He Is Just a Friend!!

Posted on Wed Dec 3rd, 2025 @ 11:17am by Ensign Ziahli Lorel & Lieutenant JG Nayisa Wrea

Mission: Aeon's End
Location: Jefferies Tubes
Timeline: Just prior to boarding.
3490 words - 7 OF Standard Post Measure

"Man, this blows."

Nayisa usually wasn't come to complain about rooting around in the ship's internal sensor array, but there was loads of data to pick apart just sitting there in the intelligence suite. She was mostly convinced that this was punishment for not giving P'rel the answer she wanted in her little interrogation the other day. The words "Temporal Prime Directive" started floating around the ship, so she wouldn't be surprised if the senior staff were keeping information on where --and evidently, when-- they were need-to-know with the crew.

She was currently deep in the Jefferies tubes, accompanied by Zia, to work on the internal sensor array. It was functioning well enough to the bare minimum for damage control, but it wasn't doing much more than that. So they sent Zia and Nayisa to go check it out. With the all-hands-on-deck situation, there was a more pressing need for repair teams, meaning that some of the junior staff were reassigned based off their skillsets. As such, Nayisa was unofficially reporting to either Leiko or Kyan, whoever would pick up their comms first. "I left ops for a reason," she huffed.

"At least you joined it at some point."

The retort from the vicinity of Nayisa's elbow was a relatively pragmatic one, borderline cheerful given the circumstances, though not wholly without due consideration for the seriousness of the current situation. Zia didn't begrudge the temporary reassignment, not when the necessity was self-evident, but it was more than she knew how to resist not to find the whole being-crammed-into-a-tube somewhat amusing. The benefit of being fresh out of the Academy was that it hadn't been too long since her last mandatory accreditation in Basic Starship Systems and How to Patch Them Up in a Hurry but she was little more than an extra pair of hands ferrying tools back and forth. Compared to some other tasks she could have been doing, it was positively restful.

"Besides, if we're in here, they might forget about us. We could succumb to hermitude, live out the rest of our days skulking around the interior of Starfleet's premier flagship, dragging unsuspecting crewmen to their deaths."

The waggle of conspiratorial fingers was meant to inspire intrigue. All it really resulted in was a dropped spanner. As she slapped her hand around to her side in search of it, Zia added, "Or even suspecting ones, if they played their cards right."

Nayisa snorted. "We could make the night shift believe there's gremlins in the walls," she added, crawling just a little further ahead before maneuvering herself to sit. Reaching up, she wedged her fingers into the slots of the access panel and tugged, her brow creasing slightly when it wouldn't budge. Adjusting to try and get slightly better leverage, which was a feat in and of itself in the cramped space, she tried again, launching herself backwards into the wall when the panel gave. A colourful word came out shortly after, rubbing the back of her head with one hand while setting the panel aside with the other.

From her curled position, having somehow made the cramped conditions look positively cosy, Zia basked in the indolence of one who hadn't been given anything useful to do yet and watched her friend struggle. To be fair, there was no room to assist and attempting so would have made matters worse, but the tease of a twitching grin at Nayisa's expense was probably unwarranted. At the very least, it was a bit unfair.

"Starting to think there was more than one reason for the career-change." Zia waggled her eyebrows. "I thought spy work was all cramped spaces and tight spots."

"You watch too many holomovies," came the reply from the silver-haired woman. The focus was mostly on the mess of conduit above her head and why they were trying to short themselves out. Nayisa pulled out her tricorder and held it up near the hole in the ceiling. "It's clearly about looking at data until your eyes bleed, that one tuck-and-roll maneuver, and sitting in jefferies tubes trying not to get electrocuted. I'll take that spanner."

With about as much enthusiasm as a cat being prodded to move, Zia wriggled her way over closer, within an arm's stretch, and held out the spanner. "The only movie I get to watch is Predator, or Blade Runner, or potentially Alien, and if I'm really lucky, Aliens." A roll of eyes still managed to contain its due allotment of affection, tucked in around the twinkle of candid merriment that watched Nayisa work for a moment before Zia curled herself into a tight ball to facilitate turning around and brought herself to sit cross-legged next to the other woman.

"It's no Fifth Element, that's for sure."

Fifth Element. The pause in the spanner's usage was brief as Nayisa's mind wandered back to the other night. It was... who knows, a couple weeks ago, but it felt like it had just happened. Parts of it were a little blurred due to the excessive alcohol consumption, but much of it was still there. The popcorn, the collective groans from the cheesy moments in the movie... the faint whisper of that cologne. Ugh, she thought, faintly shaking her head. "Ok, I'll give you grace for that one," Nayisa chuckled, hoping to keep the conversation moving before it got sucked into her mental replay of movie night. "The Anon series is a good one. Way better action and none of that cheesy 'love drops in through the ceiling' nonsense."

"It's hard to imagine anything of worth just dropping from the ceiling like that."

Beguiling; that was Zia's approach at times. Not in a nefarious way; there was too much inherent kindness beneath the surface for her to stray entirely into manipulative territory, but the Betazoid penhant for interrogation, coupled with the subtlty of a particularly shrew mind's ability to join the dots all on its own, made for a feline-like tendency to play with her food prior to making her point. For all intents and purposes, she was focused directly ahead, a very decent show of concentrating on the loose piece of circuitry she had suddenly dredged up the capability to recognise as requiring support. It made an effort of passing her comment off at face-value but somehow the dim lighting only seemed to accentuate the fact she was trying not to smirk.

Despite the dim lighting, Nayisa was certain that the light pink that appeared on her cheeks was visible. It had taken her way too long to figure out that Nic had been talking about himself during that part of the night, and she had specifically avoided his usual hiding spots so she wouldn't die of embarrassment. She risked a glance toward Zia and immediately regretted it. Zia was smirking, as much as the Betazoid tried to hide it. Nayisa could feel her own face getting warm. "Yeah, what a dumb stunt," she said in a weak attempt at deflection.

Zia had lost count of the amount of times she'd been given the talk about telepathy and where it fell in terms of professional protocol. It was a common misconception that Betazoids, who outwardly projected a fairly inquisitive disregard for the societal expectations of at least a few cultures, didn't know how to respect personal privacy but Zia strongly suspected she'd had a more rigorous education when it came to navigating interpersonal nuances than most. Nayisa, being an Intel officer, was a fascinating study on any given day because she was far more intentional than a lot of humans but that only left Zia wondering just what it really took to ruffle the woman's feathers enough to let fleeting emotions slip under the door.

Time to find out.

"So, did he spend the night or did you kick him out to keep up appearances?"

"What?!" The lack of space between either of them and the walls meant that Nayisa's outburst felt unnecessarily sharp to the ears. The flinch at her own volume resulted in a rapid fumble for the spanner before it reached her face. "What are you talking about?" she tried again, in a volume more appropriate for their close quarters. Of course, Nayisa knew the answer, the question was more of a reaction than anything requiring a response.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't realise there were multiple choice options. I'll try to be more specific."

The bounce of waggled eyebrows didn't do a lot to aleviate discomfort.

"Did your date with Dominic go well?"

At this point, heaven only knew how Zia had figured out the details, right down to the movie. It was easy to suspect that there had been equal-parts interrogation on the other side of the fence, which only added the intrigue of what Nic's interpretation had beeen to the mix.

The mention of the forbidden d-word made Nayisa pause the repairs, glaring at the conduit as if it somehow bestowed this knowledge upon the Betazoid. "It wasn't a date," she responded, her voice changing ever-so-slightly on the last word. "I owed him one for leaving him stranded up here during Zora's birthday party. Apparently watching Bolians play chess wasn't his idea of a good time. Sooo... to make up for it, we did movie night." Finally, she briefly redirected her look toward Zia, who had all the telltale signs of a smirk about to evolve into a shit-eating grin. "Just movie night."

Just for a hint of variety, the smirk deviated somewhat into a disbelieving squint. "That's an odd sort of debt to rack up though. I mean, I didn't get to do half as much fun stuff as the rest of you either but I don't remember any invitation to watch movies. In your quarters."

She waggled her eyebrows again.

"Alone."

The silver-haired woman gave a look of mock offense with a silent plea to any god out there that it sufficiently masked her embarrassment. "Zee-yuh," she exclaimed, adding unnecessary emphasis to each syllable. "I am hurt that you would think me being odd is out of place!" Nayisa hovered the tricorder up by the conduits again, leaning slightly to the side to reach that one stubborn node. It would have been easier to access if she had just removed the adjacent panel, but she was committed to a balancing act that wasn’t just about repairs. "You brought that diagnostics PADD with you, right? Let's get it tapped in to the sensor array to see if this made any difference."

There was a brief pause, then, "if you wanted a movie night, you could've just asked, dork."

"Oh trust me, I've had my fill. I'm far closer to being able to recite entire scenes from Alien than I'd prefer."

The pointed look of exaggerated suffering was promptly followed by a calculated squint. Zia had not exactly broadcast her relationship with Dash, certainly not to the extent of labeling one despite the Trill's recent overtures, but she likewise made no attempt to hide it. It simply was, and anyone observant enough to, say, build an entire career around putting puzzle pieces together, ought to know exactly who the culprit of these sci-fi riddled moviefests was. It did present a rather interestingly relevant possibility, however.

"We could always join forces. Double up, see if we can strong-arm them into something that doesn't involve aliens terrorising the universe."

Oh god. The only thing worse than a date was a double date. Nayisa knew the cheeky Betazoid enough by now to know that if she called it as she saw it, Zia could easily deny and make Nayisa seem paranoid. The exact same thing she'd do in Zia's position. Irritated that her own techniques were being used against her, Nayisa chose her next words carefully: "A group movie night, with friends, in a place friends meet for movies, sounds fun."

Her mind reviewed the information and implications disclosed thus far. Zia knew an unsettling amount about the movie night. Stopping the repairs entirely, Nayisa directed her attention entirely to her friend. "Ok, what exactly did Nic tell you?"

In keeping with expectations, Zia took a moment to express an exaggerated shock at the accusation, though the dance of mischief in her eyes made the attempt an immediate failure.

"You do realise," she started, "that it doesn't take a telepath to interpret the way he looks at you. The telepathy certainly helps to fill in some of the blanks though." The Betazoid scrunched up her nose. "He's got a very busy head."

It was a polite way of describing the kind of person who had zero structure or control over their inner self-talk. She would have had to avoid the guy entirely not to catch the richochet of stray thoughts and feelings.

Nayisa's expertise was in deciphering signals, and for Zia to imply, even slightly, that she missed a rather big one left a mix of emotions in her. Was it that obvious? Was Zia pulling her leg and trying to get into her head?

Was it true?

"His busy head is not my problem," she responded, annoyed at herself for how flustered she was getting. She grabbed the PADD that was sitting by Zia's side, the one she had asked for moments ago. Pretending to work was becoming less effective, but she was committed to the bit, even if it were for her own sanity. "It was a cashed-in favour, nothing else." God, even her own words felt fake now. She typed for a few seconds before her fingers slowed.

"Even..." she sighed, lowering the PADD slightly. Zia was not going to let this go. "Even if what you said is true, that he... looks at me a certain way..." Nayisa firmly shook her head. It didn't matter what her own feelings were. "I can't reciprocate. I don't want to. I've had my own friends used against me before. I couldn't imagine if it was a loved one instead." Ugh, she hated how that felt. The PADD beeped as it displayed what the internal sensors were seeing, which honestly wasn't much more than a welcome diversion. Nayisa frowned before giving the PADD to Zia. "I'm going to keep tinkering with things, let me know if the sensor feed changes."

It was the Betazoid's turn to look surprised; not at the designated task, which she accepted without batting an eyelash or even affording the PADD a second glance at first, but because for all her teasing, she hadn't expected this level of honesty from the Intel officer. It softened her demeanour considerably, since it was one thing to tease a friend and another thing entirely to make a mockery of their personal situation.

"So is the alternative to just stay alone forever?," she asked, her tone a good deal more careful in its word choice. "Because that doesn't sound fantastic either."

Nayisa brought a micro-resonator up to the conduits, the tool making a quiet humming sound as it worked to tune the circuits. It wasn't often that people could coax the full, unfiltered truth out of her, and it was uncomfortable every time it happened. But she trusted Zia, at least to the extent where she was willing to sit with the discomfort. "I could quote some dumb speech about 'the needs of the many,' but really it's just... part of the job," she responded with a shrug. "I don't plan to stay alone forever. I have friends who more than make up for it, but it's tricky to... you know, go beyond friends." She refused to let that dreaded d-word be spoken again. Nayisa's faint grimace turned into a sigh. "I keep secrets for a living. I lie, a lot, for the sake of those secrets. Those just don't work out in something like a relationship. It's guaranteed to fail." The with someone like me implication didn't need to be said in the brief silence that followed.

While the response certainly felt dramatic thanks to the shift in atmosphere, for Nayisa it was pragmatic. Logical. A faint line of introspection appeared on her brow as she purposefully focused on the tool in her hand. Maybe it was a fear of personal commitment that she didn't want to admit to. And if it was? How could she lie and keep things from someone she loved? The other person didn't deserve that. It wasn't a choice she enjoyed making, but it was better than the guilt of lying to a loved one.

"But they would know that going in. Or at least, in this case, Nic would know. It's not like he doesn't know what your job is, it's not a great deal more to explain it to him like you just did me. At that point, the ball's in his court."

Though she wasn't always the most likely candidate, Zia was also pragmatic. She was also Betazoid, and that came with a certain difference in cultural norms that sometimes made it difficult to truly understand the nature of genuine secrecy. She was curious by nature and so it was probably asking a bit much for her to never try to weasel information out of Nayisa but that didn't mean to say she couldn't understand the logistics of trafficking data. More to the point, she had the capacity to sense the lack of malice behind the other woman's closed lips. She was silent out of necessity, not because of a lack of trust or regard. Perhaps it was a little starry-eyed but it didn't feel like a huge stretch to think this was a conclusion others could make, especially someone who by the nature of the relationship in question, would have a vested interest in actively trying to understand.

Or that was how a healthy relationship should go anyway. According to Dash's aspirations, Zia supposed she was about to put that somewhat to the test herself.

Nayisa’s stomach did an uncomfortable flutter. While she certainly didn’t want to die alone, the idea of a romantic partnership was never at the forefront of her mind. Zia had a point; Nic had been around long enough to know Nayisa’s role aboard the ship, and being upfront about the fact that he couldn’t know everything about her would give him the choice to continue their friendship. But she didn’t have to do that with Zia, or even Darin. Why would she treat Nic differently?

The micro-resonator beeped to indicate that the tuning was finished, so she swapped it for a phase inducer to hopefully get these damned relays to talk to each other so they could leave. While not claustrophobic, the space was really starting to feel cramped. “I think I just need time,” she admitted quietly. She glanced toward Zia, “I… don’t really know how I feel about Nic. He’s an interesting figure, but he also reads me in a way I’m not used to."

Zia's eyebrows shot up and the Betazoid was unperturbed by the bluntness of her own surprise. It gave her pause for thought, however, and bought a few seconds of silence whilst she mulled over her own impressions of the guy.

"He's very forward-presenting," she eventually arrived at and thankfully had every intention of explaining. "Humans sometimes are, I believe the popular description is something about hearts on sleeves." Zia's time at the Academy had been a delightful cultural explosion but that still left room for some bewilderment. "I don't think that's entirely an act, he genuinely seems to have no idea what's going to come out of his mouth until it's there. Still, he doesn't share much," she conceded. "Actually, now that I think about it, I'd say he's about as self-protective as you are."

Nayisa opened her mouth to reply, then her hands shot out to brace against the sides of the Jefferies tube as the ship rocked. It felt like several impacts, and there was a slight delay before the red alert sounded. When the tremors seemed to eventually subside, she grabbed the PADD and checked the sensor readings, which seemed to take their time in reporting several hull breaches and an increasing number of unidentified bodies. "We can worry about what the hell Nic is to me later," she told Zia, showing her the datapad.

The telepath's eyebrows shot upwards and, within seconds, Zia had scrambled into a position less indolent and more suitable for getting the hell out of cramped spaces.

"Well," she observed, circumspect 'til the last. "I guess sensors are working again."