The BLTS Archive - House of Stone I
House of Stone
by Novus Homo

---

No reposting allowed without my permission (I'll probably say yes.)

This is my story; I wrote it. No copyright infringement intended.

Comments always welcome.

Warning: no sex or relationships mentioned (except for Harry/Libby).
Hey, envoy did it, why can't I?

---
"Build for me a house of stone
Lock it up when you leave me alone
Cage it in a fence of iron
To keep your child from all harm
Mother, mother oh help me
Someone's trying to hurt me..."

Kate and Anna McGarrigle, "Mother Mother"
---

Imagine drawing a very hot bath, a hot steaming bath, so hot that it
is near the edge of what your skin can stand. You ease into it, and
become languorous. Maybe you read, or listen to music.

The communicator rings. You stand up abruptly.

You become abruptly drowsy, as the blood runs from your brain through
your heat-dilated veins. The world spins and you clutch frantically at
a bar. You see a rush of grey static and a roaring noise. You remember
nothing else until you rediscover yourself sitting in the tub, water
all over the floor.

My earliest memory was of that exact sensation. I was sitting in my
room - I must have been three or four years old. My room was in an
apartment building on the slopes of Mount Royal. I was born in San
Francisco, but my family moved to Montreal when I was very young, when
my father took a designing job for Starfleet Intelligence in that
city. My room overlooked the gleaming city below, and one of my
greatest joys was to watch the flashing, glistening spacecraft of all
designs rising like birds from the St.-Hubert spaceport on the other
side of the river. I was watching a large, brushed duranium spacecraft
- Betazoid, I seem to recall - when the communicator went in another
room.

The beautiful image in front of me shattered into its component
colours, which spun in a blur. The beep of the communicator became a
piercing shriek, like claws on a slate chalkboard. I fell backwards
and started screaming. I couldn't move, I couldn't think. The sound of
the communicator and the image before me were too much to process at
once.

After a few incidents of this type, my parents took me to the
psychiatrist. They didn't tell me until much later, but I was
diagnosed with autism. This disease was an extreme rarity in the
enlightened 24th, and even after they cured the more severe parts of
my syndrome, I was left with difficulty in interpersonal dealings.

When I was in school I never took too much of an interest in the other
students. Although I did have some crushes, I never had a girlfriend
or boyfriend. Or even a best friend, for that matter. Instead, I
poured all my energy into my studies. I found I thought in pictures; I
didn't understand how anyone could think in words.

I was lonely for years, but I never realized it. I knew how awkward I
was around other people, so I created an eccentric persona to go with
it. I was the unfailingly polite, sweet, naif little man who knew
everything. Math trouble? Ask Harry. Need some trivia? Ask Harry.
People kept asking me questions which were designed to embarrass me. I
didn't get any of the subtext, even though I'm sure they found it a
riot. The disease unrelentingly drove me to attain perfection, and
when I couldn't, I was swamped with  frustration.

Finally, I joined Starfleet, studying science and (ironically)
communication technology. I wanted to escape, to run away from the
world I couldn't understand into the cold shroud of space. I could
make something for myself.

I met Libby. I thought we were boyfriend/girlfriend. I was completely
faithful to her, and she to me, I suppose. In many ways she was as
naive as I was.

Then I got my first deep space assignment. I was thrilled; this was
what I joined up for. In many ways I was better at communicating with
the computers and navigation devices than with people.

Then my ship was lost...

---

continued in House of Stone II - 'Rainbow Ride'