Posted by Lieutenant Casela Synthi-er (Counsellor / RTF) in Like We Always Did

Posted by Ensign Juliet Anders (Security Officer /RTF) in Like We Always Did

Posted by Lieutenant Casela Synthi-er (Counsellor / RTF) in Like We Always Did
Posted by… suppressed (1) by the Post Ghost! 👻

(snip)
Jewels nodded silently. Slowly she stood up, breaking the contact between. It was strange. Despite not feeling Cas, she still felt her in her mind. It was almost like a memory. She didn’t turn around as she headed for the cabinets around the replicator. “You were always there. Weren’t you? Before,” she paused before continuing, “when we were younger. I remember you were teaching me. About this, I mean,”she tapped her temple before opening the cupboard. “I remember feeling you there. All the time. Even before i killed those Marines. It was a whisper. Calling to me. ” She pulled a bottle from the back of the cabinet and grabbed two glasses from the table, recently unpacked from the material still beside them. “I was in so much pain, so angry, I thought I imagined it.”

Casela nodded. “Once your talents turned on you never wanted to let go. You were okay at first. It’s scary; it’s so overwhelming at first. But then…the news about the Dominion came. At first it just seemed like stories to scare us. But then things got worse and you, we were so scared we just latched on all the time. The extra stress was hard for you. And…I was always so good at it. You picked it up fast with us sharing, being connected like that. They hadn’t made it to our village. And then Dad decided to lead a group away into hiding. Your dad decided to stay and protect the others till we came back. We…I don’t know Juliet. After we left we some how managed to stay connected. I was scared for you and you for me.”

She came back over and handed Cas a glass. “I’m sorry. I should have listened.” She held the sapphire colored bottle up in offering to fill it with the amber liquid.

Jewels
Sec/ RTF

Casela looked at the glass and then the bottle. She put the glass down and shook her head. I can’t. I have a very adverse reaction to alcohol. “I heard you, I just couldn’t find you. I tried, now…maybe I could do it, but I wasn’t strong enough then. Dad tried to help, but he had to find me first. You had no way of knowing Juliet. Your mind, and even then I could tell, was traumatized. You wouldn’t have been able to tell if it was real or not. Dad thought it might be the same with me. He thought when I heard you but couldn’t find you I was imagining it because of the guilt I felt… I saw the people you took out though…later, the pictures. Your dad couldn’t have done better.” It was a sad thought but also an honest compliment.
Lt Synthi-er, CNS

Juliet left Cas’ glass where it was. Instead of pouring herself a glass, she merely took a swig from the bottle, probably a longer draw than she should have, and moved back to put it away as she covered a slight cough from the burn.

Shrugging as Cas explained, she turned back to face her, leaving back on the table. “Doesn’t matter, now. We were kids. We’re not anymore.” Whether the words were meant to be an excuse or an apology, even she wasn’t sure. “What’s done is done. At least you know now I’m not dead. You didn’t fail.” She was putting her shields back up, and Cas would feel it.

“So what now? Who needs to know? And who should know? I’m guessing your man should know. And Captain needs to. Any other suggestions?” She crossed her arms. The emotions had taken a toll and she was letting her mind shut down and enjoy the warmth of the whiskey still burning her throat.

Jewels
Sec/ RTF

Casela felt it and it was like a slap in the face, but that wasn’t Juliet’s fault. It was hers. And it was good reminder. Casela took a deep breath and stood up. “That’s up to you. The Cpt knows, Dr Knox knows. I do of course. But, I mean damn, Juliet we still look like twins. No one may know for sure but they are all going to suspect. If you’re going to working RTF you might want to make sure Cpt Manhattan knows, for emergency situations, but that’s up to you.” As for the XO, she hadn’t been on board but just over 24 hours. How does she already know about that? Seriously? The gossip mill on this ship!? “As for ‘my man’ as you put it. He has his own connections and if he should know, he already does. If you prefer for him to know or not again that’s up to you.” She never lied to him and if he asked directly she wasn’t sure what she would tell him. But it wasn’t her secret to tell. She’d though…, her fingers started tracing over a necklace holding 4 tiger’s eye runestones. It was just stupid sentimentality but to have family to introduce him too, to share the person who made her so happy with her family…she stopped and moved toward the table returning her knife and bracelet to her pocket. Juliet would feel the wall close, the blank blackness that was so different from other telepathic shielding techniques. Uncle Jo’nar had told her. But before it did if she was paying attention she’d feel overwhelming heartbreak from Cas.

Recognizing Juliet pulling away Cas wasn’t sure she should stay. “You’re trying to settle in, I just wanted to return your things. I can go if I’m in your way.”
Lt Synthi-er, CNS

The slap in the face was aimed at Juliet this time. She reached out to grasp Cas’ arm then let go right away not wanting it misunderstood. “You aren’t in the way Cas. You never have been. I just…” she sighed and settled back against the table again. “I seem to know just one thing… closed and empty. That’s all I’ve been for almost 2 decades. I tried to let the shield down to let you in and I fell apart. I don’t know an in between and don’t even know how to start.” The frustration in her voice was evident. If more had been within reach, she probably would have thrown it. As it was, jet orchids whiskey, the knife and one of her favourite glasses were all she had at hand. None were viable options.

Pushing away from the table, needing to move, she walked over to a pile of crate packing material and stayed picking it up and tossing it into the empty crate in the corner. “It seems all I can do is be a mental and physical wreck, or hurt you more by closing you out.” She the the last couple balls of material a bit harder than necessary.

Jewels
Sec/ RTF

She breathed, rolled her shoulders, and relaxed. “Hey, I’m tough, I can take it. The last two decades have been…they sucked.” She moved, she didn’t know why, but she did and started catching what Jewels was throwing and tossing it back. She needed an outlet for frustration and simply tossing packing material wasn’t going to get it. So Casela, not really thinking about it, playing goalie. Juliet was good, always had been, but so was Casela. It was fun, or it was for her. “You need head space and physical space, I get it. I do. Not too long ago…okay I’ll be honest, I’m still that way, but this crew is....my mentor, my trainer, she told me once that I’d find a crew, they’d become family and I wouldn’t even realize it. It wouldn’t be the family I wanted, but what I needed. And it irks me to say it, but that old half Vulcan Irish biddy was right. I’m learning. It’s hard, but don’t let me or anyone else rush you.”

So step back Casela. Talk shop. “Jewels? Call sign right? Mine’s Valkyrie.”
Lt. Synthi-er, CNS

Jewels caught the packing material without thinking. She threw it again but Cas blocked it. She frowned a moment then let it go and listened. “No one every mentions family around me once thru know what my story is. Or rather the the that’s in my records. Orphaned during Dominion War. Parents lost in combat. Kinda true, I guess. But it’s hinted they were Federation soldiers from Earth. Not civilian casualties.”

“Never did around me either. But sometimes things work out strangely. Sometimes it’s easier to let them believe the assumption than talk about it.” It had been a hard day, mentally exhausting so Cas didn’t press. If you ever want to know about…after… She let the offer hang there not expecting a response, just letting Juliet know she could.

She threw two in succession and managed to get one past the woman, but it missed the box. “One of my Team dubbed me ‘Jewels’ and it stuck. Said my hair was like coal and my eyes like diamonds. So the before and after of going threw pressure. They all thought I was so cold and emotionless because of the things I’d endured. The pressures I’d been thru. They were right, not not for the reasons they thought.”

Casela thought the name appropriate then, but was sure that ‘Jewels’ like ‘Valkyrie’ hated the name to some degree. “Don’t know how much you know of Earth’s Norse culture. Valkyries are women who die in battle and are brought back to the be the …judges, angels of death, avenging angels, protectors of the innocent…the list goes on. After my first mission…” She blocks another piece of packaging, stalling, “I showed up … 8 month later. They thought I was dead.”

She suddenly threw a large armful at Cas, impossible to catch all at once, and a small burst of laughter tumbled from her lips as she watched Cas try and react.

Jewels
Sec/ RTF

Casela dove, trying to use her whole body to block the mass of packaging and failed, she didn’t care. She landed with a dull thump on the floor, and at Juliet’s laugh, she grinned, and then started laughing. But as so often happens when things are stressful and you find laughter, eventually you find the tears. And those tears were working their way into sobs.
Lt. Synthi-er, CNS

Juliet didn’t hesitate. Whether it was the laugh, or the tears, it only took a moment for her to land on her knees beside Cas and pull her into a hug. The rolls reversed, it was Jewels who was doing the soothing this time. “It’s all right. I’m here. I’m safe.” The words came out over and over, trying to calm the woman who had held her just moments before.
Without realizing it, her mind reached out as well. It’s all right, Lala… I’m here… it’s ok.

She shifted her seat so her legs wouldn’t go to sleep and she closed her eyes and held her cousin. How cruel the universe could be. And how pleasant and giving when it chose. Both girls had been thru their own gauntlets. But in the end, their prize had been in coming full circle, back to each other.

Jewels
Sec/ RTF

Memory, instinctual memory, drove so much of Casela’s life. Honing skills based on instinct to react without though without hesitation. And how ingrained those early connections become no matter how later event mould a person’s body and psychi in unexpected ways. So that now, the circle having come back around they clung, like small teenagers to each other. Just as they had in their bedroom, in Casela’s house, the night they’d over heard their fathers discussing, planning, arguing about the Dominion that had landed in the capitol city and were marching their way towards their village. They’d been inseperable then, instinct formed and forged over 10 years, connecting them. Back then Casela would have swore that nothing and no god could make her leave Juliet behind. And in the end had been the Dominion that did it. Juliet might be alive and here now, but she’d never get over the guilt.

Lala? I never thought I’d hear that name again. It made her feel small, like a child again. Watching that black diamond eyed, raven haired toddler wobble after her. Casela hugged her hard, somewhere there must be gods because she never though she’d find Juliet. But even sitting she had to crane her head just a bit. “When did you get taller than me?”
Lt. Synthi-er, CNS

Juliet adjusted her hold on Cas till she was mostly leaning on her, her hands twined with her cousin’s. With a shrug and the sweet smell of whiskey on her breath, she answered. “Late teen years, I guess. When puberty hit, I got really sick. Doc said it was something to due with my mixed genetics. But without mom’s medical history, he couldn’t tell what it was. I’d grown a handful of inches in just a couple years after that. Pretty much settled around this height halfway thru the Academy.” She sighed realizing just how much they’d missed about one another.

Wanting desperately to change the subject before either of them cried again, she asked quietly, without turning to face Cas. “So who is he?” She grit her teeth trying to keep a wicked teasing grin off her face.

Jewels
Sec/ RTF