Work Text:
28. Now
Beta'd mildly by LegacySoulReaver. Any remaining mistakes are my own.
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Trip slouches intentionally as Shran surveys their warp drive. There are two MACO’s flanking him (as well as two engineers that Trip assigned specifically to make sure Shran didn’t poke his blue fingers where they didn’t belong), but Shran simply looks curious. The Andorian eyes him curiously, as if sizing him up and weighing his questions.
Trip leans against the wall easily, kicking a heel up behind him, arms crossed in front of his chest. He offers Shran nothing and simply allows the MACO’s and engineers to show him around. Shran waves off the engineers by pointing out an out-of-balance flux in the antimatter chamber to one of them (a minute one that Trip knew about) and idly mentioning to another that the EPS manifolds weren’t functioning as normal (yet another intentional issue created by Trip).
Shran leans against the wall beside of him, antennae drawn tight and away. “Did I pass your test, Commander?”
Trip shrugs. “Depends, now doesn’t it?” He lifts off the wall, stalking away from the engine room. He hadn’t intended for his feelings to go this way, but, as his mom used to say, there they were.
Shran follows him though. “Is this about the Xindi?”
Trip stiffens. Elizabeth’s death is still painful, though not quite as fresh, and he isn’t ready to talk about it with much of anybody, let alone fucking Shran. “Just goin’ to my quarters.”
Shran shrugged amicably enough beside of him. “And here I thought you wanted to blame me because I know your warp engine better than any Vulcan, but you hate me because the Andorians didn’t intervene before your sister was killed.”
Trip stared a long time after Shran walked away. The alien had a way of getting directly to the point when he saw fit, and Trip struggled for a moment after. He took a deep breath, remembering the smooth feel of T’Pol’s sure, certain fingers against the nerve points that were keeping him awake.
After purging the EPS manifolds and correcting the antimatter inequality, he seeks Shran out intentionally. If nothing else, spending 10 years in the furthest regions of space have taught Trip that when faced with a blunt alien, you should drop your shit and be blunt right back.
Shran is in his quarters, reading a rules book for a Terran game. He glances up absently when Trip enters. “Can I help you, Commander?” He reaches idly to take a drink of water from the Starfleet-issued canteen.
Trip steels himself, reminds himself that this is the Andorian way, and goes full-throttle. “Are you fucking the captain?”
There’s a small amount of satisfaction that Trip takes when Shran chokes on his water and even more gratification is had at the way Shran fumbles the playbook he’s holding. His antennae are tense and uncertain. “And if I am?” Shran finally asks defiantly.
Trip crosses his arms again and leans against the wall of Shran’s quarters. “Why?” he asks simply.
Shran stares at him for longer than Trip is comfortable for.
It’s quite a bit before Trip had seen the door had opened behind him briefly. Before Trip realizes it, Porthos has jumped onto Shran’s bed and curled against Shran’s hip. Shran cards a few blue fingers against Porthos’s ears.
“You ask why, Commander,” Shran says, an ironic, self-deprecating tone clear in his voice. “I ask why would he.”
Trip stiffens a bit, trying to read the minute body language of an Andorian. All he’s really getting though is that Porthos is snuggled against Shran’s hip and that Shran’s reading a game book in Terran that hasn’t been translated. It comes to Trip suddenly, as he watches the comfortable way that Shran strokes Porthos’s ears.
“You’re reading Terran.”
Shran tilts his head at Trip. “I’m sure that I don’t know what you mean.”
Trip bristles and starts towards Shran. “Listen, you blue mother-fuc—“
Porthos snaps at Trip with an indignant yelp.
Trip jerks back, pulling his hands away and staring at Shran. With a resigned sigh, he heads for the door. “Look,” he says without turning his head, “I don’t know what’s happened between you two in the last few days.”
The silence hangs long, and Shran finally deigns to answer.
“He offered me a Starfleet commission.”
Trip sighs, though he knows it will be more trouble than it’s worth. “You should take it. The captain always makes good on his promises.”
Shran seems to consider the words, stroking fingers over Porthos’s ear bones. “What do you think?”
Trip turns then, his face fierce and loyal. “I think if you’re just fucking with him for the shits and giggles of it, you need to get the fuck off this ship now or I’ll throw you out a goddamn airlock myself.”
Shran regards him, landing a casual hand on Porthos’s head.
Porthos studies Trip for a moment with a low sound before turning into Shran’s hip.
Trip hates feeling like someone’s got the drop on him, but he says nothing while keeping his clenched fists against his sides.
Shran finally sighs, as if he’s being put upon. “I am fucking him; I’m not fucking with him.”
Trip steps back a little, because Shran has responded in english. “You learned English…well, Terran.”
Shran tilts his antennae at him. “Yes?”
Trip swallows and scrabbles for the door. “You learned English.”
On his way out, Trip could swear he heard Shran say something in Andorian that the translator didn’t pick up, but sounded suspiciously like “Of course I did.”
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