Randal Shayne Posted July 12, 2019 Posted July 12, 2019 @Quentin Collins III; giving this fleet a good name since the day he started. ((Interior. Faculty of Classics. Cambridge University. Cambridgeshire, England)) Note: This takes place shortly before The Slow Blade Penetrates the Shield. Angelique: Now I know exactly what you are all thinking. “Well, she certainly doesn’t LOOK like a witch!” ::A nervous but genuine laugh broke out amongst the lecture hall. It was always better to try and disarm them first. Catch them off balance. Something she had grown quite adroit at during her long years in academia. Everything about her presentation today was designed to charm. From her burgundy colored tweed suit to the loose curls her thistled hair hung in around her shoulders, she aimed to make the best possible impression on the “stuffed shirts”, as her beloved referred to them. Jamison wasn’t particularly thrilled about the idea of her living in England for the incoming weeks, on loan to the college’s Classics department to help inventory a newly discovered cache of texts, thought to be stolen from the archives of St. Thomas Aquinas. But he wasn’t about to keep her from her books or from teaching new students. Any more than they could have kept their son away from the stars.:: Angelique: Trust me, I have heard it all before. And I’m sure the things I didn’t hear were twice as bad. But here is the question I pose...what if I was? ::the expected Murmur of dissension rattled the room. And the wolfish smile that usually accompanied it from her came as well.:: Angelique: think about it. Truly, think. We will in wondrous times. I look around this room and see a world of academia idealized. Races and creeds from behind the very fold of space now sit among us and learn of us just as we of them. We enjoy a society free of the ugly prejudices of before. A wealth of food for every table. All of this? At one time? Thought impossible. ::he raised her hands in contrition and crossed downward on the stage.:: Angelique: Now I know what you thinking here now as well. “You mean to tell us love gives you the power over matter?! Poppy[...]!” My husband has given me all forms of this argument I assure you. ::more laughter and a wider smile from the Professor. Time to finally reel them in.:: Angelique: but I, like you all, have seen incredible, groundbreaking things. Things that decades ago would have been indistinguishable from magic. I myself have stood upon a leyline and felt it’s charge. I have walked upon the moors of Loch Loroma and cast bones in the moonlight. We cannot be so close minded as to Ignore the mysteries that still await for us here in the hidden parts of the world. Angelique: how can we call ourselves Scholars if we are not willing to seek out the knowledge beyond knowledge? That is what I intend to seek here with you. Now if you’ll allow, I would like to give you a bit more background as to my “school” of thou- ::she never finished the sentence. In its stead a vision pierced though her skull, sending her eyes rolling into the back of her head and her frame bucking at the knees.:: ::Quentin. He was far away. Further than he had ever been from her. Blood coats his hands. The metal god looms underneath him. The frightened keepers hover above the Bird of Prey. She tries to reach for him but he fades. Further still, The Eyes fix on her son. Calling for him again and again and again and again and again and again.:: ::When she awakes, she realizes she’s crying. The assistant given to her by the university, Lucie, stands in front of her, clearly also shaken.:: Angelique: My boy...something’s happened...to my boy. ::is all she manages.:. END PROFESSOR ANGELIQUE BOUCHARD-COLLINS PROFESSOR OF PARAPSYCHOLOGY AND ANTHROPOLOGY EMERITUS SALEM U. BANGOR, MAINE As simmed by LT jg. QUENTIN COLLINS III SCIENCE OFFICER U.S.S. EAGLE NCC-74659 E239512QC0 1 Quote
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