Heilige Scheiße

Posted on Mon Apr 26th, 2021 @ 7:44pm by Captain Björn Kodak

Mission: The Place of Skulls
Location: Grand Delphinium Resort, Isle of Delphi, Risa
Timeline: Mission Day 1 at 0035

[Grand Delphinium Resort]
[Isle Delfino, Risa]
[MD 1: 0035 Hours]

After returning from what could be considered a strip club, Andrew had promptly but lovingly said goodnight and passed into the bedroom to sleep off the liquor he’d consumed. And while it was heading towards 1am and Kodak knew that he, too, should get some sleep, the boozy buzz and some elevated endorphins had eschewed the desire to crash for the time being.

In a bleary-eyed huff, Björn flopped down onto the sectional in the main living area of his suite and stretched out. He felt very warm and regretted wearing actual clothing vs. just shapeshifting himself an outfit for the evening. Reaching up, he had to bother himself with removing his t-shirt the old-fashioned way, leaving him bare-chested on the couch as he stared at the ceiling.

Legs still clad in denim, Björn’s shiny black boots rested on the arm of the couch. Looking down the length of his legs, the man was fairly certain that — back on Earth — Ingrid Müller was somehow psychically aware of his boots on the fabric and was swearing at him for living like an animal. This brought forth a deep chuckle from the Chameloid.

He regretted that he’d not been able to physically meet up with his family during shore leave. Everyone was so busy and, without being able to go to Earth himself — having to stay on Risa to ship out who-knew-when — Björn had had to settle for a lot of long-range communications calls. They were better than the alternative but still, he missed his mother’s hugs and his father’s strong hand-shakes.

But they weren’t really his mother and father, were they? It was the alcohol talking, Björn knew, but the booze was right. They raised him like he was one of their own but he wasn’t. Not really. No, he’d supposedly come from Chameloid parents who’d left him in a beach bag right there on Risa. Eying the sphere he’d been found with — which sat idly on the coffee table nearby — he picked up the device for the thousandth time during his Risian stay.

When he’d visited the beach he’d been found on some weeks before, holding the sphere in the sunlight had somehow activated it. Miniature control knobs, buttons, dials, and switches had manifested across the surface of the orb, a hologram projected at the same time. The speaker had indicated that if Kodak could solve the mysteries of the puzzle sphere, it would put him on “The Path.” The Chameloid still had no idea what that “path” led to but many of his spare moments over the last few weeks had involved trying to solve the puzzle.

Every single attempt had come up short. Kodak attributed this to not even knowing what the end result of the solved puzzle should even look like. It was like being tossed a tricorder without being trained on one and then being told to figure out how it worked. Not impossible but certainly not at all easy. There’d been a couple of times the Chameloid had thought he’d been onto something only for one mistaken button push to send the sphere’s protrusions back to their starting positions.

It’d all been rather aggravating. But tonight, half-drunk as Björn still was, it was as if the sphere were appealing to him to keep trying. There was little harm in it, after all. Some frustration at not being successful, certainly. But the Chameloid wondered if maybe the act of trying to ferret out the puzzle’s solution would help make him sleepy. Mind hazing and blazing, he worked at the orb’s little knobs first, having spent a whole week figuring out that they were the starting point.

The knobs were almost like chess pieces that could be slid around on the board without being picked up. After moving several around in various combinations he’d not tried before, Björn suddenly heard a click and noticed that one of the larger switches — which had previously refused to budge — now moved with ease. With a press of the switch, other components unlocked as well; components that, when manipulated, unlocked others still.

It was as if somehow — in his drunken state — the moves were just coming easier to him. Like the alcohol was plying his brain with added focus that opened Björn up to new possibilities he hadn’t seen before. And while he was so excited that he wanted to wake up Andrew and share the news, Björn feared that if he stopped manipulating the sphere now, he’d lose the streak that he was on. So he kept at it, pushing buttons, twisting knobs, sliding switches.

And then, suddenly and without warning, the controls began to whir and buzz as they had so many times before. Kodak rolled his eyes and growled, ready to throw the ball across the room and into the wall. He’d come so damned close this time! It took a second to realize, however, that the buzzing hadn’t stopped like normal. In fact, it was now accompanied with a building hum…

The same hum he’d heard with Emni on that damned beach he’d been found. The same hum that precipitated the hologram appearing to speak its cryptic message. The hum that now receded as — once again — a hologram appeared in mid-air, projected forward from the orb. Instead of the foreign symbol he’d seen before — which could not be found in the Federation database — a man-in-miniature stood in the bed of Kodak’s chest hair, face hidden by an oversized hood as the figure began to speak.

“Welcome to The Path, Kodak,” the figure said. ”I am sure you have many, many questions. About your past, your origins…your parents. I’m afraid I haven’t the time to answer them now. However, the sphere you hold in your hand is a key to all you wish to know. As are you, Kodak,” the robed man added. ”These are the first coordinates on The Path. With the sphere and the very nature of who you are, you can find us,” he said, reaching up to remove his hood.

Face revealed, Björn saw what appeared to be a Klingon. Why would a Klingon be hinting to answers about his past? It made no sense. At least, not until he noticed the man’s eyes. They were startlingly golden, just like his own. With the same kinds of striations that Starfleet Medical had once presumed were unique to Chameloids. That was it! “The Path” must lead towards some kind of hidden enclave of my people, he mused.

”Find us, Kodak. Find your past and your future. But do this carefully. Tell only who you must. We have been hunted for so very long…” And with that, the hologram faded mostly away, leaving only the coordinates still floating in mid air.

Jumping up from the couch, Björn practically stumbled over himself to get to a PADD he’d left on the kitchen counter. He quickly keyed in the coordinates and saved them before the numbers, too, had faded from view. And then, just as it had before, the dials, switches, buttons, and toggles all scrambled again, locking the holographic coordinates away behind the puzzle once more.

“Heilige Scheiße!” Holy shit.

Björn wanted to rouse every member of his crew now and head straight away for the coordinates. Only that wasn’t his mission. His mission was to get everyone onboard by 0900 hours and ship out for the Delta Quadrant. But when would they be back on this side of the galaxy? When would they again have the chance to jump on this information? And if the Chameloids were being hunted, what if he waited too long and they were lost to him?

No, not going to wait on this. Striding into the bedroom, he stripped off his boots and jeans and packed them into a duffel that sat waiting with the rest of his things for transport to the Sojo in the morning. As he began stuffing himself into the fresh uniform he’d laid out for the next morning, he wondered if he should wake Andrew or let the man sleep. It was so much to explain — difficult to follow at the best of times, much less when someone was sleeping off a drunken stupor.

I’ll leave him a note, then, Kodak mused, using the stylus of his PADD to scribble down a message:

Emergency business on the Sojo. Everything is perfectly alright but I had to beam up early. See you in the morning? I’ll be waiting, handsome boy. Let me know when you’re aboard. - Love, Sir

Setting the PADD down where Andrew would see its blinking message light, Björn quietly moved out onto the bedroom’s balcony. With the door closed behind him, he knew his partner would not be woken by a verbal exchange.

“Kodak to the Sojourner. One to beam up,” he said, lowering his hand after activating his combadge.

”Sir, we didn’t expect you until later this morning. Is everything OK?” came the Sojo’s reply.

“Everything is fine. Some business is calling me up sooner than anticipated,” Kodak rasped. “Please get Admiral Dermont on subspace for me. I’ll take the call in my new quarters.”

”Aye sir. Prepare for beam up.”

Looking around the resort — and the darkened beach beyond — Kodak drew the salty ocean air into his lungs for the last time. He was going to miss Risa, even though he’d been itching to get back into space. But the promise of finding his people made setting aside that melancholy a little easier, at least.

Taken by the sparkling haze, Kodak disappeared into the night.


=/\= A post by… =/\=

Captain Björn Kodak
Commanding Officer
USS Sojourner