Raumuk

A Joint Log by Scott Sabourin and shiKame Raumuk (note - this takes place before last week's sim, when Sabourin was needed on the CT to answer hails from the entire universe) shiKame turned towards Scott, antennae flicking inquisitively. “Are you getting anything more from the Yorktown? They’ve passed through the storm by now.” When Scott admitted that he hadn’t, he suggested that downloading the Yorktown’s log might give them some insight into the nature of the storm. With Dent talking to Captain Halloway and a request for information from the ship’s operations officer sent off, the two settled back for a moment, allowing data to accumulate. Scott stood, heading for the replicator. “Would you like anything?” She declined, and pulled up a screen displaying her insanely complex Andorian solitaire game. Trying to distract herself and him, she asked what his normal duties were, away from what they had dubbed “Space Weather Central”. “Answering hails” was the most exciting part of the non-answer. He blew on his raktijino and peered over her shoulder as she place a card, grimaced, and hit the ‘undo’ button. Pointing, he suggested “That card on that one?” She shook her head. “No, that clan isn’t in ascendance right now.” It took a lot of time to be able to understand her game, but sometimes people surprised her. “It would mess things up later.” She continued. “Have you been on the station long? All you pinkskins start to look alike after a while”. She smiled to take the sting out of her words. “It doesn’t feel like it, but it’s actually been a couple of months. How about you?” he asked, finally taking a sip of his drink. She joked that it seemed long enough to need notches on the walls, and he laughingly suggested padds, instead. Complaining that she didn’t get out much, he asked “When was the last time you …got out?” “Sickbay” she said flatly, rolling her eyes. “During out last spate of…. visitors.” She flicked her antennae. “These aren't really for sound, but they do help contribute to a very good sense of hearing. The aliens discovered that I could hear them, in whispers, and nearly drove me crazy calling my name. I'm told they were just trying to get someone's attention, but I didn't appreciate the headache.” He stared, mildly shocked, and suggested with a smile that sickbay was where she should have been carving notches. She swore him to secrecy, then admitted that one of the biobeds was now somewhat scratched. He laughed, then mused. “The last time I “got out” was right before the station was about to explode, when the aliens were here. Looks like they did more for us than we realized,” he said thoughtfully, raising an eyebrow. shiKame heard a sensor beep and quickly switched her screen back to the ion storm. She swore (in Andorian, of course) and added “That’s not slowing down at all. It’s going to be a bad one. Two days, probably less. If it moves faster, will it blow over us more quickly?” Scott wasn’t sure. “They’ll be de-ionizing the hull, so it’ll be more likely to slide past us.” He pressed a button on his console, taking another, longer drink. “The Yorktown Ops officer still hasn’t responded to my request for their logs. Perhaps something’s wrong with their com.” She was adding together the most recent information and posting the update to the CT. “Maybe they’re busy reconfiguring after their… stunt.” Scott said something about ion storms not being the best things to fly through, but that it was probably fun. When she muttered something about hotshot pilots, he only grinned, and wished he had some antennae to raise. …And the storm whirled closer through the night…..

shiKame bumped along, slung over Lieutenant Commander Brown’s shoulder, her stomach jolting unpleasantly. She didn’t really need to be carried to sickbay, just guided, but she couldn’t manage to come up with the ability to say so. All her thoughts and words were scattered under the unceasing, irritating, infuriating noise. For some time now, she’d been annoyed by odd whispers, footsteps, the sense that someone was just behind her. The way your shoulder blades itched when someone was staring at your back. The movement out of the corner of your eye as you turned, just too late. The awareness of, well, somebody else’s awareness of you. Andorian antennae were not precisely sound organs, as many people assumed, although they did help contribute to an acute sense of hearing. They were more sensitive to pressure, to minute changes in air currents, sometimes to temperature. With them, she could “sense” the shape of a room, the objects in it by the way they took up space, the people by their movements, their solidity. The taste/color/feel of it – there really wasn’t a word in Federation Standard to describe a sense her people had developed to a fine pitch. She would rather have done without her eyes than her antennae. Commander Brown stumbled as the lights flickered again, lurching into a wall and bumping shiKame’s hands off of her tightly curled antennae. She swore (or tried to swear – she didn’t know if the words had come out or not) and quickly replaced them. But recently, when someone (or several someones?) had whispered to her, there was no one there. When she’d identified several people in the room, her eyes told her there was only one or two. She supposed she’d have to apologize to Cheatle – the poor Denobulan had an irritating habit of standing just over her shoulder, but he hadn’t deserved the times (several times?) that she’d snapped at him, and then discovered he’d been the one across the room. And, again, no one had been behind her. Was this the Summer Madness? It didn’t sound like it. From the stories the warriors told, Summer Madness made you crazy, yes, but you always knew who your enemy was. And now she was hearing laughter- nasty, teasing, sniggering laughter – but she still didn’t know who her enemy was. shiKame hunched down yet farther, trying to protect her most sensitive organs. Whether her problem was related to the odd sensor fluctuations and power problems or not, she was going to have to get a really good pair of earmuffs to be able to do anything about it. Or, if she was crazy, just a good sedative and a padded room…… And voices whispering her name followed her down the corridor……………… (P.S. btw, it is highly unlikely that I will be attending next week’s sim, so please assume that Raumuk is in a quiet, dark corner somewhere – or a brightly lit biobed in sickbay – with her hands over her head.) (P.P.S. It’s fun to be the drama queen sometimes!)