Humanities for Science Majors
Humanities for Science Majors
Summary: Kai, Roubani, and Nine make poetry out of science geekery. (Short log)
Date: MD050
Related Logs: None.
Players:
Kai..Roubani..Nine..

Kharon - Library

Kai has shunned the digital disc library of books and periodicals, possibly due to the quite adamant caveat of 'no pornography'. Or, possibly just because he's an old-fashioned man and likes his reading material on paper. In either case, he's settled at a cozy little table tucked in between a bookcase and a bulkhead, flipping through something large and textbook-looking.

And all is quiet on the library front. That is, until someone on the other side of the bookshelf on Kai's left starts trying to dig out a particularly tight-wedged tome from between the others. The line of books seems to wriggle back and forth like a catepillar until suddenly the tension gives. Four of them come spilling off the shelf, leaving only standing - and Roubani on the other side, blinking at the mishap. "Drat."

No footsteps announce the arrival of the snipe. Even in her heavy workboots the habitual pattern of her footfalls keeps her from making any noise, such that when the snipe drifts from the hatch to behind a bookcase, visible only for a brief moment, someone could easily doubt his eyes. Around that bookshelf, in silence, then, "You okay?" she asks Roubani, her voice little more than a whisper, but from somewhat closeby, coming out of the woodwork in her usual less than overt manner.

Well, at least it's better than the 'frak' that would likely have come out of Kai's mouth. He's in the process of flipping a page when he hears those books go tumbling, and is seated in such a way that he can simply lean back a few degrees.. and spot the Ensign standing there awkwardly. And then Nine, like she just oozed out of a crack in the deck plating. He raises a brow slightly, pauses, then returns to his book with a twinge of bemusement.

"Hmm?" Roubani blinks and looks around. "Oh, it's just books. Where did they…?" He gives the one in his hand a slight look and puts it down on the shelf, carefully. He sticks his hands through the now-empty shelf, gently hooking his fingers on the edge and pulling his head through, trying to spy where the missing four fell - and finding himself right about face to face with Kai. "Er. Hi, sir."

Nine crouches down, meanwhile, knowing precisely where the books she wants are living, down near the floor by Roubani's feet, two thick volumes of engineering templates. That out of the way, a narrow arm snakes through the gap to pick up one, then another of the books tumbled to the floor on the other side of the bookshelves, drawing thrm through the gap one at a time and stacking them on top of the two books resting on her arm and against her leg. She's almost got the third by the time she answers, "They're down here. I meant, how does your head feel, sir?"

"Try not to get your head stuck in there," Karim points out, blue eyes lifting a fraction so he can watch the Ensign-in-bookcase from under his eyebrows. "Because if I have to get the petty officer over there to cut you out, I will name you something you'd wish I hadn't." His tongue tucks against the inside of his cheek, which is moderately successful at hiding his smile. "As it is, I'm considering Butterfingers." Oh, the hell of being a pilot without a callsign.

"Did you know that a cat can get the rest of its body through anywhere its head can fit?" Roubani answers Kai's jest, with a light sniff. "I was just conducting some research." He deftly pulls his head back through the hole, putting his treasured book back on the shelf. It's about then he realises Nine's down by his feet. "My head?" He asks, confused. "It's fine, thank you."

Nine keeps by the floor, though she hands the books up one at a time to Roubani, that he might put them away where they belong. "That's… good," she replies, realizing that that's about as far as that discussion goes. "Cats are squeezy creatures like that, I guess." Squeezy. That's a technical term.

"No," Kai murmurs, definitely smiling now as he returns to his book. "I didn't." He's got some kind of dry and dusty text on cell metabolism and protein synthesis cracked open in front of him, which he's ostensibly reading while the pair talk.

"I suppose they are," Roubani answers Nine. His tone has that politely agreeing quality of someone who's probably never had a cat. "They're also quite good for illustrating quantum indeterminacy." He takes one of the books from her, starting to quote with rhyming lilt, "Now, you'd say the cat either lives or it don't / But quantum mechanics is stubborn and won't. / Statistically speaking, the cat (goes the joke)/ Is half a cat breathing and half a cat croaked." The book's slid back on the shelf. "Shine light on electrons - you'll cause them to swerve. / The act of observing disturbs the observed— / Which ruins your test. But then if there's no testing / To see if a particle's moving or resting / Why try to conjecture? Pure useless endeavor. / We know probability—certainty, never.'/ The effect of this notion? I very much fear/ 'Twill make doubtful all things that were formerly clear." Geek poetry. He sounds quite happy.

Nine's face parts with a smile of wonder as she listens to the poem about that famous cat and/or ex-cat. "Of course. Cats wouldn't have a problem observing electrons," she adds, a joke underlining her tone, "They can see in the dark. So at least the cat gets to know whether it's alive or not. Which… is more than can be said for some people, I guess." She looks aside, then stands with her two large books.

Kai might just have stopped reading at some point, and started listening to that oddly lilting bit of verse from Roubani. "You're a regular poet, Ensign," he murmurs at the end of it, eyes twinkling with a rare mirth— and, thankfully, currently masked beneath lashes held at half mast.

"Not really, sir," Roubani says with well-ingrained modesty. Though he smiles. "I'm not so sure about electrons, Petty Officer. But protons? Positive." A slight smirk. He notices one final book on the floor, lying near Kai's table, and starts around the edge of the bookshelf to scoop it up.

Nine tries to hold in a laugh. It's not really appropriate for enlisted to laugh at officers' jokes, and even though she -thinks- she's not likely to run into that other pilot in here, she's still deathly afraid of her. No less a light laugh escapes her before she stifles it with a smile, taking her books to a table to consult them, trying to dredge up some bit of geekish poetry from her own memory. "The integral sec y dy / from zero to one-sixth of pi / is log to base e / of the square root of three / times the sixty-fourth power of i."

"Don't bother being modest." Kai checks his watch briefly, closes his book, and reaches over to fetch Roubani's. "You've got a name. Say 'thank you, sir', before I change my mind and call you 'dead cat'." Leaving his book for some poor librarian to put away, he offers his own piece as he moves to his feet and starts buttoning back up his jacket; looks like he's got somewhere to be, soon. "A mathematician confided / that a Moebius strip is one-sided. / You'll get quite a laugh / if you cut it in half / for it stays in one piece when divided." Roubani gets a wink before he turns to depart.

[Intercom] Vendas says, "Pass the word: All Air Wing and Marine personnel participating in the strike operation should report to the ready room."

Roubani clears his throat quietly. "Thank you, sir." And now they're both meeting the geek poetry challenge. A rather dazzling smile blooms on Roubani's face than even shows his straight teeth, and then the intercom goes off. "Oh goodness, the briefing!" He sets the book in hand down quickly. "Take care, Petty Officer."

"Okay, Sir," Nine replies, scouting through the index of one of the volumes as the pilots scurry off.

Unless otherwise stated, the content of this page is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License