Chapter 4 - Thoughts
Authors note: Here's a short update, thanks everyone for your reviews! And I love your humor, guys and gals, keep it going! :)
Personal log of Lt. Irina Paranov:
I'm very excited about the direction our program is going! We've just had another team meeting this morning and everybody loved my idea to incorporate detailed holoshots from planetary surfaces.
Well, not everybody, Soltek is still somewhat skeptical – not that I would have expected it otherwise, but he seems to be bothered by something about it. I dunno, maybe I'm just imagining it, who knows what's going on in that Vulcan head. He seems to accept Glenn's decision to continue incorporating the planetary holoshots and Soltek helps to make it work whatever his personal feelings are. Erm, if a Vulcan has personal feelings, whatever.
Even Dr. Zimmermann liked the idea and wasn't as much a jerk as he had been in the last meeting!
Glenn said he's going to ask some sensor technicians to look at the program and maybe they even come up with a way to improve the scanning techniques of science ships to adapt to the new layout of our database. I'm so glad I came here, I really start to feel at home.
After dinner Soltek was sitting in a secluded spot in the Japanese garden area of the arboretum under a strangely pruned tree. There was a small pond with a botanical species Soltek didn't know, it was a flower with an orderly symmetrical form – well equipped as a subject for meditation.
So he sat there watching the pond, there was a small fountain slowly bubbling out, but not strong enough to disturb the perfect calm of the water flowers. It was an interesting alternative to a meditation lamp or candle and he had seen a human male sitting there meditating a couple of days before.
Soltek had researched human culture – particularly human meditation techniques. He had to admit to himself that he hadn't been aware how diverse and complex their culture is.
He became aware that there was some emotional reaction faintly bubbling deep inside him. He was displeased that his parents didn't see the opportunities in his work and studies. They would be well advised to be more open-minded and fair towards other cultures.
But he could do nothing about his parents, he could only change his own reaction, search for faint hints of emotions and break down the emotional complex.
What was it exactly that disquieted him? Was he seeking validation of his choice to leave the T'Kumbra?
He stared into the bubbling fountain. It was a strange object for meditation, it seemed to him like a symbol of the human attachment to emotion, a waste of precious water, bubbling away for no logical reason, formless and unable to grasp - but after a while Soltek perceived its soothing effect.
Was he getting too fascinated with human culture? Was he losing his objectivity?
'Hey,' Lt. Paranov's voice startled him and interrupted his musings.
'Oh, sorry,' she said, 'you were meditating.'
'No problem, Lt., how can I help you?' he asked politely.
'I just ran into Cmdr. Glenn on my way back from the gym and he told me the sensor guys just called him,' she drew a breath and sat onto the grass beside him. Soltek could tell from her pitch of voice and fast speech that she was very excited, 'we're going into the sun with metaphasic shielding to test some new sensor calibration! They want to take close-up holographic shots from the corona to incorporate an accurate holographic representation into the database – just imagine you could stand in the holodeck and call up the moving holo image of the corona – it would be like standing in the corona of the sun!'
He raised both his eyebrows, 'fascinating.'
She stared at him, 'that is an understatement'.
'You stated last week that standing in a holographic representation of space made you feel nauseous because it made you feel like floating in zero gravity, but you look forward to stand in the holographic representation of your sun's corona,' he observed in a tone Irina read as bemused or ironic.
She returned a playful grin, 'cool, isn't?'
At that he raised only one eyebrow, but very high. 'If you would stand in the real corona of your sun it would most likely be hot.'
'Very hot,' she replied with a wide grin and a twinkle in her eyes.
Soltek just stared at her for a moment in confusion. He wasn't sure this dialog was progressing in any coherence he was able to recognize.
She laughed out loud at his reaction.
He concluded that her excitement about the mission was triggering emotional impulses that made her line of argument more erratic than usual.
'Has Cmdr. Glenn informed you when the mission briefing is scheduled?' he asked ignoring her incomprehensible outburst.
'Yeah,' she answered while calming herself with a deep breath, 'first thing tomorrow morning in the conference room, we will receive all the details, he just told me that we both will come along.'
'I'm sure it will be an intriguing mission, Lt.' he replied. 'I have read about the metaphasic shielding, but have never been in the corona of a sun.'
'Me neither, but we did corona exploration a few times on my last ship with a special shuttle craft and every time I helped to review and sort the data I hoped next time it would be me,' she answered still grinning.
'I see you appreciate the technological and scientific opportunity,' he replied.
'You bet I do...but I don't want to keep you from your meditation - see you tomorrow then!' She gave him a smile looking into his eyes for a moment that somehow seemed much longer to Soltek than the estimated time period.
He needed a few seconds to formulate an answer, 'Good evening to you, Lt.'
He watched her walk away. After she was gone he returned to his meditation and realized that retaining his mental equilibrium of logic and calmness was much more of a challenge amongst humans than he had anticipated.
Her erratic outbursts over this mission had provoked some sensations in him he found extremely difficult to categorize and deconstruct. His head felt foggy like he had a low blood sugar level or low blood pressure, but he felt quite warm and awake which wouldn't fit to a low blood sugar level or low blood pressure. This phenomenon seemed to get more pronounced, but maybe he was just thinking so because he was keeping a closer watch on himself.
He made a mental note to stay observant on this matter and make more of an effort to protect himself against human emotional outbursts.
Obviously these effects were the reason why some Vulcans have chosen to keep their distance from emotional species and have advised him against his choice to work with them, but he will take measurements to adapt his emotional control and meditation regimen to the circumstances.