Twenty Questions with Lake, Part 1

Posted on 03 Feb 2018 @ 10:52am by Lieutenant Lake ir-Llantrisant

893 words; about a 4 minute read

Circa MD 30 of Episode 15 “Emanation”


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Lake ir-Llantrisant’s Personal Log, Supplemental:

I consider myself an active listener. I’m able to balance informational listening, critical listening and therapeutic listening. It’s essential to my career as a counselor. But. But do you ever get to a point in a conversation where you can’t even remember what question you asked in the first place?

My mind must have drifted into the clouds, because I suddenly noticed Nancy was saying, “--even living within the construct of a post-scarcity society, I still toss and turn in bed some nights, worrying about the second sundae I replicated. We still live in a universe of finite matter and energy, you know. What if the matter in that sundae could have been used to replicate one more photon torpedo casing — that last critical shot? What if that energy could have been stored on a power cell and donated to a developing colony?”

And then without taking a breath from her existential crisis, Nancy asked, “What do you like to eat when no one else is around?”

My first instinct was to answer with a sexual euphemism.

Thankfully, there is a half-second delay between my brain and my mouth. I paused. I considered my surroundings. The woman standing across from me in a Starfleet medical uniform wasn’t really called Nancy. Nancy was a pseudonym for this support group of Counselors. Nancy was here because a so-called non-corporeal lifeform had persuaded her to grope a co-worker. I was here because I crashed a shuttle into a navigational marker bouy, years ago, nearly killing me and my then-husband. However, the support group was taking a break. That meant Nancy --or a non-corporeal being within her-- was standing between me and the buffet table.

I supposed the only way out of this conversation was through it. “Hlai'vnau,” was what I answered. I couldn’t be bothered to explain it was a seasonal celebratory dish made from an animal local to my native Romulus. I did, however, explain how I don’t replicate it in the traditional style; rather, I like to replicate it as if its a left-over fry up of the Hlai'vnau mashed up with the vegetables and fruits associated with the season.

Evidently, that proved to be a mistake, because Nancy asked me another question: “How would you respond if your Department Head had asked you out on a date?”

I blinked and I stared at her, and I asked her the clarifying question, “Do you mean when?”

Nancy blinked back, her head visibly recoiling back. “What?” she asked, either confused or surprised. Human vocal tones can still elude me at times.

Rather than explain myself, I answered the original question. “I would say I’m married,” I lied.

Nancy laughed at my answer and emphasized the point by saying, “That’s funny. You’re funny,” and she patted me on the chest. “You should have been a comedian,” she said. In another apparent non sequitur, she asked, “What subject did you absolute loathe at the Academy?”

It didn’t take me long to answer, “Warp mechanics,” emphatically. I explained, “Give me the vagaries of sentient behaviour irregularities any day rather than relative warp field differentials.” Shaking my head, I sighed at the thought of those interminable lectures, and then I snickered at another thought. “Now that final exam was when I needed an authority figure to offer me favours in exchange for sex, am I right?” When Nancy looked at me with wide eyes, speechless, I added “...Confidentiality extends to the snack table, yes?”

“Yes,” Nancy said quickly. I imagine it was mostly to make me feel more comfortable. It was an impulse that appeared to come naturally to her. She then felt the need to clarify with, “I have to agree with-- I have to agree with you on warp mechanics. I never really thought I would be cruising aboard starships by day when I was growing up. When you were a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?”

I winced at Nancy with preemptive embarrassment. I answered her question in Romulan, and I could hear from the Universal Translation that the equivalent wasn’t a perfect translation, but that it was close enough. Translated, my answer was, “When I was ten years old, I wanted to be an oboe.”

“Uhm,” was all Nancy said at first, but the thought of a silence apparently filled her with dread. She filled the gap with, “Um, an oboe? Well, if you weren’t in Starfleet, where would you be now?”

Romulus was probably the easiest answer, but what I said was, “Ash.”

Nancy laughed at that. It wasn’t the full-bellied laugh of an audience member at a comedy show, it was the nervous tittering of someone overwhelmed with awkwardness at a funeral. “How did we,” she asked desperately, “How did we even start this conversation?”

Simply, I said, “I asked you if there was another container of milk,” and I waved my mug of black coffee towards the empty jug.

“Oh,” Nancy said, and then she said it again. “Yes,” she said stiffly. “On the next table over.”

Log ends

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