced...in one of those damn huge
blenders the slug-creatures had!"
"There were slug creatures?" blinked Trisees, "How did they walk? And
they had blenders? How did they operate them? It would be rather
challenging for a slug to operate advanced technol..."
Then he stopped and cleared his throat.
"...however," he continued, "I sense that you are in an emotional
state and now is not the time to be bandying evolutionary arguments
around. What do you mean it was your fault?"
"I was in one of the other blenders," said Keto, breaking his gaze
away again, staring at the wall next to him, eye unfocussed, "And I
did what any sane person in my position would do."
"You kept yourself safe and damn everybody else."
"Yes."
"Exactly the right thing to do. So what's your point?"
"But it WASN'T the right thing to do, Lawrence!" growled Keto,
clenching his fists, "Damn it, if I'd done something differently maybe
we could have broken out of that blender, released the others and
then, somehow, none of this would have happened the way it has! But
no. Instead I held myself up against the lid of the machine and
ignored the others trapped with me. Hell, what kind of doctor does
that make me? How does that fit in with the Hippocratic Oath?"
"You took that thing?" blinked Trisees. Keto hesitated.
"I took BITS of it," he replied, "And, okay, I had my fingers crossed
through most of it. But even so! Because of me, at least to some
degree, Cleavage is dead. I can't just carry on as normal after that."
"So you're resigning?" asked Trisees, catching up as Keto started
walking again.
"That's right."
"And this will magically bring Cleavage back to life?"
"Maybe not," said Keto, "But it'll stop me killing anybody else."
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OOC: Tag! :D