Memory of a Dream

Posted on Fri Nov 9th, 2018 @ 12:30pm by Lieutenant Commander Mnhei'sahe Dox

Mission: Escaped Pantheons
Location: Deck 8, Crew Quarters
Timeline: 2395, en route to the Galactic Core

Laying in her small bed, Melanie Dox looked up at the bluish streaks of light out of her window that filled up space while at warp. She turned over, pulling her thick fleece blanket over her as she curled up tight into a ball and shivered in the cold of her tiny room aboard the smuggling ship, the Forager.

Environmental control rarely worked well while they were at warp, and the cold made it hard for Melanie to sleep. Suddenly, the engines knocked hard and shook her in her bed and the anxious 5 year old girl let out a light gasp. She bolted up in bed, sitting with her knees up close. Nervously, she ran her fingers through her short cropped hair along her ear, rubbing the point at the top of one. Across from her was a small mirror where she could see herself sitting. Her thick hair was mussed from bed as she brushed the v-shaped bangs out of her eyes and her reflection began to vibrate in the mirror.

She looked around the room as the walls began to shake as well. Lightly at first, then harder as the bolts in the bulkhead began to shudder. Melanie let out a yell as one of the bolts shot out across the room with a loud clang. Then another, and another as the mirror across from her fell off the wall and shattered. Above her, the window rattled hard and a thick crack snapped across it. From out in the corridor, she heard a loud bursting sound followed by the screams of her mother. The entire room shook violently as the bulkhead beside her buckled and ripped violently and suddenly from the ship, leaving the open expanse of warp space. Melanie tried to scream as the air was pulled from her tiny lungs and she felt herself ripped from her bed into the void.

Then she opened her eyes.

Laying on her back on board the U.S.S Hera, a 31 year old Melanie Dox woke up. She looked above her at the streaking blue lights of space at warp speed she could now see out of the windows of her new quarters. Sitting up to reorient herself, reality quickly came back to her as the nightmare began to fade slightly from her mind. "Lights, please." She whispered softly.

With a light chirp, the computer of the massive starship complied and light gently filled the room. It was only a week ago that she had been promoted to the position of Chief Flight Control Officer of the Hera and the room she had found herself now in was a benefit of that station. Command crew quarters were positively luxurious by her standards and she looked around her to the bare walls of the room.

It was still hard to believe that this room was hers and she was slightly embarrassed to have so few personal belongings to fill it, making it seem all the emptier. Getting up to walk around and reboot her brain, she walked over to the bathroom and tapped the pad on the wall to turn on the overhead lights. In the mirror was her now long hair tied up in a messy bun and her decidedly human looking ears. She started long at them.

Running a finger over the rounded top, she squinched her face slightly. Melanie Dox was part Romulan on her mother's side, but it was only in her eyes where you could really see it. There were other cues in her complexion, where any time she blushed, her cheeks took on a deep tan color due to the mixed blood in her veins being a deep brown color. But she was sure that her ears had never been pointed, as Romulan ears were. Except in her dreams. Even in dreams that were little more than memories, she had her mother's ears for some reason. It was something she never understood but tried not to think about.

Melanie was raised Romulan for the first 14 years of her life, in spite of her human father trying in vain to reinforce her human side. Her parents argued a lot over the subject for the few years he stuck around, but he left when she was only four. Even now, years later, she could remember the fights. While Melanie looked more human than Romulan, her actual physiology leaned heavily towards her mother's genetic influence and it was a strong point of contention that she believed was a major factor in her parents separating. She remembered her mother being absolutely livid over the extent with which her father tried to erase Melanie's Romulan heritage, but she always refused to go into details with Melanie. Maybe that fueled the dreams, she thought.

As she stared at her reflection, still rubbing her ear, she thought about the nightmare. She had honestly been expecting something like it to disrupt her first night sleeping in her new quarters. It was how her brain worked. The last week had been one of the most positive in her adult life. She was successfully making friends on the Hera. Real friends. And her career as a pilot, which had all but come to a standstill after 6 years stuck at various starbases ferrying cargo back and forth, seemed to be moving as fast as the Hera herself. So, of course her subconscious mind would pick now to mess with her. It wasn't anything new to the young pilot, but it was annoying, nonetheless. And she knew that she needed to clear her mind of it before trying to go back to sleep so she wouldn't fall right back into another one.

Walking out of the bedroom area into the main section of her quarters, Melanie sighed, really feeling how large and bare it was. There was a few pieces of almost generic art of spacescapes that just came with the room. A small couch and a table with two chairs, also parts of the stock decor. On the table, a small rolled out portable keyboard that was the only obvious possession of Melanie's in sight. But more than the room feeling a little too big for her, it felt empty. The first thing she did was unpack the single bag of clothes and uniforms she had brought with her on board, which only took a few minutes. Everything was neatly hung up or folded in the small dresser provided.

She was used to cramped quarters and small rooms. On her last posting, she was even stuck with a roommate that she didn't quite get along with, which wasn't uncommon on remote starbase postings. But so far, the Hera was different. She was making friends for what felt like the first time in forever and finding herself alone in a room that was too big for her at the moment.

She was lonely.

But it was also just past 3 and she had to be up for duty again in a few hours. The last thing she wanted to do was irritate those new friends by seeing if any were awake. She walked over to the replicator and asked for a warm milk. It was something she discovered that she liked while at the academy and it usually helped her sleep, so she took the glass back to her bed and slid back under her blanket. The same fleece blanket she clung to all those years ago that featured prominently in her dream from when it was new, not thin and threadbare. The only thing she had left from the childhood she both hated and missed sometimes.

Sitting in bed, nursing her milk she thought back to the message she had received from her mother a couple of days ago. She got messages about once a month, but she hadn't seen her in person since shortly before her graduation when she was still on Earth, where her Mother lived in protective Starfleet custody. Her mother was a defected Romulan, though believed to be dead by the Empire, and shared secrets about her years working with the unification movement to free Romulus. Her mother was extremely warm in the message, something that was rare for the very stern Romulan.

Since the message, Melanie had been surprised at how much of Rhinnasu, the Romulan language, had come rushing back to her. It was pretty much all that she spoke for almost 15 years. Earlier, Melanie had attended a dinner party in Commander Rita Paris' quarters along with Rita's husband, the Vulcan Science Officer Sonak, and the ships chief Medical Officer, Asa Dael. An El Aurian with an extremely outgoing personality that Melanie found that she really liked. But, when asked about her knowledge of the language, Melanie downplayed her knowledge as it had been over 6 years since she had uttered a word of Romulan, so it was a safe assumption on her part that she would be rusty. She hadn't lied, but she had also learned while on Earth to downplay her knowledge and heritage to the point that it was a knee-jerk reaction to do so. But since the message from her mother, she realized that it was all right there. She found herself bouncing back and forth between English and Rhinnasu in her brain and almost cursed in it while jogging with the First Officer the prior morning, which Romulan or not, she thought better of even if she was off duty.

Even today, she found that she was less ashamed of her Romulan heritage then she was afraid of being judged for it as happened when she was sent to High School on Earth and at her time in the academy. In her head, she didn't believe that Sonak, Asa, or Rita would ever judge her based on it, but the fear was still strong in the back of her mind, affecting her reactions and fueling her insecurities.

Thinking of the friends she was making led her mind down a different path. So far, she liked most everyone she had met on board with the exception of the ships Councilor, Avender Jurot. Melanie had a number of confrontational and required therapy sessions with starfleet councilors after she had been sent to live with her paternal grandparents after the smuggling ship she had been raised on was caught and her parents arrested. She was resentful of her Grandparents. She was resentful of Earth and of being told that it would behoove her to speak English. She knew the language, of course, but she was 15 and acting out. As such, she had since harbored a dislike for therapists and Jurot was a Betazoid on top of everything else. And one that practically bragged about how efficiently she could read Melanie's mind. It put her off almost immediately. She had seen a report from the mission on Meroset that referenced that something significant had happened to the Councilor, but didn't read the full report.

Finishing her milk, she laid back and stared up at the window over her bed at the streaking lights of warp space. The dream stuck in her head. She wondered what it meant? Was she afraid that her new life was going to fall apart like the ship in her nightmare? In reality, the Forager had never fallen apart, but dreams were like that sometimes. Melanie sighed, trying to let her mind wander but she couldn't quite shake it. She tried falling back to sleep, as she knew she had a long day ahead along with a scheduled lunch debriefing with the entire senior staff to discuss the Meroset mission. And, as much as it still surprised her, Melanie was now senior staff as head of the flight control department. After laying there for another half hour staring literally into space, she rolled her eyes and sat back up. It was obvious that she wasn't going to get back to sleep so she decided to take a shower and try and start her day.

Maybe focusing on work would push the nightmare and all of the thoughts lingering as a result from her head. At least she hoped it will, as she rubbed her ear again.