SIM:Nicholotti (Breeman/Sahmson) Connections

Main Archive - Sim Timeline

((Flashback - 3 Years Earlier))

::Sahmson ran his fingers along the edge of the console, as though it were something he'd never seen before. He imagined the room around him dusty again, ancient and forgotten. And the status reports came back, each panel appearing before him as an island in a turbulant sea of information. He pressed a thumb up against the sensor diagnostics panel. Nothing had returned.

"It doesn't need to be perfect," he'd said a few days earlier, when he'd suggested this idea in the first place at their last meeting. "Just adequate."::

((Present))

::He ran his fingers along her skin. He wanted to tell her she should get off the starbase, that things were going to change. But he couldn't. He needed her here. He needed things to remain the same, as they were, so he could control the changes.::

Aodhnait: I love you.

((Flashback - 20 Years Earlier))

Sahmson: I love you.

Mother: I'm sure you do! You're never home!

::He gasped slightly.::

Sahmson: But I do.

Mother: I'm sorry...

::There was a scar on her wrist now, a bruise on her face from when the men had come.::

Mother: I love you too.

::She was strange somehow, her face was peaceful, her markings less colourful.::

Sahmson: Okay.

::There was a bang at the door.::

Mother: I love you.

::Sahmson began to turn toward the sound. But he heard something behind him. Turning back he saw his mother swing her arm toward her throat. There was a flash and then blood.::

::The door crashed open.::

Romulan: Where is she??

::Sahmson looked up at the man as he entered. Looking down he saw the expanding pool of blood pass his feet, running slowly from what was left behind him.::

Romulan: Don't think we won't conduct our normal appointment when you're dead!

::The two soldiers walked past him, shoving him out of their way.::

Sahmson: What's happening? Why are.. Wha Nnnnnn......

((Present))

::There was something rhythmic in her breathing, as though every part of this was perfectly normal, and love was as simple as stepping into a transport or reading a book. Her human body against his felt at once primitive and excitingly modern as he felt every pulse of her heart and every movement of her muscles.::

Sahmson: I know.

::She pressed her lips against his and he forgot about the need to say anything more, as normal came to replace life in a way it had never done before.::

((Flashback - 20 Years Earlier))

Romulan: There's a social services depot two blocks from here.

::He looked over at the pile of clothes on the floor near his mother's dead body.::

Romulan: Someone will come by to clean this all up.

((Present))

::Aodhnait lay beside him now.::

Cair: What's it like on your world?

::All Sahmson could do was smile. He could feel a pleasant pulsing on his forehead now as his mark shifted colours.::

Sahmson: Cold, mostly. We didn't have a moon.

Cair: Like... snowy? With forests?

::There weren't forests there now. The wood had come from standing poles, dead branches adorning their feet. The skies had been gray, lights hovering about through them as the men picked and chose the houses to visit, the workers to enlist. Sometimes a shaft of light would pierce through the canopy above and Sahmson would catch a glimpse of something that shone in the distance, reflected metal somewhere.::

Sahmson: No... We used to have forests. I... I don't want to talk about this.

::Aodhnait looked at the ornate pattern on his forehead, the way it changed colours. She ran her finger along it and said,::

Cair: That's quite alright. I haven't been to Earth in years.

::His forehead pulsed at her touch, like an ecstatic migraine. There was something homely and also normative in the name. Earth. Where the Federation had originated and bumped up against the only civilization Sahmson had ever known. The name appeared to him amid a symphony of explosive pleasures and deep connections.::

((Flashback - 12 Years Earlier))

Hanaj: I'm proud of you.

::The sunlight shone in through the shudders, illuminating the dust like a thousand living stars, seething and moving about inside that single civilization.::

Hanaj: We all are.

::Sahmson nodded gravely, taking the dagger and placing it in his Romulan uniform. The gold-plated battle dress adorned him, the Y-shaped belt criss crossing his chest.::

Hanaj: It seems we were wrong about your little... computer pastime.

Sahmson: That does not change the fact that I needed to prove its usefulness to all of you.

((Present))

::They fell asleep in each other's arms. Aodhnait dreamt of Earth. In her dream her father was there. He told her how proud he was of her for having gotten into Starbase 118's university. Her mother hugged her.::

::Sahmson's mind retreated once more into the calm repetitive world of code, the unfeeling instructions that flowed through everything, like blood, at first inside the heart, then along the veins, and then even into the most unexpected places. His code ran out before him, covering the very home in which they slept, and leaking into the thousands of ships and colonies through the lightyears of space around them. It was a brief dream he'd had once. And every so often it would come back to him, reminding him of where he'd come from and what he wanted to do.::

::Aodhnait smiled in her dream, dimly aware of the warmth of the arms around her body as her heart beat softly, contentedly.::

Lt. Sahmson
Security Officer
Starbase 118

and

Aodhnait Cair
University Student
Starbase 118

both simmed by

Lt. Cmdr. Kevin Breeman
First Officer
Starbase 118

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