Chapter Text
Will Riker didn’t look good.
His eyes were lively but hooded, with deep bags underneath. His skin was pale and slick with sweat, and regularly, as Beverly circled him with the scanner, she stopped to wipe a moisture-wicking cloth over his forehead and cheeks. As quick as she could pump fluids into his body, his pores were pumping them back out.
“Maybe you just ought to skip the regeneration, Doc,” he said. “At the rate I’m breaking ribs, it might be more efficient to implant new ones. Steel, this time.”
“All the better to puncture your lungs.” Beverly kept her face blank as she read the scanner’s screen. He hadn’t been eating. He’d lost 12 kilos since the last time she took his stats. And his water levels…
Beverly paced away from Riker, pretending not to see the spark of humor in his eyes. She fetched a cup of water for him and set it down at his bedside with a clink.
“Drink,” she said.
Riker extricated his arm from beneath the blanket and grasped at the cup with numb fingers. His angle was awkward, but Beverly made no effort to help. She wanted to see what he would do, and she wasn’t surprised when he tried to sit up, his abs clenching and a fresh jolt of agony going through his ribs.
“Ah…” he said, losing his grip on the water. Beverly steadied it before it could fall.
“Hurts, doesn’t it?” she said. “Painkillers aren’t as effective when your patient won’t eat.”
Riker’s eyes had been scrunched tight in pain, but now they flew open. He studied her face — stern and unimpressed, the same look she reserved for Wesley when he needed to think she was disappointed in him. Riker didn’t seem to know what to make of it. He edged slightly away from her and stared at the opposite wall, processing.
“Mr. Worf,” Beverly called.
Worf was stationed just outside. He ducked through the open door, his face professionally blank and his shoulders stiff. “Yes, Doctor?”
“I’m requisitioning you as sickbay muscle until your shift is over. Help Mr. Riker drink his water, please. He’s severely dehydrated.”
Worf nodded solemnly. He wedged one strong hand between Riker’s shoulder blades and leveraged him into a more or less upright position.
“Were you listening?” Riker asked.
“No,” said Worf firmly. He helped Riker steady the glass of water, but didn’t hold it for him.
“Doesn’t a warrior always pay attention to his surroundings?” Riker asked after one sip. “Constant vigilance, Mr. Worf. What if Beverly and I were plotting an ambush?”
“Don’t tease,” Beverly scolded him. “Worf, did you hear anything I said to Will before you came into the room?”
Now his honor was at stake, thanks to Riker. Worf gave the commander a beady stare.
“No,” he repeated. Then, after a deep breath, “I noticed you were … atypically weak in the holodeck today, Commander.”
“Thanks.”
“Your muscles have atrophied,” said Worf, his nostrils flaring.
“I lost some weight,” said Riker flatly. “Stomach bug. Geordi can attest to that — he caught me in the head last night. Couldn’t make it to my own quarters.”
This seemed to offend Worf’s Klingon sensibilities somewhat, for he tipped the glass hard against Riker’s lips and backed away as soon as it was drained.
“Thank you, Worf,” said Beverly drily, while Riker sputtered. “You may go.”
“Feels like a hostage situation,” Riker complained. He palmed the excess water off his chin and visibly resisted the urge to flick it at Worf’s retreating back. “I should have come to you earlier, I know,” he said to Beverly, dropping his voice into a conciliatory tone. “But I was embarrassed. And I’ve been down here an awful lot lately. I don’t mean to impugn your company, but—“
“But you’re sick of hyposprays and biobeds,” said Beverly.
Riker’s face smoothed out in relief. “Exactly.” He ran a hand over his sore ribs and down to his stomach, like it ached. “Pop me some Imodium, Doc,” he said. “I’ll be fine.”
Beverly studied him, her hands folded behind her back. Then she let her breath out in a sigh.
“Your problem isn’t a stomach bug, Will,” she said heavily. “You’re not eating. You’re not sleeping. You have elevated blood pressure, low oxygen levels, a high heart rate. All of this, plus your recent injuries in the holodeck… I’m keeping you overnight for evaluation.”
Riker digested this without expression. He glanced around for his uniform.
“Will,” Beverly prompted.
“Fine,” he said amicably, still searching. He found his jacket tucked beneath his bed and fished through it, coming up with a deck of cards in one hand and a winning grin on his face. “But you’re playing at least two games of Sivic with me. I can only take so much solitaire.”
“Some of us have work to do,” said Beverly, relieved that he was taking it so well.
“You’re telling me. I’m supposed to be on the bridge.”
And already, he was dealing out the cards.
Specialist DeWalt was parked in a visitor’s chair with a portable speaker in one hand and a music disc in the other, his brow creased with concentration.
“I just watched the tutorial last night, sir,” he said apologetically.
“Take your time,” said Riker. It was nighttime — shipboard-night, at least, and he’d changed an hour ago into a comfortable set of civilian pajamas and non-slip socks. They were keeping him till morning, at least, while Beverly monitored his blood pressure and kept him pumped full of water and nutritional supplements. Not the most comfortable arrangement. He watched Specialist DeWalt fiddle haplessly with the music disc, his impatience steadily rising.
“Excuse me,” he said finally, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. Specialist DeWalt gave a distracted grunt as he tested the speaker’s buttons. There was a new jazz technique he wanted to show Riker, a synthetic form that sampled the ships radio waves for bursts of melodic static, but he’d been here for thirty minutes now and still couldn’t figure it out. Riker made his way to the sickbay head, which he’d been using with increasing frequency as Beverly reversed the dehydration process.
His palm rested flat on the door release. A medic appeared at his side.
“Can I help you?” asked Riker, studying the petty officer’s inscrutable face.
“Sir, I have orders to escort you.”
“Escort me?” Riker must not have heard right. He looked over his shoulder at the baffled Specialist DeWalt. “Why?”
The petty officer stared at the floor, his cheeks turning red.
“Answer me, Petty Officer.”
“Doctor Crusher’s orders, sir,” said the petty officer, shifting his feet.
Riker didn’t have time for this. He had to pee. He gestured for the kid to follow him with a rough jerk of his hand and went straight to the urinal. He wasn’t shy, but he hitched one shoulder up by instinct and felt a prickle of heat on the back of his neck as the petty officer watched him take a piss.
“Clear,” the petty officer muttered into his communicator, and Riker’s stream cut off instantly.
“What the hell was that?” he demanded. “Who are you talking to?”
The petty officer just stammered.
“What do you mean clear?” Riker said.
The poor guy looked like he wanted to melt into the floor, but Riker didn’t have much sympathy for him. “Sir, your… your urine is clear now,” the petty officer managed.
“And? You had to get an eyeful of Lil Willy to determine that? You couldn’t just ask me?”
“Dr. Crusher—”
Riker tucked himself away and slammed his palm against the sanitation pad. The clattering noise of metal against the bulkhead at least covered up his sigh. He pushed past the petty officer into his private room — and then past Specialist DeWalt, who was still struggling with the synth — and burst into the main lobby of the sickbay.
“Beverly, if you wanted a show—” he started.
Beverly gave him a quizzical look. Then she saw the petty officer over his shoulder and understood. “Will, go back to bed,” she said in the distracted, exasperated tone usually reserved for small children.
Back to bed? He was so stunned by the order — the complete dismissal of his concerns — that he didn’t know what to say. The petty officer put a gentle hand on Riker’s arm and Riker half-turned to him by instinct. He searched his face the same way he studied people at a poker game and saw … embarrassment, concern. Sympathy.
“This is a psych hold,” Riker realized and instantly he felt stupid for taking so long to realize.
“Will—” Beverly started.
“Did you send him in there to check the color of my piss?” Riker asked. “Or was he making sure I didn’t…?”
“Didn’t what?” Beverly asked, her voice calm and neutral.
Well, that answered that. Riker dislodged the petty officer’s hand from his arm with an uneasy twitch. “How long?” he asked Beverly. “How long am I stuck here?”
It took a span of two, three breaths before she answered. Steady and soothing, like she was talking to a dangerous man.
“The captain wants to review your file,” Beverly said. “He’ll come to a decision in the morning.”
“And what’s my diagnosis?” Riker asked.
“We don’t know that yet. We’ve barely got a grip on your symptoms.”
He took another step away from the petty officer. “I can tell you my symptoms. I took a cartiga to the chest. Since when does that necessitate a psych hold?”
Beverly’s lips thinned. She’d decided not to engage him unless he played along; Riker could tell from the flinty look in her eyes.
“What does necessitate a psych hold?” he asked. “I have a right to know why I’m being kept.”
His heart was pounding. He needed to center himself, calm down. But only a tiny part of his brain was willing to do that. The other 95% was focused wholly on Beverly’s answer.
“Anorexia,” said Beverly hesitantly. “At the least.”
Anorexia? Riker stared at her, his lips curling into a crooked, disbelieving smile. He looked down at himself — not fat, sure, but nowhere near as thin as … hell, as the petty officer next to him.
“You haven’t eaten any of the meals we brought you,” Beverly said softly.
This was ridiculous. Riker lifted a hand and let it slap against his side. “I’m still nauseous,” he said.
“You don’t have the stomach flu, Will.” She sighed and squared her shoulders, eyes snapping away from Riker. Back to her padd, as if he were dismissed. “We’ll discuss it in the morning. For now…”
“Can I still have visitors?” Riker asked, resisting the urge to glance back at Specialist DeWalt.
Beverly’s professional mask cracked. “Of course, Will,” she said, looking almost hurt.
You’re not a prisoner, was the unspoken message. Riker dipped his head in a grateful little nod to show he understood. That he would cooperate. Psych hold! He turned away, keeping a fair distance between himself and the petty officer, and returned to his room to find Specialist DeWalt banging the synthesizer against the bedside table in frustration.
“It’s alright,” said Riker easily. “We’ll figure it out next time.”
“Sorry, sir,” said DeWalt, shame-faced. His eyes darted past Riker to the main lobby. “Are you…?”
Had he heard?
“I’m fine,” said Riker. “Just sore from the holodeck. Nothing contagious.” He lowered himself back into bed and arranged the thin hospital blanket over his lap. He wasn’t exactly relishing the cold night ahead of him. They kept this place freezing. “What’s your name, Petty Officer?” he asked.
“Texar,” said the petty officer, who’d taken up a vigil by the door.
“Do you have any extra blankets, Petty Officer Texar?” Riker paused. “Or could you get mine from my quarters? I’ve got a quilt my grandmother made me. Can’t sleep without it.”
Texar hesitated. “I’ll see what I can do.”
And he left through the hallway, directly into the corridor outside. Riker watched him go, then turned his head to meet DeWalt’s eyes. Psych hold. Anorexia, of all things. Some treacherous part of his brain conjured up his father, imagined Kyle Riker hearing of the diagnosis, the look on his face. And the embarrassment that came from this … it wasn’t just limited to fantasy. Picard would review his file in the morning and see it written out in bold lettering. And DeWalt would tell everyone in Ten-Forward what he heard today.
His chest was still tight, but when he spoke, Riker’s voice was steady.
“You up for a game of Sivic?”
DeWalt looked reluctantly at the battered synthesizer and the deck of cards. He rose, as Riker had known he would. “Visiting hours are just about over, sir,” he said apologetically. “Dr. Crusher told me when I came in…”
Told him what? Riker studied DeWalt’s face.
“...that it would have to be brief,” DeWalt said finally.
And she must have told him something else too, for him to hesitate like that. But Riker kept any suspicion off his face. He took DeWalt’s hand and squeezed it lightly.
“Well, thank you for coming,” he said warmly. “Come back tomorrow if you have time and we can take a look at that synth together. Okay?”
DeWalt gave a relieved nod. “Yes, sir.”
Riker didn’t need to dismiss him. He left on his own, his step a little lighter than it had been. And Riker was alone, with Texar fetching a quilt that didn’t exist and DeWalt certain that he could come back tomorrow. He glanced at the door to the lobby. Firmly closed.
Psych hold. He swept a rough palm over his face, where the skin suddenly felt like numb rubber. That was his career, wasn’t it? If he’d experienced some great trauma recently, it would be different. The loss of a comrade. Captivity. But there’d been nothing. Just the average everyday stress of running a starship, and it had worn him to the ground. They’d give him a desk job. A teaching job.
That wouldn’t be so bad, he told himself. He liked kids. He had fun whenever he helped the Enterprise’s teachers with their lessons. But he tried to conjure up that sense of fun, a bit of optimism, and nothing came.
He stood and exited through the hallway door as silently as he could. There was a turbolift not far from sickbay, and he was lucky enough not to be spotted as he made his way inside. He tucked himself into the corner of the lift, with cold steel pressing against his back and bumping his elbows. Arms crossed tight over a knotted stomach, he said, “Computer. Take me to the holodeck.”
The turbolift whisked him away. By programming, it deposited him at the nearest empty holodeck, Level 6. Riker stepped out into the empty suite, feeling strangely small in his pajamas and socks. He studied the computer and typed in his own name. It would bring up all his programs — or at least, all the ones Picard hadn’t locked.
There. Valdez, Alaska. One he hadn’t used in at least a year. Last time he’d gone to the cliffs he loved as a boy, where he could see the orcas breaking through the water. His favorite type of sea creature. He’d read everything he could find on them when he was seven — remembered Mrs. Shugak bringing him a stuffed orca toy from the zoo — all those lonely exhilarating hikes to the top of the cliff for the best view. And then he remembered the day his father escorted him to the beach where one of those beautiful creatures had washed ashore. The dead-fish scent of its rotting flesh, the half-liquid globs of blubber scattered across the stones. Pink insides and yellow bone, and seabirds picking at everything they could find.
No. Riker set the computer to drop him off somewhere else, at the little river where he liked to go fishing in the mornings before school. It was easy as pie to disable the safety protocols before he went in. And it was just habit that made him do so. He liked the holodeck to be as real as possible. That was all.
The holodeck phased in around him.
Beautiful.
Riker took a deep lungful of cold air, so crisp it made his nose prickle and his throat ache. Already blood was rushing to his skin, producing an unnatural heat to make up for the cold. Snow crunched beneath his feet and soaked his socks as he moved forward, toward the sharp clear burbling of the river. Icy water trickled over stones and around thin scrims of ice still clinging to the banks. Fish darted beneath the surface, pink and silver in the moonlight.
In his hospital pajamas, Riker sank to the ground. He pulled his knees up to his chest. He hadn’t brought a fishing pole. No bait. No hooks. He just sat and watched the river rush by. He could see a thousand early mornings in that water, sneaking out of the house before his dad got up. He’d always leave while it was still dark, hoping to avoid the tension over breakfast — Dad nitpicking at his cooking or warning Will to behave at school today, digging up old complaints from teachers Kyle hadn’t even spoken to in years.
Better by far to run down to the river. To fish in the cold morning air and let his thoughts slide away. And there were a thousand afternoons in the water too — evenings with Mrs. Shugak’s nephews and nieces, with the sturdy Aleut girl from his baseball team, the one who always let him play with her family’s sled dogs. All of them swimming or dunking each other, lifting rocks to see what was underneath.
He’d fallen in this river once.
In winter.
He’d jumped, really. He could vaguely remember it. There was a boy who stayed with him for a few months, while his dad was away and Mrs. Shugak was visiting — one of her nephews, an older kid who took Will down to the river to fish. He wasn’t careful enough on the snowy banks. He fell in, weighed down by his clothes and boots. And what could Will do, except jump in after him?
He remembered inhaling cold water. Lungs burning. The awful nerve-burning pain of ice-cold water numbing his arms and legs. The frantic struggle to kick his waders off and grab onto something solid. And he remembered the miserable walk home afterward, both of them naked and dragging their wet clothes, mortified when they had to pass six different houses full of giggling kids before they made it to the Riker home. They’d hidden the embarrassment as best they could, puffing their chests out, refusing to cover themselves, winking at any girls they saw or flexing their nonexistent muscles at anyone who stared.
It would have been a funny memory.
But Kyle Riker had come home early.
Kyle Riker was waiting for them.
And the beating that came after — and when the beating was done, when Will was lying stomach-down on his bed and crying into the pillow — when his dad came in—
Riker pressed his closed eyes tight against his kneecaps until the vivid images in his head dissolved into a wall of static. He sniffed hard to clear his sinuses and shook his head. His clothes were soaked; his teeth were chattering; his hands were locked tight around his shins. Ahead of him, the icy river churned and bubbled and he could imagine it in spring, the mud sucking at his bare feet, the fish nibbling at his calves and making him laugh.
They’d find him soon.
Petty Officer Texar would abandon his search for the quilt that didn’t exist. Beverly would open Riker’s private room and find it empty. The computer would cough up his location in a heartbeat. So Riker sighed and pushed to his feet, ready to return before the cavalry came searching for him.
He ordered his body to turn around and head for the gate. Instead, he watched his feet take five steps forward, till his toes were hanging over the edge of the riverbank. Riker half-smiled. This wasn’t what he’d meant to do. Funny how the body disobeyed you sometimes.
And then he shrugged to himself and took another step forward.
He let the icy water wash his mind away.