Let the death drum break the slump, before the once young braves succumb!
Posted on Fri Nov 26th, 2021 @ 6:15am by
Edited on on Fri Nov 26th, 2021 @ 6:20am
Mission:
MISSION 0 - History Speaks
Location: Starfleet Academy, San Francisco, California
Timeline: 2392
1132 words - 2.3 OF Standard Post Measure
ON:
"I have received my orders," Rael told his roommate. The PADD was clutched between his fingers, and he regarded it neutrally.
"You take care," Aris murmured with a fond smile. He squeezed Rael's shoulder, his pitch black eyes warm and fathomless.
Rael wasn't like other Vulcans-he had a feeling. Where Aris struggled to find his footing with others of Rael's species, he was the solid root systems of an Aspen tree. Ancient. The warmth of ground in the sun. Light through leaves. Aris found him singularly comforting, and would miss him when he was gone.
"Of course." The Vulcan bowed his head. "I wouldn't take anything else."
"You need to work on your sense of humor, friend." He didn't say don't leave. Their relationship had never been that way-Aris was quintessentially Betazoid, relishing each connection in its infinite uniqueness for what it was and allowing it to pass untethered when the time came for the rope to slack. But always, the potential to lead back.
"I should think that it would be evident: as a Vulcan I could not possibly ascribe-"
Aris lifted a finger. "Oh, shush. The Mathletes won't know what to do without you."
"They'll need to rely on Savok."
"Savok is an idiot wrapped inside a moron," he rolled his eyes. "You've spoiled me."
"You are spoiled," Rael agreed as he picked up a coffee from the replicator and sipped it carefully. He leaned against the counter. He was all lithe lines and long limbs strewn casually-not the typical posture of a Vulcan.
"Rude!" Aris laughed. "When do you leave?"
"Next week. I am to stand detached from my current duties and station and report to the USS Turing. My app packet is on hold for Longview."
"That sounds-" the Betazoid grimaced. "That sounds heavy, Ray."
Softly: "I hadn't expected to receive the appointment."
Aris still had two years left-he was headed to Command school on a double Track. It was unlikely that they would see one another again. Impulsively, he reached out and enveloped Rael in a hug. "You'll do excellent, Ray. I believe in you."
"Your confidence inspires me."
"It better. Come, let's get some lunch. On me, Freud."
"Aris-"
"How do you feel about that?"
"Aris."
"If it isn't one thing, it's your mother."
Rael shook his head. "I have many regrets."
"Don't front. You love me." Aris threw an arm around his ornery Vulcan friend's shoulders and led him out the door.
An age-old Starfleet joke. "How do you know if an Orion vessel is a merchant ship or a pirate ship? If it's got phasers, it's a pirate ship." The first time he'd heard that one was in his interstellar diplomacy class at the Academy, and his stylus pressed so hard into his touchPADD screen that it swirled up brilliant rainbow globules, streaking permanently into the carbon fibers.
What once was normal has since become abnormal. It made you distinct. One. One alone. Dr. Calnin told him, "it's a fucking stupid joke." It eased the tension-the man was pushing 65 and still cursed like a sailor, and didn't ask him how he felt about that-as if it wasn't plainly, disturbingly obvious.
Traditional individual therapy wasn't effective for him and ultimately Rael didn't need a therapist. What he needed was friendship, and humanity, and dignity, and compassion. And it came in rivulets. Slow, sure, steady. Kelan visited him and stole his hat right off his head, waving it until he tripped backward into the old fountain in front of Talar Hall. Served him right!
They caught fish right out of the sea and grilled them over an open flame at Twin Peaks Park, and Kelan told him about the pretty girl he was slated to marry. "She's dull," he muttered. "But she'll make a good wife."
Aris came later, haughty and pompous and fresh off the boat from Rixx of all places. It doesn't matter. He held value as an individual, as a whole sentient being, and they helped one another grow. They lost themselves in the dark and the light, the brilliance of v'kresh and glitter-soaked wonder and Animus's-the Orion bar attached to the consulate.
The pounding music beneath their feet, pushing them steadily forward on the long and winding road.
The Ʃar Pipeline wasn't a real place. You couldn't visit it. You couldn't touch it. Nor run your hands along the walls catching your fingers in the cracks and eddies. Yet, he felt its presence as keenly as though it were a living being made of flesh. An intertwined nervous system of routes and crews along their journeys-oxygen sifted through hemoglobin, on the way to the Heart.
The Khadri had blood flowing through its walls. It moved with the joy of family. The engines sang with the praises of Zeritha the Defiant. She who spared him smiles and allowed him to purchase her cookies; with a kiss. The Khadri was connected to the nervous system of the Rāpla Underground-it was the afferent sensory fibers that traveled into the pulsing synaptic network of the Orion Syndicate.
It was real to him.
An Oru had no place in the universe but to the single confined world in which they were born. No loyalties or allegiance but to the caj-the family-who take them in. Legends said that an Oru was the blood-not flesh, but metal. They emerged from the Shimmering Veils of Heaven as perfectly formed infants. Blank slates to be written. An Oru was born from the very mother-fabric of a starship.
They were nothing but the name given.
He could never say that he was proud of it-it just highlighted his place in the order of things so skillfully that he could not bear to part with it. Lightfooted. Pressed into his skin just like the brand at the back of his neck. The tattoos burned their way down his spine. Curled ink blots that spread out Trader creole characters. Eventually he was told they could be removed.
The Ʃar Pipeline wasn't a real place. Lightfooted wasn't a real name. The Khadri wasn't a real mother. The brands would stay with him forever-the tattoos were his choice. One choice, plucked out from a vibrating tapestry, billions of dead-stars winking like glass eyes in the endless expanse.
Your life, your choice.
OFF:
Cadet Senior Grade Rael
Starfleet Medical Academy
San Francisco, California
Cadet Senior Grade Aris Razur
Starfleet Academy Tier II
San Francisco, California
