An Abundance of Empty Streets

Posted on 29 Oct 2018 @ 1:20pm by Lieutenant JG Sofie Ullswater

1,363 words; about a 7 minute read

Sofie waltzed into her quarters with a look of frank satisfaction on her face. Just back from the holodeck she had under her arm a large sheaf of music. When she'd got off duty Aria had still been asleep so in order not to wake her she'd slipped off to the holodeck to get in some vocal practice. Now that she was back though it seemed as though her roommate had already set off for the day.

Sofie sat down at her desk, still humming some melody from the i'Traan Cycle (which she would have you know is the greatest work of Romulan opera ever to have graced the hallowed halls of the Imperial Opera House - which of course, no longer exists) and flicked open her computer access point and looked through some various messages she had waiting for her. Something from the Federation Geological Survey, the newsletter of a society she had joined at the Academy, a group message with a bunch of her old friends who were discussing a recent holoadventure, and most excitingly, a letter from Farla.

Sofie read through the letter with unfettered glee relishing in the news of her friends and in the reminiscing about the old times. She felt calm, calmer than she had in weeks - she felt like she had a friend. That's not to say that she wasn't friendly with plenty of people in the crew, but being friendly and being a friend were - at least in Sofie's mind - vastly different concepts.

It was a short while later, after a snack and some tidying, that Sofie decided to respond with what had been going on in her life. There was a lot - all the new people of the ship, working on the bridge, the science department's food project and of course that one time during the Senior Staff Meeting when she had been in charge of the bridge and thus by extension the entirety of the ship. Sure if anything had happened all she would have done was call for the captain to return to the bridge but still it had felt good.

Sitting down at the desk Sofie thumbed up the recorder and and began to create her new message. "Farla! Its great to hear from you again. Sounds like all things are rather exciting down in Woking and perhaps I do have a liiitle bit of envy.

"Space is without a doubt quite big and quite scary and being in a small pressurised box floating through it is really quite bleak when you think of it like that. We are constantly moving distances that would boggle the mind of someone who has only lived on a single planet. However those distances are not really comparable because though we're travelling light years we're travelling that distance through the emptiness. I'm sure you see more interesting things on your walk to work than I do in a week sailing through space. We have an abundance of empty streets here.

"There are some good bits though, the other day the captain let me have the bridge, and there are plenty of people here who I'm sure you would like. Take for example a one Lieutenant Matthew Plumeri who's one of the other officers in my department. He rather reminds me of Nelthin from the Academy, he was the one with the green hair I'm sure you remember.

"I'm not fully sure about this whole space thing. What I really wanted was to find friendship and family on this ship but as of yet despite the fact that everyone is incredibly friendly I still feel lonely here. I think its just because space is so large and there are so few of us out here. I wonder how Saliera deals with it...

Star fleet Academy, Earth
A Party
Several Years Earlier

This was not Arthur's normal scene but Teyal assured him that it was going to be worthwhile. This was the Sciences Ball, an annual event hosted by the Science students of which Arthur was not one. Teyal however was and apparently a couple of his friends were going to be there and so he wanted Arthur to come along.

Despite the unusual company though the black tie dress code was very much so Arthur's sort of thing. He loved the extravagance of it all, the champagne, the string quartet and the massive hall it was taking part in - some 18th Century German location. It reminded him of growing up in the opera, a nice break from the utilitarian aesthetic of Starfleet.

"And this is Farla, a friend of mine, we met during our first lecture here." Teya pulled Arthur out of his reverie and indicated towards the young woman stood in front of them. She had brown hair and an unusual blue tattoo on her forehead, she looked reasonably human though.

"Pleased to meet you." He extended out a hand "I'm Arthur."

"Oh I know," she grinned slyly "I've heard very much about you."

Arthur wasn't entierly sure what to make of that comment but took it in good humour and gave a polite laugh "I will admit then that you have me at a disadvantage."

"Only for a short while I hope." She responded with mock indigence.

Teyal broke up the exchange by introducing the Romulan standing by Farla's side. "And this is Saleira t'Wansee, she's Farla's roommate."

She nodded with what Arthur considered to be grace and perhaps some beauty too. "Jolan Tru." She said with a little grin.

"Jolan Tru." Arthur replied, raised his hand and tried with little success to make spread his fingers.

"Arty," hissed Teyal "That's a Vulcan thing you idiot!"

His faced dropped with horror "Oh I'm really sorry Miss t'Wansee, I didn't mean to..."

"Don't worry, its alright!" She cut him off with a wave of her hand and a slight giggle "And you can call me Saleira, that's fine."

Arthur nodded, a tad sheepish and said "Alright Saleira, shall we start this again." Just then he noticed that Farla had grabbed Teyal by the arm and pulled him off to the dance floor "Looks like those two are getting along well." He nodded in the direction of their friends.

"Farla's just trying to get Teyal away from the two of us, she's duplicitous like that."

Arthur raised and eyebrow in slight confusion but then it began to dawn on him what was going on here. "Are they trying to... Set us up?"

With mock severity Saleira nodded her head. "That's Farla for you, she's been trying to set this up for at least a week."

"Do you know why?"

She laughed, Arthur decided he liked her laugh though he wasn't sure if his feeling was genuine or engineered by Teyal's meddling friend. She seemed nice "Farla imagines herself quite the matchmaker, she imagines herself quite the a-lot-of-things."

Arthur shrugged in what he hoped was a charming way "Well maybe her imagination isn't exaggerating." He smiled wryly "Can I buy you a drink?"

"...And see that's what I think about the Chief of Security's emergency simulations."

A panel chirped out a happy sounding message and she cut off the recording. She opened the message and read it thoroughly. The Ship's Counsellor had requested an appointment. Something welled up in the pit of her stomach as she momentarily worried at the possibility of being questioned about her past or how she was settling in or any of the other awful prodding things that counsellors want to know about.

She took a moment to calm herself down. There was nothing to worry about, the message said that these appointment were somewhat routine and this was Starfleet and she was meant to be integrating into some big happy family. Just tell them that everything is fine and everything will be fine.

She put all that worry aside and began the recording again. Some things are best left for later times.

"So," she said, the recording continuing "The chief of science on the other hand has a lot of thoughts about food..."

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