25% Social Call

Posted on Fri Feb 23rd, 2024 @ 11:39pm by Crewman Adelaide Kirkby & Consul Andrinn Orin & Lieutenant JG Miraj Derani

Mission: Season 6: Episode 4: Memory Lane
Location: Crewman Adelaide Kirkby's Quarters
Timeline: Following "The Brig 3"
2288 words - 4.6 OF Standard Post Measure

[ON:]

Adelaide was happy to be home and in her quarters. Not much to look at these days. Most of her personal effects were piles of trash when she returned from the ice planet so many months ago now. Luckily, she wasn't attached to the lot of them or she would have cried. She comforted herself that her Mr. Peanut statue had been recycled and perhaps turned into a bandage? A piece of clothing for a wee child? A cuppa coffee for someone?

She stood in front of the replicator and asked for some tea, "Lassen black tea. Hot." And like magic the hot tea in a nice ass blue and white mug appeared. She took the tea and padded over to the couch. Miraj should be back by now from her appointment with the Commodore. Adele sat down on the couch and gently sat back into the sunken cushions. It was like having your bum hugged by a poofy couch monster. She wasn't particularly sore anywhere. And yet she still had a strange "buzzing" feeling all over. She took a smell of the tea. It had a rich, dark hue to it inside the white interior of her mug. The fragrance was like jasmine and honeysuckle. She took a sip. It was marvelous. She was just relaxing when the door chimed. ~Ah, that'll be Miraj~ she thought.

She got up and went to the door. Out of an abundance of caution, the door was programmed to deny entry and remain locked until she approved entry. "Who is it?" she asked.

"Its me," Miraj called out. "And the usual +1, but he can stay outside."

Adele opened the door and looked at Miraj. One look and she could tell that the meeting with the Commodore had been distressing. "Come on in. He can come in too. I'm just having a cuppa. Won't you join me?" she asked politely as they entered.

She was about to close the door whenshe noticed that the ship's Chief Diplomatic Officer, Consul Andrinn Orin had rounded the corner and was approaching her way. She smiled at him, "Andrinn, please come in. It has to be five o'clock somewhere" she said as she genuinely and warmly welcomed him.

With Andrinn stepping inside she said, "Make that plus two. Security Officer Igor...I can't pronounce your last name...is Miraj's escort. She looked at Igor and made a sad face, "You must be so bored?" Adele stood by the replicator ready to fulfill any requests.

"I get plenty of reading time," Igor said with a smile. "I will Have raktajino, please"

Miraj held up a bottle. Something a dark caramel colour sloshed inside it. "And I brought something fun. Its the only bottle that survived, but I figured now was good a time as any."

Orin said, "I'm surprised that you managed to get that thing out of the mess hall and off that deck, especially with Avalon slowly getting her strength back up and running. You're seriously a magician or something," Orin said with a small chuckle, remembering how they walked past over a dozen officers that were taking a meal break down in the mess hall.

"Oh no, this is my private stash. I picked up some from this living history plantation in Jamaica last time we were at Earth. But the others all got smashed in the, you know."

Adele was very happy the four of them were together and she smiled knowingly at the bottle of booze. Eager to taste the contents. First things first though, she spoke to the replicator and said with a thrilling roll of her Rrr's, she is from Costa Rica after all, "RRRRrrrraktajino!" Raktajino's only came in on size, large and they only came hot. Definitely plus points for the Klingons and replicator programming engineers. Th hot, steamy, spicy drink materalized. While the computer did that, Adele got four shot glasses with one hand and Igor's raktajino with the other.

She handed off the raktajino to Igor, set the shot glasses down on the coffee table and came around to Andrinn, "I'm having tea and whatever it is that Miraj brought. What can I get for you and Orin to drink?"

"I'll just take a thing of Rigellian Tea, if you've got any or can replicate it?" Orin replied, not wanting to be bothersome or annoying by any stretch of the imagination.

"Mmm! Good choice. That'll be my next cuppa too" she said as she went to the replicator and asked for his tea. Rigellian tea was always served in an ornate metal teapot. It came with an ample handtowel and a bone china mug with terran rabic influences etched into the blue and white china. She set it before him and poured the first cup for him saying, "I'll just get this started for you" and she poured from the metal teapot an aromatic, dark tea. She set the teapot down, "It's good to see you. Thank you for coming by, even if you are somewhat unexpected?"

Adele sat back down and took a sip of tea. It had cooled some but it was still hot. She wondered where to start. She wanted to know how things went with the Commodore meeting. And she suspected that this is why Miraj brought the bottle of fine drinkage. But, she didn't want to put her on the spot. She might not want to air out how she really felt in front of the CDO and her Security escort. It would be safer to start with Consul Orin because she wasn't even expecting him to stop by. Of course she could guess why. Andrinn was such a dear heart. She decided by the end of her sip of tea to split the difference and cut it down the middle. Acknowledge the meeting that Miraj had and focus on Andrinn first. She swallowed the delicious tea, lining up the shot glasses as she did so and said, "I want to hear all about your one-on-one meeting with the Commodore today, Miraj. But first, Consul Orin? I can guess why you're here; but I'd rather you tell me."

Andrinn shrugged his shoulders and lowered his head a little bit before responding, "Well, I know Sam is the one that hurt you. I just wanted to offer up the olive branch and say that he's sorry, it wasn't him. Whatever you need from the both of us because I know Sam's not the kind of person to harm a fly, you know?" Andrinn was rambling a little bit, but it came from a place of not knowing or wanting to be more burdensome than he already was.

Adelaide was quiet a moment, reflecting on what Andrinn was saying. She took an inward breath and said, "I know. But. I saw the look in his eyes. They were....so vacant and so empty. Not the usual man that I know him to be. It is a little bit hard to talk about. I'm sure you understand? What's so strange is that the wound, while painful as hell, isn't in a spot that could really have hurt me. I mean, it did and it does, but it missed anything mortal. That's not to say that...well...I'm just glad the doctors were there to help. I can see this is difficult. I don't know what I'm feeling right now. I'm confused, I'm a little bit scared" she took a sip, "I just need some time. To process what happened."

She set her teacup down and said, "I know it wasn't him. Not really. But then what? You know? And I feel awful that I even suggested that it might have been Sam that hurt Miraj. Igor set me straight on that. Oh! Its all too terrible to think about. I don't want you to worry. I'm fine. And I'm not angry at him. For now, I know that much for sure. When you see him, let him know that I am looking foward to seeing him. And there are no charges being filed. Not by me. OK?" she smiled warmly and forgiving.

Orin wasn't sure what to say either, but he knew that something was taking control of Sam when he did what he did. He looked at Adelaide and said, "That's what we've got to figure out before it gets out to more people than just Sam. I know that it probably has to do something with the whole nightmare things, but we can't be sure yet until we get our teams down to the planet. But, how are the wounds healing up and is there anything that I can do for you?"

Adele looked at Miraj who had been quietly seated, "Miraj Derani has been keeping me company. She has a unique perspective on being attacked I think" she said as she sipped her tead and pulled her legs a bit closer on the couch. "Are they any closer to finding any leads on who attacked you?"

"Yeah, I'm a bit curious myself because that's not right you were harmed either," Orin said, a bit curious himself.

Miraj unscrewed the top from the bottle of rum and filled the shot glasses. "All a bit of a dead end really. I can't remember a damn thing, and there's no other evidence." She was carefully not looking at her shadow. "Between the level of traffic, and the cold, everything's meaningless."

"Not to us. I don't know about Adelaide, Sam, or the rest of the crew, but I've seen way too much hatred over my many lifetimes. So, when I see senseless hate like what you experienced, it's not meaningless. You deserve better," Orin replied, wishing that he could do more for Miraj. He knew that he had to let the investigation team do their jobs, but it was hard when Orin knew that there wasn't much evidence to go off of at the moment.

Adele held her shot glass a moment before taking the swig. It was a scintilating shot of some brown liquid. It reminded Adele of a rum or a whiskey. It instantly cleared her sinuses and her tongue came alive. She swallowed it and down the hatch it went. As it shot down her throat she was imagining a photon torpedo being fired out of a photon tube. When it landed it her tummy 'KA-BOOM!' she imagined in a cartoon like action. She tried not to let the tears flow and so she momentarily bowed her head and shut her eyes tight as the liquid torpedo destroyed her insides. She closed her eyes and listened.

"It can't be helped. They're doing their best, I'm sure." She grabbed a shot of her rum and downed it. "Anyway. Lets talk about something else. How was the wedding planning going. Before all this, anyway?"

Adele lifted her head and watched as Miraj downed the drinky-poo. Seeing no ill effects could only count her lucky stars as she gingerly replaced the shot glass back on the table. She took a soft breath in and reached for her tea. Her insides felt like they were melting but she tried not to let on.

"It was actually going fairly well. Sam and I had talked about several ideas about where and when we'd like to have the wedding. Since we don't know when we're going to get back to our own galaxy, we talked about several ideas that involved some of the crew and stuff. But, nothing quite yet set in stone because of everything that happened and our current location in space," Orin replied, pouring himself a shot and taking it down like it was water.

Adele watched as another shot glass was poured into Andrin's mouth and down it went. She could feel the hot, molten remnants of her guts now being volcanoed up her body. As if she were being dipped into a hot bath. She took a drink of tea; and it felt like the water in the tea was being vaporized and she had steam coming out her ears. Adele said, "Yes...he...last time I spoke with him was in the MXO's office. Ahem! And he seemed very, very happy. I think, after a bit, I'd like to help you out. Help you plan or get things ready OK Andrinn?"

"Yeah, once everything is figured out, I'd love for someone else to help plan out the wedding. This is the first time in a while that I've been married, if ever truly married. So, I'd love to have another person giving ideas besides just myself," Orin replied, a smile forming across his face for a brief moment.

Adele turned her attention to Miraj, "How did your meeting go with Commodore Lawlor-Richardson? I don't see any scars on you; so not too bad I hope?"

"No big deal. She was talking to everyone. Could have been worse." Miraj chased that comment with a shot that was in danger of overflowing the glass.

Adele asked, "Well, can you talk about it? What did she want?"

Miraj looked down, weighing her need to vent her frustrations over the presence of CPO Zakharov and Andrinn. "She's just checking in."

"Well, if there's anything you ever need from me, just let me know," Orin replied, taking another gulp of the liquor that was brought in.

Adelaide could read between the lines as surely Andrinn could as well. And she decided not to press. "We can talk about it later if you like?" she said as she smiked at Miraj. Well. I have an idea. Is anyone a bit peckish? We could make dinner right here. Make the most of our time together?"

[OFF:]