Alliance Central Access Network
Presents: Arrhythmia
The Story Of One of the Finest Ship in The Ghost Fleet
ACAN v 1.0
ARRHYTHMIAIn Production throughout the year 2001.
Chapter 2
Cybs Patrickson could still remember her touch upon his warm body as they expressed their emotions for one another physically. Cybs could still remember her warm breath as she breathed heavily upon his neck, working with and for him as he did the same for her. Their moans grew louder as they both came closer to one another. They had wanted each other for so long they couldn’t remember a day when they hadn’t seen each other, admire each other, or had laid a kiss on the other’s cheek, or face, or neck. They were in love and each time they could they wished to express it in every which way possible. Cybs cast off the angry comments his parents made in regards to his relations with her as he was encompassed in the first and only true love of his life. Anna was everything he had ever desired in a woman, intelligent, passionate, understanding and curious of the world that existed around him. Cybs was everything she desired of a man, caring, compassionate, and equally understanding, the true gentleman she would have otherwise never met.
Years ago, following their passionate love, he would have honestly been able to say he would have died for her and would have never lived in a world where she couldn’t exist as well. Years change a man as man changes years, however, and their passionate love couldn’t last. He remembered painfully the day after he received his Lieutenant bars, and his orders to become the Executive Officer of her ship. They would be together on the same ship for days, months, maybe even years! Each night would be romantic; each passion shared like an unfolding novel, there would be nothing stopping their deepest envies, their deepest desires for one another would be expressed in whatever way they needed to be expressed. But then, the dark cloud had begun to appear. Within a few months of his assignment on the Segan Royal Destroyer Takzuma, the vessel was assigned to the frontlines. The doctors fought long and hard to resuscitate Anna, but she was too far-gone even for Segan 26th Century technology to do any good. She had died, almost a year ago for a nation that no longer existed.
Cybs Patrickson’s life was destroyed the moment she had died. There was little that he could cling to that was hers and her will and testament had offered Cybs little comfort or refuge. In the previous years, Cybs had adamantly opposed religion agreeing entirely with the famous Terran quote: “religion was the opium of the masses.” In the good times he saw little need for religion, believing it to be more of a tool for the controlling of the weak and those stupid enough to believe in it. But when the death of Anna was pronounced, the rules, which he had lived by, the assumptions that everything would be all right needed some clear re-examination. He took a leave, during the war, as he found refuge in the Cardassian monasteries closest to Segan Sovereign Space and not at risk from the Styx onslaught. Religion had guided him, and had promised in him a man at peace with himself and the events that had happened. He no longer sorrowed for Anna’s loss, and celebrated her moving on to a better life. He would join her soon enough, they would be together again, two stars unable to touch one another in this universe, but free to do as they wished in the afterlife.
By the time the Segan Monarchy had fallen into its civil war with the Segan Popular Union, Cybs was back on the job fighting for yet another lost cause. As the executive officer of the Cardassian warship Grakesh, he was able to put the loss of Anna behind him. When he had once thought he would never be able to live without her, Cybs now knew how to ignore his feelings of pain. Religion had given him the tools, and the hope that he would meet her again and that they would be able to embrace one another forever as they shared the best moments of their relationship. He sorrowed only to know that Anna wasn’t survived by a child that they together could have had produced, it would have made the death of Anna so much easier on Cybs. During the Civil War, however, she was his hope, and his only reason to survive the Civil War. As Anna would have had it, it was Cybs’ destiny to live.
“Executive Officer’s Personal Log, Stardate 250102.25,” Cybs dictated to the computer from the Captain’s ready room, “Following my reassignment to the Arrhythmia just shortly before the war ended, I was a bit uneasy about my entire place in life. It’s been almost a year since I’ve lost Anna, lost her forever to the abyss, and it’s been almost a year since I’ve wished Anna a peaceful afterlife. There were times when I felt I couldn’t make it, when I couldn’t go through with life anymore but somehow thanks to her and my guiding monks, each time I have made it through.
My assignment here on the Arrhythmia tells me I’ve got a good career coming up, the Arrhythmia’s one of the best ships in the Ghost Fleet, and from what I hear we’re going to get a good Captain too. She busts a few nuts here and there I hear, but only if they don’t follow the book. A by the book Captain is good, but I do hope she knows how to use common sense. If she doesn’t, it will be my duty to make sure I am her common sense. No matter, however, I am for the first time in a year looking forward to the assignment at hand.
We’re on our way to pick up the Captain and about half of the crew, the current crew that is piloting the ship is being rotated to other Ghost Fleet ships in need of their expertise. I hope the crew that replaces them will be equally as good, it is my understanding that it is a diverse crew coming from the various 15 provinces of The Alliance. It’s funny to think, when Anna died we were Sego-Cardassians, but now… We’re Cardassians with a citizenship that tells us we’re Allied citizens. So much has changed, so much of which I would have wanted to share with her. I sometimes wonder if she looks at me from wherever she lives now, and hears me.
What would I tell her if she heard me? Well Computer, I’d tell her she’s the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen in my life, especially for a human. That she had a refreshing effect on me, an effect that I forever thank her for giving to me. I’d tell her that she is the kindest, most deep person I’ve ever known. I’d tell her, I miss her, and I hate her for leaving me out cold like that. Couldn’t she have been at my side during the damn assault? I miss you, Anna, I really do. Computer, end log,” Patrickson sighed as he heard his communications badge beep for attention.
“XO, CONN,” The Navigations Ensign chimed in, “Trevor Palladin here sir, we’re receiving a message from our future Captain, she requests to have a word with you.”
“CONN, XO,” Patrickson paused, wondering if this was already a chew out in progress, “Affirmative, transfer communications over to my console.”
“XO, CONN,” Ensign Palladin tapped his console as he bent his head, “Message is transferred.”
Patrickson tapped the personal computer access open as the holographic image appeared in front of Patrickson. Standing in front of him was a tall woman of approximately one hundred and eighty centimeters, who seemed slim but very fit. Her eyes were dark brown, and peered at the Commander in an almost curved quadrilateral. Her nose was thin, and elongated, almost met by full and luscious lips. Her ears resembled those of the traditional alien, even though the point wasn’t as punctuated. Her hair was trimmed short, but Patrickson could imagine them long, they would be beautiful and pitch black but it blended well with her light brown almost copper colored skin. Patrickson saluted remembering his new Commanding Officer’s attention to the rulebook.
“Commander Cybs Patrickson,” Patrikson allowed a small to appear on his face, “Executive Officer, A.G.D. Arrythmia, it’s a pleasure to speak to you, sir.”
“Captain de Pax, Commander,” Grace replied keeping a very monotonous tone, “The pleasure is mine, Commander. I wanted to inquire on your ETA, if possible?”
“We’re going to be entering the Segan Monarchy within 12 hours, sir, we should be at your location in time for you to take over command of the vessel on Stardate 250102.29,” Patrickson replied, looking over the latest navigational reports.
“Anyway you could speed it up a little, Commander?” Grace’s head bent awkwardly, favoring her right shoulder, as Patrickson again looked at the navigation reports.
“If we took it to Warp 15, we’d still be in regulations, and we’d be able to get there on Stardate 250102.27,” Patrickson replied, a reply, which made Grace’s monotonous face break into a warm smile.
“Make it so, Commander,” Grace’s head returned to her normal position as the woman took a deep look into the Commander’s eyes, “Just make sure you stay in regs, otherwise I have your neck, Commander.”
“Yes, Sir,” Patrickson blinked, unaccustomed to such a forward speaking Captain.
“Good, I’ll see you on Stardate 250102.27, assuming nothing goes wrong,” Grace turned to the console, “De Pax out.”
Patrickson watched as the logo of The Alliance of Incorporated Worlds spun on its own axis. He stared at the logo for a moment more, as he turned his head away from the computer screen. He approached the view port as his eyes watched the stars streaking by as the starship proceeded on course at faster than light speeds. Anna had died in space, and now space carried a little bit of her. That was another way he lived on, the coldness outside had been warmed by the fact it was the burial site of the most beautiful and kindest of women he had ever known. If only space could allow itself to create a nebula in the shape of her, or allow for a visual phenomenon to see her face laughing again, he would be contented for the rest of his life and would ask for nothing ever again. He sighed, as he his mind brought him back into reality, his future Captain had ordered him to hurry up and he could tell with her tone that any time they would be for the better. He walked over to the bathroom, making sure he looked all right as he turned for the door. The doors hissed as he traversed from his private reflections, into his public life as the Executive Officer of the A.G.D. Arrhythmia.
“Ensign Palladin,” Patrickson stated as he walked over to the Commanding Officer’s chair, “We’ve just received a communications from our Captain.”
“Oh?” Palladin turned to Patrickson, wondering if it concerned his driving skills, he had never been secured even if he was in the top ten percent of his graduating class, “Did she say anything about me?”