Disclaimer: This story and the characters I created belong to me. "Star Trek" belongs to The Powers That Be at Paramount…more's the pity.

Notes: This story was originally written August-October 2004…etc…etc.

The words that inspired this chapter? WILDS PEACE BREAST FIVE GUY

Feedback welcome!

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Sickbay...

After speaking with Captain Kirk, Dr. McCoy hit a button on the computer in his private office to close off his end of the communication. As he straightened up, he felt his muscles complaining about the stiff, unnatural posture he'd had to assume for hours while conducting his tests. McCoy was rolling his neck and shoulders around to loosen them up, and idly contemplating the feasibility of keeping a full-time masseuse on staff, when a loud wail from the main room shattered the peace of Sickbay.

Startled, McCoy twisted around to face his office door...his open office door...that led directly to Sickbay's main room...where Leendel was still abed, and probably still awake...awake enough to have heard his entire conversation with the Captain…through the door that he had neglected to close in his haste to give the results of Ensign Jed-Ghar's autopsy. McCoy cursed his thoughtlessness and ran out of his office.

As he rushed up to Leendel's biobed, McCoy was struck by her look of horror as she sat up against the pillow. One hand clutched the medical gown at her breast, while the other hand was clamped over her mouth, holding in the screams. When Leendel spotted him, her eyes went wide and she began to tremble.

"You were wrong, Doc...you were wrong. I did kill Proo; you said it yourself. The ipecac was there...I put it there...it killed him...therefore, I killed him."

"You didn't know about the hekim," McCoy protested. "You weren't trying to kill him; it was an accident."

"It doesn't matter, Doc. It doesn't matter who or what else was involved. I'm responsible, too. If I'd just held onto my temper, and those five little teaspoons of ipecac that I put into the scrapple, Proo would be alive today. Deny that, if you can," Leendel said tightly.

McCoy looked down at the bedsheets, at a sudden loss for words in the face of her pain. Leendel noted his silence and shrank back into herself, crossing her arms over her chest and pulling her knees up until they touched her elbows. She turned her head to the side, seemingly to stare at the stars through the viewport, though her thoughts were actually light-years away.

"I can see it all now, Doc," Leendel said dully. "Kicked out of Starfleet, drummed out of the guilds back home - and without my guild affiliations, the only way I'll be able to make a living is as a short-order cook at some backwater dive in the wilds of Ceti Alpha 5."

"And all alone," she continued, the bleakness of her tone sending a chill down McCoy's spine. "I'll be all alone...and rightfully so. I mean, what guy would want me now, after what I've done..." Leendel's voice trailed off and she closed her eyes.

"You'd be surprised, Leendel," McCoy said softly as he placed a hand on her shoulder, startling her into looking up into his eyes. "You'd be surprised..."

TBC…