If Only Time Travel Was Real

Posted on Sat Nov 4th, 2023 @ 10:24pm by Ka'see 'Cassie' Anderson (*) & Chief Helmsman Kalahaeia t'Leiya

Mission: Fractures
Location: Rec Room
Timeline: MD -08 18:00
1016 words - 2 OF Standard Post Measure

Cassie stared out the window as she watched the ships warp core. The sound of shouting at the other end of the rec room as people excitedly about the holoedeck triggered a cascade of emotions that she struggled to contain despite all her attempts. Each word of excitement over the holodeck echoed in her mind, transporting her back to holoworld for a moment.

The nightmares, the panic attacks, the haunting images – they all consumed her some nights. She was sure that Jake knew but he had not said anything about it. Sometimes she felt like a prisoner of her own mind, unable to escape the horrors she had experienced sometimes even as she heard someone calling her name. “Hmm?” She asked turning around confused to look at the person standing by her table.

"Mind if I sit here?" Kali jerked her chin and thumb alike at the empty chair across from Cassie.

Cassie blinked a couple of times looking at the woman blankly for a moment before she looked at the chair and nodded. “Not at all. Please.” She offered a small smile. “Been a while since I have seen you.”

"Had to play around with all the dragons and such while I could." Kali grinned, taking a seat with her drink. "Sure beats freezing our asses off." She rather suspected the shared points on their ears meant the other woman had been no more fond or tolerant of the cold during the system failures in the storm before that than she had.

"Been months since then," Cassie said with a small smile. She shivered at the memory of the cold when the ship had been at breaking point. She had spent weeks after freezing, it had been magical when Hysperia had warmed up enough and seemed to help warm her naturally. "Feels like I have only just warmed up."

"Unfortunately a bit of a weak point in the design; as a variety of friends in the past from cold-weather planets and places have been all-too-willing to remind me sometimes. I'd suggest we find all the rest of the various hot-weather species on board and start a petition to turn the temperature up, but we all know that then the Andorians would just start a counter-petition to turn it down." Kali joked.

Cassie smiled just a little at the joke. “I think I am better just keeping my quarters that little more hotter and escaping to there when needs be.” She decided. She was already doing most of that already which was nice to come home to at the end of the day. “I am sure Jake does not mind too much.”

"I hear you've been cataloging the grotto?" Kali raised one eyebrow inquisitively, with a little bit of a smile. "Still say we ought to hold an auction, once we have more of it done. There's a couple folks in the area who owe me a few favors and would probably give us a decent deal on facilitating it."

"I have when I cannot sleep," Cassie commented on. "I think that is going to happen but it needs to be catalogued first." Cassie could only do so much at one time before it became to much for her. But she had found several profitable items so far it was just a case of gathering enough of them to make it worth while.

"Well if there's a fair price for those earrings with the royal blue jewels, I want to buy those." Kali grinned, then shrugged. "My usual strategy for not being able to sleep is to go beat the hell out of something, honestly."

“Talk to the Captain,” Cassie advised before shrugging. “I am not much of a fighter. I spot for Liha sometimes but it’s not really what I do as standard.” Cassie admitted with another shrug as she looked around trying to find somewhere else to look. She had far too much on her mind.

"...You ok?" Kali noted the shifting eyes and other subtle little tells, shifting herself at discomfort asking the awkward question.

Cassie's mind swirled with worries and insecurities, but she wasn't ready to confront them. She feared judgment and vulnerability. “Holoworld is playing on my mind a little.” She half lied. Cassie knew she needed to address their issues eventually, but for now, she sought refuge of the half lie, hoping time would mend it all without having to confront its fragility.

"Never thought I'd get to add 'computers' to the list of things out to get me, yeah." Despite having survived the crash itself and the period after it, Kali seemed rather less disturbed, and more annoyed, at the homicidal ship. "We blew the place sky-high though, and Curtis checked all the systems to make sure whatever that was didn't transfer to us,. Makes sense to sorta look over your shoulder at the computer systems for awhile though, yeah."

"I know but I just feel odd about it all. I was pretty much dead if Angel and Liha had not resuscitated me and I have made nothing of my second chance being here in this time." Cassie shrugged. This were things she really should discuss with someone else but the woman who was trying to reach out for a connection

"What would you like to make of it, then. if you had control of it?" Kali asked, curious.

Cassie paused her drink mid to her lips and frowned. She had never been asked that before and it struck one thing deep down as she thought on her life back in 2246. “I would like my life back that I had.”

"...Yeah. Me too. Unfortunately, only way it'd happen for either of us involves time travel. And that's usually a hornet's nest best left unkicked." Not to mention, Kali thought, that in her own case it wasn't like she would unpunch the admirals anyways, time travel or not - they deserved it. She might just have picked different ones to start the list with.

If only….