Whose the Commodore on This Night Shift?

Posted on Sun Oct 27th, 2024 @ 1:13am by Ensign Noah Balsam & Lieutenant Irynya

Mission: Mean Green Queen
Location: Main Bridge, Deck One
Timeline: Mission Day 16 at 0230

[Main Bridge]
[Deck One]
[Day 16 | 0230 Hours]

"I had no idea that sound was so hypnotizing..." Noah's voice was a soft, almost sleepy murmur. He'd yawned for the third time in half an hour, this time trying to hide it behind the cup of his hand. The sound he was referring to was part of the navigational system- a series of high-pitched, rounded pings like a Doppler effect. Before them, the main screen was an endless streak of stars behind the gossamer blue tunnel of light that was high warp. "It's putting me to sleep." It didn't help that most of the consoles pulsed with the languid icon of Condition Gray; the lights were also low. The light was, thankfully, shifted blue, which for many humanoids staved off the ease of sleep.

Noah looked over from his position at the hook-shaped starboard console of Ops toward the center console that dominated the front of the Bridge- Flight Control.

Noah could feel a sympathetic yawn- the type of yawn that yawned because you were thinking about yawning- trying to force his mouth open. Noah did his best to stifle it. "How-how are things at the center of life, the universe and everything?" He asked. A beep at the Ops console almost startled him. Ops Management was no more demanding than any other operations or engineering system in theory. But suddenly he had data flying at him on one hand- the navigational part of the job. Coupled to that was the string of resource requests that came through even at this hour.

Noah checked the request- Stellar Cartography wanted five minutes on the lateral array. He tapped the message. "Stel-Cart- Req. Lat Array- SB bearing 033 mark 267, dark energy cluster. ?" "Uhhh, Stellar Cartography wants the lateral array for five minutes? Do I just say... uh...." He hesitated. "Yes? Are you using it right now?"

"You've got to stop doing that," Irynya half mumbled as she caught Noah's yawn, mouth opening wide with a rushing intake of breath. Her eyes squinted as she yawned, one hand flicking out and making a minor adjustment to their course. She craned her neck across the break between their consoles as if reading the request would make any difference in her answer.

"Sorry," Noah laughed around a breath and shook his head.

The hand she'd been using to rub her eye dropped to her console and flicked open a stream of data. Her fingers hovered over the display for a moment before she nodded. "All theirs," she said.

Noah fingered across the controls, turning primary control of the lateral sensors to Stellar Cartography, then slaved it into standby recall. Then he started a chronometer, counting down from five. With a toggling beep sound, Ops confirmed that Stellar Cartography had taken over. Noah was about to open his mouth when the console beeped again. "Jeez." Noah said. His eyes dropped to the new request. It was a message from... the Quartermaster? In the Cargo Bay? Noah felt a shiver down his spine.

"Who has my antigrav sled and Dot Delta?" The message read. Noah could practically hear the monotone, unpleasantly nasal drone of the Zakdorn man. Niceties meant nothing to him. He made Noah uncomfortable- he was as flesh and blood as any of them, yet he was as cold and direct as a machine. "It's Rumat." Noah said idly to his companion. His eyes cast to the empty pair of command chairs. The Officer of the Watch had moved down to replicate the three of them some coffees. "He wants to know where his grav sled and a dot are." Rumat reminded Noah, tangentially, of a dragon guarding his hoard with all the jealous and acid it could hold.

"Iry? I don't think Ops is for me." Noah half-joked while his fingers typed out a texted return. 'Antigrav sled in fabrication lab for repairs. Dot Delta, unknown. Will trace. Five minutes please.'

The terse message that returned was, "Where is the transfer slip for the engineers taking my sled? You have two minutes to find Dot Delta or I will file a grievance." Noah sighed, reading this. "What an asshole..." he muttered.

"Let me guess," Iry half murmured, eyes flicking over to Noah at the ops console. It was a rare treat for them to both be on the bridge at the same time and she was enjoying his company particularly for this shift. Condition gray night shifts were rarely... exciting. "Rumat didn't like whatever you told him and is threatening to file a grievance?"

"Yeah." Noah nodded. His fingers were busily trying to save himself from Rumat's litigious tendencies. He set a trace for Dot Delta, and then searched for the engineer's receipt the Zakdorn wanted.

Her eyes crinkled with amusement as she said it. Rumat was well known both for his threats and for the regular way in which they were, kindly, deflected by the XO. Irynya, personally, didn't enjoy the man's company, but in a general sense mostly didn't mind his gruff and direct manner. She figured that the Quartermaster was probably plagued with people wanting special favors and that having one who was as slavishly tied to the rules probably helped keep things fair.

Her console flashed a yellow beacon drawing her eye to a report that had been submitted by Ariadne Tolbert. It had been a few weeks since Tolbert has asked for a few minutes of her time in the Cargo Bay to ask if she'd done something wrong. Despite her assurances then things had been slightly off between herself and the Crewman ever since. She couldn't decide if it had something to do with her promotion or if she'd really left such a strong impression with her wandering eyes that Tolbert felt uncomfortable with her. Either way she poked at the console, pulling up the report.

"Do you know Crewman Tolbert?" she asked Noah absently as she skimmed the details.

"Umm..." Noah's fingers made a circling gesture on the console. He sent the receipt for the sled to Rumat. But for some reason, Dot Delta was not answering the location pings. And that was a little strange. "N-no, I don't think I do." Noah frowned- both at the weight of the Zakdorn's counter ticking down, and his lack of a face in his mind. "Why? Who are they?" Noah asked with a quick glance over. "Delta's not responding to my pings. Should I send out an all points?"

Irynya's brow furrowed and she turned from Tolbert's report to focus on Noah. "Are there any good reasons Dot Delta wouldn't be responding?" She asked scrubbing through her memory for the right ops protocols. "Check the last recorded ping and see if there's someone present who can look. If not then yes to all points."She waited a moment for Noah to sort the next steps before answering his question about Tolbert.

"Maybe its in a very shielded area but... no. I'm not sh-" His panel beeped. His shoulders, which has tensed, relaxed. "Oh. Found it. Them. It just came out of the Jefferies' near the impulse manifold." He frowned and sent the note to Rumat. And then Noah closed the countdown. "S-sorry, you were saying? Crewman... uhh?"

"Ariadne Tolbert is one of the enlisted team under flight control," she explained, frowning slightly. "I think she may be uncomfortable with me or something. It's weird being her official chief now, but I'm not sure that's it." She felt her cheeks flush slightly as she debated admitting to the moment a few weeks back when she'd let her eyes wander.

"Oh." Noah frowned again. "Uhhh why would she be uncomfortable with you? I don't..." Noah squinted an eye, confused. "Were you friends before you got the um? The center console full-time?"

Iry shook her head, eyes turned back to her console. She chewed the inside of her cheek for a moment then blew out a breath as if she needed to steady herself. "I honestly don't know her that well beyond working with her. A few weeks back though... I was going through a dry spell..." She trailed off feeling embarrassment creeping into her cheeks.

"I was a little distracted and she noticed, but thought she was in trouble. I thought I cleared that up, but..." She shrugged, swiping the report to the side in a too casual motion. "It's probably in my head anyway."

Noah's brows creased, his mouth turning quizzical. They'd talked about this dry spell. "Keep going?" Noah suggested. "So... by distracted you mean you were...." Noah grimaced, "Interested?" Noah had to deal with a late night Yeoman's request to send data on to Pathfinder. He moved it out, wanting to get back to the hanging story and the strange pause it'd caused. "Maybe she's interested?"

Even with her eyes on her console Irynya caught the grimace, perhaps more as a byproduct of his tone of voice than the expression itself. "Yes? No?" she said, annoyed with herself. "She's... nice to look at... but..." she shrugged her shoulders helplessly, turning again so she was facing her friend. "I don't know. It wasn't... I'm not..." she sputtered to a stop and one hand came up to snag the end of the ponytail that hung over her shoulder, trailing down the front of her. She worried at it with her fingers for a moment. "Maybe she is interested or maybe she's creeped out or maybe she actually thinks I have an issue with her," Irynya said. "But also... I'm her direct line of command now... it's just not an option. It wasn't even when I was... distracted..."

This was almost a strange feeling to Noah. He felt a... hotness... that quickly subsided. But more than that it was odd to see Irynya so confused about something that she did so freely, and with so much easy confidence. Noah blinked. And he blinked again as he listened, finding himself a bit at a loss. But as Irynya started to piece it together and walked it back, Noah settled. "Hmm. Well. I-I mean its only against the rules if you don't disclose it to the XO. That way they know not to put you-you on Away Teams together." His console beeped. He was too engaged. He shunted the request into standby- but was mindful to leave himself a timer. Was that what Commander Cross had to deal with? Timers and demanding Zakdorn?

"OK... leh-let's walk this through. So. She's pretty." Noah blinked. "And you were feeling uhh...." He smirked gently, his brows popping. "Horny." Then he blinked and looked up. He hoped the ULT did that word justice. "So... what did she say... what'd you say... when you just saw her? I mean, why do you think she's weird with you?"

"Pretty isn't the right word," Irynya responded with a shake of her head. No. Tolbert wasn't pretty. That word felt almost delicate. Tolbert was sexy. She was a study in curves and the ways the uniforms meant to be functional only could somehow accentuate everything. She was long legs and green eyes and brilliant auburn hair. "Striking is probably better," she hazarded. Yes. That felt right. "Like... you've probably seen her and would recognize her even though you don't know who she is. She's got a sort of red brown colored hair with brilliant green eyes and she's tall. Like... maybe as tall as you."

For a moment the Risian's eyes tracked the length of her friend's body almost appraisingly. "Yes. I think she might be as tall as you." A look of slightly embarrassment, less so than before, flashed across her face, but she continued. The ULT had, in fact, translated the word horny quite well though it's Risian equivalent had more shades of meaning that Iry could count. A race that saw physical contact as something to be treasured and sought out and who built it deep into their culture had many different ways of describing arousal.

"Wow, she's tallish..." Noah added.

"And yes, I was... aware... of her physicality. But it wasn't... it wasn't for the purpose of exploring and getting to know her and sharing experience. It was like a surrogate. I needed an outlet and my brain pointed to her."

Noah nodded and listened. A surrogate, he wondered. He considered asking for clarification but he thought he understood. And Irynya continued.

"Anyway, We were wrapping up a meeting and every time I looked at her I got annoyed at myself and I must have been frowning each time. She stayed after the meeting to ask if she'd done something wrong because of it. And I told her no, that I was just distracted, and tried really really really hard not to notice her while she was sitting that close to me and then she just... she seemed ok and left. And she's been... a lot more formal ever since. I don't know. I was usually able to joke with that group, but Ariadne seems withdrawn. Like maybe she's worried I was lying."

Noah considered what his friend said. He didn't know anything about this woman. He hadn't been handed her psych profile- the type they handed out to people when new personnel came aboard and they needed to be understood, strengths and weaknesses. So this woman was a name only. "Well..." He proceeded with caution, nibbling his lip with thought. "Just ask her if she's alright. She might be worried that you're not so much mad... but maybe... watching her performance? And so she's making sure she does what she's supposed to. I-I mean," Noah smiled into a cheek. "You are a Lieutenant. And she's a Crewman. You outrank her by a lot. And usually her first contact would be her Chief. Though.... I-I guess Flight Control doesn't really have the numbers like Operations might."

Noah hmmed and looked at his timer. He had to address the request. "One second. Someone wants an okay to replicate some kind of-of, uh, monitored drug. I'll pass it on to the LMH." Noah made the gesture and signaled for the LMH to please look it over. "I don't know Irynya. Maybe just talk to her. You're pretty good at talking to people. Just ask, hey, I've noticed you've been pretty formal lately. Well..." Noah frowned. "Ok now that it comes out of my mouth that sounds harder than I thought..."

Iry imagined the sheer panic she'd have had if anyone other than Timmoz had approached her with a hey can I talk to you for a moment inquiry. Like... full gut churning worry. And she had a particular fondness and openness with Timmoz that she didn't have with any of the other team members in Flight Control. For a moment she found herself jealous of the larger departments where a crew chief was commonplace. Flight Control was simply too small to warrant that and so, to Noah's point, the person she'd call on in any other role to find out what was going on was gone.

"Yeah," she said, drawing out the sound and screwing her lips to the side. Another indicator lit up on her console and she turned back to it, flipping it open as yet another report came in--this one detailing a Waverider review that she'd requested. She pushed it to the side with Tolbert's update and twisted back around to Noah. "Maybe I just need to bite the bullet on that. It's part of being a department chief, right?"

"I mean...." Noah grimaced again and sort of awkwardly shrugged. "Y-yeah?"

Her forehead creased into a frown again as another thought settled in. "What if it is that she's... you know... and wants to..." she trailed off, eyes widening to imply the idea that maybe Tolbert was interested in her in that way.

"Oh well, that's easy." Noah said. "Are you interested in her as a um... placeholder... still?" Noah asked. He tugged on the loose neck of his uniform collar and frowned.

Placeholder. The term made her cringe inwardly even as her gut squirmed uncomfortably. "You mean like a fuck buddy." It was phrased like a question, but stated as fact. She'd learned this human term somewhere and spoke it in English rather than Risian.

She wasn't a prude. The idea of taking someone to bed just to scratch a mutual itch was something she was quite familiar with. But for some reason the thought, in this instance, felt off. Like she was taking advantage of Tolbert rather than offering something mutual. Was this why Timmoz had previously told her he didn't sleep with people in his chain of command? Or well... At least not with her.

"Ehm. Yeah. Yes. Yeah, I guess that's one way to put it." Noah looked down at his data. "I mean, or the Risian way of doing it. It's probably more beautiful. But I mean..." Noah shrugged. "But remember what we were talking about the other night. It's a small ship a long way from home. And if you can find... you know..." He chuckled. "Someone to warm up your toes at night. Just you know... umm, follow protocols. But..."

She tried to imagine it. Her. Tolbert. The expanse of her new bed. But no matter how she tried, she couldn't. "Yeah," she said, "there's that too."

She was quiet for a few moments as a fresh batch of navigational data scrolled down her console reconfirming speed, sheer, direction, and numerous other key statistics that she needed to review and confirm. Her eyes tracked down the list, but her brain kept trying to construct scenarios until finally she flicked at the display and turned sideways in her chair so that she was once again looking at Noah.

She liked his profile and a moment of appreciative recognition flashed through her. "I don't think I want Tolbert for a placeholder," she said. Just the saying of it settled her as if a lend that had been stuck dropped into place.

Noah looked up and met eyes with her. He smiled. "That's OK too. There's always the hol-" The doors near Noah swished open and the Officer on Watch stepped inside with a small holder of drinks and treats. "Noah, medium roast, sweet." She said. And she set a small plate with a tart on it. "Lieutenant," she said as she proceeded over to Irynya with her drink and another treat. "What's our status?"

The swish of the doors startled Irynya and she swung her legs back around to face her console, straightening slightly in her seat. She had the odd feeling of being caught doing something private on a public place. But it was just Noah. And they were on watch together. She shook it off, accepting her own coffee, hers in the form of a latte with creamy milk and a touch of sweetness. "Thank you sir," she said, recalling the last set of navigational data with her free hand and doing a fresh skim. "Maintaining warp 5.6 with no course corrections. Chronometer indicates 5 more hours are warp will put us right in front of the nebula I mentioned earlier, then we'll need to drop out and navigate at impulse for 3 light years while we run before we can resume warp."

"Very good," the officer said with an appreciative nod to Irynya. Then she turned to the curiously skinny and- to her eyes- kind of mousey-nervous Ensign. "Ensign. Status report please?"

Noah smiled at Irynya and then looked back to the officer of the watch. "Uh yes ma'am. Rumat had a list of grievances. I-I think the Lieutenant and I handled it. Them. Though. Stellar Cartography is using the lateral array for a more few minutes. Their time is about up." Noah checked the chrono. "Everything else, uh, seems alright." And he lifted his cup of coffee, "Thanks." he sipped it- and then pulled away. "Ow. I-I think I'll give that a few minutes."

The officer chuckled and looked to Irynya as if to say something about the quirkiness of this Ensign kid. "Very good. Maintain course and speed. Keep monitoring long range sensors for vessels. Remember we are still carrying a Kazon fugitive aboard." She moved to the center chair, "Also, Stellar Cartography is almost certainly going to want to extend their time. I know their guy. He's a taker if he gets the chance. So be firm if there's a queue."

The officer's look was lost on the Risian. She was firmly in the pro-quirky ensign camp. She had pressed her lips together to stifle a chuckle at Noah's burnt tongue. She glanced over to him, hoping to catch his eyes and give him an encouraging smile even as the officer delivered her insistence that he be firm.

As if on cue Iry caught the blink of a resource request popping up on Noah's console. She grinned as she noticed that the timer on the lateral array was just about to expire.

A Post By:

Lieutenant Irynya
Chief Flight Controller

Ensign Noah Balsam
Systems Specialist (Moonlighting as Ops in an Trial Experience Shift)