Capturing the Moment
Posted on 26 Apr 2025 @ 7:11pm by Chief Petty Officer Ibis Xeri & Major Porter Wallace & Brek - Timeless Treasures Art Gallery
Mission:
M4 - Falling Out
Location: OC, Environmental Deck
Timeline: Immediately following Surprises
2384 words - 4.8 OF Standard Post Measure
The evening was nice, just like it had been organized. People milled around and enjoyed the refreshments. Kids played in the grass, making up games with the hoops and sticks and lawn toys someone had thoughtfully included (Ibis hadn’t remembered planning them). The music set the mood of a lovely atmosphere.
Ibis finished talking with the marine, Syimmi, who was curious about weddings. Why, for instance, there was an event before the wedding. Had there been an event prior to this one? Was there an event held following the wedding? Ibis was politely curious in return as to why she hadn’t seen weddings before, although she intuited that, maybe, Syimmi’s people had developed social systems akin to the kingdoms of invertebrate creatures. At Ibis’ question, Syimmi went on to describe the parades the male drones held. They were adept in arts and history, music and poetry, and for the soldiers and workers like Syimmi, such had been curious days when they were given to rest, in appreciation of the queen's consorts. It was the closest Syimmi had experienced to anything like weddings until she’d come to the Federation.
Ibis glanced to the side to catch Wallace’s eyes where he stood in another knot of guests. He seemed still as if he were irritated, or coping… or hurt. She felt herself straining to sense what was eating at him, but only felt the telepathic silence in her head all the stronger.
Instead, a different telepathic voice suddenly filled the space in her mind, triggering something very old, very familiar; Ibis snapped around, her hair swinging in a circle, searching for him.
~The fa-vo-rite chiiiiiild… she’s back from the deeeeead…~ she heard in equal parts snark and love.
Ibis excused herself from the conversation with Syimmi just in time to brace for the impact of a hug, anticipating being lifted off her feet and bracing to be swung around playfully.
“Timo!” She practically cried, in both happiness and discomfort at the rough brotherly hug before she was set back down and given the chance to return it, in spirit if not in kind.
He leaned back from his sister. At first, Ibis could only think about how ten years had changed her brother Timoleon, though (she hated herself for thinking it) not entirely for the better. He was rounder in the face, swollen almost. Those were still his eyes, the ones that could swing from amusement to vengeance and back again. The ones she’d been careful to read, searching his intent against his stated words or his curated thoughts. As kids and then young adults, Ibis had learned how to make herself scarce until the darker moods had passed over. She couldn’t read him now. She had to hope that time had changed him enough…
“Altha! you must really be off your game! It’s not like you to let me get the drop like that!”
“You came,” she managed to say at last, coming out of her surprise.
“Of course I came! You sent for us. Everybody’s on the way. Naturally, I got here first. Everybody else and their family concerns–” Timoleon launched into a mocking tone, “Have to get someone to watch the pets, need a liner that takes children, three connections, blah blah blah.” He waved at the annoying claims. “All that business. I got on the first charter headed this way. It’s not everyday your kid sister returns from being presumed dead.”
“I was presumed dead,” Ibis echoed softly. When she’d first returned, she’d assumed she’d just been listed as missing, but then had found many sympathy messages in her old accounts. A few she had started to read before she closed them off and left it that way. The messages all seemed to maybe belong to someone else. Someone who had never left Korix. Someone who would never read them. “I guess I was, yeah.”
“Yeah. After a few years. No funeral though. Mom wouldn’t have it. Just these boring high society memorial fundraisers every year she insisted on calling ‘Vigils’. Who knew being missing would still make you the center of attention?” He rolled his eyes.
Was he teasing? Of course. It was just Timo, same as she’d always remembered him. It couldn’t have been pleasant for him, thinking he’d lost his sister, and he was just making light out of that difficult place. He couldn’t possibly have resented her for her own disappearance. That would have been absurd. Before Ibis could even figure out what to say he carried on.
“Now look! You’ve got me coming to another event! You’re getting hitched! I thought you were more of the try-not-buy type. I had stopped trying to remember the names of who Mom said you were dating eons ago. Doctors, pilots, scientists, instructors, soldiers, musicians… I lost track. So where’s the unlucky sot you’ve got on the line? I heard he’s human. Mom’s beside herself with–”
“I…” Ibis turned to try and motion for Wallace, but saw he was already closing the distance, having noticed the significant reunion.
“Timo, this is Porter, my fiance.” She said in her ever-small voice. “Porter, my brother, Timoleon. He’s just made it to the station.”
For a moment, Timoleon stood very silent, gauging his brother-in-law-to-be by craning his neck back and looking up, quite a ways. None of the Xeris were all that tall to begin with, but the difference seemed to quiet Timoleon, momentarily, making him gauge what he wanted to say, now.
Ultimately, Timo settled on a jovial, “Welcome to the family!” He beamed a smile and extended an arm to shake.
Wallace’s hand engulfed his future brother-in-law’s. “Thank you,” he replied. He tried on a smile, but it felt lopsided on his lips and quickly slid away. “And thank you for coming out here. It’s not a short journey.”
“You are not wrong! Weeks, it takes to get out here. I hope you’re thinking of moving somewhere not out on the fringes of civilized space!” Timoleon remarked back. “Otherwise I’m gonna rack up a whole lot of lightyears trying to keep up. Consider Betazed, why don’t you?” He let go of Wallace’s hand and flexed his fingers to get some blood flow back. “Then I can just see everybody all in the same week, get it out of the way. Can rent a boat on the gulf and just kick back. Whaddaya say?”
The idea of everyone around him crawling into his head made Wallace grimace, an expression he didn’t bother hiding from Timoleon (who was probably reading him anyway).
Sensing his advantage as the bigger man squirmed inside; Timo grinned like a shark. “Hey! Mom! Dad! Everybody! Bring it in here!” Timolean waved over to Jalaine and Irwin who were also enjoying the party– if ‘enjoying’ could encompass having uncomfortable telepathic deliberations silently while being polite out loud to the strangers congratulating them on their daughter’s wedding announcement.
Responding to the invitation, and crossing the lawn in choppy little steps in order not to lose her strappy designer shoes along the way, Jalaine wrapped Timoleon in an overly tight hug and started a dramatic sob. Timoleon patted his mother’s back in a consoling fashion, the two sharing their thoughts profusely, out of perception of all of the non-telepaths in attendance.
Irwin, meanwhile, stood a pace back from his wife, settling beside Wallace and shaking his head, ever so slightly. He could see very well what was happening here, but there was a delicate balance of peace to maintain between all of his loved ones. “The nature of siblings…” he mused faintly.
Wallace cast a glance back over his shoulder at his dad’s wing. “Yeah,” he agreed audibly, while he echoed his earlier sentiment in his mind: goddamn it. He looked back at the production playing out in front of him. At least he didn’t have to worry about that with Marcus: there was no one for either of them to try and be the ‘favorite’ of, not that they tried that hard anyway. Ironically, it would be easier if there was. “Do they usually do this for a while?”
Still being diplomatic, Irwin only offered up a restrained smile, just as his wife began blotting at her eyes. Timoleon was no doubt leveraging this moment as ‘the good son’, while his baby sister was ‘disappointing’ her mother. Irwin had long ago stopped stating the obvious, learning that such things had to play out in their own way.
“At least someone understands!” Jalaine declared, basking in the sympathies of her youngest son…
Kyrill stood motionless behind his tripod, bewildered. What was supposed to be a joyous occasion had turned sour, leaving him with an overwhelming urge to walk away. The world of adults was too complicated and unmanageable. You expect one thing from them, and they give you the opposite. So, despite Brek’s exasperated gestures, urging him ‘to take a damn picture!’ He chose a different course.
“We should slip away quietly,” he whispered to his grandfather. “It’s all gone pear-shaped.”
“This is a defining moment,” Abrasha whispered back. “The time to step up and prove yourself. Remember: use diffused light, coordinate the clothing, and aim for a pleasing depth of field; we don’t want an intrusive background - or don’t do anything and settle for being a nobody.”
Kyrill scratched the back of his head. The idea of being a nobody didn’t trouble him much - it came naturally. But his grandfather took charge. He moved the tripod and portable light closer to Wallace and Xeri, leaving Kyrill no choice but to follow.
“I... er... think now is the perfect time for a family picture!” Kyrill stammered, his voice uncertain. “If you could all just... maybe group together a bit more—and smile for the camera, please?”
Ibis practically jumped at the invitation to break the awkward moment between her family members. She tried to call out to Olivia and Ikemba where they were tumbling with other children, but was frustrated when she once again couldn't seem to fill her vocal chords. She tried to wave them in, but neither were looking in her direction.
Sensing what she was after and eager to do something apart from stand amid the uncomfortable air that a family of telepaths seemed to generate, Wallace went to gather the kids for the photo. As she watched him in the adjacent field, picking up Ikemba and calling Olivia over– she resisted, of course. It was almost her turn in a game and he was disrupting it. Somethings never changed, no matter what planet or station you were on– Ibis couldn’t help but still think something was troubling him. In years past, when she saw his brow all knotted like that, there would be some explosive reaction on the horizon, the first chance that anyone gave him cause. She tried not to worry. They only had to get through a family portrait, after all.
Irwin, Jalaine, and Timoleon seemed to be pantomiming a conversation they were having in their heads, their bodies emoting something they weren’t sharing with the rest of the class. Not that it was terribly difficult to guess. Jalaine was going through all of her woes and objections, Irwin trying to talk her down from the worst of it, and Timoleon feeding on his mother’s distress in his own pursuit of favor.
Ibis was almost glad she couldn’t hear any of it.
She took a deep breath and felt around at her outfit. Looking to the young photographer, she moved close to get his opinion and whispered. “Is my hair okay?”
The first thought that sprang to Kyrill’s mind was that Ms. Xeri’s hair was what he referred to as ‘mum’s hair’ - plain and unremarkable. In fact you defined this type of style at your peril. So of course he bungled it - again. “Oh, it’s fine. It... suits you fine. The style I mean. Great black hair. Love the colour. Excuse me for half a minute, I need to check the camera...”
He went behind the old Zenit, hoping to ask his grandfather for advice. What setting should he use? F2.8? F5.8? Brek was right, this outdated tech was a joke. Too many decisions to take, too fast. And where was the ‘burst mode,’ anyway? He needed it to avoid capturing any closed eyes when the shutter clicked. But grandad had wandered off... to get himself a drink, a sandwich and a little chat from a group of perfect strangers.
As Wallace returned with Olivia and Ikemba, Ibis’ father directed and motioned everyone into place sorting the couples together and arranging people by height. Irwin beamed as the family was sorted into place.
“ As the patriarch of a large and growing family for so many years, you can imagine I have more than a little experience in family portraiture. It is nice to have a photographer to manage the image itself however. I can just focus on posing. Imagine! When the rest of the brothers and each of their families arrive for the wedding! Mister Kyrill will need a wide lens. You will be the wedding photographer, won’t you?”
“I don’t know that I am, Sir,” Kyrill managed to say. “A big event like that, you had better have a plan B, in case I frame everyone badly, with no smile...” This would be so much more interesting though. He would make them all look like thespians from an old black and white ‘movie’ from those pre-warp days where people gazed at cameras with a reverent fascination.
“Oh please. There’s no date set yet,” Jalaine said, putting on a brave face. “Of course they haven’t arranged this young man or anyone else for that matter.” All Ibis had was a promise for a dress that might not even come in. And a giant rock in a park. None of which had to amount to a wedding, much less a marriage.
The shutter snapped.
