Arithmetic of Souls, Part III
Posted on Tue Nov 11th, 2025 @ 12:49pm by Lieutenant James Constantine & Lieutenant Ezra Van Wijnbergen
Edited on on Mon Nov 17th, 2025 @ 5:36am
1,575 words; about a 8 minute read
Mission:
Episode 2 - The Sins of History
Location: The Sidebar Lounge - Deck 5 - USS Artemis
Timeline: MD017, 2145 hrs
"I studied law," he began simply, "and for a while I thought that's where I belonged."
He gestured to Constantine for the bottle. "It wasn't where I started. I attended the University of Yalnos on Betazed first. Studied xenopsychology and sociology. I liked learning how people worked, what made them break and what made them mend. Starfleet Academy seemed like the logical next step. I studied Federation Law and jurisprudence. I thought maybe law school might be interesting--but I knew I could never stand and speak in a courtroom. So I did my MJ at the Starfleet Legal Academy. Three years there, reading statutes, writing arguments, watching professors claw at each other over a comma." He smiled faintly. "It was a good education in the limits of idealism."
"A few years later, I went back to Earth to lead a trauma unit at Starfleet Medical and earned another degree. I spent the last leg of my career doing a lot of refugee work. Romulans, mostly."
Constantine nodded lightly as he spoke about his learned past. The guy wasn't just smart, he was also able to absorb knowledge like a sponge...the two were very different gifts. And then there was patience...Constantine wasn't sure he'd be patient enough to stay the course for as long as Ezra had in his training. But Ezra's biggest strength was probably compassion. Some would call it a weakness, but Constantine wasn't quite that cynical. Not yet. "That must have taken its toll."
Ezra took a another large pull from the bottle before passing it back to James. He liked the way the cool glass seemed to sweat against his hands. The implication that his work must have taken a toll was an easy answer. Yes. He definitely could've said yes--that there were night he couldn't sleep, that he still remembered some of the Romulan children--their faces, their voices. They were still very present, but he'd learned to dance with it and then let it move on--like a Viennese waltz mixer.
"You've likely seen your share too," he said. "Investigations like yours don't always end neatly. There are always things that don't fit cleanly." He met Constantine's eyes. "What was one of the cases that stuck with you?"
Constantine's smile weakened at the question. He had become so used to deflecting questions in the past, but it was somehow harder now. Perhaps it was because as an intelligence officer, he had always felt like he was playing the part of a legend, even when he wasn't. But here? He was just himself. "More than you know," he finally replied, softly. "I used to be an Intelligence field agent, so..." it still felt so wrong to say that out loud, but the more he said it, the more he ensured there was no way back. It didn't stop his heart thumping a little with saying it though, or his mouth becoming dry.
Ezra casually passed the bottle back to James. "Hey," he said with kindness. "You don't have to."
James gave a weak, half smile at that, taking the bottle to sip, using the moment to gather himself. "My first case as a Criminal Investigator was a hell of a learning curve. Working it out in the open, for all to see. No blackouts, no grey areas. All...above board and to the letter. And then, the trial...going back over it all, having it openly picked apart. Watching the outcome in real time with the people it had touched there. I'd never felt so exposed."
Ezra listened carefully, nodding but refusing to interrupt with a question or affirmation. His eyes stayed fixed on James while the aftertaste of the liquor overpowered his mouth. He knew the man had more to say.
James let out a quiet, bitter breath through his nose. "There was a girl," he said eventually. "Fifteen. Caught up in something she didn't understand. Half of them never do. She'd been used, lied to, manipulated. Didn't even realise how serious half of what she was doing was.”
James glanced at Ezra briefly, then away again. "I figured it out too late. She survived, but barely. The man who'd groomed her got off lighter than he should have, and I had to stand there while his lawyer shredded the evidence. Picked apart every step I'd taken, every choice I made, to make him seem like less of a monster. I kept thinking... if I'd been faster. If I'd seen the pattern earlier. Maybe she wouldn't have ended up in that courtroom at all. They told me it was a win. That we saved lives. But it didn't feel like it."
The half-empty bottle was passed back to Ezra and he turned it in his hands for a moment before answering. The silence was not uncomfortable between them--it was the sort of quiet which enabled them to breathe and find shape to their words.
"You did what you could," Ezra said finally. "And that's the truth no one tells you about this work. You can do everything right--follow procedure, build the case, hold their hand when they can barely stand--and still, there's always a chance it ends poorly. With someone walking free who shouldn't and someone else left to suffer."
He took a drink from the bottle and winced a little, leaning across to pass it back to James. "When I work with survivors, I tell them the same thing I tell myself--what happens in a courtroom isn't justice. It's process." Ezra shrugged, beginning to feel the effects of the alcohol. "Sometimes there's justice in the process. Sometimes not."
Ezra paused again and rolled his shoulders. "You said she survived. That matters. You were there for her even when the system wasn't."
James nodded with a soft sigh, accepting his words though as he drunk deeply. He closed his eyes for a moment, putting the memories neatly away in the box they'd come from. "I guess that's why people like you are here," he said quietly.
Ezra watched James, his elbows resting on the back of the chair which was in front of him. His eyes were half-lidded as if he were staring at some point light years away in space.
"You ever see a dam fail?" he asked. "I have. Not a big one, mind you. This was several years ago when I served aboard the Talleyrand. We were dispatched to this planet to mediate a dispute between two interests in a mining consortium"--he waved away the memory--"but they had built this mining reservoir long before the Federation had even cared about the place. The thing had been leaking for decades. People there just... learned to live with it. You'd walk by and see the water bleeding through--thin lines running down the reinforced concrete in more than a dozen places. I watched our engineering team assess that dam and tell the local government it was unsafe. But everyone in that little community said the same thing: 'It's fine. It's always been like that.'
He rubbed his chin with his thumb for a moment, recalling the memory. "The next winter, the temperature dropped... and dropped. It was one of their coldest winters on record--going from daytime highs of five, six, seven... and then all the way down at a rate of twenty degrees per hour. Ice got into the cracks. The pressure built-up. And one night--they say it didn't even sound like much, just a muffled crack, like a boot pressing down into dry snow. But by morning that community was gone. The valley was gone. Residential structures flattened or washed away. They say the town magistrate's home was found twenty-six kilometers away."
Ezra fell silent a moment. "James," he went on, softly. "This is what people do. They build walls to hold everything in. Doesn't matter if it's pain, guilt, or fear. Then they point to the leaks and say, 'it's fine'. They don't bother to patch them. They don't release the pressure. Until one day, something small gives way--could be a word, a memory, even something as small as a scent--and everything they've tried to hold back rushes through and takes out everything in its path."
He raised his eyes and met Constantine's. "It's why we all have to talk."
James remained silent as he studied the stars for a moment, letting the words sink in. It was different here, he knew that. A lifetime of plastering over the cracks in order to just keep going was hard to shake. It didn't mean that he didn't understand that he was the one at fault though. He nodded slowly as he looked back to Ezra, before motioning to the bottle. "Or drink," he replied softly, but there was a conceding smile on his lips that showed he understood and was grateful for his wisdom.
A Joint Post By
Lieutenant James Constantine
Criminal Investigations Officer, USS Artemis
Starfleet Criminal Investigations Unit
Lieutenant Ezra Van Wijnbergen
Victim Advocate Counselor, USS Artemis
Starfleet Criminal Investigations Unit
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