Vorik released Trumari's wrist after splinting it, and asked, professionally curious, "How did you come to acquire artificial replacement nerves and such an antiquated method of bone repair?" His interest was purely due to his preference for small scale and medical engineering.

She looked at him thoughtfully. "It was the best care available at the time." She tapped each of her finger tips, and pinched her fingernails, no doubt checking to make sure the splint had not worsened her condition.

"Where was that?"

"A Maquis base. I couldn't exactly walk into a Starfleet facility."

"Why not? You are a citizen, aren't you? You may have been arrested for your Maquis activity, but you wouldn't have been denied care."

"Oh, I was a citizen, but it was revoked a few months before we ended up out here. Actually, when the Maquis raided the prison, that was the first I'd had anything to do with them."

"You were injured escaping from a Federation prison?" He didn't want to think what she might have done to lose her citizenship. Only one particular crime with such a punishment came to mind. Treason.

Trumari raised an eyebrow. "No." she said simply. He was annoyed with himself to find that the lack of further information was frustrating. He could ask of course, but that would tacitly indicate a much greater degree of curiosity about and interest in her than he wished to express to her.

Trumari began to shiver, no doubt a result of the prolonged pain.

"You are going into shock." he observed. He tried again to comm call anyone, sickbay in particular, but was unsuccessful. The holodeck controls remained similarly inacessable. "It is imperative that we stabilize your body temperature." He said, surrendering to the inevitable.

She narrowed her eyes at him. "Your point?" He moved to sit beside her.

"Uh, no. Definitely not." Trumari flatly refused.

"We could be here some time. I would prefer you not be comatose when help arrives."

"Because then you would look bad?" Trumari grumbled.

"It never looks good when a man has an unconscious date."

"You did not just say that."

"I believe I did." Vorik had no reason to suppose that Trumari's hearing was in any way impaired, unlike her grip, so he assumed she was expressing either disapproval or disbelief.

"Pervert!" she accused him. That seemed hypocritical, coming from her.

"I assure you, I have no interest in doing anything of that nature to or with you. I am merely concerned about your health."

"Right, sure you are." Trumari was clearly not as rational as usual, at least not as rational as she usually was on duty.

"Move. Now." He told her.

"Or?"

"Or you'll be unconscious, but not comatose, when help comes."

"You threatening me?"

"No. I was making you aware of your options."

She grumbled, but complied, sitting in front of him.

"You try anything, and my elbow will make sure there are never, ever, any little Voriks."

"Understood." He said dryly, wrapping his arms around her. As a touch telepath, 'cuddling up' to someone like this, someone he had to admit he disliked, was particularly unpleasant.

Except….it wasn't. Other than the fact that she was in considerable pain, brushing up against Trumari's mind was actually very pleasant. Apparently Trumari felt the same way because she relaxed quite quickly. She let out a long sigh. This was not at all what he had expected from someone with Trumari's reputation. Despite her earlier anger at him, she was now quite nearly calm, aside from her discomfort with the physical contact, and anxiety, presumably about the crew. There was none of the aggressive sensuality he had expected, and her intense concern for their crewmates certainly was far from consistent with the self centeredness he had thought he'd find. She certainly didn't seem like the sort of person who'd lost their citizenship after a treason conviction.

"Stop that." She snapped irritably.

She noticed? "You don't have to be so surprised. Not being telepathic doesn't necessarily mean being unable to recognize telepathic contact. Anyway, I wasn't born this way. Things make it through sometimes. I'm not psi-null. I didn't show really up on the Devore's radar, but they did hassle me a bit."

She lost telepathic ability? "It was not my intention to intrude. What I perceived was so unexpected that I looked further without considering whether it was appropriate."

"Well it wasn't. I'm not snooping on you! I may not be an engineer, but hacking was a required skill in my previous employment, so I totally could!" she grumbled. "I told you I'm not what you think, why do you have to be so surprised?" She sounded aggrieved.

"It seems I have rendered a judgement of your character that may be inaccurate." He admitted.

She snorted. "You think? I may have done a few stupid things when I came aboard, but the rumor mill has grossly exaggerated them. I haven't slept with anyone since the first three months, so very very exaggerated."

"So it would seem." Vorik conceded. "Still…"

"I'm still Romulan."

"Yes." He admitted.

"I suppose I can see why you have trouble with that," she said grudgingly, "but you know, we're not all the people who hurt your brother."

Vorik stiffened. "How do you know about what happened to Taurik?" Did this have something to do with what she'd said when they'd first met? About them being even if he helped her? Something to do with how she had taunted him that day they'd last been on the holodeck together?

"Because I helped get him home. It was my last really successful mission, before my superiors decided that the same things that made me a valuable intelligence operative made me too dangerous to keep around and they left me to rot in a Cardassian prison."

If that was true then he owed her an open mind at least, but if it wasn't, she was just trying to manipulate him. Even if it was true, she was probably trying to manipulate him. Well, he could always suspend final judgement until he could ask Taurik.

"You were an intelligence officer?"

"Mhmm. I was a Romulan spy, just not 'a spy for the Romulans'." Vorik listened to the ensuing wandering summary of Trumari's career as an intelligence operative with Starfleet, and how it had ended with her capture by Cardassians on a visit to her family, and subsequent disavowal by Starfleet, and the Federation at large. She painted herself as the betrayed, rather than the traitor she'd been designated. Despite his attempts to block out her emotions, he could tell the recounting was distressing for her.

"You have a twin sister?" he asked, well aware the question was abrupt, but he felt a redirection was in order.

"Had. Not identical, like you and Taurik, though. I'm the last of my clan now, unless someone on the Empire side managed to fake being killed." He understood all too well the intensity of the pain she felt at the recollection of her sister's death, having once thought his own twin dead, and he shuddered inwardly to imagine what it would be like to lose his entire clan.

A/N: Trumari and Vorik's date gets both worse, and better :D