ten_fwd | Holodeck

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Holodeck - OTA

Each victor is expected to have a talent, something that they now have the freedom to do - and something to talk to the journalists. Annie had picked glass-making. Nothing to do with anything in her previous life, and something it'd take time to learn. Time being something she had all too much of.

She'd wound up actually being good at it. She'd wound up loving it. She'd make things, sell them to the Capitol and to the merchants in District Four. There are better glassmakers in District One, but madness does lend itself to artistic allure, it seems.

She misses it. The running her own tiny business, yes, but mostly the making things. The execution of a craft she's earned burns from. The ability to create.

Finally, she's missed it enough to go to the holodeck and try and create a studio. Not hers, that'd confuse her too much and anyway, this is a chance to have the kind of kilns she never could. But a studio. Fully equipped, nicely lit, manuals for the kilns and furnaces. Space. Space to move. No teacher.

She's not quite up to actually trying to make a cup again, but if anyone walks in, they'll find her either arguing with the computer over technology-levels, working out how this particular equipment works, or inspecting the supplies.

Or, possibly, twirling the poles to get used to the movement again.

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Beverly hadn't expected to find Annie in the holodeck, much less in a recreation of... well, she's not entirely sure what this is. A studio of some kind. It looks interesting, from what little she can tell right now. The point of finding the young woman had been to see how she's doing. Apparently, she's doing better and that's the important thing.

"Am I interrupting?" she asks after a moment or two, her expression warm and easy.

She startles, a little, but all she's holding is a manual for the furnace: the only sign is a tiny flinch, which relaxes at the sight and sound of Beverly.

"Oh," Annie says, then smiles a little. "No. Just readin' up on things before I turn any of 'em on. I know it's not real, but there's procedures."

She likes not blowing things up, as a general principle.

"I...Miss my studio back home. And makin' things. Not sure if I can make things that'll last here, but in theory, I think I can. I just.

Miss it."

Misses all of it, even the heat she has to be so careful of, given Fishery One's tropical climate. Misses creating. Misses being good at something. Misses the risk of it, too, because she's a fishergirl and a Career and there's no bit denying that she likes a bit of risk.

Reasons why Beverly had taken care not to be too threatening or startling. She didn't want to make Annie nervous or upset.

Her smile turns far more curious as she gazes at everything in this little room. It's fascinating to her. She's never seen anything quite like this.

"Is this the glass making you mentioned?" she asks with no small amount of interest. "Do you think you could show me how it works?"

"It is. I-"

She stops, studies Beverly a little. It's not just shyness, or uncertainty after not having made anything for months - and with molten glass, there is a safety concern. But it's also that it's rare for anyone to watch her. The main person is Finnick, although she's not instructing then.

He just likes to watch her work.

"Sure," Annie says. "If, um. Y'don't mind that I'll be a bit rusty. And it'll get pretty warm."

She's not adverse to the idea. It might be nice, showing someone.

"That's all right," Beverly answers. She is nothing if not adaptable, especially after everything she'd been through in Zelien. "The holodeck safety features are on, so we can't be hurt, if that makes you feel better."

She still opts to stand out of the way, off to the side where she will neither distract Annie nor get in Annie's way. Really, she just wants to see how this works. It's fascinating to her.

She crinkles her nose, a little. It's not as if she likes being burned - and there are tiny burns on her hands, her arms, that show that she has been - but the idea of safety mechanism like this makes her mind hurt. How does it work? It just magically stops you from being hurt?

And what would that do to studio-discipline?

Then she shakes her head, a little.

Possibly not a bad idea, given how much she'd be out of practice.

"Okay," she says. "But, uh, still. Be careful. And if I tell you to get out of the way, get out of the way."

Then she tilts her head up to address the computer and, as she takes off her jacket and shoves her braid down the back of her shirt, rattles off some instructions. Once she's finished speaking, the studio's changed: the furnace is on, there's a bucket with soaking newspapers, across a table there are little piles of coloured glass, and Annie has a pair of dark glasses perched on the top of her head.

"A cup, I think," she says. "That's a basic thing. Probably gonna be wonky, though."

Then she glances over at Beverly, and grins a little. Impishly.

"It'll be fun."

Beverly nods seriously. That's what she would ask of anyone in sickbay, so she will absolutely accept that of Annie in her space. "Of course. Just tell me where to stand and I will stay out of your way."

She's really looking forward to this, as evidenced by the genuine smile of interest on her face.

"Okay." Annie smiles back and then takes a deep breath as she pulls her glasses over her eyes. She's said it'd be wonky, and anyway, this is Beverly. It'll be fine. And maybe narrating what she's doing will help her re-remember.

"So, I asked the computer to already melt the glass. I use quartz glass, as it has the iron impurities taken out - otherwise, you'll get glass that is greenish. Which is nice if you want it, but otherwise, pain in the rear."

She picks up her blowpipe - a long, hollow steel tube, and twirls it to familiarize herself with the weight again.

"You can use moulds," Annie adds, "but... this way is more fun. What I need to do is gather molten glass at the end of this." She opens the furnace and there's a blast of heat. "If you can see, to gather the glass, you keep turning the rod. It makes sure the glass is all even. Once I get enough, I move over here, to my table."

Which she goes, very carefully still turning her blowpipe.

"And then I shape the glass by rolling it across the table. Once I start to get the shape I want, I cap it. Which means I blow down the pipe, like this. Then I cap it, see, with my thumb?"

The air bubble she's blown into the tube enters the glass, pushing it out as she stops the air from escaping.

"Whatcha think so far?"

She's not finished yet - not hardly - but still, her grin is bright as she looks over at Beverly. Her movements have been gathering in confidence as she moves. She's never rushing, but more the speed has come back from years of doing this."

Beverly watches each step, careful to stand where she can see, but out of the way of anything Annie is doing. Her expression is one of marked interest as she watches, eagerly taking in everything. When Annie pauses to see how she is liking all of this, Beverly can't help the smile she offers.

"I think it's wonderful," the doctor breathes. "What a great way to make something lovely. It looks calming, too. You probably used this a lot, didn't you?"

As a way to escape the horrors and flashbacks and memories. Beverly knows she uses things like botany and cybernetics like that. Sometimes a healthy escape is really the best thing.

"It's not as calming as it looks," Annie says after a moment's thought. "Not in a soothing sense? I - okay, so, to pause, what I need now is some more glass, and this is where I start to put colour in it, to create a swirl through? So, I'm going to take my glass over here, where I have these shattered pieces? And I roll it over them like this. And now it's back to gather more of the plain glass."

The explanations pause as she does what she narrates, and then blows another air bubble through.

"I guess it's calming in a way of, I need to concentrate on it and I can fall into a headspace where it's just this. It's distracting, you know?"

Another round of colour, then plain glass.

"Now, here's where that pile of soaking paper comes in. I have to shape it." Keeping the pipe turning in one hand, she grabs a pile of wet newspapers in the other, and then rolls the glass over her cupped hand. The paper sizzles, and burns, and she has to get more.

But finally, she's done shaping it, and then she's rolling the glass back along the steel table to finalize.

If there's anything Beverly understands these days, it's using something you know very well as a distraction. She nods emphatically at that. Oh how she knows that feeling well.

"A distraction in the way that some of my botany projects are distractions," she offers gently. Distractions are wonderful when one's mind is working overtime in the wrong ways.

The end result is just as interesting to Beverly as the beginning and she watches with just as much fascination. The glass is so pretty, even when it isn't yet finished, and she wonders what the end will look like.

"It's lovely, Annie. I can see a lot of time and experience in what you just did."

Jadzia isn't sure what she's doing. She's had a lot to get used to, more than a lot, and a distraction of sorts would be oh so welcome. The holodeck sounded like a great idea. Maybe she could program in something familiar, something Klingon or like Deep Space 9 or even Trill. Maybe. Or she could just program in a Klingon program and have fun with that.

She's so lost in thought that she doesn't realize the holodeck she chooses is taken until she walks right on in. "Oh!" Whoops. "I'm sorry. I didn't realize this was taken."

Whatever this girl is doing, though, looks very interesting.

"What are you doing?" Dax can't help asking, sounding curious. Dax always likes learning new things. That's the whole point of the Joining, after all.

Annie had been in the middle of twirling one of the long metal pipes when Jadzia Dax walks in, and her reaction is instinctual: she turns sharply, twisting the pipe out defensively.

She lowers it quickly once she realizes what she's done, eyes a little wide.

"Um."

Annie takes a calming breath and tries again.

"Testin' things out. It's. In glassmaking, sometimes, you gotta spin the pipe. But I haven't done it since I got here. So. Thought I'd see if I could remember before I did anything with molten glass."

Even holographic molten glass.

Being as used to Klingons as she is, Jadzia's only response to the obvious threat is to bring her hands up in what is obviously a defensive movement. If the girl keeps going with that pipe, Jadzia is in the perfect position to parry and redirect the blow. Luckily, that blow never comes.

"Is that what you're doing?" she asks curiously. "I've never seen anything like that before." And for Dax to be unfamiliar with something is always interesting.

Annie takes a moment before replying. Another moment. She didn't attack the woman. Didn't break anything, didn't bruise, didn't hurt, didn't leave herself open to a retaliatory attack. Nothing.

It's fine.

"Yeah," she says. "Well, um. I guess most glass-makin' is in factories, or. Actually, here, it'd be the replicator. So. You don't see how it'd actually be made. But, really, most of the time it'd be more the pipe just being rotated in my hands, rather than twirled."

After dropping her hands to her sides, Jadzia makes no move or comment to indicate that anything happened at all. She's used to Klingons. Fighting is just something that happens.

"We have science and replicators to do it for us," Jadzia agrees. "There are some planets and cultures that still do this sort of thing, but none that I spend a lot of time around. So this is what you do when you have time?"

This involves science, too, she thinks, but doesn't say. This woman is a stranger, after all.

"Yeah," is what Annie actually says. "Had a small business making things, actually. Back in Panem."

(She doesn't say back home.)

"Not sure if anyone here would be much interested, though. Unless I did the really artistic things. Which I do miss anyway."

"I'd be interested," Dax offers with a shrug. "But I like learning about new things. It's part of being what I am."

Joined, she means, but she will answer with "a Trill" if asked. Keeping the secret is still important, as far as she knows.

"I think you should find a way to make them." Doing it on the holodeck might not result in real ones, but Jadzia would certainly be interested in helping her figure out if it's even possible to do on the starship. On Deep Space Nine it might be, if they found a good place and made it fireproof.

"Oh, I didn't mean classes..."

Although, some part of Annie which misses being confident and working with classes and lessons and the Academy stirs. A little.

(Maybe an idea to be planted, grown.)

"I was, um. I did some reading, of these places. And how they work. But, I didn't quite understand it, so I'm not sure if there's a way to say 'this thing, I want you to make for real'. Like turn some of the energy into being a replicator. Or, a way to safe the code to give to an actual replicator."

Jadzia considers that for a few seconds. "The holodeck might be able to do that. But if we can get the computer to give us an exact molecular structure, I can program it into the replicator and there's no reason we can't get it that way."

There's always a chance that it won't work, but if this is important to this woman, Jadzia will certainly try.

There's a wash of different emotions over Annie's face, the first and biggest being disappointment. Intense, at that. This is her craft, so much as she has one, but without a way to make it real-

Except the woman keeps talking, and all she said was 'might not', and that is a little of what Annie said anyway, so she can stop and listen.

And, finally, look thoughtful.

"If there's a way," Annie begins, "I'll. I'd like that. A lot. I could even offer you the first good thing I make, I'm. I've missed it."

Jadzia ponders the idea seriously. "I'll have to see what the protocols are for this starship. I've never lived here until right now, so it's hard to say, but I don't think there are security measures..."

She lapses into thought, considering the idea. Glass shouldn't be a big deal. It's not a weapon and as long as it's kept small...

"I'm not an engineer--" Anymore. "--but I'm a scientist and I know a few tricks. Why don't we try it? You go ahead and make something you'd like to keep and then I'll try the replicator."

Annie smiles at her. Not broadly so, but bright and happy and hopefully enough that her dark sea-green eyes sparkle.

"It's certainly worth a try," she says. She could make things again: she could even sell them, down in the markets on the ship. "It's, um. Gonna take a little bit. I gotta make it, and then once it's in the kiln I guess I run the time forward? So, um. Not sure if you wanted to stick around, or I'll come and find you?"

Jadzia does not mind at all the attempt. At this point, it will give her something to do. "If it works, I'll be sure to show you how to do it again, so you won't have to track me down every time you want to make one of these." That way, Annie could make her own glass things at any time she wants.

"If you don't mind me sitting here, I'll be completely quiet and on hand to try as soon as you're done. That was we won't be wasting time while you track me down." The quicker they get this done, the faster Annie will have something she likes. Of course, if she would rather not have a silent audience, Dax can wait outside. She doesn't mind that.

Annie hesitates for a moment. Her eyes are restless as she thinks, darting around the room and back and forth from Jadiza more than once.

But...

"If you promise to stay out of the way," she says, "I don't mind." She'd hate for the woman to get hurt.

It's a lie, the not minding. She does, but she also minds her constant, constant fear, and maybe teaching other people would be nice in which case they'd have to watch her, and... This could be practice.

"I'm Annie, by the way. Annie Cresta."

Dax notices the restlessness, taking that in and filing the information away. She's careful to keep herself straight and calm; without moving quickly or suddenly, she makes her way to a corner where she is completely out of the way and out of sight enough not to be a distraction.

"I'm Jadzia Dax. I'll be right here," she says, folding her arms behind her back and settling in just to watch.

Lacey has heard about the holodecks, from the orientation she got when she came here. It sounds a bit like what the Gamemakers do with the arenas, which automatically means she can't fully trust it... but at the same time, this seems more... benign. Not like it's meant to trick someone, just... for entertainment. For fun, and not the kind Capitol people mean when they talk about the Games.

She decides she might go to try one out, just to see how they work and maybe feel a little better about it, but she's not familiar enough with the Enterprise or the displays near the holodeck to notice that the one she's walking into is already occupied, at least until she's already past the doors. Then she freezes, immediately, on realizing she's made a mistake.

The setting isn't anything she recognizes, because Lacey knows nothing at all about glass-making, but the young woman with the red hair — she does know her, and maybe that's as much cause as any other for her to be visibly just a bit nervous.

"Annie?" A pause, and then, polite without seeming overly friendly, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to walk in on you."

She takes half a step back, prepared to leave if Annie seems at all uncomfortable with her presence, but... now she's curious, after the initial shock of abruptly walking into the running holoprogram has worn off. Lacey may not know what's going on here, but Annie obviously does.

"Lacey."

Annie, lifting up a large set of pliers, turns around to face the other woman properly. A belated second later, and she lowers the tool, too. Not a threat. Not being overly defensive. No, not her.

"Hi."

Then Annie offers her a smile, small and shy.

"It's alright, I think the occupied sensors on these things are busted anyway. I keep doin' the same thing. Um. I was just messing around, anyway."

She misses her studio, that much is plain: but so is the automatic dismissal of that. It's just a talent for the Capitol, nothing she really loves. Fluff, everyone understands that.

(Except that she never had to devote so much time to it. Never have to get those tiny burn scars over her hands and arms from it.)

Edited 2015-12-12 04:36 (UTC)

All the victors are supposed to settle on a talent of some sort after their victory, something they can show off for the Capitol. Lacey had picked dressmaking, even though her mentor had told her not to pick something so obviously Eight. She couldn't pretend for a second that that was something she didn't love, even though the Capitol cooed over her work not in a genuinely impressed way but after the manner of someone charmed by something quaint and provincial. And Annie's talent had been...

Lacey looks around her, at the studio, the tools, and thinks about it for a moment longer before it comes to her suddenly.

"Glass-making, isn't it?" she says, punctuating the question with a slight arch of her brows. Trying not to seem too interested, although she may or may not actually be succeeding.

If Annie seems defensive, well, Lacey's hardly going to begrudge her that. She's not exactly relaxed, either, though her posture is nonthreatening and her hands are clearly visible at her sides.

"Yes." A short answer, but then Annie softens it with a hesitant smile. "I, um. Missed it. It's harder to get the finished products out here, gotta do tricky things with the computers and replicators, but..."

But it's something. And it's something she's genuinely good at. Her works always sold well, the lure of artistic madness lending a form of prestige. But underneath that, Annie's got a good eye for colour and the surreal, a steady hand to turn glass, to paint it, to keep it even as she twists and pulls and manipulates.

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Holodeck - OTA

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and a million years later here I am

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