Following Up... Like it or Not

Posted on Sun May 26th, 2019 @ 2:34pm by Lieutenant Commander Mnhei'sahe Dox & Lieutenant Samuel Clemens XV

Mission: Fractured Fairy Tales
Location: Undetermined
Timeline: 2396

It had been decided to try and wait to deal with the massive amount of cosmic knowledge that was being indexed from the Titan Gaia that was now in the cybernetic parts of Lieutenant Samuel Clemens' brain. The affable Intel Chief had asked Lieutenant Mnhei'sahe Dox for assistance in figuring out what to do, but Dox knew that the problem, on many levels, was beyond her. And with the Captain's Tribunal just days away, the situation would have to be dealt with later.

The download of information had been paused, and Sam had assured Dox and Doctor Asa Dael that his brain was stable. But the anxious Romulan pilot didn't buy it. He asked her for help first, knowing full well that she had neither the authority to make command decisions regarding the data OR the technical knowledge to assist with the computer brain aspect of the problem.

So as the ginger cyborg left the holodeck where the three had met and Doctor Dael had left to return to sickbay, Dox stood in the doorway thinking. Sam said he was fine, but Dox knew better. She had called herself 'fine' far too many times when she was secretly falling apart. And she suspected that that might be exactly why Sam had called her first. The two officers had more in common then one might think on the surface and Dox was familiar enough with her own demons to recognize Sam's at work in his head. So she followed behind him.

Walking with her hands folded behind her back at the martial stride she had picked up from Commander Rita Paris, she quickly caught up with the Gray-clad Intelligence officer. But in the open corridors of the Hera where anyone could walk by, she suspected that he might not want to talk openly. But as the Chief Flight Control Officer of the Hera, she had her own resources. "Lieutenant Clemens. The wreckage of my personal craft in Shuttlebay 2 has been removed from quarantine after the investigation into my assassination attempt. Since your department was responsible for cataloging my personal items in the investigation, I was hoping you could assist me in going through some of them. Would that be okay?"

It was an obviously leading question as the ship was isolated and he knew it.

The goal-oriented ginger matched her pace, and looked left at her as he continued to walk toward the turboshaft.

"That'd be just fine, Miss Dox. I know it's rough getting your personal stuff rifled through to figure out if it's going to try to bite off your hand. If you're free right now, let's go to the bay and look it all over."

"Excellent. Thank you." Dox exclaimed plainly as the pair took the lift to Deck 22 and walked to the largely empty Shuttlebay. There was a single officer on duty at the control console who nodded at the Flight Chief as they entered. It was after regular shift and it was almost as quiet in the hangar as it was the night of the assassination attempt that had left a young officer dead and Dox herself very nearly the same.

In the far corner of the bay was the remains of Dox's personal craft, the Khallianen. While the body was largely intact, the nacelles and all functional components had been dismantled in the security sweep, to ensure that there were no more assassin droids or other surprises in the cargo or parts. Dox sighed slightly at the leftover pieces of the ship that had been gifted her when she accepted her position as one of the Captain's Baronesses in the Artan Pirate Family.

Without saying much of anything, she gestured to the officer on duty with her eyes to leave and she stepped inside the twisted metal hatchway of the Khallianen, still damaged from the attack. "She's seen better days, but I'll put her back together eventually."

Turning from just inside the small j-type freighter, Dox looked at Sam who was behind her.

Sam was looking sadly at the pieces of the external pods and the guts of the ship that were tagged and bagged, but left strewn all over the place. His face hardened a bit at just what a mess it represented.

"There's no reason to leave her in this state. If they had the tools to take 'er apart, they had the tools to reassemble her."

He was glowering by now, like a slow fuse had been lit, somewhere. "It's an insult to you, to Paulson, and to the ship itself at large, to add more damage to the situation."

He walked about the internal organs of the pretty little ship, clearly scanning everything in a way that suggested he was documenting it via his built-in tricorder-like systems.

He glanced back at Dox, adding, "I'll have this all scanned for you in a few minutes, Dox- then we can get this organized and account for anything missing and put together a damage assessment." He was pretty visibly trying to control his temper, as every item that had been savaged, some irreparably, was pissing him off a little more as he went. "We're gonna need all hands on deck for this upcoming cluster- and that includes your girl, here. We'll get Khallie back together in time for the fireworks." He patted the hull affectionately, the anger past, as he made the ship and her owner a promise.

Smiling that awkward looking half-grin she was known for, Dox walked past the boxes of personal effects to the two rows of benches along the starboard and port bulkheads near the rear and flumped somewhat casually on one. "I appreciate the offer, Sam. But I'm looking forward to working on her myself and besides, she's not the primary thing that I'm worried about putting back together right now."

Tilting an eyebrow at the ginger intelligence officer, Dox gestured to the bench across from her. "Right now, I'm more worried about how you're handling all of what's happening with yourself. It may not be a direct comparison, but as someone who's been broken and put back together, body and mind, I know there's nothing easy about it. And, as someone who knows a lot about keeping those feelings to herself, I can recognize it when I see you doing it. Soooo, how are you holding up?"

The Southern boy with the bland accent shrugged. "I've gotta lotta work to do, and a short time to get it done. I've got non-conventional warfare plans for when the shit actually hits the fan after the Tribunal, because we know that when we win, Queen Bee isn't gonna just let it ride. The stuff in my head is in a holding pattern until after the dust settles, and I've been looking through the fractional index my systems compiled before I stopped the process for anything that might be of use to us during the conflict. I'm getting rest- AND sleep, like Doc wanted, and no bad dreams. Weird ones, sure, but with that catalog up here," he tapped his noggin, "that's really no surprise. Everyone keeps asking me how I'm holding up, being half-machine, and I'm choosing to look on the bright side- I'm never gonna have to worry about diseases, or stuff going bad, as happens over time. I look normal, I'm myself, and I have my friends."

He added, with a genuine grin, "If I'd had that stroke without either my friends (that means you, Mnhae'sahe, by the way) or my cybernetics, I'd have lost a damn sight more than my accent (and the pain in the ass I know it's always caused)."

Chucking slightly at the self-effacing joke, Dox had a bit of a grin. "Well, we ask because we care, Sam. I used to have this nervous tic for years when I was nervous. I rubbed the top of my ears like this."

Taking one hand, the red-headed Romulan ran a finger over the point of her left ear. "I didn't know why. I didn't consciously remember the surgery, but my brain knew something was missing. On some level I knew my ears had been cropped. The point being is that you lost a lot more than the tips of your ears."

Sitting further forward, Dox leaned on her knees. "A positive outlook is great. Personally, I'm terrible at that so you've got that. But you've been through some tremendous trauma and it's in there. And because I am your friend, I'm going to keep checking because I know first hand that this kind of stuff can hide for a while and hit you in ways you're not always prepared for. Phantom pains. Anxiety you can't explain. So, just know if you ever need to talk about it. About anything... You've got two pointy ears ready, okay?"

"Aw, hon. Thank you." Sam's eyes were a little misty, as he knew she was being earnest. "I hope ya know that it goes both ways. I got sliced and diced, but it wasn't by those who were caring for me. I was just blindingly-angry at that prissy weasel for cheating me out of the win." He sat back, shaking his head at it. "I know that sounds nuts, but ever since I was a kid, it drove me into a positive rage whenever someone cheated me out of something I'd earned."

Sam leaned his chin on his fist, and leaned forward, whispering, "I promise I'll letcha know if I need a hug. But I'm a lot better than I was, even before the fight. I'm guessing it's because I had over a year in my own head, manning the steam engine room of a riverboat to get it all worked out. I kinda wish you guys could have seen her."

"A riverboat? That's a story I think I'd like to hear someday." Dox smiled a bit more broadly. "But for now, we both have places to be. So just remember. Anytime."

The red-headed Romulan was sincere in her offer. When she arrived, Rita Paris was there to help her learn how to open up and she could do no less for the ginger Intel Chief as he nodded and flashed that genial smile he was known for as the pair of Lieutenants went their separate ways for the evening.