Day 09 [2030 hrs.] Mandala

September 01, 2022, 08:49:47 PM

[ Lieutenant Amelya Rez | Personal Quarters | Deck 11 | Vector 02 | USS Theurgy ]
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The quarters of Amelya Rez were a vibrant place. Over the past several weeks she’d felt an innate desire to redecorate, to tear down the old, dreary standard issue grey tones, and replace them with more comforting and vibrant hues. She’d replicated a large white sheet, and hung it from the bulkhead with a trio of large, round magnets, fastening it to the wall to the right of the door to her bedroom itself. In front of the sheet, were several buckets of paint, which had clearly already been delved into, given the strange mandala-type design that was taking shape with each stroke of the brush from the Rez.

“Thea, can you please play some Andorian Blues please? Maybe throw in some of that weird new band I heard on Aldea, the one with the Trill bells. Thanks.” She dropped the blue brush back into the bucket, and instinctively reached for the red, creating a large swirl in the dead center of the mandala, with a sphere of small blue right in the middle. She replaced that brush as well, and stepped back, looking at her work. It was far from complete but she was getting there. The Mandala resembled a galaxy almost, with splatters of multicolored stars thrown in between each arm. Thus far, the spatters and the rough sketch of a pattern beneath was present, but none of the rest had been painted on yet, and by the design, Amelya herself seemed uncertain of how many arms she planned for. So far, based on the sketch on the surface of the sheet, there were four of them.

Her attention at present was not focused on the arms however, but on the strange, flamboyantly colored center. The lapis blue center was cocooned in a ring of Aegean green, a tendril of crimson paint wrapping itself then around the shell of green. The brush strokes were fluid, but at spots…wavy, as if there were a resonating wave traveling across the paint. She reached for another shade of blue, a handsome sky-colored shade, intending to start painting one of the arms. The can of paint was still sealed tight, the black metal denoted only with a single stroke of the color at the top of the tin. She brushed her hands off and moved towards the replicator.

Tapping the screen, she issued her order, “One fan brush, size six and a paint tray for…five-hundred mLs.” Both of them materialized, Amelya looking at and picking them both up quickly before moving back to her workspace. She wasn’t entirely sure what had possessed her to want to paint all of the sudden, but there she found herself, embroiled in a project, her official duties completed for the day. Kneeling down, she brushed her hands against her already stained gym shorts, and started to undo the top of the blue paint tin, unscrewing the lid. Turning her head, she picked up the brush, dipping it first right into the tin. She drew one long brush stroke across the tapestry, connecting the ‘eye’ in the center, to the long arm she’d just brushed onto the fabric. She gave it a nod of approval, and turned to dump some of the paint into the tin. In the reflection of the tin though she saw something.

With a sharp inhale, she stepped back, dropped the paint tin, and looked over her shoulder. In the metal of the paint tray she’d seen a pretty face. The face she hadn’t been able to catch much detail on, but the eyes…a light green-grey, and on the right eye…there was a splotch of brown in the lower quadrant of the iris.

She looked over her shoulder and around the room.

“Thea, am I alone in here?” She brushed her hands off, stepped over the small puddle of paint that had been left on her sheet of plastic under her feet, and went to investigate the rest of her room.

Thea confirmed that she was indeed alone, and from her sweep of the quarters…she was. She stood in the center of the room for a moment, once more investigating the paint tray, but on her second glance at the reflection she saw, it was only herself, strangely distorted by the texture of the metal tray. She grabbed her towel, and soaked up the spilled blue paint, recycling it immediately in the replicator. She scratched her chin and stared for a long moment at the tapestry. In the panicked commotion, she’d kicked over another tin of paint, causing two long streaks to appear through the mandala, in effect, creating a splattering effect of thicker paint, right where she’d intended to paint four arms. Instead, there were four sprays of paint that resembled multicolored tendrils, wrapped around the center which then appeared…smothered. Despite her momentary panic, she wasn’t frightened by the eyes themselves. The eyes seemed…soft almost. They even in a way reminded her of the way her mother would look at her, at her graduation, or when she finally figured out the protein structure of the bacterial capsule that had been causing so many issues. They were caring eyes.

She backed away, letting out a deeply irritated sigh. “Hold music.” The music stopped at once as Amelya moved towards her bathroom. “Lights.” She said, and at once, the room was illuminated. She took a quick glance at herself in the mirror and couldn’t help but laugh at herself. Across her body were flecks and streaks of paint that was practically every which color. She’d made quite the mess of herself. Chortling, she started to strip out of the ruined clothes.

With one blue-stained hand, she tapped the controls on her shower, steaming hot water starting to pour from the faucet at the top of the shower. A sonic shower would have been more practical, but Amelya had always enjoyed a hot shower. Recently though she’d found them to be nothing short of divine. Stepping into the water, she watched as the color washed down her body, and eventually down the drain in a strange looking swirl.

She reached for her canister of shampoo, which had actually been a gift from one of her nurses. Amelya had commented that one of them had smelled nice during a procedure, and had quickly realized it was the shampoo of a human surgical tech that was handing her her instruments. She’d asked what the shampoo was, and by lunchtime that day she had a canister of it set neatly on her desk with a short, but sweet note. Reaching for it, she pressed the pump on it three times, a generous amount pouring into her palm. She rubbed her hands together, the sudsy substance giving off a fragrant scent that resembled a Risan dessert, both fruity and floral, but not enough to be overpowering. She closed her eyes and began rubbing the shampoo in.

As if by instinct, she started humming a tune. It was poppy, and happy. It reminded her of some old earth doo-wop one might have heard in a high-class broadway musical in the twentieth century. She even allowed herself to give a little bit of a dance as she washed the soap out. After a moment, she paused, spitting out a bit of water that had rinsed down her face as she called out, “Thea what am I humming?” The realization had dawned on her halfway through her rinse that she did not in fact, even recognize the song she had been jamming out to in her birthday suit.

“Trill musical circa-“ Thea began to rail off the details and Amelya let her eyes narrow. She had never been to such a musical, and after having Thea play the song as she finished rinsing, she realized she’d never even heard it before.

“Thanks.” Her eyes shot open, staring at the frosted glass of the door to the shower. In the glass she saw yet another reflection. This one was a bit clearer, but still hazy, the details concealed by the thick steam set in the air by the water based shower. This reflection was once again, not Amelya, instead it was a woman, who was mirroring Amelia’s exact moves, even with her lips pursed in an identical hum. Her hair was red, her brows thick, her lips full, and eyes a vivid green, silhouetted by a curtain of beautiful eyebrows.

Amelya again inhaled in shock, and stumbled backwards, the slick floor of the shower causing her to lose her footing and knock down her entire soap rack, bringing the Trill woman to the ground with it.

“What the fu-!” She started to scream, before she was drowned out by the loud clatter of a massive array of beauty products hitting the deck. She pulled herself to her feet, groaning.

“Ow.” She’d whacked her shoulder on the way down, leaving a slightly red mark that she knew full well would grow into a nasty colored bruise come morning. It was nothing a quick subcutaneous regeneration wouldn’t fix, but it still hurt. She snatched the towel from the rack and wrapped herself in it, patting herself dry from head to toe, the grey fabric a stark contrast against her pale skin, marked only by the spots that ran down each side of her body.

What had initially been just happenstance, being frightened by nothing but a trick of the eye, was growing into something much more concerning for the doctor. It was never good when someone started seeing things. The woman she’d seen in the shower had been a different one to the one she’d seen in the paint tray. Each of them had been spotted for only a moment, but that moment was enough for Amelya to know, that the reflection she saw was not of herself. The second woman was happy, her eyes spoke of an alluring confidence, and they were positively transfixed on the naked body of Amelya. There was nothing motherly about them, they were the eyes of a coquettish, and studious gaze. Again though, she did not actually recognize them.

“Thea please confirm, is there anyone else in my quarters?”

“Negative.” The familiar voice rang out, and Amelya shook her head. She moved for her quarters, towards her medical kit and immediately reached for her tricorder, running the probe up and down, not even bothering to get dressed yet. All readings were nominal. There were no changes from her baseline other than a lightly elevated blood pressure, heart rate, and respiratory rate. Given the shock of what she’d seen though, those readings made complete sense. That was a natural response to stress, increased metabolic function. It was basic medicine. Yet…her neurological function was completely normal. Running the probe over her abdomen, she even checked the symbiote which as far as she could tell…was functioning normally, it itself functioning only slightly elevated as well, but they did share many bodily functions so, she thought nothing of it.

She let out a sigh, set the tricorder down, and pulled on her pajamas. They were basic, grey sweatpants with THEURGY embroidered down the leg, and a plain white racer back with built in sports bra. Running slender fingers through her hair, she began to pace. Seeing faces was never a good sign, particularly faces that she didn’t recognize. Her feet carried her back into the bathroom, and her eyes transfixed themselves upon the fogged up mirror.

She could see nothing more than the vague outline of herself in the mirror and she gave a nervous swallow. Would it happen again? Would she see yet another unfamiliar face glaring back at her? She knew at once if she did, she’d be marching herself right for sickbay.

Reaching for the mirror, she ran her palm diagonally across it, revealing herself. She did see herself, but behind her she saw another figure. That one though, she recognized immediately.

It was Edena Rez. She stepped back, thinking she might step back into the woman, but the woman too, simply stepped back in the reflection, before she faded away, dissipating as if in a puff of smoke.

Amelya turned on her heel, and fetched her combadge from her bedside table, pulling a hoodie over herself as she rounded the corner into the living room. What she saw standing, staring at her art though, terrified her to her core. While she had never seen the individual, she somehow knew exactly who it was.

It was a figure of a tall man, with slightly greying hair. He was well built, and his eyes were a bright shade of Aegean green. He ran a finger across his stubble with a subtle scratching sound, and turned his gaze to look right at Amelya.

“Hey kid.” The deep baritone spoke up and her moved to sit on the couch. Even as he sat, he appeared to make an indent in the sofa itself. She could even smell the cologne, and she remembered exactly where to buy it. She stood in silence for a long moment before she realized just what the events had meant. Her joining had not been failed at all. She didn’t understand why it was happening, but it was. She opened her mouth to speak, and only one word escaped.

“Jona.”

-FIN