I know it's been a long time since I've posted a story due to a great deal of stuff happening in real life of which the most recent and most traumatic thing was my hospitalization due to congestive heart failure. One of the things I learned most from my recent experience is that there is nothing more important than family, loved ones, and friends--and my virtual friends are very much my friends and all of you here are my friends. Thankfully, I'm also once again feeling the desire to write. Forgive me for taking it slow initially, and I promise I will get back to "Blood Cries" and "Aliens", but to get back into the swing, I thought I would do a "Perseus" short story--a mystery. So...here's a brief snippet...I hope you like it.
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P’jem Monastery
“Gods!” An attractive blue-skinned Andorian woman exclaimed as she carefully reread the Vulcan text lying open on her desk making sure that she had translated the obscure dialect correctly. Shaking her head, she sighed as she closed the book and began a most ominous and foreboding log entry. “I’ve found what the humans call the ‘smoking gun’ in these ‘lost diaries’ of T’Pol that a friend loaned to me. T’Pol was very careful. Besides using a pre-Surak dialect, she wrote in a code that took me over three years to decipher. I suspect that she must have had help from Hoshi Sato in developing the code. The only way I managed to even begin cracking it was that I picked up on certain human and other elements that would not have appeared in any Vulcan code of the period, but that Sato would have been able to have easily put together. What’s in this diary...it’s hot. Once it gets out...” The Andorian historian paused as a light flashed on her computer monitor. “They know...” she exclaimed, a note of panic in her voice, “I have to move...they’re coming for me and the diary. I know a place where I can hide the diary and my notes, but I have to get out of here and get help and there’s only one person I can truly trust—but will she still be willing to help me after all this time? I hope so. Gods I hope so! End recording.”
Taking the recording rod from its slot and quickly gathering the diary and her notes, Larissa threw together the few clothes she possessed into a valise. Then, addressing the computer, she commanded, “Computer...transmit the following message to Lieutenant T’Pren on board USS Pegasus from Larissa sh’ Lannonshin. Plastering a nervous smile on her face, Larissa spoke, “Hey baby...”
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“Thanks for the workout, Samuels!” Lieutenant T’Pren remarked cheerfully to the young human who had agreed to serve as her sparring partner as she wiped the sweat off her arms and legs with a towel.
“Don’t mention it, sir!” Crewman Richard Samuels replied as he joined his superior officer in cooling down. “I was getting rusty. I hadn’t been in a bout since Basic.”
“Well...” The young Vulcan woman answered back, flashing a friendly grin taking the newly arrived security crewman aback. Noticing the surprised look on the young crewman’s face, T’Pren’s grin grew wider as she redid her ponytail, “Never seen a Vulcan smile before, have you? I’ve gotta admit, most of us don’t. Anyway, to get back to what we were talking about...you showed me a couple of moves I hadn’t seen before.”
“Oh...” Samuels blushed, “I picked those up from a friend of mine who’s into this Bolian martial art—I can’t remember right off hand what it’s called. It involves making use of a lot of feints to lull your opponent into making a reckless move and then countering by striking at the exposed weak-point.
“I see...” A now more thoughtful T’Pren replied. “Maybe you could teach those moves to the rest of the team?”
Pleased at his superior’s praise, the young enlisted rating beamed, “I’d love to, sir.”
“Great!” T’Pren smiled back. “I’ll get with you and your division leader and we’ll set up a schedule.” Then, catching a whiff of her aroma, the young Vulcan woman blushed a delicate shade of green, “Don’t know about you, but I’m going to hit the showers—I positively reek. Thanks again for the workout!” She called out again as she walked away.
Watching the retreating form of the Vulcan security chief wearing her skin-tight gym togs, the young man sighed longingly.
“Forget about her, Samuels.” A female voice playfully teased, “No way you’re ever going to get her interested in someone like you.”
“Why?” Samuels retorted, “She got a problem with getting involved with lower ranks?”
“No...” The woman chuckled, “It’s not your rank.”
“Then what is the problem?” Samuels bit back, his frustration growing as T’Pren disappeared behind the sliding door.
“It’s your gender.” The woman responded, her voice tone now a bit more sympathetic. “She’s only interested in girls. Preferably, from what I’ve heard in the gossip mill, blue skinned and with white hair and antennae...”
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Stripping off her gym togs the moment the door to her quarters slid shut behind her, T’Pren noticed the blinking light on her desk indicating a stored subspace message. Internally debating as to whether to check the message out now or wait until after she had finished her sonic shower, the young Vulcan, after getting yet another whiff of her body odor from her armpits, decided that hygiene couldn’t wait, “Shower now...message later.” Emerging a short time later from her shower, the security chief, now clad in a white terry-cloth bathrobe, began brushing back her long, luxurious auburn hair as she sat down at the desk. “Computer...” she commanded in between brush strokes, “...play messages.”
As a familiar and long-missed face appeared on her viewscreen, T’Pren gasped in pleased astonishment, “Larissa!” Her pleasure quickly turned to concern though as the perceptive Vulcan at once picked up on the worried look on her lover’s face.
“Hey baby...I know it’s been a while...too long...” the smile that had been on the Andorian woman’s lips turned down into a frown as she continued to speak, “...but with everything going on...the war and all...I guess we got kind of separated. I wouldn’t blame you if you cut me off right now, love, but I hope you’ll at least listen to the rest of this message first—it’s important—as in ‘lives—my own especially—on the line’ important.” Pausing to take a breath, the lovely historian brushed back a stray lock of white hair before continuing. “To make a long story short, after the war, I continued my research into pre-Romulan War Vulcan history—you know the stuff I was working on dealing with the return of Syranists to power and T’Pol and Tucker’s role and possible tie-ins to the Terra Prime movement and all. Well...” The young Andorian glanced nervously to her side before continuing, “I found something. Something big. Something I don’t think I was supposed to find. And it was out there all the time—all someone had to do was look hard enough for it. If...when...” she stated definitively, her eyes now displaying her Andorian warrior heritage, “...this gets out—a lot of people—I mean a lot—are going to get extremely pissed off. T’Pren...” her frown deepening as she saw the look of fear on her lover’s face, T’Pren leaned forward towards the monitor, watching and listening with even greater intensity. “...I need to see you. You can find me on Vulcan at the Valaran Hotel...suite 4314. Please...please...come. I’m scared, honey. Really scared.”
Exhaling deeply as her old girlfriend’s image vanished from the monitor, T’Pren, springing to her feet, quickly donned her uniform as she tapped her comm badge. “T’Pren to Captain Hobson. Sir...may I see you for a few moments at your earliest convenience?”
His thoughts concentrated on the Fu’Puk after-action report sitting before him on his desk, the fastidious commanding officer of the Perseus, quickly detecting the urgent timber in his security chief’s request responded in his usual quiet, patrician, voice. “Of course, Lieutenant. Would now be a sufficiently good time?”
“Yes, Sir. Thank you, Sir.” The young Vulcan responded, heaving a sigh of relief as she took a recording of the message along with her. “I’m on my way.”
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GHOSTS
“Gods!” An attractive blue-skinned Andorian woman exclaimed as she carefully reread the Vulcan text lying open on her desk making sure that she had translated the obscure dialect correctly. Shaking her head, she sighed as she closed the book and began a most ominous and foreboding log entry. “I’ve found what the humans call the ‘smoking gun’ in these ‘lost diaries’ of T’Pol that a friend loaned to me. T’Pol was very careful. Besides using a pre-Surak dialect, she wrote in a code that took me over three years to decipher. I suspect that she must have had help from Hoshi Sato in developing the code. The only way I managed to even begin cracking it was that I picked up on certain human and other elements that would not have appeared in any Vulcan code of the period, but that Sato would have been able to have easily put together. What’s in this diary...it’s hot. Once it gets out...” The Andorian historian paused as a light flashed on her computer monitor. “They know...” she exclaimed, a note of panic in her voice, “I have to move...they’re coming for me and the diary. I know a place where I can hide the diary and my notes, but I have to get out of here and get help and there’s only one person I can truly trust—but will she still be willing to help me after all this time? I hope so. Gods I hope so! End recording.”
Taking the recording rod from its slot and quickly gathering the diary and her notes, Larissa threw together the few clothes she possessed into a valise. Then, addressing the computer, she commanded, “Computer...transmit the following message to Lieutenant T’Pren on board USS Pegasus from Larissa sh’ Lannonshin. Plastering a nervous smile on her face, Larissa spoke, “Hey baby...”
*****************************************************************************
“Thanks for the workout, Samuels!” Lieutenant T’Pren remarked cheerfully to the young human who had agreed to serve as her sparring partner as she wiped the sweat off her arms and legs with a towel.
“Don’t mention it, sir!” Crewman Richard Samuels replied as he joined his superior officer in cooling down. “I was getting rusty. I hadn’t been in a bout since Basic.”
“Well...” The young Vulcan woman answered back, flashing a friendly grin taking the newly arrived security crewman aback. Noticing the surprised look on the young crewman’s face, T’Pren’s grin grew wider as she redid her ponytail, “Never seen a Vulcan smile before, have you? I’ve gotta admit, most of us don’t. Anyway, to get back to what we were talking about...you showed me a couple of moves I hadn’t seen before.”
“Oh...” Samuels blushed, “I picked those up from a friend of mine who’s into this Bolian martial art—I can’t remember right off hand what it’s called. It involves making use of a lot of feints to lull your opponent into making a reckless move and then countering by striking at the exposed weak-point.
“I see...” A now more thoughtful T’Pren replied. “Maybe you could teach those moves to the rest of the team?”
Pleased at his superior’s praise, the young enlisted rating beamed, “I’d love to, sir.”
“Great!” T’Pren smiled back. “I’ll get with you and your division leader and we’ll set up a schedule.” Then, catching a whiff of her aroma, the young Vulcan woman blushed a delicate shade of green, “Don’t know about you, but I’m going to hit the showers—I positively reek. Thanks again for the workout!” She called out again as she walked away.
Watching the retreating form of the Vulcan security chief wearing her skin-tight gym togs, the young man sighed longingly.
“Forget about her, Samuels.” A female voice playfully teased, “No way you’re ever going to get her interested in someone like you.”
“Why?” Samuels retorted, “She got a problem with getting involved with lower ranks?”
“No...” The woman chuckled, “It’s not your rank.”
“Then what is the problem?” Samuels bit back, his frustration growing as T’Pren disappeared behind the sliding door.
“It’s your gender.” The woman responded, her voice tone now a bit more sympathetic. “She’s only interested in girls. Preferably, from what I’ve heard in the gossip mill, blue skinned and with white hair and antennae...”
***************************************************************************
Stripping off her gym togs the moment the door to her quarters slid shut behind her, T’Pren noticed the blinking light on her desk indicating a stored subspace message. Internally debating as to whether to check the message out now or wait until after she had finished her sonic shower, the young Vulcan, after getting yet another whiff of her body odor from her armpits, decided that hygiene couldn’t wait, “Shower now...message later.” Emerging a short time later from her shower, the security chief, now clad in a white terry-cloth bathrobe, began brushing back her long, luxurious auburn hair as she sat down at the desk. “Computer...” she commanded in between brush strokes, “...play messages.”
As a familiar and long-missed face appeared on her viewscreen, T’Pren gasped in pleased astonishment, “Larissa!” Her pleasure quickly turned to concern though as the perceptive Vulcan at once picked up on the worried look on her lover’s face.
“Hey baby...I know it’s been a while...too long...” the smile that had been on the Andorian woman’s lips turned down into a frown as she continued to speak, “...but with everything going on...the war and all...I guess we got kind of separated. I wouldn’t blame you if you cut me off right now, love, but I hope you’ll at least listen to the rest of this message first—it’s important—as in ‘lives—my own especially—on the line’ important.” Pausing to take a breath, the lovely historian brushed back a stray lock of white hair before continuing. “To make a long story short, after the war, I continued my research into pre-Romulan War Vulcan history—you know the stuff I was working on dealing with the return of Syranists to power and T’Pol and Tucker’s role and possible tie-ins to the Terra Prime movement and all. Well...” The young Andorian glanced nervously to her side before continuing, “I found something. Something big. Something I don’t think I was supposed to find. And it was out there all the time—all someone had to do was look hard enough for it. If...when...” she stated definitively, her eyes now displaying her Andorian warrior heritage, “...this gets out—a lot of people—I mean a lot—are going to get extremely pissed off. T’Pren...” her frown deepening as she saw the look of fear on her lover’s face, T’Pren leaned forward towards the monitor, watching and listening with even greater intensity. “...I need to see you. You can find me on Vulcan at the Valaran Hotel...suite 4314. Please...please...come. I’m scared, honey. Really scared.”
Exhaling deeply as her old girlfriend’s image vanished from the monitor, T’Pren, springing to her feet, quickly donned her uniform as she tapped her comm badge. “T’Pren to Captain Hobson. Sir...may I see you for a few moments at your earliest convenience?”
His thoughts concentrated on the Fu’Puk after-action report sitting before him on his desk, the fastidious commanding officer of the Perseus, quickly detecting the urgent timber in his security chief’s request responded in his usual quiet, patrician, voice. “Of course, Lieutenant. Would now be a sufficiently good time?”
“Yes, Sir. Thank you, Sir.” The young Vulcan responded, heaving a sigh of relief as she took a recording of the message along with her. “I’m on my way.”
And bread... my beautiful, beautiful carbs!
