Hacking through drama, sword in hand

Posted on Fri Aug 17th, 2018 @ 10:00pm by Lieutenant Naryi Avonavi

596 words; about a 3 minute read

Mission: Mission -1 - Prologue Posts
Location: Starfleet Academy, Drama Department
Timeline: 2256.069 1300

Naryi hovered over the blonde lying prostrate on the ground, the tip of her sabre an inch from the blonde's throat.

"Please..." the blonde said in a voice barely above a whisper.

"If you prick me, do I not bleed?" Naryi asked, a dead look in her eyes. "If you poison me, do I not die? And if you wrong me, do I not revenge?"

Naryi and the blonde stared at each other in silence for seconds that seemed to stretch on forever, before Naryi struck out and...

Pushed the rubbery tip of her blade on the blonde's nose, making a meeping sound while she did so. This elicited a giggle from the blonde on the floor, and a dramatic sigh from a young Japanese woman watching the scene.

"First of all," the Japanese woman said, looking down at the electronic clipboard in her hand, "You're supposed to spit before you start quoting Shakespeare."

"I can't spit," Naryi replied, helping the blonde up. "It just runs down my chin like dribble." This made the blonde giggle as she steadied herself on her feet.

"Why do you have Naryi's character quoting Shakespeare anyway, Murasaki?" the blonde asked. "And incomplete Shakespeare at that. Isn't that sort of cliche? The protagonist quoting Shakespeare or Milton or some other major writer?"

"That's sort of my point, Emily," Murasaki answered, making a note on her electronic clipboard. "I'm tapping into an archetype. Who would you have me quote, anyway?"

"We should forgive our enemies, but not before they are hanged," Naryi quoted. "Christian Johann Heinrich Heine. Perish the universe, provided I have my revenge. Savinien Cyrano de Bergerac. Revenge is sweet and not fattening. Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock."

"Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya," a long haired, light olive skinned woman stated as she stepped out of the shadows, waving a sabre identical to the one in Naryi's hand. "You killed my father; prepare to die."

This set both Naryi and Emily to laughing, and elicited another dramatic sigh from Murasaki. "Sophia," she said with a roll of her eyes.

"I'm sorry, I couldn't help myself," Sophia answered with a smile. "Let me get back to working on the props."

"I find it fascinating that the Academy is not only allowing you to write a play for you third year project, Murasaki," Naryi noted, "But that it is not uncommon to approve such an assignment, particularly for individuals who will become communications and linguist specialists."

"I would say that it would be an acceptable project regardless of the discipline in question," Sophia observed.

"Really?" Emily asked. "I mean, no offense, Murasaki, I can see how something like this would allow for cultural and social insights, but Sophia, you're a hard science sort of gal. Outside of the fact that the four of us have been together since our plebe year, I don't see the appeal to you."

"Drama, poetry, art, it all appeals to me because it isn't 'hard science,'" Sophia answered. "I can sit in an ordinary differential equations class and learn how to get exact answers. But the humanities teach us that life is not anywhere close to being exact. It's sloppy and fuzzy and raises all sorts of unanswerable questions."

"If we could put the philosophical discussion aside for a moment and continue blocking this act out?" Murasaki asked. "We could pick up where Naryi tells Emily..."

"...that she killed my father and she should prepare to die?" Naryi asked innocently.

This produced a round of laughter from everyone, even Murasaki, before everyone got back to work.

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