Forks and Tongues

Posted on Fri Jul 15th, 2011 @ 3:35pm by Lieutenant Torrna Maliya MD & Lieutenant Commander Aral Aix

Mission: Too Close for Comfort...
Location: Torrna's Quarters, USS Arizona
Timeline: Following

"Thankyou." Said Aral as Torrna put a plate of what could only be described as Bajoran delicacies before him. He peered at it down the length of his nose and pretended to try to hide his aversion. "When I was a girl we didn't have replicators... we cooked properly." His words were twinged with a friendly, but mischievous, irony. Torrna had invited him for lunch, it wouldn't be the first meal they'd shared, in San Franciso they would occasionally grab a bite or a coffee after yoga. It was, however, the first time Aral had been admitted to Torrna's personal space.

Maliya chuckled, "Well I have a newsflash for you Spotty. You're a guy, for one, and two I suck at cooking...if I had cooked, you'd probably be in Sickbay and pressing assault charges." she said as she sat down herself. "I can however program a mean recipe. It doesn't taste half bad."

With that she took a bite. It actually had taste quite similar to the real thing. As they began eating, she observed him from the corner of her eye, wondering about a certain piece of information she heard from her gossip mongers in Sickbay. Spotty and Xylia Lischka? Was it just Lischka or were there more? Spotty might have gained a few more stars in her book. Time to find out.

"So, you settled in alright?"

"Yes, very comfortably." He paused to pick up his fork and stab at the contents of his plate with feigned disinterest; Torrna was being unusually tolerant, she was obviously planning something. "A short spell in prison makes you thoroughly appreciate a Starfleet issue mattress..."

"I know..." she said quietly, the tone suggesting there was truth there. Quickly though, she recovered, "Get around much, do you?" she asked, her eyes twinkling with amusement.

"Yes, like an Orion harlot in heat." He mentioned casually, as if he were complementing her on the unusual print that hung above her dining table. He shovelled forkful of her food into his mouth and his eyes sparkled with mischief.

Aha! She chuckled at his casualness. "So Lischka, huh? How'd that happen? She doesn't strike me as the sleep-around type." Maliya and subtle never went together, not even in crisis situations.

"What do you think?" Aral was amused, he set his knife and fork down, crossing them on his plate. "It happened because I am a confident, handsome man and any right minded woman - or man for that matter - would be foolish to spurn my advances." He scanned Torrna's face while biting his own tongue in a bid to keep his face straight. Following his chat with Idrani in Sickbay he had a good idea why Xylia had been so willing and he had had enough counselling in the past to recognise his own patterns of behaviour.

Maliya burst out laughing, to the point of tears. Truthfully, he WAS a handsome man, and any woman WOULD be foolish to reject him. But she was nearly absolutely certain another thing was the case.

"Drunk and horny? Or drunk and needy?" she asked, having calmed down, wiping the tears away.

"Uhuh." Aral replied facetiously brushing away her statement with his right hand. "Had I not been strapped down when I first met myself, I'd have jumped me." He returned to his food. "Infact, I don't know how you're managing to control yourself now."

A dark eyebrow raised, eyes catching his, a smirk in the corner of her lips. "Careful what you wish for, Spotty. I've taken down bigger men than you." she winked at him cheekily and returned to her food aswell.

"It's always sex and death with you isn't it?" He replied.

Maliya looked up, chuckling, "As opposed to sex and madness with you?"

"We've both had our share of all three." Aral replied, his smile had worn thin on his lips.

=Memorial Gardens, Starfleet Heaquarters, San Francisco, Earth=
=August 2385; following previous Aix/Torrna flashback=

Maliya wouldn't admit under pain of death that she actually found this whole meditation crap helpful. She had felt herself calmer and less agitated lately, and more focused. Frenna had tried to talk to her about the changes she'd noticed in her colleague, but the Bajoran remained tight lipped, just arrived at the meditation sessions at the grounds when she had the time.

So now, there she was again, setting down her blanket, just before the start of another session. The day was nice and breezy, and not too hot. The sun was yet to climb to its highest point, and the morning birds were singing. Maliya stood still for a moment and closed her eyes, just breathing and listening to nature's music about her while the other meditators murmured amongst eachother quietly.

"Good afternoon." The words were confident, but quietly spoken. The male Trill at whom Torrna had stolen glances sat himself down beside her once again. "I think today I will be a Cardassian vole attacking a self-sealing stembolt. How about you?"

Maliya chuckled, appreciating the Trill's dry humor, "I think a Savaran Hawk on the prowl for a french key. Not sure, Greylin is a sneaky bitch." she opened her heyes finally and looked over at the Trill, "Well hi there, miss me already?"

In truth it had been a few weeks since their initial meeting. Maybe these things won't be so bad if she had someone to be sacrastic about the whole thing with around for company.

"I've thought of nothing else." Although he sounded sincere, he looked far from it.

"Yeah and I'm the queen of....what is that place called...Sheeba?" she shook her head and began working out the kinks in her shoulderblades to warm up. "You think this crap works, huh?"

"Now that depends on what you think it will do." He replied. "It lets me escape the lab," and myself "for an hour or so..."

Maliya looked over at him, "You're weird, Aix. What's your specialization? I get that you're with the squint squad...the scientists I mean...but what actually?"

"I do a bit of allsorts... at the moment I'm part of the transwarp project." As they were talking the class had started bending exercises, following Aix doubled over and grabbed his ankles. He carried on talking through his legs, "I know it's over a hundred years old, but it's starting to look almost possible."

"Great, a techno-geek." she muttered as she followed suit, wincing slightly at an old injury tugging at her calf, "You do well in the normal world though, you speak normal-talk. Good for you." though her face couldn't be seen, there was a light amused, teasing tone in her voice.

"Normal? I suppose that's a change." He replied. "What about you... you're either medicine or pretend science. I do hope you're not an anthropologist, it would be such a shame."

"Prophets no!" she huffed, "I wouldn't be caught dead digging in the dirt trying to find out how people lived, who cares? I'm a Doctor. Surgery and Virology. I work at Medical in the Special Analysist Unit with Gordon House." there was a hint of pride there, though she'd probably be the only one ever to be proud to work with a nutjob like him.

"Never heard of him." The four most lethal words in the academic lexicon; in academia to be wrong was acceptable, to be right was enviable, to be unknown was intolerable. "Then again, I'm not part of your incestuous little world over there."

Maliya laughed, "Incestuous huh? Way to butter me up for special favors when you get ill and you need the best to fix you. You ungrateful prat."

Now the pose was a bridge, with the left leg extended at a horizontal angle for leverage. She glanced over at him upside down.

"Prophets forbid you and I ever actually serve together." a chuckle.

"What kind of special favours did you have in mind?" Aral asked as he shifted down into the lotus position. He bit his tongue between his front teeth.

Maliya chuckled, "Spotty, you're going to have to do better than 'your incestuous little world' if you wanna know that."

"Well nose, I'm too old to perform. You'll just have to stalk someone else for your kicks."

"And you think that's why I meant?" she raised an eyebrow at him, "Is sex all you think about? I was talking about actually getting into being seen to by House, rather than rejected because you were too uninteresting."

"Sex?" replied Aral. "Who said anything about sex?" A quizzical look crossed his face, before he paused to continue the stretches, "It's either sex or death with you lot... and by the looks of your face you've seen too much of one of them..." He finished the stretch. "... and it's probably not sex."

Maliya went quiet for a few minutes as she stretched aswell, actually lost for words for once.

~Snap to, Maliya!~

"Then what are you too old to perform at?" she asked after a minute's silence, choosing not to explain which was it she'd seen too much of.

Aral shifted into the lotus. "You just want entertainment... a reaction... you're spoiling for a fight." He shuffled on his mat, "But then, I would be too if my planet had been occupied."

"Actually, when you insult someone, it's rather stupid to expect that person will play along unless you make some sort of amends." Maliya said, eyes focused on Greylin and trying to be still in the lotus position.

"But where's the fun in sulking?" Asked the Trill as he closed his eyes and prepared to meditate.