In the Void

Posted on Tue Jul 21st, 2026 @ 4:59pm by Lieutenant Anna Esquivias

Mission: Interlude
Location: Anna's Quarters
608 words - 1.2 OF Standard Post Measure

Anna Esquivias stood in her quarters and stared out into the endless void of space. It seemed quiet, though soon they would again streak by at warp speeds. Her arms were crossed in front of her. She wasn’t exactly hugging herself. She looked less anxious than impatient, though appearances were deceiving. Not that anyone could see her now. She wasn’t in her uniform. Instead, she wore a simple but elegant blue robe that came down to just above her knees. She was alone for once. She had been spending more and more nights with N’vok. It had become a warm, cozy place for her. Tonight, however, she was alone. She had needed a little time with her thoughts. Sleep had come easily the previous week. Now every quiet moment seemed to drift back toward the same memories. It had reminded her entirely too much of what she had already experienced with the slavers. It wasn’t quite the same thing. Whatever else she could say about the Lonians, it hadn’t been quite the same thing. It didn’t have to be to give her flashbacks. She remembered being so completely overpowered. She remembered the helplessness. She remembered…she remembered all of it.

Anna sighed. Going over the same thoughts again and again wasn’t going to help her find any kind of peace. If anything, it just kept the thoughts alive. But she couldn’t just ignore it. Was it even healthy to just shove things to the back of her mind? Maybe she should have gone to N’vok’s. Maybe she should talk to a counselor. She didn’t exactly want to. She knew there was no shame in it. It was actually encouraged. But she felt embarrassed. She knew she shouldn’t but she did. She turned and walked away from the window. She just needed something else to think about. “Computer,” she said, “Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, The Solitary Cyclist.” She drifted across the room, the robe flowing around the gentle curve of her frame. She absently sat down on the edge of the bed, pulling the robe tighter, as a screen came alive with the ancient, two-dimensional production. The light played across olive skin and dark wavy hair. She leaned back, eyes on the screen, allowing herself to be distracted for a moment. How would Jeremy Brett have felt to know a woman, only half-human, would be watching him in a distant galaxy four hundred years later? She liked this one. She had seen it before, of course. She wasn’t really working the mystery. She liked that they actually let Holmes be wrong about a small point. She liked how Holmes had firmly stated a forced marriage was no marriage at all, even as all the other characters had attached legitimacy to a fraudulent priest saying the magic words to a gagged woman. She distantly wondered whether that was why the story still appealed to her after the horror of the slavers and the angst of the trial. Holmes's refusal to accept a forced marriage as real, the comfort of imperfect heroes, there was maybe a connection there. But that rang false. She had liked it when she was young because it had broken the chain of fictional logic that so many stories played straight. She liked it now because it was a comfortable memory. She tried to focus. She found she couldn’t. It wasn’t too late to contact N’vok but she found herself lying down, almost like she was drifting. When she woke up, it was morning and she felt strangely out of it.