Posted by Lieutenant Commander Eulailia Dacascos (Chief Operations Officer) in Deck 5- Hiding Out

Posted by Lieutenant Miranda Martel (Chief Engineer) in Deck 5- Hiding Out

Posted by Lieutenant Commander Eulailia Dacascos (Chief Operations Officer) in Deck 5- Hiding Out

(snip)

Bethany stepped into the darkened room, passing by Martel and squeezing her shoulder. “Smells like we’re drinkin’ shine. If you want different you know where I keep it. Help yourself.” Bethany slid down beside Calloway, picked up the shimmering jar and blinked as the fumes burned the eyes and nose. Good Stuff. She tipped the jar back for a swallow, set the jar down and then her whole body shook and twitched as it went down.

Gadi, CoS

There were all sorts of hiding places, even in a smaller cabin like this. Especially if one knew their way around the innards behind the bulkheads. Engineers and Security/Intelligence folks tended to know where all the ‘slicks’ were. The former because they always stumbled across stuff when working and made notes. The latter because they were the ones having to find the hidden stuff. Or secure it away for themselves when on an operation. While Miranda hadn’t’ had to fix anything in here, Gadi was good about doing her own repairs and was no doubt certified in Tactical Engineering, she could imagine where to look easily. More than that though, she’d been on ths hip long enough, and given free-reign of the space that she did know where most everything was first go. Randi considered for a moment then decided to pass, ultimately. Wasn’t the first time she’d wound up drinkin’ absolute hooch shine. This couldn’t’ be any worse.

Eulailia waited for Gadi to finish taking her drink then she held her hands out for the jar. She had never drunk shine but what the heck she was down for it and when in Rome Do As the Romans Do, right?

“I have a second jar here unopened but I don’t trust everyone else with it yet not to be knocked on their asses, so I’ll wait and see who can handle it.” Tipping her head back and her gaze to the ceiling, Shara closed her eyes and sighed. “Sixteen goddamn years. Sixteen! Never once have I ever broken character. And hell, I’ve sworn in meetings before. Usually it’s this jackass of an Admiral in Intelligence I clash with. We can’t stand each other, but he knows how good I am in the field and he was rather unhappy with my decision to retire from field work. But who gets me to break character in all of this mess? Some punk-ass kid counsellor.” Shara reached for the jar and took a swig, putting it back where the others could grab it. “I am not looking forward to sleep tonight.” A simple statement but one for Shara that was more ominous with her issues.

Commander Calloway, CIO

Eyeing the second jar and before taking a drink, Eulailia finally asked Shara, “What happened to you?” It wasn’t supposed to sound like it sounded but she really wanted to know. “I mean I don’t want to be all in your business but....are you okay? If I did anything in the conference room today to....irritate you. I am sorry. I was just surprised because you seemed....angry. However, there is more to it than that… isn’t it? There is something bother you.”

She smelled the shine first then closed her eyes and took a large drink. First, her eyes watered, a lot, then she started to cough violently as the hooch spilled from her mouth and some of it from her nose too.

Dacascos, COO

Randi scooted over to the others, settling next to Dacascos but closer to Gadi and sighed, partially decompressing, and partially from her own stroll down the terrible side of memory lane. When she had a chance she took the jar and took a good swig, letting it trail fire all the way down, drawing out a couple of quick coughs. “Ugh, wooo, that’s pretty stout.” Then again, it had been two years since she’d had anything stronger than a beer or two.

Martel, grease monkey

“From our still,” Shara said, allowing a smirk to touch her lips. “Never thought I’d be married to man who owned a still, but hey, life Is surprising.” She took a sip and passed the jar on.

After a moment, Calloway looked over at Dacascos. “You know, sometimes the emotion on the surface isn’t the one that’s actually there. You didn’t make me angry, you made me scared, kid. And I don’t say kid to be derogatory. It’s the reality that I’m sixty-five years old and I spent most of the last two decades having the fear trained out me. Existing in situations where fear gets you killed. It’s not that you don’t have it. It’s there. But you learn to stuff it down so far that it can’t play a role.”

“What happened to me is that I retired from covert work, from field assignments and I had some knock down verbal arguments with my uppers to get to have that. I’m not supposed to be doing this work, Laila. I’m supposed to be doing a normal duty assignment so that my daughters know where their mom is. I’m supposed to be moving froward from a really chaotic time where I upended one daughter’s life and got to finally meet my other daughter. Instead, here I am, doing the same old work but without the safety mechanisms. I can’t stuff it down the way I need to. Not fully. And that makes me a liability because what’s wrong is that, and I’m not ashamed of people knowing this, but I have PTSD. It’s a result of the last Op I went on and I had it under control until recently. Now?” Shara shrugged. “I’m just trying to not be a liability and get people killed here.”

Commander Calloway, CIO