HOMES IS WHERE THE HEART IS & MY HEART IS OUT WANDERING
WHERE In Town
WHEN Shortly After Arrival
RATING PG
She would know that determined but awkward gait anywhere. Spock.
For biologists and medical scientists like herself, the Prime Directive was especially complicated. If there was ever a circumstance in which keeping the Prime Directive meant she had to ignore what was found in Epidemics, Book I, from the Hippocratic school: "Practice two things in your dealings with disease: either help or do not harm the patient," then the Prime Directive could take a hike. She loved being in Starfleet, loved the opportunities that it afforded her and the brilliant places she got to see. She liked feeling as though she was pushing beyond her own limits every day, it was rewarding and it was fulfilling - but some things were still more important. Life was more important.
This is why Christine had felt a little guilty about really wishing someone would just get hurt already. Not too badly, but just enough that she could feel justified in blowing her cover a little. Just enough so she could exhale and make an attempt to engage with the strangers she'd suddenly found herself surrounded by. (Well, she didn't want to engage with all of the strangers. She really didn't want to know what the deal was with the man with no eyes who always seemed to end up behind her whenever she was in line to grab a coffee from the deli.) She'd avoided using her devices that had been thrust into her hands by - actually, she didn't know what that was - trying instead to search for any sign of the rest of her crew each day. She'd looked through the halls of The Last Resort, and poked her head around town while doing her best to keep a low profile.
She wasn't exactly sure why she had the urge to fake a squeaky Southern accent whenever someone tried to talk to her, but at this point, she felt like it was too late to stop, less someone catch on to her master-level deception.
For three days her search had been fruitless, but then she saw him, walking out from between two buildings in what had to be the most uncasual way possible. He had a sweatshirt on with a hood up and the drawstrings tied so tightly that he looked a bit like he was wearing a babushka scarf. Christine exhaled to stop herself from laughing as she tightened the lid on her to-go coffee. She decided that she wouldn't make a comment about how he looked, knowing full well that he probably would have seemed less conspicuous if he's just let his pointed-ears see daylight, given how strange so many people seemed to be around - wherever here was. She knew he was trying.
Failing, a little bit, maybe.
But trying.
And really, wasn't that what the Prime Directive was all about, right?