Dinner Under the Falls

Posted on Tue 25th Sep, 2018 @ 10:54pm by Lieutenant Damion Ildaran & Elizabeth Anderson M.D.
Edited on on Wed 16th Sep, 2020 @ 5:35am

1,342 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: Oblivion
Location: Rock Falls Inn, Tivoli Gardens, Deck 1554
Timeline: MD 2, 1950

Elizabeth sat back in her chair, replete with a good meal. The food had started with Boureka at a food cart and only gotten better from there. She and Damion had chosen a seat on the 2nd floor deck, under Rock Falls. One would have thought the sound of the falls would have drowned any conversation, but there was a sound barrier in place which muffled it to a comfortable level. It also served to keep the guests on the patio from winding up damp after an hour of mist soaked them.

"That was wonderful, Damion. I haven't experimented with food this much since I was first taken out to eat. I really enjoyed it. It's too bad about the dancing, but even with a barrier, the humidity wouldn't be good for instruments," Elizabeth guessed.

Damion nodded. "I remember back home, my friend Ruven had a guitar. He never would play it near the air humidifiers because it would make his strings go out of tune." He gave a happy sigh as he finished the last bite of buttery mashed potatoes. "I'm afraid Jade Lantz might have some competition with this place--even if there is a sad lack of dancing." Damion smiled at Elizabeth and sipped from his tea.

"She might, but there's a lot of room for competition here. If I had to choose one over the other, I'd probably choose Jade's place, because of the dancing and the music. The food is different enough, that I think we can patronize both often," Elizabeth agreed. She had found that she could shunt automatic functions into a dead file, so right at that moment, it didn't occur to her that she might be making unwarranted assumptions about future time spent with Damion. Later, when she examined the things in the file before deleting, she would also examine Damion's reactions to what she said, and she would be reassured that she hadn't gone too far.

"Speaking of music," she said, pushing dishes aside and leaning toward him, arms crossed on the table, "I read something truly interesting today, something that has far-reaching ramifications for holographic entities, or at least it could have. It will undoubtedly cause more discussion over whether or not we have rights as sentient beings, those few of us who are advancing beyond the parameters programmed into us."

Elizabeth paused for a moment, for dramatic effect and then told Damion, "The Aldebaran Music Academy has decided to accept the application of a holographic student for the first time in the school’s history. She composes original music."

"She does?" Damion's eyes widened. "That's bloody amazing!" he said and then thought a moment. "I remember the first time I heard you play the piano, back when we were on the Hermes," he said. "I remember thinking you played the piece very well, but that it sounded a bit stiff. You told me you weren't considered very good, although you could play anything set before you. I wonder if that has changed any? And this student being accepted--I don't know much about music, but I know the Aldebaran's considered one of the best music schools. They wouldn't take a holographic student just to be politically correct or capricious; the jury must have genuinely considered her compositions to have merit--enough to oppose the naysayers. That's impressive, Elizabeth. It tells me the sky's the limit for you all. You can do anything you have the passion in you to do."

Pensively, Anderson nodded. "The passion ... yes, if we develop emotions. I don't know that every holographic personality does. The article says, 'Unusually high levels of activity caused Cecilia to develop a distinct personality and hone her musical talents beyond the original scope of her programming. The program’s original creator noticed this abnormal activity and allowed her program to run continuously so that she could have a degree of autonomy.'" She read the information from the file she'd flagged and shunted into her personal database, briefly reflecting that this ability was something she wouldn't want to give up, even to be more human.

"Basically, like me, like the doctor on Voyager, like a few others, her program was allowed to run. She was allowed to grow. someone noticed the 'abnormal' activity and allowed it to continue. Damion, do you have any idea what that feels like? To be 'allowed' to become more? To need permission to grow into all you can be?" She pulled back from the brink of becoming challenging. It wasn't Damion's fault that holographic entities were treated in certain ways. He'd never been anything but equal in his treatment of her, never talked down to her, never denigrated her for being non-biological.

After a moment, she smiled and took his hand in both of hers, giving it a gentle squeeze. "Sorry, it touches close to my non-existent heart."

Damion clasped Elizabeth's hand back. "You do have a heart. If you didn't, you wouldn't have understood just now that I might feel threatened by your anger, and you wouldn't have been able to feel anger or frustration, in the first place. To answer your question--no. To show solidarity with you, I'd like to be able to say yes, but honesty requires me to say no. Being born biological, I always had the basic components of humanity and never had to be 'allowed' to grow into them. What I did have to fight for was greater freedom and a greater chance for an education than I was born into. And even when I found that freedom, I had to be nudged into using it. I never, ever imagined becoming a Starfleet officer when I left Turkana; that was an inconceivable ambition for the person I was back then. I had to be convinced it was a real possibility for me before I would pursue it.

"I could split hairs, I suppose, over what I have and haven't been allowed to do in my life. It could be argued that I was allowed to sign on with the Fine Investment by its captain and allowed to enter Starfleet Academy by the admissions review board. But even without being allowed those things, I would still have been freer in my self-determination than you were, up to a point."

Anderson nodded in agreement. "Yes, there is some parallel there, and I'm glad for your sake that circumstances pushed you to become more. The difference is being pulled forward, or pulled back. And, truthfully, what is most upsetting is not the pulling back. It's the ... the presumption that the behavior is correct, that a holoperson is not a "real" person." She reflected a moment on that thought, as her thumb gently rubbed the back of his hand.

"Or maybe even worse, that no one thinks a thing about switching off a holographic personality without asking. It's all about the user being finished, so everything is shut down. What if the programming has a question? What if it has found something interesting to explore? It's never considered at all. None of us were until Voyager had a need, and then things changed ... but, it's such a small percentage of us for which they've changed, for all that." She smiled brightly at him. "Still, the number grew by one this week!"

Suddenly, the counselor thought of La Llorona. She ought to give her a call, put her on the track of this musician. She made a note in her personal database to make an effort to reach the person who had contacted her quite some time ago. Then Elizabeth stood up, still hanging on to Damion's hand. "If we can't dance, let's walk. Or maybe head up a deck to Olla Podrida Mall. Maybe there's music and dancing in one of the cantinas there."

"I'd like to just walk, if you don't mind," Damion said, giving Elizabeth a brief smile. "We can dance some other night. Tonight, I just--I just want to be with you in the peace and quiet."

 

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