Non-Human Bonding

Posted on Sat Nov 6th, 2021 @ 11:34pm by Lieutenant Irynya & Ensign Noah Balsam & Lieutenant Timmoz

Mission: Starbase Shoreleave
Location: Junior Crew Quarters - Deck 4
Timeline: Mission Day 4 at 2100

[Junior Crew Quarters - Deck 4]
[MD 4 - 2100 Hours]

Nearly 2 months after coming aboard the Sojourner, the junior crew quarters shared by Irynya, Noah, Kennedy, and Sheldon had shifted from the somewhat stark standardized look of a brand new, unlived in, starship to something more cozy. There weren't any significant changes, per se--no new wall décor or nick knacks in the main room. But there were signs of life. A haphazard pile of PADDs graced the circular table, one of the four chairs not fully pushed in. A glass of water that someone had forgotten to return to the replicator for recycling sat on the low angular coffee table and two cozy blankets now graced each end of the couch, up for grabs for any of the room's occupants should they want to make sue of them.

Towels and bathroom kits were stored in the shared bathroom and bedrooms bore signs of regularly living with shoes kicked off and clothes draped on top of comforters.

Irynya had been off duty now for a few hours, but had agreed with Timmoz that he should come by around 2100. If they were going to drink they might as well do so comfortably and without any concern about either of them being called up unexpectedly as the back up relief pilots. She exited her room with one hand clutched around the neck of a tall thin bottle which she set on the odd butterfly shaped coffee table before swiping the half finished glass of water and returning it to the replicator.

"Two rocks glasses," she told the replicator, "with ice."

The device complied generating two heavy-bottomed glass tumblers, each bearing a large globe of ice in the center. She took both of those over to the bottle and settled herself on the couch. She had opted for sweats. She was off duty anyway and it wasn't as though she and Timmoz had never hung out before, nor was she terribly worried about impressing him. So sweatpants and her fitted SOJO t-shirt, the after-hours uniform she tended towards, it was. Bare feet tucked underneath her as she settled in, picking up a PADD to review some notes from the day.

He was adorned in slinky black that flows like ink around him. Despite being a creature of Orion sensibilities, the stereotype didn't always meet the reality that Timmoz presented. Clothing that could have been a layer of lacquered paint applied had its place. Timmoz appreciated the feelings of things close, even flush, to his skin. It served a purpose. But the clothes of Xo-I- the granted rites of safety and relaxation- depended.

There was a touch of pirate in the glossy blacks he wore- the drop-crotch harem pants were unmistakably silk. His top was brocaded, black in black with its pattern matte and its backdrop glossy. It had no sleeves or collar, its neckline plunged to nearly halfway to his navel. Its buttons were knots and loops. Instead of a collar, a limp hood hung about his shoulders and behind. And against his verdant lime skin, he had copper jewelry: a series of three necklaces, each rising a little higher. And lastly, he'd tied his bunch of frizzy hair back into a small knot.

Timmoz pressed the key to the door. This small ship vexed him but he schooled his features and eventually let it slough off his Teflon exterior. It was small, soulless, and drab. The Adelphi had been aged- and to Orion eyes, had a campy lounge quality to it: the kind that old Humans sat around and swayed to music to. But at least it had a peculiar character.

"Come in!" Iry called as the door chimed, an anticipatory excited grin on her face. The doors parted to reveal the tall lean figure of the Orion pilot, frizzy hair tied back and black attire both leaving too little and exactly enough to the imagination.

The tall, willowy Orion swayed inside, casting eyes first to Irynya and then to the smallness of the junior crew quarters.

The Risian stood as he entered, goofy grin still plastered across her features as she came over, wrapping her friend in a hug -- this one sans cuffs.

When she stepped back her eyebrows crept up in amusement and she made no attempt to hide the fact that she was looking him over. It had never been necessary with Timmoz to feign a lack of appreciation. "You look like walking sex," she remarked with amusement. "Does Nico know you're over here dressed like that?"

Her eyes were jovial, clearly teasing, and she winked at him. Though she knew Timmoz fairly well, she was less acquainted with his Vegan paramour, so she didn't, truthfully, know what Nico thought about Timmoz's fashion choices. For all she knew Nico had picked the outfit out for him.

Timmoz's sly smile wolfishly tilted a fleeting quirk into a cheek. "Nico sees the choices with a closer fit," He raised his chin in almost a Patrician way, along with his eyebrow. He smiled, "And what's under them." The Orion gestured with a sway of a hand, "He is the jealous type, however." The Orion's pungent scent matched Irynya's descriptor of his clothes, like a waft of an oaken forest floor or... something truffle-like.

"You share this space with three other men?" He asked, looking about the place. Timmoz grinned with an impish air and he graced with a stealthy cat quality toward Walsh and Noah's room. He touched the door key and poked his head inside.

Irynya smirked, hands on hips as Timmoz peeked into the rooms. "Yes, three men," she quipped with dry amusement. "That's Noah and Kennedy's room."

She made her way back over to the couch, perching on the edge as practiced fingers worked the bottle's stopper. A sharp alcoholic smell emanated from the bottle. One finger on the rim of the bottle while the rest of her hand wrapped its neck, Irynya tipped a liberal pour of the amber liquid into the glasses, dousing the rounded ice in the center. Satisfied with her pour she returned the bottle stopper and picked up the glasses. "Drink?" she asked with a mischievous grin.

Timmoz withdrew- with a hush, the doors to the mens' quarters closed. "Which one has the little statues?" He asked. The Orion took the offer of a drink with a gesture and a bob of his head. He approached and picked up one of the Old Fashioned sized glasses, his gaze astute on the floating balls of ice. "What should we drink to?" He asked in the Human fashion, knitting his brows a sense of reverence. He traced the glass with a beckoning move under his nose. "The Enolians love their jails and.." he smirked, "Authority. But their alcohol tastes like it came out of a rusty vat. It's been awhile since I had something palpable."

"To reunited friends and new adventures?" the Risian suggested, tilting her head to the side to indicate the seat next to her even as she raised her glass.

Timmoz raised his glass and he drank. It was, thankfully, not sweet. But he still could not exactly place it. He undulated the amber in his glass with a studious eye. "What are we drinking?" He asked. It had a good burn that warmed the Orion- and on a V'Draysh ship, an Orion was always cold. He smiled into a cheek with a wry air.

"Scotch." She raised her eyebrows once then tilted the glass to her lips, savoring the warm burn of the liquor as she took a long sip. Holding the glass out she studied the amber liquid a cat-like grin settling on her features. There really was nothing quite the same as real alcohol. Setting the glass in her lap, she turned back to Timmoz. "The statues would be Noah's," she remarked, coming back around to his first question.

Timmoz slid into the seat next to Irynya with no concern over space, intimate or stranger. He slung his arm across the back of the seat around Irynya's back. "Noah, he is the one that isn't your lover, correct?" He smiled and indicated with his glass at the middle door, "This must be your room. With Sheldon." Merry teasing spirited his eyes while he sipped again. "And no sign yet of Dravor. Pity. Someone has to keep Parsons loose."

"Noah is the one I adopted," she said, scooting closer until her thigh was pressed against the Orion's. She sipped her glass again, sucking in a breath as heat ran down her throat. "The one I've been seeing is Kennedy. Lover isn't... yet... the right term." She settled closer then, tucking her shoulder underneath his arm.

"You know you'd be warmer if you had sleeves," she remarked with a chuckle. "Not that I'm complaining, but I know you're cold. Took me a whole week to reacclimatize to the ship after months on Risa."

Timmoz acquiesced to that with a shrug, "My pride keeps me warm," he grinned with a raise of his glass, "And your Scotch will do the rest." He sipped it. "Creatures with hot blood have to adapt to V'draysh compromises." He chuckled, "I'm sure the temperature controls were selected by a committee of no less than ten Federation species." He tapped her thigh, "I don't want to talk about the temperature," he said, setting his drink down. He smiled near her face and then eased back, "I want to hear about your not-yet Ashka." He leaned back, lean chest wide and long arms draped behind her and then on the other end of the couch. To an Orion it was an invite: Occupy this space with me.

Irynya grinned back at him, understanding her friend's body language fully. She reached across him to snag one of the two perpetually present blankets and unfurled it, settling it over both of them and snuggling against him. "Shame we're both otherwise claimed. There are plenty of ways to keep warm," she said, voice all mischief.

"Indeed," Timmoz murmured with a amused husk, "Humans make engaging mates.. naïve, alien,. conservative but... engaging." He sighed down his long body, the woman against him, and the blanket over them. "Their contractual approach to intimacy is strange."

She sighed then and considered what to say about Kennedy. "My not-yet Ashka, is currently the Acting CMO on the ship. He's young. Younger than me at least. And he's never been in a relationship before. Before me he'd only been kissed once. He's... got a lot of learning to do on a lot of fronts. Complicate that with an unusually conservative upbringing for a human..." she trailed off. One of her hands snaked across the Orion's abdomen, adjusting for a more comfortable position.

Timmoz leaned into her wishes of his torso, presenting his side for her benefit with a slight turn of his body. An expanse of green, dusky and leaning blue in its limeness, eclipsed half her line of sight. He touched her hair in an unhurried pet. Nico would always take pride of place so long as they chose one another. But it was a noticeable change to lay near a female again. It was not better, it was not worse: it was different and welcome on its own terms. He listened.

"I think the thing that has surprised me most about him is how very deeply he feels things. You wouldn't know that from talking to him. He's shy, but he's very curious and open when you get to know him. He knows there's a lot of things he doesn't know, but for someone who has been... sheltered... he's extremely interested in new things. It's almost as if he's just figured out that he can do more in life than medicine." She trailed off for a moment before finally adding, "And he loves me."

"Strange," Timmoz commented, "So many authoritarians repress rather than feel. Look at Vulcans." He tucked her hair around her arm, "It is good that he is open minded. Is he a willing student?" Timmoz's brow rose quickly and rather sharply. "He expresses his emotions quickly as well as deeply." Part of Timmoz's Orion ennui couldn't help but wonder if one so naïve, so repressed by a conservative rearing, lacked the right words to describe the many layered feelings that was a love spectrum. In the end, Timmoz chose as so many like him chose- it was not his business. Words describing emotions was a ridiculous enough, limited construct.

Irynya's expression was thoughtful. "I'd say, arguably, that Kennedy doesn't know how to not be a willing student. If anything he's painfully persistent in wanting to know and understand." A small grin crossed her face as she considered that description. "When he decided to get to know me he started by writing a list of questions--things he wanted to know. Everything from favorite color to... much more intimate details even when those questions were uncomfortable to him. It was a bit like being interviewed at first. Possibly the most unusual sort of Jamaharon I've experienced, but the spirit of it was the same--discovery." She trailed off, taking a moment to sit in the comfortable warmth of the blanket, and warm arms, and gentle hands on her hair and shoulder.

"How do you feel for him?" Timmoz purred, "Cautious, warm? Receptive?... intrigued?" Timmoz asked, "What other... hm... words. Is this holy love? Kind-love? Traduus Vand?"

"Mmm..." she murmured, considering the question. "Intrigued, certainly," she said. "Both safe with him and protective of him in turns. And seen." She pursed her lips. "He's obviously aware that my upbringing is dramatically different than his... my take on life even... but the fact that I'm Risian doesn't seem to factor into what he sees. He just cares about me... as I am... in this moment and in this place. It's a very... vulnerable and powerful thing to be seen and wanted like that."

Timmoz's brows lowered with pensive thought and a soft hum pushed out of his chest, "But you are Risian..." he murmured, the sole concern of what Irynya was saying catching him in what seemed such a common Human trope: species blindness. "Your Risian roots should not be ignored... or glossed over... any more than my Orion roots. You are ultra-aware of his Humanity for him."

Irynya played the Orion's statement over in her head for a long moment, quiet as she did. "I am ultra-aware," she finally said, agreeing. "I would be tempted to explore Jamaharon with both of them," Here she raised her hand to gesture to the door of the room Kennedy and Noah shared, "if I thought it wouldn't cause issues. For now, you are right, certain parts of my Risian ethos are being set aside while he becomes more familiar."

"For now," she repeated, before tilting her head up then, trying to catch a glance at her friend's face. "How would you describe the way you feel for Nico?"

Timmoz raised a brow, "Dedicated. Connected. Passionate. Flawed. Addictive." He touched her hand and opened his palm as an offer to touch.

She took the offered hand in hers, gaze moving from his face to slender green fingers. With a deliberate but gentle motion she tugged, repositioning his hand against his thigh, palm down. Slowly she began to trace, running her index finger up from the base of his wrist to long muscular fingers. She inspected as she went, dropping into memorizing mode out of sheer habit--noticing the lean muscular stretch of tendons and ligaments. She nodded her head against his shoulder, acknowledging that she was listening.

"He makes the same mistake as your Doctor-Assistant. He prefers to ignore my Orionness... and it has caused problems in the past. When I withheld from him that Starfleet Intelligence..." he smirked, "Hmm, absconded with me... and I was unable to tell him the truth without getting him involved... he became very angry. Humans do not like lies or deceptions. Orions in serious relationships deflect and deceive to protect. It is part of our Cluros. That nearly ended us..."

She had completed her circuit of the back of his hand while he spoke, flipping it so that his palm now faced upward, fingers lightly curled. Her movement paused, faltering just a moment as he explained what had happened on Risa. She threaded her fingers through his a moment, pressing her smaller palm against his and squeezing lightly, a suggestion that he continue.

Timmoz sighed with an acquiescing tilt of his head, "I had to go to Vega to fix what was done. He still does not like what I had to do. I am not sure he fully understands. But we have agreed it is in the past. When I must deflect and not tell him what he wishes to know, I am to tell him he cannot know rather than tell him something to comfort him." He grinned wolfishly with a perk and drop of his eyebrow. , "The sex is good... I can report. And I like his smell."

She grinned up at him, chuckling slightly at his final comment. Her finger, having resumed it's tracing, was paused, lightly brushing a small square shaped scar just off center of his palm. Gently she lifted his hand, brushing her lips across the scar. The gesture wasn’t sexual, nor was it inviting that sort of intimacy. The press of her lips was tender, almost mothering--acknowledging a wound that had healed in tandem with his own description of a less physical wound that had required healing.

Irynya returned his hand to his thigh, settling her own next to his, palm up, repeating the invitation he had made to her. “Is good sex sufficient to get past his desire to ignore your roots?” she inquired, curious. “Or has this conflict created inroads there as well?”

Timmoz's mouth twisted, "I was harsh with that word choice. He is not willful in ignoring. But he wishes to..." Timmoz paused and gestured an arc of a hand passing over, "Float above it. I think he is... " he frowned, "Again the words fail. Unsure to probe too deeply, afraid to find something that is incompatible with him." Timmoz tilted his head with a subtle shrug, "He has been raised with the same views of Orions as the rest of the V'draysh. Groups like the Syndicate and the Xo-a Kulkaadi... color their perceptions. And he knows I was once aligned with members of the Syndicate."

Irynya's arm has returned to wrap around his abdomen and she squeezed lightly, reassuring. "You are who you are," she said simply. "If he was incompatible with you, you would tell him."

Timmoz's mouth opened to speak but the hushed sigh of the quarters' doors opening stopped him. Inside stepped a tall, skinny person with a mop of sweaty, curly hair. He was very pale and lanky, dressed in spandex shorts and a wet SOJO t-shirts stained around the neck, small of the back and underarms. he stooped and rested his hands on his knees, panting softly.

"Hi Iry," the stranger panted. "How-" he stopped when a strange and earthen scent browbeat his aquiline nose. Noah glanced more exactly to see a strange man- a strange Orion man- wrapped up with Irynya. He wore strange, slinky black clothes with his arms and most of his chest bare. "Uh... H-hi?" Noah said. His dark eyes swept to Irynya and back, dissonance prickling his anxiety about what he'd just walked in on.

To Be Continued...

A Joint Post By:

Lieutenant Timmoz
Chief Flight Controller

Lieutenant JG Irynya
Assistant Chief Flight Controller

Midshipman Noah Balsam
Systems Specialist