Posted by Lieutenant Markus Woods (Chief Science Officer) in Another New Ship

(Snip)

“Oh, it doesn’t bother me. Well not much. I’m still figuring things out. Still getting poked and prodded about it too.” He shrugged once more. “I’ll show you mine [scars] if you show me yours.” The scars were an added undercurrent, silent, unsaid, but sent for clarity. Scooting closer he rubbed his hands together, preparing, then spread them apart. In the air in front of him an object began to take shape, like a holographic grid, nothing more than lines and faces creating a complex set of polygons. The object was a foot long, and as thick as his forearm at the ends, but narrowed to about wrist thickness in the middle. It resembled almost square tubing that had been crushed into a piece of modern art. The whole thing was covered in mysterious symbols and lines, and an underlying grid pattern. It had no seams or visible openings. As Markus opened his eyes it seemed to hover there in front of his hands, solid and and real, with reflections from it’s dark metallic surface.

Sharah watched him rub his hands together and then spread them. She could tell he was trying to convey some thought to her but suddenly there was no sound coming from him. It took her a moment and a mental adjustment, he was conveying images. Sharah had to close her eyes momentarily in order to ‘see’ it. Once she did he would hear her silent affirmation that she could see it.

“This device we found when I was aboard my second posting, the U.S.S. Darius. I was serving as a scientist, but I was just a wet-behind-the-ears junior officer then. The device tended to impart rather alien knowledge and ability for anybody who was exposed to it. But only temporarily. Like an hour or so. I, being overly ambitious, spent a lot of time with the device. Tried to really record as much as I could and plumb it’s depths. It seems my repeated and prolonged exposure had some more… permanent effects.”

Much like her wayward experiment with the reality bubbles and Mini Fayth. ‘Sometimes Science gives us more than unexpected results.’

“I wound up in a lot of crap for breaking protocol. But I’m pretty sure I had more than enough to deal with as I spent the next year or so locked in a box, being poked, prodded, studied. I’m pretty sure they would have liked to dissect me. Just to find out if I was somehow unique or special, and what they could glean from that. But I was released, and returned to active duty. During that time I got a lot of training and counseling on how to [ handle my abilities. And it took a lot to keep control of my head, as well as build the skills, discipline, and so on to get to where I am. It’s been a long road, gettin’ from there to here. I’m still learning. But at least I haven’t had a Mind Storm in a good while.”

Mark

Dissection and study and locked up? Sharah was a doctor and by default a scientist, but she took an oath to do no harm. And what he described offended her at a fundamental level. Not Markus, but what he had been put through. “Mind Storm?”

“Oh, they never got that far, but they were thinking about it. When they thought I was out of range, or wasn’t paying attention.” He shrugged. “I’m pretty sure Captain Hawkes put an end to it.” He didn’t immediately answer her about the mind storms, instead letting her explain about her condition.

He showed his, so now hers, she supposed. “On Betazed I am diagnosed as a supersensitive telepath. Unlike most Betazoids, whose talent and skills turn on during adolescence, I was born with mine on. Not just on but fully developed. Basically it means I hear and feel everything from everyone around me. I can’t stop it and I can’t turn it down. It is not within my capabilities to block the input. I hear it even in my sleep.”

Fayth

“That sounds rough. No wonder you like it in here,” he said with a small, but knowing smile. “Also that’s really good information to know.” Taking a moment, he cleared his throat. “Ah, a Mind Storm is just my term for it. When… I’m particularly stressed, overwhelmed, or worried too much. It’s also happened when I’ve attempted to consciously do Precognition. I also had one shortly after coming aboard the Viking, when I tried to open up more to sense whatever was here. I touched on it, and .. woke up drooling on the floor of my quarters. It’s a flood of psychic information that I can’t stop, limit or control - it just keeps coming until I collapse or it just stops on its own. This is a sort of uncontrolled “opening of oneself” to everything around. It might be akin to a sort of mental or psychic seizure too. I dunno. I always feel so drained, so wiped after one happens, and usually migraines follow. So I have to be careful about pushing those abilities.” Reaching down he picked up a pebble from the soil, holding it in his hand. After a moment it lifted into the air floating and rotating slowly. “But this doesn’t seem to have the same effect.” Concentrating on the stone and keeping it aloft required focus, and it was both thought and feeling. Not just emotion but sensation, feeling the weight of the rock, it’s relation to his hand, how much force to push against it, feel it’s rotation. But for a small object like that, he seemed rather practiced with it

Mark

Sharah listened and knew exactly what he was talking about. But was stopped from commentating as the pebble began to levitate. She was fascinated, watching, and at the same time he could hear, much as he had done earlier, her mind begin to run with questions about how it worked, what caused him to have these abilities, how it differed from regular telepathy. There was an underlying basis that Betazoids once had similar abilities but had lost them, and how those abilities might connect with her research and a cure. Then a thought that was quickly tucked away, and the feeling that it had been rude of her. She processed and filed away each sensation, feeling, and thought he shared with her about it, but didn’t pry for more.

When he stopped she gazed at him, really looking at him as if she was seeing things that others could not. And then gently offered, her own memories of such a thing, for him to see if he chose…

Pain, confusion, overwhelming sensations -, even pleasurable happy emotions were a burning pain because there were simply too many, too strong. Drowning and unable to identify your own feelings from others. There is no self except as a recepticle for others. Thoughts too loud to understand, so much noise things can not be separated and you can not think. Then more pain, hot fire cutting through your essence, a hammer shattering the mind, only tobe put back together for it to happen again and again.. And then memories of waking up in the hospital. “Mind Storm. That’s a very accurate term for it. I am sorry you’ve had to experience such a thing. I would not wish that on anyone.”

Suddenly she closed her eyes tightly, curling into herself, pain etched across her face, one hand tugging tightly on a curl, the other curled into a fist nails biting into her palm.

Fayth