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I want to thank @Alieth, along with @Roshanara Rahman & @Quen Deena, for making this entire arc absolutely incredible to explore. I've said this on Discord, but I'll reiterate it here because I think it's important - generally speaking I find it difficult to explore my own character, or to make them the 'center' of a narrative arc. I'm always concerned it's self-indulgent or exclusionary so I rarely go to these stories, excepting with the help of the writers I've most come to respect and trust. I'm glad I did, because what @Alieth did in this last sim is an incredible reflection on my own character, and my 'history' with our fleet. Thank you, Troublemaker. ========================================================================= Falling from the ((Bridge, Deck 1, USS Veritas)) Reality collapsed at Alieth's feet, in a cascade of memory fragments into darkness. Glimpses for the past rained down around her, disjointed and senseless as she tumbled hastily into the abyss. The red light in the teetering corridors of the USS Artemis. A well-endowed front end of a version of Captain Rahman riding a Veritas through the space, with spots ALL the way down. Teller: Alieth! For some reason, a violent impact to the chest followed by a more than audible “FALLHHHASLLPPPPPPPP!”. Someone speaking in a strangely flowery manner. For some reason the words "Silas" and "Saga" echoed over and over in the void. Neither made sense to the Vulcan. The texture of the Uss Diligent's captain's chair, firm under her fingers, though she had never been there. The woodlands of Til'ahn, the gurgling sound of his chest after a runabout fell on his head. Mackenzie, working on a mechanical arm for a reluctant G'var. A robotic leg for a Betazoid officer, Adea. While Alieth knew the former CMO, she didn't know either of the other two, but she recognised their faces. Somehow. A little girl, playing with a yellow-robed muppet, who looked suspiciously like a certain red-haired fellow. For some reason, she knew there was a degree of mischief involved. Teller: Alieth! We have to go! Now! A white wake that, for some mysterious reason, left a trail of bamboo and coconuts behind it hurried towards her amidst memories of a crazy party with someone called Ukinix and a snooty-looking black-eyed woman in the chase of a bellhop. Somehow, there, when everything was crumbling around her, smelt like coffee. Amidst the maelstrom of memories and shadowy images, she intuited a familiar form. Alieth stretched out her hands in search of the faint figure she could not fully see. Alieth: We cannot Sern is still... Teller: It won't matter if we don't get out of here. You have to break the meld! A firm hand grasped her wrist. She clung onto him as they both spun on the trajectory that had resulted from their collision. Alieth: Alright! Alieth closed her eyes and concentrated on her hands. Not on those, clinging to the skinny pale wrist, but on another, far, far away, resting on the profile of a face just over the qui'lari. She felt the electric tingle under her fingertips, the vibrant connection between her minds. With one last effort of her will, Alieth flexed her fingers... ... And pushed. And when she opened her eyes, she was still in her office chair, as a very large dog performed the duty her kind had been performing for millennia and was saving a human's life. Licking him. ((CMO's Office, Main Sickbay, USS Thor)) The light in the office was too white, too bright after her plunge into darkness. Alieth closed her eyes and breathed in, the emotions of the meld still lingering in her mind. Some were not her own. Most of them were just hers. And she didn't want to deal with them, not there, not at that moment. She just could not. She breathed out deeply and inhaled once more. When she exhaled again, it was herself all over again, what had happened pushed away and tucked away in a place deep in her mind, shelved for... for later. Yet there was... a certain tension in her face, a certain frown in her slanted eyebrows, a subtle dull gleam in her dark eyes. Teller: Doc...Alieth...are you... Alieth: I’m fine. ::She frowned deeply and reworded the statement:: I am fine. Fine was a non-descript and imprecise term, and yet she could find nothing better to convey the truth. Teller: But...what about Sern? What the hell was all that? Alieth: That is rather more complicated, I… She tilted her head to one side and, quickly, she regretted it, the throbbing pain piercing through her temples. She leaned back for a moment, eyes closed, before she stood back on her feet. For a moment she held herself upright, as if she questioned her own stability, just before she moved the scant two steps that separated her from the officer sprawled on the floor and the solicitous canid. She patted the animal's head a couple of times and pushed the dog aside from him before she offered a hand to the human. With one efficient motion, she assisted him back to his feet. That brief contact ceased quickly, however, with Alieth pulling her hands away just as soon as he regained his verticality. She folded her hands behind her back, hiding them in the sleeves of her lab coat. Alieth: Sern needs help, expert guidance. Assistance that I can only find in Vulcan. Teller: ? Alieth: I cannot answer that, Geoff, not now, but whatever it takes, I will sort it out, he can count on me :: She gazed into his eyes earnestly, her concern well hidden behind her impassive mask :: And so will you. Teller: ? She allowed herself for a moment to relax her firm grip on her features, and one corner of her mouth curved up slightly, barely a shadow of what she had been in his mind. Alieth: We shall see, but for the time being I think you should have some rest. And in the next few weeks just... make sure you stay out of trouble. And for once play it safe, troublemaker. Teller: ? [[Tag! & TBC]] OOC: qui'lari -> the Vulcan name for a focal point in the bioelectric field in foramen magnums of a humanoid ================================= Lt. Alieth Chief Medical Officer USS Thor NCC-82607 E239702A10 Image Collective Facilitator /Art Director =================================

Howdy Gorkonites, Don’t despair, we haven’t forgotten. But knowing who was the winner for QotM February it had to be perfect. Now who’s the winner, you ask? It’s none other than Tali Namura with: Namura: Physically, yes, I could fight a corpse. But emotionally? Imagine the toll. Congrats and thank you Jo for this awesome badge again: Seeing we're almost at the end of March, don't hesitate to toss in a few more quotes in your next sims. Greetings Sami.

I can't really describe what an honour it was to have @Geoffrey Teller agree to take part in this insane scene, but to have him do it with such an amazing quality of writing is a gift in itself. This sim, heading to the wrap up of the mind meld scene is a real treasure where he demonstrates his amazing knack to weave drama, humour and action together, even more so to leave us with the message that creativity can take you everywhere and that is just top notch. Thank you so much for jumping into this madness and a well deserved call out to @Quen Deena and @Roshanara Rahman for having jumped in and delivered up and better than I could have ever dared to imagine. _________________________________________________________________________________ ((Purplewhitehaven Beach, Limbo, within Geoff Teller's mind)) Geoff knew what he was 'seeing' was somewhere between a ghost and a memory, but that didn't matter. She felt deeply real to him even as her appearance rippled and changed. For a moment, Geoff caught a glimpse of something behind the mask. Something sad. Something hiding. It was gone a moment later and the Skipper returned to the form he had always known. Rahman: But *this* is the woman you still remember. The woman returned a playful smirk as she reached down and lifted her right pant leg slightly, revealing some Trill-like spots that ran down the side of her leg. Rahman: She told you that was inaccurate. Geoff felt himself blushing in slight embarrassment. Teller: You know how it is, Skipper. You get an idea in your head it can be tough to dislodge it. ::Geoff turned back, wagging a finger accusingly:: Wait a minute, what the hell am I embarrassed about. You're just in my head, you're not the real Rahman. This Roshanara shrugged before looking down at her chest. Rahman: Well, I suppose it could be worse. Geoff paled deeply, forced to recall the entire embarrassing situation with his ill chosen tattoo. He gasped, the full force of the memory hitting him all at once, unfiltered and in too perfect clarity. It was as if all the emotions of the original experience were back with him at once, magnified and distorted. Rahman: Now... I'm hungry! Let's get something to eat. ((Campfire, Purplewhitehaven Beach - Day)) The "New Risa resort" that Teller had helped construct with the other Veritas survivors in the real world no longer existed in this iteration of Limbo. So instead, Teller and Roshanara had set up a small campfire near the escape pod. Rahman: ::to narrator:: A campfire in the day? No, that won't do... ((Campfire, Purplewhitehaven Beach - Night)) Geoff's head whipped around, trying to process the sudden changes as the terrain shifted and reformed. The memorial stone was again in the distance and he was back at the escape pod, standing before a large stone encircled fire pit he could not remember ever building in the real world. The brutal tropical sun above made the fire pointless but in another moment, night had fallen and along with it the temperature. The woman in his mind was looking to the sky, and Geoff's eyes followed. With the sun gone, the brightest star in the sky had become the Veritas herself, suspended in time like a fly in amber. It had infuriated Teller ever single day he was trapped on this moon to be within sight of the ship but completely cut off. Roshanara cut a piece of fish they'd caught earlier in the day that had been cooking over the fire before handing it over to Teller. Rahman: You look like you could have a bite. Geoff looked down, accepting the stick with a deep scowl. Among the things which had competed for his most hated experience on Limbo had been the food. Fish. Fish stew. Baked. They were lucky to have had it and lived on it, and almost exclusively it, for months. Geoff no longer ate fish. Ever. Teller: I think I'll pass if it's all the same to you. Rahman: I promise it'll be even better than you remember. She sat up a little straighter, clearly proud. Rahman: I added some berry juice I found earlier. Geoff shook his head at the sudden warmth and eagerness to please. It made the Skipper seem vulnerable in a way Geoff had never consciously imagined. She'd never once acted this way in person, he was certain of that. Whatever it was, it compelled him to take a few hesitant bites. His eyes widened in surprise. Teller: That's actually..not..bad. Thank you...I guess. Geoff slumped down on the sand, suddenly tired of standing. He chewed through another mouthful of fictitious fish before leaning back against the escape pod in exhaustion. He was warm from the fire and considered closing his eyes for a moment, the lapping of the nearby waves calming him more than it ever had on the actual planet. Captain Rahman's voice sounded far away, but it kept Geoff anchored. Rahman: What we need to figure out, Mister Teller, is how you're going to get us back up there! Geoff shook his head, confused again. Teller: I...we did already. This was almost two years ago. We got off that world, all of us. ::Geoff thought again of the memorial stone:: Most of us. Rahman: Well how did you do it last time? Teller: What, you're going to make me explain it to you like I did last time? That took all night, and I don't have Wil here to draw the diagrams. Geoff tried to stand but his exhaustion was growing deeper the longer he sat around the fire. Some part of him knew the truth, that the meld had gone wrong. If he didn't find Alieth, or more likely if Alieth didn't find him, they'd both end up trapped within their own minds, slowly going mad as their bodies failed. Rahman: Then let's think outside the proverbial box. I don't care how red that shirt gets, you'll always be a Starfleet engineer. Something in the Captain's voice connected with the earliest moments in his Starfleet career. Stepping off the shuttle that had delivered him from Starbase 118. His orders, partially garbled by the subspace interference of the Shoals, had led him to believe he'd be a helmsman. He'd met the Captain minutes later, already deeply embroiled in a crisis. She had immediately overawed Geoff in those first moments, and he'd spent the rest of his career trying to live up to that titanic memory. Geoff struggled up unsteadily but managed to come to his feet. He felt calmer and more focused. Teller: You know, I had a whole plan for mass producing hydrazine on this planet...::Geoff imagined the little cave workshop he had built, far from camp for safety reasons. He'd never had the time to get much beyond the experimental phase before he'd figured out a different path home for the crew.::...and I was planning to launch a rocket. Unmanned, of course. Thought we might be able to get a transporter relay into orbit... The beach shimmered again but what now stood there had never existed in reality. Beginning at the treeline, a launch ramp made of lashed together logs pointed towards the sky. It had been planed down to create a smooth slide, and the surface had been coated by something that looked like petroleum oil. At the head of the ramp, a small vessel of equally improvised construction sat with bamboo door wedged open, a single seat inside. Geoff thought about it and his thinking became more clear. He was trapped within his own mind, and his creativity had always been his greatest strength. Here, it could be unbounded by the laws of physics or material science. Here, Geoff could make any ridiculous contraption he'd ever dreamed of. Right now, he was dreaming of a bamboo rocketship that would take him to the Veritas so he could rescue his friend and get the hell out of this place. The rocket motor of the bamboo ship sputtered to life, a small stream of smoke and fire from the rear. Geoff took a step towards it. Rahman: Response Teller: Skipper, you're right. You're always right. The minute I start forgetting what I'm doing, you remind me I'm here to build things. Mad, wonderful, fantastic things. ::Geoff took the wicker seat in the center of the improbable craft. The controls were all coconut halves and bamboo levers. Geoff tugged at a few confidentally, certain now this would work.:: You want to come with me? ::Geoff nodded, and suddenly a second seat appeared in the small craft.:: Rahman: Response Teller: Well, it's up to you, but in about ten seconds I'm pressing the big red coconut so either get in and hang on or get out and wish me luck, because I swore I wasn't going to die on this beach once and I'll be damned if it beats me now. And that's a God Damn Good Job Guarantee, Skipper. Rahman: Response Geoff smiled and winked, pulling the door closed and settling back in the chair. Teller: Thanks, Roshanara. For everything. Geoff fixed his eyes on the falling Veritas out his seaglass viewport and smacked the launch control. As his imaginary ship rocketed down the launchway, bits and pieces collapsed off the sides and top while the ground behind it vanished into nothingness. The beach and the island and the whole of the world vanished away as Geoff took flight, all the elements of the fantasy falling away around him as he grew closer towards his goal. His eyes stayed fixed on the point of light that had been the Veritas, but Geoff realized now it was something more. He leaned forward, calling a name out into the dark. Teller: Alieth! He flew like an arrow towards that point of light within his mind. It was the only thing left in a space that had gone pitch black. This was his last chance. He called out again. They'd escape this place together, or not at all. He felt himself growing closer to something familiar and shouted again. Teller: Alieth! We have to go! Now! Alieth: Response Teller: It won't matter if we don't get out of here. You have to break the meld! Alieth: Response Geoff felt himself tumbling again, spinning out of control as Alieth's voice became large in his mind. Then, a light. And a very large dog. ((CMO's Office, Main Sickbay, USS Thor)) Geoff pitched backwards in his chair but could not catch himself in time and ended up sprawled on the floor of Alieth's office, a monumentally bad headache throbbing behind his eyes. Before he could move or speak a single word, Cheesecake was hovering over him, the dogs huge face upside down to Geoff's perspective. Cheesecake then very helpful provided resuscitation services by licking the entirety of Geoff's face and at least one of his eyeballs. Teller groaned and tried to stand without success. Teller: Doc...Alieth...are you... Alieth: Response Teller: But...what about Sern? What the hell was all that? Alieth: Response [Tags/TBC!] =============================== Commander Geoffrey Teller Executive Officer USS Thor - NCC 82607 Commodore A. Kells, Commanding V239509GT0

CELENDI NEBULA — Returning from a time portal inside the nebula, the crew of the USS Resolution (NCC-78145) bring back their crew and those from several other vessels, including the missing Andalucia. The Resolution returned to our time but a few days ago, having travelled hundreds of thousands of years into the future in their search for the missing freighter, the Andalucia. A race known in the future as the Sau, a species that does not exist in our time, had been manipulating the nebula to ensnare ships from the present and captured their crews to use as slave labour. Fortunately, the ship’s crew brought this practice to a halt through ground combat and space standoffs. “Thank the Exchequer they were technologically comparable to us,” squealed Lieutenant JG Gnaxac, a Ferengi Engineering officer. “Can you imagine if we’d run into the Borg with three hundred thousand years of bonus experience? It doesn’t bear thinking about!” he added, before shuddering and refusing to talk to us anymore. Good news for most families who believed that the nebula had taken their relatives. The Resolution returned through the spatial anomaly packed to the gills with crew members from countless different vessels who had disappeared over the years. Not least of whom is Cormac Finnegan, the Captain of the Andalucia, the very ship that the Resolution investigated its disappearance. When the crew of the Resolution passed through the anomaly a second time, the portal was permanently closed behind them, preventing the Sau from capturing further vessels. A collective sigh of relief occurred on the bridge of the ship at this discovery, cementing the idea that the Sau are a race who should not have access to time travel. Next to unconfirmed reports of injuries within the crew, the FNS also learned that another Engineer, Ensign Callium Treetus, lost an arm in a firefight with Sau ground forces, whilst rumours swarm around the sudden disappearance of Fleet Captain Kali Nicholotti. Our sources claimed that she may have suffered an aneurysm aboard the ship and that the Resolution’s next destination will be somewhere with specialist medical facilities, able to deal with her sudden condition. Written by Genkos Adea The post USS Resolution Returns Back… From The Future… appeared first on StarBase 118 Star Trek RPG. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ufopsb118?d=yIl2AUoC8zA http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ufopsb118?i=60zQIyLVTDE:e0jRZRx7m4M:D7DqB2pKExk http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ufopsb118?d=qj6IDK7rITs http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/ufopsb118/~4/60zQIyLVTDEView the full article

Beat me to it, I enjoyed this one myself. Great job you two!