Who Is This Guy?

Posted on Sat Aug 24, 2019 @ 5:46am by Lieutenant Penelope Naroot & Lieutenant JG Camille Lévesque PhD

859 words; about a 4 minute read

Mission: Plaga Navis
Location: Penny's Quarters
Timeline: Concurrent with Knave of Hearts

Camille waited impatiently in the turbolift as it headed towards the officers' mess. Penny said she was going for a coffee break and the computer put her on that deck. But the turbolifts never seemed to go fast enough when one wanted to go somewhere badly enough.

Suddenly the turbolift came to an unexpected halt and the doors opened. Penny reached in and grabbed Camille's wrist, pulling her out. "You didn't really think we're going to talk about this in the mess hall did you?" she said, dragging her down the corridor to her quarters.

Camille couldn’t help but laugh as she was yanked forcefully down the corridor. She managed to keep pace but only just.

She opened the doors and walked inside. "Just ignore the creative organization," she said, pulling clothes and padds off a chair so Camille could sit. She then cleared a chair for herself and sat down, fidgeting. "Okay....first thing's first: Not a word of this conversation to Nicole, or she'll dismantle me."

“Wait, dismantle?” Camille asked, her brow furrowed. But she shook her head. Some other Penny expression most likely. “Okay. Not a word to Nicole.”

"Okay," Penny sighed. "So his name is Lieutenant AJ Taggart. He and Nicole were...involved. Then he got called away by SI, and they broke up. Then he came back and it was kinda on again, off again, and then she kinda started to date him and someone else at once, and then they had a big blowout, then he left the ship again, and then a few months went by and you came and she's never been happier and you really have nothing to worry about because she really loves you and this is just going to be one of those stories people laugh about later and beep beep Penny!" she finished, shouting at herself.

“Whoa, whoa, hey,” Camille said softly. “It’s okay. Deep breaths. Thank you for telling me. I’m not worried; I know she loves me. Everything is okay. Thank you for telling me.”

"You're welcome....just remember: I didn't tell you anything."

Camille nodded. “What does he look like?” she asked.

"Brow hair, blue eyes, handsome, well built," Penny said. "His hair does that thing where it looks messy even though it isn't because he knows it looks cute."

“Um,” Camille said, not liking what she was hearing, “beep beep? Is that what I’m supposed to say?” Sad eyes couldn’t quite meet Penny’s. She knew Nicole loved her deeply, and she knew her own curiosity earned her the answer, but she didn’t exactly expect that many complimentary adjectives all at once.

"Your hair is a lot nicer," Penny supplied, smiling a bit.

"Th-thanks," Camille replied. Rationally she knew that she had nothing to worry about. But it didn't stop her nightmares from flooding back to her mind. "Is there anything else I should know?" she asked, trying and failing to maintain a façade that she wasn't bothered.

Penny wasn't always the strongest at picking up on social cues, but even she was reading Camille's face. She ran through several dozen possible responses and by the time she finished blinking had picked one that had a 74.6% chance of diffusing the situation. "If you see him, go easy on him. They had a huge fight and falling out the last time they saw each other so he probably won't be surprised when he finds out she's all yours."

Camille tried to take a deep breath, but additional thoughts began attacking her mind. “Or they’re able to resolve their issues, and even though she loves me he wants to try to pick up where they left off and now she has two people who love her one of whom she loves now and one she used to and maybe could again and I don’t fully understand Rigelian culture yet and I might be overreacting but I love her and she just treated me to the best dinner date the other night and I know she loves me too mais câlisse j’ai peur” Camille switched into her native tongue and became increasingly incomprehensible as the UT failed to understand her accent.

Penny tilted her head. "Oh...so that's what I sound like?" she said, then got back on track. "I'm sorry I made you worry," she said. "But you really shouldn't. If you are though, you should talk to her. She's probably going to freak when she finds out he's here and go running to talk to you anyway. That's always the solution, right? Talking?"

Camille stopped talking and listened to Penny. She took another deep breath and then nodded. "Okay. That's a good idea. Talking. Right." She stood and took another deep breath. "I'm okay. I'll manage. Now, before we left the bridge we were asked to find Torrance's ship. Let's go to my lab and see if we can find where he broke off from the freighter."

"Good idea!" Penny said, jumping up and quickly returning her clothes and belongings to their previous positions. "Lead on!" she said, grinning.

 

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