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Cptn Corizon

Finding Focus

The soft sounds of a stringed instrument echoed across deck two of the Excalibur, emanating from what was sure to be an unlikely source for most people’s brains – the Captain’s Quarters. Having survived his first flight in years, and the crew having preformed more than admirably in transferring a load of supplies, he decided to get some much needed relaxation in as they headed towards their next destination.

 

Corizon’s clawed fingers moved a bow delicately over the strings of a wooden and bone instrument his people called an ang-to’lo-ji. The delicate, deeply burled wood of the body and brilliant, carved bone of that made the neck of the instrument poured out soft, melodious tones. Engrossed in the Lament of Sa’gol, he barely noticed when one of his two yeomen, Augustus Quintius, entered to collect some stray bits of paper work and get them typed. Stopping to take in the music and the rare moment of tranquility on his commanding officers’ face, the silver-eyed twenty-something male smiled.

 

For Corizon, he’d always found music to be more of an avenue of focus and harmony than anything else, and it was something he did not get to do nearly as often as he would have liked, but such was the life of a starship captain.

 

Focus, clarity. They were words repeated over and over by clerics, adepts and followers of the su-no belief system that Corizon had trained and studied in for most of his formative years. He found it hard to believe where the path of life had taken him and how little clarity there was in where he was headed. Still, focus and clarity were or should be the goal of any individual seeking attainment of the highest order. Music was a path to such clarity.

 

Finally bringing the selection to an end, he looked up to see the awed Qutinus. There was much of both his parents in the boy’s face and that caused a small smirk to cross the Dameon’s own features.

 

“That was…,” Quintus said, startled and half-ashamed he’d lingered long enough to be noticed, “quite beautiful, sir. I didn’t know you were a musician.”

 

Corizon smiled and put the ang-to’lo-ji aside. “Thanks, I haven’t played in a while. Too busy I suppose.”

 

Quintus nodded and started to leave.

 

“Augustus.”

 

Stopping, starting to flush slightly, the half-Morian turned on heal. “Yes, sir?”

 

“You forgot your PADD’s.”

 

Flushing, despite himself, he quickly returned and gathered up the PADDs and headed out with a curt smile. “Oh, thanks…I would have wondered where I put them.”

 

With a stray thought about calling the boy’s mother at some point, Corizon went to see what had been left for him. Picking it up, he scrolled through the PADD. Nothing like cargo lists to kill his focus. Sighing, he began looking over the lists of supplies they were to drop off on the next planet. Amid the hustle of getting out of port, not having a dedicated first officer, and the usual problems associated with coming off leave, he’d not really even looked at the list yet.

 

It was mostly routine supplies. Water, food stores, spare parts, lithium-ion batteries, a few new computer parts for their communications systems, twelve palates of GHB, medical supplies, candles. He stopped.

 

“Wait… twelve palates of GHB…”

 

Mentally running through a list of possible supplies with an acronym like that, he came up empty. Firing up the desk console, he pulled up the actual shipping manifest that had the explanation of the cargo.

 

Gamma-Hydroxybutyric acid or GHB is a naturally-occurring substance. It is also a neuroprotective therapeutic nutrient that is categorized as a hypnotic drug in many jurisdictions.

 

Giving that a full moment to sink in, the Dameon’s face quickly paled.

 

“Oh for the love of…”

 

Reluctantly he looked up the information on the religious group they were dropping the supplies off for and felt the need to hit his head against a proverbial desk.

 

“Just one of these days,” he said to himself and any deity that happened to be paying attention, “I’d like to know when my ship was going to be turned into a street-corner pharmacy for a bunch of hippies using some sort of mystic religion to cover getting baked…”

 

Feeling a headache the size of a Galaxy-class starship coming on and deciding it wasn’t worth the effort to even find out how they managed to get the permits to have a Federation starship deliver a load of narcotics alongside basic supplies. Federation socialization told him he shouldn’t question other religions practices. Glancing towards the wooden structure that formed the shrine to the hereditary sword he owned, he supposed that was likely a good idea. What was the human phrase? Careful throwing stones in glass houses?

 

“Well,” he said again to himself. “I suppose that’s simply their method of finding focus.”

 

And with that, he made a quick edit to the manifest to list the palates as something innocuous before his crew decided to find focus for themselves.

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