Silence. Blue-green light is flickering through the leaves of various plants. The air is fresh, but warm enough to feel comfortable. The surroundings with its different trees and flowers remind of one of the Great Gardens of Ch'Havran. But we are far away from the homeworlds. And we are not on a planet either: the young romulan female enjoying her rare spare time abord the Romulan cruiser Germania is looking into the star-stripes of warp travel outside the hatches of Germania's bar named 'Grasland'. Moments like this don't occur often in my life, the life of Nimoka Balar T'Ellyn, Senior Decurion in the Service Department of the Germania. In these precious moments of silence, thoughts wander througt past and future, memories of persons and events...
A lot of things happened since a nervous Decurion came aboard the new Prototype vessel about two years ago. Fresh from the academy, I was not used to board routine. And the first days were not routine at all. Shortly after boarding, the Germania was sceduled to do her first test flight after completing all tests in orbit around Ch'Rihan. But then, an emergency call came in from space station NightBird to investigate the events leading to quarantaine of research vessel Thrai in the Eld'arin system ... As we had to hurry, we could not return to docking station around Ch'Rihan when we noticed that our newly assigned commander was not aboard the Germania. Ioánnis tr'Médus as highest ranking officer (in those days he was Centurion Commander and First Officer) took the seat in the middle and was promoted to captain after successfully establishing diplomatic relations with the 'treefungus' intelligent life forms on Eld'arin IV. Ioánnis tr'Médus ... a young and very active officer ... I was very impressed when he welcomed the new officers aboard the first day ... sometimes I dream of him ... are there feelings of love? I often wonder. Sure I adore him, maybe it is more, but he never treated me different from any other officer under his command, male or female.
This attitude did not change over the years, except for a certain feeling of confidence. There have been a lot of reports, data researches and communication links I had to do for him during our standard patrol at the edges of romulan space.
There were some diplomatic missions (as we are one of the most luxurious ships of the imperial fleet, we have been ordered several times to get diplomatic personnel to the conferences in time), cartographic missions and a lot of patrols.
As we have to stay aboard all around the clock and there is some spare time (as it is impossible to do concentrated work for more than 9 hours a day), most of us took a 'special duty'. Today, after correcting the last reports to the homeworld, I left to look after the bar. Yes, Grasland has become a kind of replacement for the surroundings of my family's home. It was my idea to have a lot of plants in the bar, forming small niches where you can talk undisturbed about every theme in the universe. Or have a snack from the bar's replicator ... Just now I am wondering that noone is here. Usually, this is the time when the first crewmembers of dayshift finish their work and start relaxing before having their evening meal in the dining room next door. Well, I think it won't last long... But wait a moment, the stars outside, we don't travel at patrol speed any longer! We seem to have a new assignment ... I am curious what it is this time: rescue mission, research mission or reconnaissance mission? We will see. But now I have to prepare the first snacks to offer at the bar table.