Awkward Truths

Posted on Sun Nov 24th, 2024 @ 1:37pm by Lieutenant JG T'Mara & Lieutenant Evelyn Stewart

0 words; about a 1 minute read

Mission: Year One: Strange Bedfellows
Location: Shuttlecraft Apollo
Timeline: MD 018: 1300 hrs

Stewart sighed in annoyance as the shuttle left the atmosphere of Kalandra Prime. They were running late and trying their best to outrun an oncoming ionic storm front that was coming through the system. " Atmospheric thrusters disengaged, course laid in." She called out dryly as she tapped the console. "What are the readings on that ion storm? I want to know what to expect if we get caught in the edge of it"

The human female barked out a question in an abrasive manner, and T'Mara looked down at the sensor readings to determine the answer she sought. "The storm's speed is slowly increasing. Given our current speed we will not be able to outrun the edge of the ion storm." She tapped on the console screen and brought up a holographic representation of their current location and speed and plotted out the trajectory of the storm. "According to current calculations, we will encounter the western front, which does appear to be particularly unstable. I would suggest an increase in shuttle velocity, if at all possible."

"You want to fly?" Stewart snapped rhetorically as she glanced at T'Mara, her hands flying over the console. Evelyn turned her eyes towards the projection and doing calculations in her head tapped in a series of commands. "The particles are preventing the production of a stable warp field...we can't go to warp." she stated to the Vulcan about the situation as she focused. "Transfer what power you can to the navigational array, I'm going to try and out run to the edge of it."

T'Mara took no offense to the abrasive directives coming off of Lieutenant Stewart. She had heard that particular tone come from numerous mouths of surgeons she trained under - it was a tone that brooked no argument. For lives to be saved, orders must be followed.

"Aye Lieutenant," She began. "Transferring all readily available power to the navigational array. Shields are currently reading at 98%."

As Stewart thought, the ion storm was already overtaking the shuttlecraft. The particles were weakening the signal from the navigational array already and it wouldn’t be long until they had as much chance as finding their orientation by looking out the window as they would the array.

It was soon apparent that they weren’t going to make it to the edge and skim over the edge of it. Feeling the atmospheric turbulence, the console had a minor power surge, leading to sparks to dance on her hands and avert her eyes momentarily while trying to work their way out. But instead it was to the proof needed they needed to wait this storm out somewhere safely. It was then she decided to reverse course. “I’m heading back to the planet. We can wait out the storm and-“

Stewart couldn’t finish her though when a particularly hard wave caused her to fly up and away from her seat, showering her with sparks as the next thing she remembered, Evelyn was picking herself slowly up from off the ground, looking around and asking after T’Mara.

The same wave caught the doctor as well, tossing her like a rag doll into the bulkhead behind her. The back of her head came in contact with the tritanium support with a sickening crunch. Her unconscious form crumpled to the ground in a heap, and only signs of life from her were the subtle rise and fall of her chest.

Her head pounding, Stewart saw the unconscious Vulcan on the floor of the shuttle and she quickly turned to the console to check and secure the shuttle's systems and send out a distress signal to the Moore before turning back around towards the Vulcan. Moving for the medkit, Stewart let out a yelp of pain as her leg gave out from supporting herself. The pain in her knee telling her she had more than a headache of her own to deal with.

With a grimace, she bore down and supported herself as much as she could on her other leg while she shuffled her way over to T'Mara. "Lieutenant, can you hear me?" She asked while pulling out the medical tricorder and began her scans.

The Vulcan physician did not respond for some time. The impact with the bulkhead had knocked her 'operating system' completely offline.

"Kal-tor nash-veh tev-tor..." T'Mara said in a slurred tone as she slowly regained consciousness. She didn't recognize that she had spoken aloud, and in Vulkahnsu no less, until the UT in her commbadge translated it to standard making her words sound mildly electronic.

Allow the sun to set, was the literal translation of what she had uttered in a half-conscious state, but what it meant? Well...it wasn't often a Vulcan asked for oblivion. Without the filter--or control--of her logic, her words were rather nihilistic.

T'Mara tried to push herself upright, but only managed to get to her side before a blinding pain lanced through her brain and she immediately began to wretch as the only acceptable physiological response was to loose her breakfast.

Head strike. LOC. Pain and disorientation, worse with movement, nausea and vomiting. It was a head injury, moderate to severe concussion if she were fortunate, and if it were worse? Well...sunset indeed, then.

"Tricorder...what...?" Motioning with a trembling hand to the item Stewart held out, T'Mara was asking what the readout was on it.

Stewart batted T'Mara's hand away as she read the readings, running the scanner over the Vulcan's brow. "You have a severe concussion and some bleeding in that damn Vulcan brain of yours," Stewart told her before reaching for the hypospray and a vial in the medkit and adjusted the dosage to help with the swelling and slow down the hemorrhage. "I can stabalize you, but we need to get you back to the Moore." She explained as she pressed the hypospray to T'Mara's neck and began administering first aid.

Within a few minutes and some more scans, Evelyn was able to get the doctor stabilized and resting against the bulkhead more comfortably. "You can go into a healing trance now if you," she offered as she put aside the medkit and made to stand. "I'll get to work on repairs to the shutt-" Stewart yelled out in pain as her leg gave out under her again and she fell into and eventually slide down the opposite bulkhead from T'Mara. Grabbing the medical tricorder, she confirmed she had fracture in her femur under her knee, mostly likely caused by colliding with the console. Setting her jaw against the throbbing pain, she tossed the medical tricorder aside in frustration as she realized that she was stuck like T'Mara. Breathing harder from the pain, Stewart glanced around the cabin. "This is just great..." She muttered out loud.

A healing trance? That was a rather specific option to be presented, especially by a human. A human who apparently had some sort of irrational dislike for Vulcans...or perhaps it was just her? T'Mara observed how Stewart crumpled under her weight when attempting to stand. She was nonplussed when the human woman tossed the medical tricorder aside in an outward demonstration of her ire...however, that did bring the medical device within her grasp so, she decided not to chide the human woman...for now.

"Scans...you have sustained an A3.2 fragmentary wedge fracture of your femoral condyle...this...I cannot fix this here; it will require an OR for surgical repair. Go...the go bag...there is a knee immobilizer. Put it on and press the..." T'Mara's voice trailed off as she looked far away for a moment before continuing. "There is a small green initiation tab. Once it is in place, press the tab and it should harden and provide stabilization. Then...then we should probably...go."

Maybe it was the concussion, or the fact that Stewart flopped down next to her and in doing so made her scent more obvious, but T'Mara smelled something rather unusual from the human pilot. Had she not been so concussed, perhaps she would have simply documented the finding her mind to parse out later...but given things were as they were...

"You smell like a Vulcan."

Stewart went to stand to reach the medical kit but she couldn’t pull herself up more than a few centimeters off the ground before she gasped in pain and had a few choice curse words in Bajoran escape her and she flopped back on the floor, dejected. Frustrated and gasping for a moment to breathe against the pain she leaned back against the bulkhead, intent on punching out her frustrations against it with her fist, when T’Mara’s words hit her.

Calming herself, Stewart focused on the Vulcan as she could feel her defenses go up. “You’re hallucinating.” She suggested dismissively to the other woman.

"I am not. Olfactory hallucinations are not in the constellation of symptoms generally attributed to concussion, Lieutenant." T'Mara took another breath through her nose--perhaps with a certain amount of overt fanfare--and turned her head so that she could face the pilot more directly. "I can assure you, I am no threat to you...or your mate."

It was somewhat of a leap to say, but one way or another clarification would be forth coming. Was that why Stewart was so...prickly with her? T'Mara could only surmise, but it would make sense at least to a Vulcan's point of view. Vulcans could be rather protective of things they considered theirs...perhaps such a connection would engender similar possessive tendencies in a human mate? Otherwise that would mean Stewart was a hypocrite.

Stewart held the doctor's gaze for a moment before she lost control of her rising temper. "Damn Vulcans!" She muttered to herself before she turned to face T'Mara directly, ignoring the pain it caused in her leg. "I grew up on Vulcan. I spent my entire childhood forced to live by your ridiculous standards and ideologies, ridiculed and sneered at by your kind. I know what you really are like and the lies you tell yourselves. Why the HELL would I ever chose to mate with one of your kind?" Stewart snapped venomously. All her rage and hate at Vulcans coming out at once at the young officer.

"An excellent question indeed, Lieutenant. Why would you?" There was a lot to unpack with what Stewart had just spewed at her. Obviously the woman had quite intense feelings regarding Vulcans...and yet, the co-mingling of scents was a rather overt signal that could not be denied.

"I have no interest in your mate. No upstanding Vulcan would ever sully themselves in an intimate association with me. You do not need to concern yourself with any potential overtures on my part."

Stewart scoffed at the Vulcan. She wouldn’t confirm or deny anything. She had hoped by being honest about her past it would deflect T’Mara from pushing the matter. Evelyn didn’t want to have this conversation. She didn’t when Remy confronted her, and she certainly didn’t want to have it with this presumptuous Vulcan now. But she was stuck.

Shaking her head, Stewart stared up at the ceiling of the shuttle, wondering how she gotten herself into this mess. “What is that even supposed to mean?” She asked T’Mara about the practices of supposed upstanding Vulcans. “Vulcan marriages are arranged. You don’t choose your life mates either.”

T'Mara raised a brow in question. "There are no absolutes with such things. I no longer have such an arrangement. It was...removed." She shivered, remembering the sundering of her betrothal bond. It tore something within that had never healed. "Regardless, Your scent is co-mingled. It is obvious, to me. I will not congratulate you. Given your...negative feelings to my people, you have selected a rather difficult path to navigate. He will change you."

Evelyn watched T’Mara as she spoke about the ending of her own betrothal. Whatever must have happened was serious indeed. Stewart of all people knew how serious Vulcans took traditions and ceremony. She felt twinge of compassion for the Vulcan, her temper starting to cool in response.

That changed when the female brought back up the situation with Stryvek and her rather cold perception of the situation. Feeling the heat flush her cheeks, Stewart glared at the Vulcan female. “Do I look like anyone’s property to you?” She asked in Vulcan, surprised herself she was able to keep her voice as detached as well as she did, given her anger.

T'Mara did not respond immediately, but her normally serene expression shifted slightly in a demonstration of some sort of pain. Swallowing deeply, she forced the discomfort to the side, attributing her momentary lapse in control to the damage from the concussion. Perhaps she should have kept her mouth shut and attempted to enter a healing trance per Stewart's suggestion. Regardless, a different course was selected.

Stewart appeared to have a significant amount of animosity towards her kind; and if she had lived amongst Vulcans as a child as stated--and T'Mara had no reason to doubt her veracity--it was...understandable. And yet...apparently a human was an acceptable choice for a mate. Not like herself. That was a most discomfiting truth to be presented with.

"Please. I do not mean to further..." How did one talk a human down from extremes of emotion?

"It was not my intention to test your controls. If I, in some way, spoke in a manner to cause you to infer that I looked upon you as property, I do ask for forgiveness. You..." T'Mara paused, licking her lips unconsciously as she leaned her head back against the bulkhead before continuing, "You have an option, if the current state is not desired."

"I'm not going to get out of this am I?," Stewart muttered to herself before sighing heavily at the state of things. She glanced over at T'Mara. "I'm aware of my options." She said curtly to the Vulcan female about her choice to stay with Stryvek, the most she would give as an admittance of the relationship.

"I know how to do it..." T'Mara said softly and closed her eyes for a moment, considering. Why was she even bothering telling Stewart any of this? The woman made it quite clear how she felt about T'Mara's presence on this vessel; and with the revelation of the human female's scent mingled with a Vulcan's...well, it made sense. Mated females were quite possessive - the bond was already changing Stewart, even hijacking her instincts.

Vulcans did not have a word--or even the concept--of irony. However, once learning about the human expression, T'Mara found that her life had been filled with it. Kaiidth. Even after all that had happened--was still happening--she struggled to accept her lot in life. Starfleet was the 'last chance,' to have a few years of purpose and a camaraderie of sorts before...well, before her own biology caught up with her.

Licking her lips, T'Mara continued, "Regardless. All is silence..." She would say nothing to anyone regarding what was discovered here and now. "I...I do have a request, however. It is being asked irrespective to my pledge for silence. I do not desire acrimony between us. I will avoid you...and your mate if that is your wish. You are very powerful here...and I am at your mercy."

Evelyn narrowed her eyes at the Vulcan as she considered her with more than a fair share of skepticism. "I have no idea what you are talking about...", she shifted to make herself more comfortable before giving T'Mara her attention again. "I may outrank you, but am still only a lieutenant." She commented, thinking that the Vulcan was referring to their ranks.

"I do not speak of Starfleet rank, T'sai." T'Mara dipped her head formally showing the respect that Stewart was owed, especially given their disparities in their respective stations within Vulcan society. "I serve at the captain's prerogative. A transfer so soon after my posting would end my career. This is all I have. Therefore, a harmonious co-existence is preferred. I will do whatever is required to achieve that."

Stewart's expression softened as she looked at the Vulcan woman and considered her words. She was far from trusting T'Mara, and she doubted she would never like the Vulcan, but she could appreciate her situation. She didn't want to ruin the young doctor's career. She knew what it meant to have nothing but her career.

Sucking air through her teeth as she shifted to look T'Mara, Stewart resettled and considered for a long moment how to proceed and what to say. When she finally moved to say something there was a crackling over the comms system.

=/\=..Oore to Shuttlecraft Apollo...please respond...we....on your locatio.......status update?=/\=

Stewart took the interruption as an excuse to not address the situation between the two woman and subconsciously looked up at the ceiling of the cabin as she addressed the transmission. "Stewart here. We're alright, but we are a dead-stick and need medical assistance."

=/\=Understood. Closing in on transport range. ETA....standby...=/\=

 

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