by Dane Cristiane and Keiran O'Sullivan
90129.21
Concurrent with In High Places
Soundtrack: Glass of Water by Coldplay
-=/\=-
-=Location: Classified=-
90129.21
Concurrent with In High Places
Soundtrack: Glass of Water by Coldplay
-=/\=-
-=Location: Classified=-
Worn and weary though he was, Dane Cristiane found that for once in his life, he was actually happy to be where he was.
Where he was, was standing on a transporter dais in the same structure that currently, and covertly housed the USS Alchemy.
The prototype would remain at this site until the Serendipity was repaired and ready to return to space. In the meantime she'd have some upgrades, routine maintenance, and Dane didn't really know or care what else.
All he knew was he was about to go to the first place he had ever come to think of in his life as home.
He was returning to the Serendipity.
Better still, he was returning to people there that he found, to his continued disbelief, that he had actually missed while he'd been gone.
Happy as he was, however, he remained distracted by a nagging concern at the back of his mind.
Gira Lassiter had not responded to his last communication, and he had thought that if anything would be enough to get a reply out of her of some sort beyond the one line she'd sent doubting his actual location on Bajor, it would be the sight of absolutely unholy cuteness of the orphans from the sanctuary at Altaan.
They had put on quite a show for her as he filmed them with the vidcamera, and he was more than a little disappointed that the effort hadn't gotten so much as an electronic confirmation of receipt of the message.
*Maybe she sent her reply to the Sera, thinking I would have returned by now...*
"Are you ready, Ensign?" The transporter operator asked.
Dane drew in a deep breath, and nodded. "Energize."
-=Moments earlier, in Transporter Room Three of the Serendipity=-
It was very early morning if you believed the chronometers of the ship, but to Keiran O'Sullivan it still felt as though it was the middle of the night.
He hadn't slept well, his mind swimming with too many thoughts to sort out before dropping off from pure exhaustion.
This being the case, those thoughts did what they always had a tendency to do on nights like last night.
They chased him from his waking hours into the supposed refuge of dreams, mutating violently into sights and sounds that he didn't want to experience.
Still, he had been greeted with the most comforting of all sights possible upon opening his eyes at four-thirty hours and finally giving up the attempt at resting.
The sight was that of his wife; safe, sound, and fast asleep beside him.
*My wife, Liis...*
The idea of her being his wife after all they had been through was still a complete novelty to Keiran, and he found he couldn't erase the grin from his face as he strolled the halls with renewed energy.
He nodded to those he passed as he started to whistle a few notes of a familiar tune. He strode into the transporter room, and was glad to find that the person he'd planned to be waiting for had not yet arrived.
"Wait! Captain O'Sullivan!"
A youthful, female voice called out to him. The woman it belonged to came skidding through the half-closed doors and then stopped just short of plowing into Andrew Parrish as he stood at the controls.
The bright-eyed, auburn-haired woman squared her shoulders, brushed her bangs back out of her face and stood tall, her expression calm and cool as though there had been nothing at all out of the ordinary about her entrance.
Keiran knew this girl.
Yet, he also knew that from her standpoint they had not met before, and the last thing he wanted to do was alter her present impression of the situation. "Ensign..." he said, purposely leading her to fill in her name.
"Landry Steele, Sir. Captain O'Sullivan, I,"
"Commander." Keiran corrected. He knew that Landry had been working as Gem Lassiter's assistant since her resequencing, and so her information about him, accessed through TI channels, still maintained his old rank. "Not my ship, Ensign. Here, I'm just one of the bunch."
"I'm sorry, Sir. But you'll always be Captain Keiran O'Sullivan to me, Sir..." Landry gushed, actually somewhat star-struck. "I mean, the man who carried off the infamous 2378 Jump where..."
Keiran became immediately and intensely uncomfortable. He didn't want to think about the past at all, especially not now.
It was all he'd been thinking about for such a very a long time, as he continually struggled to resist the pull of the multitude of memories he'd been stuck with.
He didn't want to spend any time regaling what seemed to be an almost-teenaged fan club with stories of what were supposedly his fabled 'glory days'.
To him, those Jumps were made up of days marked by misery, longing, and a love long unrequited. A love that had finally been returned to him, only to be viciously torn away the moment that he trusted in it.
He'd faced war, destruction, death and dishonor, but those memories of losing Liis' love were the ones that frightened him the most.
*Here and Now. Now is the only time that matters,* He repeated internally, trying to slow the pounding of his heart. He inhaled and exhaled once, deeply and slowly.
"Ensign, 'tis very kind of ya to be aware of meh work. But I hav'a very busy schedule today. Is there...somethin' in particular you were needin' from meh?"
Landry giggled furiously. "Captain, your accent is quite lovely, Sir, I swear, I could listen to you all day,"
"Landry," Keiran slipped into familiarity out of sheer frustration as he looked down at the very petite Steele; more than a foot shorter than he was in his boots. He gently removed her Pixie-like hand from his massive bicep, where it had suddenly and inexplicably clamped down. "What didya need, then?"
"I just need your signature, as Security Liaison to the Project, to confirm my new orders, Sir. Admiral Lassiter said,"
"Wait." Keiran held up a finger in question. "New orders?"
"For my internship aboard the Serendipity, Sir. I...I thought the Admiral had told you." Landry looked quite disappointed now. "She said that you were familiar with my file and my past work, whatever that was." She shrugged suddenly. "Honestly I can't remember what I did before. I could have been top of my class in Underwater Firefighting, for all I know."
Keiran couldn't help but be as amused as ever by the woman's bubbly nature, and fought to contain a smile, trying to be very formal so as not to give the impression that he remembered her past work quite well.
"But," she continued, "they tell me that's the way it's supposed to work. So I s'pose that's a good thing, right?"
"Aye," Keiran's blue eyes clouded again, and he stared distantly off toward the doors. With more than a trace of bitterness in his soft, rumbling voice, he continued. "Is exactly how it's supposed to work."
He shook himself free of the thought that had seized him and folded his arms over his chest."So what's to be the outcome of this 'Internship', like yeah?"
"Well, if I want the job for a career, I have to jump through all the required hoops first. Ha. Jump through hoops. No pun intended."
"The job?" Keiran's chest tightened. His lungs felt all at once too small to contain the necessary amount of oxygen required in order to catch his breath.
Landry had never before expressed to him any desire to stay with Temporal at all, let alone to become a Jumper.
"Yes. The job. If I'm going to become a Jumper, they want me here and they want me going through the different departments until I learn all I can learn from you and...Captain....Zanh..." Landry's voice trailed off. She realized suddenly that the transporter operator was gaping at her to the point she couldn't believe his upper jaw was still hinged to the lower.
"What's your deal, Crewman?" Landry asked, putting her hands on her hips and tapping her toe impatiently.
"I...um...work...here?" Parrish replied, reddening. "That's my 'deal'."
Keiran realized then that they shouldn't, really, be discussing this in front of Parrish. "Drew, would'ya mind too terribly much steppin' out fer a moment? Please?"
Drew Parrish never minded doing anything that O'Sullivan asked him, because the man was just so damned polite when he asked it.
"Of course, Sir. Let me know when you need me."
The doors shut behind him and Landry turned her attention back to O'Sullivan, a big smile upon her face. "We don't need him anyway. Captain Keiran O'Sullivan of Temporal Investigations could run a common transporter with his eyes closed and both hands tied behind his-"
"Ensign," Keiran felt the beginnings of a headache, and he closed his eyes a moment. "You're very kind. But if we're goin'ta work together and you're going to learn from me, then you have to let me do some of the talkin'. So."
Landry nodded. "So you'll approve the Internship?"
"Aye, will that." Keiran took the PADD from her hand and affixed his thumbprint to it. "Though you might wish later that I hadn't. I can be hard on those I teach. I'll be...expectin' quite a lot from ya."
"I'm ready to give it, Sir."
"Am glad to hear it. I've got another intern I'm takin' on too, and in fact, he's probably wonderin' why we haven't beamed him back yet. So I think I'll just be lettin' Mister Parrish back in now. Actually, would ya be so kind?"
"Happy to help, Sir!" Landry stuck her head out through the doors and yelled to Parrish, who had taken a walk down the hall to afford O'Sullivan the privacy he'd requested.
"Hey, Parrish!"
Drew nearly jumped out of his skin, lost in through and truthfully, still half asleep as he leaned against the wall of the formerly quiet corridor.
"Back to work! Chop chop!" Landry added, clapping her hands together twice for emphasis as she spoke the last two words and before jerking her thumb in the direction of the transporter room.
Keiran sighed and raised an eyebrow as she turned back to face him with a satisfied smile on her face.
"I could've hollered for the poor boy mehself, Ensign Steele."
She bit her lip. "Sorry, Sir."
"They're ready when we are, Sir," Parrish announced, shooting a look at Steele as he read the text on his communications screen.
"Then let's welcome Mr. Cristiane home."
Keiran's stare locked on Landry as he spoke the name, but not a hint of recognition appeared in her eyes.
-------------------------------
Ensign Dane Cristiane
Communications Officer
USS Serendipity NCC-2012
and
Commander Keiran OʼSullivan
Security Liaison
The Alchemy Project
USS Serendipity NCC-2012
Ensign Dane Cristiane
Communications Officer
USS Serendipity NCC-2012
and
Commander Keiran OʼSullivan
Security Liaison
The Alchemy Project
USS Serendipity NCC-2012