118: Loose Lips

By Commander TC Blane and Fleur Le Marc
80128.16
Following Chit Chat Cafe

--=The Aft Observation Lounge/Afterthought Cafe=--

TC sat staring out of the large aft windows of the Afterthought Café for hours. He never returned to his quarters to sleep. Sleep was something that was not coming to him in recent nights and he had found the quiet serenity of the café to be relaxing. So he sat here, and contemplated his thoughts as well as tried to steady himself for the day to come. It promised to be interesting.

Suddenly the lights of the café illuminated with increasing brightness, and a voice came from behind him.

"Mon dieu vous m'avez effrayé à la mort!" Fleur blurted. To Blane's ears through the Universal Translator he heard her exclamation as "My god, you scared me to death!"

"Sorry," TC said, noticing that her arms were full of what appeared to be bags of flour and cartons of eggs. "Can I make it up to you by helping you with that?"

"Yes, yes." Fleur said, catching her breath. "There is a cart out in the hall. Help me unload it please? I am behind already in starting this morning's baking."

TC obliged and helped the tiny woman as she lined things up on a countertop.

"Baking? I thought with running the main kitchen, that you wouldn't have time to work back here and we'd have to make do with replicated donuts." He smiled at her a little, remembering the things she used to bake back at their previous assignment. "Not that I'm complaining."

"The main kitchen is no longer my assignment, nor my problem." Fleur announced, pausing to blow a stray strand of hair back out of her face.

"What?"

"I was, how do you put it, replaced. By one Angus MacDougal."

"You mean the same guy who,"

"Yes. The one who ran Seven with London on the other ship." Fleur explained. "When I asked London to bring in help for the dinner to get me out of the tight spot that I was put into, I didn't expect that he would do so on a permanent basis. I did not know that MacDougal had already grown bored at his previous location and wanted to follow London off on his new adventure. He was already on his way here and Trick did not tell me." She rolled her eyes.

"However, perhaps this has more to do with punishing me for my past indiscretions as far as Starfleet is concerned, I do not know. In any event, it pleases me. I would much rather run this small kitchen and make it my own back here, in the quiet and away from the bustle. It is what I am best at."

TC nodded. "Well then things worked out for the best then for you."

Made a trip out into the corridor and brought in another load of baking supplies and gently placed them onto the counter. It took two more trips to empty the contents of the cart onto the counter. Fleur thanked him as she began putting things in order.

"Well I think you are getting the better deal anyway. Sugar and caffeine, makes a good combo in my mind. Plus..." He nodded to the surroundings. "...I like to décor. It is good to know they are not just leaving replicators in here. A personal touch will make this place even better." He smiled.

"Meh." Fleur frowned. "The décor needs a few living things to bring humanity to its perfection. I will take care of that the first chance I get." She was already envisioning plants along the wall where the window seats were situated. "It will do."

He glanced up at the clock on the wall, thirty minutes left until he was due on the bridge. "Is there anything else I can help with?" He glanced at the various brewing devices behind the bar and winked.

Fleur sighed. She opened her mouth to say something but preempted the statement before it left her lips. She wanted to ask him so badly how things had gone on Bajor, how the Vedek was doing, if TC happened to know why he had again lost his power of speech.

She already knew the answer in her heart, though, she knew even before she'd seen him. She believed that the Prophets were not pleased with him, and she had fully expected when he returned, if he returned with Zanh Liis, that they would have struck him silent once again as penance, as they had before.

"Yes. Your uniform looks different. But you are still the Operating Chief yes?"

"Affirmative."

"Then can you operate me a larger oven down here? Perhaps two? There are six in the main kitchen, and that is far more than they need. I cannot bake for 150 people on a daily basis with the thing that is around the corner. With that and two other ovens, I could get by."

TC cringed at the mention of his uniform; he had, for a moment forgotten about it. "I think I might be able to arrange at least one to be relocated here for you." He forced a smile. "Because I think that ship morale will benefit."

"Thank you very much. Whatever you can arrange, I will make it work."

He once again glanced at a particular espresso machine. "Are you sure I can't help with anything. Like, oh lets say, make some coffee?"

"Oui, Oui, where are my manners?" She took a bag of coffee beans out and then pulled something from a box that had been on her cart.

She removed what appeared to be an antique. . .whatever it was. The item consisted of a large wooden box of some sort, with a manually operated crank handle on the side. A black iron grate hid a small compartment inside and beneath there was a drawer.

Fleur smiled at Blane and opened the compartment. She took a bag of coffee beans from her supplies and ripped them open, then poured them into the contraption. She snapped the door shut and then gestured to the handle. "If you want good results, sometimes you have to put in a little extra effort. If you will grind the beans, I will assemble the percolator."

"Percolator?" TC raised an eyebrow, unfamiliar with the term.

"Yes. These have been in my family for generations, and they go with me wherever I go. Little, happy pieces of home."

*Just about the only happy pieces.* She thought.

He set to work grinding out the beans, it was laborious but oddly fun. It only took a few minute to reduce the beans to a sand like powder.

"How is this?" He shows the results of his labor to Fleur who nodded her approval. He handed her the grounds and she set to work brewing the coffee.

TC leaned back against the bar as watched her perform her magic. He frowned as his ever active mind wandered to the new bakery chef and her recent history. He sighed as he once again remembered the black collar he wore and what it entailed.

"So why did you stow away on the Alchemy?" He asked bluntly.

Fleur looked up at him, staring straight back at him. "Why did you go on 'vacation' in order to join the mission, Monsieur Blane?"

"It was not my attempt to join the mission, only to protect my captain. I knew I could help."

"Then there is the answer to your question, why did I stow away. I wanted to help."

"I didn't know you were so fond of Captain Zanh."

"I am not." She answered honestly. "I am fond of her crew. Some of them I have known for years, I fed them every day more than once most days aboard the deep space station. I did not know quite how I could help," She explained, "But I took the chance that I might, in the end, be able to somehow. That is why I did it."

TC nodded understanding but was not buying the explanation. "Fair enough." He scratched his chin. "How did you get by security? I mean the Alchemy was a secured ship, top secret. Getting on board would be a feat, especially for a culinary master such as yourself."

"You are suggesting, Monsieur Blane, that my talents lie only in the kitchen?" She flashed him a rare, wicked grin. "I assure you, that is not the case." She coyly allowed him a moment to consider, and to make whatever he wished of the statement. "Are you asking me merely out of curiosity? Or perhaps the higher-ups in your new department want to know, eh?"

Blane's jaw set in barely contained frustration. Even the kitchen help knew what his collar meant on sight.

"Once again I would remind you, Commander, that I spent years on Deep Space 23. All manner of Starfleet people came in and out of that place. I learned a few useful things. Some skills, I had already brought with me . . ."

Her eyes were vacant and TC wondered what she was remembering as she continued. "But, regardless of why you are asking," She decided not to evade him any longer when the answer was so uncomplicated.

"I am small. The guards were distracted. It was as simple, sadly, as picking a moment of opportunity and climbing into one of the larger containers on the anti-gravity unit. I did not sneak onto the ship. Once I sneaked onto the cart, they wheeled me on without a thought. That is the truth."

TC nodded. His gut told him that she was telling him the truth. Years of experience told him that her reason for doing it was not out of the goodness of her heart, well not completely.

"OK. Enough questions. I do not want to piss off my caffeine source." He smiled. "Thank you for being so frank."

"Thank you," Fleur added, nodding slowly, "For taking my answers at face value even though you know that I am not being entirely truthful with you."

Blane's eyes widened a little. Whatever had happened to her in her past, or wherever she'd been in her life in the twenty-seven years she'd lived before she found herself on this Federation starship, one thing was certain. Fleur Le Marc was not ordinary kitchen help.

Fleur had never spoken of her feelings for the Vedek outright to anyone before, but as she watched TC Blane now with his coffee cup in hand, continually tugging every few moments unconsciously at the collar which seemed to be too tight for him mentally if not physically, she felt she could tell him the truth.

"Special Operations. You are good at keeping secrets, yes?"

TC nodded slowly.

"Then if I tell you the truth of why I hid aboard the Alchemy, you will tell no one?"

"Affirmative."

Fleur sighed. She wondered if she should take the leap, and then she figured that perhaps the man with the lovely, troubled blue eyes could use the distraction of thinking about someone else's worries, even if only for a moment.

Instead of speaking, she raised her hands gracefully into the air and began to sign.

[[I did it, because I love him.]]

TC pondered for a moment. This was a big deal for the ships new barista. He knew that she had opened herself up. It suddenly occurred to him that she could be a valuable resource.

[[The gossip proceeded you]] He signed back.

Now her eyes widened. "I was not aware that you could sign so well."

TC smiled. "That is my secret for you to keep."

"It is my job not to be left out of any conversation." He looked at the coffee. "I am truly sorry for intruding into your personal life. One of the tasks I have been given is to protect this project, unfortunately for me to do that effectively I have to make sure it is safe from the locals first, if you know what I mean."

Fleur nodded. She frowned a little.

"Problem?" TC inquired.

"Gossip." She said. She hated the thought that she was so transparent.

"Don't worry. If there is one person who seems completely oblivious to the. . . gossip," TC chose the words carefully. "It's 'him'."

Fleur was relieved. She didn't care if everyone else on the ship thought her a fool, just so long as the Vedek did not.

"Loose lips sink ships." She added. "Is that so in space as well as on the ocean?"

"Affirmative."

----------------------------

Commander TC Blane
Second Officer/Chief of Operations/Special Ops
USS Serendipity NCC-2012

and

Fleur Le Marc
Civilian
USS Serendipity NCC-2012