Day 4 - A Destination?

[Ciara Mei]

Once the meeting had finished, Ciara left the room rather quickly and, instead of heading off towards stellar cartography, she went off to her quarters. Once she managed to close the door, she leaned against it and closed her eyes. Could this actually be a way home? Could they actually get back?

Tossing the PADD onto her desk, she slipped over to her bed and looked opened one of the drawers that she normally kept locked up. There were many things she kept hidden on this ship, from this crew. No matter what she did or how much she flirted with others, her heart wasn’t completely in it.

Pulling out a picture, Ci felt a few tears go down her face. The one person back on Earth that really mattered to her. The one person she’d actually been able to settle down around. She messed around, everyone knew that, even this one person. But her heart was back on Earth.

“I’ll try to come home,” she whispered to the picture as she wiped a few tears away. “I’ll be there with you again.”

Putting the picture away and closing up the drawer, she checked to make sure that she still looked decent and headed out the door after grabbing her PADD again.

Ci didn’t look anyone in the eye, she didn’t want to. With this whole thing needing to be kept quiet on top of being away from home, her mind was spinning. Slipping into stellar cartography, she began working while she awaited whoever Matthews was sending to her.

Tags: whoever it is!

[Azaria]

Jai had only just finished tasking off her crew and sending them on their way when a chime went off on the wrist watch she'd linked up to her PADD.

Mathews was requesting she meet with a Lt. Perlit from Sciences.

"Anybody know a Perlit?" She called out to the few engineers left in the work space.

There were a few chuckles. She raised an eyebrow and turned in the direction of same.

Nabaal stood there with a shit eating grin on his stupid face. "She's been fucking her way up the chain for long enough that half the fleet has had a pass."

"I seriously doubt that," Jai retorted as her jaw tensed. "She's a junior Lieutenant. If she'd slept with half the fleet she'd be a Commodore by now."

Nabaal laughed, thinking she'd cracked a joke rather than pointed out the hole in his logic, and leaned against the console Jai was working on. "Guess she's not much to speak of... she might be up your alley though. Maybe you'll finally get your P1s out of it!"

She rolled her eyes, "Oh please, if I wanted my P1s all I'd have to do is wink, smile, and put in a memo to the career manager. I've been offered my star five times now, I just don't have the patience to deal with all that comes with it. You have to start dealing with officers, when you get that high up, and I'd rather be around useful types..." she paused and looked pointedly at Nabaal, "people who know that if you have time to lean, you have time to clean."

Nabaal's face turned dark and he quickly moved away from the console he'd been slouched against. "Fuck off, Lee. You think those hooks will protect you out here?"

Jai stood quietly to her full height, which was an underwhelming 148 cm, looked up at Nabaal, and cocked her head to the side. "No, I think me being the best grease monkey on this floating jungle will protect me. I think being well respected by both my subordinates and superiors will protect me. I think having friends in every department on this ship will protect me. And mostly," she pulled the knife she kept concealed in her sleeve, "I think I can protect my own damn self pretty fucking well."

Despite the heavy machinery running around them, the room was deathly silent. In the background, though neither noticed, the other engineers stopped their tasks and stood watching. How would they side?

On one side stood Jai, their superior. Capable and well respected. Calm, methodical, humorous.
On the other, Nabaal, their winger. Passionate, outspoken, brash, and charismatic. Angry, insubordinate, and ready to act.

One represented order, the other... many were mad, correction, they were pissed off. Stranded in a different GALAXY? With these assholes!?!? Of course they were pissed... but, at the same time... were they pissed enough to act on it? Mad enough to abandon friendships in a place with a limited number of new ones?

"Stand down, shut up, get to work, and I'll pretend this didn't happen." She growled lowly, as she shifted her weight slightly to her back leg. "Or do you want to join the ship's choir as a soprano?

There was a long moment where Jai didn't know if she was going to be fighting for her life against a man three times her size or not... thankfully it was at this critical moment that several alarms went off.

"Containment breach in antimatter locker," a voice across the space shouted in a panic.

Everyone snapped out of their stupors and moved into a flurry of action. Jai and Nabaal shared a quick look that said it all, 'lets get to work'.
Taking charge, Jai began shouting out taskings and coordinating teams to find and repair the damage. Their shift, red watch, was a well oiled machine and the drills Jai put them through regularly showed.
It took only five minutes for the situation to be controlled and the fault discovered. The containment field was fine, a small glitch in the sensors registered a fault.

The team clapped shoulders, laughed, and sighed with relief together as they regrouped in the control room.

Jai looked around at them and was proud. Moments before, these people had been at a cross roads, ready to act, bursting with that raw, primal stuff that needed to be released.
And in that moment, they harnessed that stuff and did what they needed to do. Fuck the officers, grabbing at power, playing with peoples minds and souls. They were a team. They'd kick this galaxy's ass to the milky way and back if that's what it'd take!

Interrupting her silent jubilation, a young ensign who'd been on watch during the incident tapped her shoulder. "PO... can I say... you were awesome. That was impressive."

Jai spun her chair around and gave a self deprecating shrug. "Ma'am, it was everyone. We all did good here. This is what we drill for. This is why we're fucking awesome."

The ensign made a slight face and shuffled slightly.

"what?"

"No, nothing, I.." the Ensign looked around and lowered her voice, "I didn't know what to do, or say... to stop crewman Nabaal... so... I'm sorry... I."

Jai held up her hand. "No, Ma'am. Its okay. That was fucked up what happened, I won't lie. And its something that needs to stay in this department. We've taken care of it. We're good."

The ensign looked... unresolved.

"Thank you, though," Jai nodded and gave her a smile that said more than can be written. "I'm just glad that alarm went off when it did. That was fortuitious..."

Suddenly suspicious, Jai's eyes widened at the look of... collusion, satisfaction, and chagrin on the young woman's freckled face. "You did that?!"

The ensign, Zabrina McLeod, Jai remembered her name to be, a mere 18 years of age, nodded quickly and grinned for a moment before glancing around again as though afraid of being caught.

"Well damn," Jai exhaled loudly and clapped her hands over her head. "And here I was thinking officers were a waste of oxygen! That was fucking brilliant!"

"Thank you," McLeod flushed, whether from the compliment or the swearing or both, Jai didn't terribly care. "I just, couldn't stand there and not do anything."

Jai nodded and pulled the ensign close. "No, that was exactly the right thing to do. But never ever ever ever ever ever evvvver tell anyone it was you. This cannot be in any reports, no casual mentions, or your back will have a target on it the same as mine, understand?"

McLeod nodded, eyes locked with Jai's, despite the height difference. "Yes PO."

Jai nodded again, released her grip on the younger woman's shoulders, and sighed. "Okay, Ma'am. I've been summoned up top to see someone in sciences. Can you brief the Lieutenant when he gets down here?"

The ensign's eyes widened. Jai had never trusted any of the junior engineering officers under training to take over the shift until they'd proven themselves to her exacting standards. This was a big deal. She swallowed heavily, "yes PO."

"Very good, Ma'am. If you need any help, the team is here for you. I'll be a bit." Jai smiled and handed McLeod the incident reports, then left engineering.

It wasn't until she was several levels up that she took a moment to duck into a washroom and throw up. Her hands shook as she washed her face, and checked the daggers she had tucked into various hiding placed on her person.

When she left the washroom, her hands were still again.

>>>>


PO2 Jailyn Lee
Petty Officer of the Watch
Engineering Department
USS HORIZON

[Azaria]

After taking a round about route, Jai arrived at her destination. Lt Perlit's door.

She stuck the chime and waited for the door's locking mechanism to activate. Most people didn't think about how the doors on these vessels work. Sections of the ship are airtight, and the doors within those spaces - while not as robust as the doors between section - were built to hold against vacuum for a short while, and therefore were effectively soundproofed. The security systems are designed to acknowledge when someone says 'enter' or something similar, it means to unlock the door, or open it all together, depending upon the security setup for each individual space. Public spaces react simply to proximity of active badges, whereas private quarters and secure spaces are set up with access lists or vocal codes.

What some also did not realize, was that the ship's security system logs who has entered which spaces, when, and with whom.
Now, Jai was not one to pry or dig into other peoples' business, but after hearing the rumours floating around the ship and on the Ticker Tape, plus the worrisome revelations by Arkady, she was very curious about the logs...

She lost her train of thought as the door opened and she was greeted by, well, possibly the most stunning woman Jai had ever met.

"Oh, uh, Ma'am! Petty Officer Lee, as requested!"

Tags - Ci

PO2 Jailyn Lee
Petty Officer of the Watch
Engineering Department
USS HORIZON

[Ciara Mei]

Ciara raised an eyebrow at Jai as she did her best to slip through her own door. “A propos du temps,” she mumbled, handing her a PADD. “We have a lot of work to do.”

She’d done her best to compose herself before making her face shown again. Ci wasn’t one to look worn down or distracted. She began walking at a brisk pace off towards stellar cartography. “I assume Matthews filled you in at least a little on what you’d be assisting me with?”

Not that it really mattered. Ci was going to fill her in anyways if she didn’t speak up once they were there.

Tag: Jai

(Translate: "About time.")

[Azaria]

[KendleRJ]

Talia stretched, turned her head one way and then the other, hearing and feeling a satisfying crack as her neck settled back into place. She had lost track of time as she worked, pouring over the reams of information that had finally, after almost 18 hours of steady recording, begun to repeat itself. The initial assumption was possibly an encrypted message but that hadn't helped her so much... but with the loop? That indicated a more likely scenario that it was meant to be understood. And if that were the case...

Pressing her thumbs into her eyes, stemming the tide of an oncoming sleepless headache, she yawned reflexively and realised that if she didn't get up, she might lose precious time, time that Horizon simply didn't have.

Coffee.

Yes.

And maybe a quick shower.

Yes.

That might shake the cobwebs that were threatening to glue her eyelids shut as her eyes lost focus. Shaking her head sharply, Talia pushed herself to her feet and shook her extremities, encouraging blood flow and urea dissipation. That and if she could feel her ass cheeks, it might also help some. How long had she been sitting, really? Now if she could focus her mind, that would be even better...

Time dilated oddly when involved in such detail-oriented work. Sometimes it felt like no time had passed and hours had gone by, and sometimes, if she were very, very lucky, it was the complete opposite. But now was not the time to figure any of that out; now was the time to take a break before her head fell off of her neck. Again, if she were very, very lucky...

A clump of clothing was dropped behind her as she stepped into the sonic shower, letting the waves pelt her body in an attempt to inject energy into a fleshy body that was fighting the sleep with every breath in her body. At least, she was trying. If she closed her eyes for only a moment, the drifting through space with stars around her, letters, numbers, light, darkness, flickering back and forth, repeating, repeating, repeating...

Talia's eyes snapped open with a start. Linguistics. Logistics. And a process of elimination... and the future communication in this area of space, and suddenly, in a dizzy moment of sonic pelting, it clarified for her. She padded naked across her carpet, grabbed up her PADD and began punching options, letters, sounds... phrases... phonetics... now if she could only see the languages written, she might have a working knowledge of the ACTUAL language rather than the spoken one.

But yes. Yes! There it was, like an immense ball of yarn tangled for miles that had suddenly been identified as a mere slip knot twist... everything unravelling, everything falling into place... absent-mindedly she pressed the comm button for the Captain. "Sir," she said, the computer showing the modesty that Dr. Talia Flowers obviously was completely unaware of, "if you have a few minutes, I'd like to ask you about something, if it's not too much trouble."

At least that was better than blurting out, "Eureka!" Wasn't it?

Tags Captain / all

[Ciara Mei]

Ci nodded and noticed that Jai turned away. “Right then. On that PADD there is a list of work to be done, and done quickly. You’re not to tell anyone else what you are repairing, only that you are assigned to my team for the time being.”

She looked over at her. “Is that understood?”

It still caught her strangely that Jai had looked away. “Something wrong?”

Tag: Jai

[Amanda Rose]

[Azaria]

[Ciara Mei]

Ciara had a hard time believing what Jai was saying. Though, as she thought about it as they reached stellar cartography, she smirked.

“I suppose all of that is true, the first part anyway. I don’t think I’ve ever heard someone use the term ‘ducky’ in that form. That’s what happens when your first language is French I suppose.”

Then the dreaded question, how was she? Ci sighed and tossed her own PADD onto one of the consoles that actually was working.

“Complicated question there. A lot on my mind and a lot I wish I could get off my mind.”

That was an answer, wasn’t it?

Tag: Jai