[Aurelia is laying on the bed in her family’s quarters on DS13, staring unhappily at the ceiling, worrying at a thumbnail with her teeth. Suddenly, she laughs. It’s hard. Angry.]
I’m sitting here trying to figure out how to get on the Tebok, where to find the good kali-fal to take Nathes, how much to bribe security, which PADDs I could compromise in which offices, which basecode they’re using, which excuses to lay in front of Rellir this time, and I realize: I can do none of it. Not a shard. To do so would be, as they say, an international incident. I can’t even go to the commander directly.
So I am going to quite possibly do something I have never done before.
I am going to tell my superior officer.
[She laughs. And laughs again, and buries her face in the pillow laughing, long peals of it. Snorts. It sounds almost terrified. When she’s done, she rolls back over to stare at the ceiling again, wiping her eyes.]
Of course, I could always just take Nathes some kali-fal, call it a get-to-know-you meeting. It’s not spying if I get lost on the way to the bathroom, is it? Your security officer is compromised by a madwoman and my insane and abused former best friend, yes, the same one that published the book I had to basically join Starfleet and haul all the way out here to escape, oops, I didn’t know I was walking into the brig, I really thought that large bloke was a toilet attendant, warbirds are fancy these days –
[A snort.]
Nobody’s going to believe for a second that a woman who spent seven years trapped on a warbird in a time anomaly can’t remember where the fvadt bathroom is.
No. I’m going to have to do it the right way.
[She puts a pillow over her head and screams.]