Before It Has a Name

Posted on Mon Jan 5th, 2026 @ 7:11pm by Lieutenant Elsen Rava
Edited on on Mon Jan 19th, 2026 @ 7:01pm

2,813 words; about a 14 minute read

Mission: Episode 1: A New Sheriff in Town
Location: Research Commons & Archives, Mojave Starbase
Timeline: Evening - Three days after arrival at Mojave Starbase

The research commons were never completely silent, but they came close.

Elsen had claimed a corner table tucked between two low shelving units, far enough from the main thoroughfare that people passed by without feeling invited to stop. The light here was softer, deliberately so, and the ambient noise had been tuned down to a murmur that encouraged lingering rather than efficiency. It felt like a place meant for curiosity without an agenda.

She had half a dozen data panes open in front of her, layered loosely rather than neatly. Linguistic notes. Cultural summaries. Scans of carved stone and wood. Old Earth, very old by Federation standards, but young enough that the stories still carried rough edges.

Norse myth had a way of doing that.

Elsen scrolled slowly, pausing on passages that caught her attention more for how they were written than what they claimed to describe. The repetition of names. The way meaning shifted depending on who was telling the story. Gods who weren’t quite gods, heroes who were painfully mortal, endings that were never really endings at all. Ragnarök wasn’t a prophecy so much as an expectation. A cultural acceptance that things broke, and that breaking mattered.

She tapped a note into the margin, then deleted it again, dissatisfied. Some things didn’t need commentary. They just needed to be held alongside everything else and allowed to resonate.

It struck her, not for the first time, how familiar it all felt. Not in a literal sense, but in shape. Civilisations across worlds telling themselves stories to explain forces they couldn’t yet measure, encoding observations into myth because that was what they had. Fire and ice. Giants and storms. The slow, grinding inevitability of change given a name so people could talk about it without flinching.

Elsen leaned back slightly, eyes unfocusing as she considered a runic inscription again, tracing the lines with a fingertip against the table rather than the display. Language survived longer than structures. Stories outlasted stone.

She smiled faintly to herself and scrolled on, perfectly content to follow the thread wherever it happened to lead.

Her attention lingered on Odin longer than she’d expected.

Not the one-eyed god as a figure of power, but as a collector. Of stories. Of names. Of pieces of the world he couldn’t afford to misunderstand. Odin sacrificed for knowledge in ways that were rarely framed as heroic in the modern sense. An eye. Time. Certainty. He wandered, listened, learned languages not meant for him, all in the service of seeing what others missed.

Thor, by contrast, was simpler on the surface. Strength. Action. The one who showed up when things were already broken and needed to be faced head-on. Protector, destroyer, both without apology. The son who acted while the father watched and planned.

Elsen found herself turning that relationship over in her mind, not as myth but as pattern. Observation and action. Knowledge and force. Neither particularly effective on its own. Together, though, they shaped the world those stories came from.

She wondered, briefly, how many cultures had told the same story with different names. How often wisdom and strength had been split into separate figures simply because it was easier to understand them that way. Easier than accepting that one person, one civilisation, might need to hold both at once.

Her fingers hovered over the display, then she closed the file without quite meaning to, letting the thought settle instead. Some stories weren’t meant to be dissected all at once. They unfolded when they were ready.

Elsen shifted in her chair, eyes drifting back to the slow movement of people through the commons, and stayed where she was.

The voice came from nearby, close enough that it hadn’t needed to carry, pitched to sound incidental rather than intrusive.

“Odin gets more interesting the longer you sit with him,” they said. “Most people don’t.”

Elsen looked up this time, her attention shifting fully from the display to the person who’d spoken.

They hadn’t appeared out of nowhere so much as resolved into focus, standing a few steps back from the table as if they’d been there for a while already. Human. No uniform, no obvious insignia. Someone who knew how to exist in quiet places without apologising for it.

“He’s not much of a hero,” the stranger continued, nodding once toward the paused file. “Not in the way people usually want. More… preparation than action.”

Elsen considered that, head tilting slightly. “I don’t think they were meant to be the same thing,” she said. “Odin watches so Thor can act. One gathers the cost, the other pays it.” A faint smile touched her mouth. “Stories like that don’t split roles unless a culture knows you can’t hold them all at once.”

“Thor’s easier,” the stranger replied. “Hammers and storms are straightforward.”

“They’re reassuring,” Elsen agreed. “But they’re not where decisions get made.”

She angled a little in her chair, opening the space rather than closing it. “You sound like someone who’s spent time with the stories,” she said calmly. “Or someone who’s been watching what I’ve been reading.”

It wasn’t an accusation. Just an observation.

The stranger’s smile didn’t fade, but something in it sharpened, as if they’d just realised she was listening more closely than they’d expected.

The stranger studied her for a moment longer, then their gaze drifted past her shoulder, as if the thought had only just occurred to them.

“Funny thing about stories,” they said lightly. “People always think they’re universal until they aren’t.” Their eyes came back to her. “Take the Iconians.”

Elsen didn’t react immediately. She didn’t need to.

“Most people stop at the gateways,” the stranger continued. “Advanced civilisation, mysterious disappearance, cautionary tale about hubris. That’s usually where the interest ends.”

She leaned back slightly in her chair, fingers resting idle against the table. “That’s because the gateways are the loud part,” Elsen said. “The part that survived.”

A pause, then she went on, unhurried. “What gets missed is that Iconian architecture wasn’t just about transport. It was about presence. Fixed points. They built as if they expected to leave and still be felt.” Her brow furrowed faintly. “Which suggests they weren’t wiped out as suddenly as people like to think. More likely… a retreat. Or a deliberate erasure.”

The stranger’s expression shifted, interest sharpening now.

“They planned for absence,” Elsen added. “You don’t do that unless you understand loss very well.”

Silence settled between them, not awkward, just recalibrating.

She glanced up at them again, a faint, knowing smile touching her lips. “You were asking if stories repeat,” she said. “They do. The details change. The patterns don’t.”

She tilted her head slightly. “Your turn. Were you testing me, or were you hoping I’d miss the point?”

The stranger watched her for a second longer, then exhaled softly, as if they’d just confirmed something to themselves.

“All right,” they said. “That answers that.”

They shifted their weight, finally stepping closer to the table, but still not invading her space. “You talk about absence like someone who’s lived with it,” they went on, tone conversational. “Not academically.”

Elsen’s expression didn’t change, but something in her attention sharpened all the same.

“Joreth Rava used to say something similar,” the stranger added, almost casually. “About the Iconians. That they built like they expected to be remembered even if they weren’t there to see it.”

That did it.

Elsen’s gaze lifted fully now, green eyes steady on the Human’s face. There was no visible shock, no flare of defensiveness. Just a quiet, deliberate stillness, the kind that came from recognising the weight of what had been said.

“Joreth’s been dead a long time,” she replied evenly.

The stranger nodded. “Dominion War. Front-line engineering unit. I didn’t know him well.” A pause. “But he talked. A lot. About structures. About how people leave themselves behind in the things they build.”

They met her eyes again, something like respect edging into their expression. “When I saw the name Rava on the arrivals list, I wondered. When I saw what you were reading…” A faint smile. “I figured it was worth confirming.”

Elsen sat with that for a moment before speaking again. When she did, her voice was calm, but there was no mistaking the boundary now.

“You could have just asked,” she said.

The stranger’s smile widened, just a fraction. “I wanted to see how you’d answer first.”

And there it was. The reason they’d been watching. The reason they’d chosen Odin, not Thor.

Elsen held his gaze for a moment longer, then nodded once, slow and thoughtful.

“He did talk,” she said. “But not always the way people remember.”

She shifted slightly in her chair, not away from him, just settling more firmly into herself. “Joreth had a habit of sounding certain when he wasn’t. It made people listen.” A faint smile touched her mouth, more fond than amused. “What he meant, most of the time, was that structures outlast intentions. That once something’s built, it stops belonging entirely to the person who made it.”

Her eyes dropped briefly to the table between them, then lifted again. “He didn’t think people were remembered because of what they left behind. He thought they were remembered because of how others used it.”

There was a pause. Not heavy. Just deliberate.

“And he’s part of me,” Elsen went on calmly. “But he isn’t the part doing the thinking right now.”

She met his gaze again, steady and unchallenging. “I carry his experiences. His mistakes too. That doesn’t mean I speak for him, or that he explains me.” A beat. “Rava is continuity. I’m the present.”

The words weren’t sharp. They didn’t need to be.

“If you’re here because you knew Joreth,” she added, tone softening just a fraction, “then I’m glad his life still mattered to someone. Truly.” A small, sincere nod followed. “But if you’re here because you think he’s the reason I’m interesting…”

She let the sentence trail off, unfinished, and waited to see if he understood what she hadn’t said.

The stranger studied her for a moment, then gave a small shake of his head, as if setting something aside.

“I should be clear about one thing,” he said. “I didn’t come looking for Joreth. Or Kess. Or Rava as a name on a list.” His gaze held hers, steady. “I know better than to confuse continuity with relevance.”

That settled, he continued.

“There’s a site,” he said. “Not a scatter of debris. Not a false positive. Actual structures.” A pause. “Enough of them that no one’s arguing whether they’re intentional.”

He didn’t reach for a display or offer coordinates. Just spoke, as though that alone was enough to establish the reality of it.

“Stone and alloy,” he went on. “Interlocked. Subsurface in places, exposed in others. Whoever built them expected the ground to move.” The corner of his mouth lifted slightly. “And it has.”

Elsen went very still.

“It doesn’t match anything in the comparative databases,” he continued. “Not Alpha Quadrant. Not Gamma. No iconography anyone’s prepared to put a name to.” A faint shrug. “Which means it keeps getting passed along, each department waiting for someone else to decide what it is.”

His eyes returned to her, intent but careful. “They’re old. Older than the current orbital dynamics of the system would suggest. Which makes the fact that they’re still there… interesting.”

A beat passed.

“I’ve seen the scans,” he added quietly. “Enough to know they weren’t built to be found. But they weren’t hidden either.”

He shifted his weight, grounding himself back in the present. “People with your background tend to notice when a place has been shaped rather than simply occupied,” he said. “You ask different questions.” His gaze didn’t waver. “I think the site would answer you. Or at least… react.”

Only then did he add, almost as an afterthought:

“People usually call me Vale.”

He didn’t ask her to go. He didn’t need to.

He wasn’t here because of who she carried.

He was here because of who she was, and because whatever lay waiting in those ruins was going to matter to the first person who truly understood how to listen.

Then she smiled. Not unkindly. Not impressed either.

“That’s a very compelling pitch,” she said, tone dry enough to take the edge off it. “Mysterious ruins, unanswered questions, vague assurances that they’ll ‘react’ to me.” A slight tilt of her head. “You’re only missing the part where I’m supposed to drop everything because a stranger decided to monologue at me in a library.”

She didn’t bristle. She didn’t retreat. She stayed exactly where she was, grounded and unhurried.

“I don’t doubt the site exists,” Elsen went on, more serious now. “And I don’t doubt you’ve seen something worth noticing. But I don’t chase whispers. Not without somewhere concrete to stand.”

Her fingers tapped once, lightly, against the edge of the table. “So if you want me to take this seriously, start there. System. Planet or moon. Something I can actually look up.” A pause. “Preferably something closer than ‘trust me’.”

There was a flicker of amusement in her eyes now, sharper than before. “And for the record, following someone through the research commons and opening with mythology does not automatically make you credible. It just makes you interesting.”

She held his gaze, steady and expectant.

“If this is real,” Elsen said, “you won’t mind saying where it is.”

The stranger regarded her for a long moment, weighing something she couldn’t see. When he finally spoke, it was with the air of someone giving up a coin they’d hoped to keep in their pocket a little longer.

“Velorum Reach,” he said. “Outer edge of the Mojave patrol sphere. KX-917 system.” A brief pause. “Third planet. No name anyone uses anymore. There’s a moon, though. That’s where the structures are. Tidally locked. Thin atmosphere. Enough stability to build, not enough comfort to stay.”

He didn’t elaborate. Didn’t dress it up. Just enough information to make the thing real.

Elsen nodded once, committing it to memory. “All right,” she said. “That’s a place. I can work with places.”

Her gaze stayed on him, sharp now, curious in a more deliberate way. “So,” she added, “what do you get out of this?”

There it was. The part he hadn’t volunteered.

He smiled, faintly, and for the first time it didn’t feel rehearsed. “I get to see what it actually is,” he replied. “Before it becomes something else.”

He took a step back, already disengaging. “People like me deal in thresholds,” he went on lightly. “The moment before something gets a name. Before it’s claimed, classified, simplified.”

Another step, already turning away. “You’re good at standing in those moments without rushing them.”

Elsen watched him go, not calling after him, not stopping him either.

As he disappeared into the quiet flow of the commons, his last words drifted back, almost conversational.

“Look it up,” he said. “If it doesn’t interest you, forget I ever bothered you.”

And then he was gone, leaving behind a set of coordinates, a question he hadn’t answered, and the distinct feeling that whatever waited on that moon had been waiting a very long time already.

Elsen watched the space he’d vacated for a moment longer, half-expecting him to reappear just to prove a point.

He didn’t.

She exhaled softly through her nose, the tension she hadn’t realised she’d been holding easing just a fraction. Her gaze dropped back to the table, to the quiet glow of her data panes, already rearranging themselves in her mind around a new set of coordinates.

“Velorum Reach,” she murmured to herself.

Elsen shook her head, a faint, crooked smile tugging at her lips. “Honestly,” she said under her breath, “I can’t go anywhere without being handed a mystery and told not to name it.”

She gathered her things, already knowing she wouldn’t forget the location, or the way he’d chosen to leave.

“If this turns out to be nothing,” Elsen added quietly, amusement threading through the words, “I’m blaming the gods. Preferably the quiet, one-eyed kind.”

With that, she slipped out of the commons, curiosity firmly in the lead.

 

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