The Face in the Mirror

Posted on Sun May 18th, 2025 @ 12:58pm by Lieutenant JG Sylorik MD

Mission: MISSION 0 - History Speaks
Location: Du'Radhzek Regional Medical Center, Vulcan
Timeline: 2388
1467 words - 2.9 OF Standard Post Measure

The shelves were nearly bare.

One box remained on the floor beside Sylorik's desk, half-filled with the last vestiges of a fifty-three-year surgical career: five years as a resident in general surgery, two as a fellow, twenty-one as an attending physician, and the last twenty-three as chief of the department.

The office itself was a serene space shaped as much by utility as by unspoken memory. The high ceiling gave the room a light stillness. Along the north wall, a broad window and sliding glass door opened onto a narrow balcony where pale Vulcan sunlight filtered through the gauze of the planet's constant heat haze.

An austere dark metallic desk sat in the center of the room. The east wall contained the office's main door flanked by sunken shelves, neatly lined with journals, data modules, and a curated collection of antique surgical instruments. The south wall bore a mirror and a small sink, surrounded by a vast emptiness where commendations, certificates of excellence and rare abstract art once hung. On the west wall, a bank of computer terminals hummed quietly above a recessed shelf cot--discreet but present, a concession to the long shifts of his former life.

He looked down and reached for a framed commendation--an award given after the Je'karr Earthquake Response--laying it gently atop the others. The glass clinked softly against a stack of service certificates, clinical citations, and two preserved surgical field journals. He paused a moment, hand resting on the frame, and let the memory wash over him. The taste of red dust in the air. The silence that followed after a collapsed building was cleared. The pulse of a young Vulcan girl beneath his hands--alive against all odds.

His hand trembled.

At first, he didn't notice. Then the tremor intensified, making his fingers shiver like plucked wires. He set the next frame down more heavily than intended and drew in a measured breath.

"Pran t'nash-veh," he murmured. Calm, from within.

He closed his eyes and began a breathing technique learned during his residency. Structured breathwork, anchored to visual recall: the slow bloom of the Le-matya orchid in his mother's garden. The way each petal folded precisely, in its own time.

It didn't help. The tremor traveled upward, wrist to elbow, until even holding his arm steady became an act of will. His breathing broke. A surge of heat flooded his chest--tight, fast, and nauseating.

He turned away from the desk with uncharacteristic stiffness.

A worn satchel lay against the back wall, already half-packed. He knelt beside it, fingers unbuckling the flap, and reached in until his hand closed around a familiar object: a small, rectangular metal case. The casing clicked softly as he pulled it free--but in his haste, in the jagged twitch of his fingers, he lost grip.

The case clattered to the carpeted floor. Dozens of slim vials spilled across the it, rolling outward in tiny clinking arcs of glass and silver.

He stared at them.

Then he bent forward, both hands pressing into the cool floor, and closed his eyes again.

Laughter burst from him--sharp, uninvited and ragged. His mouth twisted into something like a grin and he clenched his teeth to silence. But his shoulders trembled, and then his chest, and then the laughter gave way to a sob, and then another.

Emotion swelled in him like a tidal tear: rage, sorrow, helplessness, shame. He balled his hands into fists and struck the floor once--not hard, not loud, but firmly, as if to anchor himself in the moment.

"Structure," he whispered, rocking forward.

"Logic." A ragged breath.

"Function." Another.

"Control." A slower breath.

"I am in control."

It became a mantra, steadier each time. His breathing evened. His jaw loosened. He opened his eyes and began to gather the vials, one by one, aligning them with precision in the metallic case.

The final vial lingered in his hand. It caught the morning light: a dark copper, syrupy liquid. His thumb traced the etched serial number--familiar and unambiguous. He studied it as if it might provide answers. Then he returned it to its compartment and latched the case shut.

Thankfully, he would not require a dose.

Sylorik set the case gently in the bag and stood. His undershirt clung to his back and sweat had beaded along his brow. Crossing to the small sink near the office's side wall, he turned on the water and leaned forward, bracing himself on the edge.

Cool water washed over his face, down the back of his neck. He let it flow for several seconds before shutting it off and dabbing a towel across his dark skin. When he raised his eyes to the mirror, the man who stared back seemed unchanged. Austere. Quite composed.

But the question came anyway.

Why did this happen to me?

It wasn't self-pity. It was a genuine inquiry. He had done all that logic required. He had acted within ethical and medical boundaries. He had followed protocol. And still...

Still.

He stared into his own eyes, searching for clarity.

Why not me?

There was no answer. Just the rustle of Vulcan wind through his open office window. The faint smell of dust combined with sterilizing agents. And the echo of a surgical theatre left behind.

The door chime sounded.

Sylorik turned his head. "Enter."

The door opened, and his mother stepped through.

T'Raya stood in the doorway, hands clasped behind her back, an impeccable posture. Though smaller in stature than her son, she carried herself with a natural authority born of decades in the operating theatre and the corridors of Vulcan's medical elite. Her silver-streaked hair was pinned in a low, flawless coil, and the sharp lines of her face were very much like Sylorik's.

She had not aged much in the last twenty years. Her robes crisp. Her bearing formidable. She entered the room slowly, as if surveying a site of structural damage.

"You are still here," she said quietly. "I thought perhaps you had already departed."

"I was finalizing some documentation."

She looked at the half-packed box, at the emptied shelves, and then finally him. "This decision is illogical, my son."

Sylorik turned away, returning to his desk. "The administrative transition has already been accepted."

"Yes," she said, her voice tightening. "But it is not explained."

He paused, not meeting her eyes.

"I am transferring to pathology," he said.

T'Raya's brow furrowed, ever so slightly. "You are the most decorated surgical mind of your generation. You rebuilt the triage algorithms used across three provinces. You trained eleven current department heads. Why would you abandon that for slide decks and tissue samples?"

He folded his hands behind his back. His voice was calm, flat. "Because I am still of service there. In a capacity that does not... demand more than I can now give."

T'Raya stepped closer to her son, eyes searching him for truth.

"And what precisely is it you can no longer give?"

There was a long pause while Sylorik's head dropped and he averted his eyes from her.

She took another step forward and placed a hand on his shoulder. Her tone dropped. "You will not speak of it. Not to your colleagues. Not to your father. Not to me. You expect us to accept your withdrawal without cause."

"Acceptance is not required." Sylorik's eyes carefully met his mother's and she could now see there was something behind them. She had never seen this emotion reflected in any of her children. She saw shame.

She reached toward him with another hand and placed it under his jaw, preventing Sylorik from averting his gaze.

"It is required of me. I am your mother."

That word hung in the air--softer than the rest, but more cutting.

Sylorik breathed slowly, his gaze inscrutable. "My philosophy has not changed. I exist to serve the needs of others. That is the structure by which I continue."

"Structure," she repeated. "But no clarity. No healing. That is not Vulcan."

Sylorik said nothing. She was correct on all counts.

T'Raya's face did not betray sadness, but there was a distance in her eyes now. Not disappointment--something quieter. A recognition that she would not reach him. Not today, anyway.

She withdraw her hands from her son's face and shoulder slowly and gracefully, and took a step backward. "Then I will not detain you."

Sylorik watched his mother lower her eyes, turn, and leave through the door.

He stood alone, the silence gathering again around him. He looked at the empty walls. The certificates in their box. The case in the satchel.

Is there logic in any of this? he wondered.

He didn't know.

After another long moment, he returned to packing.

* * *

Lieutenant JG Sylorik, MD
Surgeon / Doctor
USS Elysium