Waters Here Are Deep

Posted on 23 Jul 2016 @ 12:26am by Lieutenant Benice Gyce Ph.D. & Ensign James Langley
Edited on on 06 Aug 2016 @ 9:21pm

1,774 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Episode 11 - Divinum Mundi
Location: USS Galileo - Holodeck
Timeline: MD 1 - 1245 Hours

[ON]

Midday. Gyce felt it best to avoid the early risers today and decided to do her swimming cardio after her lunch. It was a good plan. She had the Olympic-sized pool programmed and ready. Her black and gold one-piece racer fit just right.

Normally after the first few laps in the pool, Gyce felt at piece. Almost happy. But not today. Fifty laps in, her goggles had fogged due to her never-ending emotional pain.

At work, she was good at hiding it. Off-duty, however, she had gone into herself. Tried to put it from her mind. A cold case, a jog around her deck, even working an extra partial shift seemed ineffective.

Her free-style strokes became more autopilot than conscious acts, because of all the sad memories she was flooded with of late. Her distraction was so severe that she did not even hear the holodeck doors open.

And that's what holodecks were all about, really. Distractions. And opening doors. To different worlds. To different lives. To different realities. They could also open inward, the person's choices being a reflection of that which lay within the person's soul. Some people saw it as merely simulated gallivanting and goofing, but in reality it could be more eye-opening than any other experience in existence, especially to outside observers.

The outside observer who would come by next, maybe third or fourth in a line of people who had seen the chief security officer doing her laps, definitely fell into the latter category in an almost instantaneous fashion. When he rounded the bend without thinking to indulge in the simulated infinite, next in line to the perpetually packed schedule of using the artificial reality of the holodeck, James froze in front of the warm-watered swimming pool as though he were in front of the woman's grave.

He just watched and stared at the woman in the water. The simulated water.

Matilda, he thought instinctively before his words got ahead of him properly. “Sir?”

Gyce flung her legs forward and down as she popped her head out of the water and began to tread water. Instantly her intense brown eyes moved the the general area of the voice. She huffed and panted a moment before she gathered her breath.

"Can I help you?" Gyce tilted her head to cough and lifted her blue-tinted goggles so she could look upon the human fully.

“I uh, I was just going to use the holodeck for a bit,” James spoke, hesitant. “But you can finish up if you'd like. I've been told to never turn down a good looking woman in a swimsuit.” Good old witty remarks. It was James' trademark, but in this instance he wasn't doing it to break the ice or charm, he was doing it to defend himself. His mind was dangerously close to falling in the deep end and something had to be done about it.

“I'll just wait patiently on the bench,” he motioned over to one of the poolside seats with a wink. "Or outside if you'd prefer."

Gyce checked her waterproof watch and shook her head. "Nah. You can stay. I lost track of time."

She was glad she was wet. It covered the fact she had been crying. "It's not like I'm naked."

A natural smile. Genuine, as she was very adept at pulling off. Except that she was anything but happy these days.

“Right,” James chuckled a bit nervously. “I'd imagine you would have remembered to lock the doors were that the case, though. Modesty and all that jazz.”

Gyce smiled back and swam to the rail. She climbed a bit stiffly out of the pool, then began to stretch her sore leg out before she toweled down.

"Bajorans don't have as severe of nudity taboos as humans, though yes, we are still modest," Gyce agreed as she sat on her towel on the ground and began to stretch out her leg muscles. "What sort of program were you wanting to do?"

“Maybe a hike. Somewhere quiet, you know. The places people find themselves.”

"Used to live on a farm... we had many places of untouched beauty," Gyce found herself commenting. The nostalgia even made her feel homesick, if only for a moment.

James closed his eyes and pictured a generic farm with the chief of security mulling about and enjoying the toil and the solitude of the land. He couldn't help but smile. It looked nice. “I can imagine farm work to be quite comforting. And the close proximity to wilderness must have been nice, too.”

After a moment a thought struck the man. The company would probably do him good at the moment, especially now that he was trying to steer his mind in a better direction. Maybe she could help with that.

"Want to go for a walk?"

"I'd love to," Gyce agreed. She too, wanted a distraction.

Once she was toweled off, Gyce pulled her track suit on over her racer and drank a bit of water from her bottle before she gestured to him.

"You want to walk anywhere in particular? Or was just going to let our feet do the guiding for us?" the Bajoran asked as she rubbed the soreness out of her leg.

“Hmm,” James thought aloud. Between the woman that in her current appearance seemed fit for a sports calendar and the thoughts of adventuring out into the great unknown with said woman his mind was becoming thoroughly occupied. “Where are we now? Is this simulation confined to the pool or will it adapt as we move? Maybe we could go out those doors and see where they take us,” he said with a gesture to the doors at the other end of the room.

"This is just some randomized pool program," Gyce shrugged. "I could load a Kendra Valley program, if you want to tour vineyards and such."

“That sounds nice. A sunny day on the vineyard. Or maybe a starry night? That'd be pretty.”

Gyce thought about that. Night walks were more romantic and that was the last thing she wanted. So she nodded and walked over to the holodeck wall.

"Kendra Province program, Benice-One," Gyce told it.

Instantly, she and James were standing in a field of green as far on as the eyes could see. Jumja trees were in full bloom, and there was a gentle breeze that seemed to calm much of what ailed the Bajoran inside.

"This acceptable to you?" Gyce asked to James.

He took a deep breath, allowing his senses to fully acclimate themselves to the artificial reality they found themselves in. Radiant warmth of the warm Bajoran sun: check; A smattering of oderant molicules exciting olifactory receptors: check; Bright light and beauty as far as the eye could see (as well as right next to him): check. The gentle sound of birds chirping: check.

"It's perfect."

"I wasn't trying to be... romantic," Gyce admitted with a blush. For she realized just how beautiful and perfect of a moment that she had inadvertently created.

“Huh? Well, it isn't,” came an instinctual reply from James as the thought of anything romantic began to make him feel uneasy. “What I mean is it's lovely but we don't have to hold hands... right? Just... Yeah...”

"...I have not been out of my last relationship very long," Gyce confessed quietly. She had no idea why she just told him that.

"So, stroll sans hands it is then," James confirmed with a curt nod. "Afraid I'm in a bit of... transition, myself. Would you like to lead the way," he proceeded to question in quick deflection of the topic. "You probably know the lands better than I do. Unless you like getting lost."

"I tend to just walk in a direction and let the land guide me from there," Gyce explained as she began down the hill. "My brother and I used to take baking sheets in the cold months, and race down the hill when it snowed."

James followed along and listened, intrigued by allowing the land to guide them. It sounded like a good way to get lost, but then again that wasn't always a bad thing, especially when finding one's way was (at least in a non-metaphorical sense) as simple as a polite request to a computer. “That sounds like a blast. 'Fraid we never got any snow in Hawaii except for that one time, but I've been told skiing is fun. Sort of like that?”

"I used to snowboard," Gyce explained with a laugh. "Came home with many of purple bruises on my thighs, bum, and arms... I used to be pretty adventurous."

“That must be why you got into investigating, huh? The adventure? Ms. Double-O Seven, Private Eye,” James said with a smirk as he pondered the possibilities of Gyce actually being some sort of super secret agent. His mind went back to his earlier encounter with her and the question about her cane. Maybe there was more to her than met the eye. “I bet you're Section 31, aren't you,” he poked at her playfully.

"No... just mysterious to those who don't ask," Gyce laughed in kind. "...In the Resistance, you had to learn many jobs because of how few of us there were. So some times you had to be a sniper, others a bomb technician, often times an expert infiltrator. Many times - a guerrilla expert for ambushes... So one can argue I am no one and many, for I become what I'm needed to be."

“An enigma, huh? I happen to like puzzles,” James flirted in an almost instinctive fashion, his natural with pushing past his inhibitions and pain for the moment. “Perhaps I'll be the one to figure you out.”

"Maybe," Gyce laughed before she started to walk down the hill toward a tree farm of budding jumja fruit. "My job requires a certain amount of objectivity, so it's rare I make friends."

“Some friendship making does take a bit more effort for some than it does for others,” James nodded in understanding. “I suppose that's why you have to make friends rather than for them to just simply be. All the good things in life take some sort of effort. Like art. Sometimes you just have to draw up a good friendship rather than just stumble into one... ya dig?”

"I do," Gyce conceded. "I suppose I could use an actual friend, and not a work-related friend... Thank you."

[OFF]

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Lieutenant JG Benice Gyce
Chief of Security and Tactical
USS Galileo

Ensign James Langley
Assistant Chief of Intelligence
USS Galileo

 

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