Author's Note: See End notes for more information.
She'd always imagined sailors to be smaller, wiry and ribald men, built to live on ships where space was at a premium and concepts such as "suites" stopped at a bunk bed and lone locker. These notions were never challenged, as she had always worked with the respective Air Forces of whatever government she could latch on to for her research, and those men were a different breed entirely.
But then she watched that man walk into her appropriated helo bay, and all her preconceptions about sailors and their supposed type were a thing of the past.
He first struck her as simply broad, but the more she studied him - and to her credit, she thinks he has yet to notice - the more she realized he wasn't just a large man; he is a tall and well built individual, but it is his manner that sets him apart.
True, his frame is expansive, and carries no small amount of useful, well-earned muscle, but it isn't just that he physically takes up more room than most other men on the ship. In fact, she is certain that there are taller, and larger men currently residing on the Nathan James, but none of them can order attention or take up space the way he can. Again, it is his manner, that occasionally infuriating way about him that generates an air of command that is hard - ever so hard - to ignore.
When he walks, he portrays a predator, easy in his home environment but readily deadly given the chance. When he sits, his presence is not diminished, simply subdued. And when he brings to bear that anger, that righteous indignation, he fills his space with an infectious, chilling rage that seems to pull strength straight from the steel and steam and sailors below his feet.
And yet.
He is kind. He is a man whose smile is contagious and whose laugh - rare as it is - never ceases to lighten her heart, if only for a moment. This man who has lost so much and fought so tirelessly, he cares so very much for his crew, for his family - blood and not - and that above all things makes him formidable.
She sees the love in him, and the pain, and knows this great man is all the more great because of it.
So sure, she had always thought of sailors as quick men, small men, men who fit compact in the cramped spaces designated for them. She thought them most likely coarse and bawdy, and unlikely to have more than a little in common with herself.
Then this man stepped in from a sunlit deck and into her shambles lab, and she knew she had been sorely mistaken.
He is the ship beneath him, the men behind him, and the power of his title.
He is no small man.
And she thinks she could love him.
Author's End note: So I did actually decide to do more with this. Thank you all for your support already - starfoxtwin, StarTraveler, and IfUKnewUCouldNotFail - and as always, I look for prompts to help me along.