Mister Bill

01 02

((This one is placed just before the 0206.09 sim))
J`Tamare Farewell

T`san shivered slightly hearing the Captain's mention of family issues as the ship wide announcement was given. Earlier he had regretted the wasted time on the Nitherian prisoners he had managed to twist enough - the Nitherian chain of command was too compartmentalized for even his prime target, a weapons officer, to be fully aware of the plan. Their captain was a nut that he knew would not crack easily, so he had ordered their captain dragged in irons to isolation with complete sensory deprivation, no light, and white noise.

As far as the ... unorthodox and ethically questionable ... interrogations, it had made him wonder if he had gone soft or was simply unwilling to apply the lessons that had once been what kept him alive. As his means had changed, inevitably his sense of what means were acceptable changed with it - gratuitous violence always to be avoided, but now there was a possible justification for attempting to break another's will. And he had faltered in resolve to employ all means at his disposal, which would have included a psionic invasion into the mind - even by artificial means, not for reasons of evidence, but knowing why conditioning was applied via distrans those years earlier. The use of psionics had a history of being limited as a means to extract information from prisoners in the Empire, mainly because anyone truly worth interrogating was already conditioned to resist to the point of fatigue where the mind collapses inward on itself and the subject's mind dies. Even with the remoteness of this eventuality, he had too little head way too late, and that trouble T`san almost as much as the Captain's tone on those words ... "family issues" …

Having lost his own family early on, and with a slight twinge of grief, remorse, and a possible myriad of other tones deeply smoothed underneath the words, T`san wondered what had happened that would bring this about. He knew his Captain spoke with one of many Terran accents, but he couldn't place if his family was actually from Terra or if the accent was acquired from his companions. What could it have been? In addition, the sense of needing to get his mind away from what he considered a waste of time and effort prompted him to open his desk drawer to remove a seldomly handled box and remove two sheets of pressed paper from his last hiatus on Terra, a 60 lbs. grade press with a slight crisp scent with traces of lilac and lavender fibers sneaking their way into the view and smell. Drawing out a bottle of an emerald green ink, and set to writing.

Lilac, Daffodil, Gladioli were what he purchased on his way back to his own quarters, once the letter was writ, and after arranging the gladioli in the background, and lilac in the foreground, tied them to the top of the letter with two cords, on white, another black. He then accessed the query function on his seldom used console in his quarters, "Computer, quarters of Daniel Fraleigh, Captain?"
On hearing the response, he decided the RR was the most likely place things would be stored before shipping them out. Sighing, and deciding it would be a good gesture, he opened the closet and drew out a box a palm width on it's ends and forearm long, and checked its contents thrice.
"Well, Captain - may these do you some good in your travels, wherever they eventually lead you - hopefully back to home safe."

Sir,
It is with the best of hopes that what brings you to Terra once more, seemingly suddenly, is an affair that ends with good being manifest - whether or not the road runs with sorrow, joy, or anything else. May the wind always blow at your back, and never walk along the road without company.
I wish you well as you leave the Fed, and much happiness with your family - may they always rest at ease.

Sincerely yours,

Tarishito-sanaku`amiade-Shi'ko Bill-inyu'zho`taharin
Senior Lieutenant T`san Bill
USS Federation
Tactical Department, Internal Security Division

Star Trek and all related items are registered trademarks of Paramount Pictures, and all references to Space Fleet, and all its characters, places and events are trademarks of Space Fleet Online c/o AOL (SEE: Keyword SFOL).
The character T`san Bill is the work of the holder of the AOL screename Billinbox as are the Destronians.