The Old Gray Mare Just Ain't What She Used to Be.

Posted on Thu Oct 24th, 2019 @ 10:46am by Ensign Fiona O'Dell & Ensign Briaar Gavarus & Jaeih Dox-t'Aan
Edited on on Thu Oct 31st, 2019 @ 10:58am

Mission: Family Detention
Location: Deck 8, Crew Quarters, Ten-Forward
Timeline: 2396

In the corridors of Deck 8 of the U.S.S. Hera, the unlikely couple of Ensigns Briaar Gavarus and Fiona O’Dell were up to something.

On the hip of the towering, tubby Tellarite Engineer was the bouncing baby Minotaur the two were actively trying to officially adopt, tiny Minerva Carrot who was grinning and cuddled up to Gavarus’ fairly ample chest making an impossibly adorable, light mooing sound almost like snoring. And walking in front, was the miniature Maraposian test pilot, the red-headed Fiona O’Dell. In each of her hands was a bottle of liquor. In one, a blue-hued bottle of Kali-Fal, also known as ‘Romulan Ale’. And in the other, a bottle of deep, amber Whisky.

In her tiny hands, the normal-sized bottles looked ever larger as Briaar half-whispered down to her partner-in-crime and life. “Do you think this is a good idea, Fee. I mean, if Granny Murder-Punch wanted to see us since coming back on the ship, don’cha think she would have called or something? She was, like, kidnapped for a month! Maybe she just wants to be left alone.”

“Ach, she’s a crabby old lady, ye know that. Left to her own lot she’d joost sit in her quarters and brood and keep mutterin to herself aboot why things aren’t the way they were back in her day. Nae, I’m pretty sure this is joost what the doctor ordered. Besides, we brought along Minnie! Who could say nae to that adorable face, ye?” Spinning as she strolled, O’Dell grinned cheerfully at the babe who, on Gavarus’ hip, was nearer to eye level for O’Dell than she would be on her own. “Aye? Aye, Minnie Moo?”

For her part, Minnie just giggled in reply, a generally expected response from the surprisingly cheerful and good-natured babe.

“So aye, she’ll see us and she’ll come oot. After all, we outrank her, aye? So if push comes to shove we can always order her to come oot to the pub and have a good time wi’ us, like we been doin’.” While she didn’t believe in a heartbeat that the saturnine spy would be moved in the least by an attempted order from either of them, she said it all the same to try to boost Gavarus’ morale, as despite the fact that the duo, now a trio, had forcibly befriended the reluctant Romulan, both retained a healthy fear of the imperious woman as well. Forcing their company upon her when it might be unwelcome was a dangerous proposition. But they did have Minnie as a secret weapon should things go sour in negotiation.

Looking at the giggling babe on her hip, Gavarus smiled nervously, but relented to Fiona’s logic in the scenario, as she generally did. Arriving at the door, Gavarus pulled the tiny tot up and held her towards the pad outside the door. “You wanna push the button, Minnie Moo? It’s the big one at the bottom.”

Reaching forward, Minnie giggled and pressed every button at once, but it had the desired effect.
---------------

In the overly spacious VIP quarters that Jaeih Dox was still assigned to, the slightly older Rihannsu woman was somewhat happy that her room was as big as it was for the first time since coming aboard the Hera.

The former Tal’Shiar operative, former prisoner of the Romulan Government and Starfleet Intelligence and current Civilian intel asset in service to Captain Telvan and the Hera was glad to net feel so closed in on the ship. The large windows and space helped her mitigate the claustrophobia she had been dealing with during her captivity on the Romulan Warbird she and her Daughter had been trapped on for weeks.

Of course, the room was still fairly bare with almost no personal touches. No private effects, pictures or keepsakes lined the walls. The room looked exactly the same as it did when she was first assigned it. And at the moment, Jaeih was struggling to keep busy in the large room... by cleaning it.

Her daughter was spending some much needed private time with her wife and Jaeih didn’t want to impose on the couple with her needs. But needs, she did have. Jaeih was a generally private individual who tended to keep to herself and tended to shun social interaction with a trademark mix of contempt and sarcasm. But most of that was a well-cultivated facade designed to avoid interpersonal relationships that might encumber her as an intelligence operative. Old training that had protected her emotionally over the years.

But, much like the spartan and cold way in which she had chosen to raise her daughter, Jaeih was making a conscious effort to change those old habits. But this one was harder than not. She wanted to be around people. She wanted to talk to someone and not be alone or isolated anymore. But she didn’t quite know how to instigate such behavior and she had precious few people she would call friends on the Hera. Few, but not none.

Which is when, while she was moving the small couch to the other side of the room for something to do, her door chime went off. Seven times as if the buttons were all mashed at once. Immediately, she straightened up, adjusted the gray Starfleet intel uniform top she wore and went to the door with a bit more enthusiasm than was usual for her. Once at the door, she secured the cold, disdainful expression she wore as a near-permanent mask and pressed the button to open the door.

On the other side, were the two people that were, perhaps the most unlikely to consider friends: The ships resident troublemakers and drunks, O’Dell and Gavarus.

And a cow baby. All three grinning exaggeratedly.

Raising her eyebrow quizzically, she replied sarcastically. “Oh, this should be interesting, What can I do for you… ‘ladies’?”

Looking up and down the hall in an exaggerated fashion, O’Dell finished by looking up at the dour-faced Romulan woman. “Ladies? Nobody here but us, mum. We’ve come to drag ye oot to the pub, Mrs. Dox! To celebrate yuir triumphant return to the Hera and to make people nervous while we drink to yuir health and long life, eh?” Smiling up at the silent stone face that regarded her like a lab specimen, O’Dell held up the bottles she carried in each hand. “We managed to lay our hands on some of the blue stuff ye like, as well as some right proper 12 year old single malt from me own home planet, O’Dell’s Own. Tis me granddad what distills it, and I thought ye might like something other than yuir usual.”

At the seemingly cold and unblinking stare they received, as O’Dell grinned nervously as she blinked, wondering if she had made a terrible mistake. At that, Gavarus held out Minnie like a shield. “Don’t hurt us. We brought a baby, and you don’t want to traumatize her.”

For her part, Minnie made big brown cow eyes at the middle-aged Romulan intel asset, fluttering her lashes slowly as she investigated whether she could fit her entire fist in her mouth.

Looking at the fuzzy curiosity, then at the nervous pair of misfits, Jaeih rolled her eyes and shook her head. In truth, she had found that she inexplicably missed these two and welcomed their visit. But she also had no intention of saying as much in the moment. After all, she had a reputation as a curmudgeonly old woman who didn't like anyone, and she intended to maintain that. "And, I suppose if I want to find out what the undoubtedly ridiculous story is as to why you two are carrying a... what kind of baby is this?... I have to acquiesce to your request?"

There was only the briefest of pauses before O’Dell seized the opportunity presented to her. “Aye! That ye do! We’ll promise to tell ye the whole story, but ye have to come oot to the pub and drink with us!” Emboldened by her success, O’Dell lowered her voice to a conspiratorial tone. “Minerva here is a minotaur, but we dinna want her to grow oop thinking she’s any different than anyone else, so please dinna make her self conscious, aye?”

Said the midget standing next to her partner the giant space swine, as she spoke to a Romulan about their baby minotaur.

"Oh, Elements forbid I do that." Jaeih replied sarcastically as she raised a finger up, curiously to the fuzzy enigma. And Minnie being Minnie, she immediately reached out with her grabby hands, tightened her grip around the offered finger and pulled it in to begin gumming it adorably, her big brown eyes never falling away from Jaeih's.

"Well... she's... certainly strong, isn't she? Yes. Very good. May I have my finger back? Thank you." Jaeih smirked ever so slightly as she pulled back her now slobber covered finger that she held up and looked at with a faintly dismissive air. Then, without missing a beat, she reached over and rubbed it dry on Gavarus' sleeve and raised her eyebrow. "Very well. I suppose I have no choice. Lead the way."

"Aw, c'mon! Really?!" Gavarus griped as Jaeih simply arced her eyebrows, smirked and stepped out of her quarters with them.

"S'nothin ye's not had her dribble on ye afore, Briaar," O'Dell dismissed as she fetched out a wipe and dried off the drool, smoothly depositing the wipe back in the diaper bag with a surprisingly practiced ease.

The trip through the ship’s corridors and down the turbolift was, for the most part, uneventful and passed in silence, save for the occasional gurgle or raspberry from Minnie. O’Dell wasn’t going to press the Romulan woman to talk until they had some privacy and a drink or two in her, and Mrs. Dox’s capacity for silence was a given. The hard part was getting her to try to talk, after all.
But once they entered 10-Forward, to the collected groans and eyerolls of the staff, O’Dell navigated across the floor to a booth near the viewports, with the back to the wall. It was a favorite of Mrs. Dox, where she could observe the lounge while having her back to a wall, and while the odd couple preferred to sit closer to the bar, today they needed to make their returned renegade comfortable, so they would sit in ‘her’ booth.

Setting the two bottles on the table, O’Dell held up one finger, then bounced back across the lounge to the bar, to fetch a few tumblers for their liquor and to order a warm bottle of milk for Minnie as well as some appetizers for the lot of them. After all, drinking on an empty stomach disagreed with her partner in crime, as did just an empty stomach. While ordinarily, they were legendary for their harassment of the wait staff, today was a bit different, and there would be opportunity aplenty for that.

Returning to the table, O’Dell unloaded the tray with the trio of tumblers, then hopped up into the booth to stand on the bench seating and open the bottle of whiskey, the brand she’d known literally all her life. Inhaling the scent that smelled like her childhood, she expertly poured two fingers for Mrs. Dox, two for Gavarus and one finger for herself, as she was in all ways a lightweight. Passing them out, she eyes Minnie. “You’ll get yours when we get yuir bottle, little one, aye? Dinna ye worry, yuir mums aren’t forgettin aboot ye, aye?”

"So, we've now brought a baby to a bar. There must be a special level of Areinnye for that." Jaeih rolled her eyes as she picked up her tumbler of whiskey, holding it up to examine it visually, then giving it a light sniff. "And you say this is your own family distillery. Consider me intrigued."

Taking a light sip, Jaeih rolled it around in her mouth before swallowing. "Hmmm. Sweet. Strong enough." As she spoke, she downed the rest and put the tumbler back on the table, empty. "Miss O'Dell, were it illegal, I'd smuggle it."

“Pshaw. Me da was bringin’ me to the pub when I was still in diapers, and I turned oot joost foine,” O’Dell defended, taking a tiny sip and savoring the flavor. As the lightweight of the group, she had to be careful about her intake, otherwise she’d be passed out and Briaar Gavarus would have to carry both her and Minerva home. “But I’ll take the compliment. Tis aged in oaken barrels and distilled the old fashioned way, so it doesnae have that artificial taste ye get from the synthetics. O’course, in my family they do joost aboot everything the old-fashioned way, so take that for what it’s worth.”

Pouring another glass for the Romulan, this time O’Dell made it a double. While she was dying of curiosity to know what had happened and to hear the story, she recognized when someone was in the mood to get properly drunk before their tale was told, and she suspected that was the case tonight.

“How about ye, Briaar? D’ye like it, or would ye rather stick to beer?” O’Dell asked solicitously. The Tellarite had quite the snout for a good beer, and whisky was seldom her drink of choice. But tonight was an occasion, she had offered the strong stuff, but was, of course, willing to accommodate her porcine partner.

Slamming her glass back, Gavarus knocked it off easily and presented her glass for a refill. "Hey, we're drinkin' the fancy shit tonight, so I'm in. Hit me." As she did, she turned to the bard and shouted, "C'mon! Where's the baby's @#$%ing BOTTLE?! What the hell, people? Don't make me feed her one of your slow asses."

Then the portly porcine turned towards Jaeih and whispered. "We actually got a book on it, and she doesn't eat people. Totally vegetarian, like me. But they don't know that." Then she leaned over to look at Minnie, who she was bouncing on her knee, "No you don't, do you? You don't eat slow ass servers, do you, Minnie Moo? No, you don't!"

As the bobbing bovine babe giggled on Gavarus' knee, Jaeih took another sip of her offered Whiskey and cricked an eyebrow. "So, I am here and drinking as agreed. How long do I need to wait to hear how you two now have a baby that is... clearly neither of your respective species? I wasn't gone THAT long."

“I reproduce asexually,” O’Dell deadpanned, to which Jaeih simply rolled her eyes and chuckled.

"Frankly, I wouldn't be surprised, my dear. Nor would I want to ever know the specifics for either of your proclivities or techniques. Still, neither of you has horns, so there's certainly more to this story, I'm sure." Jaeih said as she turned to Gavarus and held out her hands towards the giggling tot, saying nothing. As she did, little Minnie tilted her head and cooed slightly as she looked up, first and Gavarus and the back to Jaeih as she started bouncing in place with excitement. 

For her part, the two-meter tall Tellarite looked extremely nervous about letting go of the baby, but scrunched her face as she slowly handed the child over to their unorthodox drinking partner. "Just... just be careful. She likes to grab hair and stuff and... and her head is... with the horns, she's heavier than she looks and..."

"Really, Miss Gavarus. My daughter is your supervisor. I've held children before." Jaeih said as she took the furry little bundle into her arms. Looking down at the child, Minnie looked up and she reached slowly up to touch Jaeih's pointed ears inquisitively, still lightly cooing as the server finally brought over the bottle and the ordered appetizers. Grabbing the bottle, Jaeih gently squirted it on her wrist and then handed it to Minnie, who grabbed it and began drinking.

In a display that was positively bizarre to Gavarus and O'Dell, Jaeih was positively gentle as she leaned over and whispered to the baby and lightly rubbed her back, "Slowly, little one."

As little Minnie had her bottle, Jaeih looked at the ordered food, "So, what did you procure for us Ensign O'Dell?"

"Joost some pretzels and popcorn and potstickers and bread and jam..." O'Dell trailed off, somehow perplexed by the maternal display of the prickly provocateur, as she and Gavarus both stared a bit slack-jawed until O'Dell's brain could catch back up again. "Wee Minerva was born to a gel here on the Hera, who didn't make it through the birth. The, ah, horns, methinks. Truth be told I've nivvir known and ne'er cared to ask. I suppose it's all in her medical records, but... we're nae that curious."

"Our flight doc, Mr. Carrott- with two t's, though god only knows why. Mebbe it means somethin' else on his world. But he and his wife... Amy?" The sprightly test pilot secured a pretzel and jammed it as the rough engineer, nodded. "They took her in for all of a boot a week, and we were at her bebe shower when her water broke, and it was on to the delivery room. In all the excitement, they joost kind of left her with us. We both come from big families, so, " Fiona O'Dell shrugged her narrow shoulders and pointed to the gold and black Starfleet engineer toolbag that serves as their diaper bag.

"I canna explain it... cept apparently I can. See, there's this... izzat classified? Is't classified to her since she's intel? Did innybody warn ye twas top secret? Izzat a defense that holds up at a court martial? Eh, foogit." O'Dell finished talking to herself as Gavarus kept preparing to answer, then made her decision and throttled forward.

"So there's a woman onboard, an alien, but one of the old an' powerful ones, aye? Wi' abilities and rot what look like magic to the likes of us. Ye ken?" In her own way, as her brogue deepened with the explanation, O'Dell was testing the waters to see if the pointy-eared dam would believe her before proceeding with the story. Taking a sip of her whiskey, the emerald eyes of the leprechaun sought the dark brown eyes of the spy soon to be grandmother.

"Officially, no. I don't know about the being classified as a 'goddess' two doors down from my quarters. But I listen and I pay attention and I am fairly good at connecting dots when most of the dots are missing, Miss O'Dell, so you've betrayed nothing, nor will there be any Court Martials." Jaeih slowly held Minnie up and handed her back to Briaar as she was still sucking down on her bottle with a knowing smile. 

"So this alien being is somehow connected to the little one, then?  And the two of you have become, well, you referred to yourselves as her 'mums' earlier, so I take it you feel quite attached based on both of your body language cues when I was holding her. Ensign Gavarus' ears twitch with every sound she makes. The custom diaper bag. You, Ensign O'Dell, watched me to see if I twitched when I tested the temperature of the bottle." The observant operative picked up a pretzel and took a bite after she finished speaking.

"Aye, well... the we little thing was apparently a bit much for Carrott and his bride, so they both took LOA as soon as she went into labor, and they've nae been heard from since. So we're plannin... I mean, basically we have to secure the rights, but aye. In an odd way we make a family, and.. well, I mean lookit her. She literally is magically adorable. I dinna think we had a lot of choice. But we dinna mind." O'Dell leaned in, beaming a happy smile at the suckling infant. "Nae we dinna, because yuir the cutest wee beastie ever. Ay, and ye know it too, doonchye? Aye?"

For her part Minerva tried to giggle, then coughed on her milk as some went down the wrong pipe. Gavarus had her in one hand, patting her back with the other as O'Dell smoothly got a blanket in place on the table beneath them for the baby to cough and sputter and puke up a bit of milk. As one cleaned the table, the other cleaned the baby, and within a few seconds the baby was back in the crook of Gavarus arms, calm and breathing evenly again, as she sneezed, then made grabby hands for the bottle again. The blanket went into a sealed bag that vacusealed the air out, deodorizing as it did so. Then O'Dell wiped the table clean with a sterility wipe, and business continued as usual.

It was, in concert and in practice, as if both of them had been doing it for years. And watching the display of uncanny parenting skills, suddenly Jaeih felt somewhat embarrassed that she had all but bragged about her own abilities with children that clearly paled next to the two attentive Ensigns, especially when she considered how damaged her own daughter had turned out.

But she masked that reaction with practiced skill, as she reached over and unstopped the bottle of blue liquor then poured herself a full three fingers in her tumbler. Ultimately, the Rihannsu woman was quite observant, so it hadn't escaped her notice that the unorthodox couple had been attempting to get her to come out of her carefully cultivated shell and talk about what had happened to her over the past month. And while she genuinely, if inexplicably, liked the two young women, her natural inclination was to not want to dive into her own feelings too deeply.

Of course, she also knew a solid technique for deadening such feelings and it was in the glass in front of her.

All this was running through her head as she downed the tumbler of Kali-Fal quickly. Noticiably quickly, in point of fact. As the liquor hit her throat, even the seasoned drinker hissed slightly and knitted her eyebrows as it went down harshly. "I shall let you two in on a galactic secret. Know that whole cultures will collapse if you reveal this to another living soul."

Speaking with a false air of intrigue, she leaned in and poured herself another glass. "Nobody actually enjoys Romulan Ale. As with at least one hard liquor in almost every culture, we start drinking it when we are younger... to prove we can." She gasped again as she slammed the next drink down just as quickly, outpacing even the ship's resident drunks.

The odd couple eyed one another at the display, then O'Dell spoke up, as the more vocal of the two, in a quiet voice. "Mum, ye dinna have to impress us. We know ye kin hold yuir liquor. We joost... we were worried about ye, and we're glad to see ye back is all. And we know ye dinna... er, ye dinna like people much, but ye put oop with us, so... we joost wanted to get ye oot was all, to relax and have a laugh or two. Have some of me good scotch and some of that sour stuff ye, well, okay, galactic secret and all, but we thought ye liked it."

"We joost wanted yuir company, to introduce ye to Minerva, and to get ye oot of... well, bein all by yuirself."

The small-statured sprite braced herself, because after enough liquor to drop an 18 stone grown man, the woman was likely to get defensive, as drunks do. Having grown up around them literally all her life, Fiona O'Dell understood drunks, so she was prepared for a defensive outburst, and prepared herself for it.

Looking at the empty glass, Jaeih refilled it with the caustic blue liquid and eyed it attentively. "Well, addendum. I suppose it's more accurate to say that we learn to like it. Or at least become... comfortable with it. But that's neither here nor there."

As it turned out, Jaeih Dox wasn't all that defensive of a drunk. She seemed to be a maudlin, introspective drunk, as she took a more measured sip of her drink. "But you're correct. I find I don't much like people. People are judgmental, backstabbing, agenda-driven creatures. They look upon others as means to their own ends, and think little of how that affects those they choose to manipulate. I know, we can smell our own."

"You two.... you're terrible at that. You wear your agendas on your proverbial sleeves and don't bother with those kinds of people. You hold them in open contempt, more often than not, in fact. Except for me. For some reason, you bother with me and it... confounds me." Jaeih never quite looked at them as she spoke, instead looking at her glass as she took another sip. "You really shouldn't. I am a horrible creature, in truth."

Holding Minnie, Gavarus looked legitimately confused as she knitted her eyebrows and looked over to Fiona, then back to Jaeih and blurted out, "Bullshit. Right Fee?"

There was a narrowing of the eyes, and a long few seconds of silence before the reply was put forth by the midget Mariposan. “Back home, me Aunt Danilla was a vurrah antisocial woman. Cross, stern, a sharp tongue in her head, and she was bitter over a man what loved and left her years agone. She’d nae suffer fools gladly, and she’d no time for frivolity. All she really craved was to be left alone, and so for the most part she was obliged.”

“On her deathbed, I took me turn, because I was wee and relegated to nursing when it was needed- women’s work. Aye, aye, I know, dinna judge me family,” O’Dell acknowledged the casual sexism even as she dismissed it. “When she woke, she spoke to me, and she opened up, after all those years, and she was honest with me. She told me the people who push everyone else away are the ones who want people to try harder, to prove to ‘em that they are still valued, that thir prickliness is easy to overcome if innyone bothered to try. She told me she regretted living alone, because it was a lonely life she’d chosen, and that she wished she’d nae worked s’hard to poosh everyone away.”

“There on her deathbed she made me swear I’d see such things and not stand for it. Briar here,” O’Dell paused to shoulder nudge her bosom buddy, “she’s like that. She pushes folks away before they can reject her, and she’s a bit like me old Auntie. But ye coulda given her lessons.” At that, the brave little Bringloidi took another sip of her whiskey to bolster her courage, and at a nod from Gavarus, she pressed on.

“Yuir smarter than most, ye dinna like most people… but ye dinna want to be alone. I dinna know how ye got here nor what yuir life has been like to get ye here, nor even what ye went through when ye were nae onboard the last month. But I know yuir nae a bad person," the daredevil damsel explained, shaking her mop of crimson curls. "Ye’ve had plenty of chance to get both of us drummed up on charges or at the least in trouble with the Lieutenant. But ye dinna. Because at least wi’ us ye know yuir in the company of fools, but we like yuir crabbiness and yuir sarcasm and yuir poor opinion of most, because we understand alla that.”

“Not likin yuirself we get- I mean, lookit us, we’re not normal by any measure, and we dinna fit in, e’en with our own kind. But we like each other joost fine, and we like ye too. So maybe dinna be so quick to call yuirself a horrible creature, mum. Because if ye are, that makes us worse, and we’re tryin’ ta be better. For the little one, aye?” Reaching over, O’Dell’s small pale hand delicately stroked the furry cheek of the suckling infant monster.

"In short, as me mate says, s'bullshit, mum." Leaning back in her seat a bit, O'Dell braced for whatever might come, partially hiding behind Gavarus and the baby.

Swirling her drink in her hand, Jaeih looked at the pair of miscreants that she was bizarrely fond of. She looked at the miniature minotaur still gripping her bottle tight and going to town on it, as babies were wont to do and thought about how clear it was just how in love with her those two were. And looking at that all, she felt a rush of shame over her own failures. Shame and fear, considering that she had three grandchildren on the way.

Part of her wanted to lash out, in truth. Tell the two women offering their hands in friendship of all the lives she had taken. All the blood on her hands. In just the last month, she had brutally killed 5 of her own people to try and resist capture and then escape it. But as she looked at their faces, she realized that while they might be irascible, they were also innocent and she refused to unburden herself at the cost of putting that burden on them.

"Trying to be better." Jaeih said as she sipped her drink, forcing out the slightest of smiles for their benefit. "That is what Mona... your chief... tells me I am trying to be. I do not know if I always agree with her. But I'd like to think there's some truth to it, if only because I don't think that dear woman is capable of lying."

"The chief don't lie. If SHE likes you and we like you and, heck, Minnie Moo here likes you cuz' she let you hold her without making a fuss... and that is a BIG deal if we told you some of the stories we got from the day we let daycare watch her.... then that... like... that frickin' means something, right?" Gavarus said, rocking the tiny tot gently as she finished her bottle, letting out a long and disturbingly deep burp as she did, followed by a string of gurgling giggles.

“Aye!” O’Dell added enthusiastically. “Ye may ha’been a lot of things. But what matters to us is the here and noow. And ye covered for us when we needed to move the Chief. Ye came oot with us for shenanigans. Yuir a rum sort, e’en if ye dinna believe it. And… okay, I’ll admit I am curious what happened and why yuir so… whativvir ye are after it. But that’s yuir tale, not ours. Us, we’re joost happy to have a night in the pub wi’ our friend again, and to introduce our wee sidekick, aye?” O’Dell bit off the end of the statement, partially because she was prepared for the tart-tongued old spy to deny it and try to rain on their parade.

In truth, while she was generally bold, Jaeih Dox scared O’Dell, for reasons she could not put her finger on, so she always tempered her brash nature a bit around the soon-to-be grandmother. But she worked at hiding it, because she had balked more than a few times with Gavarus until she’d learned how much it hurt the woman not to be trusted. So O’Dell was working on overcoming that tendency with people, and she liked the cranky old Romulan, who seemed much more morose than usual tonight.

"Your sidekick is appropriately adorable, and..." Jaeih took a moment and lightly rolled her eyes, "And I thank you... for your concern and your interest. I... appreciate it." The statement was terse and more than a little stiffly stated, but it was clear that saying so was a minor effort for the woman.

"Regarding this last month... much of the details are still classified. My daughter and I will need to be taken to Earth for debriefing with Starfleet intelligence where our... futures... will be determined." Jaeih leaned forward with a more hushed tone. "In truth, that was likely more than I should have said, but in truth, I also don't care as much. I cannot divulge the specifics of our... absence. I can tell you that you likely do not want to know those specifics even if I were at liberty to tell you."

“It’s alreet, mum. Ye dinna have ta tell us. We’re joost glad to see ye back, aye?” O’Dell leaned back in and smiled, a genuine expression from a woman whose life was spent being just that. In both their cases, the misfits of the R&D department were nothing if not genuine, to the point of hindering their careers. “So, I hear tell that MacNeille’s got herself a beau, hmm? So who do ye figure is putting it to the brown-noser?”

Taking a sip, and barely taking a moment to think, the intel agent with the eidetic memory replied flatly over her drink. "Jones, is his name. Ignatious Jones... science department."

"THAT Asshole!?! What the @#$%!!" Gavarus yelled a little louder with a shocked look on his face. "He tried hitting on Fee a few months ago and... wait, how the hell do you know that?"

Refilling her tumbler and taking another pretzel, Jaeih raised an eyebrow and grinned like a cat with a canary in her maw. "I'm an intelligence operative and I tend to hover around my daughter's department for lunch with either her or Mona. Not that I heard that from my Daughter-in-Law or anything while we were catching up earlier, nor did you hear it from me."

“I'll be damned. Our lips’re sealed, outside this table and in our quarters,” O’Dell agreed easily. “So what other stylish gossip have ye got, She Who Was Off The Ship For A Month yet Allays Seems To Know More Than us?”

Taking another drink, Jaeih put her glass down and pondered for a second. Then, she reached over and gently gestured for little Minnie. Hesitantly, but a little less so this time, Gavarus handed the gurgling baby over to their unexpected drinking buddy. 

Cradling the furry newborn in her arms and looking down at her, Jaeih thought long about the future. Her future, their future, her grandchildren on the way, and decided that she wanted that future to be a better one. And a part of that was being a better woman herself. "Well... I do have a good degree of catching up to do, but when I was in sickbay getting cleared to come back aboard, there was a nurse... a Lurian woman who would not stop talking that mentioned that you, Miss Gavarus, had vomited inside a space suit after suffering a bout of radiation sickness?"

Raising her eyebrow at the portly porcine engineer, who blushed slightly as she took a swig of Whiskey and chuckled nervously. "Well... we were racing after you and the engines were fit to blow up the Captain had us pushing them so hard. So Me, Whatshisface... the Vulcan dude... Mister Commander Thunder-Rack, and the chief engineer were trying to keep it in one piece. So..."

As Gavarus unfolded and relayed her story, there was a legitimate smile on the Romulan woman's face as she cradled a small piece of the future in her arms. relaxing despite herself, she chatted and mocked and chuckled with her unusual, unexpected friends.

In all, she reflected, it was very good to be home.