Just Friends.

Posted on 22 Jul 2021 @ 6:43pm by Lieutenant Commander Gemma Alexander & Lieutenant Parker Voss

1,366 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: Extinction
Location: Mess Hall
Timeline: Mission Day 16 at 1200

Having just finished his latest shift, and training for the SAR team, Voss headed towards the mess hall to get something to eat. After getting something, he planned on returning to his quarters and stay in the sonic shower for awhile to take care of the aches and pains he received while training.

He walked in, got a sandwich and a drink, turned to find an empty table, when he saw Alexander sitting, alone at a table. He walked over.

Gemma glanced up from the PADD she was reading, cooling tea at her elbow. "Lieutenant Voss." She greeted with a polite but genuine smile as she tended to be a friendly sort unless someone required otherwise.

"May I join you, commander?" indicating an empty chair to her right.

"Please do." The Squadron Commander replied politely and waved at the chair, placing the PADD down. "How goes the settling in?"

"My quarters are sparse...I never take much with me when I move to a new ship. Engineering is doing nicely, thank you. Finally getting the names of my staff down. Training for the SAR is taking a lot of my spare time...and I never seem to have enough spare time to spare." He laughed a little at his little joke. "How goes things with you?"

"SAR? That stuff is no joke I heard." Alexander replied, "So you decided your schedule wasn't full enough and sleep was for the weak?" She joked. She heard about what kind of training they did, she had her hands full with focusing on her own work but the thought occurred that maybe a small refresher would be good in case of a crash. She made a note on her PADD to look into that as she replied, "I'm good. I actually get to see my quarters on a somewhat regular basis."

He sat in the empty chair. "Seems our good security chief decided that I would be a good fit for her SAR team, so how could I say no?" He sipped his drink. "I've been doing some mountain climbing in the holodeck, trying to qualify for the team.....one good thing, I haven't been in shape like this before." He smiled. "So...you’re a fighter pilot. Must be exciting flying one of those fighters."

"It is a good time." Gemma agreed, "Not always exciting but any flight you come back from is a good flight so I never pass up a chance to get in the air. Downside is unlike old atmospherics you can't feel the wind in your hair. Also not recommended to open your canopy. And believe it or not, I do have to tell several pilots a year that an EVA suit with magnetic boots still doesn't mean they can ride on top of a Gryphon at sublight." She replied amused.

He looked at her. "I would think doing something like that would be vigorously frown upon." He leaned forward towards her. "I think we should find a way to have our departments work together...never know when you might need a spare engineer or two on the flight deck."

"It Rather is. Frowned upon I mean." The Commander replied, "I'm mostly sure they are joking but one gets the feeling if permission was ever actually given there'd be a line of pilots wanting to try it." She smiled again, something one could get the impression she did often and easily, "I'm always game for extra support." She replied, refreshing her tea. "Did you have a chance to review that data about emergency planning? That’s something we could really use help on."

"It might be sitting on a desk, along with a lot of other things I'm supposed to read. I probably need an assistant to help go through the things on my desk." he replied. "Give me the short version, please." He kept looking at her, seeing how beautiful she was.

Gemma thought about it, a bit a annoyed but to be fair she didn’t know his full workload, an old supervisor called it ‘competing priorities’ so she gave the benefit of the doubt, "I feel your pain, I make room on my desk only for my yeoman to drop more paperwork but it really does explain our department needs pretty well so I would strongly encourage you review as soon as possible. Let's see..."

She paused considering how to condense the multipage report, "In essence how to get critical systems repaired when we are cut off from outside access and/or coms are down. We've got some work arounds and adjustments because of previous experience but if there's something we missed or a more elegant solution I'm all ears."

"Makes sense. I already have my people getting used to me and what they do. Maybe the answer is to train people to do emergency repairs in the event of a disaster. I can request additional staff to cover this team." Still leaning closely and asked... "So tell me...what do you do for fun on the ship?"

Alexander blinked at the sudden change in topic, as her dad would say, 'there was more meat on that bone'. Still unless she wanted to rehash the report in full, there wasn’t much more to add she supposed. So she rolled with the changes in topic. "First off, I'm sure there'll be other aspects we can do. Once you read the emergency document I sent think you'll have a better understanding of where gaps might be and we can go from there.”

Then she continued with, “ Ok, changing gears." she said leaning back to consider the second part and decided to answer in more general terms. "You're looking at it." She gestured to the lounge, "Or there's the holodeck, card games. I think someone formed a holodeck hiking club awhile back, someone from science is running a theater group. Sort of depends on your interest."

"My interest is meeting lovely ladies and having dinner with them."

Gemma blinked and her mouth quirked in a suppressed smile. She couldn’t quite believe he just said that, "I see." She replied after a moment, "Well I don't believe there are any clubs on ship that focus on quite that area of interest."

Parker smiled at her. "Maybe no one has thought of starting a club like that. So I guess I will be the sole member, for the moment." He took a sip of his drink. "May I suggest a quiet dinner, and we discuss the document in detail."

Alexander barely stifled a laugh, she'd seen smoother. "That's a working lunch at best and it would help if you read it first."

He smiled at her. "Ouch! Shot down in flames." Parker paused. "How about then just a quiet dinner?"

"At least that's honest and I can appreciate honest." Gemma replied, "And along those lines" She paused considering the wording, no need to be cruel about it. "I'm not inclined to date seriously at the moment. This..." She waved about, "Is about as quiet as it gets for me lately. Pulling extra g's with new training patterns, incorporating new crew, reviewing the latest on pirate activity." She shrugged, "Best I can do is just friends.” Her voice was firm on this point, “As a friend I gotta tell you if you want to date on this ship you gotta bring your A game because we got some smooth ones here already." Her tone was not mocking more like trying to gently pass on useful advice.

"Thank you for being honest. I would like us to be friends. You need someone to vent your frustration, I'm okay with that." He leaned back in his chair. "And to let you know...I got game." He winked at her.

At this point Alexander did laugh, he didn’t lack for confidence that was for sure. “Yeah alright.” She said after a moment attempting to keep the lack of belief from her tone and not quite succeeding. “Well, I need to be off, my tea is cold and my break is over.” She stood picking up her PADD. "I'll see you around." She ended in parting before heading out.

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