thestarkoboljournals | The Dumb Supper (Reply)

The Dumb Supper

The table was set and the candles lit in preparation for a romantic meal. Music played softly from speakers hidden in the very walls as the smell of charred steak and seafood wafted through the apartment. The cook, a woman of modest skills when it came to the culinary arts, placed the carefully charred meat on a platter and set it to one side, turning her attention back to the trio of skewers arranged on the grill. Seasoned and basted with a sweet and sour glaze, she removed it when the color turned just right. The vegetables and rice were the last to be added to the plate before she shut off the food prep unit and dimmed the lights.

Third Meal was ready.

The woman herself was dressed in an elegant gown with layer upon layer of diaphanous purple multi-hue material that made her appear to float rather than walk as she brought the single plate to the table and placed before a holograph of a handsome young man in the prime of his life. The dark blue of the uniform he wore enhanced his already bright blue eyes and contrasted sharply with his yellow blond hair. His smile, warm and genuine, only served to make him even more handsome. The woman paused, the fingers of one hand lightly caressing the frame before reaching out to retrieve a bottle from the bucket of ice on a nearby side table. She filled each glass way with a dark red wine, the bottle’s label marking its origins as being that of the planet Taura.

Setting the bottle back in the bucket, the woman padded on bare feet to her seat. Shoes were not necessary for the event and, truth be told, she was unaccustomed to the fashionable high heels worn by Colonial women. She didn’t sit though. Instead, she turned once more to the side table and picked up the censor that rested near the wine bucket. Stepping away from the table she went only far enough to the small pedestal where a single candle sat in the direction she had earlier marked out as being east. Raising the censor, she intoned an ancient Sagittaran litany before lighting the candle. She proceeded to another candle on another pedestal; this time located in the direction of south and repeated the action. This she did for the directions of west and north, circling the dining table before returning to the east once more. Replacing the censor, she returned to the table now located in the very center of the circle and took her seat.

One more litany, this one different than previously spoken and the woman breathed in deeply, then exhaled. An almost tangible calmness spread over her before she looked at her own table setting.

Two hypo-sprays lay next to her empty plate, each clearly marked as to their contents. Both were legal and non-lethal drugs. Both could save her life if it came right down to it. Both were also very necessary on a night like this. She cast a look of disdain at them, inwardly cursing herself for being so weak. She had tried on more than one occasion to be strong as she knew she should, but old wounds ran too deep to suppress for long. There was a certain amount of decorum expected of her in the days after The Betrayal, however in a situation like this she knew she could not live up to everyone’s expectations.

Raising her own glass, she looked the man in the photograph in the eye and saluted him with the rim.

“Happy natal day, My Love.”

No sooner had the words left her lips then tears poured uncontrollably from her eyes like dams bursting after an exceedingly heavy spring rainfall. She reached for the napkin beside her own plate and dabbed at the streams that felt like molten metal on her cheeks. Her voice, a harsh whisper now, choked with emotion and her eyes stung painfully.

“I said I wasn’t going to do this.”

Her voice, suddenly octaves higher than usual, strained trying valiantly to keep her from exclaiming too loud. She had lied to herself. Told herself she could get through one event, one remembrance meal, without tearing up. All those hopes for just one damned dignified, unemotional meal went right down the turbo-flush!

“I still love you and I miss you so!”

Her heart broke once more like a broken vase put back together one too many times with repair bond insufficient to hold the overwhelming heartache that had all but shattered her two yahrens ago.

“I’m sorry… so sorry…”

Her apology to thin air went unanswered as she buried her face in the cloth napkin in her hands and sobbed uncontrollably.

Long centons passed before she cried herself out sufficiently to raise her head. The man still looked out from the holo with a smile that could warm a dark, cold mid-winter’s night. In her eyes and in her heart he could do no wrong.

Except die.

Against his will, he had left her and his mortal coil two yahrens ago when his ship had joined the Fifth Fleet embarking on a mission to Molokai where they had met their end at the hands of their scaly enemy and their metallic drone-soldiers.

That was the day Madness took her in its cold embrace and claimed her, mind, body and soul. While there were some doubts of her returning to duty, four months later she was suiting up in uniform and moving back into her old life and newly renovated execs quarters aboard the Star of Kobol. Her shipboard home that she had all but destroyed with projectiles, booze and blaster fire. She spent little more than three days in a drunken stupor, venting her rage by destroying everything at hand in blind painful hysteria. When they finally cut through the bulkhead wall from the adjoining storage room, they found the woman on the floor of her quarters unconscious and laying in the middle of debris that couldn’t have been any better described as being that of a bomb having gone off inside. The woman was covered in her own blood, though not dying from any self inflicted wounds. These superficial yet productive wounds were the result of flying glass bouncing back at her. A blaster had been found under the desk, apparently sliding there during the tempest with power cells depleted. Evidence of the discharges had been found on the door and the locking panel of the quarters. It was left to logic that she had inadvertently locked herself inside. While this had not been a bad thing n that she could not leave, no one could get in to help her, either.

Emotionally spent for the time being. The woman straightened herself up and looked at the holo.

“Now where were we?”

She paused. Oh yes. The wine. Picking up the glass again she repeated the salute.

“Happy natal day, My Love.”

Yes, that went better. No emotional upheaval followed. She took a sip and the dark, tart liquid flowed down her throat.

(To be continued...)