The Sound of Silence

Posted on Sat Nov 7th, 2026 @ 8:15pm by Lieutenant Commander Bonnie "Bon-Bon" Durnell

3,674 words; about a 18 minute read

Mission: The Haunting of Deck 12
Location: USS Sunfire
Timeline: Current-ish After the Tractor Beam Activation

Bonnie had discovered something profoundly irritating about being ordered to rest. It gave her far too much time to think. Following her conversation with Dean, she had spent the better part of the morning wandering the ship, attempting to find something sufficiently entertaining to distract her from the fact that everyone else was working. The holodeck seemed unappealing, the arboretum was too quiet, and the prospect of returning to her quarters only reminded her of the bathtub incident.

Even the mess hall had lost its charm after her rather 'interesting' conversation with Dean. Her thoughts continued circling that terrible dream, occasionally returning to the expression on his face as he held her beneath the water. She knew Dean would never deliberately hurt her, and while that certainty offered some reassurance, it did little to erase the memory.

Bonnie wandered along the corridor with her hands tucked into the pockets of her civilian trousers, listening to the familiar rhythm of the Sunfire. A starship was never truly silent. Beneath the gentle whisper of the ventilation system lay the subtle vibration of the impulse engines, the distant murmur of power distribution conduits, and the occasional mechanical click of an environmental regulator adjusting its output. Most people ignored those sounds, but Bonnie listened to them the way a musician listened to an orchestra. She could usually identify a malfunctioning circulation pump by the uneven rhythm of its bearings or recognize an overworked plasma relay from the faint harmonic whine just before it failed. Those sounds had become as familiar as her own heartbeat, which made the peculiar vibration she felt beneath her feet all the more concerning.

She stopped beside a junction panel and tilted her head, concentrating as the low vibration deepened, faded, and returned with a faint metallic shudder. Crouching beside the panel, Bonnie pressed her fingertips against the adjoining bulkhead, feeling the subtle oscillations travel through the metal before settling into a steadier rhythm. Perhaps the ship was maneuvering, or perhaps Engineering was adjusting the power distribution network. She considered several explanations, including the possibility that she was simply being ridiculous, before straightening and glancing toward the nearest wall display.

The Sunfire had reached the vicinity of the J-class nebula, whose crimson cloud occupied the majority of the navigational sensor grid. Turbulent gases swirled around a small, indistinct object identified as the USS Nile, an abandoned starship drifting dangerously close to the volatile nebula's outer boundary. Naturally, because the universe in all of its glory apparently believed that Starfleet engineers needed constant opportunities to die creatively. Bonnie leaned closer, examining the limited information available on the public display and discovering that the Sunfire had established a tractor beam to draw the vessel away from danger.

The deck trembled again, prompting Bonnie to narrow her eyes at the display. “Come on, sweetheart,” she whispered to the ship, resting her palm against the bulkhead. “Don't tell me you're having trouble with a simple little towing job.”

The vibration intensified beneath her fingers, and a faint groan traveled through the surrounding metal, accompanied by a subtle fluctuation in the artificial gravity that forced her to brace herself against the wall. She recognized the sensation as the ship struggled against some external force, and her mind immediately began calculating possible causes. Tractor beam resistance, gravitational interference, or perhaps an unexpected mass discrepancy aboard the derelict could explain the strain. If the Nile was caught in a localized gravimetric distortion, the tractor connection might be transmitting additional stress directly into the Sunfire's structural integrity field.

She could help. Bonnie reached instinctively for her communicator but hesitated as Sarah's orders came back to her. Two days off duty, with strict instructions to rest and recover. She stared at the communicator with growing irritation, torn between her desire to investigate the disturbance and the knowledge that she had been explicitly forbidden from working. After a moment's hesitation, she reluctantly lowered her hand, muttering something unflattering about doctor's orders and their inconvenient timing. Engineering had competent officers on duty, and they were perfectly capable of handling a tractor beam problem without her assistance, although she found herself mentally adding several qualifications to that reassurance as she continued down the corridor.

Her pace quickened despite her determination to remain uninvolved, and a few minutes later she found herself approaching one of the smaller observation lounges. The room was empty, its broad windows offering an unobstructed view of the nebula, and the sight beyond the transparent aluminum stopped her just inside the doorway. Deep crimson gases twisted around darker pockets of dust and plasma, while brilliant veins of electrical discharge flickered through the turbulence, briefly illuminating enormous folds of material before fading into shadow. Somewhere within that impossible landscape floated the Nile, connected to the Sunfire by a pale blue ribbon of tractor energy that disappeared into the surrounding red haze.

Bonnie approached the window and studied the distant vessel, attempting to judge the relative movement of the two ships against the nebula's turbulent background. The longer she watched, the more concerned she became, particularly when the enormous crimson cloud appeared to swell across her field of vision. She leaned closer, searching for a fixed reference point among the stars, and felt her stomach tighten as she realized the Sunfire was moving toward the nebula instead of away from it. “That's... unfortunate,” she murmured, glancing toward the room's communications terminal while debating whether the circumstances justified interrupting Engineering.

Before she could make that decision, a faint sound threaded its way through the steady hum of the observation lounge, drawing her attention away from the terminal. Bonnie turned toward the sound, recognizing the gentle, almost absent-minded humming of a woman somewhere behind her, although a quick glance around confirmed that the lounge remained empty. She listened more carefully as the melody surfaced again, its soft notes weaving through the ventilation system with a familiarity that stirred something deep within her memory. Her breath caught as recognition settled over her, bringing with it a sudden warmth and an ache she had carried for most of her life.

Her mother used to hum that particular tune while cooking, usually when she was occupied with something that required both hands. Bonnie remembered the gentle rise and fall of the melody mingling with the clatter of dishes and the smell of something simmering on the stove. There had been a time when she knew every note, but the years had slowly eroded the memory until only fragments remained. She had spent much of her life trying to remember how the melody ended, and now those missing notes were drifting through an empty observation lounge aboard a starship thousands of light-years from home.

“Mum?” Bonnie whispered, the word escaping before she could stop herself. The humming ceased almost immediately, leaving her standing motionless as her heartbeat quickened and the familiar sounds of the ship seemed to recede into the background.

A moment later, a woman's voice answered with a gentle, questioning “Bonnie?” that sent a shiver through her entire body.

Bonnie turned slowly toward the doorway and discovered a woman standing just inside the entrance. For several seconds, she could only stare, struggling to reconcile the figure before her with a memory that had always been cruelly incomplete. There were details of her mother's face she had spent years attempting to preserve: the particular shape of her smile, the way her hair framed her cheeks, and the delicate creases that appeared beside her eyes whenever she laughed. Those features had gradually softened in Bonnie's recollections, becoming indistinct despite her desperate efforts to remember them, yet now every detail appeared painfully clear.

“Mum?” Bonnie repeated, her voice trembling as she searched the woman's face for some indication that she was mistaken.

“Oh, mo mhilis my sweet Bon-Bon,” her mother replied, smiling with a warmth so familiar that Bonnie felt her throat tighten.

Her mother had died at Wolf 359, lost to the Borg alongside thousands of others in a battle that had scarred the Federation and left countless families searching for answers they would never receive. Bonnie knew the history, remembered the casualty reports, and understood with absolute certainty that the woman standing before her could not possibly be real. Yet she was looking at her with such unmistakable affection that the intervening years seemed to collapse, leaving Bonnie momentarily overwhelmed by the desire to believe.

“How...?” she managed, taking a hesitant step forward as her mother extended a hand toward her.

“You've grown so much,” the woman observed, her expression brightening with something resembling pride.

Tears gathered in Bonnie's eyes as she studied the outstretched fingers, remembering how those hands had once brushed her hair, wiped away childhood tears, and guided her through the awkward frustrations of learning to tie her shoes. She wanted desperately to reach out and feel them close around hers, to hear her mother's voice without the distortion of old holo-recordings or the fading uncertainty of childhood memory. The longing was almost unbearable, although something deep within her continued to resist the impossible reunion.

The Sunfire trembled beneath her feet, and a low metallic groan rolled through the lounge, drawing Bonnie's attention momentarily away, toward the observation window. The nebula had grown noticeably larger, its dark crimson folds spreading across the view as the tractor beam continued to stretch toward the derelict vessel. When she looked back, her mother had moved closer and was watching her with an expression of gentle encouragement.

“Come here, milseán sweetheart,” the woman urged, extending her hand a little farther.

Bonnie swallowed against the tightness in her throat, her eyes moving between the woman's face and the inviting gesture. “I can't,” she whispered, struggling to maintain her reservations and composure as the familiar smile softened into concern.

“Why ever not?” her mother asked, tilting her head in precisely the way Bonnie remembered from childhood.

“Because...” Bonnie faltered, forcing herself to acknowledge the terrible contradiction standing before her. “Because you're not real, you're dead.”

For several seconds, her mother simply watched her, allowing the words to linger between them as the distant rumble of the ship filled the silence. Gradually, the warmth faded from her expression, and the affectionate smile disappeared beneath a look of something Bonnie could only interpret as disappointment. “Is that what they told you?” she asked quietly, lowering her outstretched hand.

Bonnie felt a sudden chill creep across her shoulders, raising goose-pimples along her arms despite the comfortable temperature of the lounge. “Mum?” she asked, taking an uncertain step backward as the woman's expression continued to change.

“You... left me there,” her mother replied, the familiar voice acquiring a bitterness Bonnie had never heard before. “You... left me with THEM.”

Bonnie recoiled as though the accusation had struck her physically, her eyes widening with confusion and disbelief. “No, I... I was a child,” she protested, searching the woman's face for some trace of the affection that had greeted her only moments before.

“You could have helped,” her mother insisted, advancing another step and fixing Bonnie with an accusing stare.

“No, I couldn't!” Bonnie exclaimed, shaking her head as her composure began to crumble. “I wasn't even there!”

The lights flickered overhead, and the observation lounge seemed to dissolve around her as the temperature plunged and the familiar hum of the environmental systems gave way to the shriek of emergency alarms. Bonnie staggered backward, nearly losing her balance as the polished deck transformed into a damaged starship corridor filled with thick, acrid smoke. Emergency lighting pulsed through the haze, painting the walls in alternating shades of crimson and shadow while sparks showered from a ruptured conduit. The air reeked of scorched plasma and overheated metal, and somewhere nearby, an alarm shrieked beneath the grinding protest of a collapsing bulkhead.

Her mother stood at the far end of the corridor, illuminated by the intermittent flashes of emergency lighting. Behind her, a Borg drone emerged from the smoke, its mechanical limbs clicking against the deck as it advanced with the deliberate certainty of a machine following its programming. The pale glow of its ocular implant pierced the haze, and Bonnie felt her heart lurch as she recognized the terrible silhouette.

“Mum! Run!” Bonnie shouted, stumbling forward as the drone continued its approach.

Her mother turned toward her with an expression of naked terror, extending an arm as though Bonnie might somehow bridge the distance between them. “Help me!” she screamed, her voice almost swallowed by the surrounding alarms.

Bonnie lunged forward, but the deck buckled beneath her feet, pitching her onto the floor with enough force to send pain shooting through her knees. She scrambled upright and seized the edge of a nearby engineering console, struggling to focus on the flickering display as the corridor shuddered around her. A structural integrity failure had triggered the emergency containment system, and the damaged section was being isolated by a series of descending bulkheads. She recognized the sequence immediately, and despite the chaos surrounding her, her training began assembling possible solutions almost automatically.

If she could reroute emergency power through the secondary distribution grid, she might be able to override the damaged relays and delay the containment sequence long enough for her mother to escape. Her fingers danced across the console, entering commands and bypassing damaged circuits with the frantic precision of someone who had spent an entire career solving problems under impossible circumstances. She knew how to do this, understood the systems involved, and believed she could still prevent the disaster unfolding before her.

The console responded with a sharp warning tone as EMERGENCY SEAL ENGAGED flashed across the display. Bonnie cursed beneath her breath and entered another command, her fingertips slipping against the illuminated controls as the descending bulkhead began narrowing the passage. “Come on, come on!” she pleaded, striking the emergency override while her mother screamed from the other side of the corridor.

The console erupted in a violent electrical discharge, hurling Bonnie backward before she could withdraw her hands. She struck the deck hard, her shoulder colliding with the wall as the bulkhead slammed shut with a thunderous metallic crash. The impact rattled the surrounding structure, sending dust and debris cascading from the overhead panels, while the terrible screams from the other side ended so abruptly that Bonnie felt the silence settle over her like a physical weight.

She stared at the sealed door, her hands trembling as she struggled to understand what had happened. Everything had moved too quickly, and the solution she had been so certain would work had accomplished nothing beyond leaving her bruised and disoriented on the deck. “No...” she whispered, dragging herself toward the bulkhead as a faint tapping began somewhere beyond its reinforced surface.

Bonnie pressed both palms against the cold metal, leaning forward until her forehead nearly touched the door. The tapping continued, slow and deliberate, before her mother's voice emerged from the other side with a calmness that frightened her more than the preceding screams. “You always were blessed with the absolute worst ádh luck, Bon-Bon,” the woman observed, each word cutting through the silence with terrible familiarity.

“Mum, please...” Bonnie begged, searching the sealed bulkhead for some means of opening it as the tapping continued. Her fingers traced the edges of the containment barrier, although she knew the emergency mechanism had already engaged and that her previous attempt to override it had failed.

“You break everything you touch,” her mother continued, the accusation delivered with such certainty that Bonnie squeezed her eyes shut against the sudden sting of tears. “You'll break 'them' too.”

The corridor shuddered, and Bonnie heard someone call her name from somewhere behind her. She turned toward the voice and discovered Dean standing at the far end of the passage, his clothing soaked and water dripping steadily from his hair onto the damaged deck. His face appeared unnaturally pale beneath the emergency lighting, and the expression he wore carried the same terrible smile she remembered from the bathtub.

“Dean?” Bonnie whispered, scrambling backward as he began approaching her, leaving a trail of water that spread across the deck in shallow, glistening pools.

“You should have stayed away,” he replied, his voice carrying through the corridor with an unsettling calmness.

Bonnie shook her head, struggling to retreat farther as the sealed bulkhead pressed against her back. “Please, don't,” she pleaded, glancing between his approaching figure and the door behind which her mother's tapping continued.

Dean stopped beside the bulkhead, his wet clothing clinging to him as water collected around his boots. “You know what happens when people get close to you,” he observed, his smile widening as the emergency lighting dimmed around them.

The tapping behind the door grew louder, developing into a frantic hammering that reverberated through the entire corridor. Bonnie pressed her hands over her ears, attempting to shut out the sound, only to hear the unmistakable laughter of a child somewhere in the darkness. Another voice joined the first, followed by several more, until their high-pitched amusement bounced between the damaged bulkheads and mingled with the relentless pounding behind her.

“Stop it!” Bonnie cried, staggering upright and searching desperately for some avenue of escape. The corridor appeared to stretch away in both directions, its distant ends dissolving into darkness as the laughter continued to swell. Her mother's screams returned from behind the sealed door, accompanied by Dean's cruel laughter and the steady mechanical footsteps of the approaching Borg drone. Bonnie stumbled backward, striking the wall with enough force to jar her shoulder, and screamed for everything to stop.

The observation lounge returned around her with such abruptness that Bonnie nearly collapsed against the leedge beneath the window. Both hands clamped around its smooth surface, her fingers tightening until her knuckles whitened as she struggled to draw air into her aching lungs. The room was empty, its overhead lights glowed steadily, and beyond the transparent aluminum, the enormous blood-red nebula continued churning against the darkness of space. She stared at her reflection in the window, barely recognizing the pale, wide-eyed woman who appeared to have aged several years in the span of a few moments.

Bonnie remained beside the window for some time, allowing her breathing to slow while she tried to reconcile the damaged corridor with the peaceful observation lounge surrounding her. Her hands trembled uncontrollably, and the muscles of her shoulders ached from the effort of maintaining her grip. She had apparently been standing beside the window throughout the entire experience, although she could remember falling against the deck, striking the damaged engineering console, and pressing her palms against the cold surface of the sealed bulkhead with a clarity that defied explanation.

Another hallucination seemed the most reasonable possibility, particularly given her recent exhaustion and the disturbing nightmare she had experienced in the bathtub. What troubled Bonnie most was the certainty that she had been completely awake when the humming began. Sleep deprivation could produce perceptual disturbances, especially when compounded by severe stress, and she knew that the human brain could manufacture remarkably convincing experiences under the wrong circumstances. The nebula's electromagnetic activity might also be interfering with the ship's systems, although she possessed no evidence suggesting a connection between those disturbances and what she had just witnessed.

Her thoughts turned toward the practical tools she normally relied upon when confronted with an unfamiliar problem. A tricorder could establish whether any environmental fluctuations had occurred during the experience, while the ship's internal sensor logs might reveal unusual electromagnetic activity or localized changes in atmospheric composition. She needed reliable data, preferably something recorded by an instrument that had no personal investment in the outcome, because she was beginning to doubt the reliability of her own senses.

Bonnie reached for her communicator, only to hesitate as Sarah's instructions returned to her thoughts. The doctor had ordered her to rest and recover, although the absurdity of attempting to relax after seeing her dead mother and a Borg drone materialize aboard the ship nearly provoked a bitter laugh. “Rest,” she muttered, glancing toward the nebula beyond the window. “Right. Wonderful advice.”

The Sunfire continued moving toward the crimson cloud, its enormous folds of gas and plasma growing steadily larger as the tractor beam remained connected to the distant Nile. Bonnie watched the approaching turbulence with mounting concern, recognizing that whatever had happened inside the observation lounge, the ship itself was experiencing a genuine problem. Her engineering instincts urged her to investigate, although the memory of her mother's accusations continued to intrude upon her thoughts, leaving her uncertain whether the events she had witnessed were symptoms of exhaustion or evidence of something far more troubling.

Bonnie found herself genuinely questioning whether she could trust her own perceptions. She had always believed that even the most complicated problems could be understood through careful observation and logical analysis, provided someone was willing to gather enough information and examine it without prejudice. Now she was struggling to determine which of her observations had actually occurred, and somewhere beneath that uncertainty lingered the memory of her mother's voice insisting that she would eventually destroy everything she cared about.

A tear slipped down Bonnie's cheek, and she wiped it away with the back of her hand before straightening her shoulders and forcing herself to draw several slow, deliberate breaths. “Murphy's Law,” she whispered, remembering the familiar principle that had accompanied so many of her less successful engineering endeavors. “Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong.” She studied the nebula once more, considering the increasingly precarious position of the Sunfire before allowing a faint trace of her usual stubbornness to return.

“Yeah, well...” Bonnie murmured, releasing her grip and turning toward the lounge entrance. “Murphy never said I had to make it easy.” With that, she headed toward the corridor, determined to discover what was happening aboard her ship.

TBC

 

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