Mess Hall Meeting

Posted on Mon Jun 12th, 2023 @ 12:41am by Ensign L'Nari & Lieutenant Feeva Drylo & Ensign Dramin

2,468 words; about a 12 minute read

Mission: Mission 4 - Like a Thunderbolt
Location: Mess Hall
Timeline: MD-01

On:
Feeva found herself in the Mess Hall, a place she didn't go to usually. She preferred to take her meals in her office, where it was safe, , and quiet, and there weren't people. The young Vissian didn't like people as a general rule, and that extended to all races and genders. It wasn't a personal thing; her brain simply got overwhelmed and she shut down.

The scientist sat, primly, her long red braid over one shoulder, nearly falling into her soup as she read her PADD in earnest. Immediately after leaving the CO's office, she'd gotten straight into the investigation. She was off today and would start duty officially tomorrow, but it never hurt to get a head start. She'd already scheduled a meeting with the older, incredibly kind Dr. Harrison. So far, he was unassuming and a bit quiet, and she liked him immediately. He had a bit of a "father" thing, which made sense, because she'd learned he WAS a father of two young daughters.

She looked around as she scooped some noodles into her mouth. Pho today. The lemony-herby mix of broth and rice noodles was soothing. She'd also added enough Sirarchra to choke a horse. Her table was the last one with available seats. Damn it. The lunch crowd had poured in.

Dramin could smell pho when he saw it - no, really, Kelpien noses were incredibly sensitive to pick up the scent of predators on the wind, though it was also surprisingly useful for picking out the scents of other things too. Such as bowls of delicious beef noodles in fragrant broth.

He let that be his inspiration for dinner tonight, replicating... a bowl of pho. Yep, how incredibly imaginative of him. But he did very much like the dish, even if he didn't understand why humans put in slices of raw beef to cook in the broth at first. He shuffled off then to locate his own seat, passing the poor Vissian's seat and casting a shadow over her in the process. Being tall isn't all it's cracked up to be, especially for those who noticeably aren't.

Fee noticed the absence of light, and looked around confusedly. Was it an eclipse? Were the lights out? Oh, no. It was just an incredibly, weirdly tall being. "I'd thank you to sit down, please, you're blocking the light," she said, her Standard accented in what might pass for Old Earth's Irish but not quite."You'll have to sit here, I have the only open seats. I repel people," she said.

"And why would that be?" Dramin sat down across from her with a look of visible concern on his craggy features. "You haven't repelled me just yet." Somehow, he sensed that this strange redheaded girl and he weren't all that different at the core. Both of them lacked confidence, or at least she seemed to. Neither of them was particularly good with people, or so it seemed.

"My name is Dramin. What's yours?" He set his tray down, which contained an exact copy of her bowl of noodles. Sans the hot sauce, of course. Dramin had never particularly liked spicy food.

"Feeva," she said, absently. "I think because I'm so quiet, and people frighten me. They don't really know how to respond," she'd already closed in on herself, talking to him. She was trying to figure out how to make a fast escape already.

"Feeva." He repeated. "Well, I aren't the best with people myself. Some find me painfully awkward. I really should fix that, given that my job does entail a considerable amount of dealing with other people as an attorney." He chuckled tiredly as he began to eat, slurping up noodles with expert use of chopsticks and a spoon. "What do you do on board?"

She was listening, even if her eyes remained trained on her PADD. "I am the Chief Science Officer," she said. "I was trained on Vissia in Astrometrics before I got my biology degree at the Academy." She explained. "I also have a PhD in Xenobiology." She'd been a bit of child genius, though she hated discussing it-just another thing that made her weird.

She really, really wasn't good with people. Hell, she wasn't even looking up at him while talking to him. She reminded him of himself as a boy, in fact, painfully shy and awkward, scared to meet people in the eyes and so quiet his voice was rarely above a whisper. Age and maturity had improved upon that, of course, but it'd still taken years.

"An impressive repertoire. Biology was my favorite science, in fact." He commented. "What drew you to it?"

She shrugged. "It was more interesting than Engineering. That took too much physical strength," she said. She glanced up, then down again, flushing red. She put some noodles in her mouth, so she didn't need to talk anymore. "Why did you choose the law?" She asked, after swallowing the bite.

"Personal reasons." For the briefest moment there was a flash in Dramin's otherwise clear baby blue eyes. A flash of great pain and trauma. It hadn't just been any old happening or childhood dream that brought him to the law. "Which I would prefer not to share. Suffice to say that the law is capable of saving lives and doing an incredible amount of good by others."

She nodded. "I would prefer not to share, as well," she said. She hoped she didn't sound rude. "I just...I am little different, though you probably understand." The Vissians were a reclusive race, and besides their prominent facial folds, there were social aspects that she worried about, too, should it ever happen for her to date or reproduce.

Different as in 'there are painfully few of us around in Starfleet'? Yes. Yes, there were indeed. They were alike in that regard. "And?" Dramin tilted his head. "Everyone is different to each other. As am I. You're alright in my eyes, Feeva."

"Well, what do you do in the way of hobbies?" He asked. Shared interests were always good ways to connect with someone.

She finally raised her head for a brief moment, and smiled, then lowered her gaze again. "Something like that. At least I've HEARD of Kelpians. I usually say "Vissia" and people just go "huh?" She shrugged. "Um..hobbies? I...I like to read. Research. Sometimes I read holocomics. I do needlework." She rattled these things off, as if they were merely trivia instead of key character traits about herself. "What about you?"

"Reading, you said? I am an avid reader myself." Dramin's baby blue eyes lit up with recognition. Finally they were getting somewhere! "What genre? Otherwise? Ummm." Dramin's ears turned pink. "I... don't have any other hobbies. My duties keep me very, very busy with this case or that, or research."

Fee nodded. "Mostly fantasy. Occasionally, I'll read the classics or something. What do you like?" She asked, hoping that he'd get bored with her and move on. Or something.

"Mostly non-fiction. Though nowadays all my reading tends to consist entirely of legal material related to my duties." Min sighed. "My duties don't leave very much time for relaxation. There's always too much to do. I hope the science depsrtment isn't hardly as busy?"

She nodded. "I understand that. I am the department chief, even though I am only a Lieutenant. There's always something, isn't there?" She asked. "It depends on what you mean by busy. I have a small staff, so at least there's two other people to help me, but I still have to do all the paperwork, duty assignments, etc." She shrugged. "I don't sleep a lot-I never have, and so that helps." Insomnia had plagued her since young childhood.

"I don't sleep much either. I don't really have a choice." Dramin sighed. "Such are my responsibilities. I am only one of woefully few JAG officers aboard at the moment. Which means that I have much more work to cover - mostly research and case handling, of course. Thankfully it isn't too strenuous." Yes, but it was also tedious, extremely tedious, and that there was the killer.

"I see. Is there a lot of crime out here?" She was only able to muster enough to ask sentences at a time. He probably thought she was a ninny, instead of a savant.

"No. Elsewhere. I can't say where." Solicitor-client confidentiality and all that. One of the main things about his job. "The station itself is very peaceful - though recent incidents have set some of the crww on edge. They are concerned for their safety and rightly so in my opinion."

She nodded. "I heard about the suicide bomber," she said. "Scary stuff." She, herself, was trying to process the samples that Medical had pulled. "But I understand that you can't say much." She nodded, took some more soup, and then she looked at him to confirm if that's what he was referring to.

"Exactly that." Min's tone of voice and expression were a mixture of solemn and mournful. "Investigations are still ongoing. Starfleet is looking at the matter very closely as you can imagine and people want answers we, well, don't exactly have yet. How I wish I could catch them and bring them in myself - but of course that is the work of more trained individuals. I would be glad to write up the necessary documentation to prosecute them."

Fee nodded. "I am doing what I can to process samples, so I'll send them to you once I am done," she said. She was nearly finished, though her soup had long gone cold. "Would that be helpful?"

"It would be. Thank you." Dramin smiled warmly at her. "Now, why don't we both finish our dinner before they go cold, hmm?"

She made a face. "I think mine already is," she said, giving the bowl a sniff. "Yes. I think I've lost my appetite, as well," she said, standing up. "Excuse me," she crossed over to the recycler and deposited her things, returning quickly. "The food that is preloaded into the replicator is...different. Vissians are mostly vegetarians; our diet is similar to Betazoid's-similar climate in the same quadrant-and my last posting was a science ship-our replicators were pretty basic." She over-explained her reason for recycling her half-uneaten dinner. "I'll be ok; I don't eat much anyway. I've never had much of an appetite." She was a mess, really.

"I... actually did not know that about your people." Dramin confessed. "Cases that involve Vissians are woefully rare." He swallowed a spoonful of soup. She hadn't fled from him just yet, which was good in any case. Which meant that they were making decent progress all things considered. "I'd like to try something of your people one day. The food, I mean. Just to see what it's like."

She nodded. "I don't doubt it; there's two of us in the fleet, and, as far as I know, only a handful of us have left Vissia. We're a neutral planet, and don't leave our system much. We're...not really interested in interacting with most." She shrugged. "Though I don't really know why." She paused. "I'll upload one of our recipes. Maybe our noodles and cheese." They were vegetarians, mostly, but did appreciate Earth cheeses-the stinkier the better, though Fee generally avoided those outside of her quarters, for obvious reasons.

"Noodles and cheese? Well. That certainly does sound quite... unique. I'd like to find out your people's spin on the concept, as our human colleagues do say." Following a brief pause Min added quickly, "I consider myself to be an amateur cook at best."

She nodded. "It isn't like macaroni and cheese, from Earth. Rather, it's cooked pasta with vegetables and then chunked cheeses on top." She explained. "Maybe I will make it for a staff meeting sometime," she said.

"Oh, that sounds lovely. I shall order it next time - thank you for the suggestion." Min had a tiny smile on his lips. "Well, tell me more about your people? I would like to learn more."

She sighed. "Well. What would you like to know? We're quite a bit more advanced that Humans, though not as far along as, say, the Vulcans or Deltans. We have been warp capable for two millennia; they're Middle Ages. We used to explore the Universe far more than we do now; we didn't agree with the Dominion, so we kind of stopped to avoid gaining attention," she said. "Ask me anything."

Somehow she gave him the impression that she wasn't all that keen on talking. Maybe it was the sigh she heaved at the start, as if sharing about her people were a menial chore she had to complete unwillingly. "Well, for a start. I have heard about the progenitors among your society - that is what they're called, isn't it? I hear things are slowly improving for them, aren't they?"

"Cogenitors, and yes. Slowly. As we become more and more integrated into the Fleet, and bringing back more..,progressive ideas, things are changing. Someday, I hope I can convince my people to join the Federation. For now, neutrality will suffice." It wasn't that she didn't WANT to speak to him, she just found it an exercise-she was quiet and shy, and opening up took a lot out of her. Unlike some others, though, she wasn't unwilling. It just took time.

Min nodded tiredly. "Perhaps. Change happens at its own pace after all, like it or not. I'm sure your people will warm up to the idea of membership eventually."

Fee smiled lightly. "Yes, that is true." She had run out of things to say; her brain always shut down when she got nervous. Which was basically 24/7; she was basically scared of her own shadow and it didn't help that Min was a tall MAN.

Min knew when someone was no longer in the mood to talk, or no longer had anything to say. He'd been there and done that many, many, many times over himself, and he saw it in Feeva now. In short, their time together was at an end - for now. "Well, um. I have some work to do-" Which was true, actually, and somewhat urgent at that, "-I suppose I'll see you around then, Feeva. You aren't as hard to talk to as you think you are." He said, standing and leaving with his tray. "I hope you'll remember that, at least."

She smiled. "Thank you. Have a good evening. Thanks for the chat, it was nice to meet you," she stood up, and headed for the door, carrying her PADD with her, off in the direction of the Science department.

 

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