Communication Breakdown

Posted on Tue Nov 22nd, 2022 @ 5:59am by Lieutenant JG Calanthe 'Cal' Diaz & Commander Benjamin Jamesson

Mission: Sojurn
Location: Corridor outside the Armory
4359 words - 8.7 OF Standard Post Measure

"Pretty sure that's your problem now, Chief."

The sound of Lexi's teasing stuck with Calanthe all the way to the turbolift, not because she took any offense to her friend's banter but because there was zero wiggle room to argue with it anymore. For the last few months, the pair of them had fallen into a pseudo-leadership role in Leroux's invariable absences, since a lack of formally appointed successor didn't mean that someone wasn't forced to make decisions to keep things moving. Sharing it between them had provided plenty of scope for trying to hand-pass back and forth but those days were soon to be a thing of the past and Cal couldn't help but wince at the turbolift doors as she stood, alone and incumbent, waiting for it to reach its destination. Ultimately, the ensign didn't shirk her fair share of the department's responsibilities anyway, but it felt weird to be somehow elevated above the person she'd considered her equal for so long.

Looking down at the information in her hand, the Communications Chief sighed and squared her shoulders. Nostalgia could wait.

Stepping into the corridor, Cal referred to the map she was intent on memorising and veered in the direction of her intended intervention. Ever since the issue with the engines, various system malfunctions had cropped up across the board. Most pressing on her list was getting the comm relay between the Armory and the Bridge operational again.

Benjamin was lying on the floor across the corridor upper torso firmly inside the walls trying to find a route into fixing what he needed to he did not hear the footsteps until they were on him giving him no wiggle room but to call out. “Going to have to climb over.” He admitted with a shrug. There was no choice. He was not moving when he was so close to finding the breakdown.

There was no mistaking him, even with his head buried in a mound of circuitry. Though Cal wouldn't have readily admitted to avoiding anyone, that kind of thing not really being her style, there had been a deliberate caution to her interactions with the engineer since their previous disclosures. Being around him was difficult, the ache that pulled from a place that didn't even belong to her provoked emotions she wasn't entitled to and she'd promised herself she wasn't going to make this harder on him than it already was. Nothing changed the fact that they both worked together now, however. She stopped, folded her arms across her stomach, and gave a soft huff of laughter at his remark.

"Pretty sure my legs aren't long enough for that."

“Pretty sure they are.” The man shot back forgetting himself for a moment. It took a long instant for the realisation of what he said to hit him and he let out a curse. He realised what he said and that she was not the right person to say it to and the fact he had tried to sit up to apologise but it only lead to him getting shocked by the circuit he had been working on.

As was the case with most of her emotions where he was concerned, Calanthe had been hit with a contradictory surge of affection and discomfort, a tangled mess of hope and wistfulness and a more pragmatic sobriety and need to keep a clear head. With no idea how to respond at first, it took his slapstick failure to rectify the faux par to permit a genuine smile and, because it seemed kinder to draw attention to his clumsiness than his flirtatiousness, she shook her head and declared, "You're a mess." Further consideration saw the brunette brush aside the need for apology by crouching beside him to get a better look at what he had his head stuck into in the first place. "What are you doing anyway?"

Benjamin sighed to himself as he could not deny that he was a mess at all. It was easy to tell he was a mess and it did not help the fact he had just shocked himself on his forehead to prove that. He slowly scooted out from underneath the mass of wires and chips to look at the woman. He looked her over and just sat there, blushed bright red. “I’m trying to find where the communication issue is. I thought O’Connery was meant to be meeting me here?”

His words hit like a bucket of ice water. Calanthe understood why being around her was difficult for Jamesson, had tried her best to be respectful and ignore her own sense of displaced longing and loneliness so that she could keep a reasonable distance from him, at least when it came to interactions between just the two of them. It didn't making hearing his obvious discomfort at having to deal with her any easier. Rising to her feet again, Cal waivered apologetically for a moment and then indicated her change in uniform. "It's kind of my problem now, I thought I should deal with it."

But, she's miscalculated, clearly. Wanting to live up to Leroux's faith in her had not come with any sort of user's manual and navigating the interpersonal intricacies of Ben's prior experience with her just added a layer of complication that Cal didn't know what to do about. She glanced down the corridor, avoiding his eyes, and quietly said, "I'll go see if I can figure out what relays are out." Another hesitation, this time forced to consider him stretched across the corridor again, and the petite brunette opted for stepping over his ankles before moving several metres along to gift him back his privacy.

“Fair enough. Slightly quieter.” He said with a small smile in her direction. He knew that Calanthe was a lot quieter than O’Connery so that would be nicer. He was out there working on the communication relays because Sloan could send several crewman to do it but it was easier to use them for the big job and give one Officer the job. “I’ve checked the first three.” He called out indicating where she was stood about to start working. “The fourth led me here. So feel free to carry on after number four.”

To many, the idea that Diaz could be quieter than anyone would have been a stretch. It took getting to know her better to see the spaces between, and to understand how much the just-Lieutenant tended to punctuate her bouts of extreme sociability with isolated retreats. She was, after all, an only child of busy parents. Keeping her own company had been a decent facet of her childhood, and on a ship lost in the middle of no where, Cal coveted the moments where she was allowed to just be. Of all the jumbled assortment of memories she'd inherited from the other universe, knowing that her counterpart had found a relationship that gifted her those comfortable silences was predominantly responsible for the keen sense of loss and longing she felt now.

This wasn't one of those silences.

It was brittle and awkward. Thankfully, the task of isolating the malfunctioning relays was a series of tedious steps that required just enough thought to keep her back turned to the sprawled-out figure of a man only several metres away. There was enough heat in the recollection of her admiration for her Ben's physique; she didn't need to add to it the very real visuals of what his uniform hid.

Damnit.

Eventually, their mutual work ethic found a happy medium and, once she started to trace the connected issues, Cal relaxed into her responsibilities and forgot, for a moment, to have an emotional breakdown. "Is it possible the entire corridor got taken out? I'm not getting any response from 6 or 8 and 7 is only giving me garbled static."

Since the knowledge of the woman’s memories from the other universe had become apparent Ben had taken to silence. He did not want to be reminded of the could of beens, would of beens and the wants that her being there hit him hard from that universe. The fact she was metres away was killing him more than the expression on her face from the almost flirt he had thrown her way had created moments before. He glanced over hearing her voice and sat up. “It’s possible the ship took a hard knock as it stopped. Things were pretty intense in engineering for a few moments lots of explosions and extinguishers used.” He admitted turning around to face her properly.

By nature, Calanthe was a problem-solver. Part of her natural optimism, though it was peppered with brutal observations at times, stemmed from a lack of willingness to add to a problem unless she had some sort of working theory on how to improve it. Engineering was not her strength but she understood enough of the situation to know how serious the ramifications were. Adding an untrustworthy communications system to the mix would be just the tipping point that threatened failure if they weren't proactive about addressing it. With that acting as a distraction, she was able to remain oblivious to Ben's attention, eyes focused on a pendulum swing back and forth from the ceiling overhead and her readouts.

"5 is out too. Looks like the Armory could be in total communications blackout."

Lowering her gaze allowed her to catch him watching her, and that was enough to illicit a slight hesitation. Holding her tongue was difficult, Cal favoured conversation over silence even when the topic was a difficult one, but she wasn't about to force anything onto an already-grieving man. Striving to stay on top of a professional friendship, she smiled and asked, "Is there something more useful I could be doing? This looks like a big enough job to warrant an extra pair of hands."

“You are being useful. You let me know this is a job way bigger than expected.” He reminded with a smile. He had been messing around with the relays for lower end of the spectrum. “You have helped me cut a few corners and know now that I just need to change the whole set which is easier but messier. So Lieutenant Diaz, tell me which areas of the ship are not used at the moment fully.”

The use of her new rank, from him of all people, almost warranted a flush of colour to Cal's cheeks. Rather than render her demure, her embarrassment simply brought out her feistiness and, with a smirk, she retorted, "No where large enough to hide an engineer who tested his luck one too many times." It prompted a grin, a flash of camaraderie that owed as much to her own recollections of time spent with her version of Ben Jamesson as it did his relationship with her alter-ego. This time, rather than regret the connection, Cal allowed herself to lean into it, just a little, if only to enjoy the relaxation of tension it provided. She gave his question proper thought.

"We've been pretty strict about making sure we only power and maintain the areas that are priority use," she replied eventually. "As far as I know, nothing's completely offline but we've condensed a few areas. Why?"

“We don’t have the many power to replace completely but if I can reroute from less occupied places, it would save many hours of your plotting on where to hide this poor engineer you are picking on.” He countered readily countering her move for move. It was so simple as he sat cross legged on the floor watching her down the corridor.

"You say that like I haven't already plotted well enough in advance." It was dangerous territory to push but, at the same time, the pair of them had to find some kind of level grounding. A playful glance accompanied the visible signs of Cal laughing to herself as she then turned to glance up the corridor, considering his query. The turn her thoughts took, whilst practical, didn't do much to maintain her mood. "I suppose," she said quietly, turning back, "that we have a few crew quarters now that are out of use."

“Touché.” He commented grinning at her. He felt lighter than he had in a very long time. It would be so easy to just slipped into it but her comment about unused quarters sobered him and made him pause in the back and forth. “That would work.” He admitted standing awkwardly to track down one’s that were unused via a PADD.

The reminder of friends-lost brought Cal back down the corridor to stand and watch Ben's face as he catalogued the recently-vacated quarters. It didn't bring her a lot of joy to have inherited her father's practical side but, whilst they'd inherited several new crewmembers, they'd been allocated quarters that, to the best of Cal's knowledge, had not yet been placed onto the reduced grid. Whatever was going on with the MACO was also going to have an impact on crew dispersal, Cal just wasn't sure enough of what was going on to provide any direction in that sense yet. "It's probably worth checking that there are no quarters still siphoning off more than they need. There were a few reallocations when it became clear we were likely to be stuck out here for a while with no additional recruitment incoming to fill the empty rooms."

“We did the same. We spread out and people if they were not wanting roommates had the option of not having a roommate. It was pretty nice for a lot of people to have space even in the circumstances.” The man paused and looked at the woman for a moment offering a sad smile before he looked away. He started searching his pockets and pulling out a communicator. He flicked it open and spoke into it having a back and forth conversation for long moment before he grinned triumphantly. “Six quarters are not being used. Four guest and two crewmen quarters.”

His sense of enthusiasm was infectious, all the more so because it wasn't the first time Calanthe could recall being swept up by it. The tension across her shoulders eased slightly more and she returned his triumph with a satisfied grin of her own. "Combined brilliance," she gestured back and forth between their heads. "Are they helpfully located in roughly the same section or do I need to start ordering eviction notices?"

“We will take the guest quarters. They are together and that is more than enough to regain communication in needed areas.” The man said moving back to lie down on the floor and started to disconnect the broken relays. He quietly started to move the parts he needed and cursed under his breath realising he did not have what he needed to hand and could not move to get it. “Can you pass me the smallest hypo spanner you can find please.” He asked sticking his hand out hoping she’d be able to find it.

There had been a brief moment, stood there adding updates to her departmental record regarding the maintenance and repair, where Calanthe had genuinely forgotten any need for guarded deliberation. Hearing him muttering to himself had evoked a distracted half-smile, and his request for assistance had felt so immediately normal that she found herself finishing off the sentence she'd been working on with the intentionally unhurried deliberation that she usually teased Lexi with. She moved eventually though, crouching to peer into the toolkit and pull out, in swift succession, a range of options before making a decision regarding the smallest. Stretching across, she tapped it twice against his palm to coax him to take it. "Small enough?"

Benjamin could not even move to see if she had heard him or if she was even getting the item so he let out of breath of relief when he felt that she was handing him the correct item. He put it up to his face to see properly and smiled. “Perfect” he declared and set about completing removing the relay. “So are you my partner or assistant for this or do you have better things to do?” He wondered quietly.

Too long. The pause she left, the breath she held, the regrouping after his choice of words; that hesitation was too long to mask. By now, the sensation of reacting with two-minds to everything was starting to chafe, which only meant the provocation of a mile-wide stubborn streak. Calanthe, already fed up with her own head, plopped herself down to a proper cross-legged position and leaned sideways to drag the toolkit into her lap. "Restoring communications with the armoury is first priority. Second priority," she added, rummaging and pulling out a fistful of spanners, "is organising this. There is no way this is your kit." Too fastidious about his work, too orderly in general. He irons his underwear. A gentle clatter saw the pile of tools scatter onto the ground. From there, Cal started to lay them out in order. "We'll have to see about getting you allocated specific assets before your head explodes."

“Nothing is really mine on this ship.” He said glancing down his body to look at her intently as she set about messing with the toolkit he had taken out of a locker and hoped for the best. “My head has other issues to explode on before I get to that.” He said gently despite the appreciation he had for what she was about to attempt to do.

"Yeah, I know."

In many ways, avoidance was more problematic than just confronting the situation. Still, Cal kept her attention on her task, sizing up each spanner before laying it it out in a gradually-developing ascending order on the floor. Talking about things was undoubtedly a more healthy option, but it would be infinitely easier if she stayed busy enough not to be tempted to just stare at him.

"It's early days yet though," she continues softly, offering a brief glance so as to not withdraw entirely but managed not to linger. "Just because there's no choice doesn't mean you're not welcome here."

"I am not judging anyone, even myself. I know I am welcome just a little odd a lot of those people buried me so it is a little difficult for people to connect. Sloan is trying, the Captain and Gerhard are more than trying.” He was not going to mention the Marine Officer that was just as trying as that was not something he wanted or needed right then and there.

There had been a deeper layer to Cal's words, a delve into the fragility of their personal situation without being blatant about it, but she left his translation to sit as he chose. She was just as happy, despite not even knowing it was an option, to leave out talk of Marines. Their persistence, if nothing else, was starting to wear thin.

"I think it's a lot of things," she eventually offered, her tone quiet as she removed the cleaning tool from the kit and set about working on one of the spanners without stopping to realise that it was not her specific knowledge, but the experience of another lifetime, that was guiding her steps. "Even before Smith arrived, we'd hit a kind of slump. It was probably why he was able to step so easily into the role he assumed. Now we've lost people and home's never seemed further away."

After a moment's silence, Cal glanced up at him again. "Lexi's been talking about making sure we start the weekly social gatherings again. You up for card night?" It was more of a struggle than she was proud of to get the words out but it was important. There was no way on a ship this size for him to avoid treading where their Ben had once trod, and to Calanthe's way of viewing things, that meant being deliberate about it was probably going to be easier than attempting to navigate accidental convergence.

Benjamin thought about what she said about a card night and shrugged, noncommittal. “I cannot really say I’m a card player. But I might come along to socialise and just be part of the group.” He mused thoughtfully seeing the kindness that she was offering him which struck him deep.

This time, his words cut too far down for her to hold her tongue. Fondness mingled with sadness prompted a soft huff of laughter and Cal glanced up as she left the spanners in their neat row and continued to pull out the rest of the kit's contents. "He used to complain too," she shared, shaking her head at the memory. "And then consistently cleaned us up." Pointing something important-looking at him, she added with light-hearted jest, "I'll believe this 'I'm not really a card player' when I see it, buster."

“Please do not point that.” Benjamin requested leaning over to lower her hand down so she was not pointing the offending item at him and smiled. “Sometimes if the mood takes me I play a mean game of poker face but I am there mostly for the socialising so maybe I will come along.” He was not at all sure if he wanted that step yet but it was nice that she thought highly enough of him to invite him even after knowing he could and had cleaned up.

It took a spark of last-minute common-sense for Cal to avoid pointing the offending tool at herself in an attempt to assess its capacity to alarm. Opting instead to trust his concern, she cautiously set it to one side and peered into the kit with tentative hesitation. Engineering, which he had probably ascertained by now because she couldn't imagine any universe where it wouldn't be the case, had not been her strongest grade. She was sure at some point in her training she'd been expected to name every last one of these instruments; now that she'd taken a step up in seniority, it was probably time to confess she'd forgotten half of it.

"In the meantime," she continued, leaving the task a moment to bend down beside him in an attempt to peer into the panel he was working on, "Talk me through this. Not that anyone's going to let me try to repair problems with the relay network any time soon, but you know...since it's apparently now something I have to keep operational..."

“This is a routing terminal so if it is broke it’s not routing anything about the ship. There are 100’s of them all over the ship so if there is a cluster of quarters unoccupied I can take the one connected to them until I can repair this one.” It was a tricky problem but he was determined to get it done and move on to the next problem.

"Is that something I can go get for you or is the extraction process more complicated than opening a tin of soup?"

Far too late, Cal realised that the quip, a reference to a previous conversation, was not her memory but one of the myriad she'd inherited from a branch of her lifestream that she kept chastising herself not to encroach on. She winced at the slip and, not knowing what else to say, not wanting to lead the conversation there every damn time they spoke, she murmured an apology and carried on. "Do you need me for anything," she amended softly, "or should I get out of your way?"

Benjamin wanted to cling to her and tell her never to leave. But the part of his brain that was a mature earth Starfleet officer told him he had to let her go. She was a distraction that he just did not need that moment if he was ever gonna get this terminal working again. “I do not need you here but I appreciated the keeping me company and organising my kit.” He said sitting up properly to see the work that she had done to help him.

"I have no idea who had this last but they did an absolute number on it." Staring down into what remained of the toolkit, Cal frowned. One thing that had been put to the crew very early on was the absolute need for processes to remain in place, for procedure to be adhered to and protocol observed because lapses now could cost them dearly later. It was also an important psychological buffer, the idea that life continued as usual despite the increasingly crushing odds of it ever amounting to anything. Leaving repair kits in this state didn't fit the Captain's expectations, which left her wondering how many other oversights had occurred during Smith's insidious distraction. "We might have to pull out all the others and see if they're in a similar shape."

The man nodded as he glanced at the mess was no longer round his kit and smiled. “Thank you. I really appreciate what you did there, but I would not worry about the other kits for now. It would be something we need to consider maybe in the future of the current events are over. And I do not think it is something that you would need to deal with though even if you are good at it.” He teased just a little.

In another time and place, it had been something he'd said to her any time he wanted to try his luck at getting her to do something she wasn't all that keen on. In there here-and-now, the smirk it provoked was no different, nor the edge of daring to Calanthe's tone as, fingernails tapping against the instrument that had caused him alarm, she pointed out, "It's not too late for me to point this at you again, you know."