Posted by Lieutenant Junior Grade James Rowe (Scientist) in Side Sim: Happy Hour (17 Forward)
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She’d been waiting for his call and was ready to walk out the door of her quarters as soon as she heard from him. =/\=Ren here, I’m on my way.=/\= With a little pep in her step, Talia smoothed the skirt of her pink dress down and headed to 17 forward. Upon entering, she looked around for James and spotted him at a small table. She walked over smiling. “I actually got off an hour early since I went in before my normal shift this morning. I had time to shower and change.” It was an explanation about how different she looked, in civilian clothes and with her hair down.

Taking a seat in the only other chair, Talia looked around the room to see what kind of company they had for the evening. A server came over and she got her usual, a dirty martini. “I have to be honest with you. I’ve been looking forward to this all day.”

Lieutenant Junior Grade Talia Ren
Doctor USS Athena

Rowe’s attention was pulled to the door as Talia entered. James felt immediately underdressed in his uniform as she approached. The dress flattered her figure and her hair was longer than he had imagined outside of the crown braid from the night before. He couldn’t tell if she’d styled it intentionally to frame her face or if he simply found himself drawn into her eyes.

Following her explanation and commentary, the man relaxed allowing a comfortable smile to spread across his face. Now that she was closer a distinct hint of vanilla tickled his nose and seemed to calm a creeping nerve sensation in his left cheek.

“Well you clean up nicely doc. And for what it’s worth, that did feel like the longest shift in recent memory.” Before the waitress returned James asked, “How were things in sickbay today?”

• Rowe

A lanky, shaggy haired Science Officer entered the lounge and started scanning its occupants feverishly as he clutched a PADD in his hands. It was unlikely anybody took particular note of him… especially if they were wrapped up in a private conversation.

“It was a fairly normal day in sickbay. I was focused on records so I didn’t see many patients, but nothing out of the ordinary happened.” She’d spent the entire day scanning medical records for things the department should make themselves aware of, then scheduling visits from the officers she ran across that needed monitoring for one reason or another. There were another few hundred to go through, but that was for tomorrow—not tonight.

“So, how was your day? How did you spend it—I don’t have any idea what you might be working on.” Her drink arrived and she held it up to James for a toast. “Chin-chin!” (cin-cin)

Lieutenant Junior Grade Talia Ren
Doctor USS Athena

James lifted his glass to join in Talia’s toast, but before he could respond to her question heard his name.

“Rowe? Rowe!” Khiryn spotted Lt J.G. James Rowe at a table and made a beeline over to him, offering him the PADD he’d specifically brought to show his fellow scientist.

Talia was surprised by the eagerness of the new face to speak with James. She withdrew her extended glass a few inches while the men acknowledged each other.

“The delayed echoes? It’s a phase shift! I can’t believe we didn’t see it before. But… you asked me to map our readings against known anomalies.” Khiryn was standing behind Rowe so they could both see the screen of the PADD. His eyes were intent and gleaming with excitement.

Rowe listened intently as the eager Ensign rapid fired information....

Ensign Donivas reached over the sitting man’s shoulder and tapped the display impatiently. “When I did that, I saw similar readings associated with micro-fissures in the very fabric of space! Not at this scale of course… and it doesn’t account for all of our discrepancies… but the correlation is too strong to ignore.”

The Ensign glanced between the PADD and Rowe… eagerly awaiting a response about this latest development.

Ensign Khiryn Donivas - Science Officer - U.S.S. Athena

While others might take offense to the Ensign’s ‘intrusion’… Rowe couldn’t help a small smile that crept onto his face. The younger scientist’s excitement was both palpable and contagious. Instinctively Rowe took the tablet with his left hand and his eyes gave a cursory glance to the data before he looked across the table with an apologetic grin. “Talia, this ball of excitement is my friend Ensign Khiryn Donivas. We’re actually doing some research together.”

Rowe then looked at Khiryn, “Khiryn, this is Doctor Talia Ren… my date”. He watched the younger man amusedly awaiting his reaction to realizing that he had stumbled into a dreaded ‘third wheel’ situation.

Khiryn’s eyes shot wide and he glanced over at Talia. The excitement faded from his eyes as it was replaced with complete and utter embarassment.

The younger man’s expression did not disappoint, which only widened Rowe’s smile. He remembered a time several years ago when his own excitement lived that close to the surface…

She raised her brows and smiled at Donivas, sure the Ensign hadn’t even seen her in his excitement to share his discovery with Rowe. “Hello.”

Ensign Donivas winced. “I am such an idiot. I’m so sorry. I kind of get tunnel vision when working a problem.”

Tipping the padd to Khiryn, “This is good work, I look forward to reviewing it at a time when I can give it the attention I’m sure it deserves. How about you give me the full run down tomorrow?”

• Rowe

An innocent little bump in their date was alright, but Talia wondered if the newcomer would excuse himself so she and James could continue their evening.

Lieutenant Junior Grade Talia Ren
Doctor USS Athena

Rowe was handling this better than he was… trying to give him a graceful way out of the situation. “No… I don’t think that will work. I’ll either be in medical dying from embarrassment, or transferred off the off the ship in shame.”

Talia laughed softly, “Please, don’t stress about it. It’s all good.” Something about the ensign seemed familiar, but she couldn’t put her finger on exactly what it was.

Rowe’s attention lingered on Talia as she addressed Donivas and in the moment her poise and kindness struck him. It was endearing to see he treat his friend with the same level of respect that he had, it was more endearing that he could see through her body language that it was genuine.

He turned to the Doctor. “Again, I’m so sorry. I’m leaving now… please enjoy your night and pretend this never happened.” He took the PADD from James and started walking away. A moment later he looked over his shoulder and said, “Nice dress by the way!”

“See you in the morning Khiryn.” Rowed called after the fleeing scientist.

“Thanks. Maybe we can all do dinner another time?” Always up for meeting new people, the invitation was genuine.

OOC: So sorry for the delay… I didn’t get the tags!

Ensign Khiryn Donivas - Science Officer - U.S.S. Athena

Lieutenant Junior Grade Talia Ren
Doctor USS Athena

The couple sat silently for a long moment as the excitement around their table eased back to the realm of intimate curiosity. James returned his glass to the uplifted toasting position and offered to close the toast Talia had begun… “Was it ‘chin chin’?” As he said the words he didn’t know what they meant but they brought a smile to his face nonetheless.

“Yeah so you asked about work… and there it was.” He said with a sarcastic shrug. “Khiryn came in looking for the CSO, who was out of the office, so I asked him to look at some data that I was confounded by. We had several independent sensor systems all hinting that something might be happening in the same patch of space. It set us on a bit of a mystery chase.”

-Rowe

Bump