Posted by Commander Roman Alden (First Officer & Chief Science Officer) in Side sim: Matters of the Heart

Posted by Ensign Rand Farquharson (Yeoman First Class) in Side sim: Matters of the Heart

Posted by Commander Roman Alden (First Officer & Chief Science Officer) in Side sim: Matters of the Heart
Posted by… suppressed (2) by the Post Ghost! 👻

(snip)
Roman nodded, squeezing her hand. “They’re right. So they can’t predict where you’ll be.” He pulled her closer so he could kiss her and then looked up as Temple came in with lunch trays. As Randy was heading out, he said, “Take a security detail. And be careful.” The idea of Randy wandering around unprotected, alone, and tired, was way too worrying to him. He could make it official later, when Morgan or the Captain came to talk to him.

~ Roman

“Yeah yeah yeah, I think it really did fry your brain, Cmdr.” Randy smirked. “That goes for both of you. Don’t do anything that requires I get back here so fast I break my ankle.” He pointed a finger at Roman with a grin, “You aren’t strong enough to carry my bridal style to sickbay if I do.” Rand pressed her face into Roman’s shoulder and just groaned. Morgan was outside the door waiting for Randy. He was gone a few hours.

Roman grinned. “It fried everything else, didn’t it? And I would be if I could stand.” He smiled down at Rand, “I’d do it again if I had to.”

Rand found all the notes from Franks and set them in a stack next to Roman. Grat had apparently rethought his diet restrictions. There was plenty of liquid diet on the tray but some regular food as well, but all lighter, nothing too heavy, especially since Alden wasn’t up and moving around yet. After lunch though, the comms started. When Rand would normally be running about the ship helping here and there, she was ordered to sit in sickbay. So all those questions that got answered, tasks that got completed, and requests that she handled were now being done over the comm. She paused once to look at Roman. “If it’s bothering you, I do this somewhere else. I’ll get security to go with me.” She didn’t want to, she wanted to stay there, but he needed rest. Even she had to admit the non-stop comm calls were getting annoying.

Roman picked one of the light but solid foods for lunch, finishing it quickly. When he was done he pushed the tray aside and watched the animal feeds. After a while, Roman looked like he was falling asleep, laying back, still looking at the computer console but if Rand looked his eyes were closed. Occasionally they’d open when her comm went off, waking him back up. But when she asked if it was bothering him, he took a deep breath and shook his head. “No… I’d rather you stay here.” Both because he didn’t want to be here alone and because he didn’t want her needlessly leaving their secure little room.

When Randy came back, Morgan was with him. “You feel up for a chat, Cmdr?” she asked from the door way.

Rand

Roman was still half-awake watching his animal video feeds, with one of Franks’ reports unread in his lap. At Morgan’s voice he looked up suddenly and nodded. “I am.”

~ Roman

Morgan came in and pulled up a chair. “I’m glad you’re awake, Cmdr.” She had a PaDD with her and turned through some of the pages, “The machine you were using? You are the only one that uses it?”

Roman frowned in thought, and then nodded. He still didn’t remember the incident at all. “I am the only one allowed to, to prevent accidents with it.”

“When did you first notice the machine malfunctioning?”

He thought back. “About two weeks… I submitted a ticket, but it took a while for engineering to get to it. They’ve been busy lately.” By two weeks, he’d mean three, he just hadn’t adjusted to the lost time.

“When En LaCroix came to work on it, did you notice anything strange or off or not quite right. Even something you might have dismissed at the time?”

Roman thought again. “He was… Nervous. I thought he was just new. I didn’t recognize him, so I knew he must not have been on board long.” He took a deep breath and then shrugged. “He seemed like he knew what he was doing so I let him be.”

“Now before that, about two…well three now, weeks ago. Did you notice anyone hanging around the lab that should not have been? They were there but didn’t have a reason to be, or didn’t have a good reason to be there. Or perhaps they had too good of a reason?”

Morgan

Roman shook his head. That he would remember. He was very particular about lab access, again, to avoid accidents or contamination. But other shift leads weren’t necessarily as strict as he was. “No. No one unauthorised was in my labs, at least not while I was on shift.” He sounded tired when he spoke.

“What about authorized personnel that were acting strange, or working near the machine?” Morgan didn’t bother asking about the day of. Their investigation had already proved that it was planned ahead of time. The culprit would not have been in the lab the day of, most likely. “Anyone working in the lab that day that didn’t usually work in the biology lab?” They may have come in to watch though.

Roman thought back. He didn’t want to think any of his officers would do this, but he had to look at it with an unbiased eye. Still, no one stood out in his memory. “No, I don’t remember anyone acting strangely or being around it at all.” He tried to think about that day, taking several moments trying to remember. Beyond that morning, just before lunch, it was a blank. “Not in the morning. Other than that, I can’t remember.”

He looked up at Randy and then Morgan, “Randy is not to go anywhere without an escort. I want him on the same orders as Rand. As a noble of Scotland, he could be as much of a target of this group as I am.”

~ Roman

Morgan stopped, looked at Alden, then at Rand who nodded, and then at Randy. Rand would have thought Morgan knew that for as much time as Morgan spent with her brother. Randy shrugged, popped a hip, and tossed his head, “Oh honey, I’m too faaaabulous to go after. Besides how would they know?”

Rand raised a brow, “They are obviously well informed on the nobility. It’s not a far stretch that they studied Scotland as well. There isn’t exactly a clear cut line between the two. And you wore all that wonderful finery at the Valentine’s dance.”

“I’m running out of security guards.”

Rand, Randy, Morgan

Roman nodded his agreement. “Your Clan Farquharson is well known in Scotland, isn’t it? I wouldn’t want to bet your life that they don’t know who you are. Nor that they wouldn’t take a shot at you if they had the chance. And we don’t need a barbequed Scotsman to go with our french-fried Englishman. It will strain available personnel, but we can’t risk using guards we don’t personally know and trust.” The monitors started to beep, he was stressing himself and stressing his heart talking about this. He gave a frustrated sigh.

~ Roman

“I’ll look into assigning someone.” Morgan nodded and stood up. “Thank you, Cmdr. If I have more questions I’ll be back. I’ve looked at the tapes, it looks like it was tampered with during gamma shift, roughly 3 weeks ago, while the normal lab staff was on their meal break.”

Rand looked up at the monitor, she didn’t look concerned this time. She took Morgan’s place beside the bed and squeezed his hand. She knew he was frustrated. “It’s okay. You’re heart is beating a little faster, but there’s a reason. You’re stressed over the investigation, it’s your body’s natural reaction. It’s supposed to do that. But it’s not dangerously high, or high for no reason.” She turned, “Right Randy?”

Randy rolled his eyes but smiled, “Right. The machines are going to warn us when it starts going up or changes rhythm because it can go bad quickly. But your body reacting normally to stress and then coming back to normal on its own, is good. We just have to make sure it doesn’t go bad.”

Rand