His Final Flight
Posted on 23 Mar 2019 @ 10:33pm by Commander Andreus Kohl
Edited on 23 Mar 2019 @ 10:35pm
1,932 words; about a 10 minute read
Previously on Episode 10 - Symposium...
Andreus Kohl’s Personal Log, supplemental.
I didn’t grow up with Hamidah Romar, my biological mother. I never lived with her. I don’t think I’ve spent an entire solar day with her. I can’t say I know her body language, nor her moods. But watching her pace, on this day, watching her pacing spirals around the antechamber, I could guess that she was in a problematic mood.
She spun on me. “You have been shorn from the thread of this life,” Hamidah said. “You were scattered to the warm winds of the Rubal desert, but you have returned to me. I will tie your roots.”
“No, I...” Shaking my head, I said, “Hamidah, I’m asking you how you are. I want--” but then I decided to abandon my question. Persistence is futile, once she’s decided what she wants to talk about. Considering the recent changes in my life, considering command school, I told her, “I’ve been promoted, mother. I’ve moved on from the sciences into starship command. I have the privilege of watching over the crew of Galileo... through the night. I get to lead, in my own way.”
Hamidah continued to pace around the perimeter of the room. She raised a hand, when she said, “I am not a proud woman. When I must ask for help, I ask for help plainly.”
Feeling dizzy from following her blindly, I stopped and I sat. I dropped myself into an overly plump armchair. “You tried to contact me through subspace communications,” I said. “Some weeks back, you used the computer to contact me... You’ve never done that before. You always said it was too impersonal. Too hollow.”
Then Hamidah stopped. She stopped and she looked at me. Looked right at me. “You are more like your mother than you know,” she said. “You deny this. You care only for genetics, for learned behaviour.” --Coming from her mouth, those words sounded like Andorian surnames rather than familiar concepts-- “But there are other characteristics, other shades to you.”
“Is there a message you want to share with me?” I asked. Rising to my feet, I approached her with the caution I might exert towards approaching an animal in the wild. “A warning? Some lesson?”
Hamidah shrugged and she scoffed at me. Like it was no skin off her back, she said, “If you must leave, you must leave... but you never leave my house without a gift.”
Previously on Episode 11 - Divinum Mundi...
Galileo's hastily-assembled search and rescue (SAR) team had quickly gathered themselves on Deck 8 as ordered by the rear admiral. There had been two colony modules in distress that had landed in less-than-idea circumstances in the middle of the approaching plasma storm, and the probability of casualties was high. The Nova-class' sensors had detected life signs within each of them but the electromagnetic interference of the storm meant their sensor and information-gathering abilities had been hampered.
Lumbering in his own environmental suit, Commander Kohl followed Randy's path of travel into the compartment. Kohl put a hand on Randy's left shoulder and he visually inspected the seals on the white and crimson plates of Randy's environmental suit. While it was still useful --within the environs of Galileo-- Kohl took a quick pass with his tricorder to confirm that each of the away team's EV suits were effectively sealed.
To the entire team, Kohl announced, "We move out staggered on two lifelines linked back to Galileo, but we work in tandem as one away team." --He crooked a hollow grin in Gyce's direction-- "We wouldn't be Starfleet if we didn't love our redundancies. We'll make our way to Semmes-Three, begin triage operations, and then move on to the second colony module."
And now, the final conclusion...
Timeline: Episode 11 - Divinum Mundi [Backpost]
[ON]
Andreus Kohl's Personal Log, Stardate 67856.8
My dad died the day I set foot aboard the USS Galileo.
...Not the most auspicious of beginnings, I'll admit. I crossed the umbilical connection port to board this tough little ship as a junior nurse. In those days, I was proving to be a career ensign, but nobody needed to know that yet. This was going to be a new beginning. I had it planned, I had it all planned out. I was going to pass myself off as a bright-eyed young officer, as if I'd only been out of the Academy for a year. Yes. Eager and inexperienced had been a more comfortable reality for me than the truth: a failed diplomat ashamed of my string of career-lows. I had it all planned out. A new beginning. And then my dad died.
I think I snapped at my department head the day I met her. Sweet, dear Pola. I learned a lot from her. I am the leader I am today because of her. I had it all planned out. A new beginning. I hadn't planned on having a nervous breakdown in Sickbay, with my boss, on my first day.
Somehow, I sit here today aboard the shuttle, watching Galileo's shuttlebay slide out of view as the pilot hits the thrusters. I sit here as Galileo's Second Officer, a Lieutenant Commander, a little bit older, my spine a little twisted, and with enough shore leave time to spare. The pilot is a showy one, and he's spinning the shuttle to give us the cinematic few of the primary hull. My eyes lock on the NCC-80010 and I feel a shiver race down my spine.
I don't know why.
Admiral Saalm has honed this crew into an impossibility-engine of brilliant minds and tireless spirits that can solve any mystery, mend any hurt, and defend every city from every volcano. (...I can't say I cared for crashing into that volcano that one time.)
Our mission to Celes Three was a success by any measure. I'm fully on my own two feet now --out from behind the biobed, from behind the test tubes-- and I led a search and rescue mission to lift those colonists from out of the crash site. I never imagined that's what mycareer in Starfleet would be. I'm so wildly grateful for it. The ship is continuing on its way to Starbase 234, well within Federation space. So why am I...?
The circle.
Is it a circle?
A closed loop?
Or a Möbius strip?
One of the acolytes of the Temple of Whereness contacted me while Galileo was grounded on Celes Three. It was one of my mother's acolytes. My mother has been reaching out to me more frequently; sending me cryptical communiques since the [REDACTED], since before we lost our way through the parallel universe. I thought I understood what Hamidah was trying to tell me, but even that basic assumption was wrong.
She wasn't trying to tell me anything.
She was asking me a question.
The acolyte told me my mother is ill. They don't believe the condition to be mortal, but they say my mother needs rest. I told them I need to see her medical charts. The acolyte told me my mother will need to step away from her duties at the temple. This will be the first time in her lifetime she had done so. (...Apparently even when she gave birth to me, I was birthed on an altar.) I'm told my mother has requested my presence. I have been summoned, officially, to Argelius.
There are rituals? Or rites? That my mother needs me to complete in her stead. The timing is bad, the acolyte told me, for my mother to fall ill. I asked her what time would have been convenient, but I don't think she understood the sarcasm. I don't fully know what they need of me, but she's my mom? How do you say no? Apparently, my mother said I have talent in my blood. But through her Argelian accent, it sounded like the acolyte said I have tragedy in my blood.
I don't know what I'm getting myself into, but I'm headed to Argelius. I go to start a new beginning with my mother. I started a new beginning with my mother the day I stepped off the USS Galileo. My dad died the day I set foot aboard the USS Galileo. I started a new beginning with my mother the day I stepped off the USS Galileo. My dad died the day I set foot aboard the USS Galileo. I started a new beginning with my mother the day I stepped off the USS Galileo.
Still.
I don't have too much shore leave time left. I can't be away from home for too long. I'll be back soon.
Computer, end log.
[OFF]
Episode 17 - Crystal of Life
Timeline: MD -181, 0200 hours
[ON]
Commander Andreus Kohl looked up from the information status display on the armrest. The transcript of his personal log scrolled slowly across the small LCARS screen until it ran out of text to share. Kohl rested a hand on the status display. He could feel the smooth, glassy surface and he pressed his palm agains it, as if he could tangibly share his strength with his younger self. He had known, but he couldn't have known, but he had known that he was never going to return to the Galileo. That ship had been lost. The crew had lost their way, and enough of them had found their way home. Eventually. Without him.
It wasn't as if Kohl could have made a difference. It wasn't as if he could have saved them. He had still been so young in his Command career. There wasn't anything he would have seen, or would have known to do, that the Admiral-- that Captain Saalm--
Commander Kohl cleared his throat and he leaned back in the Captain's chair of the USS Lagrange. While the Captain slept, the ship was his. For a little while. Executive Officer Kohl cleared his personal log from the status display and he called up the default reports and system checks. All in the green. Everything normal.
Since the ship was his, and since they were at the beginning of a terribly long transit to Regula One, Kohl allowed himself one small indulgence. He called for CONN to adjust the position of Lagrange among the convoy by a minuscule degree and he requested an adjustment of the sensor focus from OPS. As a result of his changes, the bridge's viewscreen shifted its point of view. Gliding into the centre of his field of vision was the USS Galileo, NCC-80010-A.
It wasn't a closed loop. Not really. He had made his way back. It had taken a little longer than he had expected, but he had made his way back.
[OFF]
OOC: I played Andreus Kohl from 2012 to 2016 aboard Galileo and so it seemed sad to me that he never got a final post. He never left the ship, finally. Since that time, he's popped up as a guest star here and there, but I felt like I still wanted to pay tribute to his final days as an officer aboard the Galileo, and now I have.
RSS Feed
Back to Top