Posted by Captain John Tiberius Glen (Captain) in Station Deep Space K-5 - Glen’s Musings at Rue de Rivoli
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John Glen wandered the promenade of the space station looking for some kind of café to sit down at. His mind wandered but he found it was difficult to get work completely off his mind, despite what Joe had advised. The arrival of the new XO bothered him the most and those redacted mission logs. Glen had no idea what he was going to tell Joe Milligan about their missions to the Ancients and Elders and Harvesters, all officially still kept under wraps with an ‘S’ Notice courtesy of Starfleet Command, and the more shadowy Section 31. With Miriam Cross back on board the Merri that made keeping all their little secrets even harder. Miriam has a habit of letting her mouth off, and then there was her health too. If Joe begins asking questions, the truth would eventually come out. Let’s face it, this whole crew still suffers from post traumatic stress syndrome, not only those who had been tortured. It was going to be hard to keep secrets from Joe that most of the deckhands and redshirts already knew about. The question was really how he broke to Joe. Did Glen slowly slip some hints? Did he just hand him the mission logs and say, ‘here, read these!’

Glen found a café eventually. It was called Rue de Rivoli, and he sat down outside. When a human waiter came he first ordered a Raktajino, but they hadn’t heard of Klingon coffee yet, not out this far from Earth and so he settled for a Flat White instead. Yes, he needed to brief Joe fairly soon. Those missions were an important part of what the Merri was. The feelings and attitudes that resulted from those missions informed the way decisions by other senior officers had, and were still, made. It was like a glue that kept them all together; a mutual bond no matter what divisions they were struggling with. It was a part of their psyche.

It was quiet on the promenade. Glen had thought to sit and watch the passing visitors and stall holders plying their trades, but when the coffee eventually arrived he was almost the only person around. At the next shop but one, there was a Vulcan wood carver being watched by two Starfleet officers but otherwise nothing stirred. If Glen didn’t brief Joe soon, that could drive a wedge between them. Joe might think that Glen didn’t trust him. The problem was, did Glen really trust him yet with this secret and utterly mind-blowing information? They had been to the past. They had been to the future. They had seen the USS Merrimack become a 100-year-old museum and the daughter of a Romulan commander become a Starfleet Captain. How much did Glen know yet about Joe? For all Glen knew, Joe could himself be a Section 31 officer? He had a very detailed cover story if he did. No one would go to the trouble of creating a fake personnel file that large. Stupid idea!

Glen drank the coffee. It was as good as one ever got this far from home. The café reminded him of Paris… and of Andromeda du Astra. More years have passed. His son Iain would be even older. He would barely remember John now. Stop! Stop! Stop with all the negative thoughts! Iain will still remember me and there are no spies aboard the Merrimack! Okay! There was that one spy, but we dealt with Dr. Kim and we will deal with any more!

Further up Cross had came down just to clear her mind from the two previous days,she did not see the Captain for she was lost looking at the shops.Just like a little child would glance at the display behind a glass window .The doctor kept on going from shop to shop but was never seen entering to buy anything,having just started working she had no credit to her name.

Just then two females who worked at the station K-5 came out with shopping bags in their hands ,one pointed at Miriam while her friend pretended to throw up and they started laughing and making fun of her.
The female doctor didn’t move she tried her best to hold back tears.......yet something inside her was stirring,something she had not felt for a long time....

Glen had seen no one he recognised from the ship until now. Seeing Dr Cross, he shouted out, “Miriam, over here!” It was only then that he saw that she was in distress. He had felt that she had been holding something back when she had visited him two days ago, and now was probably the right time to find out exactly what that was. He also wanted to tell her about his concerns over exactly how much to tell the new XO about their experiences through time travel and into the Andromeda Galaxy. If they told him absolutely everything that had happened then he would probably think they had gone crazy. Glen knew that he had been too lenient with Miriam when she was last aboard the Merrimack, but it was natural, they both having shared that excruciating mind-probe. No one else who hadn’t experienced that kind of pain could understand what it was like to have a worm crawl through your brain like that. It was something that stayed with them every single day.

“MIRIAM!!!!” Glen shouted louder. “Over here! Come and sit down here and tell me what’s the matter.”

Glen called Cross just in time before the doctor went berserk ,she calmed down and went over to the Captain.

“Was it those two officers?” Glen asked. “They are out of uniform. What department are they?”

Sitting down ,Cross shook her head ‘’No they either work here, or another ship has docked ‘’ she replied.

Glen was relieved. Not only didn’t he want his crew behaving in that way, but he had pride in believing that he knew the name of every officer aboard.

‘’Captain what is wrong you look so worried, is it that Kord left or the classified material and all the package we have been carrying all this time?’’ the female doctor asked without mincing her words for she was there and knew.

“I look worried?” Glen asked. “Sorry! I was actually trying to forget work for a while and relax. it was on the suggestion of, Joe, the new XO… but I do wonder how much he needs to know about the Merrimack, and about the Ancients, Elders and Harvesters. I don’t want him to find out without it coming from me. He would think that I didn’t trust him, so yes it does bother me a little.”

‘’Captain I have not said a word about what we went through to anyone and do not intend too,’’ she barely whispered the words afraid that someone would hear.

“I know that you wouldn’t intentionally,” Glen replied, “but that’s a lot of pressure to place upon you. It’s unreasonable I think, though it isn’t my decision to make. Anyway, if you serve on the Merrimack these things will come out. The odd slip up in some innocent conversation. A file that was missed and didn’t get redacted. All kinds of unexplained things will crop up during other work. And then there is always the possibility that it might happen again. Commander Andone from the future, the Starfleet daughter of the Romulan Commander, she told me that the Merrimack was some kind of nexus for temporal anomalies. The artificial intelligence NX Memorial ship told me that too; about chroniton fields. It explains why we kept getting shifted around, though the last time was supposed to have cleared us of all the chroniton flux we had.” Glen saw Cross was in danger of her eyes glazing over, and added, “I don’t understand it all either!”

“Miriam, ” Glen said more carefully, “Tell me, what do you actually remember of those events? A Vulcan mind-meld took away the most traumatic memories that you had, because they were too awful for you to function properly with them. Do you remember saving my life once from an Ancient Worm? I will always be indebted to you for that, even though it was reckless and put your own life in danger. But there are other events that I won’t mention. Not because I am expressly forbidden from speaking about them, which I am, but because they are too terrible and you are better than you cannot remember them any longer.”

Cross bit on her lip and when she spoke there was a hint of sadness ‘’Captain I remember more then you can ever imagine about what we all went through,I even know the AI, the female doctor who no one trusted and the security who was the spy for our enemies and…and the baby’’ for a moment she stopped taking a deep breath before continuing ‘’I feel so bad about it because honestly I don’t care much, yes I’m ashamed of saying it’’ but it was the truth ‘’Captain there are other crew who were there and are still on the Merrimack, Faith will definitely remember every detail, Joe is now your first officer and sooner or later you have to trust and tell him’‘.

Glen sighed. No wonder she is hurting. She was meant to have forgotten all that, and being back here where it all happened once again… he thought. “Then the mind-meld didn’t work? Or was it only temporary? I have trouble thinking about those events myself, but I just can’t imagine how hard it must be for you. The ‘not being able to talk about it’ makes it even harder still, but I sometimes think it is what draws us together as a ship, because so many of us who experienced those times together are still here....” Glen paused then continued, “…You speak like you already know Joe. Have you served with him before? You see, my other problem with telling him anything is whether I trust him enough yet to tell him all of this, but if you can vouch for him, that would go a long way to help. Like he’s not another spy is he?” Glen laughed.

‘’The mind-meld did not make the memories go away it made them less painful ,so I tend not to dwell on them’‘.

“I probably should have known that,” replied Glen. “Sorry! That mind-meld stuff is all Vulcan emotion woo woo to me!”

Regarding the fact that she already knew Joe, Cross shook her head ‘’To be honest when I do look at him there is this vague memory that I cannot quite put my finger on maybe its due to the mind meld which made me forget irrelevant small things ?’’ she asked more to herself then to Glen .

Glen nodded his understanding, It made sense to him.

‘’I cannot vouch for him, he has only been the ship’s XO for a few days, actually what I do see is the devil himself!’’ and Cross went on to explain about the crew man with the broken nose and ‘’ Joe’s insisting that I punish Hunter!’’ she exclaimed raising her voice in irritation .

“I should have been made away of this,” Glen was now shocked himself. “Discipline and human resources are a part of the XO’s job, so he has every right to get involved, and as Hunter’s DH you should definitely reprimand him… You know that I was always very lenient with you, don’t you? First, because you were subjected to the stigma of your father’s genetic engineering, and then later because of the kidnap, torture and your loss. And that you selflessly saved my life too. Some people who didn’t know the facts, couldn’t understand why I was so lenient. Even Kord thought you should have been punished for insubordination. But a ship can’t function when crew don’t obey orders or the hierarchy. Discipline must be enforced to keep the ship…” Glen tailed off as he knew Cross did understand, but her mind grappled with the weight of everything else.

‘’I did actually send him to the science dept until further notice,may be he’ll work out something now that a shaped like egg was found in one of the sphere and his actions will go in his records’’ Cross passed her fingers through her hair ,it was evident she did not want to reprehend Hunter but obeyed the XO.’‘I know I was causing problems and that was the reason I left the ship,it was not because I wanted to act that way but rather the urge for stimulation and it was literally beyond my control’‘.

Okay, okay Cross, easy breaths calm down the female doctor thought to herself ‘’Captain he can very easily find out one word here another there, Joe is far from stupid and from what I have seen he has an inquisitive nature ‘’ Cross gave him a long wide eye stare ‘’Captain its your decision but if I was in your place I’ll tell him, better find out about what happened from you then from another source ......we still occasionally get crew members who are suffering from PSD and and....are you 100% sure we shall never come across them again’‘. even at the very thought Cross shuddered.

“I will need to tell him, but I still don’t know exactly how much,” Glen decided. “I need his full confidence in me. As for the other question, who knows? I can’t say if we will ever see them again. The whole point of the last mission involving the future was to the clear the Merrimack of the chroniton flux that had been causing us to become a Nexus for those anomalies. As far as I understood it, the Harvesters were banished from our time, and in the past, the Ancients and Elders were held back from a rise to such great power, However, in the future, the war goes on, and where manipulation of time is involved, there is always that possibility of altering the past again. In the future, the Federation has ships that travel through time to enforce and protect our timeline from changes. I guess we have to have confidence in that.”

“But Miriam ,” Glen added, “Maybe you don’t appreciate it, but my mind was addled by the experiences too. I don’t know if things I experienced in our timeline actually happened, no longer happened, or were imagined, or if they were inserted into my memories by the Worm. It’s all mixed up! So, that’s why I seem unsure of things, or forget things and events, or remember them a different way. Like… do you remember when we were transported for one night to the Ball at Black Rock in the future, where the USS Merrimack had become a floating museum and there were aliens and androids who were now officers in Star Fleet? I sometimes remember you being there, but I think it was long before you had joined the ship because I remember that Noelle Ghassan was my CMO. That night was a very good one, because we saw the Federation at peace, and we saw a future without war and horrible events taking place. It made me confident that we were doing some good out here… I’m sorry, I need another coffee. Do you want one too?”.

She could not remember seeing the Merrimack in the museum but did hear Sulu telling the Captain about it,which had made her wonder.... where they living in the past, present or future?.

‘’Oh Captain if you only knew how worrying and defeated I felt when I could not do anything ,not knowing the repercussions of what could happen to you by either removing or killing the worm ‘’ with arms clutching her body as if to hold it together Cross went on ‘’Either the worm was searching for memories for their own agenda or purposely putting in false memory into your brain cells or it could be both. So I don’t blame you for you’re interpretation .Could it be because of such memories that were put with the intent and aim on making you reluctant to tell anyone?’’ the doctor asked or better still offered a hypothesis.

And as for an offer of some coffee Cross smiled ‘’I thought you’ll never ask!’‘.

Glen called over the waiter again and asked for two more coffees. He wrote it down and went away.

“Yes, Yes… Captain Sulu and Ambassador Spock did brief me,” Glen remembered. “So, I’m not imagining that part, but I do wonder sometimes what was real and what was put into my head, and I have wondered before if I was going mad. I have even seriously considered your idea of hiring a Ship’s Counsellor for the Merrimack. “

-Glen, CO

‘’That’s exactly want they wanted to question our own sanity,if you bring a counselor he/she too would find our experience hard to believe and it the long run it would do more harm then good’’ .

When the coffee came Cross put her fingers around the cup while taking in the aroma she sipped it quietly ,then got up ‘’ I better go back to sickbay someone might miss me ‘’ she joked but before the female doctor left she went up to Glen and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek ‘’Glen don’t loose faith in your ability as a Captain and em I hate to say this but you’ll find our new Cmdr an asset’’ and with those last words Cross left.

Cross Dr.