He looked around at the makeshift crew. Ensign Chris Washington was at the helm; another fresh recruit from the Academy and from his gaunt build, in desperate need of a good meal. Lieutenant M'ovara sat at the tactical station; an Andorian male of unknown age, but he looked as though he had been around the block a few times. Behind him, Elaine Davies and Tony Moreau were still on duty from ealier in the day, though they were due to stand down in a couple of hours. Andorians were never known for small talk, so Stephen had spent his time getting to know Washington, whom he discovered was an avid baseball fan.
"Argh!" Lieutenant Davies exclaimed as she took her earpiece out and threw it on the console. The other four members of the bridge crew turned her direction. Realizing she didn't mean to be vocal about her displeasure at the communications system, she looked down rather humbly. "Sorry, Sir," she apologized, half looking up to Commander Kirk's gaze.
Stephen dared a slight smile, remembering what it was like to be publically caught in an embarassing situation. "What seems to be the problem?" He asked innocently.
"Well," she started cautiously, "it's this comm system. Ever since we put in that new computer, it keeps popping every now and then. It's really annoying... and the loud ones actually hurt."
Stephen turned to Tony. "Tone, do you know anything about this?"
Tony shrugged. "It's the first I ever heard about it." Tony had been meaning to talk to Elaine ever since their misunderstanding a couple of weeks ago at the restaurant, but never quite found the time. Eventually, pride set in telling him that since she was the one who acted unreasonably, it was up to her to clear it up.
Elaine looked rather sheepishly at the commander. "I was thinking I could fix it by myself and not trouble the lieutenant." Tony rolled his eyes.
"Well, Davies," Kirk replied, "that IS his job." He motioned to Tony. "Why don't you take a quick look." This was, potentially, a bad combination. Stephen had noticed that since they returned from Earth, the two had barely spoken a word to each other; a dramatic difference from shortly after the conflict with the Rapier, when he had to quiet them down from talking too much.
"Thank you, Sir," she replied half-heartedly. The truth was, she had meant to talk to Tony for awhile, but on her terms. He had been a little presumptuous with her after the restaurant and she wasn't about to be some 'conquest' for anyone else. The past several weeks had proven to her that she had much more worth than she had thought.
Tony got up and walked over to her seat. "So..." he said cautiously, "what's it doing?"
Trying to be civil, she handed him the earpiece. "It's like I said... it winks out every now and then with a pop. They can get kind of loud, too. Take a listen. It happens every few minutes."
Tony put the earpiece to his ear. He just couldn't resist taking a shot, though. "If I'm being too forward with your earpiece, just let me know." He added a very sarcastic smirk.
Her eyes narrowed as she smirked back. "Don't worry, I will."
Lieutenant Moreau rolled his eyes. Sure enough, after several seconds, he heard a fairly loud 'pop' come from the earpiece. "Ah!" he exclaimed as he took the instrument from his ear. "You're right, that was loud." He handed the earpiece back to Elaine.
She took the earpiece and wiped it off with her shirt. "Don't sound so surprised, Lieutenant. There IS a brain inside this body, after all." She sounded rather spiteful with that statement.
Tony looked confused, and a little upset. "Huh? I never said there wasn't." His voice began to raise.
"You didn't have to say it... those few times you actually looked someplace other than my breasts, I could see it in your eyes." Her voice raised a bit as well, causing the other three bridge officers to turn and look.
"What are you...?" Tony started. His mind quickly recalled the night at the restaurant. He couldn't remember any conscious attempts at looking at 'inappropriate' body parts. "You're unbelievable. I never looked at... I mean... I was just trying to be nice. You're giving yourself WAY too much credit, Lieutenant."
"Am I really?" she retorted. Her mind went back to all the supposed times when they talked on the way back to Earth. Elaine finally saw through his plans; he was trying to lower her guard after a traumatic incident. When she finally called him on his behavior at the restaurant, he got upset. Everything was falling into place. "You're just like all the..."
"Kids," Stephen piped up.
"You'll never know!" Tony hollered.
"Lieutenants!" Kirk shouted. Shocked, they both stopped and stared at Commander Kirk. By the look on his face, he wasn't very happy. Ensign Washington was desperately struggling to keep from laughing. M'ovara merely cast an extremely disapproving stare at them before returning gruffly to his console. Kirk took a breath and glared at them both. "Now, if I have to set you both in time-out, I will." The two looked a little embarassed with that statement. "I trust that won't be necessary, since I'm not dealing with school children, but Starfleet officers."
"I'm sorry, Sir." Lieutenant Davies admitted, her head down.
Tony felt a little hurt that his friend wasn't taking his side. "Yeah, me too." He concurred.
Kirk tried to change the subject and get them off their personal problems. "Do you have any idea what's wrong with her station, Lieutenant Moreau?" Kirk softened his expression and his tone.
"Yeah," the lieutenant answered. His shoulders slumped slightly and his tone softened as well. "I'm pretty sure the communications systems got overlooked when we put the primary systems into buffer protection. So... when the nodes sync up, there's a momentary pause. I can fix it pretty quick."
"Typical," Elaine muttered under her breath.
Tony heard that remark. "What's THAT supposed to mean?"
Kirk had to think of something quick... not his strong suit. "Tony!" he started, "I need you to look at a computer problem in the ready room. Why don't we take care of that now." Stephen nodded to Tony.
Tony rolled his eyes. Kirk's quick-thinking lying ability was as bad as ever. "Right." He got up and headed to the ready room.
Commander Kirk turned to Lieutenant M'ovara. "Lieutenant, you have the con. If anything happens, come get us."
"Aye, aye, Sir." M'ovara replied. He turned back to his console and slowly shook his head. "Humans," he said quietly.