Posted by Captain Alexander Cochrane (Commanding Officer) in Captain’s Quarters- If You Can’t Stand the Heat

Posted by Lieutenant Faye Calloway (Mission Specialist) in Captain’s Quarters- If You Can’t Stand the Heat

Posted by Captain Alexander Cochrane (Commanding Officer) in Captain’s Quarters- If You Can’t Stand the Heat
Posted by… suppressed (2) by the Post Ghost! 👻

(snip)

Alex chuckled. “Well, I must say that my record is very fortunate to have the… editors… that is has had. Now if you want to see a really pristine record, you should see my sister’s. Makes for a recruiting manual, that one.” and he laughed. “I call her ‘Snowflake’. Makes her so mad…” and he laughed again.

Faye propped her elbow on the table and rested her chin in her hand, grinning. “Too good for your own good, the both of you,” she teased.

After a moment, he paused and sipped his wine. “My sister and I come from a very long line of people who have served their governments and, in the past, countries. We can trace our family back to the late fifteenth century on Earth. And in every single generation without exception, someone from our family has served. Hell, I’m named after my Great-Great-Great-However-many-times-back grandfather who was an Admiral in the Royal Navy of England… and a knight, for crying out loud.” and he shook his head in subdued amazement… it still got him whenever he thought about it. “So we are very proud of that. And when she did what she did it really hurt us far more than she will ever grasp. Well, my sister and I… and my older brother to a certain extent… decided that that black mark on our family tree would be the last one as far as we could manage it. Our brother had already made his career, so Racheal and I decided that it was up to us. And here I am.” and he gestured broadly to the room and smiled and chuckled.

Cochrane

“Lucky for us,” Faye said. It was interesting to watch him talk about his family. They had touched on V’astur a couple times before, but they hadn’t really had a chance to delve into the rest of his family before.

“I have some extended family, technically, but I’ve never met them, and neither of my parents had great relationships with theirs, so I’m just always intrigued by other people’s situation. I’m also an only child, so I have to ask… what’s it like having a twin?” she asked before taking a bite of her disappearing hasperat. Her cheeks were flushed from the heat and her entire mouth was tingling, but it was awesome as always.

~Faye Calloway

Alex looked off in the distance and smiled. “You know, I heard my whole life about other twins who either did everything they could to be ‘twins’… dress alike, talk alike, listen to the same music, eat the same food… or went the entire opposite end of the spectrum and just hated each other. Racheal and I? It was never really a thing until ‘The Episode’, as we call what happened with the Admiral. Then it became a kind of anchor for both of us, I think. It also helped that we had each other to back us up when it came to dealing with her.” His emphasis on the last word dripped with venom.

Faye nodded. She didn’t have that same antagonistic relationship with a parent, but she understood what it was like to loathe someone you were forced to deal with a great deal.

“You mentioned the incident in the Commandant’s office, right? Well, I wish I could say that was the first time Rach and I had to take a stand against her but it wasn’t. Far from it, actually. You must know that the vast majority of the crap she did and pulled never made it into a formal report, right? For years… and I mean years… she was protected by Command. She gave our family a black eye, but god forbid she make Star Fleet look bad.” He looked at her, his piercing gaze boring into her before he finally said “No one else really knows about this, but I think we can be candid… you know she kidnapped Racheal and I? Took us from school and put us on Star Fleet vessel under orders to take us from Vulcan to Earth. Even though my dad had full custody of us.”

Cochrane

Her eyes widened. “No, I didn’t.” Faye frowned. “How did she manage that? And how old were you?”

~Faye Calloway

He nodded. “We were 16. It was a year after my parents split up. Dad had just met V’astur, but he wasn’t trying to build anything with her then, they had just become immediate friends, you know?” and he took a drink. “Apparently the Admiral got wind of them from some vid where she was his guest at a lecture at the Vulcan Science Academy where my Dad works. It was totally above board, but she didn’t see it that way. The day after the vid was released, my sister and I were in our math class when the door opened and three Star Fleet Security officers came in and told us we had to go. We grabbed what we had with us, and they beamed us to the Malton. As soon as we were on board, the ship went to warp back to Earth. No explanation, no nothing.” He downed the rest of the glass and refilled both glasses.

She was trying to imagine what it had been like to just be up and removed from class. Faye could imagine all the scenarios that might have gone through their heads and she knew she didn’t envy them that worry.

“As soon as we hit earth orbit, all hell broke loose. Our Dad had gone straight the Vulcan Chancellor’s office, and there was another official inquiry into my mother; this time for ‘misallocation of Fleet resources’…” and he paused and shook his head, ‘… but no mention of intra-system abduction or violation of custody orders. She was super insulated, and used that every chance she got. Well, it took about a week, but we finally made it back to Vulcan.” Alex smiled at Faye. “And it turns out that V’astur was super impressed by my Dad’s logical and steady approach to getting us back. They started dating like a month later. I always made sure to mention that little tid-bit whenever I could around the Admiral.” and he chuckled softly.

Though small, Faye gave a lopsided smirk. “I would too.”

“You know who payed for that little stunt of hers, though? You ever hear the name ‘Captain Donovan Brakes’? Awarded the Christopher Pike Medal for Bravery for actions against the Romulans? Saved the colony of Rihlk IV from the Naussicans and Orion syndicates?”

There was the tiniest moment where she was discomfited by just the narrow association of this person to a piece of her old life but instead Faye focused on whether she knew who the man was. She gave a small nod.

“Yeah… he was the Skipper of the Malton. Lost his command and was forced to retire… he was up for Admiral at the time. What a waste.” and he shook his head and scowled at his glass for a moment.

Cochrane

She snorted and shook her head. “And I bet she just waved her hand and never thought of him again.”

“Well, for what’s it’s worth, I’m sorry you had to deal wit that. My parents might have made questionable parenting choices at times but I do know they only ever wanted what was best for me. They did the best they could.”

~Faye Calloway