Racking it home

Posted on Thu Nov 10th, 2011 @ 1:15am by Lieutenant Jimmy Cooper

1,424 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: Unmasked Miners
Location: Holodeck
Timeline: Immediately following "Re-Group"

"Crewman, follow me please," Jimmy said to Birsi as the officers filed out of the briefing room. They too departed, but instead of settling onto the bridge, Jimmy led them to the turbolift. Birsi's interests were naturally piqued further when he met her expectant gaze with nothing more than reciting their new destination, "Deck 5." Her efforts to forecast what he wanted to talk about, much less why he sought the confidentiality the growing distance from their origin ensured, remained fruitless.

Once there, they exited and took a left. Eventually, they stood front of the Holodeck's doors.

"Lieutenant?" prompted Birsi aloud this time, the pieces of this puzzle even less coherent.

Without answering, Jimmy entered the holodeck, urging Birsi along. It was a flat field, lined, with a net in the middle. In short, it was an old-earth Tennis field. Jimmy tossed Birsi a tennis racket.

Years of familiarity and honing her reflexes bested months of underutilization, allowing Birsi to step into the throw and catch the racket by its handle. The confidence exuded by her movement was short-lived, however. Casually familiar with tennis, she found the idea of them playing desultory, casting the final straw for her quiet acquiescence.

"This," she began, her gaze blank despite its initial focus on the racket, "is a bit more involved than a quick word, sir."

"As your boss, I'm responsible for your schedule. And unless you want me to toss you a PADD with your schedule details, right now it's Tennis detail with me." Jimmy then looked her straight in the face and smiled at her utterly confused look. "I felt you needed to blow off some steam. In addition, I would like to know what's going on, if you would like to talk about it. Alternatively, you could smack me some balls in silence, if you so please."

Silently, Birsi mulled the offer. Perplexity rather than reluctance stemmed her reaction, though the Ranger's current predicament and Captain Halliwell's orders certainly weighed upon her consideration. Then again, she wasn't specifically ordered to do anything, and doubted she could add anything those the captain had tasked wouldn't. The nebulous inkling of an idea that encouraged her to speak at the meeting hadn't come any closer to tangibility since.

A small smile broke the Bajoran's placid expression. "Well, you almost chose the right sport."

"Well, this reminds me of home." Jimmy mused as he grabbed a few balls from the side. "And home helps me clear my mind and make the plans the Captain expects of me." Absent-mindedly, he looked at the virtual sky. "Then again, maybe I should've added a dome. Not much sky 2000 leagues under the sea."

"Where would it be representative of if you had?" Well within the Federation's reach as the technology for submersed colonies was, Birsi remembered that there weren't many, even on Earth.

"New Martim Vaz," Jimmy answered, then he threw a ball up in the air and hit it with his racket.

Obviously meant to accommodate her unfamiliarity with the game, the serve demonstrated Birsi's latent potential. Different as the means of ball movement and scoring was in handball, it shared the basic concept of anticipating the ball's heading and positioning herself to intercept it. She did so quickly and easily; it hadn't even struck the ground before she whipped it away.

So how did she wind up at the bottom of love-ten anyway? Solid, yet flat, her swipe sent the ball hurtling into the net. Their play action consequently broken up, Birsi took to addressing one of Jimmy's earlier statements.

"I don't quite get what you want me to talk about, Lieutenant." Acute enough to suspect Jimmy's interest lie in her obvious discord with Commander Michaels, his prompt was so open that she wasn't sure where to start.

"Well," Jimmy began while grabbing another ball, "You seemed to disagree earlier on the probe solution, and while I can't read minds, you did seem to be holding yourself in. I don't want you to hold yourself in, not to me personally in the least."

"I wasn't," Birsi countered earnestly, "I just didn't have much to say this time. Though I'm sure that even if I did, just about everyone but you would ignore it, too."

Jimmy couldn't hold back a small smile. "They have decisions to make. As have I. Just because they didn't do what you thought up, doesn't mean they ignored you." He looked at the ball in his hand. "Here it comes, wait until after it bounces and you'll have an easier time hitting it back."

"Really?" Birsi's gentle voice bristled at her recollection of what she found most offensive about her attempt to contribute. "Because I remember Commander Michaels opting against the survey probe because 'the Taylforthians might see it.' Yet after we arrived, she contradicted that with the shuttle mission, which not only risked a major Prime Directive violation because it occurred within viable range of their detection measures, it helped expose us to whatever operation that spacedock of a ship is heading up. It's not just my advice she said to hell with in favor of playing Romulan roulette, either. I spent most of the week studying past surveys to help with this."

"Tell you what," Jimmy said, returning the ball which Birsi had mindlessly struck back to him, "I'll talk to her. I want to go through the data with her anyway."

Ironically, Birsi failed to return the ball once she gave her full attention to it. Her shot sent the lime-green orb high, and it quickly became evident that Jimmy would do well to let it sail out of bounds. The game idle once more, she shook her head, and spoke without the frustration that seemed to constrict her throat before.

"I don't expect anyone to hang off of every word I say. . .I know that's not how things work. But if people are going to disagree with me, I don't think it's wrong to expect consistency in why. That didn't happen. It isn't why I didn't say much in the meeting, but when someone does that, it makes me think I'm wasting my breath. . .and that they've got their own agenda."

Something came to mind to Jimmy, whom let his racket hang from his arm. "Is it. . ." He paused, looking for words. While he was usually pretty okay at talking to people, he was afraid of pushing the Bajoran over a limit. As a result, his hairs, which had behaved pretty well up till now, had risen up in spikes to reflect his discomfort. "Is it a racial, no, a trust issue?" Jimmy still wasn't quite sure how to put it. "Is the fact that Commander Michaels is partially Vulcan making things. . .worse?" He hastily added, "Not that I would judge you by something like that. I don't think any Klingon could ever become my friend!" A hazy smile flicked on his face.

Jimmy didn't abort his initial phrasing soon enough. Though backed by the common lore of Vulcans' tendency to put their abilities on a pedestal, Birsi disliked the suggestion of her deriving a judgment on little more than a broad stereotype. Laughing incredulously, the Bajoran enlistee breathily asked, "Did you just ask me if I'm a racist?"

"I. . .eh. . ." Dropping the racket, Jimmy scratched the back of his head. "Just. . .never mind." It took a bit for him to regain his composure. "Would it help if I'd say Commander Michaels has no agendas that I know of, and that changes in her behavior are at most to be contributed to either changes in the circumstances, or in her personal well-being and emotions?" While Commander Michaels had Vulcan blood, she didn't seem to follow her brethren's self-control techniques as rigidly.

Birsi lead her reply with another chortle. "The planet. . .the space station. . .even the Romulan outpost. She's mentioned infiltrating them all at some point or another, sir. She's either really hands-on or she has an adventure complex that makes James Bond look more like Harriet the Spy."

That actually made Jimmy chuckle, and his hair dropped into its original state as well. "She does love her exploring, I can't deny that." He walked towards the Crewman. "I think it's about time we get back. I want to have a scientifically approved plan ready which does not include Vulcans."

"I'm not sure that's even possible at this point," Birsi quipped in reference to the widely renown kinship of Vulcans and Romulans, the latter of which their efforts would involve investigating.

 

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