simplestgift | Three Bells: [WRITTEN] - New Horizons in Lit Appreciation

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Current Location: The Library, or Cloud 9

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Three Bells: [WRITTEN] - New Horizons in Lit Appreciation

They have everything Shakespeare ever wrote in the library. Everything! It's a fountain of gold. I could spend days here. I'd sleep here if they'd let me. I don't think I've ever been happier. And there's no theatre group here? None? Do people here not realize what they have? What kind of a world is this?

In case anyone asks, I'll be in the library for the rest of my life.

[Or really just the rest of the day. At some point he'll have to come up for air and grab something to eat at the 7th Heaven, where he'll be buried in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. It'll be dark before he goes home, carrying only a single book.]

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What is the Federation, exactly? I don't think I've ever heard it explained.

I haven't? Well.. putting it simply, the Federation is an interstellar republic – uh, that is to say, a whole bunch of governments from other worlds that have bunched together. Starfleet is the Armada.

Other worlds? Like Luceti, or like other planets?

[He knows what a republic is, McCoy. He's also grasped that Luceti isn't merely another planet in his own universe.]

Other planets. I have no idea where Luceti is or what planet it's on, but the Federation would have discovered what's happening here and found its missing officers by now. [ wishful thinking, probably. ] I don't think about it that much. I'm a Goddamn physician, someone else can get headaches over this.

[That earns a sharp exhalation akin to a laugh.] So it's a republic made up of a lot of planets and Starfleet is its navy. I judge by the illegality of its poison that Romulus isn't a part of it. Are these planets like colonies?

Exactly. There are a few races that don't want to associate themselves with the Federation: Romulans and Klingons, to name a few and looking at them, you can guess that stubbornness usually plays a part of whether they’ll join the Federation or not.

[ he shakes his head. ] No, not quite. Starfleet usually needs permission from the planet's government to establish a Federation colony. My daughter is being schooled on a colony on Cerberus when she isn't with her mother.

Races?

[This is where his head might start to hurt. He's found out a LOT of things since coming here, and after a day reading history books, he's already nearing max capacity.]

It's what we call people who don't come from Earth. One of my housemates -- [ he hesitates. ] -- my girlfriend is a Trill. She's humanoid in appearance, except for the spots and cold hands.

So instead of races being other sorts of people...on-on Earth, they're other sorts of people...

I think that's the most simplest way of explaining it.

[He'll have to mull over that one for a bit.] Right. [He orders another glass of whiskey, slightly wide-eyed.]

[ McCoy will just rest his head on the bar. ] One of my crewmates was a Vulcan. Pointy-eared, green-blooded and stiffer than they come.

[Because part of him will always be twelve, Kennedy snorts.]

Right. Er, green-blooded. Pointy ears. Green blood?

Sounds like a demon, doesn't he? Well, that was what I had to deal with on a daily basis back home. [ he might have even scared a few kids when drunk one time. it's a good thing he never got reprimanded for that. ]

Stiff, you say?

Like talking a brick wall.

[Archie is going to stop following that train of thought. Now.]

I've known men like that. Sometimes they learn to relax, sometimes they don't. Or was it his entire race?

It was a package deal, but I still think he had it in for me.

[ he wisely leaves out the vice versa there. ]

[Another noncommittal noise, and Archie takes a big gulp of whiskey.] We'll have to discuss this more later. For now, I just spent a lot of the day catching up on history and I still keep knocking into things with my wings.

[He pauses as something suddenly occurs to him.] When I was up in the tree, could I have just spread the damn things and jumped out?

[ lifting his head from the bar and looking very serious. ]

No. You would have ended up with a broken neck.

Then I couldn't... [he makes a swooping gesture with his hand] ...glide or anything?

As far as I know, you can only levitate with these things. I've never tried myself and I'm not in a hurry to throw myself off something at a great height.

[ he pales at the mere consideration at doing this. ]

[This smile creeps onto his face.]

Not scared of heights, are you?

[ McCoy doesn't answer him. maybe if he ignores this question, it will go away and never be brought up again. ]

[Riiiiiight.]

You are, aren't you?

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