Lieutenant Dhae’s official log, officially mandated entry, stardate [REDACTED]: my activities are within the norm and the parameters thereof are within reason.

Diran and Dhae walked quite silently all the way from the bar to the turbolift. The Betazoid seemed to have regained some spirit, although they were still horrendously pale.

“I’m doing a bit better now” said them, licking their lips.

“To the medbay we go anyway” answered the Romulan, awaiting for the turbolift, still extremely irritated that he had had to take a break from the elegant, and so far very productive, dinner party. What would Kitty have done in such a situation?

“It’s just — the thoughts — everyone was so –” tried to explain Diran.

Dhae stared at them.

“It’s difficult to express in words to non-empathic species” said them. “I always pick some traces of what everyone is feeling. For a moment, when that glass fell, the emotions were — a sea, dark — and –“

“You were doing quite bad even before that bottle fell, Diran.”

“Yes. I don’t know why, since one hour I’ve been feeling restless. Maybe it’s just stress.”

“Stress is suspicious” answered Dhae. “I’m sure the medbay people will study you with great interest.”

“You mean the doctors?”

Dhae stared at Diran and then the door of the turbolift opened.

The way from the turbolift to he medbay wasn’t long — the medbay had been, rationally, built next to a turbolift door — but while walking there Diran seemed to again lose his nerve.

“I’m — not sure I want to go in there” they said.

“I’m sure you don’t” agreed Dhae trying to sound conciliatory despite his growing annoyance at the whining Betazoid. “That’s why I’m bringing you in.”

Just to make sure that he was communicating this clearly, he put his hand on Diran’s shoulder: not forcefully, but with some resolution.

The medbay door opened and a choir of complaints and whines came out of it. It wasn’t quite full — the medbay of a starship with humanitarian capabilities had quite a good capacity — but it was busy, with medical personnel moving fast from one side to the other.

A medical Lieutenant approached Diran and Dhae and looked at them.

“I’d rather we leave” said Diran, now struggling against Dhae’s grip.

“I’ll let you argue with the nice medbay person” answered Dhae.

The doctor, a middle-aged Antedian, looked at Diran and then at Dhae. “A Betazoid?”

Dhae raised his eyebrow. The Antedian had been a crew on this ship before the arrival of the Redding personnel, so she probably had never met Diran Koli. “Correct. Are you very good at guessing species?”

The Antedian smiled sourly. “Every single Betazoid, and other empaths, are reporting signs of distress. You can hear them.”

That explained the complaints and moans that bombarded Dhae’s poor ears.

“And you? Any distress?” asked the Antedian to Dhae.

Dhae felt suspicion. He had just brought a patient to the medbay, and there was no reason to think he himself was unwell. Were Federation doctors always this aggressive? “Why should I?”

“Forgive me. We have heard nothing from our Vulcan crewmates so far, but you are also telepaths.”

Dhae felt ashamed to have been so defensive so quickly. He had exposed himself, he had over-shared. He tried to sound genial to hide the magnitude of his mistake. “I’m Romulan and I’m doing fine.”

“Ah! You’re our new Romulan.”

“Please, I need to get out of here” said Diran Koli.

The doctor smiled nervously and took Diran by the arm, forgetting about Dhae. “Now, let’s get you to a bed. We’re going to give you an empathic dimmer, that’s going to help.”

Dhae, not able to stand the sickbay any longer, exited.

He walked to the turbolift. While he had tried to remain polite, he couldn’t deny that he was very annoyed. Diran’s inexplicable crisis of whining had ruined his elegant dinner party. Could Diran have faked it to spite him? Could Diran be jealous of Dhae for his newfound relationship with Iskander?

He stopped in front of the turbolift door. Iskander was far from blameless, on the other hand. He had been doting on Diran and encouraging him to play the role of the sick person. Iskander didn’t take much pleasure in social gatherings: had he planned to slightly sabotage the dinner party, so that Dhae wouldn’t try again? That wasn’t a thing that a romantic partner would do, but what security did Dhae have that Iskander really loved him?

After all, Dhae had told him — to that morose human — his true name. Sure, he had thought they were going to die, and he — a romantic at heart — was absolutely repelled by the idea of dying without another person knowing his true name. The revealing of the true name was, for a Romulan like Dhae, one of the most significant acts that could be undertaken. Had Iskander done anything even remotely equally important? Stupid humans who didn’t have true names, who insisted on using their personal name after ten minutes of chatting, stupid humans incapable of grand actions.

Sure, Iskander’s could be an act. Why not? Starfleet had much to gain by studying and exploiting a Romulan. Were they observing him? Were they studying him to get secrets about the Romulan Navy? Was Iskander their most sophisticated method of control, their sneakiest agent? Would at some point the gilded cage slip to reveal its bars?

Dhae’s communicator chirped. “al-Kwaritzmi to Dhae.”

He had to avoid saying anything suspicious. “Dhae here. I’ve brought Diran to the medbay and I’m coming back.”

“Sorry — we can’t stay in the bar. I’m going back to our quarters.”

The Romulan almost choked. They were interrupting the social gathering? Without asking him? How dared they? But he couldn’t act like this affected him, he couldn’t give Iskander this piece of information, he couldn’t let his rage speak. “I understand. Dhae out.”

And then, just while he touched his communicator, Dhae realized what was happening to him. He had been standing next to the turbolift door — he had even forgotten to call the damn thing — for maybe one or two minutes, drowning in negative thoughts.

He was experiencing unconstrained paranoia.

The Romulan psyche was, to some extent, built on paranoia, on secrets, on concealing. Paranoia was normal, paranoia was good, paranoia was to be used. The Romulan dialect that he used distinguished between the normal, healthy paranoia that a Romulan is encouraged to carry, and the unconstrained paranoia that is the sign of a degrading mind. Sadly this linguistic distinction couldn’t be carried over to Standard.

This was unconstrained paranoia. He was even suspecting and accusing Iskander, his beloved. That was not supposed to happen. If there was something resembling an unforgivable sin, especially for a romantic like Dhae, was being paranoid towards a beloved to whom he had given his true name. Dhae realized that he was almost out of control.

He sat on the floor and started rheolanexshu breathing, not caring that he was doing so in the middle of a corridor. Nothing mattered, if his mind was clouded.

At [REDACTED], he had, like all Romulans on his home planet, had courses on emotional balance. His home planet had created amongst the best psychically self-controlled minds of the old Empire. Dhae himself had been good at it — at the end of the seminar, he had withheld a psychic attack of a level 7 Reman telepath without as much as a wince.

He decoupled from his emotions, retreating into his meditative abstract core, and studied his fears and paranoia. The meditation was simple: he had to distinguish his good paranoia from his bad paranoia, and eliminate the bad by strengthening the good. There were five steps, a meditative parkour through the forest of the mind.

“My fears will serve me. I am master of my fears. My fears will destroy my enemies” he whispered. This was the mantra that worked for him.

And, within two minutes of meditation, he felt his mind quieten, the sea of emotions unstir, the paranoia retreat to its normal parameters.

He knew.

Something was happening to the ship. It affected first the telepaths, but he realized that he had been, like Diran, experiencing enhanced anger and fear for quite a while. So, presumably, everyone was hit. Iskander had claimed that he couldn’t stay in the bar, and Dhae could assume that his human lover had been overwhelmed by paranoia and had fled in response.

“Computer” he called, unknotting his legs and standing. “Are we under attack?”

“Negative.”

“Is there any other ship in range? Are there any unexplained life signs aboard this ship or in its vicinity?”

“Negative.”

Useless machine.

Dhae suspected that not many people on board had the required paranoia training to resist a psychic attack like this. But —

“The Vulcans!” he said. The only telepaths who hadn’t yet reported to sickbay. They didn’t have specific paranoia training, but were experts in broad emotional control — good generalists whereas Romulans were excellent specialists. If this was a telepathic attack, a Vulcan would be able to find the culprit, to tell Dhae where to strike. Dhae needed a Vulcan, and he knew the one.

“Computer, locate the whereabouts of Counselor Sakar.”

“Counselor Sakar is in the Counselor office.”

That wasn’t a long way from the medbay. It was time to pay the ship psychologist a visit, thought Dhae.