Posted by Ensign Rand Farquharson (Yeoman First Class) in side - sim: Honoring the Ardent

Posted by Commander Roman Alden (First Officer & Chief Science Officer) in side - sim: Honoring the Ardent

Posted by Ensign Rand Farquharson (Yeoman First Class) in side - sim: Honoring the Ardent
Posted by… suppressed (4) by the Post Ghost! 👻
She had put this plan into motion months and months ago, when Randy was still Alden’s yeoman, and Randy and Roman were butting heads and arguing like spoiled toddlers. Yes that’s how Rand saw it. Rand had spent enough time around officers to know that lost work was considered one of the worst possible things to happen to an officer’s career. Roman had let slip that very first day he’d asked her to help in the lab, that he’d lost all his notes, all his work, all his animals on the Ardent.

All those months ago, Roman had told her he had lost his entire research project previously. And then when, some time later, Roman had told her about the Ardent, well, it was pretty obvious where his project had gone.

The animals and samples could never be recovered, but the files could be. She had made an inquiry to a friend back at SF Command, who had found that the wreckage of the Ardent had been sent to Surplus Depot Z15. Rand then got in touch with the depot and found that the ships computer core had been sent to Luna Shipyards. The core was able to be physically reconstructed, but Luna did not have the facilities to restore the digital date. That led Rand to inquire to Starfleet Command’s Fleet Operations Center, Department of Starfleet Corps of Engineers, Sol Sector. It was there she finally tracked down the data. After a few trades, and several months the team was able to reconstruct the data that had been lost. This included personnel records, ship’s logs, officers’ duty logs and personal logs, and being a science vessel there were a lot of science logs. Roman’s included. Well he’d been the CSO so they were all his, technically.

The files were sent to Roman, but a few days before she received word from Eng Corps that they were sending the files out, so Rand was on the lookout for it. She intercepted it and moved it all to a data disk. She warned Randy, just in case, and then finished work early that night, and after changing out of her uniform she knocked on Roman’s door.

Rand

Roman had forgotten all about telling her about his lost notes. He thought about them, from time to time, but he’d remind himself it was gone, and he knew of no way to get it back. The Ardent had been destroyed. It had taken Engineering time to get life support systems in stable working order. The computer core had not been repaired in favour of life support and Sickbay systems. There hadn’t been much left to do. He still couldn’t technically finish the project, not without the final samples he’d lost. He wasn’t sure he’d want to, though, without Jay, who he’d done nearly all the work with.

That day hadn’t been overly busy for him, and he was glad for that, he’d been more tired lately. Not like those first days, when Rand had first caught the mistakes in his reports, but he was having some trouble sleeping. He’d gotten off duty at his usual 1800, changed out of his uniform, and then let Pipkin out and spent some time playing with her. It was earlier than he expected that he heard a knock at his door. He assumed it would be Rand. Very rarely did anyone else come to his quarters. He set Pipkin on his bed and pressed the button to let the door open.

~ Roman

Before the door opened, Rand tried to make sure she didn’t look nervous. She was nervous but she didn’t want Roman worrying over what was making her anxious, she wanted him to…well focus on himself. It was like the night she’d confronted him about his reports, should she be doing this or just leave it alone? When she’d first gone digging for the reports it had been a way for Randy to show his usefulness as a yeoman, rather than an annoyance, and a peace offering of sorts. Though even then Rand had known they would never stop arguing.

Now, knowing what she did about what happened on the Ardent she wasn’t sure she should have done this. And she’d ‘tampered’ with the mail. She’d argued that it was marked with containing personal logs and got the comms officer to put it all on data disks, for privacy. They were sent to Roman, but the logs and files wouldn’t be here though if she hadn’t gone asking.

She needed a part to play, to keep her from worrying how he would react to her meddling. Elizabeth? No not the right scenario. Catherine? Yes she’d confronted Heathcliffe about his behavior and habits, but no, she was cruel about it. Guinevere? No too fantastical though a good option if coming from the Roman Empire stand point. Arabella? Yes that was a good choice. But as the door opened, Rand couldn’t bring herself to hide behind a role, not with Roman. He didn’t need her to play a part, put on a mask, be the perfect character for the situation. He needed someone who knew how he felt about it and would be with him, more than anything to be his friend. She was glad she had stopped and grabbed their dinner tray.

Roman smiled and stepped out of the way so Rand could come in. He smiled at her and followed her further into the quarters as she set the food down and sat on the bed.

She smiled at him as she passed through the door and set the food on the table, and then walked over to sit next to him, giving Pipkin her attention. Rand was relaxed enough around Roman now, despite the data disk burning a hole in her pocket, that she was comfortable enough to kiss him when she saw him. But never in public.

Rand

Rand had seemed a little nervous, but it must not have been because of him because the first thing she did after giving Pipkin some attention was kiss him. So he assumed that little bit of nervousness was because of something during her duty shift. “How was your day?”

~ Roman

Rand smiled and let out a sigh, it had been a good day overall. “Short. I think I will document today in my duty log. Today was the first time I have not had to return any reports for corrections or clarification, none were missing, no delays in subspace communications, no shortages or miss-stored materials, no missing or wrongly filed reports, and no mix-ups with the laundry. It was like a mini vacation.”

Roman grinned. “Not one mistake? Better write this one down, those don’t happen often,” he said. The lack of report correction was partially why Roman’s day was easier than usual. There was a lot less rereading corrected reports.

She had seen him a couple of times today, mostly when she was working with Nibbles. In fact, she’d been able to stay longer than usual and give Nibbles extra attention. “How was yours?”

Rand

“Slower than usual,” Roman replied. He’d seen her working with Nibbles and he’d noticed she’d stayed longer. He’d spend part of his day cleaning the animal cages and playing with (testing the reflexes of) Mushu, and that always made a day better.

~ Roman

She had seen him playing with Mushu. Roman might make up scientific reasons for what he was doing, but he was playing with the little lizard. But she knew part of it was Roman seeing if Mushu was doing better. Mushu’d been lethargic for the last month or so. Rand had thought it had been the little lizard missing Roman, but his return to work hadn’t had an immediate effect. “Is Mushu doing better?”

Mushu had gotten a little better when Roman returned to work, but no, he was still lethargic. Roman could coax him to eat but he didn’t seem as interested in his food as usual either. Roman had been finding more excuses than usual to spend time with him, and he could claim trying to find out what was wrong with Mushu was a scientific endeavour but he’d had no luck. He didn’t think the little lizard was seriously ill, but he worried he become sicker, if Mushu even was sick. “He hasn’t changed. He hasn’t gotten worse, either, so I don’t think he’s ill, but…” Roman shrugged. He tried to hide his worry for the lizard, like he always did.

While they talked Rand argued back and forth with herself over whether to tell him before or after they ate. In the end she decided to give it to him first. He may not want to eat after, but that was okay. She really didn’t know how he would feel. “Something came for you in the communiques today. I didn’t think you would want to receive it while you were in the lab.” She handed him his PaDD and several data disks an- it was a lot of information. Not just his personal logs but the whole department, including Jay’s work, and that of all the other officers who had worked under Roman. Survived and deceased. From what she understood Jay’s personal logs had been returned to his family. “If…if you don’t want them yet, I’ll take them and put them away.”

Rand

Rand seemed to turn suddenly serious. “From command?” That was the only place communications came from for him. There wasn’t any reason to keep it from him until they were alone, unless… she thought whatever it was would be upsetting to him, which also explained the look she had. She handed him his PaDD and several data disks. He loaded one of the disks onto the PaDD and opened the data.

It was a scientific report, dated for the end of August of 2247, written by one of his junior officers, he recognized the name. That officer… hadn’t made it off the Ardent. The image of his exact fate was all Roman saw. Sucked out the hull breach and into space. That’s what all the disks were, wasn’t it? His old notes and reports, along with those of everyone on board at the time. He didn’t know which disk had Jay’s work. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know. “Miranda… How on earth did you get these?” His voice was filled with awe… And sorrow. It was a confusing mix of emotions, it was incredibly touching of a thing for her to do, but they were also really surprisingly upsetting to see again. He was not going to cry. He was not going to cry. He didn’t want Rand to think she’d done something wrong. That wasn’t at all it. But the tears started before he could stop them and he set the pad aside, trying to force himself to take a deep breath. Instead, he took a long shaky breath, turned, and hugged her.

~ Roman