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 (5) by the Post Ghost! 👻

(snip)
Roman shook his head. “I am planning on continuing the work. I can’t hand it off.” Why not delegate it? Wasn’t it obvious? But Roman wouldn’t say it. The disks sat at the edge of his desk, waiting, untouched since he’d put them there. There was a piece of paper over top of them, he’d grown tired of looking at them, or avoiding looking at that part of his desk.

~ Roman

“Why can’t you? It’s been years, you don’t have the samples or the animals anymore. Your current lab is too small for what you have.” Randy knew this because he had spent endless hours helping maximize the space just to have barely enough room for what Alden had. He pointed at the disks, “You can’t even look at them. They are covered up and there they will stay until you forget what is on them and they get erased. If the project is important then let someone work on it.”

Randy

“They won’t get erased!” Roman would never let that happen. The information on them was too valuable, both scientifically and personally. He lowered his voice, not wanting to be overheard. “Did we have to do this here?” He muttered frustratedly. “There… There wasn’t much left to be done. And I’m trying to move Mr Wyvern already. I don’t think space would be a problem. Most samples are small. We’d also need some live plants, but those take much less space than animals.”

~ Roman

Oh good they were getting somewhere. Alden was feeling it rather than fighting with it. “I wasn’t aware you, personally, studied plants. I thought you just played with animals all day. Speaking of which, what is the project about? You never said.”

Randy

“I don’t, I bring in a botanist for that part.” Roman replied. Then he shook his head. “You try extracting venom from Mr Wyvern, see how that goes. And you already know what the project is.” Roman went back to pretending he was working on something. He wasn’t really, though.

~ Roman

Randy grinned and pointed slightly at Alden. “Ha! I knew it. There is a bit of an adrenaline junkie in you.” Then he shook his head, “Rand probably does, she is quite involved with the lab. I only know it is similar to Aldaria III because you said so.” Randy was pushing his buttons. It was his least favorite thing to do. He hated it, but sometimes it was necessary. Alden was going to hate him or punch him. Either was okay with Randy.

Randy

Randy was very good at pushing Roman’s buttons and though Roman was trying to hide it Randy would be able to tell. At Randy’s statement he scoffed and looked up. “I am not an ‘adrenaline junkie’. I carry out necessary research.” For Randy’s second question Roman simply pretended he was talking about Aldaria. “It’s an environmental project meant to determine the safety and viability of a human colony or outpost. When it’s been decided that it can support a colony, then the research begins to make it safer, developing antivenoms and studying plants and animals.”

~ Roman

“Of course you are, why else would you want to be around a devil snake and milk it for something that can kill you?” Rand was going to kill him if she found out he called the ‘crimson cobra’ a devil snake. Apparently she was the only one allowed to insult it. He found that out months ago. “”Ah useful stuff antivenoms. So how is that like your project from the Ardent?”

Randy

“Mr Wyvern is not a devil snake,” Roman said. Rand was definitely the only one allowed to insult the snake judging by the look Roman was giving Randy just then. Roman seemed to nearly physically flinch at the name of his old ship. “They… They’re both environmental studies of the same kind.”

~ Roman

“Oh come on you can’t tell me his fangs don’t remind you of a pitch fork. And that red color.” Randy noted the flinch and least he didn’t walk away this time. “So they both are studies of Aldaria III? I thought Aldaria III was a more recent discovery. What planet was this other one?”

Randy

“They don’t.” Roman’s tone was less than friendly. He might’ve walked away except he felt very cornered. When Roman walked away, he came to his lab. Now Randy was here, in his lab. Roman felt like he had nowhere else to go. “What is the relevance of that question?”

~ Roman