The comms blinked then bleeped then trilled, the last indicator saying a transmission was in queue for retrieval. It was also some 03:36 ship time. It wasn’t flagged for any urgency so did little more than cause the Trill to open one eye, see the blinking light, then slip back to sleep until the morning … Later, after breakfast Dagen was moving about the bedroom, toothbrush at work while looking for a stray sock and wondering why, in this day and age, there were not such things as ‘smart socks’ that could be more easily located. It was then that he saw the offending sock at the base of the console. Picking it up, his head rose over the console, toothbrush freezing in place as he noticed the transmission light. Muttering around the toothbrush he tapped it with the hand that held the sock.

=^= Hello Dagen dear and Reia, sweetheart. =^= The toothbrush froze. It was his mother. =^= Mother here. =^= There was some crackling on the transmission. His father could be heard saying ‘I’m sure he knows who it is, followed by a ‘hush, it’s the polite thing to say’. His father mentioned, ‘you may want to tape that, there, yes because’ .. ‘there is no reason to’ .. she continued as the crackling grew more intense. Dagen shook his head. His mother would be the foil to the Borg if they ever assimilated her. Their civilization would fall in days. She was a menace to all things that had a technological level greater than a stick. =^= Dagen dear. We’re on .. way to ....... sa to visit Aunt .... and will stop .... you after. Toodles. Oh and your father says … =^= The conversation ended in a hiss of static.

He played it again with the computer attempting to enhance the speech. Alas it was the same with the problem at the source. He cast a glance at Reia with a look of ‘well that was clear’ etched on his face.
Dagen