To Boldly Go (OLD)

THE HOLLOW ART

Episode Two (Part One)

Captain's Log
Stardate: 2365.239.13

We are on a voyage to Betazed to pick up a negotiator. We shall be arriving in seven days. Until then, I have advised my senior officers to take some well-needed time off.

Captain Anthony J. Berkley

Signing off.

Caesar sat across from the first officer in the furthest corner booth in Solomon's bar. Newt was slowly sipping on a fruit smoothie, a red-ish brown drink that made the Trill feel like puking. On the other hand, Caesar had a large cup of black coffee to hopefully remedy the dark bags under her host body's eyes. It was the apex hour of the Alpha shift so other than a few Beta shift early risers having a quick drink, the Seven-Eleven bar was relatively empty.

The duo weren't speaking, simply basking in the rare silence that normally indicated a dead ship. They hadn't planned to drink together that morning quietly, but rather instantaneous decision-making. Caesar had seen Newt deeply concentrated on drawing an atomically correct blueprint of the Euphoria on the napkins Solomon provided, she communicated her wish to join them with a flurry of nods and basic gestures before pulling out a chair.

It was safe to say none of the senior crew knew what to do with their new off-duty hours. It was like sitting in a boat in the middle of the ocean, having no clue how to operate it. So you follow one of two options: do nothing and wait for help, or push through it. Caesar had chosen the latter; which was why two hours prior, she had been kicked out of engineering for trying to work overtime.

So had her commanding officer, Newt, who had been dragged out from their office kicking and screaming.

The only person to successfully push through without any hassle was T'Kuk, who glared at anyone who dared to say otherwise when he strode into his workstation that morning to review crew files. It probably helped that the crew-counselling department had only five people in it, three of whom worked the Beta shift, so there wasn't enough manpower to kick out a trained Vulcan.

No one knew where Keidress and Daphnea were, but there hadn't been any news of the two trying to sneak into their stations so Caesar believed they must have chosen the first option. The Captain had joked that the Andorian had retreated to his secret medical research lab, which was rumoured to be in a storage closet near the Bridge, and some ensign had muttered about the holodeck being occupied by Daphnea.

Forced into the first option by her crew, Caesar took a deep breath in and glanced at her drinking buddy. They were staring out the window, gazing into the ominous nothingness of space. The stars twinkled as the Intrepid swept through the vast frontier. "It is so peaceful out there," Newt murmured, earning a short nod from Caesar.

"Too bad everyone has to wear expensive overgrown suits just to float out there," Caesar replied, forgetting she sat across from the one person who didn't need space gear; they could survive for ages in the vacuum before Newt's power eventually ran out. Her android friend didn't respond, they were too busy ordering another drink.

After a brief pause, Caesar felt it necessary to comment, "I wonder what the Captain is doing," She took a sip of coffee, "I have never seen him out of the Bridge," Newt grimaced whilst taking their refilled drink from Rodolpho, one of Solomon's alpha shift waiters. This time, they had asked for a pineapple-flavoured smoothie, which was a neon yellow colour and as equally repulsive to the Trill Lieutenant as Newt's previous one.

"According to Nellie, he's working the alpha on the Bridge," Newt's face scrunched up as they downed their drink, clearing not favouring the taste. "That cheeky bastard!" Caesar scoffed.