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Side sim: Lounge Shenanigans

Posted Nov. 24, 2021, 7:29 p.m. by Lieutenant Séan Iven (Chief of Psychiatry) (Matt Evans)

Posted by Lieutenant Junior Grade Solal Segal (Oncology and Immunology) in Side sim: Lounge Shenanigans

Posted by Lieutenant Séan Iven (Chief of Psychiatry) in Side sim: Lounge Shenanigans

Posted by Lieutenant Junior Grade Solal Segal (Oncology and Immunology) in Side sim: Lounge Shenanigans
Posted by… suppressed (9) by the Post Ghost! 👻
<snip>
Séan picked the deck up, discarded the top card, then dealt one down for Solal, one up for himself, one up for Solal, and a last one up for him. Solal was showing an eight of diamonds, while Séan’s were showing a seven of hearts and a jack of spades. He looked expectantly at Solal to see if you wanted to hit or stay.

CoP Iven

Solal considered the cards for a moment and then indicated for a ‘hit’. “What else did you do for fun on cargo runs?” It was his attempt to make polite conversation over the game.

~ Lt JG Solal

Séan dealt Solal another card face up, it was a five of clubs. “Well for awhile it was a lot of reading. Then it was physical training and meditation, which I know doesn’t sound very fun. It was something I needed in my life to center me though. So between distance learning, card games with my dad, reading and keeping myself centered… well, I kept busy. It’s probably ironic that I’ve spent most of my life in space but I still love novels set in space.”

CoP Iven

“Meditation is fun,” Solal replied. Fun wasn’t really the right word to him, but it was something nice to do in free time. “Old novels set in space are fascinating, to see how wrong 20th and 21st century earth writers were about space. I’ll stay.” The last comment was regarding the game. His down card was a five of spades, making eighteen total.

~ Lt JG Solal

“I’m staying at seventeen.” Séan said with a smile. “They certainly had some strange ideas on how faster than light travel would work, what sort of ‘aliens’ we were bound to discover, and the ratio of habitable planets. Though I have to say Vulcan barely counts in that category. Why do you think most non-humans are humanoid in appearance? Is that a human-centric question to ask?”

CoP Iven

“Then I believe this round is over. Eighteen,” Solal commented, flipping his down card. “Some of them made liberal use of imagination, others attempted to guess with the knowledge available at the time. Books on earth go for relateability, a humanoid is more relateable to human readers than anything else.”

~ Lt JG Solal

Séan waved a hand in negation before he swept the cards aside and dealt the next. “No, I mean why are there actually so many humanoid species? Some of the fantastical ideas and races in science fiction were far more outlandish then reality. I’ll admit that there are lifeforms outside of the humanoid mold, but compared to the races humanity have met, they’re surprisingly similar to humans. Cross speciation being possible between Vulcans, Klingons, Romulans, Bajoran, etc. I’m not sure if Andorian’s are compatible with humans, but… a thought for another day.” This times cards were an ace of hearts and a 6 of clubs for Séan, with the flipped up card for Solal being a 10 of clubs.

CoP Iven

“One theory is a common bacterial ancestor, however there is no scientific proof.” Solal had never given it much though. The fact existed, most sentient species discovered so far had the same basic shape. Why wasn’t relevant to him. “Andorians are compatible with humans and other humanoid species,” Solal confirmed. It was a fact he happened to know. His down card this time was an eight of diamonds. Another eighteen. “I’ll stay.”

~ Lt JG Solal

“I’ll stay as well.” Séan said with his seventeen showing. “Isn’t it nearly impossible for a common bacteria to profligate across across several thousands of light years? I mean statistically what are the chances?”

CoP Iven

Solal flipped his down card. “The odds are astronomically low.” He listed some incredibly low number of odds. “Less likely things have happened. But personally it isn’t something I think about often, so I don’t know whether it’s true or not.”

~ Lt JG Solal

Séan shrugged before sweeping the cards aside and dealing another set. His cards this time was a queen of clubs and an ace of spades, while Solal’s top card was a four of hearts. “I just think it’s an interesting point that the life diversity among the stars isn’t nearly as diverse as authors thought it would’ve been centuries ago. But then again they thought we’d be travelling through space using temporarily created wormholes too.”

CoP Iven

“They also imagined we would have left the galaxy. We cannot tell what’s beyond the milky way,” Solal replied. His down card was a seven of clubs. “Hit, please.” He shrugged then and continued, “But that is all it was, fiction, and they had no reference point from which to base their guesses.”

~ Lt JG Solal

“Even with warp speed it’d likely take a couple of human lifetimes, or maybe a Vulcan’s?, to reach Andromeda. So a generation ship at warp five might be the best way to attempt that. Or put everyone into stasis in shifts with a skeleton crew keeping things going.” Séan slowly mused. He flipped another card to Solal’s hand. The next card was a five of diamonds.

CoP Iven


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