Weightlessness

Posted on Sun Aug 2nd, 2020 @ 9:11pm by Crewman Finn Jones & Lieutenant JG Mattias Constantine

Mission: Mission 3 - 100
Location: Deck E - Hydroponics
Timeline: Day 39, Month 2, Year 0 17:30
3668 words - 7.3 OF Standard Post Measure

Staring at the ceiling of his quarters from his bunk, Lieutenant Constantine idly passed the time scrolling through a few photos that he and Lexi had taken together in the evening prior to the Vrav boarding party had interjected themselves into the equation. There were multiple retakes saved on his PADD - one where Lexi had blinked, another where he hadn't smiled properly - but they had eventually agreed on what was the best photo of the group. Matt had reset his background image to that moment forever frozen in time, a fond memory that distracted him from the current circumstances that he, Lexi, and the rest of the crew were experiencing.

The communications officer rubbed his temples in an attempt to fend off an impending headache. Though he was hydrated, he took another drink of water from his bottle, stopping with the bottle halfway to his lips as he realized that the herb plants that Lexi usually tended to in hydroponics needed watering more than he did. With his headache all but forgotten, Matt nimbly popped up to his feet and exited his quarters to make the short journey over the hydroponics bay.

As he walked through the sliding doors, Constantine recognized the now familiar face of Crewman Jones looking towards the door to see who had entered. To his relief, Matt realized that he had caught him while in the process of watering Ensign O'Connery's plants.

"Oh man, thank you so much, Finn," Matt exhaled in relief. "I don't know if you know or not, but Lexi was injured when the Vrav boarding party came aboard, so she hasn't been around to take care of her plants, and I totally forgot until about two minutes ago. Thanks, man, you're a lifesaver."

"Sir?" The static crewman wondered at the man started to approach him. No one ever really came to see him other than the Vulcan's and O'Connery. He was surprised to see the man that had been with the Communications Officer the previous day and the man was thanking him, calling him by his first name and actually looked happy to see him. "Um, you are welcome?" He questioned glancing back the way he had come and the watering can he had left behind. "I knew that I took her some mint for a proper herbal tea but she was asleep."

"That was really sweet of you. Lexi always says such nice things about you, so I'm not surprised at all," Constantine explained with an amicable smile. It was the truth, though she had also mentioned how he had become increasingly withdrawn over the past few days as well. Without knowing where to begin with him, Constantine decided to start from the beginning. "Hey listen, I know we haven't really met yet, but my name's Mattias. My friends call me Matt or Matty. I came down to check and see if you needed any help with anything while you're short handed."

The crewman blushed brightly and looked at the floor trying to think on what to say. He liked the communication officer as she actually bothered to talk to him. He knew he was awkward, gangly and knew far to much about random herbs and plants but he hated feeling an outcast since Crewmen Carvajal and Majdoub had been killed. Both had been close to him but Majdoub had been his room mate. It was lonely now.

“She is nice. She brings me news and coffee daily. I have not been able to get out much as this stuff needs a lot of caring..” He said as if that explained everything. “I am Finn, Sir. Well you knew that. Um...” He glanced around and shook his head. “I am pretty much caught up but you are welcome to stay.”

"Actually Finn, that's not the only reason I came down here. I think we work the same shift, so I wanted to ask if you want some company for dinner. Maybe we can take some herbs and spice things up a little bit, cause I know you're just as tired of algae as I am," Constantine chuckled. Even the simple act of saying the word synthesized the taste of pond water in his mouth. "Come on," he urged on, "any friend of Lexi's is a friend of mine. We can go hide in the sweet spot and chill out in zero G. You ever eaten in zero G?"

The offer of dinner surprised him let along with the offer of having dinner in the sweet spot as everyone referred to it. It was not often that people discussed it anymore since the Vrav kept attacking but he found himself smiling despite his stoic nature. “I would really like that Sir and no I can't say I have really.” He wanted to go into thanking the man but he assumed that the man would just brush it away. Finn appreciated it, either way, he had found himself feeling more and more withdrawn as the days went on and it scared him.

"It's just Matt. Drop the sir for a while, that's an order," Constantine parroted what he considered to be the best impression of a serious, officer-like tone even though his normal, easy-going smile never left his face. He motioned towards the door and beckoned Finn to follow. "If there's anything the past month has taught me, Finn, it's that every once in a while, we have to get away from the rank and file - get away from burying ourselves in work and just remember that we're all brothers and sisters out here fighting to survive. And I think we do that best when we help each other, don't you?"

Lieutenant Constantine allowed the rhetorical question to hang in the air as the two men walked together down the corridor. Admittedly, Mattias's area of expertise meant that he noticed the downtrodden body language of his colleague. There was a battle going on within Crewman Jones that he could empathize with. On a small crew like theirs, everyone recognized every single name that they had laid to rest over the past weeks. It never got any easier, but it disproportionately affected some more than others. Such was the callous indifference of life in deep space.

"Oh hey, did you bring any peppers? I've found that spicy and acidic sort of makes the algae more tolerable. My sister would laugh directly in my face if she knew how much hot sauce I was using on a daily basis, it's embarrassing," Matt chortled. He could picture her look of disgust, right down to her crinkled nose as if she was standing right there in from of them. "Hey, you know, you gotta do what you gotta do. A man's gotta eat, right?"

The crewman stayed quiet letting the officer carry on talking. He liked the way his voice sounded and it was almost musical to the man who had barely been around anyone recently. He liked the sound of being brothers and sister once in a while even if the rank and file were what he knew as a military brat. "Lucky the radiation did not get it," Finn said finding himself relaxing as they walked. "No peppers at the moment. They are still growing." He admitted. Everything was still growing best it could.

"I look forward to the day, Finn," Matt nodded. Together, the two of them went through the same rigmarole as always, standing and waiting for their turn to grab a plate of algae from the chow line. This time, however, Matt and Finn grabbed theirs to go. Constantine took an extra moment to refill his water bottle with ice and water before waiting for Finn to finish seasoning his food. "It's not far. Just gotta climb through one junction."

Finn added far to much pepper and salt mixing it all together before he followed the man interested to see where they were heading. The algae was plan and boring without it, it could not be much longer until the replicators were back and they were able to format them to use the algae as something right? It could not be long was all Finn kept thinking.

"Alright, we're just about there. Now, the geniuses back at drydock rounded off some corners and installed a couple of handles in here because they realized people would want to come hang out here. I'm not a boomer, but heck, I still think it's pretty cool," Constantine explained as he opened the hatch into the rectangular space. "Let's sit and eat down here where the gravity still works, otherwise things are gonna be a mess."

Whereas Mattias knew himself well enough to know that the language of his content expressed itself in the form of humming, singing, and physical contact, he understood that not everyone was the same way. He resisted his natural urge to strike up conversation with someone he didn't know very well, and ate in silence with the young man. Matt knew he would speak if and when he was ready.

Finn was relieved to eat his meal in relative silence. It was not that he did not have words to express but he just did not know how to express them all. It was just nice to have company in some comfortable silence. "What do you enjoy most about the ship at the moment?" He wondered thoughtfully.

"Ah, good question," Matt replied as he worked his knife through the chunk of algae and cut it into more managably sized pieces. The metallic clink of the knife against his plate seemed to echo around in the room. "You're gonna think it's cheesy, Finn, but I like how we're starting to cohere as a crew and truly become a family. I think that's changed a lot recently, and for the better. It starts at the top with Commander Leroux. There's no tension over who our leader is anymore, and we need clear, unwavering leadership to succeed. It could've gone either way, you know - sometimes the hardships isolate people, sometimes they brings us together."

The big communications officer took a bite of lightly salted algae before turning to make eye contact with Finn. "What about you? What are you thankful for?"

"There was tension?" Finn wondered oblivious to everything that had gone on between Leroux and Sloan. He just accepted the change in leadership easily, he was a man who followed orders.

"Oh," Constantine was caught by surprise, but then again it made sense that the enlisted crew might not have noticed as many of the details as he had. "Yeah, a little. You see, Mister Sloan served with Captain Morgan on the Valiant before they were assigned here. There's a lot of internal politics and etiquette that must be followed, but to make a long story short, one could say that it would have raised less eyebrows had Captain Morgan chosen him to the be the executive officer over Commander Leroux. It surprised some people, or so I'm told," he explained as he unscrewed the cap to his water bottle and took a drink. "As far as I'm concerned, she got it right. I don't know what it is about her leadership style, but I'd follow Commander Leroux anywhere, but c'mon mate, don't forget I asked you a question," he made a friendly jab.

That pretty much covered everything and made sense to some of the things he heard, Mattias was correct they needed the leadership and Leroux was not so bad. She came down every now and then to hydroponics just to experience some fresh air. "I am thankful for the fact I get to hang out in the hydroponics bay. It saved my life when my roommate and buddies were killed."

"Oh Finn, I'm so sorry," Matt's entire body language changed to a sullen expression, finally understanding the grief that the crewman was living through. The pieces all fit. He had made it his prerogative to attend every wake for every fallen crewmember. "Would you like to talk about it? It must've been Crewman Majdoub, right? I had a brief, but lovely interaction with him in the mess one day. I'm sure he was a good friend."

The crewman shrugged, he was mostly over the need for people to say sorry especially when most people did not know the man properly. "Aye Maj. He was a good man. Did not deserve to have that kind of death even if it was quick." The man murmured his thick northern accent coming out worst than McManus at 3am drunk on the last of his scotch.

Being Ensign McManus's roommate for so long meant that Matt had an easier time than most understanding Finn's accent, but one did not need to listen to know that he had grieved and come to make his own peace with the situation. Constantine admired that about him, and continued to eat his meal in silence, thereby paying his respect to the crewman's memory by not cluttering the air with useless platitudes.

"Well mate, hopefully you don't get motion sick, cause I figure it's about time," Constantine broke the serenity after a long time after having placed his now-empty tray in the corner so it would be out of the way. "So, it's a little bit bizarre at first, but if you think about things in three dimensional space, the very center of this room is equidistant from all of the gravity generators, so it's zero G. But as you get further away from the center, gravity starts taking over again. The trick is," Matt jumped from the floor and slowly drifted up to the center of the room, "to not overshoot cause then you just end up stuck to the ceiling."

"No motion sickness. I passed that course." Finn assured quickly as he finished up the food and put his cutlery down to concentrate. Finn followed the other mans lead and soon found himself floating around in a way that he had not experienced in a long time. "I did end up on the ceiling in training. I will not be doing that again." The hydroponics operator assured.

"Well done, you! You're a natural!" Matt was off aspect by some obtuse angle from the floor below, but he had successfully found the area of zero G right beside Finn. "You're not a boomer are you, Finn?"

"No born on Earth. I grew up in Newcastle. I never knew anyone who had even left earth until I joined Starfleet." Finn admitted thinking on his parents for the first time in a long time. They were both long dead but he did suddenly wonder what they would have made of him so far from Earth.

"Somebody once told me that naps in zero G are incredible. One of these days when things calm down, I'll have to figure out for myself."

"I have heard that too." Maybe he could discover this as well. It would be nice to have a restful sleep instead of fitful. "Maybe we can have what you Americans call a sleep over or maybe slumber party?"

"Now you're thinking! I could bring one of the portable projectors and a couple of wireless speakers in here and we can have a small, reduced gravity movie night with a couple of people," Constantine was warming up to the idea more and more as he thought it over. "If only we had some buttered popcorn. Oh man, Finn, it's crazy the cravings I get from time to time. This must be what it's like to be a pregnant woman."

"Maybe you can use this as a date spot?" The Crewman wondered thinking back to how he had met the pair in the hydroponics bay. It was nice to see people happy even if he himself did not feel it so much. Well, that was until the other man brought up cravings. Finn actually let out a small laugh as he imagined the man with a stomach on him for a moment. "I am pretty sure the majority of the crew have those thoughts I know I do for pease pudding." It was never going to happen but a man could dream. "but can you imagine if we really do become a generational ship?"

Constantine was busy manipulating the law of conservation of angular momentum to do a few tumbles and spins in the reduced gravity, but a slight miscalculation took him out of the sweet spot, causing him to gently float towards the hatch opposite of the one they had entered the room through. In a fluid, cat-like motion, Matt performed a half-flip and landed on his feet for a split second before pushing back off again for the geometric center of the room.

"Generational? I haven't given it much thought, no," Mattias admitted as he floated by and performed a similar half flip against the opposing wall, carefully avoiding their dinner trays stacked neatly on the floor. "I'm not ready to accept that yet, Finn. I want to see another sunrise break over the peaks of the Rocky Mountains. I want to enjoy one more meal on a balcony overlooking the San Francisco Bay - have a bottle of wine in Paris with the woman that I love. And then another."

Matt's voice trailed off as he took a deep breath. "And that's why I still believe we can make it home."

Finn stayed quiet watching the man spin and turn whilst he stayed mostly the right way up just enjoying the feeling of nothing aching as they had no gravity. It would certainly make him feel and sleep better later on as he climbed into the top bunk. He just could not bring himself yet to take the bottom bunk, it was not how he wanted to steal it. "I wish I could have your positivity, Sir." He spat out the rank on autopilot and offered a shrug to the man to apologise as the movement took him upside down. "I think about it often to be fair." The man said thinking that him finding anyone onboard would be impossible but he was accepting of that.

"Think often about about getting home? Who's waiting for you back on Earth, Finn? You're a good looking dude, you've probably got a girl at every port."

"No us being a generational ship." Finn coughed awkwardly and shook his head. “I would if I liked girls.” He mumbled looking everywhere but at the man. Some people were cool with it and some not so cool depending on where they grew up despite the change in major attitudes in the last century.

"Ah, so a man at every port then," Mattias rebutted without so much as blinking an eye. His older brother was gay, and he had been quite close friends with his husband as a teenager growing up. The full implication associated with Jones's departed friends made Constantine realize that pursuing this line of conversation was imprudent at best. His mind drifted to how close he had been to losing Lexi. "Well, if it comes to it," he cleared his throat to change the subject, "I think we've got what it takes to be a generational ship. The challenge will be finding enough fuel and resources to keep this marvel of modern engineering running."

Finn felt the relief in every fibre of his body as the man just simple corrected himself as if it had been his mistake to assume. It was people like him for had supported people as Allies for years, it was humbling. It took guts to say that and Finn found himself admiring the communication chief even more than before for inviting him for dinner. “I like to think so. We have at the very least unlimited water again.” It was a positive thought. The water was not going to run out and the replicators should be able to use algae soon as core material to create other stuff so it would at the very least be better soon. It was the fuel that could be a concern.

"That first shower afterwards was just amazing. And fresh, clean laundry," Constantine broke out into a wide grin. "Sometimes it's the little things, you know? They'll get us through."

"My mother used to say you enjoy the little things before the big things get you," Finn admitted. He had found it strange at the time by now he got it more than anything else the woman had ever said to him. It was true, you enjoyed the things like this so the big things like the Vrav or losing friends did not get you all the time. There was an attempt at balancing.

"Wise words," the communications officer simply nodded, content in the knowledge that he had at least gotten Finn to open up a little. Matt understood the need to grieve and the need to be alone for a time, but he also understood that humans were social creatures and needed some sort of interaction on a regular basis to keep sane. Constantine considered it a victory If he had helped at all, even the tiniest amount. "Well mate, I think I'd better get back to work. There's always something that needs doing. I'll bus our trays on my way out if you want to stay here for a bit."

"Thank you, Sir. I think I will stay here a little longer. Give my regards to Ensign O'Connery when you see her next." Finn quickly said thinking he might indeed stay there for a bit longer. He had nowhere else to go or do for now so it felt right to just enjoy the little things.

"I will, Finn. Take care of yourself, send me a message if you ever need some help or just want somebody to talk to, okay?" Matt floated down and picked up both trays before disappearing through the lower hatch, leaving Jones there by himself.