No Need to Escape

Posted on Thu Nov 12th, 2026 @ 3:31am by Petty Officer 2nd Class Quinn Sullivan & Lieutenant JG Jenna Jade

2,810 words; about a 14 minute read

Mission: Chimera and Deep Space 16
Location: Holosuite Arcade

Quinn entered the station's holosuite arcade and flinched at the assault of light and sound coming from the patrons in the bar area. She'd contacted him regarding a holosuite program Katie had left for her, and he'd agreed to try it out with her. He looked around for Jenna and saw her talking to one of the employees behind a desk, checking them in. He walked over to her and as she turned away from the check-in desk, he smiled at her. "Hello," he said.

"Hi Quinn." Jenna said to him, with a scowl at the employee who was clearly just doing her job, but sighed before she leaned up on her toes to kiss him on the cheek briefly, "Ah was just told that we can't bring any tricorders in with us, but that's gonna make this really hard, Ah think." She shook her head as her hand quested for his. Since he'd declared his intent to date her, she'd begun to show more public displays of affection, but still it was subdued, taking things slowly with him. "Ah'm not even allowed to see the contents of the program before we enter the holosuite, but accordin' to her, it states that we go in without technology or anythin' besides ourselves and our wits."

Quinn took her hand and held it securely. "Which goes against your engineering instincts," he teased, smiling softly.

"Which goes against my curiosity!" Jenna agreed, "Ah don't trust Katie not to play tricks on us!" She objected, then settled a bit, "Ah do trust Katie, though, so.."

"The rules say no technology, we follow the rules," he said. "Let's try and have a good time with this....whatever it is."

Jenna gave the attendant one more glance of distrust, but the look on Quinn's face settled her down, "All right, but why would-?" She cut herself off and shook her head, "You're right, never mind. It'll be fine."

He nodded and squeezed her hand, giving the attendant an apologetic nod. They walked down the narrow hall towards the holosuite doors and stopped at the one on their ticket. Quinn gestured for her to go first and stepped aside.

The room was the definition of cozy. It was a relatively sizable study, with a large desk in the center and a steamer trunk behind it. The walls were lined with bookshelves floor to ceiling, along with a rolling ladder to reach the top, and cabinets of varying shapes and sizes. There were a few small tables in the room, and a soft, leather armchair for reading. On every surface were books, trinkets, souvenirs from various travels, crystal decanters of various spirits, a chess set, globes, sextons, compasses, maps of various lands, and more. Evidence of a life richly lived and a world traveled. There was even a telescope by the window to look beyond the sky. The floor was hardwood, but covered in oriental rugs, and the lighting was low. As the holosuite doors closed, the silence of the room descended like a blanket, the only noise being the crackling of a strong fire in the fireplace.

Quinn thought it looked like perfection.

Jenna had some other thoughts. “This looks like an overstuffed version of my father’s study,” she said as the arch and entry door vanished, covered by a haze of holograms, another set of filled cabinets, drawers and display cases framing the door to the room now in its place. She was still bitter at having her normal emergency kit confiscated by the attendant out front, the multitool and tricorder she carried everywhere she went. Why they’d had to not have them had really annoyed the engineer as she took a couple steps and spun the globe in front of them slowly, watching the continents turn beneath her gaze before looking back over at Quinn, “Why would Katie leave this program for me?” She asked, “Ah dunno what we’re supposed to do here.”

Quinn shrugged and began looking around the room. “Be together. Relax,” he suggested. He looked at the various books on the shelf, some about locations on Earth, some about animals, some about cultures. He stopped in front of a photo of a light-skinned man–the one from the painting above the fireplace–standing, surrounded by a cluster of darker-skinned people who were draped in various layers of fabric with large, fur-covered hats. The photograph appeared to be signed by the people in it with one English name and several indigenous symbols. Gansu, 898 was engraved on a small plaque under the photo.

Jenna gave him a short glare, then sighed as she tried to put herself into the moment. There had been some text with the program, but she’d ignored that when she handed it to the attendant, probably just a description of the place and clearly she should have read it. An old study? What was Katie thinking? This could be a good studying location, but she didn’t want to spend her free time doing THAT!

She picked up an old worn journal from the desk and flipped a couple pages in.

It was four days into the month of August when I had the honor of being inducted into the Mbagwe Tribe in the Sudan. It was an honorary adoption into the tribe, of course, but a necessary gesture, else I wouldn’t have been permitted to enter their ancestral hunting grounds. Nonetheless, it still felt as if I was being accepted into a family, and being treated as one of their own. The women and children kept feeding me nuts and berries, and a drink of fermented goat’s milk was shared among the men and myself. I had, perhaps, imbibed too much, but it was a most pleasing libation. At the conclusion of the feast, I was gifted a wicker shield and a thin spear with a broad head of iron on it. Traditional tribal markings were drawn on my face, to give me the strength of a lion, they said, and the agility of a gazelle…’

Jenna read on, turning two pages before she stopped. “Christ, someone ripped this page out?” She glanced around in disgust, “Why would this be in a holoprogram like that?” She closed the journal and dropped it back where she found it. “You know, screw this. Arch!” she demanded of the computer, but nothing happened. “Computer, exit.” Nothing. “Quinn?” She asked, then turned towards him, “Quinn! Help me get us outta here? The computer ain’t respondin’!”

Quinn looked around the room and up the ceiling where the intercom should be. “Computer, respond,” he said. When there was no indication either way of the computer responding, he looked around the holosuite. “There should be an access panel somewhere,” he said.

She moved towards the bookcase that had covered the door before, pulling several books out from one of the shelves and trying to pry open the back of the case itself where an emergency panel typically would be, but it remained stubbornly closed, “Is there a hammer over there? Somethin’ Ah can break the wood with?”

“That’s walnut,” Quinn said. “You aren’t going to break it easily.” He combed through the possessions on the shelves, and pulled open what drawers he found. There were papers, stationery, more personal effects, maps, and travel supplies, but no hardware. Whoever this room was modeled after, he was an explorer, not a builder.

He looked over a small, broken musical organ on a side table, thinking perhaps they could use a heavy object as a make-do club, but thought the better of it. Antiques were well-built, but they would break before the wall did.

“Nothing yet,” Quinn said. He looked at the wall behind the desk, at the large map on the wall covered in push pins and red string. Scrawled along the bottom of the map in a corner were the words, “Home is a direction, not a place.” He thought it a fitting motto for a man who explored the globe, but not helpful to find out to get back to their own home.

Jenna had abandoned the panel that covered where she should have been able to access the internal panel of the holosuite and joined the search for something to use as a bludgeon. “‘s gotta be somethin’, this is not fun, Ah don’t wanna be trapped.”

Quinn came around to the door where the arch was and looked at it carefully. He tried the handle, finding it locked and immediately spied the keyhole. He stopped as looked closer, seeing the rest of the door’s locks. He assumed they were various deadbolts, but they were four very distinct looking panel entries. He pushed a few buttons experimentally, then looked back around the rest of the room.

“Jenna,” he said, “we need to get through this door,” he said.

“Ah know we do, but we gotta get the arch to form first or override the doors from that internal panel!” She was exasperated. Why couldn’t she just get out of here? Damn Katie and her sense of humor.

“No, I mean, that’s the game. Finding the key and the various codes to this door,” Quinn said.

Jenna spun and stomped over to the door where he was at, examining the keyhole, “We could probably pick the lock, but that wouldn’t help us with the rest of this. How many combinations do you think these have?”

“Too many to guess,” Quinn said. He pulled her back and took her hands. “We could try to solve the puzzle…play the game…” He smiled calmly at her, holding her still as she radiated frustration as if the holodeck were her personal nemesis.

“And kill Katie later for putting us through this.” Jenna grumbled, “Or do… Something. Ah guess we don’t have much of a choice, especially since we can’t just gimmick our way outta here. Either that or we wait the six hours we have the holosuite reserved for.” She gave the room one more glance, “And this place is too borin’ for that.”

“If you say so,” Quinn said.

“Well, Ah have no problems with libraries or anythin’ of the sort, look at the shelves in my quarters after all,” She’d invited him over a couple times to just spend time, but that had been the extent of it, “It’s just this is all about one person’s memories and memoirs! Okay, maybe a few books on places on Earth for reference, but ah couldn’t imagine enjoyin’ spendin’ time here for fun.”

He shrugged and put his arms around her. “I’m not here for the holosuite,” he said, simply.

That had been a surprise move by him and she felt a warmth going up and down her body that had nothing to do with his body pressing up against her. “Oh, Quinn…”she said softly, leaning into him, her arms going around him automatically as she sighed. Then, suddenly, she pushed away from him and her eyes flicked around the room as if something was going to jump out at her. “Then maybe we should solve this mystery and get through it so that we can go do something more enjoyable!”

Quinn nodded and looked around the room. They needed a physical key, and somewhere were written the codes for the door. As his gaze settled on the various maps, books and objects in the room, he realized how many things had numbers on them, and how many options they would have to go through.

Jenna wandered over to the map and began to look at it, noting where the strings went to and from. There didn’t seem to be a pattern to any of them: no one central location, no consistent distances, just… Random to her eyes. Her eyes turned back to the globe, certain that there was something there that was important. It was just too prominent not to be.

Quinn took the other side of the room, again looking through drawers, behind objects and under tables. He finally turned back and saw the journal Jenna had discarded on the desk and picked it up. He sat down in the armchair and crossed his legs, going through the pages, reading carefully.

The engineer turned away from the portrait she’d been examining, again to no avail, then slid herself onto the arm of the chair Quinn was sitting on and smiled down at him. “Ah mean, this was nice of Katie to suggest, but Ah think she didn’t realize that it wasn’t my cup of tea. She put one hand on the back of his neck, rubbing it gently. “Ah don’t think Ah asked you before, but why on Earth did you decide to join Starfleet? From everythin’ Ah’ve seen, Ah wouldn’t have thought that it woulda been your ideal.”

He leaned back into her hand, enjoying the feeling, and put a hand on her knee. “I wanted a place to be useful,” he said, simply. “Starfleet needed good mechanics and pilots. I fit the bill. I went where I was needed, where I’d be useful.”

“Ah’d hardly think that you wouldn’t have been useful back at home, not with as many sisters as you have.” Jenna said softly, “Ah know that you could say it’s bein’ all misogynistic to say that the girls need a guy around, but still. You said you grew up on a farm, right? Or did Ah even ask you about that ever?”

“Farm country, but not on a farm,” he said. “And they have husbands and boyfriends in their lives to squish spiders and move furniture.” He turned a page in the journal. “I love my sisters, but I also enjoy the quiet in the evenings I have in my quarters.”

She looked down at the top of his head as he said that, then quirked a slight smile, “And my presence doesn’t ruin that, on occasion? Ah mean, ever since you and Ah started datin’, Ah’ve been takin’ up a bunch of your evenin’s. Ah’m not always a Chatty Cathy, Ah know, but still… It could be a little less complicated if Ah stayed out of your way, yes?”

“It could,” he admitted. “But then I wouldn’t have the comfort of your presence,” he said, squeezing her knee. “The sound of your voice is worth the break in the quiet.”

Jenna looked down at him with affection, then reached out and plucked the book from his hands and laid it back on a side table before sliding down into his lap on the chair and squirming so that she was kneeling with her knees on either side of his lap, “You say the sweetest things, Sugarcube.” She whispered as she leaned in to give him a kiss.

He held her gently and kissed her back, holding her tight. He put aside his thoughts on the journal, the room, and the game in general, just enjoying having her there with him and in no rush to change the situation. If they ran out of time on the holodeck, so be it.

One of the many things Jenna had found that she liked about Quinn was that he did nothing to rush her, ever. The fact that he was a good kisser was only a positive and while his hands did roam, she didn’t actually have any real problem with that. Her own hands went from around his neck to his chest and back as she relaxed there. Maybe at some point he’d push her a bit further, which would be welcoming, but she wasn’t in any rush herself. It took a while before she finally pushed back from him gently, just looking down at him from above him with a smile.

He looked up at her, a contented smile on his face as well, and put a hand on her cheek. “We could just let the holosuite timer run out right here,” he offered. “I’m in no rush to stop this.”

“Then Ah say let it run out.” Jenna leaned back down to him, “And remind me to get a chair similar to this for one of our quarters… Maybe just a little wider, for better snugglin’”

“Noted,” he said, pulling her back down to his lips and holding her close, the game put aside, but not forgotten. It wasn’t a frenzied make-out session, it wasn’t a clothes-tearing event, but above all, it wasn’t without passion. Each kiss was deep, slow and savored, each caress gentle, firm and delivered to make sure Jenna made every small sound Quinn had grown to love.

 

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