He realized only after an hour that he was running his fingernails up and down his shirt. Gaeta put his hand down on the table. Dr. Cottle was adamant about the medication. He wasn't so in love with it. He couldn't focus on anything, he couldn't seem to feel anything. Except when he spent hours rubbing his fingernails on his shirt. Or rolling a felt tip back and forth on his desk. He felt off balance, and tired, and completely incapable of thinking of much beyond keeping his eyes open.
The medication made him crazy, in other words. In theory, he was supposed to be filling out Dr. Cottle's reports for the Admiral, helping out with the organization in sick bay. In reality, he was pretty certain that he had spent the last few hours rolling a pen across the desk, rubbing his hands on his shirt, and folding the reports into clever animal shapes.
He assumed he had been the one to create the little herd of paper cows, anyway. And that was no way to fill out reports, but he suspected it was busy work to begin with. He rested his head on his hands.
" Hey, are you sleeping, sir?" He looked up with a start. Petty Officer Anastasia Dualla was staring at him, her expression both concerned and amused.
He tried to shake it off. He couldn't. Finally he said, "What?"
She took a seat in the chair that was beside the desk he was sitting at, and put her hands on top of his. " Dr. Cottle said you could have visitors, sir. How are you feeling?" Her expression was loaded with concern.
It made him angry, to be perfectly honest. He liked Dee. She was a friend. He was putting himself through hell, had been putting himself through hell for months, in order to protect his friends. And the thanks he got? They thought he was crazy. He was willing to sacrifice himself and that had led to this. " I feel awful. No one believes me, and I am on some sort of anti-psychotic medication that makes everything feel numb. That's how I am feeling."
" Admiral Adama let us all see the test results, sir." Dualla managed to look both concerned and motherly. " He didn't want anyone to try and hurt you. I know you think you're a Cylon, but you've been tested twice now. And I can't believe that the man that fought so hard to save the fleet from the Cylons is one."
She wasn't going to get it, he realized suddenly. Humans were sentimental, and that was their downfall. The admiral had been sentimental about killing him, and certainly was being sentimental over the new Sharon. Dualla was being sentimental over him. She couldn't conceive that the same man who worked along side her often had to mentally bite down against orders that would kill her.
And he was too disorientated to try and argue with her. " So what is everyone else saying?"
"Seriously? That you've been under a lot of pressure. That they're worried about you. That they're glad that you aren't a Cylon and they hope you don't keep trying to hurt yourself." She squeezed his hand. " A lot of people care about you and would miss you, Felix. And I'm one of them."
He wondered if she would care quite so much if she knew he could leap across the desk and break her neck in an instant.
Cottle looked at Baltar with surprise. " You want to what?"
The dark haired scientist twitched. " I want to borrow Lt. Gaeta."
" Dr. Baltar," Cottle didn't even know where to begin. " Lt. Gaeta is not in any condition to assist you with… whatever it is that you do. He's medicated and under observation." And completely useless while on medication, but he assumed that would be obvious once Baltar saw the paper animal menagerie.
It was odd for Baltar to come nosing around anyway. With a day to think about it, Cottle still hadn't come up with a plausible reason for Baltar to falsify Gaeta's test. It wasn't logical. He didn't consider himself to be on top of the ship gossip, but he had the impression that Gaeta had been a barely tolerated imposition on the mighty Dr. Baltar. He wanted to believe that Baltar had lied, because he despised the man and because it was more palatable to him than having to diagnose a young officer with incurable mental illness.
He wasn't being a good doctor if he ignored the obvious. The obvious answer, even with Baltar's shifty behavior and Gaeta's ability to bend steel, was that Gaeta was schizophrenic and delusional. Then again, he thought as he lit a cigarette, it was damn odd of Baltar to even visit Gaeta, let alone want to take the man to his lab full of potentially dangerous objects. If Baltar had falsified the test, then he was taking a big risk wanting to be alone with a Cylon that was pretty mad at him. Baltar was not a brave man, not in the slightest. It would be interesting to know what he was up to.
" All right, but there's conditions. Number one, he wears a life signs monitor. If he takes it off or does anything that significantly alters his vital signs, an alarm goes off. If the alarm goes off, I call in the marines. Number two, you only get him for an hour today. If he isn't a mess when you bring him back, I will consider longer time periods. Number three, you don't leave him alone. He's on medication to control the suicidal tendencies, but it's not fool proof." He paused. " Still think you need him for chores?"
Baltar crossed his arms. " Did it ever occur to you, Dr. Cottle, that I thought it would help him? To get him out of this… madhouse you call a sickbay just for a little while? That he might like a change of scenery from the brig and the sickbay?" Baltar's voice took on an aggrieved note. " You know, I may seem a little cold at times, but I genuinely like the lieutenant. It would be an utter shame if he was not able to recover from… from this lapse."
It fairly oozed sincerity. He almost bought it. Almost. The problem was that Baltar was almost too anxious to get a yes for his little field trip for Gaeta. Getting Gaeta out of sickbay to help with some experiment was an excuse to be alone with Gaeta. Baltar wanted to be alone with Gaeta for some reason.
And that was just a little too odd for his taste. The Cylon theory suddenly looked much more realistic. He was suddenly intensely curious to know what Baltar was up to. " All right, but all of my conditions stand."
" That's perfectly reasonable," Baltar said, his tone suggesting it was anything but.
Cottle walked back to his office, where he had deposited Gaeta earlier in the day. It was open, and there was a window and he had taken out anything that could be considered sharp. He didn't think Gaeta was suicidal, and he was veering back to the Cylon theory, but it paid to be careful.
Like with the anti-psychotic meds, which were clearly not helping. He was going to switch Felix over to some anti-anxiety drugs he had once the anti-psychotics wore off. He couldn't not medicate Gaeta, not two days after a suicide attempt and admission of severe delusions, but the anti-psychotics were too powerful. And if Gaeta was a Cylon, it stood to reason that he might be a little anxious.
The lieutenant was filling out forms at the desk. That was a step up from earlier when he had been playing some sort of pen rolling game. That was a plus. Gaeta would be reasonably alert for the field trip. " Get up. I've arranged a play date for you with the other ship crazy."
"What?" Gaeta stood up. " A play date?"
" With Dr. Baltar. He thinks you need more stimulating surroundings." He quickly explained the terms of the visit. " So don't do anything crazy. We'll have a little therapy session when he brings you back."