The Sandbox III

Posted on 19 Feb 2013 @ 3:42am by Crewman Athlen & Lieutenant Lilou Zaren & Raifi Zaren
Edited on on 19 Feb 2013 @ 3:43am

1,997 words; about a 10 minute read

Mission: Episode 03 - Frontier
Location: USS Galileo: Mess Hall
Timeline: MD3 1900 Hours

MOUSE OVER Trill language for translations!

OFF:

Last time on The Sandbox part II...

Athlen had a few good guesses. "I'm assuming it's because we take the meaning of Catharsis pretty literally. For instance, it's acceptable on my world to challenge someone you're having a conflict with to what's called a complex-meditative spar. Essentially a fight. It's also acceptable to go away and yell, rage. Pick flowers. Dance. Whatever you like. Usually two people don't leave until it is settled somehow. There's lots of ways to do that. And because of what people know of Vulcanoids, that slants the way we are perceived." He spoke more quietly. "So, I think, those who consider us that way, they don't trust that we can integrate or adapt into another society." He finished the last slug on his plate.

"But you do. And quite well," Zaren shrugged. "So long as an encounter is resolved without lasting violence, harm, or ill will, then why should it matter how that resolution came about?"

"That's basically it," Athlen agreed. "I think, in the end, peace is really the best that any society can hope for. Nobody's perfect, as they say."

"Exactly so."

And now, the conclusion...

ON:

Lilou looked between them, then down at her empty plate. Wandering off somewhere and yelling might not be a bad idea. How soundproof were her quarters, she wondered.

"Is there something on your mind?" Athlen asked Lilou, tilting his head toward her and resting his hands in one another on top of the table.

"Always," the engineer said quietly.

"And now? You're simmering." Athlen smiled gently.

Lilou peered at him. "I am not a pot of soup."

Maenad walked into the mess hall moving as though she were looking for someone. Which made sense because she was looking for Petrov; the computer had said that he was here. Why couldn't she see him? Did he leave before she'd arrived? Apparently so. She sighed; it wasn't that important anyway. As her eyes scanned over the many heads and faces in the hall, she picked out Zaren sitting a table with Athlen and Peers. She felt a flutter in her chest - why was he here? She wasn't expecting to see him so soon after leaving his quarters.

"She's right," Zaren agreed. "She's neither soup nor pot." He glanced between their shoulders and smiled immediately as he spotted Maenad.

Athlen swallowed his soup and tried again patiently. "I meant that you look and feel very upset. If there is something bothering you, or if I've said something offensive," he trailed off, and followed Zaren's eyes behind him, turning around. He waved toward Maenad.

She hesitated, wondering if she could pull off pretending not to see them, but it was too late. "Hello," Maenad said to the group once she'd reached the table.

Zaren patted the chair to his left. "Sit. Want some wing-slugs?"

Lilou offered a small, shy smile and ducked her head. At least the focus was off of her again.

"No," she narrowed her eyes at the plate. "Thank you." Maenad grabbed a chair that wasn't being used and pulled it to the side of the table between Raifi and Peers. "I can't stay long," she lied.

"How's the mission prep?" Lilou asked quietly.

Athlen distracted himself from feeling awkward by poking the frothy foam mixture topping his tea with his finger.

"Fine," Maenad said, tucking her hands between her thighs under the table. "How's the ship?"

"Not fast enough," Lilou cupped her water between her hands again. "But there's time. So long as, you know, no one tries to murder us."

Maenad frowned, turning to look at Peers. "Murder us?" she wasn't sure if she should smile.

Zaren watched her the way an owl watches a marmoset.

The engineer looked up, her mouth forming a little 'o'. "...I should probably go now."

"Well, as long as they don't try, we'll be fine," Athlen chipped in hopefully.

"Who?" Maenad asked, deciding it was alright to smile. "Don't go."

Lilou stayed where she was, looking perplexed. "It's... an expression."

"Not one I've heard," Zaren commented with a slight lift of his brows.

"Oh," Maenad shared a glance with Raifi.

Zaren looked back at her quizzically as if to say 'what?'

She shook her head. It was nothing; she had only just realised that she had missed the figure of speech that Lilou had made.

He flexed his ears and brows in a facial shrug, then turned back to the engineer. "You were saying the ship isn't fast enough? For what?"

Lilou flushed, staring at her water. "Maybe you could teach me some Rigelian," she said, apropos of nothing, turning to Athlen. "So I could know what it is I'm singing."

Athlen sipped his tea and looked up only when he was addressed again. He smiled. "I would be happy to, if that is what you wish. I recall that you played Shennari Kolle in the Jefferies tubes?" he asked. "Rage in Chains, you called them. For us, the name is more aptly translated to the Star of Rage-Keeping, or the literal translation which is Enraged Star."

"Enraged Star," Lilou repeated. "Star of Rage-Keeping." She could feel the other Trill's eyes on her, steady and unfooled. "This is what I'm talking about. So much gets lost in figurative translations."

The Rigelian nodded. "I imagine quite a lot does with us. Standard is a really linear language, Rigelian is presented linearly but the concepts are malleable. The Standard translations make sense, but they're not wholly an accurate representation. Are there any translations in particular you'd like?" he asked, chasing around some soup in his bowl.

"Windswept, Tantrum, Moku in a Box... oh! The Blind. The Blind is fantastic."

Zaren studied the woman. It was possibly the worst coverup he'd ever seen, but he would let it go for now. He knew more than he had a few minutes before. And now he was getting a lesson in Rigelian music.

Athlen laughed. "The Blind, seriously? I've never met a non-Rigelian who has appreciated that one. I know the Standard translation lacks, as well. This is a city of the dead and dying / this is a city of the tired and trying / you will die before your parents / you will inherit nothing," he recited the opening refrain in a deadpan. Musical, he was not. "Which should look more like, Machu pi vit desanaek'miro tor sel malrayi iwen / sel malray iwen'prai / sotira malrayi prai iwen tor-atmo shavase-thran / sotira khash kean / atmo dinan vorrayi. The direct translation is: This-is the city wanderers-rest of many gone out of immanence / going out of immanence. Your light will disappear before your parents / your lines are nothing / you are stuck in the dark. So, uplifting," he finished with a smirk.

"It's not meant to be," Lilou took a drink of her water. "Music's about messages. It's not meant to always be a palliative. And when you get bands like Rage In- Star of Rage-Keeping," she corrected herself. "I mean, it's not every day you hear stories like that. Like-" she closed her eyes, thinking over some of her favorite lyrics. "'How wonderful to let myself go mad / how wonderful to go on this kind of journey / and not care if I come back to tell the story / some days I can't stand up because the room moves under my feet / and I smile because I'm almost there / I'm doing fine / they don't understand sometimes the angels come in for a minute and say I'm doing fine'." She drummed the table, whisper-singing the translation with a slight rock of her head. "Course it sounds so much better in Rigelian."

"Fenwa belgari tap nalegrat krazen bel / baryra akiro / touren vor-kenaye raistasuri desanaek tap shujinan athal malrayi'miro / senorin tendar miaraike. / Nalegrat'risha tap kash'ak'vasai'rar ashumaihrah kash'ak / leio lashe, kari, kari risha'reyel kijan gaila senyosheth / leio lashe, vele amani. / Malrayikhash paske tendar ansam noorthira oshoae handia, malrayikhash gaila texua. / 'Atmo vele amani.'" Athlen spoke the Rigelian underneath her interpretation, pausing to drain more of his tea as he did. "It's a little harder to directly translate. It's sort of..." He frowned and sat with it in his brain a while, alternating between pastry and more soup. He lingered over the choice as it came together. "How wonderful to pace the cage / crush it all / rip-apart-frenzied-beauty a journey to never finding soul-rest / stories drowning. Stumbling to the clear shatter-stone / reflecting day, almost-there, tap-tap tripping to the ledge and smile-secret, almost there, doing fine. They don't understand when the angels phase between, they smile back. 'You're doing fine.'... almost like that. These things also lose some meaning to psinulls, for example, the words story and journey, they mean more an inward, sort of thing." He plucked up a giant floating leaf on top of his Sorrel.

Unconsciously, Maenad let out an impatient sigh to herself. She knew there was a reason she'd tried to avoid sitting here. As much as she liked everyone at the table, she was bored with this conversation. Her interest level was zero and, really, she thought Athlen was being rude. She looked at Raifi without meaning to, and he caught her. "Well," she flushed a bit, "I had better go. Have a wonderful evening. I may see you all later when we get to Rojar," she nodded once and scrambled away from the table once she'd pushed the chair in.

Zaren watched her rise, then looked back at the two of them. "We'll continue the lesson soon," he said, standing up. "Zhial."

Lilou watched them go with a little deflated sigh. That had been a little close for comfort. "Maybe, as we work on expanding the universal translator's utility, I'll be able to experience more levels to the music."

"I know that Liyar developed the opposite," Athlen said, casting his eyes toward the retreating forms a little cluelessly. "That is, so that psi-nulls could experience telepathic resonance in music. I'm sorry for scaring away your friends."

"My friends?" she looked at him strangely. "I thought they were yours."

Athlen blinked. "Yes, I suppose. But you were talking to them. It appears I had inadvertently bored Maenad." Athlen found himself grinning. He loved it. Him. Boring. If only they'd known how long the path had been in his life to achieve such a perfectly mundane status.

"I thought that was me." Lilou tugged on her ear with an awkward shift of her shoulders. "I can't believe I said that. Spirits preserve us."

The grin broke out. "Oh, it was definitely me. Apparently I am rude." Rude and boring. Fantastic.

"Apparently, so am I," Lilou murmured with a shyly approaching grin.

Athlen began the final phase of his meal. The sample bowl of soup. Throughout their entire conversation he had quietly decimated each and every part of his plate methodically until only the little bowl remained, and one last piece of pastry. He shoveled them into the Pit and pushed the tray of empty plates out at long last. He rested his head in his arms, as though eating that much had taken a monumental effort, blinking up at Lilou like an overgrown kitten. "That was really good."

"Should I roll you home now?"

Blink blink. "Possibly. I don't think I can move," the Rigelian whined.

"Maybe you shouldn't have eaten a planet," Lilou offered primly, taking another sip of her water.

Athlen slumped, lying his head fully into his arm, clearly giving up on existing for the time being.

OFF:

Lieutenant (JG) Maenad Panne
Chief Science Officer
USS Galileo

Lilou Peers
Chief Engineering Officer
USS Galileo

Crewman Athlen
Sociologist, SSC
USS Galileo
(PNPC Liyar)

Raifi Zaren
FNN Journalist
USS Galileo
(pNPC Lilou Peers)

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