The Red-Headed Woman

Posted on Mon Aug 10th, 2009 @ 7:42pm by Commander Jordan Gunning

Mission: Dark Discoveries
Location: Starbase Ronin - Promenade
Timeline: Three Hours After "People Watching"

[ON]

The business of giving statements to the various security personnel aboard the starbase had taken up many of the seemingly endless hours between the encounter in the cafe and his first proper meeting with a woman who he could figuratively describe as an oil painting.

He had spent the rest of the time loitering on the promenade, using his Security Officer's demeanour as a means to save himself from being moved on. He stood quietly amongst throngs of Ivorians who had been displaced due to a natural disaster on their home planet. He moved through them, creating an air of suspicion in anyone whose eye he caught. His El-Aurian heritage allowing him to get a sense of someone's state of being. It wasn't much and he had no idea why he was doing it but it often allowed him to relax, to focus on his work and forget any outside stimuli.

Gunning eventually worked his way back to the cafe where all the trouble had started. Where, out of a sense of loyalty to a woman he had never even met, he stepped in and prevented what could have been a potentially ugly situation. Starfleet security officers never wavered. Never hesitated. Never got angry. Jordan had fulfilled two of those three criteria and had tried his best to contain the third.

He smiled widely as he caught a glimpse of the woman he had saved across the room. She smiled back, gloriously returned to the angel she had been before the arrival of the bearded ensign. She seemed full of life, brimming with the confidence of a person who felt protected. He had no idea whether it was him or not but he had a strange feeling he'd find out.

He walked over to her and asked if she remembered him. He had no idea why he had asked that as it was obvious she did. He winced slightly at the question and proceeded to ask if she would like to visit a holosuite. The question held a certain sleaziness in Jordan's head as he remembered the teenagers on the El-Aurian homeworld who would run less than reputable programs, peddled by Ferengi traders with no morals and even less programming skills.

"I would like that very much," Allina replied, her hair catching the synthetic candle-light of the cafe's tables.

She was beautiful, there was no doubt about that and Jordan began to project himself into the future. He saw himself in officer's quarters of some un-named vessel, greying but not feeling old. He wore a uniform that was as unfamiliar as it was reassuring to him. Starfleet but not of this time. The red flashing on the shoulders suggested a change in status. It was too hazy for Jordan to adequately make out the rank but he suspected he was in command of this vessel. The quarters were grand and on the dresser in the corner sat a number of photos. In some, children frolicked, playing happily in a garden. In others she appeared as an older woman, with Jordan somehow locked in time, love growing, but never aging.

There was a container on the dresser. It sat upright and proud as testament to a life well lived. A shiver ran down his spine as he realised what it must contain. His attention snapped back into the room as the youthful face of Allina reappeared in front of him. He felt physically sick. He knew it was impossible to tell the future but he knew that if he was to be happy, it would end the same way.

"Shall we?" He heard her say.

"Let's." He found himself replying, still unable to shift the uncomfortable feeling in the very pit of his soul.
[OFF]