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Post by aoibheni on Jun 3, 2018 13:44:12 GMT
“Twenty… twenty one… twenty two… twenty three… twenty four… twenty five…” Winston stopped counting, and turned his neck, cracking something in his shoulder. He grunted with grim satisfaction before returning to the task at hand. “One… two…-” “Hey, Winston…” “Four…” “Can you try doing that in your head for a while?” “Six… Seven…” “Kinda hard to think when you’re-” “Ten…” Danann lay on her back on her small bunk and sighed, “...yea, exactly.” Winston looked up from his exercise, his face shining. “Almost done” he said rapidly on an inbreath, “… twelve...” “It’s just…” “Fourteen… fifteen…” “I’ve got, like, whoa… on my mind and this counting isn’t helping... I could order you, but that hardly seems cool, yannow?” He grunted in acquiescence, shook his sweating head and pressed on in silence. ”Thanks,” she sighed, resting her hands under her head. Silence occupied the free space between their cell forcefields for all of five seconds. “It’s just…” she said, “Rome apparently had, like, a son, or… something. I dunno. Daniella Perez…? It seems weird that I’d not know about her. I was his Ex Oh for god sake.” “I’m… yours…” Winston reminded her, between press ups. “Didn’t know... ‘bout Sara… twenty two… twenty three… til that message came in...” “Touché, smartass.” “Twenty five…” Winston sighed and pulled himself into a long, loud, moaning stretch. He pulled his light shirt off to cool down and mopped his brow with it. Tossing it in the corner he gazed over at her. “Why do you care? You don’t know this guy.”
“I know,” she replied, her voice inflecting it like a question, “but… now I wanna? You know?” There’s a Rome on board, Carrick... I wanna see if he looks like the Captain, I guess,” she admitted, knowing deep down what she really wanted to know was if anything of her old mentor lived on in this young pilot. She wanted to see him, and find comfort in a familiar walk, or shrug, or tone of voice.
She was desperate to search for any hint of the man she had admired and followed almost to the very end.
She longed to see peace and confidence on a face whose final, fearful, grim expression was seared into her mind forever. She wanted her grief at his death - a death that had done much to precipitate her current life choices - to be soothed. She wanted to say she missed him. That she owed so much to him. That she loved him like a father and needed him like a friend.
She’d never had the opportunity to do that in his lifetime and she felt the loss of that deeply.
“...It’d be nice to see if there’s anything I can tell him about The Captain he mightn’t know...” she added, hoping that would explain the red flush she felt overtaking her freckled cheeks and the sudden, strained timbre of her voice. “Maybe just I’m being an idiot.”
“Sounds like he was one of the good ones,” her XO observed. She couldn’t make eye contact with him. She couldn’t show him, or anyone, the desperation on her face that had come with this stark reminder of the past.
“My Mam had a saying…” she said, forcing herself to think past her sad thoughts, “'Never trust a good man…'”
“'Trust a thief to steal from you,” she'd say, “...trust a thug to strike you, trust a conman to cheat you out of everything you have'… at least they’re honest. At least you know what you’re getting with them. You can hide your latinum, hide the bruises, con them right back...” She laughed at the odd logic of it all, blinking back unshed tears. “At the very least... you can brace yourself, protect yourself a little. But a good man… a good man will hurt you more deeply than any of the others because you won’t be expecting the pain…”
She paused in sombre thought. “Yea, he really was one of the good ones..."
"Starfleet...” she added, her voice thick with emotion, “...is full of good men.”
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Post by Einar on Jun 4, 2018 10:09:45 GMT
that last bit is just amazing, great log A
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Post by aoibheni on Jun 4, 2018 12:17:20 GMT
Thanks, E. Hey, you remember that log way back when Rome met a young Danann and her mother? I've had that last bit in my head since then.
So glad I finally found a place for it
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Jun 4, 2018 18:52:27 GMT
I enjoyed that one!
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Post by aoibheni on Jun 9, 2018 17:49:46 GMT
In The Heat of Battle with Einar as SFI Commander Tony Adalberto
---
Holy shit holy shit holy shit! Danann thought as all around her descended into a dervish of noise and motion. The staccato of battle. The heady, heart-thumping drumbeat of war.
“Redirect power from manoeuvring thrusters to main impulse!” she ordered, as all those years of Starfleet training immediately kicked in. Her shoulders squared inside her targ-skin jacket, her voice lost its recent laconic flippancy. The sneer that had so recently twisted her lip melted away in an instant.
She was aware, of course, that she was sitting on the bridge of the very starship that had relentlessly hunted her thieving ass down only two days previously, and that she was mere inches from the man she'd loved and lost repeatedly; that she was under the nominal command of the phenomenal woman who's love had helped her heal; and that she was engaged in combat against her former - no, she hadn't quit exactly… she had plans in that regard - against her current colleagues in a stolen Sovereign Class starship.
It was, understandably, all too much to take in right now. So she compartmentalised.
“Oseth is all offence, Sara,” she called across the bridge, “get him on the run and he'll make a mistake!” May as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb, right?
An alarm on her Engineering console snapped her attention back to the screen flashing a multitude of warnings. Impulse engines were gasping for more power as the Chiron’s pilot pushed them to their limit.
She slammed the heel of her hand on a flashing section of her main screen. “Bridge to Impulse Control! Do you read?” “Sorry, who is this?” came back a terse reply, the voice obscured a little by the cacophony of a battle-ready Engine Room. The sound was all too familiar to her. “Where's Tony?!” Despite the edge of fear and panic in the voice, Niamh recognised the owner immediately.
“Good to hear you’re still kicking, Mac. It’s Capt- Comman-…” she grit her teeth, what the fuck even was she anymore? “...It’s Niamh Danann. I'm lending the bridge crew a hand.” “Oh… uh...Sure…!” came back an uncomfortable reply after a short, rumbling delay. “We, uh… we have a few blown relays, ma'am… Can't get to your order immediately.. uh... stand by!” Danann's eyes widened as she searched her console's display. No blown relays were registering on her screen. She glanced forward at the conn, over Tony's tense shoulders, seeing the determined set in the posture of their young pilot, and momentarily lamented the fact that she wasn't up there, herself.
A female voice from behind her sliced through her pensive moment. “Tony, make sure we've got more power to the shields so we don't get banged up by Eos' debris,” the Andorian First Officer called out and Danann saw Tony immediately swing into action, his hands moving over the shield controls, expertly transferring power from one subsystem to another, keeping the damaged shield emitters operating.
Niamh was struck by the difference in Tony's demeanour in that moment. Where before he'd seemed downtrodden, weak, and easily dominated, now she saw the man she'd known back when the Tzenkethi had been rattling their sabres at the gates. This, she realized was the man she'd fallen for. Driven, brave, focused, and strong.
At the moment of their reunion, she'd had the lion’s share of power. She'd immediately picked up on his nerves and had used that against him. But now, with both of them working side by side, sharing a considerable burden, things appeared more equal, stable, positive.
She found it hard not to dwell on how good that felt. How right it seemed.
“Sir!” Tony called back to the Andorian, “we've lost almost half our shield emitters on the port side of the main hull, I can get you 70% at best on our port. I recommend we keep the enemy on our starboard at all times.”
“Cmon, Mac”, Niamh muttered impatiently, suddenly struck by the familiarity with which the First Officer had addressed ‘Tony’. She wasn't sure she liked that. She wasn’t sure what she’d picked up on, but it made her uncomfortable.
On Tony's console appeared a short line of text from Main Engineering. “Danann on bridge?! Confirm OK.” It was Mac, checking in. Niamh smirked, wondering what sort of dramatic, mid-battle bridge take-over attempt Mac was imagining that might involve increasing the efficiency of the impulse engines.
Tony glanced down, his brow furrowed. His relationship with Mac had been less than amicable after she had visited him in prison, to tell him about Vicky´s death. He typed in a short reply, the long talk would have to wait “Confirmed, authorized”
“Transferring power now!” Mac’s voice chirped into Niamh's ear mere moments later, the blown relays seemingly fixed as if by magic. Danann nodded with satisfaction. She shrugged off her heavy jacket and rubbed her open palms together. Now they were cooking.
“All right Mac, that’s looking good.”
The ship shuddered as the conn suddenly found itself with more power. “The manifold can't handle full impulse at this particulate density. I uh… pressure’s at 107% in the starboard reactor.” Mac’s voice sounded strained.
Danann bit her bottom lip in thought. “...How about the port?” “It's running hot, too.”
“Ok… increase plasma flow to both nacelles. That should purge it.” “But we won't be able to achieve warp then!”
Danann looked sidelong at Tony. This was the kind of decision she’d have made without a second thought while wearing a Starfleet uniform, but now… now…
She tensed her jaw and decided that until she eventually got kicked off this bridge, her visible allegiances didn’t matter. The lack of a Starfleet insignia on her chest was a moot point, being out of uniform wasn’t important, the Celtic serpent tattooed in a languid coil down the length of her right forearm wasn’t a blatant statement of piratical intent.
“We won't be warping in that soup anyway, Mac, we’d be spitting in the dark... and who knows what reaction we might set off if we even attempted it.”
She paused, leaning back for a moment, checking Tony’s console for details of the damage the Chiron had sustained when it attempted the Picard Manoeuvre. “Hell, we warped out here in clear space, and look at the drone sized hole we got for our troubles! No way we're risking that in the Badlands, trust me.”
There was no answer from Engineering.
“Do it, Mac! Now!” Tony interjected, raising his voice above the din. “OK, ok… Aye!”
"You good?" He asked, not taking his eyes off the console. Danann frowned. "If Mac were Maquis I'd be in the right to knock her flat by now..." But still, she breathed an audible sigh of relief as several readings transitioned from blazing red, to orange, to yellow. Once she was sure that the super heated warp plasma had seared the impulse reactors clear, she shut it down.
She reached out to check the stability of the torque buffers after all that shaking earlier. The console denied her access with a loud squawk.
Tony seemed to sigh and leaned across her console, inputting his command codes to fully unlock the terminal. She reacted before she could think, her arms raising, her body jolting out of his way. The shock of having him suddenly so close sent a flush of pink across her cheeks.
"Full access.” He said as he looked back at her over his black-clad shoulder.
She was noticing a lot more about him this time round. In the interrogation room, she had been all adrenaline and bluster, taking in very little. Now, other hormones had grabbed the wheel and her attention was drawn to how much the greying at his temples actually suited him, how his face seemed less drawn than it had been the day before, ...still wearing that cologne… she noted as he straightened. She breathed in deep through her nose.
“Don't make me regret this," he added. She looked over at him, his brown eyes seeming to draw her in. Afraid that her disquiet was as obvious as it felt, she quipped before she had time to think. "You’ve a lot of things to regret, Tony, but this won’t be one of them." Tony seemed to ponder her words before seemingly nodding in agreement and withdrawing from her space once more.
“I mean, I...” she stuttered, cursing herself. But now wasn't the time for that conversation, and as her console once more screamed for her attention, she found herself hoping beyond hope that they'd both survive to have it.
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Rascal
Lore Committee
Posts: 120
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Post by Rascal on Jun 10, 2018 10:05:05 GMT
Wow! Action! Float... Action! Float... awesome pacing and tension on multiple levels!
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Post by aoibheni on Jun 10, 2018 18:38:14 GMT
Thanks, G! When do we get another Trev log, by the way?
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Post by aoibheni on Jun 18, 2018 16:09:50 GMT
Stardate 11806.13
[With Annie as CMO Evans.]
Everyone was just putting out fires. Some literal and others, such as in sickbay, more figurative. Between the Captain’s emergency surgery and influx of patients from the battle the sickbay had been fairly overwhelmed. With the Captain now moved into recovery, Penny picked her way across the room to where Dr. Rand was standing looking at some readings, “Did you treat Captain Danann while you were on the bridge?”
He shot her an irritated glance, “No, she refused to come to sickbay. I think I mentioned that to you already Evans.”
Penny took a deep breath and counted to five, an argument with Declan right now was a waste of her energy. “You have the sickbay,” she said as she headed out the door, grabbing a medkit on her way out. The faint smell of smoke hung in the air, she assumed a console exploded somewhere along the corridor. As she reached the turbolift the door opened and a couple engineers rushed off and down the hallway behind her. She stepped on and gave it her destination, riding it the short trip before exiting onto the bridge.
The bridge was comparable to sickbay in terms of activity. They were trying to coordinate the massive task of getting the ship flying again. She quickly located Danann, studying her as she approached. The woman looked pale and clammy, Penny suspected she was still suffering dizziness and disorientation.
The doctor stopped next to the station she was occupying and knelt down to scan her, then looked up again, “You need to come to sickbay now.”
“Right…” Danann said, addressing a tiny head visible on her console, “let's get that coil assembly patched up next. Those micro fractures won't heal themselves.” She kept her eyes dead ahead, though something in her manner told Evans she'd finally decided to notice her. “Kinda busy, doc,” she said softly. She raised her voice again as her fingers tapped her console “I need an update on that hull breach in five.”
Penny was beginning to wonder if being stubborn was the defining feature of people who Captain ships. “This isn’t a request, the swelling hasn’t gone down, if it gets worse your brain cells could be starved of oxygen, you need to come to sickbay.” Something told her it would have been easier to argue with Declan.
Niamh held on to the edge of her workstation with one, shaking hand. The other, she stretched out and jabbed at a control, reducing the light coming off her console. She sighed involuntarily and refreshed her view of the EPS grid. “What's the worst thing that could happen to me in the next…” she closed her eyes and braced herself against some invisible force, “fifteen minutes, doc.”
Penny glanced up as another engineer passed by on their way off the bridge to do something she was sure was over her head, “I don’t intend to find out. The Zorya has provided assistance, we aren’t in this alone. They can spare you. ” Digging into her bag she pulled out and loaded a hypo with Dexalin and reached up to administer it, explaining as she did, “You’re probably already suffering from mild oxygen deprivation.”
“Not the first time,” she replied, allowing herself to be medicated. “You grow up on shitty Orion stations…” she said, her jaw tense, “... you get used life support malfunctions… How's Sara?” she added, trying to make the question sound casual.
“Funny, she asked me the same thing about you before going under sedation,” Penny replied, though the look on her face was anything but amusement. She rubbed her sore neck, “Why don’t you just come down to sickbay and you can see how she’s doing for yourself?”
Rerouting power to essential systems while her engineers replaced the multitude of blown relays shipwide, Danann spoke, “Look, I get what you're trying to do here, but I'm not leaving this brijj-” she slurred slightly, “bridge… until I'm damn sure this ship and her Captain are sh- sh-” she paused, licked her dry lips and collected herself, speaking slowly and more deliberately, like it was taking more effort than it should, “safe… and out of harm's way.” She turned finally, her face wan and her pupils large and stark against the green of her irises. “I'm not abandoning my post… not ag- not ag-... ” surprise flashed across her weak face as she found herself unable to put her thoughts into words.
“Oh god,” Penny exhaled the words, concern lining her brow. “ I don’t have time for this,” she rocked back on her heels and craned her neck so she could see around Niamh to the ops station.
“Lieutenant Terell, I need a site to site to sickbay!” she called out across the bridge and Rebecca looked over her shoulder, giving her an understanding nod before turning back to her console.
Leaning forward once again she said as they started to transport, “Someone else can take over, this can’t wait any longer.”
Niamh stared at Evans quizzically as they both disappeared from the bridge.
Rematerializing moments later, Danann slumped and her right leg folded instantly under her weight. She was unconscious before she tumbled toward the ground.
Penny had barely materialized before she caught sight of Niamh going down out of the corner of her eye. Barely catching her before she hit the floor, she stood awkwardly half bent over trying to support the other woman at an odd angle with those immediately around looking on, wide eyed. “Help!” Penny cried out to them with irritation.
It seemed to do the trick and the two nearest staff members, rushed over to help her lift Danann and lay her on the nearest biobed. “Get me ice packs, we need to lower her temperature see if we can get the swelling down!” One of the two who helped her, a nurse darted off to get them and Penny called over her shoulder, “And get me a dose of Norep, I need her awake!”
She initiated a scan from the overhead cluster and watched the readings scroll across anxiously. The swelling hadn’t gone down, but it hadn’t gotten worse either. That was good. Or at least it could be much worse. She positioned a stationary osteotractor over Niamh’s head, the semicircular device connecting to the biobed. As she initiated it the nurse reappeared and began putting the ice packs around Danann’s body after handing Penny the medicine she requested. The doctor loaded the Norep into the hypo and once again pressed it to her neck, hearing the tell tale hiss as it passed into her blood stream. The hum and glow from the osteatractor died down and Penny checked to confirm the fracture was mended, but her eyes nervously returned to the vitals, “Come on, come on…”
“-nng” Danann grumbled, an indignant tone to her protest. Her eyes flickered open, snapped shut and remained like that. “Ugh” she added, for clarification of her feelings. As consciousness began to slowly seep back into her bones, she grimaced. Everything hurt and felt numb in a bizarrely equal measure. Her fingers twitched and she groaned. They didn’t feel like her hands. Her entire body felt wrong, distant, alien. “Wh-” she asked as she chanced opening one, squinting eye. It was then, as she attempted to shade her eyes with her hand, that she realised she wasn’t able to move her upper body. Panic set in in an instant.
A flood of relief washed over Evans as she heard Niamh waking. She placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder, “Relax, it’s alright.” Penny drew a shaky breath and said again, more for herself this time, “It’s alright.” It was still too soon to tell if lowering her body temperature would bring down the swelling, but at least she was awake. They would know soon enough. As she reached out to disengage the osteotractor, she realized her hand was shaking. She clenched her hand into a fist for a moment and relaxed it again once she felt steadied before removing the osteotractor. She couldn’t afford to let everything get to her. Not now.
The nurse was still there next to her, “Let’s get her on a poly-nutrient solution, she’s hasn’t been getting the nourishment she needs.” Leaning over she looked into Danann’s green eyes, checking the pupils, hoping the Dexalin she gave her earlier was counteracting the oxygen deprivation. “How are you feeling?” Penny wanted to see if she was a bit more lucid than she had seemed just before she beamed to sickbay.
Danann covered her eyes with her hand and groaned as she turned on the biobed. Everything hurt. Everything felt slow. She just wanted to sleep. Why were these people waking her? Why, were they talking jibberish?!
She winced and hissed in pain as her fingers connected with the site of her head trauma, and suddenly she remembered what had happened to her on the bridge. As she lifted her hand up to examine the half-dried blood now coating the tips of her fingers, she realised where she was, and why.
“Ugh…” she complained.
“Welcome back,” the doctor said, gently pulling Danann’s hands away from her face and raising her own. “How many fingers?” Danann squinted. “I can’t count them…” she protested, “they’re all…blurry.” Evans accepted that, for now. At least her speech centre seemed to be mending. “How are feeling?”
“I feel like I've gone... ten rounds with a… uh…” she fell silent, the word not coming to mind, “...big, strong, hair… ” Danann made an attempt at a growling noise… “eat worms… gagh people,” she slurred.
Penny tried to suppress an amused smirk at Danann’s statement, “Klingon,” she supplied the word as she watched the nurse set her up on the solution. A weariness was beginning to set in as she came back down from the rush of adrenaline that Danann’s crash had sent her into. “Try and relax, it’ll get better.”
She eyed her temperature and saw it was starting a descent, that was good. “I’m sure you feel like you’d rather be sleeping but I can’t risk that.”
As Penny stood there looking at Danann, for the first time since she started treating her she found herself considering the person, not the patient. She seemed like someone who might actually try to go ten rounds with a Klingon. She was foolhardy perhaps, and yet Penny found herself envious. She had a certain strength, or maybe it was resolve, that Penny wished she had. And she spoke and acted with a confident command that Penny was certain she had never felt. The woman went from locked in the brig to waltzing onto the bridge during battle to overseeing engineering repairs, it was unbelievable really. She felt like she could understand now how her presence on the ship had caused so much disruption. This was someone who left an impression on people.
With a gentle shake of her head, Penny chuckled at the absurdity of those thoughts. She was envious of a fugitive basically. “Get it together, Evans.” The chiding voice in her head was beginning to sound suspiciously like Dr. Rand. She forced herself to focus, clearing her throat and explaining to Niamh, “We’ve already given you a pain killer so we need to wait a couple hours before giving you anything else for pain. We’re just going to be keeping you cool and monitoring you for now. Do you need anything?”
“A drink…” came the reply.
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Post by Einar on Jun 18, 2018 16:28:39 GMT
great log girls! I love the medical jargon!
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Post by aoibheni on Jul 7, 2018 11:11:54 GMT
It was an odd sensation, standing by a Starfleet issue window frame, staring out at Starfleet space, through Starfleet issue transparent aluminum, listening to the steady, droning pulse of a Starfleet issue warp core, and not to be clad in a Starfleet uniform.
For a moment, Danann felt the hazy bewilderment and crackling discomfort she'd experienced when she first found herself surrounded by self assured, boisterous Fed-born cadets.
Lanky, shy, and with a wild explosion of red curls, she'd felt so out of place she'd momentarily considered running back across the border. Better the divil you know… But she'd held firm - though she trembled - seeing more value in the prospect of security, safe harbour and free food than in the same old desperate struggle to survive hand to mouth.
“It won't be easy…” her recruitment officer had warned her, accustomed to dealing with planet-born brats with something to prove. “OK!” she'd responded cheerfully. Anywhere with food on tap could throw whatever it wanted at her she'd long ago decided.
Danann sighed, and crossed her leather clad arms. With everything she'd endured since, she was beginning to reassess that youthful conviction. Her young self had seen the dangers of life in Orion space as normality, the hunger that came hand in hand with her poverty being the one thing that really pressed in around her. She'd since grown used to a full belly and the absence of the crushing anxiety of survival on the edge. But now, having lost a beloved Captain, a child, a lover, her independence, the respect of Starfleet, a predictable future… it seemed like far too high a price to pay for peace, safety and sandwiches. She'd endure the hunger pangs eternally if it meant getting all that she'd grown to love back.
She gripped the data chip tightly in her closed right fist and thought about Tony. “I'm sorry... I've always been a coward…”
Her green eyes stared ahead unseeing. She'd been half awake and full of sedatives when he'd visited her biobedside. It all felt like a fever dream; the wishful imaginings of a damaged brain, but… the data chip. He'd been to see her. He'd spoken. He'd explained. She was sure of that.
“I'm a coward… I'm sorry.”
She hadn't opened the file yet. It could be anything. It could be an old message from him he'd been unable to send, finally a reply to her early, sobbing attempts to make contact as she mourned alone through those early months.
“Please… just… Please, Tony. I need to know where you are. Don't do this to me… I can't handle this without you! I need you!”
Or, it could be something newer. Perhaps an apology for everything that had happened more recently, or a reaffirmation of his feelings for her, or some plan to keep her off SFI’s radar…
She bit her lip and turned from her blind examination of the cold stars outside. Speculation wasn't helping her nerves.
Moments later, she'd activated the chip and hit play.
“I don't have long, Tony… Dad…” the voice began.
The howl that clawed its way out of her throat was guttural and primal and involuntary. Without thinking, her hand slammed down on the minimal control panel. Her daughter's face froze on screen, youthful, brave, painfully familiar. The sound of her lilting accent, so similar to Niamh's own, no longer assaulted her ears. It echoed around her skull nonetheless.
Niamh's knees gave way and she crumpled like a controlled demolition to the floor. Her daughter, her beautiful olive-skinned, green-eyed jewel stared out at her from the screen unflinchingly. Her hair, a Romanesque obsidian curled gracefully around her petite, freckled face.
“Antonia”
All grown up, and so like her parents. She had Niamh's determined gaze, the tense set of Tony's shoulders, Niamh's eyes, Tony's nose.
Something of her own personality in the purse of her lips left Niamh unable to breath, to think, to feel. She was numb, suddenly confronted with the breadth of history she'd given up when she'd lost that tiny life she had been carrying.
Here was her daughter, her flesh and blood, her long lost legacy… And suddenly, all those never-lived years with her gorgeous bundle in her arms, close to her heart, tiny fingers tangled in her hair, chubby hands gripping her shins, every “I love you Mommy”, every “oh my god, Mom, stop embarrassing me!”, every “you don't understand me!” and every “you were right, Mom” all became heart-achingly, stomach-knottingly tangible for her, and Niamh, a weak, wrecked shell crumpled on a Starfleet carpet mourned alone, all over again.
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Rascal
Lore Committee
Posts: 120
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Post by Rascal on Jul 7, 2018 12:22:51 GMT
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Post by Nola on Jul 7, 2018 19:00:27 GMT
#gutpunch
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Post by aoibheni on Jul 8, 2018 20:58:32 GMT
With Einar as SFI Tony Adalberto.
“I had no idea…” she admitted as the door slid open. Danann was the last person he had been expecting at this hour. The corridor behind her was muted and quiet, confirming that it was, in fact, the depths of the night shift. Despite his exhaustion, he could see she was distressed; it was hard to miss. Her eyes were rimmed with red and her lashes bore evidence of recent tears. It didn’t take a genius to figure out why. She stood uncertainly outside his room, her body shifting as if it was incapable of a moment’s peace. Her visibly wavering courage contrasted starkly with her combat-style clothing and bare, tattooed arms. Gone entirely was the tough Maquis Captain; the confident Starfleet Commander similarly vanished. “I thought…” she started to say, her own accent now painfully reminding her of the daughter she’d never got to meet, “...I thought seeing her would make it easier, but…” Idiot. You fucking idiot Tony.“Nia….I..” he managed to croak before stepping aside, motioning for her to step inside. “I thought it might…..help. I’m such an idiot” She stepped into the privacy of his quarters. “No, ” she said firmly, her back to him. “... no… ” she repeated more softly as the door slid shut, enclosing them in the room alone together. She turned, her arms folded tightly. “It did help.” Her breath caught in her raw throat, “or… it didn't but, it's still good that you…” She let her arms drop to her sides, a pallor of remorse washing over her every feature. “I'm so sorry, Tony…” Tony furrowed his brow in sudden surprise while wringing his hands, his eyes on the carpet “What could you possible be sorry for?” “I thought…” She looked over at him, the man she'd once been determined to see out her days with, and her heart broke all over again. “I thought you had it easier. I thought meeting her would have helped...” she drew in a deep, steadying breath and tried again, “I thought knowing what she was... is... will be? ...I dunno… I thought that would dull the pain a little, and I hated you for not being there, for not giving that to me. I thought you were better off. I hated you, Tony, so… so fucking much… you weren't there to tell me what she would have been like… and I hated you for keeping that from me.” Her voice shook, and her whole frame seemed to crumble a little more as her daughter's brave face flashed through her mind, “I had no idea knowing would be so much worse.” Tony looked up, his eyes brimming with tears and turned away swiftly, using his sleeve to wipe them away as he walked over to his work desk and grabbed two tumblers with his right hand, and a bottle of Irish whiskey with his left. The whiskey he had learned to drink from her, and still to this day indulged when feeling reminiscent. He handed her a glass and pulled at the cork with his teeth, spit it on the carpeted floor and swiftly poured them both a drink. “I can tell you about her….if you want?” Niamh held the offered glass shakily, grateful for the generous slosh of spirits within. She gripped it, and nodded to him gingerly. Despite her awareness that each new detail would cut her deeply, she still wanted to know. She stood awkwardly, took a sip of her whiskey and let the firey liquid soothe her throat. Tony moved over to the couch and sat on its armrest, silently offering the cushions to her. For a while he said nothing and merely sipped off his glass.
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Post by aoibheni on Jul 8, 2018 21:02:48 GMT
Part 2. With Einar as SFI Tony Adalberto.
“She loved flying” he started off with, collecting his thoughts. In his mind´s eye he was sitting with Antonia, a visitor from another time… a timeline that no longer existed. Sitting in Main Engineering onboard the Bremen, a ship that also, no longer existed. “She claimed she was a self taught Engineer, but her main passion was flying”. He smiled. “Just like you” Niamh stared at her glass, and softly nodded, accepting his words with the regal air of a medieval queen condemned to the tower. She sat near him, careful not to make contact. Her back straight, her head bowed, she searched for words that simply weren't there. “Funny also” he said with a big smile on his face. “She had a wit...mine I would like to say”. He put his hands in his lap, cradling the glass. “And beautiful...amazing, smart...and she was fierce. Italian blood mixed with some of that Danann steel”. He looked over and down at her, the urge to reach out almost overwhelming his sensibility. “You were obviously a great influence on her” She raised a hand and rested her quivering fingers on her own chest. For a moment she was lost in the absurdity of the situation. In another reality, she had brought up, raised, and taught a young woman who then went and saved her own long lost father from captivity half way across the galaxy. She struggled to find anything to say. “I'm sure I would have told her stories about you, too…” She turned and finally looked up at him. Tony smiled at her sadly. “You did, but I don´t think I lived up to the picture she had painted” Story of my life, he thought. “I know this, that even if it no longer happened, you raised a smart, capable and extremely loving daughter who would traverse space and time to save me and to make you smile.” He took a sip to stop the flow of tears threatening to break free. “So at some point, we did something amazing” Niamh drained her glass and swallowed, her attention on Tony the whole time. Her lip quivered. “She was one hell of an accident…” she observed, alluding to the somewhat frantic and hurried fumble between two war-weary engineers in the Bremen’s engineering office at the tail end of the Tzenkethi war that had resulted in a wholly unplanned pregnancy. Tony reached down and grabbed the bottle of whiskey and topped her off as he spoke. “War makes you do crazy things. That was one of my more peaceful acts of war” Niamh found herself smiling a little. “Yea…” She got lost for a moment in memories of simpler, happier times. Tony hadn't liked her much when they'd first served together, and despite her superior position and advanced rank, he'd taken pains to inform her of that. It had taken time for her to pique his interest, and even more time for them both to realize their relationship had become more than a casual fling. She'd never intended to settle down, but as time wore on, and as the war pressed in around them, she’d begun to see a future with him, and had learnt to look forward to it. She’d learnt to depend upon it. “How’ve y’been, Tony?” Tony glanced over at her, caught off guard by the question. “You know, you´re the first person to ask me how I am doing in a long, long time”. He proceeded to empty his glass and promptly refilled it to give himself time to consider a proper response. What did he even want to say? That he was miserable? Constantly afraid, anxious and concerned about the few friends he had left in this galaxy? “I’ve not been okay for a long time, Nia.” The answer even surprised him.
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Post by Nola on Jul 8, 2018 22:13:38 GMT
I'm dying. You guys are killing me.
Well done!
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