Posted by Captain Johann Dvorak (CO) in Alt. Universe: Starfleet Command - Operation Bedlam

Posted by Lieutenant Siennadye Nox (Counselor) in Alt. Universe: Starfleet Command - Operation Bedlam

Posted by Captain Johann Dvorak (CO) in Alt. Universe: Starfleet Command - Operation Bedlam
Posted by… suppressed (1) by the Post Ghost! 👻

SNIP

He might not have seen it but she was grinning as she left the conference room.

It took her all of the hour to get things prepped. She met up with the Admiral and the crew she had access to for intelligence missions. She organized supplies for a two week trip. She sent Johann the specs and location of the ship. Then she packed for the trip and made her way to the docks.

The Danube-Class Executive ship was docked next to large window. It was a large enough ship for a crew of 5 without being crowded. It had two decks with the crew quarters being on the lower deck. She had an engineer, a science officer that had been working with her for a few years and a security officer. They had been preparing the ship for much of the last hour.

She sighed. How would she handle a week with Johann? Sienna just didn’t know.

Nox

Captain Dvorak, for his part, had managed to quickly relay all necessary orders to his XO. Korolev was going to be just fine spending time on Earth Spacedock. He actually briefly considered whether or not it was irresponsible for him to go on this adventure that was likely to take more than a week. The realization came quickly that Korolev was probably going to be kept in a perpetual just-one-more-week-of-staying-docked until some bureaucrat in the Department of the Exterior decided that nobody was going to be offended anymore. Which would probably take at least a month. He left orders to cover those contingencies and get the ship refitted while he went on this hastily planned excursion.

He arrived at the docking bay with whatever he needed for the trip in a standard-issue duffel slung over his shoulder, and saw Nox staring out of it. She seemed… taller, than his wife, somehow. No, that wasn’t it, he thought. It was something.

“Small ship,” he commented. “Looks pretty low profile though, which will help. Are those people with the crates or whatever going with us?” He hadn’t dwelled on what the week in space at warp speed (and the week back?) would be like; it was better than sitting around at “home.”

– Johann Dvorak, CO

She could feel his presence long before either could see the other. How interesting that even though they were two different men, she had the same deep connection to them both. Siennadye had avoided this Johann for several reasons. Most could simply be chalked up to avoiding the idea that she could fall in love with him. It scared her. It scared her to her very soul.

Turning to see the man she both feared and cared for, she nodded to answer his question and then decided to elaborate. “Yes. Three officers to help us on our mission known for discretion and expertise. Supplies for the mission that while I hope it lasts only a week, I prepared for much longer. Admiral Seku wasn’t happy but he will take care of making sure your crew is given some leave if we take longer than the Korolev’s current engineering load requires.”

She shifted her own duffle and moved past Johann to enter the ship. “He owed me that and more.”

Nox, CNS

“Oh really?” Johann asked casually. “How’d you manage to rack that much up?” Captain Nox must have been especially adept as a staff officer to get that much sway with the Admiral. Or at least that was Johann’s impression.

She turned her head towards him and her only answer was a grin before she stepped through the threshold.

He followed her inside. He hadn’t actually been on one of these in a long time, and never long enough to actually use the lower deck. Now he was probably going to have to. With three other people on this trip, there simply wasn’t going to be enough for him to do to stay busy until after they reached Nimbus III.

For a week.
At warp.
In deep space.

He had ideas. They were bad ideas. He was curious if she had bad ideas too. He suspected that she did. Would they act on those bad ideas? He actually didn’t know if that was ethical. He also didn’t know if he cared. He probably did, otherwise he was have descended to an even darker place years earlier. It almost didn’t matter, they were both going to think about it until they actually talked about it. They were going to end up talking about it, whether they did so as a deliberate conversation, or whether she read his mind. It was only a question of when during the trip they would. There was a version of the conversation that was best done before their ship took off, and then there was another version that could be best done after.

“This isn’t going to be a problem, is it?” he asked when the other three were out of earshot. It was deliberately open ended as to what “this” and “a problem” could be.

– Johann Dvorak, CO Korolev

Sienna had just passed the small cargo hold on her way to the 6 small crew quarters when she heard his question. At this point her three officers were on the small platform going up to the bridge area. She waited until they were gone and turned to Johann.

His question had caused her pulse to leap and even now, she felt the rapid thud lf her heart beating in her chest at a disconcerting rate. Now the question became, did she want to make him work for some a sort of answer, was she going to give him an honest answer (provided she wanted to really think about it and be honest with herself), or did she want to give him an easy out? She leaned her shoulder against the bulkhead and crossed her arms.

“And what precisely would “this” be referring to exactly?” Right, so make him work for it.

Nox, CNS