Obdurate Defiance

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M

Mara

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Original poster
Tisma Verot was tired tired tired and it showed. The usual perky, clumsy, and outerspace brained girl was quite the opposite as she was sprawled on the deck underneath a half built engine. If it wasn't one thing it was another and if it wasn't that it was something else. It almost felt like the world was falling apart around her and she couldn't be arsed to move out of the way.

A piece of coupling chose that moment to land on her face.

Yep, the world was literally falling apart around her.

Not bothering to brush the piece aside with a hand, that would involve too much effort, she merely turned her head and let the piece slide off. Tisma was running her self ragged trying to avoid the inevitable. If something was broken she volunteered to fix it. If asking for parts meant asking the person she was trying to avoid talking to she simply stayed crammed in little spaces avoiding leaving them until the coast was clear. It was to the point where she hadn't slept in her bunk for almost a week. There was a pile of laundry the size of her bed in her room, and her cat was starting to wonder who she was the few times she DID go into her room.

On the bright side three new engines had been refurbished as well as several weapons units. Quinn would be very happy when he got back to base. If he ever got back to base. Maybe if he ever got back she could finally sleep. However with Canada and Quinn gone she had no one else to run and hide behind.

Sigh.

Tisma took a moment to look around for feet and saw none. It was the middle of the night and the only people that were awake were those assigned to night watch and they were all in other parts of the building. No, she should be safe to close her eyes.. for just a little bit.......
 
Mieranor Athren knew when he was being avoided. It didn't hurt that Tisma wasn't very good at the whole "subtle" thing. It therefore came as something of a surprise that she didn't disappear into some crevice or send him off on an errand the minute he set foot in the maintenance bay.


Of course, the reason for this became apparent when he heard loud snores from beneath the engine her legs were sticking out from under. He knew perfectly well that it was the middle of the graveyard shift - the night watch routinely penciled him in on their roster as a "roving patrol," due to the long, somewhat irregular hours he kept - but surely that was no reason to sleep on the floor in the engine bay.

Thinking back and mentally counting, he realised that she'd been working - and avoiding him - for at least fifty-nine hours without sleep. On the plus side, he now knew that she worked extremely well under pressure. On the minus side, she a) had been ignoring him, and b) was currently passed out under a multi-ton starship engine.

Grabbing her ankles, he gently slid her out from under the massive block of technology, then picked her up and carried her - disturbing her as little as possible - down three levels to her quarters, where he carefully deposited her on the bed.

He wasn't going to be ignored any longer, so he sat on the ground...or rather, on Tisma's laundry...propped against her door. Settling in to wait, he let himself doze off. It would probably be awhile before Tisma woke up. And if it wasn't, well, he was a light sleeper.
 
The most Tisma did as she was carried was mumble nonsense in her sleep. Something about morguts in pink bows and a green cat. As she was set down in bed she immediately rolled onto her stomache and wrapped herself around the pillow her sleep conversation moving to how Quinn would look so pretty in the purple ruffly dress. No no, really he would. He should just try it on. He'd understand once he did and he'd be the prettiest at the ball if he would. Tisma even promised to help him with his hair and makeup! However the muttering soon ended as she drifted off into a deeper sleep.

It was some hours later when she finally started to come out of it and there was nothing gentle in the act of waking up. One moment she was peacefully sleeping on the bed and the next she was screaming and on the floor wondering how the hell she'd gotten into her room to begin with and where the hell the engine she'd been working on disappeared to. The scream turned quickly into a groan as her head alerted her to it's poor state of affairs and a hand went up to gingerly prod the welt on her forehead. The look on her face made it clear she had no idea how the bump got there and it was another moment before she paused and it dawned on her. The damn piece of broken power coupling is what happened to her.

With a grunt she rolled over onto all fours and started for the bathroom but suddenly paused like a deer in headlights when she noticed Mieranor.

Shit.
 
Even if Mieranor hadn't been a light sleeper, he wouldn't have had to worry about waking up. Tisma proved a most effective alarm clock - her scream probably woke the whole damn residential block, and the thud she made when she hit the floor almost certainly alerted the rec room below them.

He calmly glanced at his chrono and waited for Tisma to notice him. When she finally did and froze, he gave her a cheerful grin.

"Morning, Tisma. And yes, it is still morning. Technically. For another three minutes. Go ahead and take care of business." He nodded towards the bathroom. "Don't worry about me, I'll still be here when you get back."
 
Tisma didn't even wait for Mieranor to finish speaking she was diving for the bathroom and slamming the door closed before he even go to 'take care'. The lock being engaged on the door was clearly audible as was the lack of any further movement. Like hell she was coming back out while he was still there! He'd have to break down the door! Shit shit shit! She'd fallen asleep! She knew better than to fall asleep when she wasn't in a secure area! The chances of him finding her increased exponentially when she fell asleep out in the open!

After a long moment she dug in the small set of drawers she kept in the bathroom and at the very least changed into clean clothes and bothered to wash her face and teeth. When that was done she plunked herself down in front of the bathroom door and started debating exit strategies. If she move the drawers she might be able to reach the vent and shimmy through the ducts into another part of the building. She'd have to deactivate the alarms to do that though. Maybe if she dug in her vanity she could find the tools to do that. Setting off the entire base didn't seem like a good thing to do when all she was trying to do was get away from Mieranor.
 
After a few moments, he heard the telltale silence of Tisma completely freaking out. Sighing, he stood up and walked over to the bathroom....whereupon he sighed again.

"Seriously, Tisma? A keypad on your bathroom?" He stood there a moment examining it, then grunted and punched in a fourteen-digit code. The lock cycled and disengaged, and he slid the bathroom door open to reveal....an panicked-looking Tisma trying to drag her bathroom drawers into place so she could climb out the vent.

"Did anyone ever tell you that you have an avoidance problem?"

Chuckling, he grabbed her, slung her over a shoulder, and carried her back to her bed, whereupon he deposited her with a soft "thump."

"All right, Tisma. You've been avoiding me for a week now. Spill."
 
Tisma's panic went into over drive when she heard the lock being keyed. That's what she got for not installing something custom built. Screw it, there was no time to mess with the alarm system! As fast as she could she started pulling the drawers to the vent. Of course they weren't the lightweight ones. No. They were heavy duty drawers that were made to be bolted to the deck and stay on place. What had she been thinking!? When the door opened she froze again and the next thing she knew she was up over a shoulder.

"Put me down!! Put me down!!" She was banging on his back with her fist before she was put down on the bed. Tisma gave him a look a dejected teenage would that quickly turned to a pout and then hid behind a pillow.

"Nothing."
 
"Uh-huh. Nothing. Right. Not buyin' it." Mieranor simply stood, arms crossed over his chest, with one eyebrow up in an expression that clearly meant "yes, I'm sure you do have a good reason you have lime and a shovel in your truck."

" Now make with the talkies or I drag you down to the rec hall and get them to help me interrogate you."
 
"They wouldn't help you interrogate me. They know what I can do to them if they help you. They'd live to regret it for months!! I'm not talking!"

With that she threw the pillow at him and dove toward the door! With any luck she'd make it and if she didn't she was prepared to kick, scream, claw, and crawl her way out! Tisma was not going to have a serious conversation with this man ever. Or at least she wasn't going to start the serious conversation ever. Nope. He'd have to start them all. Which meant he'd have to figure out what was bothering her first every single time! A faint cackle escaped her as she reached the door, throwing a few more clothes from the pile at him for good measure!
 
Tisma's pillow caught him off guard, but the Rebellion didn't employ him for his knitting skills. He lunged forward and intercepted her just as she made it out the door. As he dragged her kicking and screaming back into the bedroom, he heard a couple of passing rebels placing bets on whether they were going to kill each other or fuck each other by the end of the night. Apparently the current odds were ten to one in favor of a murder-suicide.


Wrestling her back inside and onto the bed, he turned around and sat on her. Which, since he weighed easily half again as much as she did, should keep her in place quite nicely.

"You know, I'm on good terms with the cafeteria folks. I'm sure they'd be willing to serve us meals in here if you don't feel like talking to me."
 
Tisma managed to catch the bets as well and threw a hydrowrench she had in her hand down the hall after them as she got dragged back inside! "You keep those dirty thoughts to yoursel-...!!!" A squeak ended the sentence short and she struggled to get out of Mieranor's grip. Clearly she needed to take up some more defense classes if she couldn't get away from him. Tisma made a slightly strangled noise as he sat on her but she didn't stay still once he did, just kept wiggling and trying to buck him off of her.

"Well FINE! Just FINE! If you're going to make them bring food up here I want waffles. Waffles with strawberries and whipped cream. And coffee. Nice coffee. With caramel. Not the shit they serve in the engineering break room that keeps the mechanics up for 72 hours straight. And a plate of bacon. And none of that rehydrated shit. I want real bacon! I'll -think- about talking after that!"
 
Mieranor looked down at Tisma, shrugged, and pulled out his comm.

"Hey, Mitchell. ... Yes, she's awake all right. ... No, not exactly. ... Right. She wants waffles. ... Right. And bacon. ... Oh, hell no. In fact, she's banned from that shit until further notice. ... The funky shit I won't touch. ... You say gourmet, I say costs too damn much. ... Uh-huh. ... Yeah, a bagel and a pancake stack sounds fine. ... You know how I like my coffee. ... I don't care if it does corrode your counter, that's ... Right, see you in a few."

He hung up and slid his comm back in his pocket.

"Breakfast will be here in ten minutes. Feel like talking?"
 
"I said I'd think about talking and that was meant after I eat. I'm not saying shit until after I eat and I probably still won't say shit even after that. If you want me to talk you're just going to have to figure it out on your own!"

Her stomache made a defiant rumble at the end of her sentence proving how hungry she was. Grumbling she continued to try to wiggle free or at least reach something she could use as a weapon. Grunting as she stretched she managed to grab a paperback from the end of her bed and throw it at Mieranor. That was followed by one of her datapads and finally the cat. The cat which was a strange green colour by the way. It wasn't her fault that Boots got into her stash of instant hair dye.

"Get offame!!!"
 
Luckily, being pinned on one's chest doesn't lend itself very well to accuracy. So the datapad and book went wide, and he managed to catch Boots before she hit him.

Setting the neon green cat in his lap and petting her, he adjusted his weight so it would be harder for Tisma to find more things to throw.

"It's hard to figure things out when you won't talk to me. And I meant it when I said I wasn't getting off until you start talking. Breakfast should be interesting."
 
Tisma made another strangled gurgle as he readjusted and then heard Boots purring. The damn traitorous cat!!! She was supposed to be on HER side not his!!! Stupid cat needed to stop picking whoever could pet her first!

"I'm talking aren't I!? Words are coming out of my mouth! The last I checked that meant I was talking! It doesn't mean I'm talking about what you want me to talk about but I'm talking at the very least! And I all ready told you you have to figure it out on your own damnit! And you don't need ME talking to YOU to figure that out! If you do you're a big dense dummy who doesn't deserve my time and affection anyway!! So you can shove it up your ass and get the fuck off of me!!!!"

Clearly she didn't catch everything she had said because there were words in there she really wouldn't have used if she'd been filtering her sentences properly. A moment later the door opened and food was brought in and set on the small table she kept for various things. For once it wasn't covered in wires and pieces of electronics so the food could actually be set down on it.

"Doesn't anyone ever knock anymore!? Damnit, Mitchell! Get this oaf offa me!"
 
Mieranor nodded to Mitchell, who nodded back before beating a hasty retreat back into the hallway.

He looked down at Tisma for a long moment before sliding off her and offering her her breakfast plate.

"Waffle? And what's this about time and affection? You haven't been giving me much of either..." he trailed off before getting a glint in his eye. "Why, Tisma, I knew you cared."

With that observation, he bit into his bagel, firmly delaying any further conversation on his part until he had a chance to see her reaction.
 
"I'll get you back for that Mitchell!!! YOU BETTER WATCH OUT!!!" Tisma was shaking a fist after him as he left and all ready plotting the cooks demise. It was another moment before the weight off her back was finally lifted and she stretched and took a deep breath before smelling the food being offered to her. Quickly she sat up and took the plate. The waffle was all ready being cut and the fork halfway to her mouth with a bite when she heard what Mieranor said.

The next thing she knew the fork was flying at his head and it looked like the knife, waffle, and plate were soon going to follow.
 
He ducked the projectile utensil, depositing Boots on the floor and relieving Tisma of her ammunition as he forced himself to swallow so he could talk.

"Easy, Tisma." He said. "No need to waste good food. Now, let's see...I can think of three possibilities. Either I've done something you don't approve of, in which case I'm fairly certain the whole facility would know in great detail, or you genuinely hate me...in which case the engineering bays would be decidedly unsafe places for me to be..."

He paused before continuing, "Or you could be nervous as hell about something, which would normally surprise me, given that Killian describes you as 'impressively forward.'"
 
"He does not describe me as impressively forward. He's a dirty dirty liar! He knows I'm not forward about everything!! Especially not certain.... things! There are things I don't talk about. Give me back my food." She was glowering at him and in all honesty if looks could kill he'd of dropped dead by now. It didn't help that she really was starting to lean toward her amazingly dense theory and if he couldn't figure it out she was just going to have to stuff her feelings in a little box and close it.

Snatching a piece of precut waffle off the plate, she stuffed it in her mouth and looked at him defiantly, debating making another run for it. How many years had they spent running into each other in off the wall places in this galaxy. It'd been so long since they'd both worked for Kyle, since they'd first met on that over crowded transport. She twisted her lips and sighed. If he didn't get it by now it really was just pointless. Looking rather dejected she swiped another piece of waffle and leaned back against the wall.
 
Mier snorted and handed her back the plate. "I would like to state for the record that I did not steal it, I saved it from being used as a projectile."

He sighed and ripped another bite off his bagel, chewing it aggressively before swallowing and speaking up again. "You know, we're in the same place for more than a week for the first time since Kyle retired, and you won't say more than two goddamn words to me. Do you have any idea how much that sucks?"
 
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