Old Habits

Posted on Fri Feb 16th, 2024 @ 4:25pm by Chief Armoury Rormu Yazlin & Taev Mirok

Mission: Fractures
Location: Armoury
1329 words - 2.7 OF Standard Post Measure

He didn't often have a reason to visit Mary Rose so Taev took an excuse when it appeared, and for a change this one wasn't to deal with some issue or emergency. In fact, he hoped he'd avoided some of those by pointing a very well-qualified colleague in the direction of a position that needed someone competent and solid before they faced off with the SoC. Hence the visit was in some sense taking a sounding - getting a sense of whether the fit seemed good.

Turning into the armoury, he paused at the entry, waiting to be acknowledged and given permission to enter.

"jolan'tru Mirok, you honour me with your presence." Yazlin made her way through the large open space of the armoury and towards the door that had slid open at the Romulan's proximity. "What brings you all the way out here?" They hadn't spoken face to face in quite a while, "Oh, did Indigo tell you about the spring wine? I have a couple of bottles in my quarters."

"I do enjoy your Bajoran grape juice," he teased back, offering a smile at the joke of how little it affected his Romulan tolerance for alcohol. "But I was going to pay a visit to Liha and figured I'd drop by and see how you were settling in here." It wasn't quite a lie - he was hoping to see Liha too.

Yazlin nodded a bit at that, "I'm sure Engineering could always use some of your pipe cleaner for the waste recycle systems." She enjoyed Romulan ale, some days a little too much. It helped forgetting some of the faces. She snapped back to the present moment, "How's the Thrai holding up?"

"Well as ever," he replied, almost by rote since it was so much his standard answer. Even among Galae security, he'd always been considered tight-lipped, and the years since leaving had only reinforced the tendency to say little, even to friends. "Indigo still takes the occasional run at 'getting me out of my shell'." He grinned. "And I continue to successfully resist. How about you? have you gotten to know the crew here yet?"

"Haven't had much time to do that. There's some interesting dynamics among the crew to explore, though." Yazlin admitted. it seemed like an intricate balance that had been struck between private and work life. The mercenary groups weren't too big on mixing their personal lives in, then again that might've had something to do with the type of work they were hired to do. "They seem a capable bunch, from what I can gather though."

'Interesting dynamics' struck him as an understatement. "They are a ...diverse... group," he agreed with a soft chuckle. "But they make it work, in some cases there is even a synergy that might not be achieved with a more standard or standardly trained crew."

"I'm not too worried about the level of training." Yazlin was someone that was constantly calculating risks. Having people in relationships and family members across different departments, that made it difficult to make objective decisions. Sure it was a source of perseverance in the face of impossible odds, it was also a great way to get oneself killed in a fiery implosion. "Anyone particularly diverse?"

"Hey, I didn't say there wasn't a level of training; just that it wasn't the standard sort. Which can often be preferrable." Taev grinned. "But on diverse... hmm," he stroked his chin a moment, "For one, there's a tiny Romulan scion of defector nobility, who was Starfleet until she punched out an admiral or two. She's here because she'd served with the chief engineer, who is among my favorite humans on the ship, but does take a worrying degree of joy in explosions. Oh, and he's married to the accounts manager, who once tried to blow up one of the cargo holds. So... match made in Vorta Vor?" he said with a Romulan eyebrow shrug. "There's also an Orion medic, a half-Vulcan scientist revived from serving on this ship a century prior, and a security officer who writes holo-adventures."

Yazlin had never been in Starfleet, but she'd seen her fair share of punchable faces when some of their admiralty came rolling through trying to convince them to make the jump when the militia integrated, so she didn't feel too much like she could hold it against them. Especially knowing how they treated the Romulans before during and after the Hobus catastrophy. "I'd better take a look at one of those holo-adventures then, in the near future." The other things were neatly filed away in her mental notebook. "I appreciate the check-in." There was a beat of silence, "where will the currents take you next?"

Taev tipped his head, thinking a moment. Despite his normal taciturn tendencies, and years of Galae training reinforcing the idea of keeping all information need-to-know, this was Yazlin and she would cause to know soon enough. Better she have the extra time to prepare. "Where the currents wil carry you as well. We'll be joining forces to take out some pirates."

"Boots on the ground or ship-to-ship?" It was no secret that someone with Yazlin's particular skillset preferred the wide open of planetside combat, but the situations they would find themselves in often would probably steer them more towards ship to ship action. Perhaps a station here and there.

"The plan is ship-to-ship," Taev replied, and gave her a small, knowing smile. "But don't be sad - there's a decent chance we might want a boarding party to take one of their vessels."

"I'm sure I'll find something to occupy my time." A small smirk flashed across the Bajoran's features, to match the Romulan's knowing look. "I'm sure I'll get a proper briefing from the Captain in due time."

"Wouldn't want you to get bored," he remarked with a joking smile. "Not that there's much chance of it on this ship. If Liha ever left, I think I'd have to stay in touch with you or one of the other crew just for the stories."

"I'm sure I can keep a personal log for your entertainment." Yazlin was never one for recording her own ruminations, it seemed like an odd but mostly narcissistic thing to do. Who would ever want to sit down and listen to her drone on and on about what she had for lunch. Definitely not her. She also figured someone like Taev only saw personal logs as security hazards anyway.

Taev laughed. "If you're writing it down, I'll expect a generous helping of entertaining lies." It was the nice thing about another person with a security background - specifically, a non-Starfleet one - that he knew they appreciated things like the value of misdirection. "But you'll have to step out of your sanctuary here and get to know your crewmates for that."

Now there was one of those instances where the truth would've probably gone down better when coated in a comforting lie. Yazlin wasn't used to 'mingling', it just wasn't the done thing in the units she had bounced between. "I'll have you know that I frequent the ship's cafeteria on a daily basis even though I have a perfectly serviceable food replicator in my quarters."

"Still the social butterfly," he chuckled. In truth he couldn't criticize (much) since resisting Indigo trying to drag him out to parties or clubs had become something of an on-going game, but he did give in occasionally (after sufficient protest) since integrating with the crew was important. And someone had to keep an eye on them. "I was going to make some rounds. Walk with me."

"You really don't waste time, do you." Yazlin should've known the Romulan wasn't going to let her get away with an empty promise. "Let me just..." She moved to close the weapon lockers and made sure everything was accounted for and secured before rejoining him near the exit. "Lead the way."