Trust Issues

Posted on Thu Apr 4th, 2024 @ 1:43am by Lieutenant JG Tyler Rehman & Lieutenant JG Gulati

2,093 words; about a 10 minute read

Mission: Mission 1 - Project Concord
Location: USS Concord | Mess Hall

Benzites did not pace, they had more emotional openness than Vulcans did, but could contain it for better than a Romulan or a Klingon for that matter, but Lieutenant Gulati was not just any Benzite. She was a brilliant mind tapped for project Concord and especially entrusted with this field assignment aboard the USS Concord as mission specialist. There was barely a part or piece of the starship itself, especially its experimental and current defunct transwarp drive that she didn't at least have some assemblence of knowledge about. Curiosity killed the cat an Earth idiom that many had tarnished over the centuries by omitting it in full. But satisfaction brought it back thought Gulati. There was no questioning the curiosity of the crew, of any scientist, engineers, or even daring explorer assigned to the Concord. It was not, however, curiosity that killed the cat. It was sabotage that had done them in and cost the Concord its place in the history books.

"USS Concord a success. The crew of USS Voyager return home" Gulati muttered to herself. That was what the news was supposed to be. Now? It will eventually be USS Concord missing at least until they could make contact with Earth. Even then though, this still left the Concord stranded. It would be a needle in a haystack to find the USS Voyager out in the Delta Quadrant. Alone and cut off from the Federation. To make matters worse? The potential of a saboteur or even saboteurs aboard. They had already caused the Concord's mission to fail and at this point, it would be the long way home. The ship's Chief Engineer had been inured trying to ambitiously get the experimental drive back online.

I'm not sure who to trust the Benzite thought to herself. She had turned to the Captain and First Officer because of protocol, but even then, it was a risk. If either of them had any involvement, she would have just tipped them off that she knew. Her blue face became ghostly paler than usual as she walked into the Officer's mess. "Great... I may have inadvertently placed a target on my back" she said to herself. It was the realization that nobody was innocent or cleared. Even the Captain.

Walking into the Officer's mess, Lieutenant Gulati spotted a familiar face. Though she had not interacted with the young science officer much since their academy years, Tyler Rehman had been an acquaintance of sorts, an academic rival if anyone asked Gulati. The Benzite grabbed a beverage and stood behind the man, reading over his shoulder as the science officer glossed over a PaDD. "I see you still have your nose deep into PaDDs as usual, Tyler" stated the Benzite. "Mind if I join you?" she added uncertain with how the two of them had left things between them.

Tyler Rehman wasn't entirely sure why he was sitting in the mess hall, holding a PaDD while nursing a cooling mug of tea. He had been on the bridge for hours, and he needed a break from looking at monitors and readings of scans. Yet here he was looking at a PaDD, full of algorithms and equations that he had come up with from the sensor readings that the Concord had been continuously collecting. He had been using differential equations and vector analysis to try to get some semblance of what this nebula looked like. The farther the ship went into the nebula, the harder it would be to take scans.

Stellar cartography had been working on this problem for hours as well. He had wished he could be down in the lab with his fellow cartographers, but he had been assigned bridge duty. He ended up being the laison from the lab to the bridge and vice versa.

He felt a presence behind him but ignored it until the presence spoke. His dark brown eyebrows knitted together about hearing the voice. What were the odds? But the sounds of the respirator was the dead giveaway that matched the voice.

"Gulati," Tyler said as the Benzite female stepped around him and asked if she could join him. "Sure, have a seat," he answered, extending a hand toward the opposite chair. He set the PaDD down and waited for the Benzite to sit. The first question he wanted to ask was what she was doing on the Concord but held his tongue.

"Out of all the starships across all the stars, strange new worlds near and far," prefaced the Benzite. "Fate would have us marooned here together" teased the woman. She had no ill feelings towards Tyler, and in fact, quite the opposite. In her desperate internal panic to find someone to trust, fate served her brains on a silver platter.

The facts were simple: the USS Concord experimental drive had malfunctioned but the malfunction was not accidental; she remembered Tyler from their academy years together. He was never an enemy though not exactly a friend either. He was simply put, an obstacle, competition that she felt the need to overcome. If there was anyone who could think on her level, it was Tyler Rehman.

"Or did you request this assignment because you got wind I was going to be here and you grew tired of being the smartest one in the room?" said Gulati in jest of course. Seated, she studied his face. It felt nice to find familiarity aboard the starship.

Tyler tilted his head, shrugged and then offered a small smile. "I'll never tire of being the smartest one in the room," he said, his smile broadening. "I was transferred here for my mathematical abilities, and to help an understaffed stellar cartography department." He didn't understand how a mission such as this has a stellar cartography department that was less than, well... stellar. He almost chuckled at his own pun but kept it in check.

"Plus, the mission did seem interesting, which helped because I had no choice in the matter concerning the assignment." He picked up the PaDD and then set it back down, he went to put his finger on the corner to spin it around in its spot but refrained from doing so. Instead, he looked back up at Gulati, studying her features, and the respirator. He obviously didn't know her that well, but his first thought was she must not have wanted the genetic modification so she wouldn't have to use that respirator.

He shook his head, trying to get his overactive mind to focus on the conversation that was before him. "Anyway... so how did you end up on the Concord?"

"You know us geniuses, Ty," Gulati replied with a small huff of vapors coming off from her breathing apparatus. This was something she missed, playful banter with an intellectual equal. "We go where we are needed, and with my area of expertise being Borg technology? This reversed engineered baby is mine."

She looked prideful and bordered on arrogant in what she said next. "I am the Concord" stated the Benzite without any hesitation making the grandiose proclamation. Then the wave of reality knocked her off her high horse and down on her ass as she settled into the seat more. "I was the Concord."

The Benzite sighed. More vapor, this time an extended cloud of it in her breathy exhale. "I helped design this damn thing, not the ship of course, but the tech? That drive that was supposed to get us to Voyager. I had my hands on that project since it was in its fetal stages in the minds of lackluster men who couldn't bring it to life. I brought it to life. I poured my soul into this, Ty, and they assigned me to see this through."

She wanted to say more. She wanted to cry mostly or grab a tray of food and throw it against a bulkhead to alleviate the stress and disappointment. Instead, she just sat there looking lost.

Tyler absorbed what Gulati was saying, and as he did so, he sat there quietly... just watching the Benzite female. He understood the frustration, in his so far short career, he had incurred plenty of hiccups. Anyone in the mathematical sciences experienced it, it was how it was.

"Well..." Tyler began as he started to tap his foreginger against the table in a rhythmic motion - another habit - and continued. "It was a hiccup, or something that caused whatever to happen, happen. The drive will get fixed at some point, as you know these things take time." He stopped tapping his finger and drew both hands into his lap. "No one is going to blame you for what happened, every person on this ship knew the risk... especially the engineers."

He had this impulse to reach out and pat her forearm or hand to provide some comfort, but his hands never moved. "Besides, Gulati, you are far more than an experimental engine. I think you know that."

Gulati snickered and and shook her head. "Well, this Benzite needs help, Tyler" she admitted. "You're right nobody is going to blame me for what happened because it was not my fault. It is, however, someone's" she added with a piercing tone.

She hushed her voice. "Tyler, this doesn't leave us. There's a saboteur aboard. Worse than that, maybe more than one. Our little problem had a bit of help getting to that point, and I need a little more help on figuring all of this out. I need someone just about as smart as me" she said looking at Tyler Rehman.

Tyler was probably a smidge smarter, but he didn't voice that. However, his eyes did widen at the admission, but he quickly straightened his features. He had a hundred questions going through his mind at warp speed, but none of that mattered at the moment. There was a saboteur or saboteurs on board, and he knew Gulati would not make that up. The only thing he could say was yes. "Of course, I'll help, anyway that I can," he finally replied, his voice as hushed as Gulati's,

"There's more to it," she said. "But not here. I..." she breathed and vapor nearly obscured her face. "I'm having some serious trust issues lately. Can we meet at 0100, somewhere away from people" she explained.

Tyler's left eyebrow arched up at hearing what Gulati had said. 0100? That seemed ominous, and a bit dangerous. However, he nodded anyway, despite having a bit of reservations concerning a meeting that was meant to be their eyes and ears only. "Yeah, I can meet," he paused for a moment, recalling the specs of the ship. "There is a small mess hall on deck twenty-five, port side, that should be fine at that hour. Or there is maintenance bay two right down the corridor from the mess. Or you can come by my quarters..." he closed his mouth as he thought about that. A female entering his quarters could cause chatter among their fellow crew if someone saw. "Options anyway."

"Your quarters it us," Gulati replied with expressive eyes. A smirk for a Benzite was a little difficult to pull off. It did seem like the safest and most secure option. "Privacy is of the utmost importance after all" she added. "I'll see you then, Tyler."

"Yup," Tyler answered, a quick nod followed. He watched as Gulati got up from the table and headed toward the door to the mess hall. His focus stayed on the doors as they closed behind the Benzite. It was a good ten seconds before his gaze shifted back to the PaDD sitting on the table. Sabateurs on board? That seemed odd, but Gulati seemed genuinely worried and that was all he needed in order to keep his mind opened to the possibility of what she was saying was very much the truth. He picked up the PaDD from the tabletop, only to put it back down as he became lost in thought as to what was happening on board. All he could at this point was just wait and see what Gulati had to say, but as usual Tyler Rehman and his keen mind went a mile a minute at all the possibilities and scenarios that could be the case.

He sat there, looking off, lost in thought as the mess hall melted away and he became tangled in his own musings.

OFF:

Lieutenant JG Gulati
&
Lieutenant JG Tyler Rehman

 

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