Unity – Honey, she's home! Pt 1
by Commander Chelsea Dunham & Commander Isha t'Vaurek & Commander Richard Dunham
Post Details
ON:
Chelsea had asked Rick if they could visit Rh'vaurek but there hadn't been a spare moment to arrange it. She was about to go off duty and had been mulling over the recent developments, trying to get her head around it all, when suddenly as if he were psychic, in walked the very person she had been wishing to see.
She stood up as soon as she saw him at the doorway and rushed round the desk towards him, her arms out for a hug. She should have known better as it was highly unlikely that the erie-Khrein would allow such a show of affection to be publicly displayed but she was so pleased to see him that she didn't even think about that.
"My ira'v'Dianvm!" she squeaked, leaping at him with joy. "I missed you so! How *are* you?"
"Doctor - Chelsea ..." Rh'vaurek caught her and put her back on the floor, steadying her with his hands on her shoulders. He had used the time since he had stormed out of the consulate to find out who this 'Guark' that the oddly dis-positioned Federation counselor had mentioned happened to be.
The remnants of his chat with Guark still hung on his breath.
"Some water please, Chelsea," he asked, "I've just met a Ferengi who I suspect embellishes his wares."
Accepting the admonishment of being restrained by his hands on her shoulders, Chelsea grinned unapologetic. "Met a Ferengi?" she feigned shock as she turned and fetched him a glass of cold water from the replicator. Returning with the drink she was still grinning but she did at least refrain from renewing any attempts to hug him. "Whatever are you doing associating with Ferengi, Ambassador?" she pretended to scold.
Before he drained the glass Rh'vaurek blew a breath through his lips, "I'm only ambassador by default as Isha wasted no time in reminding me," he said afterwards. "I needed a drink, Doctor Adams, a very strong one to stop me from strangling her."
"You'll have trouble doing that until she gets back, ira'v'Di." she shortened the Romulan term by chopping off the last two syllables, customising it to suit her own ease of pronunciation and making it into a short-form of affection, rather like a nick-name.
She had no idea Isha was back on DS5 and so assumed the idea of Rh'vaurek strangling her was metaphorical and the fact that he was talking of the reminder as if it had happened recently must be just a turn of phrase.
He placed the empty glass aside. "Very good, v'Rinam, but I'm serious," he said. "The only time I've seen her more unstable is ... was ..." he swallowed as he hesititated, unsure how she would take this, "...when ...well when she terminated our association before her marriage. She attacked me then, and I retalliated, which I've regretted ever since. I'm much more controlled than I was then."
"Wait, wait....." Chelsea was trying to let this sink in. "You mean you've seen her? Since the .... since she went back to ch'Riann.... is she *here*? On DS5?" she spluttered, shocked. "What do you mean unstable?" she added, as it filtered through her stunned mind.
"She came back without informing anyone. She wasn't registered as a passenger on any vessel that has docked with the station." He clenched his teeth together for a moment before he continued, "Don't get too excited, she's not quite the Isha you're expecting."
"Why? What have they done to her?" Her alarm rose even more.
"She's done it herself, Chelsea. She's had to make some decisions that were very difficult for her." Rh'vaurek paused, aware that he sounded as though he was talking to a child. "First there was the attack on this station, in different ways both her son and brother in law were involved, but Isha holds herself responsible for the actions of all members of her House, which under law, she is. She had to bring them to justice, that is ensure that they were both executed, because it was the right thing for her to do regardless of what her personal opinion was. She might not have been the one who struck the blow but she considers their deaths her responsibilty ... the same goes for everyone who died during that attack. She's taken refuge in the delusion of her own strength and she's constantly reassuring herself that she did what she had to and of the security of her elevated position."
"Isn't she right in that? She *did* do what she was obliged to... didn't she? Was there any way or means she could have done otherwise?" Chelsea asked, her naive openness obvious as always.
Rh'vaurek folded his arms. "She was right," he said, "but she had no choice. She's not as hard as she pretends to be, and this is how she deals with it. You'd hardly know her."
"I'm willing to accept that i have come to know only a proportion of Isha and that what I *have* seen shows me there are many layers and angles that I will probably never uncover nor understand. However, any parent who loses a child, let alone has to order one's death, will never be the same again, no matter how little choice they have.
You said she attacked you last time but this time you are more controlled than to retaliate? Do I take it she has attacked you again? Are we talking physically or verbally. I suppose there is also emotionally but I don't feel it appropriate for me to include that in the question." she asked, parking herself on the front of her desk.
"She pulled a disruptor on me," he said, incredulous, "She was looking for a fight but I won't give her one.I can't do this, not again."
Chelsea noticed how agitated his eyes seemed, moving everywhere, more so than normal even given that he was always careful to take in all his surroundings.
"Rh'vaurek? Would it be either inaccurate or presumptuous of me to conclude that she has hurt you?" she asked quietly.
"It would not be inaccurate," he replied with a sigh, the fact that it was presumptuous he left unsaid. "A lot of people, myself included have protected her from herself when we could." He hesitated, "I thought it would be different now ... before she left we resumed something of our intimacy, but once again I was providing a service she wanted and no longer requires."
"I don't believe that, ira'v'Di. Not that she pulled a disruptor, as hard as that is to comprehend and impossible to believe she would have used it, but I mean, I don't believe she was using you for a service as you put it and I *know* she will *never* no longer require your love." Chelsea stood up and moved towards him so she could look up into his eyes to show him her honesty over what she was about to reveal.
"I would normally keep confidences to the grave. It's not only a part of my job but also part of my personal code of honour, however, Isha and I talked about things that it might shock you to hear, mostly personal things she could never discuss with anyone of her own race, for reasons you would understand better than I.
I will not divulge details, that would be too wrong, but I can be categoric when I tell you that if Isha has given you the impression she doesn't need you any more or ever had a time when she didn't, then you have been taken in on that regard but no other." Watching the scorn on his face as he clearly felt it was she who had been fooled if anyone, Chelsea knew she had failed to convince him. She had to go that extra mile although Isha would not thank her for it either way.
"We talked about Ryan and yourself, amongst others of course but it was only about you alone that we ever quarrelled. I thought at the time that you were ... um.... " she blushed. "... well you had just called me in the middle of the night, shown me the wreckage of a woman you had done a vivisection on... " That was an exaggeration but it made her point.
"You tricked me into a position where I revived her for you and you then blackmailed and brutalised me in an attempt to silence me about her." Again an exaggeration but it had seemed that way at the time so that was how she told it.
“I hardly touched you,” Rh’vaurek protested, though that was rather the point; the threat of force was typically more effective than violence in anyone with a healthy instinct for self preservation.
"... ok, perhaps now I look back it wasn't *that* bad". She conceded with a lopsided grin. "but the point is that Isha and my conversation somehow came around to how totally *monstrous* i thought you were.... " she stopped to widen that grin and wink at him.
"Isha defended you with such passion that she almost struck me. She hurled a wine bottle and smashed it on a rock, barely missing me and I'm not exaggerating *that* part. Hardly the behaviour of someone who only ever *used you for a service* methinks. Who defends someone with such vehemence if they are indifferent to them?" She paused briefly but went on.
“Isha would,” Rh’vaurek muttered under his breath as Chelsea continued.
"She also admitted, when we were out getting drunk together in disgust at the lack of attention and interest our men were paying us.... yes, you *know* when that was! You remember charging me to look after her for you... and all the time she was torturing herself over having done something to hurt you in the past"
“What stories has she been filling your head with?” His scornful tone betraying his annoyance at the idea that they should have been discussing his past. “Its all self indulgent nonsense – how exactly does she claim to have hurt me?”
"Of course she never went into detail" This one was ever so slightly less 100% truthful than all the rest of her declarations but it was in a good cause as that would have been too much of a betrayal. Her intention here was only to give him enough to convince him that Isha cared more genuinely than he gave her credit for.
Rh’vaurek stepped closer, he didn’t seem to be getting through to her and tried another approach, “Chelsea, Isha is a Romulan, I am a Romulan and one thing you may have noticed that characterises our people is that we have a different set of values to yours. The reason outsiders find us untrustworthy is because our underlying motives are not the same and what we call honour requires us to act in ways that appear contradictory and often downright deceitful. Don’t make the common error of projecting your own values onto us v'Rinam.”
Chelsea wavered a little. "...but women don't get drunk together and commiserate with one another over men they don't care about. If they only *use* them then they don't lose any time or sleep getting upset about their indifference, do they?" Perhaps he honestly couldn't know why women did what they did or not..... or perhaps he was right and it was she who was misunderstanding things. This wasn't going as well as she wanted it to so she dropped the attempts to prove her point and cut straight to it.
"I'm trying to tell you just a tiny few of the myriad and multiple ways in which I came to the deepset conviction that, whatever your race values or how she behaves, Isha not only cares about you more than you know but that she would be totally lost without you. If I didn't know your Romulan sensibilities would be affronted, I'd go as far as to say *loves* you!
Please don't abandon her when she needs you most because that's precisely when she would push you away the hardest."
tbc.....
JP Between:
Lt. Cmdr. Chelsea Adams
ACMO - DS5
erie'Khrein Rh'vaurek Raedheol
Acting Ambassador
and
Lt Richard Dunham
Squadron Leader
by Commander Chelsea Dunham & Commander Isha t'Vaurek & Commander Richard Dunham
Post Details
| Title | Honey, she's home! Pt 1 | |
| Mission | Unity | |
| Author(s) | Commander Chelsea Dunham & Commander Isha t'Vaurek & Commander Richard Dunham | |
| Posted | Tue Jan 12, 2010 @ 12:37pm | |
| Location | Sickbay | |
| Timeline | Early Evening - SD16 |
Chelsea had asked Rick if they could visit Rh'vaurek but there hadn't been a spare moment to arrange it. She was about to go off duty and had been mulling over the recent developments, trying to get her head around it all, when suddenly as if he were psychic, in walked the very person she had been wishing to see.
She stood up as soon as she saw him at the doorway and rushed round the desk towards him, her arms out for a hug. She should have known better as it was highly unlikely that the erie-Khrein would allow such a show of affection to be publicly displayed but she was so pleased to see him that she didn't even think about that.
"My ira'v'Dianvm!" she squeaked, leaping at him with joy. "I missed you so! How *are* you?"
"Doctor - Chelsea ..." Rh'vaurek caught her and put her back on the floor, steadying her with his hands on her shoulders. He had used the time since he had stormed out of the consulate to find out who this 'Guark' that the oddly dis-positioned Federation counselor had mentioned happened to be.
The remnants of his chat with Guark still hung on his breath.
"Some water please, Chelsea," he asked, "I've just met a Ferengi who I suspect embellishes his wares."
Accepting the admonishment of being restrained by his hands on her shoulders, Chelsea grinned unapologetic. "Met a Ferengi?" she feigned shock as she turned and fetched him a glass of cold water from the replicator. Returning with the drink she was still grinning but she did at least refrain from renewing any attempts to hug him. "Whatever are you doing associating with Ferengi, Ambassador?" she pretended to scold.
Before he drained the glass Rh'vaurek blew a breath through his lips, "I'm only ambassador by default as Isha wasted no time in reminding me," he said afterwards. "I needed a drink, Doctor Adams, a very strong one to stop me from strangling her."
"You'll have trouble doing that until she gets back, ira'v'Di." she shortened the Romulan term by chopping off the last two syllables, customising it to suit her own ease of pronunciation and making it into a short-form of affection, rather like a nick-name.
She had no idea Isha was back on DS5 and so assumed the idea of Rh'vaurek strangling her was metaphorical and the fact that he was talking of the reminder as if it had happened recently must be just a turn of phrase.
He placed the empty glass aside. "Very good, v'Rinam, but I'm serious," he said. "The only time I've seen her more unstable is ... was ..." he swallowed as he hesititated, unsure how she would take this, "...when ...well when she terminated our association before her marriage. She attacked me then, and I retalliated, which I've regretted ever since. I'm much more controlled than I was then."
"Wait, wait....." Chelsea was trying to let this sink in. "You mean you've seen her? Since the .... since she went back to ch'Riann.... is she *here*? On DS5?" she spluttered, shocked. "What do you mean unstable?" she added, as it filtered through her stunned mind.
"She came back without informing anyone. She wasn't registered as a passenger on any vessel that has docked with the station." He clenched his teeth together for a moment before he continued, "Don't get too excited, she's not quite the Isha you're expecting."
"Why? What have they done to her?" Her alarm rose even more.
"She's done it herself, Chelsea. She's had to make some decisions that were very difficult for her." Rh'vaurek paused, aware that he sounded as though he was talking to a child. "First there was the attack on this station, in different ways both her son and brother in law were involved, but Isha holds herself responsible for the actions of all members of her House, which under law, she is. She had to bring them to justice, that is ensure that they were both executed, because it was the right thing for her to do regardless of what her personal opinion was. She might not have been the one who struck the blow but she considers their deaths her responsibilty ... the same goes for everyone who died during that attack. She's taken refuge in the delusion of her own strength and she's constantly reassuring herself that she did what she had to and of the security of her elevated position."
"Isn't she right in that? She *did* do what she was obliged to... didn't she? Was there any way or means she could have done otherwise?" Chelsea asked, her naive openness obvious as always.
Rh'vaurek folded his arms. "She was right," he said, "but she had no choice. She's not as hard as she pretends to be, and this is how she deals with it. You'd hardly know her."
"I'm willing to accept that i have come to know only a proportion of Isha and that what I *have* seen shows me there are many layers and angles that I will probably never uncover nor understand. However, any parent who loses a child, let alone has to order one's death, will never be the same again, no matter how little choice they have.
You said she attacked you last time but this time you are more controlled than to retaliate? Do I take it she has attacked you again? Are we talking physically or verbally. I suppose there is also emotionally but I don't feel it appropriate for me to include that in the question." she asked, parking herself on the front of her desk.
"She pulled a disruptor on me," he said, incredulous, "She was looking for a fight but I won't give her one.I can't do this, not again."
Chelsea noticed how agitated his eyes seemed, moving everywhere, more so than normal even given that he was always careful to take in all his surroundings.
"Rh'vaurek? Would it be either inaccurate or presumptuous of me to conclude that she has hurt you?" she asked quietly.
"It would not be inaccurate," he replied with a sigh, the fact that it was presumptuous he left unsaid. "A lot of people, myself included have protected her from herself when we could." He hesitated, "I thought it would be different now ... before she left we resumed something of our intimacy, but once again I was providing a service she wanted and no longer requires."
"I don't believe that, ira'v'Di. Not that she pulled a disruptor, as hard as that is to comprehend and impossible to believe she would have used it, but I mean, I don't believe she was using you for a service as you put it and I *know* she will *never* no longer require your love." Chelsea stood up and moved towards him so she could look up into his eyes to show him her honesty over what she was about to reveal.
"I would normally keep confidences to the grave. It's not only a part of my job but also part of my personal code of honour, however, Isha and I talked about things that it might shock you to hear, mostly personal things she could never discuss with anyone of her own race, for reasons you would understand better than I.
I will not divulge details, that would be too wrong, but I can be categoric when I tell you that if Isha has given you the impression she doesn't need you any more or ever had a time when she didn't, then you have been taken in on that regard but no other." Watching the scorn on his face as he clearly felt it was she who had been fooled if anyone, Chelsea knew she had failed to convince him. She had to go that extra mile although Isha would not thank her for it either way.
"We talked about Ryan and yourself, amongst others of course but it was only about you alone that we ever quarrelled. I thought at the time that you were ... um.... " she blushed. "... well you had just called me in the middle of the night, shown me the wreckage of a woman you had done a vivisection on... " That was an exaggeration but it made her point.
"You tricked me into a position where I revived her for you and you then blackmailed and brutalised me in an attempt to silence me about her." Again an exaggeration but it had seemed that way at the time so that was how she told it.
“I hardly touched you,” Rh’vaurek protested, though that was rather the point; the threat of force was typically more effective than violence in anyone with a healthy instinct for self preservation.
"... ok, perhaps now I look back it wasn't *that* bad". She conceded with a lopsided grin. "but the point is that Isha and my conversation somehow came around to how totally *monstrous* i thought you were.... " she stopped to widen that grin and wink at him.
"Isha defended you with such passion that she almost struck me. She hurled a wine bottle and smashed it on a rock, barely missing me and I'm not exaggerating *that* part. Hardly the behaviour of someone who only ever *used you for a service* methinks. Who defends someone with such vehemence if they are indifferent to them?" She paused briefly but went on.
“Isha would,” Rh’vaurek muttered under his breath as Chelsea continued.
"She also admitted, when we were out getting drunk together in disgust at the lack of attention and interest our men were paying us.... yes, you *know* when that was! You remember charging me to look after her for you... and all the time she was torturing herself over having done something to hurt you in the past"
“What stories has she been filling your head with?” His scornful tone betraying his annoyance at the idea that they should have been discussing his past. “Its all self indulgent nonsense – how exactly does she claim to have hurt me?”
"Of course she never went into detail" This one was ever so slightly less 100% truthful than all the rest of her declarations but it was in a good cause as that would have been too much of a betrayal. Her intention here was only to give him enough to convince him that Isha cared more genuinely than he gave her credit for.
Rh’vaurek stepped closer, he didn’t seem to be getting through to her and tried another approach, “Chelsea, Isha is a Romulan, I am a Romulan and one thing you may have noticed that characterises our people is that we have a different set of values to yours. The reason outsiders find us untrustworthy is because our underlying motives are not the same and what we call honour requires us to act in ways that appear contradictory and often downright deceitful. Don’t make the common error of projecting your own values onto us v'Rinam.”
Chelsea wavered a little. "...but women don't get drunk together and commiserate with one another over men they don't care about. If they only *use* them then they don't lose any time or sleep getting upset about their indifference, do they?" Perhaps he honestly couldn't know why women did what they did or not..... or perhaps he was right and it was she who was misunderstanding things. This wasn't going as well as she wanted it to so she dropped the attempts to prove her point and cut straight to it.
"I'm trying to tell you just a tiny few of the myriad and multiple ways in which I came to the deepset conviction that, whatever your race values or how she behaves, Isha not only cares about you more than you know but that she would be totally lost without you. If I didn't know your Romulan sensibilities would be affronted, I'd go as far as to say *loves* you!
Please don't abandon her when she needs you most because that's precisely when she would push you away the hardest."
tbc.....
JP Between:
Lt. Cmdr. Chelsea Adams
ACMO - DS5
erie'Khrein Rh'vaurek Raedheol
Acting Ambassador
and
Lt Richard Dunham
Squadron Leader