Destry Steele

"Whoooooo-eeeee!" Ellen yipped as the tractor beams broke free of the Arcadia's hull and the huge ship began its not-very-graceful but thankfully still somewhat gentle descent to the packed-rock ground beneath them. "Right on the money! Target the size of a pin we had to hit and we nailed it! Right on the frackin' money!" "Lieutenant Fox, this isColeman--" "Yeah, yeah, I hear you,Sparky, beautiful work! Have everyone circle up round and get back into the shuttlebays if they can once the ship's hit ground...we blow any fuses?" "No, ma'am, not that I can figure. The dust played hell with the fuel efficiency but everything's still holding together." "Good. Let's get this little fleet down and take stock." She switched off the comm and turned sideways to glance at Destry, who was still busy moving the yacht out of the way of the dropping Arcadia, and Ellen grinned at her friend with a cat-with-canary smile,an expression that always, no matter the circumstances, seemed to fight its way out when the machinery under her care did something particularly profound. "Get us up clear where we can see everything -- we put her down soft but that ship's still gonna make a hell of a bump when it hits." "With pleasure." Destry's response was heartfelt and she wasted no time in maneuvering away and up. "We've done nothing but eat her dust for the past twenty minutes and I'm ready for a different view." Once she cleared the dust cloud now enveloping the Arcadia, Destry held the yacht's position, and swiveled to face Ellen, her own smile one of enormous relief. "That was a very nice bit of coordinating on your part, Fox," Destry congratulated her. "Have to admit, I had my doubts for a couple of minutes there." "Yeah, me too," Ellen said wryly, tipping her head back against her headrest, feeling the adrenaline of the last few minutes draining quietly out of her to puddle on the floor. "And it ain't over yet...still got to see about siphoning off the fuel from that Daedalus or it's all a bit of a moot point. But -- the worst is past!" she added optimistically, resisting the urge to add the I think hovering on the end of the sentence. "Nice flying by the way; I know she was in the mood to wrestle you back a bit." "Hmm...yeah, she was, and thanks" Destry replied absently, her mind on the next phase. "She was designed for better things, though I can't argue with the necessity." Drumming the fingers of one hand on the armrest, she eyed Ellen for a moment, before asking, "Think there's going to be any problem with the transfer?" Ellen caught her eyes, catching the mild concern in the gaze, and shook her head firmly. "Not enough to keep us on the ground," she said, with as much casualness as she could muster, though honesty compelled her to add softly, "There's always problems of one sort or another. I'm playing this one by ear, Des." Destry waited a beat and then nodded. "Guess it's a good thing you live to solve these kinds of problems, then," she answered with a sharp grin before looking down at the Arcadia, the ship looking very white in contrast with the reddish rock of the planet's surface. "That just looks so wrong, doesn't it?" Ellen pushed herself to her feet, moving to look over Destry's shoulder out the cockpit window, just in time to see the ship make contact with the ground with a light jolt that sent avisible ripple out through the surrounding desert. She winced sharply, hoping the inertial dampeners had held inside. "Even with an Intrepid or something, it's a bit off to see them out of the sky. With a Sovereign, it's just weird." "I'm going to have to put this ship down so you can walk over and get started on the transfer," Destrysaid matter-of-factly. "I also need to check in with Sickbay though I doubt there have been any issues--it wasn't a rough ride." "Nah, minus the near asteroid collision, everything went along pretty smoothly all told," Ellen agreed, leaning forward and starting to poke at the console again. "Really hoping this place doesn't start making that a habit, at least until we have actual power to the weapons systems again," she added with some asperity after a few moments' pause, remembering the tense few moments in which the ship had without warning expended much of what remained of its limited propulsion power. "Yeah, that was something.There are quite a few impact craters on the surface so it's not just a once in a blue moon occurrence," Destry observed. "Not much of an existence for the inhabitants." "Wouldn't pick it for my summer home myself," Ellen answered blithely. "Before you put down, can you circle round quickly and let me make sure we didn't knock any new holes in thehull?" "I live to chauffeur you around, Fox," Destry replied mildly, her eyes gleaming with amusement, as she adjusted the controls and started the descent.

Shorted out fluid cables and some kind of broken line to the IV supply, Ellen thought vaguely, wiping off the blue-grey slime which had coated her arm up to the elbow after her first tentative exploratory trip inside sickbay's primary SSF. Guess you don't like being tossed around any more than we do, do you? It wasn't a hard fix, but given the amount of liquid floating around, it had the potential to be a rather annoying one; if it hadn't been for Destry doing the asking and for the potential for cascading failures that could shut down the rest of the surgical suite, Ellen might potentially have dropped it low on the to-do list. But they couldn't really afford to have a sickbay failure when they were out in the middle of nowhere and blind as a bat. So she lay on her back on the floor of sickbay under the bed, staring up at the damaged coils with a pensive expression, listening as Destry leaned on the biobed above her and chatted almost as if the situation around them weren't dire and potentially dangerous. Ellen smiled faintly to herself. It was times like this that she appreciated her friend's easy confidence. It was a focusing agent. "May need a bucket to drain this out," she said conversationally, as much to change the subject from Destry's inquiry into an old boyfriend as anything else. "And have one of your people shut off the fluid supply to this suite. I don't fancy going for a swim while trying to do electrical work." “After our recent collection efforts on behalf of the unfortunately departed Palto and Lawnostug, we may be running short on buckets, but I’ll see what I can do,” Destry replied dryly, her tone deliberately belying the officers’ horrific fates. The only thing to be grateful for was that there hadn’t been more victims. “I’ll hit the off switch on my way back,” she added, turning away from Ellen to head out into the main bay. After logging into a console, it took only a moment to deactivate the biobed’s fluid retrieval/dispersal systems. It took longer for Watanabe to find something that wasn’t a bedpan and Destry was chuckling to herself as she reentered the surgisuite. Ellen slid herself out from under the bed as she heard Destry re-enter the room, trying in vain to wipe off the dusty, sticky feeling on her hands against her pants leg. It was hard not to get a little fidgety at the mention of the two imploded officers -- the latter of them had died in Engineering, and the same fate could easily have befallen much of her department, including Ellen herself. But Destry's laconic tone told its own story. There was nothing else they could have done, and so they focused on the tasks at hand. "Thanks," she said, accepting the bucket and settling it into an appropriate position before sliding a panel aside on the bed's underbelly. There was a low splurting noise and the mechanism evacuated itself with gusto, filling the bucket about a quarter full with blue goo. "Excellent," Ellen said with some satisfaction. "Better out than in." “You’re such a philosopher, Fox,” Destry grinned as she perched herself on a stool to watch her friend practice her own form of medicine. Ellen laughed, scooting the bucket out of the way and wiping the edge of the opened panel with the palm of her hand. "Only with machines, Des. They're simpler than people are, even when they're making all kinds of weird noises." Kicking one leg against the ground, she scooted on her rear to the other side of the bed and repeated the process, then popped to her feet to set the bucket on top out of the way. "Oftentimes, it's the weird noises my patients make that help make a diagnosis easier," Destry teased lightly. They were each well aware of the other's views. Ellen had never met a machine, even a bioengineered one that she couldn't take the measure of in quick fashion, and Destry knew that in Ellen's opinion, the smallest piece of equipment had a 'life' of its own and was treated accordingly and often affectionately. To Destry, the equipment she used were tools, mostly taken for granted until they failed, at which point, they became easily discarded. She loved the ships they were posted to because they became home; they were a means to an end and allowed her to do the work she loved. Ellen felt a real pang every time a plasma conduit sprang a leak. She knew it was what made Fox an exceptional engineer. "Suppose you've got a point there. Though I count it a blessing that I don't need a bedside manner for my side of the equation. Engines tend to be more patient…patients." She knew Destry well enough to know that under the light bantering tone, she took her work just as seriously as Ellen took hers. Laconic though she might be when things were calm, she could react at a moment's notice to emergencies calculated to fray the nerves and turn the stomach, and she treated her patients with tremendous compassion, no matter their situation. She'd saved Ellen's life more than once. "Oh, I don't know," Destry chuckled, "There've been many times that I've been tempted to swear at my patients the way you do when faced with a reluctant watchyamacallit." Ellen snorted, ducking back down under the SSF and sticking her hand up into the evacuated casing. "What can I say? It's a time-honored engineering tradition. I think they teach a course in it at the academy." Her fingers touched the broken end of the fluid supply cable and she grinned, pulling it towards her slightly and fumbling in her equipment case for a replacement with her other hand. "Gotcha." "Another clamshell tamed and you didn't even have to resort to a whip and a chair. I am impressed as always, Fox. It's much easier to perform surgery when all the feeds stay attached." Destry crossed one leg over the other and leaned back against the wall separating the surgiunit from Main Bay. "I haven't brought it up, but I have to admit my curiosity is getting the better of me, and though it goes against my generally optimistic viewpoint fueled by the 'Ignorance is Bliss' credo I've recently adopted, is it your expert opinion that this ship is gonna fly again?" "Yes," Ellen said promptly, pressing her face up to the small opening in the biobed panels, sliding the replacement cable connection into place. There was a short silence and then she added a little ruefully, "At some point. Right now our priorities are getting the hole in the hull fixed and getting power restored to all decks. I'm not sure we've even looked at the engines yet, though Lt. Cmdr. Black is definitely on top of things." She paused again, then withdrew her arm from the bed and stuck her head out to catch Destry's gaze. "We'll get her moving." Destry locked onto Ellen's cool blue gaze for a moment, accepting the confident statement as fact without even thinking about it. Her own eyes narrowed thoughtfully, as she replied, "Ok, since we don't have to worry about what the real estate market is like on this ball of dust, I guess it just remains to find out where we are." Ellen chuckled. "Yep — comparatively simple, at least once the EPS feeds to the sensor pallet are back up. Which I suppose is my cue to leave." Snapping her engineering case shut, she pushed herself to her feet, moving towards the Jeffries Tube by which she'd entered, giving Destry a light slap on the shoulder as she went past. "I'll let you know if I hear anything." Destry sat up and slid off the stool in one fluid motion, following Ellen out of the room. "My next plan is to get an update from the Bridge. Rumor has it that an away team was dispatched. Would be nice to know about these things as they occur, but hopefully, no news is good news."

This log takes place 8 months after the end of the log 'Old Friends Part. 1' and is located on Star Base 17. The ceiling lights of the station flashed intermittently over her head as the medical gurney rattled along the station corridor; Ellen watched them with a sort of vague distracted interest through a haze of pain which in the seemingly endless journey from Chin'toka had become almost routine. Her body felt like it was on fire, an ache set deep in her bones; her mind whirled with images of the Athens splitting itself apart around her. Shouts still rang in her ears, echoing, and god, everything hurt; tears squeezed out at the corners of her eyes, mixing with the burned skin and stinging like another wave of plasma flame. "Where...?" She tried to speak, her breath catching in her throat with a painful tug. "Where am I...?" "Starbase 17, Lieutenant," came an unknown voice from above her. "Lie still...you're gonna be OK..." Like hell... Ellen tried to say, but the words were lost somewhere in her throat in a half-sob. The first wave of injured had reached them around six hours ago and they were still arriving as life pods were picked up and shuttles made their way in. SB 17 turned out to be the closest outpost to the Chin'toka system where the Federation had engaged the Breen. Even though the number of injured seemed great—it wasn't. Far more hadn't made it—the current estimate was more than 70,000. One of them had been the Constantinople; her previous posting—all hands lost. Destry hadn't had a chance to hear the full list—the station XO, Jeffrey Avondale had come to Medbay to see how they were progressing with treatment and to discuss storage options for the dead. So many of the injured had been too far gone by the time they arrived for treatment and were currently being kept in two cargo bays. She'd heard Avondale mention the Connie and Yorktown specifically to the CMO, Dr. Clarice Yamamoto. She'd caught the concerned look Clarice had flashed her but had turned away. The day's horror was already too overwhelming—she had to do her best to think only of the next patient. If she stopped for even a second to try and grasp what had been lost...she would be overwhelmed. They were too short staffed as it was—there would be time to grieve, to try and come to terms with the enormity of what the encounter had cost Starfleet as a whole and herself, personally, when she ran out of wounded. "Dr. Steele—this one just came in—picked up in a pod and is breathing on her own but has extensive plasma burns and slight lung searing." Destry nodded as Corpsman Peter Reynolds broke the next case down for her, reaching to take the PADD from him as she approached the bed. She had this down to a science now. Check the scans and notes passed along with the patient from triage, come to a consensus on treatment options and then either perform the necessary surgery or direct to step down where the patient would have to wait if their need wasn't life threatening. This one had the gold of engineering still visible on part of a sleeve that hadn't burned and melted into the skin. Triage wasn't attempting to remove the uniforms of any of the bad burn cases. That would be part of the debrieding process because there was just too much risk of infection in trying to separate what was left of the uniform from the damaged area. She finally glanced at the patient's face; already assessing how deep the destruction went, mentally calculating how many treatments would be required to rebuild the destroyed nerve endings and muscle tissue, not even noticing the sweetish smell of burnt flesh anymore. "Fox." For a second, her hands faltered from their smoothly practiced routine of biofunction programming and checking fluid transfer leads. It had crossed her mind with sudden fear earlier that the Athens might be among the ships that had massed to fight the Breen but then she'd remembered that Ellen had mentioned in a subspace transmission from some weeks back that they were being sent pretty far out to deliver a diplomatic contingent someplace. Destry had reassured herself that the Athens was not in danger—had no reason to be in the area. She took a deep breath and savagely beat back the emotions that had been threatening to swamp her all day, fiercely reminding herself that Ellen was alive—she was going to be ok. She would make her be ok. "Well, Fox," she tried to say breezily but only managed to sound strangled. "What the hell are you doing here? I'm pretty sure that the last time I saw you, I ordered you to take care of yourself." The doctor's voice cut through the surrounding noise like a knife, and Ellen's half-shut eyes snapped painfully open, tugging the burned skin of her face. She knew that voice; no one else called her "Fox" with that direct snap, no one else could be so familiar in such circumstances, no one else for a long time had told her to take care of herself... "Des..." she rasped, the words seeming to pull somewhere inside her with every breath. She didn't know what was going on anymore but the familiar voice and face staring down at her was like an oasis in the midst of a desert of chaos. "Yeah...I...I tried...but...things were busted...I had to fix 'em..." An attempt at a self-deprecating grin tried hard to fight its way past the fear into her expression, giving the burned flesh a lopsided aspect, then retreated as she groaned with sharp pain. "The Athens...was coming apart...had to try to...hold her together, get the crew out..." "Of course you did," Destry answered soothingly, thinking that was so very Ellen. Always fixing things, always looking to find a better way to do things. "You did a great job, Fox," she said reassuringly, the ruined sound of her friend's voice ripping her heart out. She had no idea what had happened aboard the Athens, but she had no doubt whatsoever that Ellen had saved lives. She smiled gently, releasing a complicated cocktail of painkiller, antibiotic and bionutrients into Ellen's bloodstream. "You're going to fall asleep now, Fox. Your current race is over and now you can leave everything in my hands. Don't fight it...just let yourself go. It's safe to do that now." Ellen felt the numbness of the drug spreading through her body almost as soon as the low hiss of the hypospray reached her ears, and her head sagged heavily back against the gurney. For a moment, she struggled to keep her eyes open, looking up at Destry, and made a noise that was half-cough, half-laugh. "First time I see you 'n eight months...and the first thing y' do...is put me to sleep..." The joke trailed itself off into an abrupt and wonderful fuzziness that seemed to saturate her brain. It's safe to do that now... She felt herself secure for now, for the first time since the Breen ships had appeared on the Athens' viewscreens. "Thank you..." she forced out, her eyes drifting closed and the cacophony of her nerves receding slowly into welcoming silence. "Anytime, Fox," Destry murmured, knowing Ellen was beyond hearing her. Then, she got to work. * * * 2.5 years later at The Stars End Bar, McKay Colony on Mars' Southern Hemisphere. Destry paused just inside doors that hadn't quite slid closed all the way. Smoke wreathed around the dim lights and made the ceiling feel even lower than it was. The music wasn't playing so loud she couldn't hear the murmur of conversation and the stares that came her way were appreciative without being predatory. It was a civilian bar and she was dressed for it, and mighty glad she wasn't wearing a pair of spit and polish dress shoes since something distinctly sticky was now clinging to the bottom of the sole of her left boot. She took a slow look around and then spotted her quarry on a stool near the right end of the bar. Always a creature of habit, she thought with a smile. "I sure am happy to see you still gravitate to a dive when you get a chance," Destry drawled, sliding onto the stool next to Ellen Fox. "I was afraid you might have raised your standards since making Lieutenant Commander." Ellen's hand froze on the rim of the glass the bartender had slid to her, and her eyebrows went up in recognition of the voice to her side. "I would never make such an error," she deadpanned laconically without turning, lifting the glass slowly and downing a gulp of the slightly fizzing liquid, then added thoughtfully, "Though you can't deny that with three pips I now lend an air of class to the place...if you disregard the company I'm keeping." She let her glass back to the countertop with a low thunk, and spun abruptly on her seat to face the woman who had sat down beside her; a wide grin flashed across her face, lighting her steel-blue eyes, and she slapped Destry in the shoulder playfully, looked the other woman up and down. "Jeee-zus, what the hell are you doing here, Des? Last I heard you were out at Starbase...Whatsit. Playing hooky, are you?" Before Destry could answer, Ellen had spun back to look in the direction of her unkempt server. "Barkeep! Aldebaran whiskey for my friend here, straight, no ice!" The man offered a nod in Ellen's direction and, satisfied, she swiveled her barstool around and lounged back against the edge of the bar. "I figure it's a safe assumption you haven't become a teetotaler in my absence," she added in a lower tone with a laugh. "Starbase 17--transfer to SB 4 fell through and I had no complaints since it wasn't a ship," Destry replied , amusement causing her pale violet eyes to gleam. Ellen Fox always seemed to be in motion; she had a certain level of energy that never seemed to be completely contained. She'd missed her. "And not hardly, although," she added thoughtfully, nodding her thanks to the tender as he set a glass in front of her, "it is odd how much more I seem to drink when around you." She raised the glass of whiskey in a silent toast and took a sip, feeling the green liquor burn its way down her throat and blossom into a warm presence in her stomach before answering Ellen's first question. "I decided I had to get a look at this ship of yours, Fox. I just couldn't take all the long-distance bragging anymore." Destry turned the stool so she could cross one long leg over the other while still keeping her gaze fixed to Ellen's, biting back a grin. "Is she really all that?" "All that?!" Ellen responded with mock-indignation, her eyes crinkling at the corners. "Of course she is. Would I put my seal on anything but?" With the craziness of work and transfers, she and Des had rarely seen each other by anything but subspace for a while now, but they might as well still have been in their Academy days for all the change the time had made to Destry's wry, easy confidence. Ellen suddenly realized in how short supply that had been among the workaholic teams of engineers with whom she usually consorted these days and felt abruptly very glad to see her friend -- even if she doubted that Des had in fact come all this way just to have a look at Ellen's current project. Then again, station life had to be pretty slow sometimes. "She's a beautiful ship," she continued with an air of authority, picking up her own glass again and sipping from it. "The USS Tiresius, good clean lines, solid engines -- perfect balance. Seven hundred meters of awesome in a six-hundred-forty-two-meter frame. Already got a temper on her, though; spent today with an EPS juncture that refused to settle in proper." Her smile took on an air of honest pride and she caught Destry's eyes and raised her eyebrows. "Can take you up to see her easy enough, if you like." "I would like. Very much." Destry waited a beat, raising her glass to take another sip before adding, "Seeing as how she's going to be 'home' for the foreseeable future." "Home?" Ellen cocked her head in surprise and mild confusion for a moment, and then her smile grew even wider, if that was possible, and she slapped a hand lightly on the bar. "Ah, you sneak! I knew you wouldn't come all this way just to see a drydock party! When'd you find out?" As far as she had known, Des had been well ensconced in her station-side work lately; it hadn't even occurred to Ellen that the two of them might end up serving together, but the idea was an added bonus to an assignment that had already kept her up nights with excitement as much as work. "Just found out last week and decided to surprise you," Destry answered, her own smile competing with Ellen's for sheer brightness. They'd never served together and though the vagaries of Fleet life didn't preclude it, the odds were against it. "You know I've been wanting to get back on a ship but I didn't expect that the next time I did, it would be as a chief. That's just a little more admin work than I was looking forward to." "Hell of a nice surprise!" Ellen answered cheerfully, before whistling at the latter announcement. "Well, now, someone's come up in the world, hasn't she? CMO and all?! Who'd you have to bribe?" she asked, punching Destry's shoulder lightly and looking pleased. "Let me tell you, you're getting quite an office -- wired it for sound and light last night." Downing the rest of her drink, she reached into her pocket and tossed a few slips of latinum on the bartop, enough to cover her drink and Destry's. "Come on...can give you the grand tour!" "Office, huh? You know sitting behind a desk isn't my favorite thing in the world," Destry replied wryly, although she slid off the stool with alacrity. "Let's take a look at Medbay to satisfy my curiosity and then I promise I'll go quietly to Main Engineering so you can really strut your stuff. I promise I won't roll my eyes even once." "Don't make promises you can't keep," Ellen answered with a smirk, pushing herself off her barstool as well and heading for the door. Once outside, she reached into her pocket, pulling out her commbadge and squeezing it between finger and thumb to open a channel back to Planetia. "Fox to Matthews. Two to beam up." * * * 3 years later, Starfleet JAG offices, San Francisco. "It could have been worse." 

 Destry let the words drop like stones into the silence left as the door closed behind Lieutenant Peter Ellison and Lieutenant Commander Andrea Kenyon, the attorneys who'd represented them during their joint hearing. "Oh, sure. The room could have blown up," Ellen answered wryly from where she was leaned against the wall next to the door, left leg drumming a ragged rhythm against the floorboards of the Frisco JAG office. "As it stands I wouldn't call it the best day of my life, especially given that we didn't do a damn thing that wasn't in the interests of the ship." "Which is why we're not currently on the way to the brig," Destry answered, her tone equally wry. "True. A rank drop and a transfer is better than bread and water," Ellen said, shaking her head slightly and pushing off from the wall to amble restlessly down the edge of the room. "But it's a hell of a thing, Des, when we didn't do anything wrong." Pausing, she turned and looked at her friend across the table and grinned faintly. "Least we're sticking together." "Rank drop is rather understating it, Fox," Destry drawled, her eyes lazily tracking Ellen's progress. "There's quite a gap between ensign and lieutenant commander. And you're right, from our point of view, we didn't do anything wrong. Unfortunately, we hold the minority opinion." She shifted in her seat, crossing one long leg over the other, giving the free leg an idle swing. "I am surprised they're shipping us off together. I wonder if they consider it to be an infliction on the ship's CO?" Peering down at the PADD in her hand, Destry murmured, "Arphazad LoAmi? I wonder if someone up on high has it in for him." She mentally filed the thought under 'Things that make you go hmmmmm.'. Ellen chuckled. "Hey - we do our job, we get things done. This, all…" She waved a hand to indicate their somewhat sterile surroundings. "Just a misunderstanding - we'll be back on the move and earn our stripes back before long." Dropping into one of the conference room chairs, she kicked her heel against the floor and rolled around the corner of the table to peer over Destry's shoulder, looking at their new orders with interest. "Hey, now…there's a silver lining - they put us on a Sovereign class?" Her tone perked up considerably and she slapped Destry lightly on the shoulder, clearly feeling much better about the situation in general. "Another warp core to fall in love with, Fox?" Destry smiled, Ellen's buoyancy managing to make the heavy weight she felt at their current situation shift a bit so that it didn't feel quite so oppressive. "Go ahead; I know you're dying to tell me her stats." Ellen grinned. "24 decks, 700 meters...makes Warp 8 steady without breaking a sweat? Gelpack computer systems, quantum torps...state of the art sickbay -- even you can get excited about that," she said, giving her friend a teasing sideways look. Destry didn't tend to share Ellen's exuberance for all things technological, but Ellen knew she did take stuff to do with her job very seriously. They both did. In light of recent events, it was even more important, really. “I can see you’ve already fallen hard for her and all without having even been properly introduced,” Destry teased, though she was duly impressed by the description. Ellen’s enthusiasm was catching and she was so damn glad to not be heading back to a starbase. "Hey. I know what I like. And I know a gift when I see it," Ellen answered, raising her hands in self-defense, laughing, feeling some of the humiliation and tension of the last few hours draining out of her. She never dwelled on the past for long, and here, while not easy, it was less difficult than she would have expected. She was still going shipboard, still going to work, still going to have a friend at her side and things to see. Yes, it could have been a lot worse. “You’re right,” Destry agreed, an easy smile (the first one in a while) widening into a grin. “It’s not exactly what I’d call a clean slate but I’ll take the do over.” She rose to her feet and motioned to Ellen with the hand that held the PADD outlining the sketchy details of their immediate future. “Let’s go Fox. We don’t want to be caught hanging around if they decide to change their minds.” "I dunno," Ellen said with a chuckle, moving to her feet as well and nudging the chair back into its place before falling into step with Destry out the door. "I'm not sure we've ever been much for just hanging around."

Approximately twelve years ago in San Francisco. While still in the Academy... "I told you that mechanical monstrosity was dangerous." Destry sat next to Ellen on the bench of shame, waiting for them to be summoned into the office of the head of the campus housing authority. Ellen grinned, her head tipped back against the wall, her eyes half-shut, her fingers dancing in a restless, syncopated rhythm on her knees. "There is nothing dangerous about my oven; it's not its fault that guy in downtown Frisco sold me a faulty converter. Good converter, maybe a new set of heating coils, and it will never set fire to another bed again. Besides...you were complaining just the other day that we never got any good shows on campus." Still staring straight ahead, wondering if it was only her imagination, or did she still smell scorched linens, Destry rolled her eyes, and made a 'hmph-ing' sound. "I was referring to the fact that the only thing that ever plays in the auditorium, besides some windy old admirals, are various instrumental groups of varying species that have a whole different idea of what music is than I do. Not that I wanted to be treated to some pyrotechnics. And it was MY bed!" Ellen opened her eyes and leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees and drumming one leg up and down, her expression twisting into a parody of innocence. "See...this is why you need to be specific, Des...I was only trying to help." Grinning again, she bounced up to her feet and began to pace idly along the edge of the wall next to the bench. "Least it's just Housing this time, and not Campus Sec. That was a headache last time..." Used to Ellen's inability to sit still for more than thirty seconds at a time, Destry pulled her long legs out of harm's way as her roommate paced the area like a caged animal. "True. This time we weren't arrested." Sending a dour look Ellen's way, she added, "Yet." Now it was her turn to lean her head back, giving the ceiling tiles overhead far more scrutiny than they deserved. So much of the Academy's environs were beige. "I really am hoping the verdict is misuse of an appliance from Hell and not arson. I had such high hopes of actually embarking on a career." "You can always claim that I was forcing you to partake of garlic bread and spaghetti against your will," Ellen deadpanned, meeting her friend's chastising expression with a teasing grin. "Given the fact that the food is all still there -- and covered in suppression foam at this point -- I don't think we can really be accused of anything that would make us Starfleet rejects, Des, don't worry." Dropping back down next to Destry again with a heavy grunt, she blew out a sharp puff of air. "Be nice if they didn't leave us out cooling our heels all night, though. I have a date with a transporter theory textbook." "And I have a date with Jared, and since it was my evening to have the room and his roommate never frackin' leaves theirs--you can imagine how romantic an ambiance that fire suppression foam-" Destry fell silent as the door slid open beside them and a voice that sounded as if it came from the depths of a sepulcher called their names. "Time to face the music, Fox," she muttered, getting to her feet. She shot Ellen a sudden grin. "Your garlic bread actually is worth it." * * * A couple years later in a bar off Fisherman's Wharf, San Francisco. It was getting late, but despite the hour and the amount of liquor the bartender had allowed her and Destry to celebratorily pour into themselves, Ellen wasn't tired. Her usual restless energy had a different tenor to it tonight, the rough-edged tension of an era coming to a close. Excitement about the future mixed with reminiscences about the past, and bed didn't even enter into the equation. Her voice was still every bit as cheerful as ever, though, as she lounged back against the bar, twisting her hips on her barstool and sipping slowly at the large rum and coke in one hand. "I'll be damned," she said, glancing sideways at Destry with a grin after a few moments' contemplative silence. "We made it through." "You say that like it's some big surprise," Destry complained, while crooking her finger to the tender. "Another whiskey...easy on the ice," she told him, before turning so that her elbows were on the bar behind her and she could look out over the noisy crowd filling the room. A lot of new graduates were on the premises and it sounded like the party was just starting to heat up. "The Fleet is damn lucky to have us and they know it, Fox," she assured her companion. Ellen laughed. "Damn straight," she said, slapping her free hand down on the wood of the bar. "Give it six weeks and they'll have us both on plaques up at Fleet HQ...saviors of the galaxy." She took a large gulp of her drink and set it down, watching as the tender poured out Destry's drink, then gave her friend a teasing glance. "That survey team they're setting you up with won't know what hit it, that's for sure." "Yeah," Destry sighed, sounding a little morose as she lifted her drink from the bar, and met Ellen's gaze. "It figures that after spending almost my whole life in an underwater colony and joining Starfleet to get out into the big emptiness of space, my first posting is to a planet—and not a very prepossessing one at that. At least you've been given a shipboard post," she grumbled, before taking a long swallow. Ellen smiled at the familiar gentle asperity in her friend's tone, and slapped Destry lightly on the shoulder in an encouraging sort of way. "Hey, come on, now -- you're out there on the front lines, doing the exploring -- means they've got faith in you! I'm just crawling along the border with the cleanup crew. Besides, I've heard those kinda planetside postings don't last too long -- and when you get a transfer, you'd better put in for the Athens if you've got any say in it." She addressed herself back to her drink with a somewhat pensive expression, then with an attempted and quite unsuccessful casualness, "I'm gonna miss you, by the way." "Front lines, my ass," Destry muttered. "Just a survey to see if it's suitable for colonists. With my luck it'll turn out to be a breeding ground for some awful fever and I'll spend six months dodging projectile vomiting." She'd heard Ellen's last comment, and she wasn't deceived by her friend's attempt at keeping the subject of their upcoming transfers light. They'd roomed together the last three years and Destry felt as close to Ellen as she did to her brother, Devon. It was bittersweet this celebration tonight. For all her grousing about it, Destry was excited to see what the planet Meridian held for her and the crew she would soon be joining. But though their parting had always been inevitable, it was painful nonetheless. "Fox, you won't get the chance to miss me. You know my affinity for subspace transmissions—there's no place you can get off to that I won't hunt you down through some communications buoy." She turned fully to face Ellen and lifted her glass, saying solemnly, "We'll meet up again—anyone's guess where, but we will." Ellen's eyes flashed with a mixture of sharp emotions from amusement to affection as she lifted her glass in return. Des was right. There was no way in hell they were going to fall out of touch, not after the shared off-and-on adventures that had already peppered their years together in San Francisco. "I'll hold you to that, you know. Here's to having some damn good stories to tell when we do." * * * Approximately eighteen months later in a bar called Finnegan's Wake, Star Base 314. "...and that's when it became apparent that the entire thing was just a Ferengi ruse! Captain Maxwell is probably never going to live it down," Destry laughed as a grin slashed across her face. She took a sip from her glass, feeling the whiskey burn its way down, as she beamed a smile across the table at Ellen. By some great stroke of luck, both her ship, the USS Constantinople and Ellen's, the USS Athens were docked at the same starbase. It had been a long while since she'd seen her in person. "Ok, Fox...enough of this shilly-shallying around—I've heard the story for months of every damn rivet and conduit that you've fixed on the Athens. Tell me about the man in your life. Um...was it Charlie? If you weren't always such a damn clam, I would know his name." Ellen grinned. "Maybe I'm waiting to get a word in edgewise." She was curled up against the corner of the booth they'd found in Finnegan's Wake, an out of the way pub on Starbase 314 which had proved to have a pretty excellent pale ale. Ellen had developed a taste for the stuff during the last couple years, but it was hard to find any that was really good. Right now, she was ignoring it, however, in favor of trying not to laugh at Destry's blunt directness, familiar as ever, and damn refreshing. "It was Carlos, actually. Well, it is Carlos. I guess." She shrugged slightly. "He's back on the Ath doing EPS updates while we've got a moment to spare. He may be out later, though once you ship out I'll probably be going back to get started on some transporter diagnostics...they've been touchy lately." "You guess? Sounds like true love to me," Destry scoffed good naturedly. "I swear there was more passion in your voice just now when you mentioned getting up close and personal with the transporter crap." Ellen gave Destry a mock-aggravated look and picked up her ale, draining a long pull from it. "Hey...transporter diagnostics are universally acknowledged as the world's most romantic maintenance task," she deadpanned, then shrugged. "I dunno. I'm not sure what's going on right now. Believe me, I'll let you know when I do." There was a short silence, and then she shook herself and went on briskly, "What about you? Last I heard you were bailing what's-his-face out of jail...your fellow bug-nut who was running fake antiquities." Destry looked affronted. "His name is Marcus Voortmeyer. Dr. Marcus Voortmeyer. And I suppose 'bug nut' is a poor man's euphemism for entomologist. He is a victim of Federation bureaucracy at its worst. It was just a simple misunderstanding. They were supposed to be souvenirs that he could sell to fund his research. He explained the whole thing to me and it sounds like an honest mistake the Federation's Antiquities Preservation Division is blowing out of all proportion. It really amounts to persecution." The grin spread back onto Ellen's face at once. "Ah, of course...my mistake," she said with amusement, finishing off her drink. "Glad to hear he's still sweeping you off your feet, then." "Ah, well...no. Unfortunately, and it's a great injustice, he is languishing in a Federation prison awaiting trial on fraud charges." Destry made a resigned c'est la vie motion and sighed. "He had the most beautiful brown eyes, too. And a certain way of-" She caught Ellen's look. "What?" Ellen made a sort of choking noise which she converted into a cough in rather transparent fashion. "Nothing, nothing at all..." she said, grinning at her friend across the table. "Just thinking how much some things don't change. It's kind of a relief, really, given how crazy everything else is." "I'll pretend I don't know what you mean by any of that," Destry said mildly, before looking regretfully at the screen on the wall showing the Federation date and time. "I'm afraid I have to go, Fox...the Connie's pulling out at 22:00 hours tonight and I've got to get back to her Sickbay." Ellen glanced at the clock as well and sighed with a wry laugh. Shore leaves never lasted as long as you wanted, but this one had seemed even shorter than most. "Yeah...I should probably be going too, before someone starts on the transporters without me." Seeing Destry getting to her feet, she dropped a few latinum slips on the table and pushed off with one hand to pop to her feet as well, falling into step as the two exited the pub. "You have any idea where you're headed next?" "No, why would I know where we're going before we actually go?" Destry gave Ellen a fleeting grin, thinking the time had flown by way too quickly. "An AMO is about the last person on the ship to learn anything." She stepped forward and wrapped Ellen in a hug. "You take care of yourself...cut this Carlos guy some slack even if he doesn't have the magnetism or rugged good looks of a plasma manifold." Ellen returned the hug fiercely, squeezing her arms around Destry's shoulders before releasing her. "I'll try my best. Stay out of trouble, Des, or if you do get into it, let me know so I can get in on it with you." "I have missed my partner in crime," Destry laughed, blinking back sudden, hot tears. "I'll be talking to you soon, Ellen."

Starfleet Personnel File Name: Destry McCann Steele Species: Human Birth Place: Tethys – Federation Colony Gender: Female Status: Single Height: 5' 8" Weight: 140 lbs Age: 32 Hair: Long, straight, black-worn in a braid most of the time Eyes: Violet Career: Meridian Colony Survey Team: AMO - 6 months USS Constantinople NCC-27634-C: AMO - 14 months Starbase 17: AMO - 23 months USS Tiresius NCC-15673: CMO – 35 months USS Arcadia NCC-1742-E: Acting CMO – Current Education: Undergraduate and medical degrees earned at Starfleet's San Francisco campus. Completed residency with a specialty in surgical reconstruction. Graduate degree in virology attained during posting to Starbase 17. Medical Evaluation: Allergies: None Chronic Conditions: None Past Procedures: Successful repair of shattered radius and ulna/left side Identifiers: No identifying marks/scars. Ears are pierced. Psychological Evaluation: Strong willed; confident in abilities. Dedicated professional committed to the health and welfare of fellow crewmates. Slow to anger and often uses humor to defuse tense situations. Is aware of tendency towards gullibility in personal relationships. Home: Tethys, an M Class planet with very limited unsubmerged landmass. It is the 4th planet in the Daryan System within the Alpha Quadrant and is orbited by five moons called the Oceanids. Tethys is home to the undersea Federation colony of the same name. The colony is huge and supports both mining and farming operations. It is the premier oceanic laboratory in the Federation and recently celebrated its seventy-fifth anniversary. It is well known for the spirit of cooperation which exists among its scientific community and crosses all political borders. It has never been attacked, although impressive defensive installations as well as support infrastructure are in place on two of the five moons. Family: All of Destry's family lives on Tethys. Destry's parents met and married on Tethys. Her mother is originally from Tycho, Earth's lunar colony and her father was born on a freighter, and since his father never tells the same story twice, the Steele family origins are somewhat sketchy. Grandfather: Edmund Aloysius Steele: 91 years old, retired reprobate/mildly reformed. Father: Andrew Harrison Steele: 67 years old, not retired, doctorates in marine biology and biological oceanography. Mother: Judith Margaret McCann-Steele: 65 years old, not retired, medical doctor and surgeon. Brother: Devon Blake Steele: 34 years old, doctorates in oceanographic engineering and hydrogeology. Married to Suzanne Forrester-Steele, 32 years old, an entomologist currently studying marine biology. They have three-year-old twins, Harry and Maggie Steele. Interests: Earliest ambition, fueled by her Grandpa Steele's rather bloodthirsty tales of life as a buccaneer, was to be a pirate. She was seven. (He actually ran freight and smuggled a bit on the side before being roped by his son into retiring and joining the family on Tethys.) Her first career choice evolved into something of a hobby (Obsession being such a misunderstood term) for researching old legends and the treasures/artifacts at the center of them that continues to this day. She also has an inordinate fondness for genus phanaeus-the beetles also known as rainbow scarabs and keeps several as pets. Another interest is one which bloomed late. A young woman, living an extremely pressurized underwater existence, rarely has the opportunity to experience any feeling of speed. Destry enjoys flying fast and though only certified to pilot various shuttle and runabout classes, when on land, enjoys nothing more than taking a racing skimmer out though she is not precisely licensed to do so. Specialties: It doesn't come up much, but is an excellent shot with a spear gun and the end result is a mean fish taco featuring secret salsa recipe.

May I please have: X marks the spot. Thank you!