Walk of Shame? Or Maybe Not?

Posted on 30 Apr 2015 @ 9:08am by Lieutenant Benice Gyce Ph.D. & Commander Norvi Stace
Edited on on 30 Apr 2015 @ 5:28pm

2,293 words; about a 11 minute read

Mission: Episode 08 - NIMBUS
Location: USS Galileo - Ready Room
Timeline: MD 2: 0730 Hours

ON:

Exhaustion hit Gyce hard, once she made the drudge back to her quarters and into the sonic showers. She felt a bit hungover, but not from booze. No... Gyce wondered if interspecies frolicing might of had a hand in it.

All the same, she needed to get all these jumbled feelings off her chest with her friend Stace. Especially before the games started. Thus she asked Stace to have a private breakfast with her for a talk.

And the walk to the Ready Room was intolerable. Gyce probably overdid it the night before, given how sore her right leg was, but that really was not the most painful aspect of the walk. It was trying to figure out what the kosst drove her to act so stupidly.

At the hallway's door to the ready room, Gyce hit the call button. Polished, holding a covered silver tray filled with sausage links and french toast, one would never know she'd just spent the night with another person, on another ship.

Stace called up from her desk, almost forgetting about the breakfast meeting with Gyce, and bade her entry. As the opening door revealed the Bajoran laden with a tray, the memory of the breakfast snapped her like an elastic band. "Ah, Gyce! I'd almost forgot," she lied. "Come in and pull up a chair. I'm famished!"

"As am I," Gyce smiled. Or at least tried to, given her cluster of feelings.

She sat the tray gently down on the desk and popped the lid open. "That's jumja syrup in two dipping bowls. My personal stock," Gyce noted proudly as she handed one of the bowls to Stace.

Stace smiled widely as she took it from the Bajoran and set it down in front of her. "I assume it's for the french toast," she added, nodding once to the stack of them on her plate. "I have to admit," she added, dipping her little finger in the dipping bowl, "I've never tried jumja. But I've heard that it's delicious." She tasted just a little and the sweetness overtook her palate immediately. "Wow! They weren't kidding!" She sat back down fully and spread the plates between the two of them and fished in for a sausage. She looked up to Gyce and then winced a smile. "So, what's all this for?" she jovially asked. "You don't need to butter me up with breakfast now that I'm CO of the Gally. Is everthing all right?"

The Bajoran and the Trill were becoming firm friends, but in truth Stace knew little about her caller. She was intrigued and wanted to know more.

"I'm not buttering you up," Gyce assured, if not a bit nervously. "Just hungry. Sorta got sick last night from all that Klingon food. So I wanted to eat and talk about things that happened after I got sick."

By the way Gyce stuffed a sausage in her mouth and poured some OJ for the both of them, it was transparent that she was unsure and maybe a bit disappointed in herself.

Stace paused, stuck a fork in another sausage and heaved it over to her plate. She lifted her tumbler, took a generous mouthful and then swallowed hard. She placed down beaker and then raised her green eyes up to Gyce. "Something tells me that not all is well with you, Lieutenant. With Commander Blake now reassigned, I imagine that your life on board is easier since you never did see eye-to-eye. So why don't you look happy?"

"Life of a detective is..." Gyce pause for words, and sat down to eat a few bites as a stall. "Well it's hard sometimes. Being good at what I do, there's a cost on a personal level. You have to be able to let others know you're an ally, but you can't get too close to them if you expect to keep any objectivity in what you do."

Stace was about to take a bite out of a dripping, hot sausage while the Bajoran was talking but she stopped and then placed down her fork with a bemused expression. "I'm sorry, Lieutenant. I don't seem to have any idea what you are talking about. Have I missed something?"

"I slept with someone last night and I'm not sure how to process it," Gyce spoke with a nervous rattle in her voice. "My lover said something about doing it again, which at that time felt right. But now, I don't know. And I know last night broke about twelve regulations, which I'm supposed to uphold as a security officer."

Gyce dipped her toast into her bowl and started to stuff her face so as she would not say anything else.

Stace's eyes flashed open with an uncomfortable flare as she began to choke on a mouthful of french toast. She clutched for her orange juice and then practically through it down her throat to clear the blockage. She spluttered a little but then regained her composure. They were becoming fast friends, she thought, but not at warp speed. "Gyce!" she exclaimed. "I'm not sure how to respond to that." She paused and then asked tentatively, "Klingon or Starfleet? And do I really want to know about this?"

"Starfleet," Gyce spoke quietly, and guiltily looked to her feet. "I just wanted a friend's advice... because you're the only one I have at the moment to talk to."

"Oh, Gyce," Stace said sympathetically. She reached across the table and laid her cool hand onto her Bajoran skin. "Of course you can talk to me. As a friend. Just don't get me into trouble on my first day on the job!" She broke into a small, conspiring smile that betrayed her jest. She widened her eyes, reached up to her combadge and placed it onto the desk. "Just us girls then," she qualified, checking the chronometer. "I'm not officially on duty for another twenty minutes anyway. What happened? And why are you so upset?"

"I slept with someone and I'm not sure if that was morally the right thing to do," Gyce sighed with frustration, downed a bit of OJ, then ate on another syrup-lathered piece of toast. "I like the person and the idea of my lover wanting us to do it more often is promising, but they're in another relationship."

"With someone else on this ship?" Stace questioned, not really wanting to know the answer to that question in particular . But she cut into the break to steamroll over it. "Whether the other party is or isn't is besides the point actually. It's your 'friend' that has the moral dilemma, Gyce. That's not to suggest that you can't take a part in the blame but life is so messy these days. And this job doesn't help you with that side of life."

"I just can't wrap my head around the fact I got involved in that mess," Gyce half-smiled, despite her feelings. "I usually have good judgement - even when I have a physical connection with the other. Which makes me wonder if the more sensual races can affect women as they do men."

The word 'sensual' shot through Norvi like an awkward spear and she placed down her fork to look at Gyce fully. She closed her eyes and against better judgement opened them and asked, "It's probably best if you just tell me everything. I can't really advise you with half the facts."

Gyce pulled a Mott in that moment. Which entailed her stuffing her face a lot in order to keep her out of trouble. But she knew stalls only lasted so long, and after chomping down on her fifth syrup-soaked sausage link, the only conclusion left was that there was not way of telling the story that would save face.

"Lirha - Admiral Saalm," Gyce corrected in a nervous exhale, "Well we talked a lot at the Klingon ship. Got to know each other on a friend level, I'd say... But then I was not feeling well and she took me to the Atlas so you and the rest of the command staff wouldn't think my returning condition was serious."

There were serious tears of guilt as Gyce went for her glass of OJ once more.

"She said she wanted to take care of me, and she did... After I threw up all that gagh in her toilet, she got in the shower with me and the next thing I know, we're having sex in her bed and cuddling the rest of the night."

Stace's mouth dropped open wider than the exhaust pipe of a nacelle as a slop of half-masticated sausage fell out onto her plate with a thud. Her blank stare now written all over her face betrayed how flabbergasted she was at the story now horrifyingly unfolding before her. She immediately regretted asking for the details for both her conversation now with Gyce but then also her budding professional relationship with the admiral. "I - I - I... don't really know what to say, Gyce," she admitted, her eyes now like pin-wheels as she placed down the fork. Any flush she had in her cheeks from the breakfast had now all but drained away as she pushed her plate forward and away from her. "This isn't just some indiscretion with a colleague," she almost chastised. "We're talking the top brass here. I'm not even sure if it's legal!"

"It's legal," Gyce sighed, "but for command officers and command hopefuls, admiralty frowns upon it... Then again, she's currently married to an enlisted officer. So if Starfleet HR wanted to chapter her out for fraternization with enlisted, they'd of done that long before now."

It was a valid point, but to that end Gyce had no idea why she just defended Lirha. And after she drank more of her juice, she went on to say, "She said their marriage was also ending soon, but that still doesn't excuse the fact I slept with a married woman."

Still in shock, the Trill just stared wide-eyed at the Bajoran without uttering a single word. And then thoughts of both sides of the coin began to flash through her mind. "I'm not sure what could be troubling you worse, Lieutenant. The moral aspect of her relationship, or the professional implications of what's happened." She paused, fearing that she'd already said too much and then relaxed back, thinking on their budding friendship. Stace knew that Gyce had personally had a hard time fitting in on the Gally and that she must have very few avenues in which to explore this predicament, so Stace decided to change tact and be supportive. "How do you feel about it now?"

"Part of me likes her a lot and wants to see if there could be more than just a physical attraction," Gyce answered after a very long pause to ponder and eat. "But another feels the Prophets would frown upon these thoughts I have."

"Then I'm afraid that that's something that you will have to wrestle with on your own, Gyce," Stace said with a kind look. "Pursuing the relationship wouldn't be my first advice to you, but you have to decide this on your own, I think. Have you someone to talk to back on Bajor with regards to the Prophets?"

"...I've an aunt still living," Gyce thought after a few short seconds. Skeptic and nervous, for to tell this to a family member might not be a great idea. "She's a Mylar. Something like a monk or priest to a human's comprehension."

"I suppose that it's someone you could turn to if you're having a crisis of conscious when it comes to your faith. We all have to pick the harbours we turn to when the storm outside is too rough for us to weather. People are far more understanding than they're given credit for."

Gyce nodded in agreement, but at the same time, it might be better to talk to the chaplin instead. More so since they finally got one, and the chaplain was not family.

A small smile finally did cross the Bajoran's face at the end of their meal. One wry and a bit bashful. "We should have meetings like this more often... Though maybe not about sex, I think."

"I might even make that an order," Stace jested. Half jested. In fact, if she could have realistically have gotten away with it, she probably would have. If she had known at breakfast what was about to come at lunch with Tyrion, she would have made the order there and then. But hindsight is always so clear.

Gyce cleared the tray and emptied her juice glass before she stood up to take the tray with her. "So we'll plan a girl's night at some point down the road then. That all right with you, Norvi?"

Gyce was not sure when, to be honest, given her moonlighting as a private detective on the Qellar case. But this was a friendship she needed to help in her work and one she needed on a personal level. So she made a note to make time, somehow.

"Of course it is," Stace replied, brushing a few loose crumbs from her jacket as she stood up. "Once these games are over with and everything settles down to normal, we can check our schedules."

"Sounds like a plan," Gyce smiled widely. "I wish you all the luck, Norvi."

"Thanks, Gyce. And with you. If you need anything after the dust has settled, you know where I am."

OFF:

Lieutenant Commander Norvi Stace
Commanding Officer / First Officer
USS Galileo

Lieutenant JG Benice Gyce
Security Investigations
USS Galileo

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