Nothing is more memorable than a smel

Posted on 29 Jul 2024 @ 12:46pm by Ensign S'Ers-a M'Lyr'Zor

769 words; about a 4 minute read

Sera stared out of the view port in her quarters at the Pleiades. The nebula was rather aesthetically pleasing, and it did make for a rather sublime backdrop to meditate. It was a shame that her meditation lamp sat on the ground before her unlit and had been that way since she sat down 21 minutes ago. Was she...prevaricating?

It had not been a particularly challenging day, overall. The systems’ test was completed, with only minimal damage to the warp core. Minimal. Unacceptable. The injectors had been fused open - it was known to happen when a ship was run outside of safe operating parameters. That's why those parameters existed, and yet, she had learned relatively quickly that Hevam often felt compelled to push beyond the limits of safety. At least it was a relatively ‘easy’ repair that could be completed within a day – there were numerous variables in play and Sera did not feel the necessity to consider them for the point of coming up with an exact timeline for her own personal edification.

However, this was not the reason she had not started her meditation. Once she had made herself comfortable on her meditation pillow, the site outside of the ship had ‘called’ to her. Staring out in silence Sera felt a queer sense that she had somehow engaged in this act before. What she was experiencing was a sense of déjà vu, although Sera lacked the context to know what to call it. Suddenly it went beyond a vague sense of familiarity...

There was a chill in the air, and her exhalation was a wispy cloud of condensation that readily dispersed. It was dark in her quarters—unusually so—and the only illumination was the pale light coming from the nebula. An unusual musky scent surrounded her but it was not alarming. A rustling sound of movement was heard behind her. Sera turned her head as saw the form of another person in her bed, curled up in the blankets. However their face and form were swathed in shadows…all that was visible was a hand…a masculine hand.

The scene ended as quickly as it began. It was a bizarre tableau to imagine, and a disconcerting sensation of having been two places at once poured through her before her controls stamped the unauthorized sensation out.
Most unusual. She had no hypothesis why she would have experienced such a strange conscious manifestation that felt somehow like a memory. Illogical. Yet…mildly concerning.

Sera wasn’t about to seek assistance regarding this unusual mental montage, but it did reinforce the fact that meditation was now required. Enough vacillation.

She reached out and lit the lamp and gazed down at the flickering flame. She would engage in a mental form of keethera, a meditation aide which roughly translated into standard as ‘structure of harmony.’ Normally differently-shaped blocks were utilized to compose a balanced structure and was used to help to focus thought and refine mental control. That control was obviously something sorely lacking in the moment if she was experiencing for lack of a better word…a ‘daydream.’ Sera refused to consider why exactly her mind had manifested such a figment. Irrelevant. For now, it was time to banish the illogical thoughts through mental discipline.

“Structure. Logic. Function. Control. The structure cannot stand without a foundation. Logic is the foundation of function. Function is the essence of control. I am in control. I am in control.” She whispered the mantra softly in Vulkhansu as she focused on the flame and turned her mind inwards.

However, no matter how hard she tried, the phantom scent would not dissipate. It meant that it needed to be scrutinized further. As if moving the variously shaped blocks, Sera teased apart the olfactory apparition and discovered that it was an amalgamation of her own pheromones…and a human male’s scent. A human?!

It was a jarring enough revelation to end the meditation session. Sera blew out the flame of her lamp and slowly stood. Glancing over to the darkened bedroom, she finally gave into temptation and strode over to the doorway. “Computer, lights.”

The lights came on and Sera looked about searching for anything out of place to make sense of what she had just experienced. The room was immaculate. Not a single item was out of place. Why had her brain manifested such a scene?

Taking a deep breath, Sera smelled absolutely nothing out of the ordinary…and yet, her mind still perceived a lingering scent of sash-savas…

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