Two Monsters

Posted on Sun Feb 22nd, 2009 @ 8:29pm by

1,654 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: Citadel Prime
Location: XO's Office
Timeline: current

[XO's Office]

The hour was almost over but Dhindara was down to the last PADD, and had about eaten half of the Swiss chocolate. The whisky was empty and the glass recycled, just to be on the safe side in case someone else came into the office to deliver a report or something. The chocolate she could always claim was replicated, having whisky on duty was harder to explain.

Dhindara had set the room to play some music. She was a very musical person and she was singing along with a song called "Ghost Love Score". She had a clear voice and was a good singer, and even though she wasn't aware of it she could be heard outside on the corridor. Singing always helped her concentrating, and she was happily working away on the last PADD.

Before her on her desk were three stacks of PADDs. One of them was low priority, it required no more than a signature of the Commander to acknowledge that the report had passed her desk. The regular Starfleet bureaucracy that Dhindara had come to hate. The second stack of PADDs, a little smaller than the first, needed more attention. They were performance reports from the individual departments, and Dhindara could see that there was room for improvement in several cases, and not surprisingly so since there was always room for improvement. The third stack was the smallest, only two PADDs, but by far the most important, one containing a map of the area of their assignment and the other a prioritised list of all the information Dhindara had been able to gather on the sector from the PADDs she had been given and the ship's database. She was glad for the help by the ship's computer, otherwise she wouldn't have been able to do this in only an hour.

Rowena Arkham had been on the way back to her office when she heard the faint sound of singing echoing in the corridor -- though she was undoubtedly getting up there in years for a field officer, there was no dry twist in her ears -- she was sure of what she heard now. The sound only got a little louder as she moved toward her office.

She smirked a little. The Master Chief had quite the voice. Entering her office and leaning in the doorway, she waited, listening and enjoying what she was hearing as she evaluated her office. Finally, as the NCO noticed her, Arkham rasped, "Not only is my office cleaner than it was when I left, come to find you've got quite the voice as well, Master Chief."

Dhindara turned around and smiled. She had not heard a single word of what the Commander had said, but she didn't need to hear a voice to know what was being said. "Computer stop playback", she said, then she addressed her superior. "It helps me concentrate. I'll gladly sing for you if you'd like me to. It's one of my favourite pastimes." She stood and stepped out of the way for Rowena to see the three stacks of PADDs that were neatly arrayed on her desk. "I'm about done here too. There's reports you need to sign here, departmental performance reviews here and a map and priorities info on our assignment here."

"Perhaps I'll have to take you up on that sometime," the Commander said, taking a seat at her desk. Arkham looked over the reports briefly, signing each after a moment of looking them over. She hated the bureaucracy inherent to her job -- she would have loved to avoid all of this if she could.

"Dammit, I hate performance reviews -- I really don't think the best time to tell the puppy not to piss on the carpet is semi-annually. Ah well. We can't all be me. Well, Master Chief," the older officer said, rubbing her sore jaw tenderly, "anybody arrive to give a report, any calls, that sort of nonsense? It seems everyone and their cousin wants my attention nowadays... it's quite obnoxious really. I tell you, I was better off in Intelligence."

"Why, because everyone keeps avoiding intel like the plague?" Dhinara asked. "But no, no calls. Wouldn't even have had to hide the whisky glass."

Arkham chuckled a little. "Exactly, Master Chief. Nobody bothered me in Intel. I think I liked it better when people thought I was a scary, crotchety old bastard, Master Chief. Well, everyone except you, apparently. Ah well. Can't win em all, I suppose."

"I think we are too similar, in a way, for that to work on me", Dhindara replied. "I've been called a monster by some. I don't think I am one, but I can see where they were coming from."

"You, a monster?" Arkham chuckled. "I must say, I'm not quick to believe that anyone so..."--Arkham knew full well she shouldn't finish that thought-- "Why, dare I ask?"

"My telepathy", Dhindara explained, "take what I did to Turoc as an example. For a full two minutes, while I was hoping he would calm down and eventually give in after him wearing out sufficiently, I gave him the quite realistic illusion that he was burning alive. Very painful, and very frightening." She paused briefly, then added, "Well, and then there's the war time."

Arkham nodded a little. She knew how hard the war had been for a lot of people. "I did you...the decency of never reading your personnel file. You've got your ghosts, I've got mine. I've heard good things about you -- and I'd never force you to tell me something like that. It's none of my business. But if you want...to talk about it, as long as you don't tell any of these other idiots, my door's always open."

Dhindara smiled. "Thank you, Commander."

Arkham settled back in her desk chair, stretching her stiff shoulders and yawning a little. "I could do with a nap, but we've still got work to do...got to put that young Intelligence Officer in his place, we should be arriving at Citadel Prime in the next day and somehow manage to find time to figure you out..."

Arkham was unsure how to proceed, because she knew where every train of thought eventually lead, and why there were a million reasons she shouldn't let her mind go there. Catherine, chief among them. Though every rational part of her brain screamed at her for what she was about to say, she rasped, "Master Chief, it's getting rather late in the evening. Would you care to...join me for dinner?"

Dhindara was thinking just about a second, pondering what eating with that jaw must be like and how much pain she would be radiating, but then she shook off that thought and nodded. "With chocolate cake for dessert?" she grinnned.

Arkham smirked slyly. "If it would so please you, I think I can do that. Although I highly doubt this is what the Starfleet has in mind when they mean 'extra duties', Master Chief."

"In a way it is", Dhindara grinned, "think about all the extra hours in the gym it takes to make sure that chocolate doesn't go straight to my hips."

Arkham chuckled a little. "Ah, yes. But I hardly think...to be quite honest, I don't know why I'm doing what I'm doing right now. I'm a senior officer. You're an NCO, and on top of that I...I've been more open with you than I've been with Catherine in our ten years. Everything in me knows I shouldn't be doing this."

"But as soon as we get out of our uniforms we're both just servicemembers, with a lot in common. And we both need friends", Dhindara replied, "I have always believed in a separation between duty and private life. That means I can be friends with those above of below me in the chain of command without it affecting the way I do my job. Don't worry, I won't be getting you in trouble."

Arkham smirked a little -- perhaps she had a point. She looked up at the Master Chief, and said simply, "I suppose you may have a point. Perhaps. Shall we get on with dinner then?"

"I'd like a few minutes to change into civilian clothes", Dhindara replied, then added, "just to stress the fact we're off duty, in case anybody wonders."

Arkham nodded. The request seemed fair enough, and she seemed eager to spend time with Arkham -- that was quite a rarity. "Of course, Master Chief. How could I say no? It's been such a long time since I've had such charming dinner company. Meet me in half an hour?"

Dhindara nodded. "Your place or the mess hall?" she asked.

Arkham smirked a little -- she knew the right answer, but she knew the answer that she was going to give; the one that the entire afternoon had built up to, some way or other. "You know, why not my place? It's a little more comfortable than the mess hall, if I do say so myself."

"I'll be there in thirty minutes precisely", Dhindara replied. She bowed slightly before the commander, a gesture of respect she gave of her own will, unlike military ceremony where it was dictated by protocol, and then turned to leave the room.

Arkham smiled a little as she watched the younger woman leave, but a frown crossed her features soon afterward as she realized what she'd just done. She, Commander Rowena Alexandros Arkham, after almost thirty years of disciplined and noble service to the United Federation of Planets, had basically just allowed an attractive young NCO into her head, and furthermore, into her quarters.

And she didn't have a problem with it, she realized, all the more shockingly. She was...actually happy about it?

Rowena shook her head. She had no time to worry.

She only had half an hour, after all.

 

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