The Past is Always Present

Posted on Thursday 26 November 2020 @ 16:31 by Lieutenant Commander Hayley Godding

Mission: A Whale of a problem (We're going to need a bigger boat)
Location: Hayley's Quarters
Timeline: MD6 2300
1312 words - 2.6 OF Standard Post Measure

Ships Night, always a quiet time.

Alone in her quarters, Hayley was left alone with her feelings on matters. Despite the wise words from the counsellor, Hayley still felt troubled that she was losing Sansa to this Fay character. Was she being somewhat over-sensitive to the situation? After all, it had been several years now since Julie had died, yet the pain was still ever-present and raw. Why was it so much harder to put this behind her than she had hoped? All that she'd done to help recover, yet something as simple as this had set her off...? Well, it wasn't simple at all was it.

There was something to be proud of however, that she hadn't immediately slipped back into her old habits of her more intemperate youth. Substance abuse and one-night-stands was not the solution to this and it proved to her that she'd matured from that time, not to mention her immediate revulsion of the idea of being with anyone except Sansa. Somehow, her experiences aboard the Venture were creeping back into her mind with all that was going on. Since sleep was eluding her, she slipped on a pair of black leggings and a white sports-bra, tied her hair up in a pony-tail, cleared the furniture in her living space to the side and set up an exercise mat. In dim illumination, she began her well practiced and methodical movements of the warm-up exercises from her Judo and Karate routines. The simple movements provided clarity of mind and calming of spirit as she could loose herself into the routines.

Despite this; her mind wandered back to five years ago...

Five Years Ago - USS Venture

"Alright, Godding, Tanner, Phelps - go check out that area over there." Commander Wales instructed.

"Yes Commander." Tanner replied in her melodious voice, as she smiled at Hayley. "Come on Hales, lets go. Oi! Harry, shift your ass!"

"Coming Doctor!" Harry Phelps called and followed carrying a container of scientific equipment.

Their survey of the Fauna planet of Krystal X was proceeding as you'd expect and Phelps was the young science officer who would be nominally doing most of the work in their little team as they surveyed a lagoon together. Hayley was the Security Officer to their little team whilst Dr Juliet 'Julie' Tanner was the team leader as the only ranked Lieutenant on the team. Despite being one of the ship's medical officers, she had an interest in botany particularly in medicinal properties of plant-life.

As Harry moved off into the undergrowth, with instructions to stay within shouting distance, Hayley moved around the small pool in the middle of their search area looking whilst Julie scanned the nearby plants. This kind of thing really didn't interest Hayley all that much, but she was grateful to be spending the time on the planet with her girlfriend. The two had been together for the last nine months and Julie really had been the tonic that the wild-child Hayley had needed to settle down her wild ways. For the first time, she was in a proper relationship of equals and what they had went beyond the purely physical, which was all Hayley had known up until now.

"You know Julie, you're missing out on some quality us time right now..." Hayley said, her hands behind her back as she walked in exaggerated steps around the pool.

"Hales, I got work to do. You know we're not down here for a holiday and the XO would be pissed as hell if we just goofed off..." Julie said, looking over at Hayley.

Hayley looked over at Julie, with her long auburn hair flowing down her back framing her distinguished face, her being crouched helping to accenuate her large chest despite the uniform's attempts at muting it. She pulled a pouty face at Julie who in turn laughed at Hayley. "Alright, but only for a little bit..."

The two women came together and spent time with one another. After a period of time, they became aware that they hadn't heard from Harry for a while, so Hayley reluctantly removed herself from Julie's warm embrace and went off to go look for him. She trampled her way through the undergrowth looking for him on his last heading and found him hard at work putting samples into pots. She was about to chastise him for being so quiet when there was an earsplitting scream from behind them in Julie's voice.

Hayley turned and ran at full pelt back through the plantlife, her phaser in her hand as she burst back out into the lagoon, only to see Julie's hand slip from view into the maw of a massive flower-head that had appeared on the tiny island in the middle of the lagoon. The outline of Julie's body could be seen in the stem of the plant as she writhed and squirmed at her confinement.

"Julie!" Hayley screamed and aimed her phaser at the plant.

"Don't!" Harry said, arriving seconds behind Hayley. "You don't know what that might do!"

"But it's eaten Juliet!" Hayley shouted.

Harry flipped open his tricorder and scanned but it was obvious even in the few seconds they'd been standing there, something had already happened to Dr Tanner. The contoured shape that had been a clearly defined human female had already rounded out considerably and was much less defined. The shapes were merging to become a singular large blob that was progressively getting smaller as it slid further down the stem towards the base of the plant. All Hayley could do was stand there in utter shock as her girlfriend disapeared.

"Harry... we have to save her!" Hayley cried out, tears down her face.

"Hayley... I'm sorry, if it's any comfort, it was exceptionally quick..." He said, closing his tricorder and putting a hand on her shoulder.

"You bastard!" She screamed at the plant and fired her phaser at it. The plant merely aborbed the energy blast but it did the plant no harm. It raised itself up and sent out tendrils towards the two officers.

"Hayley! We need to go! Right now!" Harry said, sternly, taking charge, already on the comm with the XO...

Present Day - USS Merlin

Hayley completed her most recent segment of her regime and collapsed back down on the mat. She hadn't thought about Julie's death in such a long time, something that still haunted her from time to time, the scream, the futility of being unable to do anything. She'd gone into a downward spiral after that, which had taken her quite some time to recover from.

Rising up from the mat, she was determined not to loose Sansa. She was the first person that Hayley had allowed herself to open up to in all this time, a weakness she'd never allowed anyone to venture into in all these years. She'd kept everyone at an arms length when it came to being truly open. Somehow, she'd let her guard down with the red-haired minx and now she was residing in her heart as if she owned the place!

The two situations weren't the same and she hadn't lost Sansa in that sense. Sure, she was sharing a body with Fay, but didn't she say she wasn't in any danger? Hayley was so conflicted about how she felt about what Sansa had done, but in her deep resolve, she knew she couldn't afford to give up. She hated giving up and it was so easy to fall apart like before - but it took considerable resolve to hold herself together - but she would. She would fight to keep Sansa in her life at the cost of whatever it took.

She braced herself to begin the fourty-seventh series of moves, hoping that yet again that martial arts would help sooth her wounded soul.