[Petty Officer Kellen Gates - Sickbay, Front Ear Station]



Petty Officer Kellen Gates was upset, and Nurse Ratched wasn't helping. The young man looked gloomy and out of sorts as he stood at a console, tapping uselessly at it. "It is your own fault," the nurse whose real name escaped him declared, before making that 'tsk' noise he was beginning to dislike. "If a member of this department can't remember something as simple as their own credentials, how can we expect them to remember their training?"

The medic tried to ignore the woman's lectures, though it was hard for him to focus. He felt anxious and quite frustrated at himself. He was completely locked out of the system, but that didn't stop him from inputting different passcodes at thirty second intervals. Nurse Ratched was wrong, he reassured himself, this was muscle memory, not learned experience. Kellen Gates thought that perhaps the horrible woman just liked to complain.

"We will have to submit a report to the CMO once this is taken care of," she continued, making a show of pulling out her PADD to begin that very task.

PASSWORD: gooD3V3n1nGmRB0Nd

There came the now too-familiar raspberry noise of rejection. Those had been his credentials for Sierra, he knew. But for the life of him he couldn't recall the new sets he'd received on his first shift in Front Ear's Sickbay. 

"What if we had a medical emergency, Mr. Gates? What would we do than, hmm?"

PASSWORD: S4lmoN0FknOWL3DG3

That was even older; he'd gotten over his obsession with the Salmon of Knowledge at least six months ago. He knew it was futile, but he didn't stop trying obsessively until the engineer arrived. 


"Yes, it is me. Hullo." He pointed upward, somehow referring to the general direction where he thought the Computer existed. "She won't let me in. I appear to have... brain farted." Oh, smooth.

[Petty Officer Kellen Gates - Sickbay]

"Same!" Kellen Gates responded enthusiastically to the Trill's admission that human anatomy never stopped surprising her. The human body was a mystery that one could never solve completely. He could learn just enough each day to keep his interest piqued, but he knew he'd never know everything. That both terrified and excited him. When she explained about the outdated procedures, he nodded, this time getting the meaning behind her words seemingly correct. "I had my commbadge stolen when I arrived a few days ago," he overshared, moving a little closer so he could watch her work for himself, "Broke one of my ribs. Then I delivered a baby in a turbolift."

Goodness, he was telling this young woman a lot. It was relevant though; it had all started with him losing his commbadge.

Then it was all ruined when she tisked at him, just like Nurse Ratched had. His fellow medic had wandered off, lips pursed, tapping a report into a PADD. No doubt she'd declare him utterly useless and recommend immediate transfer to Dr. Baker. He shrugged at Crewman Tisk, not knowing what exactly he'd done to anger the Computer, other than feed her bad codes.

The screen changed quickly under her expertise though, no longer glaring angry red. He looked at her with some uncertainty when she stuck out her tongue. "Is it fixed? That was very quick." She was obviously some kind of genius. "I guess now I can get back to inventory..." He deadpanned.

[Petty Officer Kellen Gates - Sickbay]

Kellen Gates looked at her with some curiosity. He actually found inventory to be relaxing, not at all sad, though all thoughts of arguing the semantics flew from his brain as soon as she asked him out.

His heart stopped. Nobody had asked him to go anywhere with them before. Not during off-shift hours. Sure, he'd been on some dates, most of those with Bnada, the Ops crewman on Sierra, but he'd asked her, and she'd just been using him for his connections to the Commander. He wracked his brain for something to say... anything...

"Your friend sounds very responsible."

Even Gatesy cringed at himself. Then colour flooded his cheeks when she qualified her offer. This wasn't a date, she'd said, but he didn't know if he felt relieved or disappointed. "Okay," he said in a quiet voice, and swallowed a few times. He tried to gather his racing thoughts into something that made sense, all while his Adam's apple bobbed up and down.

"What holoprogram did you have in mind?" He decided to keep things as light and friendly as he could. He began putting his instruments away, but then he paused a moment to ask curiously, earlier discomfort forgotten, "Have you ever heard of James Bond?"

[Petty Officer Kellen Gates - Shared Quarters]

Nothing human.

Something... Trill?

Kaya's instructions echoed in his mind as he stood in his shared quarters in front of a console, speedily swiping through clothing options. "Computer, apply the following filters to selection: Trill. Casual. No pockets." Once he had made his selections from the variety of garment samples the Computer had provided, he replicated his choices and hurried to get cleaned up and dressed. Ten minutes later he was hurrying out the door, not wanting to keep The Lady Tsk waiting.


[Supernova Festival, Holodeck 2]

He was dressed in the ill-advised, mismatched choice of a simple, black vest top, mostly used for "lounging" on Trill he'd believed, and intricate, embroidered maroon-coloured pants that tied at the back. As soon as he stepped into Holodeck 2, he regretted his choices immediately. His eyes widened as he stopped on the threshold, taking in the frenzied scene before him. Trying to adjust to the excited atmosphere, which was palpable, Kellen Gates was taken by surprise and winded, by the head of a young human boy.

After running straight into him, the kid held up a long, sparkling stick, and waved it. Sparks and tiny holopgraphic fireworks shot from it, firing upward and exploding in a shock of brilliant colours and shapes. "SUPEWNOLA!" The kid yelled at him, grinning a gap-toothed smile. Then he pulled back his little foot and loosed it at Kellen's shin. "Too slow! Ha, ha!"

The young medic was left holding his injured leg, staring in disbelief after the small departing figure of the violent kid. "Wha... What!?" It was then that he noticed Kaya, waiting next to the arch. He could feel the blush before he even realised how embarrassed he was. He hoped fervently that he hadn't grossly offended her by his choice of attire.

"Hullo."

He ogled a man, passing by on a pair of tall poles, and wondered if the apparent Supernova tradition of kicking shins and running off should apply to stilt walkers. "This is not what I expected." He'd actually no idea what to expect. He felt a little nervous as he felt the press of the crowd, and tried to calm himself by taking in all of the moving parts to this living beast. The interesting smells, the kites, which he thought looked magnificent, and the voices raised in conversation and exclamation; it was all clambering for his attention.

[Petty Officer Kellen Gates - Supernova Festival, Holodeck 2]

At her approving nod, a relieved breath wooshed from his lungs, and his shoulders lowered a little. "Kant-en-elli tek-ush, Kaya," he repeated the phrase carefully after she'd explained it. He didn't know much about Bolian culture in general, but there was something ringing a bell when she explained the Supernova Festival. At her direction, he glanced upward, noticing for the first time the transparent dome and the too-bright star.

Perhaps she'd been right, perhaps this was a better option than James Bond. Kellen Gates found himself smiling as he processed the idea of so many billions of people waiting for this massive event. "That is a long time to wait for fireworks." A surge of excitement trilled through him when he realised he'd get to see it, too. "Should we find some good seats?" He asked unable to keep the earnest enthusiasm from showing on his face or in his voice. Of course, he'd momentarily forgotten that they were in a program, and they could pause or replay it at any time.

Another twirling holographic firework fizzed passed his ear and he found himself ducking automatically. He grinned ruefully at Kaya, his hand at the back of his neck. "What do Bolians drink?" He asked, thinking that maybe something with a kick could help him calm down and deal with the crowds.

And this not-date.

[Petty Officer Kellen Gates - Supernova Festival, Holodeck 2]

Kellen stared at the huge animal, wondering if it was in pain, carrying so many people. He was about to ask one of them, when Kaya's warning made him refocus. "Okay. Nothing Bolian. Though I've never performed an esophageal transplant..." Another thought occurred to him. "Does that go for Bolian food, too?" He'd never had that. Nor had he ever... "What about... y'know... Um," the hand was at the back of his neck again as he struggled with using a term that wasn't quite so medical. He shook his head then and decided that asking his companion was not appropriate, and that he'd have to sit on his curiosity until he got back to his quarters and accessed the database. "Nevermind!" Kellen Gates' interests were varied but often unusual.

One of those interests was indeed ale. He often favoured the lagers available in the Blue Beta; Second-in-Command-Seamus had good taste when it came to beer. He was pretty sure that anything Klingon was liable to knock him on his arse, but he didn't want to appear even more of an idiot in front of Kaya, so he nodded. "Let's find some Klingon ale, then." He scanned the throng, looking for any sign of Klingon text above their heads. When he spotted the angry-red symbols a short distance away, he pointed for Kaya's benefit, and then lead them toward the festival stand. Once he had a destination chosen, he felt he could move through the crowd much easier and with purpose.

Kaya continued to speak as they approached. His gaze slid toward her, liking her words. "'You and I are made of stardust,'" he quoted, words remembered from a holoprogram he'd loved as a child coming back to him, "'We are the stuff of exploded stars. We are therefore at least one way that the universe knows itself'." He joined the small queue for the Klingon food stand. "I don't know who said it, but I think it means what you said. Take away our tech and our histories and at our cores we are of the same stuff."

When he reached the top of the queue he gave the Klingon manning it a little head bob-bow. "Two ales, please!" The Klingon threw his head back and laughed at the human, but moved to scoop some suspect-looking brew from a barrel into cups.

[Petty Officer Kellen Gates - Supernova Festival, Holodeck 2]

The large stein of ale looked heavy, but Kellen found he could hold it one-handed with ease. Relieved that Kaya Som had ignored his weird, awkward lapse, he followed and found himself happy to continue their unexpectedly philosophical exchange. "Plenty do," he confirmed loudly, answering her question about funeral rites and practices. "Some cultures will burn their dead, others will bury them beneath the soil in what is called a graveyard."

They were indeed approaching music, but to Kellen Gates' often times indifferent ear, it sounded more like buzzing. He squinted at a quartet of Bolians, who were standing in a semi-circle, each with a small, cylindrical contraption in their mouths. The sound it produced reminded him of an Earth kazoo, yet it looked more like a recorder with far too many holes. He tried not to stare for too long.

"Vikings used to put their dead in boats, and would either set them alight and let them sail away, or shoot the boat with a flaming arrow before it got too far." As a medical professional, Gatesy could see the neat necessity of burning bodies, but the Viking funeral was both practical, and epicly dramatic. "What do you do on Trill?" He asked in return, finding himself suddenly extremely curious and forgetting the strange Bolian band for a moment. All around them people milled about, heading mostly in the same direction, though a few had paused to dance.