A Visit to Vulcan

Posted on 26 Sep 2012 @ 7:31am by
Edited on on 26 Sep 2012 @ 7:51am

2,549 words; about a 13 minute read

Mission: Episode 02 - Resupply
Location: Vulcan Science Academy, Vulcan
Timeline: MD01, 19:30

[ON]

"Your article on the Time of Awakening left me absolutely breathless." His voice was as firm as it was confident, though it lacked a desired sincerity. "I find myself asking for more, but..." Lazing music from a vulcan lute ensemble played from a corner of the reception hall, filling the pause. He took the opportunity to sip from the wineglass that he'd been twirling, annoyingly, for the past several minutes.

She watched him intently, her lips bent slightly in an insincere smile, and, taking advantage of his theatrical display of drinking, downed her entire glass. He didn't notice, which she rather preferred. His judgement of her work was more than enough; she didn't need him judging her character too, although there was no doubt that he was doing that anyway.

He finally made a show of smacking his lips and exhaling loudly. One would have thought that he'd chugged the whole thing by the way he was acting - he'd hardly taken a sip. "But..." the man started, but then trailed off to some place in the shallows of his mind.

A server walked by, mazing his way between the hundreds of mingling guests, and she set her glass on his tray in such a way that showed she wasn't new to this sort of thing. And she most certainly wasn't. These receptions were what she dreaded the most in her career; they were nothing but faceoffs with pretend smiles and pretend people. Everybody spoke and everybody clapped but nobody really listened, and when they did they listened wrong.

She returned her attention to him, away from the parting server. He was still straining to think. She thought a sigh and restrained herself from sounding too condescending. "In what way, professor, did the article leave you 'breathless?'" If she hadn't spoken, he might have fallen asleep where he stood. Worse, he might have come up with something to say that she would have preferred him not to. In all honesty, she would have preferred he hadn't opened his mouth to begin with and that she could have left as soon as the conference had ended.

"Yes," he nodded deeply and for several seconds, "I found that your take on Surak was perhaps not as fair as it could have been." He suddenly frowned, noticing that the gracefully slender hand that had gripped a wineglass just a moment ago was now holding the opposite wrist against her waist.

"I finished," she replied before he could ask. "You don't think that I was fair to Surak?" She pressed him, though ultimately uninterested. "How?"

"The evidence that Vulcans rebelled against Surak is controversial, which you must know," he replied. There was sudden sternness in his tone. Professor Raul Pendergrass was a distinguished professor from an equally distinguished university somewhere in Europe that she could not, for the moment, remember. He was a professor of ancient vulcan history, that much he had made exhaustingly clear, and was an orthodox scholar on Vulcan's Time of Awakening. It was hard enough talking to an orthodox scholar on anything, she had always thought, but this man in particular was especially trying.

"The evidence is controversial, or what the evidence suggests is controversial?" She asked, eyeing him. She decided then that the man was not just an ugly mutt, but that he was truly a disgusting human being and a sorry excuse for an intellectual. She felt a distant stab of pity for whatever pupils he might have had.

"Both," he replied. He furrowed his grayed eyebrows while shifting his massive girth onto the other leg. Pendergrass must have been at least three hundred pounds. His hair was damp with perspiration and was leaving darkened spots on his white collar. She could that see his face had gone rosy beneath the glistening sheen of sweat, even in the dim lighting of the hall.

"Both?" She narrowed her eyes at him and quickly went on. "How can you say that? You can't take issue with the truth just because it makes you uncomfortable." She snapped. "Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations is in itself a contradiction. Repressing emotion on that philosophy is contrary to the very fibre of what it professes. The Time of Awakening was just as much a time of regression as it was a cultural advancement. Do the ends justify the means of nuclear war? The killing of countless millions of people just because they preferred not to repress their own biological emotions? Absolutely not."

"Doctor!" Pendergrass rose to nearly a shout. "You suggest that the entire vulcan heritage is based on holocaust! An offence of the greatest calibre!" A bit of wine splashed over the rim of his glass and his cheeks shook at the sudden twitching of his jaw. "If you want to find trouble in vulcan ancestry, then look to the romulans. You will find all the sympathy you could ever want with them. The evidence suggests that it was the would-be romulans started the wars in the first place. It was their irrationality that got all those people killed."

She grinned widely. The man's ideas were of yesterday; there was little point to go on any more than she already had, and even that was too much, she realised. While she was articulate and excellent debater, right now she couldn't be bothered. At the risk of giving Pendergrass the impression that he'd somehow outsmarted her, she chose to give only the slightest shake of her head.

"I see you've made the charming acquaintance of the one and only Doctor Maenad Panne, Starfleet's best macro- and micropaleontologist." Ben Lutton, a doctoral student she had supervised, emerged from the thick of the crowd. He slapped the behemoth Pendergrass on the back, startling him. He spilled some more wine, this time it trickled on his hands. He switched the glass to his other hand and shook off the wine with the other.

Maenad shrugged with one shoulder, "I'd hardly say the best." Her cheeks flushed as she made an embarrassed smile.

"Ha! So she does possess a certain degree of modesty," Pendergrass sneered. He shook his head and walked away, disappearing into the noisy banter around them.

"Thank you," she sighed once he'd gone. "I despise that man."

Ben shrugged. "I think he likes you."

"What did you think of the conference?" Asked Maenad, dismissing Ben's little joke. She wasn't looking at him; her eyes were scanning the crowd for another server with a tray of drinks. Even though she was starting to feel the tingle of the several glasses she had already had, one more wouldn't hurt.

"I liked the speaker on Bendii Syndrome. There may yet be hope," said Ben.

Maenad raised her eyebrows. "Two hundred years of emotional suppression will do that to you. Prescribe a smile or a good cry once in a while and there'll be no more Bendii Syndrome."

"You don't like vulcans, do you?"

She looked at him blankly, and for the first time that evening. His skin looked darker than it already was - it must have been the lighting. He also looked older, but still quite young. "No, I just find them ridiculous. So much of their culture is based on mythology, which is illogical." She sighed through her nose and looked past him. "They do so much harm to themselves. It's sad, really. You can't fight your own body."

Ben sighed. Maenad could tell that he disagreed, but everybody always did. She did another look-around for a drink tray, really wanting more wine. "How long are you here on Vulcan?" Ben asked her.

"I don't know. I think I'll head back to Earth tomorrow afternoon, maybe sooner. I'm waiting for them to get back to me; they're making me copies of the Kir'Shara, as well as compiling document requests from the Reformation period. I've got to go pick them up at the Archives when they're ready."

Ben nodded. He took a long sip from his glass. "Light reading?" he joked.

"Where did you get that?" She nodded toward his glass. "What is it?"

"I got it at the bar," he said and frowned, holding the glass up to his face to study it. "And I don't know what the hell it--"

"There's a bar?" She interrupted him. "Where?"

He took another drink. "I don't know, over there?" He looked over his shoulder in the direction he thought it was.

Maenad stood on her toes to see over the people. She couldn't tell if he was right or not. "I'll see you, Ben," she said, leaving him alone and slipping past into the swarm of people.

"Good to see you again, professor," Ben said rolling his eyes and shaking his head.

Carefully weaving through and around the various clumps of chatting people, she imagined herself as part of a ritzy ballet. The lead dancer, the main character in some ultimately tragic tale in which she winds up dying at the end. She would have to be wearing another dress, of course - she wasn't sure how she felt about the white one she had on. It was white and very plain; she preferred black dresses. The lutists had since changed at some point to the flowing music of violins - it was nothing Maenad knew, but it could have been depressing if she wanted it to be.

After a few minutes of exploring the hall and dodging a few unwanted conversations, she was good at that, Maenad found the bar. It happened to be next to the miniature stage that held the musicians. The bar was nothing special, just a long table covered with a simple white tablecloth. There were dozens of bottles displayed for patrons to choose from, and two vulcans stood behind the table pouring the drinks. There was a small line of people queued up, but that didn't bother her at all. She was content listening to the musicians and watching them perform.

"Doctor Panne, how might I service you?" The vulcan asked her when it was her turn.

Maenad opened her mouth to speak but realised she hadn't thought of that yet. "What is there?"

"We have many beverages to choose from; to list them all would take some time. Tell me what it is that you would like and I will tell you whether--"

While the other vulcan retrieved a bottle from the cabinet against the wall, she noticed a familiar-looking colour. Only so many drinks shone blue like that, it was hard to miss. "Is that romulan ale?" She cut him off.

The vulcan raised one eyebrow and turned at his waist. His companion eyed her before pouring the other patron's drink, then exchanged a hesitant glance with the other. The vulcan turned back to her. "It is."

A mischievous smile began forming at the corners of her mouth.

"Doctor, for someone of your physique, it is not recommended."

Maenad frowned at him. "Do I need to show you my ID?" She asked. "Because I'm not going to."

The two vulcans held one another's gaze, eyebrows raised, for several seconds. "Very well." The one servicing her poured her half a tumbler of ale, though not without reluctance. He slid it across the tabletop and Maenad lifted it by her fingertips. She brought it to her nostrils and allowed the scent to linger there. Judging by the almost navy colour of it, the ale was an excellent vintage. "Oh, this is good." She nodded and raised her glass to him before walking away.

She had had enough of this place. There was nothing else to be done here; a few of her cohorts had returned to their accommodations already. She, being one of the senior-most professors in her department, had to stay for etiquette. A few members of the Vulcan Science Academy's board of directors apparently wanted to talk to her later, but she had decided that they would have to wait.

Choosing to stay at a private hotel not far from the reception, not accepting the offer to board at the Academy had insulted the vulcan hosts, she knew. It was nothing personal; she preferred hotels to dormitories. Maenad wondered what her superiors would say once they had learned that she had left prematurely - probably nothing kind. She didn't care.

Outside, her untouched glass still in hand, Maenad stood on the expansive plaza in front of the reception hall. She looked up to the purple/pink sky to see a few stars shining through the dusk. Cars and shuttles buzzed overhead. A chilly breeze caught her shoulders and she wished that she'd let her hair down for that little bit of warmth it would have given her. Vulcan was such a desolate world, she thought. There was hardly any natural vegetation. Even here, on the plaza, there weren't any trees. Instead, there were stone columns and a single water fountain.

Maenad found a bench to sit on near the fountain and crossed her legs, listening to the spray of the water. She sighed to herself, feeling relaxed out here where she could be alone. The sky had darkened more and she could see more stars now. The sound of a shuttlebus flying nearby came and went. She raised the romulan ale to her lips and took a small sip, closing her eyes as she sat back.

"Doctor Maenad Panne, I presume?"

She sat upright and opened her eyes. A remarkably tall cardassian adorned in a militaristic leather uniform, at least it looked like a uniform of some kind, stood before her with his hands behind his back. His voice sounded as though he were authoritative. But then again, so most cardassians did.

"Yes?" She asked impatiently.

"You may call me Lemek. I am a great admirer of your work." He declared, smiling.

Maenad breathed a little easier. Her experience with cardassians had left much to be desired. "Thank you, Lemek."

"You are welcome." He half-bowed, but remained where he was.

Maenad suddenly felt uncomfortable. She exchanged crossed legs. "Is there anything I can help you with?"

"Not for the moment. However, that is not to say never." Lemek replied, still smiling.

At that time, Maenad's attention had shifted to a cab that was landing several metres away, behind the beaming cardassian. What a perfect excuse. "Well, Lemek, it was nice to meet you." She stood, downed the romulan ale, and offered a courteous nod. "My cab is here. I must go." Maenad set the glass on the bench and made brisk pace toward the cab.

"Very well. Good evening, doctor." He watched her leave, still standing near the bench she'd been sitting on.

The people getting out of the cab barely noticed her as she got in. She instructed the driver toward her hotel once she had closed the door. The effects of the romulan ale began to consume her entire body, soothing her. The driver, coincidentally a human, tried to carry on a conversation with her, but she wasn't paying attention and he quickly got the hint. As the cab took off and started over the city, Maenad watched the blurring lights of passing craft and buildings and allowed herself to forget who she was.

[OFF]

Dr. Maenad Panne
Professor of Micropaleontology and Archaeology
Starfleet Academy

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