Posted by Ensign Kovan ch’Sirhc (Engineering & Communications Officer) in Side Sim: Empty Ramblings

Posted by Ensign Kovan ch’Sirhc (Engineering & Communications Officer) in Side Sim: Empty Ramblings
ooc: Wanted to do a writing warm-up so I wrote this little character study on Kovan.
ic:

Lonesome, variegated pinpoints of light crowned the pitch black of space. Blackness framed in glass and steel and held at bay by the hull of the USS Sentinel. Kovan watched the blackness, memorized the lights of stars hundreds of thousands of lightyears away. Stars living, dying, or dead, and all he saw now was an afterimage that would one day vanish. Out there in that darkness were planets reflecting the light of a nearby star. In the black were newly formed stars, whose light had not yet reached this place in space.

It was enough to make a person feel small. Insignificant. Kovan studied the lights of stars and planets and the blackness that engulfed them. He memorized this pattern of color and light that will one day cease to exist. Why was it easier to think about his negligible place in the greater scheme of existence than to write a message to his son?

Koven sucked a long breath in and exhaled rapidly through the nose. He never wanted to know the boy; he told Oshremiash over and over again that the child was better off not knowing him. Yet Oshremiash never stopped pushing and pressing and reminding him. She insisted time and time again that Kovan send Isas messages. It didn’t matter what he said, only that he sent them.

Then there were times, like now, when Oshremiash said in no uncertain terms to send the boy a message. Oshremiash knew too much about him and was all too willing to get her way through dirty means. Apparently, a boy absolutely needed to hear from his father on the day commemorating his birth. Kovan delayed the message for as long as he could, but time was not on his side. It had run out.

A blank word processor open on his personal PaDD mocked him. A bounty of words waiting to be typed. He could write one sentence and hit send. He could compose a message for Oshremiash, detailing all the ways her actions ultimately hurt the boy. Isas was better off not knowing him. The kid shouldn’t know his name, much less have a picture of him and his mother taken at a sentimental point in time. Oshremiash’s insistence on the matter could only lead to a lifetime of disappointment and hurt.

Kovan could type many things. None of them would be right.

He picked through his photos folder, by far the largest folder on his PaDD. Some files were actual photos taken with a camera. Others were scanned drawings, transferred into digital files. Kovan selected one he had drawn less than two weeks ago. Caught on paper and charcoal was the ship lounge as seen from the front right corner, facing out towards the Sentinel’s hull. Captured in precise and varied black strokes were people, their games, and the tables they gathered around. In the background the windows he gazed out of now.

Kovan selected the image, attached it to a message with the words: happy birthday, and hit send.

Ensign ch’Sirhc, COMMO/ENGR

ooc: Once again I am here to write a warm-up
ic:

Settled into a quiet corner of the lounge Kovan browsed the latest batch of messages from Oshremiash. She talked about her research, the exciting breakthroughs, and frustrating setbacks. Sometimes she wrote long paragraphs of technical jargon he hadn’t a hope of comprehending but knew it helped her work through difficult problems. In between these research updates were little snapshots into her day-to-day life. Like here, in her latest message, she started a micro vegetable garden. The garden took up two by four square feet of space but it will produce four different types of vegetables and was water efficient. Kovan hoped it goes better than when she took up knitting. Oshremiash gave the human hobby her best shot but could never make anything other than lumpy and misshapen sweaters.

Then there were her anecdotes about Isas. Oshremiash included something about the boy in all of her correspondences, even if it was only a sentence or two. Kovan never asked to know anything about the boy. He never wanted the boy to know anything about him. Kovan was a hopeless screw-up down to his last blade on the expanse. She wanted the boy to know him so here they were. In these messages, she talked about his academic achievements, commented that he inherited both their smarts, and told the story of Isas’ first broken bone.

Kovan read each message and tried not to wonder what it would be like if he had stayed with her. It would have been the wrong choice, he knew with grim certainty. They got together for all the wrong reasons. He and Oshremiash suffered great abuse and trauma and came together instead of coping. For a time they could pretend they were in love and the horrors they lived a bad dream. They could have never worked. Yet here he was, romanticizing the past and imagining what would never be.

After every batch of letters, Kovan would respond with one of his own. His messages were short, and more often than not he used his art in place of words. From renditions of ships he’s served on to alien worlds. Kovan would select whatever recent piece he was proud of then select it as his message. If these offerings were disliked or found lacking, well, Oshremiash never gave any indication of such. Though, she knew how much his art meant to him, so she might prefer it over the empty words he would otherwise write.

Ensign ch’Sirhc, COMMO/ENGR

Kovan crawled through the Jeffry’s Tubes. Overflowing with manic energy. Like the prongs of tuning fork struck over and over again. His breaths overly-loud and harsh in the confined space of the tubes. Hands shaking as he moved, occasionally slipping. Twice he’s bashed his head against the side or floor of the tube. Kovan took a right through a cross-path connection and onto the off-beaten path. There was nothing important around here. No one ever needed to come here to except to maintenance a few lights and a handful of motion-sensing modules. Kovan kept both in good repair so no one ever would need to come back here. The tube dead-ended into the inside section of the hull. Taped to a wall was his drawing of a Risan sunset. Below it was PaDD.

It took several tries before his trembling fingers could open the word processor. Breathe. Stop acting so pathetic. Look at you. One dream is all it takes to turn you into a mess. Kovan breathed sharply through the mouth, pressed his fingers tight against his eyes. How many years has it been? It still haunts him. A specter that lingered in the distance. It didn’t matter how many years, both time and light, that Kovan put behind him. He’ll never forget. Memories of that time will never fail to claw their way out of mind, he worked so hard to repress and forget, and burrow though his body until it had his heart wrapped in its claws.

“Haaah!” The PaDD slipped from his fingers and hit the floor with a soft clack. Kovan swore once. Then twice. Then unleashed a stream of foul words across a dozen languages. He wanted drugs. The kind that made him fly and hallucinate and dissolved the world into softness and air. He wanted alcohol. Drink himself stupid. Until he was throwing up and the world spun in ceaseless dizzying circles. He wanted a warm body. With him in a bed, and writhing in passions until nothing else mattered. Chasing sensations until exhausted completion.

He wanted. Wanted. WANT.

Kovan reached for the PaDD, the word processor still open. He typed, slowly, with trembling fingers. Oshremiash, tell me if the nightmares come to you too. If your dreams take you back to that place and time and it feels so real you can’t breathe. Until you believe that we’ve never escaped the nightmare and everything we lived after was the real dream. Please tell me you’ve felt the same. I don’t want to be alone. Kovan’s hands shook too much to write any more. He threw the PaDD down and pressed his palms into his eyes and cried. There were no drugs. No alcohol. No flings. Nothing to distract him from the hell of his own memories.

Oshremiash. She was the only one who understood. She lived it too. Kovan never sent sent these messages to her. It would be too cruel. She was happy now. She had Isas to care for. Kovan could watch the world burn, but he could never inflict that pain upon her. Not even to make himself feel less alone.

Ensign ch’Sirhc, COMMO/ENGR