Supplemental - Stardate 69011.74

Posted on 11 Aug 2019 @ 2:55pm by Lieutenant JG Matthew Plumeri

655 words; about a 3 minute read

[ON:]

“Science officer’s log supplemental stardate 69011.74. I’m recording this quick log entry. I’m mixing together a chemical compound for Tanakata. This’ll burn right through the deck plating as well as, we hope, the environment suits of the Tholian boarding party. If I don’t kill us with the chemicals – the Tholians probably will. They don’t seem to be too particular in whom they cut down. I don’t know if we’ll succeed here. Maybe. There is a small chance. Listen, If this be my last log entry…if this is the last one…then…whoever finds this…if the computer core hasn’t totally been fried…or stolen. Life. It’s been a good life. Really. I had a good run. I see things a little clearer now. Now that my brief time in this world is about to be cut short. I realize…all the bullshit we put ourselves through – needlessly. I fell in love with a Romulan. I know I did. I feel something for him; I wish I got the chance to tell him. Lake…no matter what everybody else says I loved you. I would have liked getting to know you man.

It’s strange…the sensation as I look at my life in the few minutes I have left. Nothing profound to say. No regrets at least. The last music I heard was Fortunato’s opera “Zoie”. I played the overture over three times. Everytime I heard it…I felt…good inside. You know? Hopeful, more impassioned. Ennobled, better than I am pointed toward the person I could be. That’s the power of music. And I cried every time I heard Zoie’s aria, ‘O, miei sospiri’. Because, I don’t know, at the very end she realizes that she has been pursuing shadows; while the things of real value have all slipped away. And when the Tallis come to raise her up – man – not even a Vulcan heart would not weep; at least a little.

Zoie and I may be late, but I think the business of living is not to get ahead of other people, but to get ahead of ourselves. To break our own record, to outstrip all our yesterdays by our todays, to bear our trials stronger and more beautifully than we ever dream we could bear them up. To recognize our false self for what it is and to embrace our true self; that part of us that…. that stands up to face death and looks it in the eye. That part of us that stands amid a Tholian boarding party…like Captain Tanakata did. And say we are afraid and go forward anyway, to stand up to the darkness, to stand up to Radamio and whip him inside and out as we never whipped him before, to give all that we are as we have never given, to love and be loved, to do our work with more forzi and a finer finish then we have ever done – this is our true self. I get it now; now at the end. ‘O miei sospiri la liberta!”

OK, well, I guess that’s it. If y’all are going to name a ship after me then I suggest something new and something big. With a lot of freakin’ guns, Tholian proof deck plating, a bar on every deck and a full-size Paressis Squares arena. Not holographic, the real deal. The best science-labs in the fleet. Once-a-month parties and…shields that work would be awesome. Oh, and I want the ship so big that it can’t fit inside anything smaller than a Celestial Class spacedock. In fact, Gargantuan Class spacedock…when they build them…will be just about the right size.

Time to go kick some hot, Tholian keester!”

=== END OF LOG ===

[OFF:]

Lieutenant JG Matthew Plumeri
Science Officer – Historian
USS Galileo-A
NCC-80010

RSS Feed