The Arrival

Posted by avrak on March 7, 2010 in category Galae, Nalah, Relationships, UFP

I’ve always thought mixing work with pleasure is a dangerous combination, but never before did I fully understand the implications of that as I do now.

Life has been pretty calm recently; that is, the usual ‘norm’ in the science department on the Aidoann hasn’t changed much. Things really are as they were just a few months ago when I composed my last journal entry.

Dhat, dhat. That’s not entirely true. Over the past few months I’ve been working on a top-secret project concerning the OOR–the black ships. I haven’t been able to write about it for obvious reasons, but now that the project has been completed and successful, the information isn’t as classified as it once was.

I created a device which, at its fundamental level, is nothing more than a subspace transmitter and receiver. What makes this device special and important is the way that it transmits and receives. In essence, I’ve emulated the old technology of yesteryear and combined it with the new theoretical science of subspace molecular physics in order to report back transmitted waves of subspace energy into a quantum field spectroanalyzer, displaying the molecular wavelength of feedback in a visual form. In laymen’s terms, I’ve developed a device which can detect physical objects in the subspace realm.

The gravity of this project becomes apparent even more when it’s realized that the OOR uses the subspace realm as a means of travel, effectively bypassing any possible methods of border and movement detection known to the Aevumih.

Until now.

I was given a congratulatory promotion for my discovery by erei’Riov t’Aegis, something that I didn’t expect but was happy to receive, as well as a new position: Deputy Chief Science Officer. This all came shortly on the heels of new orders for deployment, which is also something that I didn’t expect…but, knowing the Galae, probably should have.

Our orders brought us near to the outworlder planet of Risa. Nalah, being assigned as the leader of the mission, quite obviously chose me to assist her as I’m one of the few Rihannsu she could probably fully trust. She further suggested to me that after the mission was completed we could spend a few quality days together–alone. The idea of finally being together with my bondmate after several months of sleepless nights in the Science Department seemed fantastic, and I heartily agreed. Of course, as the old ch’Havaran saying reminds us, the best ale should always be drunk first.

We checked into the Aen’rhien Hotel on Risa, one of the only areas of the planet not totally overrun with outworlders. The rooms there are very posh–they remind me of some of the luxury hotels in Ra’tleihfi my father stayed at during his visits to the University–with all of the niceties of home that one could want including a fine selection of ch’Rihan and ch’Havaran in their restaurant. Food, of course, was near first on our list of things to do once we arrived (our shuttle flight was just over 9 hours), since replicator food just doesn’t have the same kind of panache that well-prepared food does.

After a brief romantic interlude and a stop at some local shops to locate some appropriate clothing for our stay, the topic of food came up. To my utter shock, Nalah didn’t want to go to the fine dining establishment downstairs–she wanted to see what outworlder food was like. I gave her my very limited opinion on outworlder tastes, which she did agree with, but then suggested that we would be better served with our time here on Risa if we visited the other side of the beach.

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing from my bondmate. This is the woman who constantly reminds me of how dirty the non-Rihannsu world is to her, but she had a certain logic to her methods that I could hardly disagree with. So, off to the Terran side of the beach we went, locating an outside eating establishment outside of one of their hotels. The menu selection was indeed strange as I expected (I’m still not exactly sure what ‘veal’ is), but that was the least of my worries at the time. Nalah started having pains in her stomach.

What I remember at this point is a bit of a blur. She started to stand up, then fell down to her knees, exclaiming something about this not happening before. I rushed over to help her, and the next thing I know, this outworlder Starfleet doctor was on top of us. The outworlder did a few scans with what looked like some sort of medical salihnir, then proclaimed that Nalah needed hospitalization immediately. The next thing I know, we’re both sitting on a bed in this Federation starship, and a little baby girl is in my hands.

My little baby girl.

One of the most precious things I have ever seen in my life was resting so peacefully in my arms. I don’t think even the hardest rihanha in the Tal Shiar could avoid being touched by the sight of this little jhu; at one point, she opened up her eyes to look at me…and I could swear on the fires of Gal’Gathong that she smiled.

I was lost in the moment. I’m still not really sure how long I sat there in utter amazement, but it is something that I’ll remember as long as I live: the look of my newborn daughter, the smile of my bondmate as she caressed the baby’s ear. I wish I could say that our tears of joy lasted forever, but the outworlder doctor interrupted us at some point to tell us that the child would need to be on a respirator for some time as her birth was premature.

My heart sank into my feet. For the second time in the day, I could not believe what I was hearing: my girl…my little jhu…would have to die under D’sora. The thought of having her killed by some heartless doctor pained me more than I have words to explain. Briefly Nalah and I considered terminating her right there so she could die with those who love her, but neither one of us could bring ourselves to actually carry out the act.

So that is where I am now, sitting in a comfortable chair in some grand quarters on this Federation vessel watching my bondmate and child sleep. They have had a rough day–they need the rest. So have I, but I cannot find the strength to rest right now.

This may be the last time I see my daughter and I want to savor it as long as I can.

To Be Grateful

Posted by avrak on September 20, 2009 in category Nalah

It’s been a long time since I’ve done one of these.

Not that there hasn’t been anything to tell. In fact, I think that these past few months have had more to tell than just about any other four months my life has ever had. In that time, it’s occurred to me that my live has taken a huge change for the better; I have a lot to be grateful for these days. I can’t possibly begin to discuss everything that I feel proud and happy about, so I’m just going to mention the most important ones.

Deep breath, Avrak. Okay.

The most important event of my entire life occurred a few months ago. I’ve been bonded. To Nalah.

It really wasn’t as sudden as it might seem, but I asked her to bond with me just after the party at the s’Merrok estate. After an intense moment of silence, she accepted and we kissed. The next morning, we discussed plans for the actual date of our bonding, and the next few months seemed all too hectic for any chance of a traditional bonding ritual: we were being deployed again for Elements know how long, and our window of opportunity for bonding seemed too small for our comfort.

Unless, of course, we bonded that day.

We did. After a few hours of preparation, we caught a Galae shuttle over to ch’Rihan and a transporter over to the Spires near the Apnex Sea. It has always been one of my favorite spots in the entire Twin Worlds, and I was ecstatic that Nalah and I could be bonded there.

Nalah broke some other news to me that evening…the evening that I proposed to her. A few weeks before, Nalah discovered that she was pregnant; she kept that a secret from me for a few reasons, mostly because she somewhat in denial that it was going on. I think, also, that she was a little bit afraid of how I would react. She made a comment to me about being upset that anyone knew about it–especially t’Aegis, who treated her initial symptoms–and wanted the fetus to be terminated. We discussed it at length a week or so later, and we both decided to keep the child when it is born. Like many children, it can stay with our hfihar while we serve in the Galae.

I actually proposed to Nalah before finding out about the baby; in a way, I was relieved to hear that news from her. For those few weeks, I was very worried that something was terribly wrong with her. She kept secret about practically everything involving the whole thing, including the reason for her having symptoms of an illness. I smile about it now, but I actually was concerned at one point that t’Aegis was harming my Nalah in some manner. Ah, the strange thoughts that run through our heads when we let our worries get the best of us.

I’m glad that our relationship has been a good has it has. I really believe that it’s even getting better all the time…I still think about her practically all the time, even when I’m working on new theories in the lab. Which reminds me, I have to start working on my new theory…

Yes, I have quite a bit to be grateful for.

As Eisn Shines

Posted by avrak on December 28, 2008 in category Nalah, Relationships

I thought about her today. All day. I mean, how could I not? Most of my shift was spent repairing the incorrect adjustments of the Eredhs working on the scanners in the Astrometrics lab, which gave me quite a bit of down time during the calibration phases to ponder and think about life in general. Last night was probably the most amazing night of my life. Sure, I’ve had relations with women before, but something about her is different. Very different.

I told her that I love her. It’s true. In fact, I’ve never been more sure about anything in my entire life. I didn’t intend to tell her, though…it just came out of me like the sudden and unpredictable energy bursts from a blue quasar. After the words were spoken, I was almost sure that she would be scared off; after all, she did indicate to me that she wanted to take our new relationship slowly and carefully. Quite understandable, since just mere days ago she gave up her bonding ceremony for me. That alone was a pleasant and welcome surprise.

What was an even bigger surprise was her reaction. She was speechless at first, but then whispered to me the words I begged the Elements to hear in return: “I love you as well.” Feelings of joy quickly swept over me, and I kissed her with a fire that I didn’t know existed. Passion is wonderful when it’s shared.

Although it might seem like this new love has come about without warning, we have actually been talking for some time now. At first, things seemed dim for a potential relationship between the two of us. I had feelings for her, but she was planning a bonding ceremony. Previously, I mentioned that I took her to the Poisoned Nei’rrh’s opening and despite the wonderful evening, she broke the news to me about her current engagement status. I had made some assumptions about her father that evening (perhaps due in part by his comments and in part by my own familial relationship with my father), and made remarks to her about it.

Shortly after that evening I was called away to serve in a Tal Shiar matter, and it was a week or so later before I got the chance to see her again. I thought about her quite a bit during that time, and I came to the realization that perhaps she did have some feelings for me but something was keeping her back and making her hesitate. I decided that the best thing to do was to apologize for my poor manners (which I really did feel bad about), so I bought her an elegant box of soah while I had some time to kill on ch’Rihan.

She loved them.

Now, certainly I was happy at the outcome. Admittedly it wasn’t planned that way, but I would be lying if I said that I didn’t hope it would turn out that way. Thankfully, she really wasn’t upset at the insinuations that I made about her father, and we talked for some time about our respective families. It was a very emotional moment in which I felt even closer to her than before. I wanted desperately to tell her how much she meant to me, but instead I reached over and held her hand.

We kissed.

The kiss was amazing, and she invited me to have lunch with her the next day. Mess hall food is, well, mess hall food but I wasn’t there for the fine dining: I was there to spend more time with her. After some more conversation, she confessed to me that she lost her previous love by the hands of someone on board the Aidoann, and she was afraid to love because she feared retribution by that same person on her next loved one in an attempt to hurt her.

It didn’t make sense to me.

Fearing that my emotions were getting the best of me, I asked her if she meant that she was afraid that someone would hurt me simply because she cared for me. I’m not sure why, but I suddenly remembered the words of my mother: “Avrak,” she used to say. “If you don’t go out and take the chance, you will regert not doing so for the rest of your life.” I told this to her, and she admitted to me that yes, she has feelings for me and she would be willing to have a relationship with me. We walked back to her office, holding hands the entire way.

That night is when I confessed my love for her. I’m not exactly sure why I told her, but it was a true expression of my feelings. It is difficult for me to describe, in words, exactly how I feel for her, but ‘love’ is about the best approximation that I can come up with. I’ve also been thinking about another pearl of wisdom my mother passed along to me in my youth: “When you find the right woman for you, Avrak, you will know it. You will feel more at peace with the Universe than the Two Worlds feel when Eisn shines upon them. There will be no mistaking it for anything.”

That is how I feel when I look into her eyes.

It Must Be the Wine

Posted by avrak on November 26, 2008 in category Nalah, Relationships, Social

I haven’t particularly been having good days recently. Ever since that evening with Nalah, my mind just hasn’t been able to focus well. In fact, I really haven’t been getting much sleep recently and I think that it’s been showing. I know that I drank quite a bit of wine that evening, and I think because of that my emotions have been getting the best of me; not allowing me to sleep is just one of many symptoms, I fear. I say this because that night when I got back to the Aidoann, I discovered that I left my credit chip with the bartender. Out of all the times that I’ve been out to nightclubs (mostly in my University years) I’ve never once left my chip anywhere. Of course, I had a few projects to finish up in the lab before I went back, but almost immediately after that I ran back to the club in order to retrieve it.

I remembered that I originally handed it to the bartender who was flirting with me all evening, but when I finally got back there she was nowhere to be found. The only Rihanha in the club at the time was a woman named Ekkhae t’Llhaenn. I told her my name and that I had left my chip here; t’Llhaenn was kind enough to locate my chip for me and then surprised me by actually knowing who I was! She said that she had read some of my work, which seemed to me an impressive enough feat in its own right, but then even had some questions for me about it. She offered me some of her best wine, which was excellent, and wanted to talk to me about my discoveries. Something about the whole situation made me very nervous. The erei’Riov had recently yelled at me regarding the 59-Virginis event, commenting that it was dangerous information if obtained in the wrong hands, and I took that very seriously. Compound that with a strange woman now asking me about projects that I have worked on, and my anger and fears got the best of me. I made some rude and insulting remarks to her and then proceeded to stand up and march out of the building.

I transported back to the Aidoann, but this time instead of heading straight for the lab, I tried to go back to sleep. That wine must have been fairly strong because not only was I unable to do so, but the whole time was spent tossing and turning and thinking about Nalah. After a few hours of this, I finally had enough and went back to the lab to continue working.

I think the wine was starting to wear off at this point because it occurred to me that perhaps t’Llhaenn was not trying to be deceitful, but instead she might really be interested in talking to me about my work. I felt bad for my remarks to her, but the damage had already been done and the likelihood of ever running into her again was slim; or so I thought. Later on that morning I was starting to feel exhausted, and I made my way back down to ch’Rihan and over to a hholaer shop which was one of my favorite hangouts during my attendance at the University. I ordered a large cup of hholaer and started to read the morning’s news when suddenly t’Llhaenn walked through the door. I debated with myself for a moment whether or not to confront her again, but decided that I should do the right thing and apologize to her. She seemed appreciative, and we talked for a little while–mostly casual conversation. She noticed that I was tired and offered me a room at the s’Llhaenn estate in order to get some rest and freshen up.

It seemed like a good idea, since I haven’t been able to sleep well enough in my bunk and the hholaer was starting to fail to keep me awake, so I accepted her offer. She gave me a brief tour of the estate, which was remarkable; even in a city like Ihhliae, I’ve never seen vineyards like those at the s’Llhaenn estate. I was pretty exhausted at that point, so she showed me up to a guest room and I proceeded to crash. While I didn’t exactly sleep well, I did sleep at least for a few hours which was good enough to get me by for a while.

When I finally awoke, my uniform had been pressed and cleaned by the hfai which it was in desperate need of. T’Llhaenn was waiting for me in her workshop, and when I arrived, we chatted about some of the theories that I have worked on for years. She seemed interested in them, and offered her services as an engineer if I were to ever develop them further. I must say that t’Llhaenn surprised me quite a bit. She not only seemed to grasp the concepts that I presented to her, but even came up with ways of implementing them. Yes, I know that is what engineers do, but she seemed especially good at it and I am thankful that she is so willing to help me with my ideas. It feels good to finally talk to someone who understands me on an intellectual level and not just someone who wants to agree with me in order to get something or keep the conversation going. I have a feeling that if this keeps up, we might become good friends. I thanked t’Llhaenn for the room, told her that I was glad we could put our initial differences behind us, and headed back to the Aidoann.

Now that I had rested a bit, I wanted to head back to the lab in order to finish up some of the scanner analyses that I had started the night previously. Luckily they were all still intact, and someone was kind enough to leave me a bottle of fine wine from the nightclub the previous night. Figuring that most of the work was already done, I drank a few glasses and eventually headed off to bed in order to get a proper night’s sleep. I really shouldn’t have been surprised at the outcome, however, because I spent nearly the entire evening tossing and thinking about Nalah who I can’t seem to stop thinking about these days.

I really should cut back on that wine.

Tune the Salihnd'Yael

Posted by avrak on November 25, 2008 in category Nalah, Social

My salihnd’yael needs tuning. Yes, I know that it is an extremely durable piece of scanning equipment. Yes, I know that I essentially carry it everywhere and that it is, for all practical purposes, more familiar to me than my own left hand. But something about it isn’t right. Allow me to explain.

Ever since I’ve been stationed here on the ChR Areinnye’Aidoann, I’ve felt out of place. The Aidoann is a big ship, and I am just one little science officer trying to make his way through it. I must admit, pleasantly so, that the work here is at least interesting and satisfying. Although something that I can’t seem to wrap my head around is the other science officers that I work with– many of them seem about as dim-witted as a Klingon trying to figure out a puzzle box. For instance, my first assignment here on the Aidoann involved a sudden gravity well occurrence at the star system of 59-Virginis–well into Federation space. Granted, much of my training in Astrophysics revolves around spatial anomalies, but even the Arrian who was overseeing the scanning analyses didn’t know about stellar particulate emissions from black holes and why they are important. I mean, Gravity Well Particulate Energy Emission Theory is taught in beginning Astrophysics courses and is a must know for any decent spatial scientist, let alone the advanced theoretical physics of gravity well effects on the space/subspace continuum. Absolutely incredible.

But despite the frustration I feel toward some of my colleagues, there is one saving grace about being on this ship: khre’Arrain Nalah t’Khnialmnae. I did not always feel that way, however. She was acting Riov on my first assignment, and if you had asked me then what I thought of her, I would have told you that she is pushy, rude, demanding, uncaring, and downright hostile and suspecting–basically the same as any other Riov I’ve ever met. One of the things that I have learned in my lifetime–often the hard way–is that first appearances can be deceiving. As fortune would have it, one morning I was assigned by erei’Riov t’Aegis to lead a boarding party in order to take possession of a Terran vessel which made its way into our space. I’m not a security officer–I never even claimed to be–but the erei’Riov felt that it would be a good experience for me to lead this group. I admit, I am inexperienced in such matters and the events did not turn out for the best, but I am still alive and thankful at least for that.

But something else happened during that boarding party; something that I never expected to happen now or even at any time during my life–Nalah t’Khnialmnae happened. She transported over to assist me with unlocking the Terran’s computer systems, and after that had been completed to the best of our ability, she left for the cargo bay while I remained on the bridge to finish up our shipboard scans. I felt it strange that she had not contacted me during that time to help her, so I went down to the cargo bay to see if she needed my assistance. No sooner than I entered the bay, then I saw t’Khnialmnae standing on some cargo containers that suddenly gave way and dropped her into a vat of Organic Superlube; she screamed for help.

I must admit that I am not a very spiritual Rihanha, but at that very moment I felt something that I have never ever felt before; something, that for all of my education and training, I cannot explain for the life of me. I threw down my salihnd’yael and ran to rescue her. Fortunately, she was all right–sprained ankle excepting–and I helped get her back to the Aidoann and back to safety. My salihnd’yael was dinged a bit, but seemed to work just fine; in fact, it seemed to work better than ever for some strange reason. Must have been some of that toxic Terran air cleaning out its components.

I knew that I felt something different about her, and my suspicions were confirmed the following day when I saw her in the corridor. I couldn’t believe myself! I was smiling at her–a superior officer–and she seemed to welcome it. That feeling intensified later as I ran into her again at the gym. We talked about the upcoming event at the Poisoned Nei’rrh, and she wanted to see me there! Of course, I had to dress to the nines for her and practice some of my dance steps–just as father taught me to do–and the evening seemed like a success.

That is, until her father showed up toward the end. Perhaps it was the wine, but when he took her away from me and she started becoming upset, I became furious. He left, and she broke the news to me that she is engaged to be bonded. I didn’t know what to do; I felt helpless. I asked her if she wanted me to walk her home, and she agreed. She did kiss me on the cheek for the enjoyable evening, which I quite liked, but then left me out in the cold. Something was not right–this was not the way that I imagined the evening to happen.

I made my way back to the Aidoann to change back into uniform and spend time in the lab working and thinking about the evening’s events. When I opened my footlocker to change back into my uniform, my salihnd’yael fell out onto the solid deck and made a loud thud noise. While I really don’t have any hard evidence to conclude this way, it just seems as if it isn’t scanning as well as it used to.

I really think my salihnd’yael needs tuning.