Boardwalk Confessions

Posted on Wed Jun 7th, 2023 @ 5:28am by Lieutenant Calderon Jarsdel & Captain Akiva ben-Avram

3,528 words; about a 18 minute read

Mission: Season 1 Interlude II (E5.5)
Location: Villa 17 | Temtibi Lagoon, Risa
Timeline: ID 5 - middle of the night

Akiva didn't feel much like sleeping. The darkness of night on Risa was quite relative, with seldom a patch of ground not illuminated by the moon that always seemed to be positioned overhead just-so. Rather than go inside their villa, Akiva stepped down on the rocks and let the gentle waves lap at his bare feet. There was so much to think about, and yet he had not felt so light since... he couldn't remember when.

A familiar face stood out on another rock behind him. It belonged to someone who had been stooped further back on the rocks, nearly below the wooden boardwalk and out of any potential sightlines like a true creature of night.

"Hello, Mr. Jarsdel," said Akiva, feeling slightly embarrassed at the display he had made with the man on their last meeting. "It seems I've intruded on you twice in one night. My apologies." As he made to get up and find his own thinking stoop, a thought occurred to him. This man was highly telepathic. "You weren't... eavesdropping by any chance... were you?"

Cal couldn't sleep, and he needed headspace - literally - from the noise of everyone packed in around the villas. So many voices, some quiet, some loud, some pervasive, some constantly murmuring. He could put walls up, box himself out of the conversational mix, but that took effort, and Cal was tired. A good tired, gleaned from time with good people, but low energy nonetheless. He physically winced as his brain warned him of Akiva's imminent arrival, and opened his eyes to pull himself back into social-mode, slow, steady and off-guard.

"Captain," Cal responded, his tone of voice making the singular word both his greeting and acknowledgement. The secondhand rosy sense of shame tickled his mental pathways, but he bit back any unkind words when Akiva apologised. "It's okay," the telepath said, and he meant it sincerely. "Perhaps we call this a fortuitous meeting and consider your concerns while we're here?" He asked rather than suggested, because - yes - he had overheard a little of their private conversation. Not much, but enough not to lie about abstaining.

"I caught a little," conceded Cal. "Can I claim concern for my fellow officers and then clemency for walking away before I heard anything deeply personal?"

Akiva's cheeks reddened at the thought of their intimate conversation and exchange being overheard, but he didn't take offense. "We were having a private conversation out of doors in full view of HaShem and the Universe. I can't fault anyone for having too much perception in their discretion." He grinned almost boyishly. "So... what did you hear?"

Having heard Ari's truth before Akiva's own, Cal buried a smile at those red cheeks despite not feeling any particular dislike of the man before him. Love and infatuation was a tricky beast at the best of times, and when two volatile and complicated women were in your heart's path, it was always going to be a tough challenge to figure out a way to happiness.

"I heard it wasn't one-sided," admitted Cal, openly enough. "And I left you two alone at that point to figure it out." He raised an eyebrow, expression born from curiosity as Akiva's youthful smile told tales on the man's heart. "But if a sounding board would help, I'm here for you too." His own smile was guilt-free, but indulgent. "Or you could just let me fill in the gaps from my own imagination."

This man was a ward of Memory Theta, recently reinstated to his rank and commission with Starfleet after a hefty period of life as a walking crime against humanity. Entire chapters of the Uniform Code of Military Justice dictated that Akiva should not confide in him, either personally or professionally. Yet, here and now, Akiva found himself on shifting sand and in need of interpersonal support. "Protocol be damned," he muttered. "I'm in a bad spot, Mister..." At this point, what was the point of formalities? Akiva used the other man's given name. "Cal." He took a deep breath, let it out slow, and shook his head. What was there to say? Akiva had fallen so far out of sorts that he had nearly forgotten what normal felt like.

Cal didn't have to imagine what was taking Akiva a while to consider, but he did stay out of probing deeper than surface thoughts leaking from the pensive Captain before him. He waited, patiently, for the internal decision to be made, and then offered a wry expression of curious intrigue as he was referred to by his first name. Shortened and all. Familiar. Seemed oddly appropriate given recent events, but still something that surprised the telepath.

"Akiva," Cal returned, both testing the waters and setting a more personal scene conversationally. "How about you tell me what sort of bad spot you're finding yourself in, I agree to keep your confidence, and we go from there?" He asked, voice gently inviting a safe conversational space. "You have two women interested in your affections, I believe?" He nudged gently.

Well, that was less than subtle. Part of Akiva wanted to clam up and call it a night. Another part of him just wanted out. Would talking about the problem help him find a way through it or merely aggravate his feelings and make them seem even more real?

"That's a little reductive," Akiva said, "but we can start there." With the sun down, there wasn't much to scan apart from the mild illumination of the moon and stars that Risian technology amplified across the night sky. Akiva found himself looking back at Cal. "I have history with Laena. Obligations, commitments, promises. She was my first love." Lowering his head, he said, "She hurt me. Deeply. I tried to understand at the time but I just couldn't. So I acted foolishly. Made it so we can never be together under the Law of my people, not without some kind of loophole that I can't find. We may have ruined any chance we have for a future together. I am compelled to try." He took a breath, shifting gears. "I have... call it chemistry with Ari. We started out as colleagues but our mutual respect and trust came through hard-won circumstances. After she left, we stayed in contact through..." Well, not every secret was relevant. "... let's just say we kept in touch. Then she showed up on Deep Space 9 at the same time Laena did. I tried to keep them both at arm's length, but Ari's moral fortitude compelled her directly into the middle of our many conflicts. She has proven herself incredibly loyal above and beyond the call of duty." His admiration for her was nearly palpable. "But we have committed to be familial friends despite our feelings."

Through this exposition, Cal listened in silence, paying particular attention to Akiva's underlying emotions and internal resonance. It was a naked, honest and unforgiven truth, one that the man seemed - if not at peace, then at least resolved to endure. History had a habit of finding that level, the one a soul could take and the limit at which it would break. Love. Pain. Regret. Stubborn retaliation. Acceptance. Or not. Cal heard the sounds others didn't, watched the colours that made up Akiva's psyche, swirl, ebbing and flowing as the explanation continued. He spoke only when Akiva had ceased talking for some moments, and this tone was level, neutrally informative.

"First love is certainly a catalyst for many things," Cal said. "Not always ones we wish to keep hold of. Foolish acts are common in respect and reaction, but I appreciate if your actions denied you the forward path you both perhaps desired, this was a particularly difficult mistake to erase. Why do you continue to try? Is that necessity for action based solely on your pure love and affection for Laena?"

"It's... complicated," Akiva said. "I don't know what to do but I have to try."

"As for Ari and your chemistry there, I think we both understand that this is mutual. It is, of course, entirely up to you what you choose to do with those feelings, that connection. Perhaps you are only meant to be friends?" This was a (probably obvious depending on the other man's current level of perception) soft baiting, a question thrown out there to observe Akiva's reaction and gain more information from such. Cal pushed a little harder. "Perhaps you enjoy the conflict that having both Laena and Ari in the same space at the same time creates, maybe because it rescues you from needing to make a decision as to which love you want to keep?"

The question cut Akiva to the quick. His last piece of advice came from Master-at-Arms Mayhew who told him to determine who and what he couldn't live without, which sounded fair at the time. But it introduced a dilemma enhancement that made Akiva fret over the sacrifice that his choices would require. Obstacles existed in any relationship. The price to overcome them were heavy regarding both Laena and Arianna.

If he stayed with Laena, it might cost him his identity, and perhaps salvation from that was what Ari truly represented to him--if so, that would hardly be fair for either of them. Ari refused to be a rebound, but a rescue would be even worse. In the back of his mind, Akiva confronted the thought that perhaps Laena had been that to him in the first place--rescue from his demons. Was that the reason for the strife that often soured their otherwise storybook romance? Was their foundation a bad one? Regardless of where they started, Akiva and Laena tried to accept one another and themselves for who the individuals they were. They often failed, but the struggle for mutual acceptance couldn't be discounted for those failures.

If Akiva embraced the connection formed with Ari, then it would be forfeiting everything he and Laena had ever shared. Even if it was a doomed relationship, which Akiva was not prepared to believe, even the sunk cost fallacy would demand reconsideration of any decision to end it. He had made promises, and those promises were not meaningless. They were so strong that the fact he set Laena aside meant that he could not simply take her back again. Oaths and bonds had been broken which could not be flippantly fixed. As much as he admired Laena, he could not deny the shame that colored their once passionate relationship. In contrast, Ari never made him feel ashamed of his failures or mistakes. It was when he felt most down on himself that Ari most inspired him. Not once had he ever needed to defend himself with her.

But, no matter how he stacked it, either choice would lead to regret. Maybe Cal had a point.

"While the people of Isra’el were in the desert, they found a man gathering wood on Shabbat. Those who found him gathering wood brought him to Moshe, Aharon and the whole congregation. They kept him in custody, because it had not yet been decided what to do to him. Then HaShem said to Moshe, 'This man must be put to death; the entire community is to stone him to death outside the camp.' So the whole community brought him outside the camp and threw stones at him until he died, as HaShem had ordered Moshe."

Realizing that Cal would possibly have no context whatsoever for his rambling recitation, Akiva blinked himself back to the present moment and explained. "Six days my people labor and on the seventh we are to rest in remembrance of the blessed day on which HaShem rested after creating the universe. That is Shabbat. We've become rather flexible on what that entails exactly, but in ancient tradition it meant total sequestration inside one's home. Anyone caught violating Shabbat, save for life and death emergencies, was to be executed because it broke Berith, the covenant of our people, and every form of that meant exile or death, which in the desert basically meant the same thing." He gave an awkward smile at how it sounded. "I recited one of the only times that law was ever invoked. But the reason it came to mind just now was for a different reason..." Akiva trailed off, realizing he had gone into scholar mode and had led Cal deep into the proverbial weeds where they'd nearly lost themselves. "Refusing to make a choice is a choice in itself. My people were said to wander the desert in the first place out of indecision. The same was said during our diaspora from Earth which led to the founding of Hebron Colony. Ultimately, there is no difference between refusing to rest on Shabbat and refusing to make a hard decision. Both are moral cowardice, and moral cowardice always leads to a shameful end."

Confused for a moment outside the complicated clarity of reading Akiva's surface thoughts and emotions, Cal listened to the spoken words and assumed there was some reason to them. Some lifeline back to a sanity Akiva sought in order to make sense of his apparent and possibly heartfelt love for two women. Two very different women. But Akiva gave answers before Calderon needed to ask for them, answers based it seemed in religion and belief in something that went back further for the man than his feelings for Arianna and Laena. A baseline. A go-to. Security. Sense. Home. He listened silently to Akiva explain the reasoning behind the initial chapter and verse of the spoken script.

"Thank you," Cal stated once Akiva ceased speaking. "For the context, it helps." There was no need to give his own opinion on the wider meaning, Akiva had realised this himself already. There was no need or desire to berate or question that underlying comfy blanket the familiar words and strict regimes conjured. "And yes, I agree. You're caught in an affair of the heart which is very much an impossible choice for you to make because you have a historic and romantic connection with Laena, and a new love interest in Arianna. Both of these things," Cal smiled, his concern and affection for the other man's situation a friendly combination. "Are irresistible. Both are important. Both are wonderful in their moments. And I can't claim to know more about Hebron than you have just told me, but I would not call you a coward. All of us are captivated by our chosen love interests. All of us are held to task internally by choices of the heart. To have one woman who loves you," he continued, "and who you love in return is a gift for certain. To have two? That is far more complicated."

Cal sighed softly. "You are not a coward, though if it helps you to perceive yourself as one, use that tool. Either way, as a mostly neutral observer, I can see that both you and Arianna are caught in a maelstrom. If you had to choose one, or lose them both - would that make the decision any less impossible? If what happened with Laena is so hard to forgive," he was making an assumption here. "Then why can't you walk away? It seems to me that punish yourself, drown yourself in that history over and over again. And moving forward in one direction or the other, or perhaps neither? That action alone will remove your stigma of cowardice and focus your own needs - in the absence of your concerns for both of theirs."

"Heh..." Akiva was mostly listening, teased as he was by his own thoughts. It made Cal's notion hit all the harder. "My needs..." he repeated. That was just it. Hearing it spoken aloud made it unavoidable. There was no distraction or contrary thought behind which to hide from the blaring truth. "I don't know what I need." That's why he was putting so much stress onto his relationships. Without a clear realization of what he needed himself, there was nothing to focus on except for the other people and all the reasons why he could not give them what they wanted. "I suppose I need to figure that out."

Silence. A moment of empathic listening followed by Cal simply processing everything Akiva was laying down verbally before them, then overlaying the subtler nuances projected by mind, stance and undercurrents of emotion. It wasn't a difficult conclusion to make, but it was a hard choice to follow through to one.

"Yes," Cal said, unequivocally. "Figuring out what you need is the key to everything. The only person who you can absolutely have control over, is you. Therefore to resolve this stalemate and put all three of you back to a position of emotional truth and balance, you need to be clear as to what you need. Who you need to be with - one, other or none - and take your time with this. Be sure. Apologise for nothing. Give yourself permission to be utterly selfish." A brief, wry smile. "It took me the longest time to realise that was okay." He hoped Akiva never had the kind of time trapped inside his own head that Cal had endured, even if said time had allowed him to realise a whole bunch of stuff that had been avoided previously.

"Selfishness is not a virtue," Akiva pushed back. "Sacrifice is. But... sacrifices for nothing are in vain. Going through the motions is not made noble simply for the noble intention." Taking a breath and forcing it out his nostrils, Akiva couldn't escape the conclusion to which he kept rounding back again and again. "I am afraid to choose. If I choose wrong, then that which I rejected was cast aside for nothing and that is a crippling thought." He looked at Cal with an unsteady disposition. "I can't choose because I am too afraid of loss--losing what I don't choose and then losing what I do choose." At that admission, he lowered his head. "I really am a coward."

"I disagree," stated Cal, calmly. "To know when to look after yourself first is a necessity for survival. How you can help - sacrifice or endure - for others, if you do not understand yourself and your own mind. Sacrifice of your own self without meaning or clear decision is simply suicide." But that was a matter for discussion and perhaps philosophy, if one considered it too deeply. He listened to Akiva, and could certainly identify with the man's dilemma and issues in making a clear decision. It was impossible for Cal to fix this problem for him, or to attempt to push Akiva's choice too far in either direction - to do so would be to put himself (Cal) in charge of another man's life and love, and that Cal would not do.

"It is an understandable fear," Cal agreed. "You are not a coward, but you - somewhat understandably - overthinking this decision. Lives are at stake, people's lives and not just your own. Your decision affects all three of you and ripples outwards from there in ways you cannot predict. This is a hard choice to make for many reasons, I see that." He paused and canted his head to the side, then straightened again to regard Akiva levelly and with compassion.

"To not make the decision, however," he pointed out. "Is to condemn all three of you to the maelstrom of a far worse fate - endless indecision. If you choose, then everyone can continue on their path, whether that is what they want or not doesn't matter so much as the ability to own said path and to continue down it. Besides," Cal smiled, wryly. "In matters of love and other people's hearts, no decision is forever permanent. Hearts and minds are capable of change. Make your choice, Akiva. Listen to your heart, and allow all three of you to continue your lives."

For a half-alien goy, what Cal was saying made a lot of sense. Akiva gave a solemn nod before replying. "Well, you've given me a lot to think about. Thank you for the talk. And I'm sorry again for my earlier brusqueness."

"You're welcome," Cal returned simply. "I've had a lot of time to think," he pointed out with a subtle sense of humour. "And no problem, no harm done. I appreciate your directness."

He took a moment to consider the world about him then, the freedom he now had and the fortunate position of trust among this interesting mix of souls. Then, with a wry expression, Cal realised he and Akiva had both been taking shelter away from the communal noise. In this case, he thought it best to defer to rank, and conceded the space to the Captain, gracefully.

"I'm going to head back to the huts," Cal said. "Grab something to drink..." He let that sentence trail onwards into the privacy of his own head. And slip into bed with Nandi for some cuddles, see if she wakes up.... "Good night, sir."


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