[BACKSIM] Lt. Commander V'Nille - Putting Together a Puzzle While Half-Blind
Renée Chalfant
(( Counselling Suites, Deck Ten, USS Chin’toka ))
V’Nille offered one of the animal shaped pieces to Brodie, holding it between two of her four fingers for him to take.
V’Nille: Tell me, what does this piece look and smell like to you?
He stopped for a moment.
Brodie: Smell?
She nodded and picked up one of the other pieces, one shaped like a rodent, bringing it in front of her nose. The Caitian avoided taking a good sniff of it but even just breathing with it in front of her wet nose was enough for her to pick up the scents on it - the sharp, crisp smell with a faint undercurrent of nuts that told her which tree it was carved from and the musk from the scented oil carefully rubbed into it.
V’Nille: Smell, yes.
She put the piece down after that, setting it to the side.
Brodie: I’m not going to contaminate these with my own…for want of a better phrase, sweaty human hands, am I? I’d hate to damage them.
V’Nille: ::chuckles:: Hardly. These are meant to withstand children playing with them. The pieces are hardier than they look.
V’Nille leaned forward slightly as she watched him play around with it, then smell it. She had seen the silhouette and, if it weren’t for the human’s own smell on everything, she would probably have been able to take a solid guess at the figure’s specific scent. Sometimes, she wondered how humans would react if she ever told them how they smelled and how she could get a sense of their diet and where they’ve been recently just from that alone. The smells weren’t offensive, generally, and of course being a Caitian meant she was already well used to it just being essentially background noise. Oddly, though, humans typically seemed surprised and somewhat miffed by the thought.
Brodie: I’m tempted to say just…wood…but there is something else there – although that might just be whatever type of wood this is.
V’Nille: You could probably classify it as close to a cedar wood, or maybe a pine depending on which one you have more experience with. That’s how the more astute humans have described it.
She offered him an open hand to nonverbally ask for the piece back and took a deep sniff of it herself. All of the pieces were made of the same wood in this puzzle, though from different parts of it to help indicate the level of the puzzle piece. Where the nutty undercurrent of the tree rodent piece from before indicated being close to the branches where those nuts grew, this piece had much stronger earth tone to it. That meant it was from the trunk, close to the dirt. The rubbed oil on this one had a musky smell to it as well, but it was deeper and subtly different in a way that she could never fully explain. The animal it resembled in shape and smell was a deer-like creature that foraged in the forests of Ferasa, or Cait as the humans tended to call it.
V’Nille: This particular tree and the animals aren’t native specifically to my homeworld, Hochlor IV. The ones you get from most replicators and most are based on our ancestral homeworld for consistency.
She turned it around in her paw-like hand for a few moments silently before putting it down.
Brodie: Response
V’Nille: The wood can overpower the scent of the animal sometimes, especially if it’s new to you. I’m not surprised your nose didn’t really pick it up, even accounting for the difference in capabilities. If you gave it another sniff now, you would probably be able to discern the difference because you know it’s there. That foreknowledge primes your brain, right?
Brodie: Response
She nodded and leaned back slightly, her golden eyes focused on the puzzle pieces.
V’Nille: I don’t know if this happens with humans, but for some of us, our instincts just come out stronger and mine are honed from a lifetime of relying on them for a life spent outdoors. Climbing, hiking, hunting, tracking, and all that. My village is one of the more … rural ones, I believe you’d characterize it. I’ve adjusted to a lot of life in a city and a starship, but the forest will always be my home. Homesickness or trouble adjusting isn’t why I’m here.
Her eyes jumped up from the table to meet Brodie’s. Her hands moved in gestures that accompanied her words, as if holding a PADD or using a holographic screen.
V’Nille: I think I need help figuring out how to process all the information I get for the job when it’s all visual. PADD screens and holographic interfaces are great at conveying information but it always feels like I’m missing something in how I can effectively use that information when it comes to putting it together. I can read it. I can understand it. I’m still having trouble putting it together in the same way that I’ve seen others do.
Brodie: Response