[JP] Lt.Cdr. Ava Munro & LT Tamio K'wara - The Beginning (Part II)
Michelle
(( Guluhzba - Hurutam Sub-District, Commercial District, Deck 1045, Starbase 118 ))
Ava thought of her friend Karrod, and the injuries he'd sustained in his encounter with the madwoman Emzai, and another spike of guilt poked at her as she took another gulp of her scotch.
K’Wara: For a Frontier girl, you’re drinking less like a contest winner and more like someone trying to find an answer at the bottom of that glass. Wanna ask for the bottle?
Munro: I'm old enough to know there are no answers at the bottom of a bottle. And experienced enough to know when to call it a day.
Tamio raised a very stylized black eyebrow at that response.
K’Wara: See, you say that, but your face isn’t giving me much confidence in that at all. ::considering:: You’d make a great holo sculpture. Purple, of course. I always listen to my critics, unless they’re wrong.
Munro: I always figured I was more of a black kind of girl. I have a very plain colour palette, it's a flaw in my character and I work hard to overcome my shortcomings in other ways.
Tamio scoffed visibly, distaste clear in their expression.
K’Wara: Black is a horrid color for holo sculptures. All details disappear completely.
Munro: My good new friend, you lack imagination. In the darkness are the best secrets.
Tamio paused, offering Ava the benefit of a thorough consideration, but in the end, they truly couldn’t fathom the allure of ‘blackness’ and secrets. They conceded that it was certainly one of the better colours for mysteries, though.
K’Wara: Fine, be mysterious, Ava the Mystery, but I still think it’s going to be purple. With glitter.
Munro: Okay, well one day maybe I'll come back and you can do that sculpture but I don't want to be thin. I want to be larger than life :: beat :: As expansive as the largest nebula in the Borderlands.
K’Wara: Somehow, I don’t suspect that to be a problem in the slightest. ::raises glass:: Just a brief stopover then? No time to ‘see the sights’?
Ava raised her half filled glass in response, and swilled contents around before taking a tentative sip.
Munro: I got here an hour ago, showered and got out of my uniform and came straight here. To unwind. And hide from those cadets. I have never been asked more questions in my life :: a melancholic smile :: Not that I'm complaining, my daughter is a cadet. She's a long way from her final cadet cruise but I think she'd ask a lot of questions. Just not to me. To me she knows everything. Anyway, I ship out again in 12 hours.
Tamio rejected the universe’s attempt at getting them to talk work, and instead reoriented the conversation again.
K’Wara: Ah, plenty of time for a night on the town then! SB118 is the biggest city for light years, so not taking advantage of it would be a waste.
Munro: Really? :: shrugs :: You tempted me but I can't. I have responsibilities … boring Starfleet Officer type stuff. You know the drill.
She sighed and looked around at the bar. The offer was enticing, but she was the new XO of the Artemis and she refused to show up with a hangover to meet Fleet Captain Addison MacKenzie. She had heard the rumours of airlocks.
K’Wara: Come now, this isn’t Earth. No chance of stepping on an Admiral’s boot around these parts.
At least not until Deputy Commandant Reynolds decided to do an impromptu Academy inspection, but Tamio hadn’t heard any such news lately. Though, they supposed that was the point of an ‘impromptu’ inspection.
Munro: You assume I care about that? Do I look like the kind of woman that cares about getting an Admiral’s boot dirty?
K’Wara: I assume nothing, just that Admirals don’t like getting dirty boots. So, one thing, I guess. ::empties scotch glass:: And for a girl whose first instinct was ‘Let’s not talk about Starfleet’? I’d say you definitely need a day on the town. I may even throw in some free art critic opportunities to really cheer you up.
Munro: If you had promised me I could get an Admiral’s boots dirty maybe I'd have taken you up on the offer :: nods to Corlio :: Maybe you should ask the barman when he finishes his shift. Like my mother always says ‘don't wait until you can't’.
Tamio shook their head languidly, a well-practiced frivolous expression on their face as they avoided the massive blaring sign spelling out ‘commitment’ in the air.
K’Wara: Ah, but you forget, I pretend to be an artist around these parts, Ava. ::smirk:: And artists are artists because they give up on things and pine instead. Where’s the inspired misery if I go on dates?
They made sure to say the very word with the kind of appalled shock that one might address a neighbourhood scandal of the worst order.
Munro: Oh, there's plenty of misery to go around after the dates and the kisses. Trust me. Plenty of inspiration waits at the other side of a kiss. If that's what you want.
Ava slipped off the seat and smiled at the, as she now knew them to be, Cygnian.
Munro: I hope we meet again.
Tamio raised their empty glass in her honor.
Tamio: Godspeed, Ava.
The tall blonde left Galuhzba behind, and Tamio followed her with their dark brown felinoid eyes, their elliptical pupils narrowed with interest and inebriation. This was when they sensed Corlio’s presence behind them as he stepped up to the counter again.
Tamio: See, and that’s why people don’t get married anymore.
Corlio: And individuals like you are why complaints that romance is dead spread wide and far.
Tamio scrounged up their nose in distaste at the baseless accusation.
Tamio: Ah, no, that’d be the Ferengi. Nothing to kill romance like an invoice after the fact.
What Tamio wasn’t expecting was what awaited them when they two hours later returned to their quarters, slightly more inebriated than previously - but not to a degree where their padfooted tendencies made an appearance, which would frankly have been an added insult to injury at this point - and they took a seat on one of their couches. They were about to drift off to sleep when a sudden notification alerted them that they’d received a communication while they’d been away.
The subject line nearly made them drop their PADD.
// Personal Subspace Communication
FROM: Office of Personnel, Starbase 118 Campus, Starfleet Academy
TO: LT Tamio K’Wara
SUBJECT: Reassignment to Active Duty \\
K’Wara: Crap.
Lt. Commander Ava Munro
First Officer
USS Artemis-A
A240004LL2
&
LT Tamio K’Wara
Operations Officer
USS Artemis-A
A240006GS1