There's No Earthly Way of Knowing Which Direction We Are Going

Posted on Sun Apr 24th, 2022 @ 6:43pm by Delaney O'Callaghan & Leiddem Kea (*)

Mission: Mission 15: Adrift
Location: Turbolift
Timeline: MD -6
7243 words - 14.5 OF Standard Post Measure

"I'm just saying, it's probably not a stupid idea."

Those words, out of Delaney's mouth, were always a dubious prospect at best. Whilst she didn't routinely engage in stupid ideas, per say, she was prone to risk-taking and the last couple of months had been an elongated stretch of drudgery and monotony from the perspective of a woman who'd had the pinnacle of holographic technology at her fingertips, only for it to be ripped away before she was done with it. Delaney was generally good-natured about her boredom, and definitely proactive about addressing it, but that usually meant that she was up to something. Right now, her current fixation was improving her defensive capabilities.

"I'm not in a hurry to get into any fisticuffs," she continued, stride-for-stride with Leiddem as the pair moved down the corridor, "but what's the point of having access to weapons if I don't know how to use half of them? Besides, I am so determined to convince Kali to teach me how the hell she manages to get you on the floor every single time." The redhead flashed her friend a grin and then jostled him with an elbow to the ribs. "Come on, can teaching me to shoot really be that scary?"

It was the same conversation for weeks but now it was looking less and less stupid as he was only one of the few people on board that could shoot everything they had in the arms locker. “It is not stupid.” He admitted. Leiddem nudged her back as he shook his head at her. He was really not sure what Gregnol was thinking about employing someone that did not know how to shoot. “Fine. Okay, we can do this. But remember, if you shoot me you will have to nurse me back to health.” He said, grinning back at her as he leaned back against the turbo lift wall watching her.

"I'll just aim for your head, since it's already been established nothing gets through your thick skull."

The banter was typical, her smirk was accompanied by the twinkle of natural camaraderie, and it had long been established that Delaney dug deepest into the people she cared about the most. If she wasn't teasing you, she likely didn't think much of you. Following him in, she stopped just inside the doors as they closed behind her and folded her arms across her chest. The truth was, Delaney knew how to shoot. Growing up with three older siblings she'd spent her childhood trying to keep up with had spurred on her natural athleticism and basic self-defence was part of her pilot's training anyway. She was fine with a phaser, and even a plasma rifle, but there were weapons in the armory, especially since recent salvage efforts, where she couldn't tell one end from the other. The desire to have more options for self-defense was genuine, it just happened to coincide with her needing to keep herself occupied. It didn't hurt that it gave an extra excuse for hanging out with the lug in front of her. Plotting and planning his debut into holo-adventure stardom had given them plenty to do together but that was a lot of sitting around.

“Like your aim would be that good. Just think of all those bed baths whilst you nurse me back to health.” He teased, nudging her with a wink. He had more camaraderie with her than most people on the ship at the moment, it was nice to have a friend. “Deck 3. Quarters.” He called out pressing the console closest to him making the turbo lift grind alive and start its journey.

"You might actually smell decent for once."

They could go back and forth like this longer than most people Delaney had met. Typically, people gave up trying to get the last word, either through exhaustion or exasperation. The fact that Leiddem gave as good as he got whilst still remaining good natured enough not to take her incessant ribbing personally made him an uncommon ally and, therefore, easily one of the main reasons the young pilot had lasted as long as she had on a ship without adequate entertainment facilities. There were times when her frustration with him was legitimate; she'd decided a while ago that her expectations of a telepath must have been unreasonable, otherwise Leiddem really was as thick-skulled as she accused him of, but for all his obliviousness and stubborn insistence on risking his own neck before everyone else's, he was good company and had a softer side if you prodded deep enough. They were similar in that sense; Delaney wasn't without her tender side, and certainly wasn't without some emotional vulnerability when a situation got tough enough. He'd seen her shaken, just like she'd seen him panic. The hallmark of a great friendship was that neither of them used the genuine moments of weakness against each other, even in jest.

Laney leaned back against the wall, tucked into the corner beside the door to ensure she'd be first out.

"Are we playing tonight?," she changed the subject, referring to the poker game the pair of them often sat in on. "I think Oliver said he was in, and maybe Kali, but I don't know about the rest of them."

Leiddem looked over with an eyebrow raised as he looked her over, trying to work her out for a moment. It would have been easy with telepathy but his own rules and long maintained standards in Starfleet had dulled him to only talking to Jeassaho in moments of emotion. “We? Since when are we a we?” Leiddem challenged with a grin, knowing he had moved the conversation into the space neither of them ventured without so much as a side step.

It was so uncommon that anyone ever manage to render Delaney speechless that, when it happened, there was that brief moment of panic as she floundered for a way to recover. It was, as Leiddem knew well enough by now, practically impossible to embarrass the woman and she rarely showed any concern whatsoever about speaking her mind, which took a lot of the guesswork out and rendered telepathy mostly unnecessary, but for those moments where she was fiercely trying to deny her own vulnerability. Delaney smothered herself, or perhaps it was more accurate to say that whenever she was feeling fragile, she threw coal into her own flames and used the ensuing flare to mask uncomfortable emotions that she wasn't typically very comfortable expressing. Most of the time, however, her optimism and enthusiasm were entirely genuine, and usually, when Leiddem said something that proved he'd missed a point entirely, she was all over that in seconds.

Since when are we a we?

The words stung more than they should have. "Uh," she rallied, pulling her best 'you're an idiot' face, "I mean 'we' as in the group 'we'. Is the group playing poker tonight? Better?"

The man paled as he noticed the brief micro emotion flash across her face and he wondered if he had gone too far. He was relieved when her fighting instincts kicked in and she gave him the dum dum look. “Ah-huh.” The man said with a grin and a nudge but any more retort was lost as the turbo lost shuddered dropped a foot before the safeties kicked in rendering it motionless. “Err.”

For a split second, Delaney was inches away from berating herself for being stupid, having interpreted the sudden flutter in her stomach as nervousness, which was a blatantly stupid reaction to Leiddem being Leiddem. When it was immediately followed by that sudden plummet and the jolt that sent her shoulder blades into the hull plating, her instincts took a sharp veer down another avenue. "Okay, what did you do?"

Leiddem shot her a look and frowned. “Why do you always assume it is me?” He said sharply before he touched the console. It did not respond to his touch at all, leaving him to press blindly to confirm that power was out as nothing worked.

"I don't," came the immediate response, so swift that it had no choice but, to be honest. In the time it took for her to retort, Delaney had moved to stand beside the security officer as he tried to negotiate with the dead console. "It's just usually a lot less intimidating than whatever the actual problem is." Her tone, oddly enough, was subdued, at least for Laney, and the deep frown that mimicked his paid credit for the admission. A younger version of herself had struggled with the concept of 'time and place' and Delaney didn't always get it right now, but this definitely didn't seem like an appropriate version of either to be prodding the bear. "Power's out? Has the lift malfunctioned or did we forget to pay the power bill?" The joke was for his benefit and didn't do anything to curb the concern in her tone.

The man frowned and bit back the retort that stated that she did. He normally did not mind as it was normally in jest but there and then in a situation that was out of their control, it touched a nerve. “Well, it’s not me.” He finally decided was the safer option as he saw the woman vulnerable for once. “Yes, the power is out but the safeties are holding us here. I felt them click in as soon as we dropped.” He said thinking of the sudden drop and then this underneath them.

Perhaps a more accurate way of putting it would have been to say she only 'blamed' him because she knew it wasn't really his fault and the deflection always gave Delaney time to think, to react with an appropriate amount of reason instead of allowing adrenaline to get the better of her. It wasn't the first time it had bugged Leiddem though and so, reaching out, his friend squeezed his elbow as a conciliatory kind of reassurance mingled with an apology whilst she glanced upwards towards the lift's escape hatch.

"O'Callaghan to Engineering."

He'd taught her that, if Delaney wanted to admit it. Not so much a direct mentorship as simply watching the way Leiddem operated and finding him enough of a kindred spirit to realise his methods suited her well enough too. The level head in an emergency, despite his tenacity for barging head-first into a threat if he thought it meant someone else didn't have to. Procedural security, however, the methodical approach to dealing with situations. Ruling out potential solutions, such as getting Engineering to bust them out. The comm. line remained unresponsive and Delaney's frown deepened. Or not.

"Okay, that's not comforting." Still, panic wasn't her default. When faced with adversity, Delaney typically came up fighting. They had that in common too. "No impact though, no yellow alert. But no back-up systems yet either." She screwed up her nose and dropped her gaze to regard Leiddem. "Do we sit and wait?" It wasn't his style but Delaney wasn't convinced that rushing into Plan B was wise.

“We should wait for a bit. The computer will let them know we are stuck and someone will already be looking at it.” Leiddem assured and sat down on the floor and patted the space next to him. He had no great want or desire to climb out of the lift and go looking for a way out when they were safe . “I do not fancy climbing at the moment and I bet you do not either, especially as it will be dark up there.”

Whilst auxiliary power had not kicked in enough to power the lift to its destination, there was just enough illumination from the emergency lights to reveal the switch between Delaney's frown of puzzlement and the deadpan she shot him, in good humour, for that last remark. As she'd once confided in him, Delaney wasn't so much afraid of the dark as she was not a fan of how disoriented it made her. A fertile imagination had certainly gifted her plenty of imagined threats looming in the shadows when she was a child, though how many of those were simply a diversion from having to sleep was probably a reasonable question. Delaney had a battery that kept on going until she finally crashed; bed-times had not been her favourite growing up. Many nights had seen her tucked in with a spray bottle full of sparkly water to shoot at whatever tried to crawl out from under the bed. In typical fashion, her younger self had mostly enjoyed the dramatics of it.

But it wasn't so much a fear of the bogeyman as how much the dark interfered with the equilibrium that bothered her these days, in much the same way as physical restriction could freak her out. She wasn't claustrophobic; you couldn't be a decent small-craft pilot and be worried about cramped spaces. But anything that impeded her ability to move her arms and legs, or the suffocation of not being able to see where she was going, those things were harder to tolerate. Leiddem wasn't wrong; it wouldn't be the height that bothered her, she had a good head for them. Darkness just left her uncertain of which way was up and, at the pace Delaney usually operated, she really needed to see where she was going.

To his credit, however, the Betazoid hadn't wielded the personal information like a bludgeon and Delaney had hung out with him enough to recognise Leiddem's genuine attempts at consideration when it fumbled into play. She flopped down beside him, leaned her back against the wall of the turbolift, and decided not to punch him in the arm. With a soft thunk, Laney's head hit the wall plating and she cast her eyes directly ahead at the dimly-lit door. "You know, we laughed at the time, but that funky replicator in the mess hall was probably trying to tell us something." Three times she'd tried to order coffee; three times she'd got beef soup instead.

“The soup was good. Should have tried it..” He tried to joke but it failed just a little as he sighed and shook his head. It was becoming more and more apparent that the ship was trying to tell them something. “Been a few glitches last few days. She’s an old ship. She need ls a lot of work to keep her going. Been getting worse last year since USS Temperance was stolen from us and the evacuee corridors were ripped out of us.” He admitted patting the bulkhead above her head fondly.

"Only a matter of time before it just falls to pieces entirely," came the doom and gloom from beside him, though Delaney was too pragmatic for it to be melodrama for the sake of it. At the rate they were going, it was just a statement of observable fact. Her brow puckered again, evidence of the vague sense of distraction that tended to plague Delaney when she was actually prompted to take a moment for deep thought.

The silence that loomed for a moment left Leiddem with the feeling that he was walking on eggs shells. “So… what is your next project?” He ventured trying to think on something they could talk about whilst they waited.

"You are."

It came from a place just distant enough that the choice of words could probably have warranted some polish. Wherever Delaney's mind had wandered, it returned quickly enough at the immediate attempt to grab her attention, but if it occurred to her that her phrasing was wildly ambiguous, it didn't show in the easy grin that followed. "I figure, at best, next time we're at Freecloud I might manage a few hours in a rented holosuite so I want the writing for this adventure of yours done at least. You given any more thought to what setting you prefer? I have most of the assets ready for a pirate adventure but we can tweak if you have another idea."

Leiddem would have wondered if she was pulling his leg with the phrasing that she had been using that day if she had not carried on as if it had been nothing. What was going on with her? “No. Pirate adventure sounds perfect and exactly what I have been seeing as in style at the moment.” Leiddem had researched a little before they had embarked on the project at what was in style and what could he offer. “Is that okay?” He wondered.

It was Delaney's turn to shoot her friend a puzzled look. As was so often the case with interpersonal dynamics, Delaney was more concerned by changes in Leiddem's behaviour than recognising anything about her own that might have been suddenly alarming, but what his reactions had started to create was a vague yet lingering sense of self-consciousness. This didn't happen often. Delaney was a woman of conviction, she didn't suffer crisis' of confidence very often, but the one area where there were pre-existing chinks in her armor boiled down to relationships and how other people perceived her when opinions actually mattered. Heavy criticism and rejection in the past, based on her personality, still stung in recollection and it was true she'd fallen into comfortable habits with the Betazoid because it had always seemed like he just understood her in ways that many often didn't. Now, Delaney wasn't so sure.

She averted her eyes and nodded, unusually subdued. "Of course it's okay. As long as it's what you want." The inherent hesitation in her tone would normally have frustrated her but experience had taught Laney the hard way, many times, that she had a tendency to just forge onward like the proverbial bull in the china shop without realising that her enthusiasm wasn't necessarily reciprocated. Had she badgered him into agreeing to something he was having second thoughts about? Was that the problem?

Or was he having second thoughts about her? It wouldn't have been the first time she'd out-stayed her welcome. Delaney had weathered the slow deterioration of other people's willingness to tolerate her in the past but that had been more a feature of her teenage years. And the more she fretted now, the less sense that it made that Leiddem of all people should suddenly have had enough of her because he gave as good as he got. Half the time, he instigated the banter and Delaney had always got the impression that he was as grateful as she was that there was someone on the ship that didn't disintegrate into hyper-sensitivity at the drop of a hat. Something churned inside her the more she contemplated it, the power source of an indomitable spirit that wouldn't allow her to sit in uncertainty and indecision for long. If she'd fucked up somehow, she'd rather know.

Laney lifted her gaze, with all its tentative concern, to meet his.

"Lei', is something wrong? Did I do something?"

The man glanced over and down at the strange tone in her voice suddenly and found himself looking at her. “No… never.” He found himself saying as he leant out to put his hand on her knee careful to place it lightly. He spoke with his hands and touch most of the time but Starfleet Marine training had calmed down that instinct until it was needed. “What made you think on that?” He asked carefully.

His response was genuine enough that Delaney was immediately overwhelmed by a rush of relief, but the Betazoid's denial only left the woman wondering herself exactly how to explain the mounting pile of weird moments recently. And it had been just recently, ever since the Holoworld really. Maybe it had messed with her equilibrium more than she'd realised. Delaney didn't process fear as an inhibiting force, having been gifted a very healthy fight-response that tended to override any counter flight impulses and ensured she usually stood her ground rather than running away. It hadn't been pleasant to find the bodies of the deceased, and it wasn't a scene she was in a hurry to experience again, but Delaney had more or less succeeded in pushing it from her mind and had barreled on with life with fresh gusto. It could be an admirable quality but it also tended to mean that stress and anxiety snuck up on her when she wasn't paying attention.

For a moment, Laney studied her friend's face, and her brief lapse into a quieter vulnerability lent the scrutiny slightly more tenderness than she could usually be accused of. His big dumb face as she liked to call it was about the most reassuring thing she could think of at the moment and it mattered that it was currently looking at her in concern rather than derision. "Just...stuff." Very descriptive. "I mean, I know things have been pretty stressful and, sometimes, you look at me like..." Delaney glanced down at the hand on her knee and fought the urge to settle hers on top of it. These discussions, where she had to 'fess up to knowing that she pushed the envelope sometimes, were never her most eloquent. She sighed and dipped her gaze to the floor. "Just tell me to shut up if I ever get too much."

“You know I will and I do often.” He tried to joke but the joke fell flat when she looked away. Leiddem sighed and pulled his hand back for a moment before he gently turned her chin up to look at him. “Like what?” He prodded trying to work out where this was going. There was a tension that he could not place and he was not going to pry as that was a betrayal of trust.

Well, fuck.

For someone who spoke her mind often, Delaney had a rather unique talent for occasionally failing to recognise the patterns of her own quieter ruminations. Things could churn away in the background, drowned out by the excessive noise of her day-to-day enthusiasm, and when the scattered pieces finally fell into place, the resulting revelation seemed so blatantly obvious that she usually ended up kicking herself for not realising sooner. It was selective ignorance and wasn't always the result of deliberate avoidance; she just got caught up in managing immediate issues and didn't leave herself a lot of space for just sitting in solitude with her thoughts. Even falling asleep, she usually had to watch something or listen to music before she could drift off.

But it took that simple gesture, and the tenderness behind it, for inner-Delaney to deliver a sucker-punch that actually left outer-Delaney speechless for the second time in the same conversation. All the times he'd accused her of flirting and she'd never denied it. Delaney was well-aware of the fact that Leiddem was significantly more than just a colleague but his fingers on her chin, and that look in his eyes... She could admit that she'd always kind of assumed he would have a natural awareness that was part of his make-up. Delaney didn't understand telepathy but she accepted it and didn't feel threatened by the possibility that Leiddem could get a better read on her than most. But the flip-flop of her stomach, and the rush of adrenaline that left her fingertips tingling, was going to be a hard reaction to explain in a way that satisfied either of them.

"Like I've confused you." Her tone was softer than usual. "Which, judging by past experience, often means that I've done or said something I shouldn't have."

Leiddem’s face broke into a grin and he shook his head and leant over pressing a kiss to her forehead. It was a soft gesture but he hoped it spoke enough for now for whatever it was going on between them with the tension and the vulnerability that had been brewing between them for weeks. “You always confuse me.” He said simply. “But that does not mean anything is wrong.”

There it was again! Since when had Leiddem Kea turned her insides into mush?

Since always..

Delaney's ability to cut through the bullshit had always extended to her own motivations and there wasn't a whole lot to be gained from denying the blatantly obvious. It wasn't something she felt ashamed about anyway, the only reason to be concerned was whether or not the Betazoid was bothered by it and, since Laney was still operating under the supposition that she was a wide open book to the telepath, Leiddem's reassurances unravelled what had been weeks upon weeks of self-doubt that Delaney hadn't even articulated to herself. He wasn't mad. He wasn't back-pedalling. Nothing was wrong. The breath that she'd been holding finally allowed the redhead's shoulders to relax as she exhaled.

Her eyes closed, allowing her to absorb the warmth of his affection whilst also battling the urge to tip her head back and reciprocate with slightly more insistence. Sometimes, when it really mattered, Delaney could control her impulses. And this mattered. A lot. As his lips lingered, a smile stretched her features into a familiar warmth, and as he pulled away, Delaney's eyes sought Leiddem's with typical boldness, far from the type to be rendered coy in these circumstances, and she quirked a playful eyebrow at him. "If it's any consolation, you're cute when you're confused."

“Now you are lying.” He started and when she looked at him he grinned bigger. “I am always cute. My sisters say so, my mother, grandmothers, ex lovers, former colleagues, even my father say it. Cuteness I have in abundance.” He assured playfully back to her.

The deadpan that earned him was a little closer to natural form, a return to a status quo that was somehow as much a relief as it was a frustration. Leiddem wasn't the only one somewhat confused, though in Delaney's case it was more about choosing correctly than outright ignorance. Not screwing up was technically always her hope but now, perhaps more than she'd experienced before, it took on an importance that would take a while for her to adjust to. Caring about people wasn't difficult; Leiddem had just found a way to complicate it somehow.

Because of course he had.

She flicked him on the arm, hard enough to smart despite the fact her fingernail only bounced off his triceps.

"Don't let it go to your head. Not that," she added with her own grin of mischief, "it would stand much chance getting through the concrete." A gentle push to the side of his head was promptly followed by a soft huff of laughter, an affectionate concession that took care to reassure she was only teasing. She was always only teasing. The only time he was actually full-blown stupid was when he was hanging back in rooms that were about to explode. Then, she shouted at him and meant it.

He laughed and shook his head at her teasing. It was back to the status quo and now that his eyes had adjusted to the dark space, he was able to take her in properly. “I won’t. Not much gets into my head. Telepathic shields of steel unless you are Jeassaho and she expects me to be there.” His sister would be worried if he wasn’t a presence when they were in the same compartment. “Concrete is so last year.” He added settling back down properly keeping close to her but giving her space if she wanted it.

It was one of the few times he'd ever referenced his telepathy directly. As with most things that were new territory, Delaney took the distraction in her stride with ample curiosity and a willingness to pry. She studied him for a moment, typically unabashed, and after a moment, her head tipped to the side as she considered him with a smile. "You don't talk about it much. The whole," she waggled her fingers, "mind-reading thing. I'd have thought it stopped you being confused," she added, her expression wry. As far as she'd ever been told, by multiple sources, Delaney wasn't hard to read even without telepathy.

“Why would I?” He asked gently. “It scares most people off despite not doing it without permission. I know some of my species do it but that is not me.” He explained why he did not talk about it as it was part of him but it did not define him.

It was difficult to hide her surprise, Delaney didn't have the disposition for secrecy and that tendency to wear her heart on one sleeve and her mind on the other, as her grandmother often put it, didn't leave a lot of room for her to mask how much she hadn't expected that response. Not for the first time in her life, Laney was forced to stop and considered an opinion far removed from her own. It had never occurred her to be scared of his ability to delve deeper. If anything, she'd always operated under the supposition that it was probably making life easier, and likely accounted for why he was able to relate to her without the prickles and barbs that she occasionally provoked in others. Even when he'd voiced his confusion, it hadn't occurred to her that it was because he'd intentionally avoided reading her. Delaney stared at her friend with fresh eyes, and an admittedly deeper appreciation for how well he accepted her. If it hadn't been informed via a telepathic cheat sheet then she was honestly kind of staggered.

But there was an odd sense of loss too. She'd forged a friendship entirely open to embracing his reality, curious but also courageous enough to broach the territory that others found scary, apparently, for the sake of demonstrating trust and a willingness to accept him without conditions. Delaney regarded the Betazoid intently, maintaining eye contact as her assumptions shifted to form a slightly different puzzle arrangement, and it took a moment before she found her voice to quietly ask, "And what if you're given permission?"

The man could almost feel the cogs whirling in her head as she thought through what he said and the way she maintain eye contact as if daring him to look away. “Then I guess I am there if I am needed to but I try to keep myself to myself unless people are Betazoid or very intimate with myself.” He shrugged. “Why? Did you think … did you think I was looking in your head?” He asked gently turning to look at her better being carefully to not nudge her with his heavy boots.

Well, when he put it like that... "No. I mean, kind of?" The opportunity to stray into unintentional insult was right there, Delaney could feel the familiar heat of its impending wrath, but she couldn't bring herself to be dishonest. "I think looking is the wrong word. I just..."

And she floundered because, though she was a smart woman, Delaney also just hadn't had a lot to do with telepaths, nor any reason prior to this to attempt to understand them. The faintest wince about her eyes made it obvious enough that she was treading carefully, attempting to navigate in the metaphorical dark whilst her eyes sought his in the literal gloom. "I guess I just figured it's like any other sense. I don't expect people who can see not to know what I look like, or people who aren't deaf not to hear me coming a mile away." She offered a faint smile at that jab at herself. "I never expected you'd want to rummage around intentionally but I don't think I've ever really minded if you picked up on stuff naturally." Delaney's brow flickered with the slightest of frowns. "If anything, I find it kind of comforting."

She screwed her nose up.

"That makes me weird, doesn't it?"

“Well yea but I’m not going to judge you.” Leiddem said as he leant out and grabbed her hand. “Starfleet teaches us to not use our abilities without permission. There are whole regulations for everyone’s safety and I just carried on as it makes it easier for people to feel we are approachable. Many of my species are seemed as rude or aloof and that is not what Reu would want on his ship.” It had never really come up before between them, Gregnol trusted him enough to make his own choices.

He offered a grin at her as he took in her words about it being a comfort. It was an interesting view to have that he needed to know why. It was not like they had anything else to talk about. “Comforting huh?”

For a moment, the question detracted from the fact that he was holding her hand. It wasn't that it wasn't nice, more that Delaney had a sudden third-person perspective on how they must have looked; sat on the floor of a dark turbolift, holding hands and talking about...what exactly were they talking about?

She considered his question, and the best way to respond. "Well, yeah, kind of." And because she knew he'd want more of an explanation than that, Delaney hunched her shoulders, blew a faint raspberry of introspection, and then settled on, "I just kind of figure it saves on a lot of misunderstanding. This may come as some surprise," she added with a wry smirk, "but sometimes, apparently, I can come across as a little..." She feigned haughtiness, though her eyes danced with too much merriment at her own expense for Laney to really pull it off. "Energetic." It was not the word most commonly used but there was no point flinging insults at herself in the dark. "And, sometimes, my mouth gets a little ahead of my thoughts." Staring at him a moment, Delaney deadpanned, "You can look shocked now."

The man took the hint and pulled back his hand and put it to his chest and did his best shocked impression. “Stunned. I am telling you a 100 percent stunned by the revelation that your mouth gets ahead of you.” He teased. “You are perfect the way you are, you do not need to explain yourself to me of all people.”

And that, apparently, was what it took to melt her. Perfect. Blatantly untrue, Delaney had matured enough to know where all her rough edges were and spent an honest amount of effort on smoothing them out, but it was still a damnable sweet thing to say. The conversation, if Delaney was honest, had begun to resemble a rollercoaster, and as someone who absolutely loved that kind of thing, she wasn't disappointed; just unprepared. Blue eyes searched his for a moment, her lips twisted into a half-smile, before the quizzical expression stretched into a heartfelt grin. It was probably a good thing they were sat in the dark; Delaney was almost certain he'd nearly made her blush.

"Regardless of that," she pushed on, "there is still something oddly reassuring about being properly understood." She studied him for a moment longer and added in a softer tone, "It makes it easier to stop worrying that I'll just screw up and ruin things."

“You have not screwed up so far.” He pointed out, wondering what she was searching for. “Plus it's me. I’m much more likely to screw up and say something silly.”

That earned him a slightly mischievous look of partial agreement, though Delaney's lips twitched and somewhat ruined the charade. "As my grandmother would say, we were both born with feet the same size as our mouths." She raised her eyebrows playfully at him. "Though you've made it most of this conversation without fault so far, that's got to be a record." Part of her wanted to tell him that he never screwed up, that even when he was being insufferable, he was being...well, perfect. Perfectly Leiddem in any case, and that had always been fine with her. She couldn't quite get her head around the phrasing though, hesitated just enough to make it too awkward, and so instead Laney offered, "Point is, who you are doesn't scare me and I didn't realise that might be a thing you had to worry about." She tapped her temple and grinned. "Enter at your own risk though."

“I am happy where we are. I quite like the mystery that is Delaney.” He said grinned back at her. Not sure if he meant the tension between them, the woman or the mystery of not knowing. He liked the game they were playing and the playfulness of it all. It could have happened anywhere else but he was not choosy, locked in a turbo lift was as good as anywhere.

It took exactly half a second for the look Delaney shot him to switch from playful to incredulous. "You think I'm a mystery?" In all her years, she had never been attributed that description. "Surely the concrete's not that thick?"

“Well yeah. Sometimes you act like you cannot stand me even though I know I am your friend then other times you look at me like .. well … well like I look at you. So yes you are mysterious.” It was easy to understand right? He was making sense? He was not sure but the words were out there and he could not take them back.

Like I look at you. That attempted to vie for attention, it definitely required the most thought for Delaney to reach anything like an understanding of what he actually meant, but the stubbornness of that like you cannot stand me worried her too much to ignore. Her expressive features sobered at the frankness in Leiddem's tone and, to her credit, Delaney actually sat quietly for a moment to consider the accusation before offering a response. She was, she knew, a relentless force. And he weathered it so easily, and shot back the banter so effortlessly, that it had just become the way they communicated. This was exactly what she'd been worried about though; her tendency to not know when to stop.

"I can't think of anyone I stand more," she eventually replied, her tone soft despite the fact that there was a certain gentle humour to her phrasing. "Though," Delaney continued, "I sometimes have to resist the urge to strangle you." A pointed look pinned him through the gloom, though the human was far too nervous about setting the record straight to push too far. "That's mostly when you're hell-bent on throwing yourself in front of things so that other people don't get hurt." Her brow flickered. "I'm not sure what you mean by how you look at me, though." That felt, suddenly, like a dangerous question. "Is it that stare-across-the-room when you're trying to get me to stop talking? Or the furrowed brow when I've said something you can't make sense out of? Or the smirk you get when you know you're getting a way with being a pain in the ass?" All were likely contenders but somehow didn't feel like they really fit with his point.

The man gulped, he was in a corner mentally and physically and he was not sure what to do about it for a moment. He wanted to scoff and float he was not like that but he knew he was. He defended people and his life would be nothing if he left someone behind, he was a protector and always had been. Whether he was a marine in Starfleet or security on a civilian vessel that secretly was operating with the Fenris Rangers it was all the same. “I stand you too.” He finally said and lent forward giving up on words and pressed his lips to hers in a kiss. Either she would push him away and they would laugh, be awkward and blame the darkness or it would move them forward.

It was, as it turned out, a pretty goofy way to confess you liked someone. Trapped in the dark, in a turbolift that wouldn't move, blundering over explanations because neither of you really found it particularly easy to put things delicately. He was better at it than her, as it turned out, and whilst Delaney has long suspected Leiddem of having a massive soft spot, because she'd seen it peeking out often enough, nothing took away from its magnitude now that he wasn't trying to tuck it away. If they'd both dug deep enough into honesty, there had been some dancing around this for a while now, and whilst Delaney wasn't often struck by crisis' of confidence, they'd just whittled down what had been months, really, of misunderstanding and assumption and just that nagging concern that she wasn't his type. His gentleness took her by surprise, and it took a hand cupped against his jaw for Delaney to get over the several missed heartbeats to relax into reciprocation. Rather than push, there was the eventual tug of her hand slipping to the back of his head; a fresh reset on the whole confusion thing, a chance to set the record straight. An apology and a confession jumbled up together. She standed him quite a lot.

Leiddem pulled back and looked at the woman, unsure whether he should pull himself back from her further or if he should just make a joke. “Well, that was nice.” He murmured, stroking a finger along her cheek.

It took a moment for Delaney to gather herself, content for once to sit in silence and just study his face. The pushing aside of the barrier left ample space for her to say so many things but, in those initial few seconds, it was enough to just look at him, and to slide her hand around to graze fingers against his jaw. The slow blossom of a smile mirrored his sentiment and her tone, once she finally decided to speak, was gentle. "Yeah." A pause. "Lei', I..."

The reactivation of the lights caught her by surprise and prompted an immediate wince. Beneath them, the lift shuddered back to life and after a moment to reengage with its input sequence, continued its journey as if nothing had interrupted it. Delaney's eyes adjusted to the returning light and, with it, reality reasserted itself. She wasn't so much squeamish about getting caught as simply recognising that they couldn't sit on a lift floor making out without it being eventually kind of inappropriate. Slowly, she dropped her hand from his face and pulled away just enough to haul herself to her feet. Then, she offered the Betazoid a hand. The temptation to keep holding it once he was up was fierce but Laney settled for a reassuring squeeze.

Once the doors opened, she was the first through them, buoyed by an elated sense of enthusiasm to pick up her usual speed. Delaney turned, however, leaned against the archway of the open doors, and settled dancing eyes on Leiddem.

"So," she asked, grinning as her gaze dared him to correct her again, "are we playing poker tonight or not?"