Interlude – Well Earned R & R (Pt 4) Legacy
by Commander Chelsea Dunham & Commander Richard Dunham
Post Details
OLD:
They all rose, said their polite thank-you's and left. Chelsea had no idea where they would be staying so she fell back and just followed Kim who stepped out straight away like someone who knew exactly where she was going.
NEW:
Chelsea said nothing, trying to absorb what had just happened. "So just exactly what *did* she do to Kim's dad?" she finally asked, breaking the silence.
Dunham chuckled to himself remembering the story his sister had told him, as they followed Kim to through the corridors to the V.I.P suite. “It involved the poor man being down to just his under fatigues at the time” said Dunham with a wink. “My mother can be very tenacious when she wants to be. On another note on a scale of one to ten just how much trouble am I in?”
"*under* fatigues?" Chelsea looked quizzical. ".. never mind....about 914...out of 5!" she grumbled, glaring at him for even mentioning it
“Ok you're angry with me, I understand that.” He said as they passed through the doors to the VIP suite, “and I’m very sorry, please forgive me.” He said gesturing with his hand to the centre of the room, where a bottle of champagne stood in a pile of Ice in a silver chiller holder. Next to it on the table was a collection of earth roses, and sitting beside them was a heart shaped box containing Bajoran chocolates.”
Chelsea looked at the beautiful gifts and back at Rick's even more lovely face, those eyes sincere and devastating in the same irresistible way.
"Rick..... " she sighed, melting into his arms. "I don't understand. It's.... "
She stopped to kiss him and almost didn't get to say any more. It was only because Kim was there that she got a second chance to approach what was bothering her.
"Of COURSE you're forgiven, you'll always be forgiven, you could commit murder and somehow I would find a way to justify it and forgive you. I do love you that much, but just because I'd follow you around in complete trust and naivety, surely you still understand that if you set up something disastrous to blindside me, you'd have to expect my trust to be at least be shaken?" she tried to explain how she felt.
Chelsea was quietly serious. "What worries me is that people like your mother who *test* others are playing a dangerous game with other peoples' relationships. I can see why she might feel justified in doing that when it's her own family she thinks she's protecting but she could wreck your life if she gets it wrong."
All the time she was thinking about this, Chelsea was making silent promises to herself about how she was never going to be so undermining of her own children, if she ever had any.
Dunham raised his hands in surrender, “I’m sorry I really am. I mean it from the deepest part of my heart and soul. But not only is she my mother, she is also my superior officer, and I was under orders. I know you’re feeling betrayed and that you feel like you have lost an element of trust towards me. I don’t blame you, I would too. I just want you to understand that I didn’t want to do it either, and that it was wrong and hurtful to do something like this to you. ”
"I'm sorry, honey, I just couldn't help feeling rattled." Chelsea admitted sadly. "I guess by rising to this I *have* failed her test. I did what she wanted me to, I let it cause a ripple in our relationship which just seems to prove she was right to question it."
"I do know how to take a joke, Rick. I really do, I promise, but this had a much deeper intention that to make anyone laugh." Chelsea had begun to feel like the bad-guy again and felt she had to justify herself.
"Thank you for the lovely flowers and chocolates. Please can we just forget it ever happened? We're on holiday." she smiled at him and offered the chocolates around making a huge effort to lighten back up.
Inside, Chelsea was still working out what had just happened here. Perhaps she should have just kept her feelings to herself until she had it all worked out but she had never been anything but totally open with Rick and she didn't want to let this change that.
"Why don't you open that champagne, babe?" she asked him. "Kim and I are dying of thirst here"
~and it's going to be a long night if there are more 'under fatigues' awaiting me at dinner~ she thought, her smile not fading even a tiny glimmer. When she was against the wall, Chelsea could pull up some serious strength and Rick was worth fighting for.
Luckily Kim joined her in enthusing about the bottle being opened so she was able to move the moment aside and get them all laughing again as the cork was fired at the windows and much joking about de-pressurising the Starship began.
"Do you think Commander Davies' office is in a line with that cork's trajectory?" Chelsea suggested. "You could have just crashed your career totally, Lieutenant Dunham! One Starship decommissioned and one CO assaulted all in one shot." She went to the window to pretend to see.
Dunham sat in one of the luxurious and comfortable chairs while Chelsea stared out of the window for a moment. Rick gave Kim a pleading look. The teenage girl rolled her eyes jumped off the table where she had been perched and quickly headed out of the suite to explore the rest of the ship. “Were not done talking about this” said Dunham in a sympathetic voice.
Dunham took out a bit of gum from his back pocket, he unwrapped it and started chewing on it, and the familiar sensation calmed him down a little. Dunham talked quietly “You know I don’t talk about my family much and this is why, because of this sort of crap that happens. This is exactly what my mother wants from you, to drive a wedge between us, or turn you into the woman of stone that she is. Do you know why? Because of the bloody Dunham legacy ok. You would be hard pressed to find a Dunham that has not served in Starfleet in some way. There have been Dunham’s in the fleet since the first NX Class was launched, and it’s bred this thing into our family about duty and honour. My mother especially. So that’s why she does it, to make you more like her to become more suitable for the Dunham lineage. She did exactly the same thing to my sister she will do exactly the same thing to Kim, promise me she won’t break that beautiful passionate, heartfelt soul of yours Chelsea, because I don’t care about the family stuff, I love you and I don’t want you any other way.” The final words were almost a whisper as a tear welled up in his eye.
All the negativity and insecurity that had just been instilled in Chelsea was washed away by that one tear.
"Rick, honey...why.... ". She was going to instinctively say *why didn't you say before* but he had just explained he had been *ordered* not to. ~What sort of mother orders her own children to comply with her wishes when it's clear how much distress and unhappiness it causes them?~ she wondered in the split second it took her to cross the room.
Looking at the sorrow in Rick's eyes, Chelsea wanted a black hole to open and swallow her. "I'm so sorry" she said sincerely, taking both his hands in hers and sitting on the floor in front of him, looking up into his face.
"I couldn't work out why the Rick I know would do something so out-of-character and insensitive. I should *never* have doubted what i thought i knew about you. I'm really sorry."
She went on softly. "Rick, if I had to choose between what your mother thinks of me and what *you* think, it wouldn't take me a split-nano-second to tell her to stick it up her Captain's chair. I don't care if she bounced me straight into Court Martial and right out of Starfleet for it either. I'm good at what I do and I'd get a job in civilian medicine anywhere. I only cared what she thought when I imagined I'd have to impress her to keep you."
She squeezed his hands tightly in her earnest attempt to show him that she meant this completely. "I know that doesn't seem to make sense but people always automatically think they have to fit into a loved-one's family. I thought the test was to see if I'd take being put on the spot and react in a *suitable* way to win her approval. Perhaps it *was* from her point of view.... but to me that part of it wasn't important. If she'd put me into my 'under-fatigues' I'd have endured it for you but what would have mattered would have been that *you* would have chosen to let her.... that *you* would have wanted to test me too."
“No, No of course not, there is nothing else in my world but you......I would do anything for you,” said Dunham with sincerity and commitment in his voice. He looked down at her and placed both palms of his hands on her cheeks.
It was Chelsea's turn to have a tear appear in the corner of her eye now.
"Rick, nothing in the universe matters more than that. One day, you and I might just bring your mother's prediction (and dread) to pass. Perhaps I'll become her daughter-in-law and i'll stay home with our kids and be warm, loving and nurturing to them all... and we'll have at least ten Dunhams... and NOT ONE of them will be put through the *time honoured* family test when they fall in love. How about that for anarchy? I will be the bringer of doom to the Dunhams! mwahahaa!" She laughed, raising her fingers to stroke his cheek gently. "But in the meantime, I'll find time to love you to death first.... slowly... it might take about 90 years though.... that ok?" she grinned, climbing up into his lap for a hug.
Dunham held her tightly and tenderly in a hug wanting never to let go. He nuzzled his head into her neck and kissed her there gently. “So we're ok? You’re not going to keep anything bottled in over this and not tell me, and then leave me over it or something?”
"Oh nice try....I see where this is going! You want to get rid of me, then blame it on me for harbouring old grudges, is that it?" she teased, poking him gently in the ribs.
“Actually I’m surprised at the self restraint you have exercised in not querying about my old girl friend” said Dunham in mock exasperation and tickling Chelsea’s ribs playfully.
"Hey" she squeaked, attempting to escape his fingers. "And oh yeah, that's a good point... so who was she? Was she prettier than me? Do you still love her, secretly?" she laughed.
“Her name was Emily and she was a half Human, half Vulcan from Mars,” Dunham smiled, “and you’re the prettiest women in the galaxy so how could she be prettier than you? And no I don’t still Love her, to be honest with you I’m not sure if we ever were really in love. It wasn’t that kind of relationship.”
"You weren't ACTUALLY obliged to answer that... I *was* joking you know... and so....her name is Emily eh?" she grinned widely taking advantage of his serious reply to tug at his hair softly and duck to avoid retaliation.
Dunham smiled as he tickled Chelsea further. “It’s only fair, after all I got meet your last boyfriend. So I should talk about mine. Anyway it didn't work out and we broke up, I haven’t spoken to her since I transferred to star fighter wing, but you can thank her for my more......spiritual side, she was a mentor more than anything.”
Chelsea drew in her brows in a frown. "To be honest, that sounds waaaaaaaaaaay more threatening than a torrid affair... " she winked.
“No-one said anything about a torrid affair.....why are you having a torrid affair?” he said in mock accusation and squinted his eyes in a comedy look.
"What?" she pretended to look confused. "NOT me, you Dufus! Emily..."
Dunham looked away pretending to be upset, but over-dramatising it to the hilt, he pouted slightly. “you know if this is just a sordid affair to you, just say so...” he said the edges of a smile on his lips and rebounding the question about Emily.
"Well, I was hoping a torrid affair might be on the cards but if you're unwilling ... especially as you're clearly still in denial about the passion you have for EMILY.... " That shot earned her retribution and she had to struggle to escape. A little breathless from laughing, Chelsea stood up and presented at attention, pulling her cheshire cat grin back into an unwilling straight face, the smirk still escaping.
"Lieutenant Richard Dunham" Chelsea stated formally as if this was an official declaration, which actually it was. "I do solemnly declare that being of sound mind I, Chelsea Adams, do love you totally and completely without prejudice nor grudge and I shall not *ever* hold this evening against you in fact, quite the contrary I shall love you more than ever as a result of this because seeing the sorrow in your awesome eyes just now caused me to vow to myself never to doubt you again and never to hurt you as long as I live. May the Prophets help me."
"There! do you believe me now?" she smiled at him and sealed it with a kiss.
Dunham simply stuck his tongue out and smiled. He put his hand to his chest. “Me” he said innocently.
"Don't you play the innocent with me" she smirked, nibbling his earlobe knowing full well that would get rid of his pretence at innocence and replace it with something *very* different.
Fortunately, by the time Kim came back they were getting showered and thinking about dressing for dinner.
Off
Lt Richard Dunham
Squadron Leader
&
Lt. Cmdr. Chelsea Adams
CMO - DS5
by Commander Chelsea Dunham & Commander Richard Dunham
Post Details
| Title | Well Earned R & R (Pt 4) Legacy | |
| Mission | Interlude | |
| Author(s) | Commander Chelsea Dunham & Commander Richard Dunham | |
| Posted | Wed May 19, 2010 @ 7:57am | |
| Location | Luxury Suite - USS Hagnon |
They all rose, said their polite thank-you's and left. Chelsea had no idea where they would be staying so she fell back and just followed Kim who stepped out straight away like someone who knew exactly where she was going.
NEW:
Chelsea said nothing, trying to absorb what had just happened. "So just exactly what *did* she do to Kim's dad?" she finally asked, breaking the silence.
Dunham chuckled to himself remembering the story his sister had told him, as they followed Kim to through the corridors to the V.I.P suite. “It involved the poor man being down to just his under fatigues at the time” said Dunham with a wink. “My mother can be very tenacious when she wants to be. On another note on a scale of one to ten just how much trouble am I in?”
"*under* fatigues?" Chelsea looked quizzical. ".. never mind....about 914...out of 5!" she grumbled, glaring at him for even mentioning it
“Ok you're angry with me, I understand that.” He said as they passed through the doors to the VIP suite, “and I’m very sorry, please forgive me.” He said gesturing with his hand to the centre of the room, where a bottle of champagne stood in a pile of Ice in a silver chiller holder. Next to it on the table was a collection of earth roses, and sitting beside them was a heart shaped box containing Bajoran chocolates.”
Chelsea looked at the beautiful gifts and back at Rick's even more lovely face, those eyes sincere and devastating in the same irresistible way.
"Rick..... " she sighed, melting into his arms. "I don't understand. It's.... "
She stopped to kiss him and almost didn't get to say any more. It was only because Kim was there that she got a second chance to approach what was bothering her.
"Of COURSE you're forgiven, you'll always be forgiven, you could commit murder and somehow I would find a way to justify it and forgive you. I do love you that much, but just because I'd follow you around in complete trust and naivety, surely you still understand that if you set up something disastrous to blindside me, you'd have to expect my trust to be at least be shaken?" she tried to explain how she felt.
Chelsea was quietly serious. "What worries me is that people like your mother who *test* others are playing a dangerous game with other peoples' relationships. I can see why she might feel justified in doing that when it's her own family she thinks she's protecting but she could wreck your life if she gets it wrong."
All the time she was thinking about this, Chelsea was making silent promises to herself about how she was never going to be so undermining of her own children, if she ever had any.
Dunham raised his hands in surrender, “I’m sorry I really am. I mean it from the deepest part of my heart and soul. But not only is she my mother, she is also my superior officer, and I was under orders. I know you’re feeling betrayed and that you feel like you have lost an element of trust towards me. I don’t blame you, I would too. I just want you to understand that I didn’t want to do it either, and that it was wrong and hurtful to do something like this to you. ”
"I'm sorry, honey, I just couldn't help feeling rattled." Chelsea admitted sadly. "I guess by rising to this I *have* failed her test. I did what she wanted me to, I let it cause a ripple in our relationship which just seems to prove she was right to question it."
"I do know how to take a joke, Rick. I really do, I promise, but this had a much deeper intention that to make anyone laugh." Chelsea had begun to feel like the bad-guy again and felt she had to justify herself.
"Thank you for the lovely flowers and chocolates. Please can we just forget it ever happened? We're on holiday." she smiled at him and offered the chocolates around making a huge effort to lighten back up.
Inside, Chelsea was still working out what had just happened here. Perhaps she should have just kept her feelings to herself until she had it all worked out but she had never been anything but totally open with Rick and she didn't want to let this change that.
"Why don't you open that champagne, babe?" she asked him. "Kim and I are dying of thirst here"
~and it's going to be a long night if there are more 'under fatigues' awaiting me at dinner~ she thought, her smile not fading even a tiny glimmer. When she was against the wall, Chelsea could pull up some serious strength and Rick was worth fighting for.
Luckily Kim joined her in enthusing about the bottle being opened so she was able to move the moment aside and get them all laughing again as the cork was fired at the windows and much joking about de-pressurising the Starship began.
"Do you think Commander Davies' office is in a line with that cork's trajectory?" Chelsea suggested. "You could have just crashed your career totally, Lieutenant Dunham! One Starship decommissioned and one CO assaulted all in one shot." She went to the window to pretend to see.
Dunham sat in one of the luxurious and comfortable chairs while Chelsea stared out of the window for a moment. Rick gave Kim a pleading look. The teenage girl rolled her eyes jumped off the table where she had been perched and quickly headed out of the suite to explore the rest of the ship. “Were not done talking about this” said Dunham in a sympathetic voice.
Dunham took out a bit of gum from his back pocket, he unwrapped it and started chewing on it, and the familiar sensation calmed him down a little. Dunham talked quietly “You know I don’t talk about my family much and this is why, because of this sort of crap that happens. This is exactly what my mother wants from you, to drive a wedge between us, or turn you into the woman of stone that she is. Do you know why? Because of the bloody Dunham legacy ok. You would be hard pressed to find a Dunham that has not served in Starfleet in some way. There have been Dunham’s in the fleet since the first NX Class was launched, and it’s bred this thing into our family about duty and honour. My mother especially. So that’s why she does it, to make you more like her to become more suitable for the Dunham lineage. She did exactly the same thing to my sister she will do exactly the same thing to Kim, promise me she won’t break that beautiful passionate, heartfelt soul of yours Chelsea, because I don’t care about the family stuff, I love you and I don’t want you any other way.” The final words were almost a whisper as a tear welled up in his eye.
All the negativity and insecurity that had just been instilled in Chelsea was washed away by that one tear.
"Rick, honey...why.... ". She was going to instinctively say *why didn't you say before* but he had just explained he had been *ordered* not to. ~What sort of mother orders her own children to comply with her wishes when it's clear how much distress and unhappiness it causes them?~ she wondered in the split second it took her to cross the room.
Looking at the sorrow in Rick's eyes, Chelsea wanted a black hole to open and swallow her. "I'm so sorry" she said sincerely, taking both his hands in hers and sitting on the floor in front of him, looking up into his face.
"I couldn't work out why the Rick I know would do something so out-of-character and insensitive. I should *never* have doubted what i thought i knew about you. I'm really sorry."
She went on softly. "Rick, if I had to choose between what your mother thinks of me and what *you* think, it wouldn't take me a split-nano-second to tell her to stick it up her Captain's chair. I don't care if she bounced me straight into Court Martial and right out of Starfleet for it either. I'm good at what I do and I'd get a job in civilian medicine anywhere. I only cared what she thought when I imagined I'd have to impress her to keep you."
She squeezed his hands tightly in her earnest attempt to show him that she meant this completely. "I know that doesn't seem to make sense but people always automatically think they have to fit into a loved-one's family. I thought the test was to see if I'd take being put on the spot and react in a *suitable* way to win her approval. Perhaps it *was* from her point of view.... but to me that part of it wasn't important. If she'd put me into my 'under-fatigues' I'd have endured it for you but what would have mattered would have been that *you* would have chosen to let her.... that *you* would have wanted to test me too."
“No, No of course not, there is nothing else in my world but you......I would do anything for you,” said Dunham with sincerity and commitment in his voice. He looked down at her and placed both palms of his hands on her cheeks.
It was Chelsea's turn to have a tear appear in the corner of her eye now.
"Rick, nothing in the universe matters more than that. One day, you and I might just bring your mother's prediction (and dread) to pass. Perhaps I'll become her daughter-in-law and i'll stay home with our kids and be warm, loving and nurturing to them all... and we'll have at least ten Dunhams... and NOT ONE of them will be put through the *time honoured* family test when they fall in love. How about that for anarchy? I will be the bringer of doom to the Dunhams! mwahahaa!" She laughed, raising her fingers to stroke his cheek gently. "But in the meantime, I'll find time to love you to death first.... slowly... it might take about 90 years though.... that ok?" she grinned, climbing up into his lap for a hug.
Dunham held her tightly and tenderly in a hug wanting never to let go. He nuzzled his head into her neck and kissed her there gently. “So we're ok? You’re not going to keep anything bottled in over this and not tell me, and then leave me over it or something?”
"Oh nice try....I see where this is going! You want to get rid of me, then blame it on me for harbouring old grudges, is that it?" she teased, poking him gently in the ribs.
“Actually I’m surprised at the self restraint you have exercised in not querying about my old girl friend” said Dunham in mock exasperation and tickling Chelsea’s ribs playfully.
"Hey" she squeaked, attempting to escape his fingers. "And oh yeah, that's a good point... so who was she? Was she prettier than me? Do you still love her, secretly?" she laughed.
“Her name was Emily and she was a half Human, half Vulcan from Mars,” Dunham smiled, “and you’re the prettiest women in the galaxy so how could she be prettier than you? And no I don’t still Love her, to be honest with you I’m not sure if we ever were really in love. It wasn’t that kind of relationship.”
"You weren't ACTUALLY obliged to answer that... I *was* joking you know... and so....her name is Emily eh?" she grinned widely taking advantage of his serious reply to tug at his hair softly and duck to avoid retaliation.
Dunham smiled as he tickled Chelsea further. “It’s only fair, after all I got meet your last boyfriend. So I should talk about mine. Anyway it didn't work out and we broke up, I haven’t spoken to her since I transferred to star fighter wing, but you can thank her for my more......spiritual side, she was a mentor more than anything.”
Chelsea drew in her brows in a frown. "To be honest, that sounds waaaaaaaaaaay more threatening than a torrid affair... " she winked.
“No-one said anything about a torrid affair.....why are you having a torrid affair?” he said in mock accusation and squinted his eyes in a comedy look.
"What?" she pretended to look confused. "NOT me, you Dufus! Emily..."
Dunham looked away pretending to be upset, but over-dramatising it to the hilt, he pouted slightly. “you know if this is just a sordid affair to you, just say so...” he said the edges of a smile on his lips and rebounding the question about Emily.
"Well, I was hoping a torrid affair might be on the cards but if you're unwilling ... especially as you're clearly still in denial about the passion you have for EMILY.... " That shot earned her retribution and she had to struggle to escape. A little breathless from laughing, Chelsea stood up and presented at attention, pulling her cheshire cat grin back into an unwilling straight face, the smirk still escaping.
"Lieutenant Richard Dunham" Chelsea stated formally as if this was an official declaration, which actually it was. "I do solemnly declare that being of sound mind I, Chelsea Adams, do love you totally and completely without prejudice nor grudge and I shall not *ever* hold this evening against you in fact, quite the contrary I shall love you more than ever as a result of this because seeing the sorrow in your awesome eyes just now caused me to vow to myself never to doubt you again and never to hurt you as long as I live. May the Prophets help me."
"There! do you believe me now?" she smiled at him and sealed it with a kiss.
Dunham simply stuck his tongue out and smiled. He put his hand to his chest. “Me” he said innocently.
"Don't you play the innocent with me" she smirked, nibbling his earlobe knowing full well that would get rid of his pretence at innocence and replace it with something *very* different.
Fortunately, by the time Kim came back they were getting showered and thinking about dressing for dinner.
Off
Lt Richard Dunham
Squadron Leader
&
Lt. Cmdr. Chelsea Adams
CMO - DS5