Playing Hooky

Posted on Sat Jun 20th, 2020 @ 10:01am by MERCHANT RANKS (George) 畝を作 小さく られた頭 て1つ

720 words; about a 4 minute read

Mission: The Proving Ground
Location: Deck 8, Second Star Elementary
Timeline: MD 2, 1330

George sat alone in a corner of the classroom, in front of a complicated construction he had built as part of a science project. He hummed softly to himself as he worked. His teacher walked by and paused, watching, but said nothing, and soon moved on. Around the room, children worked in groups of two or three ... except George. He was the only one working solo.

The boy looked up at the sound of laughter from the next table. Two human boys and a Bajoran girl sat there. George couldn't tell much about their project from his angle of sight.

"Look at that. Did you ever see such a mudwarbler nest of construction before?" one of the boys asked his companions. Turning away, loudly enough for George to hear him, he added, "What can you expect from a braid-head?"

The second boy laughed, though the Bajoran girl looked uncomfortable. She gave him a quick glance of sympathy, then turned away and said quietly, "That wasn't very nice."

"You wanna be nice? Wanna play with the cute little boy?" one jeered at her. She didn't answer, nor did she move away from the table where she was helping with their project.

Without saying anything, George looked back at his own work. He considered the structure in front of him. He'd heard one of the scientists talking about fullerenes and looked it up in the database. He wasn't sure what chain mail was, exactly, but he'd looked that up, too, and was trying to construct a model of what he thought he'd understood. Maybe he didn't know anything after all.

He slowly put down the piece in his hand, and looked around. Everyone was busy. The teacher was bending over another child, her back to him. He checked a second time, then got up calmly and walked out the door. He'd already had lunch, so he wouldn't be hungry for a while. One of his parents was sleeping while the other worked, and they wouldn't miss him if he didn't come home on time.

He made his way quickly down the corridor, walking purposefully until the curve took him out of sight, then slowing down. He knew exactly where he was going since this wasn't the first time he'd walked out of class. He couldn't go see Dr. Smith in the middle of the day. The man would immediately know George wasn't where he was supposed to be.

Instead, he hurried down a little-used cross corridor until he came to a quiet bend where there was an entrance to a Jeffries tube. He slid the cover off, climbed inside, and replaced the bit of bulkhead. Then he began to climb toward the backup gravity generator, knowing that even on modern ships with gravity hull plating, he would find a place where the gravity well was almost completely suspended, and he could float. As long as he made no sudden movements, he could float endlessly. He liked the feeling.

Within a short time, he reached his favorite place and let go of the ladder. His body rose slowly, as if the air were water, moving until he wasn't over the tube shaft. Though only nine, he was safety conscious, and if the gravity plating suddenly shifted, he didn't want to fall anywhere - not up nor down nor sideways. He pulled a thick string out of a pocket and anchored himself to a lateral ladder. Then he relaxed and simply floated, closing his eyes.

"Computer," he said softly. "Can you hear me?"

=^= I hear you, =^= the computer answered.

"Soft music, very soft. Something from 23rd century Earth, piano and saxophone," George said.

Soft music came up, slow and dreamy sounding. "Perfect. Now lower the volume still more? To about half that?"

The volume softened until it was just at the edge of George's consciousness. He'd been coming here after school almost every day, perfecting his own meditation plan. He knew that if he could find that place just under consciousness, he could learn something really important about his mind. He wasn't quite sure what it was he wanted to know, but he was positive about how to find out. So far, he hadn't quite made it to a conscious unconsciousness, as he thought of it, but he knew he was close. Maybe today ....

 

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