Just like riding a bicycle

Posted on 08 Feb 2015 @ 12:27am by Petty Officer 1st Class Rebecca Williams & Lieutenant Tuula Voutilainen M.D.

1,702 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Episode 07 - Sojourn
Location: USS Galileo: Sickbay
Timeline: MD42 - 1945 hrs

[ON]

As Rebecca started to strip her body of all the clothes from the evening before, she couldn't help but wince at the feeling of the blood caked onto her bare skin. The worst of it seemed to have been matted into her hair; leaking down to cover her shoulders, back and upper chest during the transport to sickbay.

Ignoring the jumpsuit which had been left for her to change into, the yeoman reached up and used her fingers to seperate her strands of hair before pinning it all up into a makeshift bun. Reaching for a dampened sponge left to one side side, the young woman starting with her neck and shoulders; moving the sponge in slow circular movements across her bare skin as the sponge colour slowly became tarnished with the stains of dried blood.

Rebecca had never been more wanting of a sonic shower in her life as she was in that very moment. "You can come around the curtain you know. I promise that I don't bite....unless, that is, that I'm begged to." She left that last comment hang with a smile as she waited to see if the female Doctor she sensed lurking nearby would choose to come closer.

"Do you need any assistance in there?" called out Tuula, pushing herself up alongside the curtain. She thought Rebecca's last comment to be somewhat curious; it was the kind of joke that Allyndra might make. Clearly, this patient didn't have a whole lot of inhibitions. Not that she did either.

As Rebecca moved the sponge along her reddened skin, she looked back over her shoulder as she watched the shadow of the woman outside. "Actually now that you mention it....Could you find a second sponge of cloth and help me? I can't reach the blood on my back...."

"Sure," replied Tuula. With the environmental controls malfunctioning, it was unusually hot in sickbay. So she unzipped and removed her uniform jacket, exposing her grey undershirt and tattoos. Normally they would be concealed on duty as for some strange reason some people thought that being covered in ink was unprofessional, but from the little she knew of this patient, Tuula didn't think she would mind. So, she pushed the curtain aside and pressed forward.

Tuula wasn't one to be uncomfortable with nudity; far from it. She would often sauna in the nude, as it was understood that the sauna was a sacred, strictly non-sexual place. But something about Rebecca had her transfixed.

"Nice ink," she said, admiring the linework on Rebecca's dragon tattoo as she came in closer with a sponge on her lap.

Looking over her shoulder at the other woman, Rebecca studied her for a moment. The Doctor wasn't striking, normally she wouldn't have looked twice but she'd a spark in her eyes that caused the yeoman to be curious. The spark seemed to speak about some hardship in live and the woman refusing to let it pull her down. She had fight in her.

"You don't have some bad ink yourself sugar. I bet yours tells a better story then mine though."

"Oh, thanks," replied Tuula, smiling at the compliment as she looked down at her arms. Reaching out, she pressed a button to lower the patient's bed to a more appropriate height. "Some of them have meanings, like this one, it means femininity and rebirth and all that jazz," she said, pointing to the butterflies on her shoulder. "But mostly they just look cool."

Leaning over slightly, Rebecca used a wet finger to trace the outline of one of the butterflies. "To others it shows an aching for freedom. To be able to take off on a winds breath and be careless and free."

"Yeah... and it looks cool," she added, following Rebecca's finger with her eyes. In truth, she was right. And in fact, that aching for freedom was a theme in most of her tattoos, even the stars on her back and the dagger on her arm. After the accident which left her paralyzed, getting inked up served a psychological need to assert control over her own body. And her rather unique sense of style was part of that as well.

"Does your dragon symbolize anything?" she asked, looking back up at Rebecca and holding aloft the sponge.

Allowing her fingertip to linger on the woman's arm for a moment, Rebecca followed the curve of the Doctor's shoulder, along the side of her neck until she was able to place it under the other woman's chin. "Some say that on a woman's body the dragon acknowledges women as being the creators. That a woman's true form is one of life, the world and the universe. The beginning and the end...."

"I..." Tuula lingered for a moment. Is she trying to seduce me, she thought, feeling somewhat strange and perhaps slightly aroused at the woman's touch. It had been so long since she had been with someone, too long in fact.

Regaining her bearings as a medical professional, she pushed herself backwards, just out of reach of Rebecca's fingers. "I... um, if you just turn around so I can take care of that blood..." she said, trailing off.

Smiling as she watched the flash of emotions in the Doctor's eyes, Rebecca turned her body to give the woman access to her back. Picking back up her own sponge, the yeoman started to move it across her chest to clean away the staining on her pale fish. "So tell me about this attraction you have to the Bolian."

"Dr. Mott?" exclaimed Tuula. In spite of their little fake marriage, the very idea was presposterous. "I don't have a crush on Olsam. He's my mentor, my colleauge, and a close friend. Sure, he's warm and caring and--" Tuula stopped in her tracks. Sometimes, it wasn't until someone else suggested something that one realized exactly how one felt.

"Oh my god, I think I have a crush on Dr. Mott."

Raising an eyebrow, Rebecca looked over her shoulder at the young woman. "You think? Sweetheart I can tell you that you do....You can see it in how you look at him and react with him....Have you never had a crush on somebody before?"

"Oh sure," replied Tuula, still in shock at the sudden realization. "I've had my share of crushes, but never on my superiors!" She sighed longingly just thinking about him. "What should I do? I can't be romantically involved with my mentor and superior officer!"

Rebecca laughed softly at the irony of the woman saying she couldn't be involved with her superior officer, the woman had many relations with superior officers through her own career. "Sounds to me like you are making excuses....As long as you're discrete and neither of you allow the relations to interfere in your work then why can't you be involved?"

"I suppose..." said Tuula, not sure what Starfleet regulations had to say about this sort of thing. She looked down at the floor for a second and then back up at Rebecca. "It's been so long since I've been with someone, I'm not even sure I know how to make him understand how I feel."

Moving back around to face the Doctor, Rebecca took her hands in hers at the wrists. "Who was the last person you were with?"

"Is that really important?" asked Tuula, still holding the sponge.

Narrowing her eyes, Rebecca studied the woman for a moment, "Tell the truth....Have you ever been with anybody?"

"Not since Zuwtt, my horrible, abusive, pig of an ex," Tuula admitted. "And not since, well..." she looked down at her legs and her chair, plainly conveying what she was having difficulty saying.

Rebecca's sight moved with Tuula's as she realised that the woman meant her chair. The yeoman had mistakening believed she'd had the chair her whole life, she never realised that it was recent, "Abusive ex's can be kicked in the nuts and forgotten about. Your chair....Believe it or not it makes people look up to you.'

The yeoman's hand moved as she tilted the Doctor's head back up so they were eye to eye, "Who you are now is a turn on. On one aspect its a turn on to think of controlling you when your defenseless and unable to completely fight back or run away. To allow a strong woman to make them do their bidding. Others want to dominate a strong woman like you who spends every second of life fighting. That kind of a strength in a woman isn't visually seen in public often and everyone dreams of. Others just want to be your equal. To let you show them who you are and in return show you who they can be. There isn't a man or woman out there with whom it doesn't cross their mind that they want you. Including your Bolian."

Tuula pushed herself in closer. "You really think so?" she asked, staring Rebecca in the eye. "It's been so long, I don't even know if I remember what to do..."

As Tuula moved in closer, Rebecca read all of the signs but needed a moment to know if to act on them. She knew a vulnerable woman when she saw one. "Remembering what to do is like riding a bicycle..." The yeoman leaned over and very gently kissed the Doctor's lips before moving back to a hairs breath of a distance, "...you'll instinctively know what to do."

Tuula wrapped her arms around Rebecca's shoulders. "Like this?" she asked, before leaning in and returning the kiss.

Responding to the kiss, Rebecca moved to the edge of the table as she leaned down into the younger woman. Deepening the kiss, the yeoman flicked her tongue across the Doctor's to give a gentle lead; instantly feeling a response.

Before the night was out, Rebecca intended that the younger woman would remember every detail of being with another person...it wouldn't matter how long it would take.

[OFF]

Lieutenant (J.G.) Tuula Voutilainen, M.D.
Medical Officer
USS Galileo

Petty Officer 2nd Class Rebecca Williams
Commanding Officer's Yeoman
USS Galileo

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