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Mia Colt was in love with her captain, once, for maybe twenty-four hours at most. That was about how long it took her to realize a long list of things, including but not limited to:
- Christopher Pike needed a yeoman like he needed air.
- He had a type, and it wasn’t petite and strawberry-blonde and busty.
- Even though he could be incredibly convincing in diplomatic interaction, he was hopeless in potentially-romantic situations, especially around women who matched his type.
- He was madly in love with his first officer, who completely returned the feelings, but there was a giant wall of awkward between them.
- He didn’t just need a yeoman: he needed her.
Some of that information she’d gathered while trying to clean up his paperwork, but the rest came when Lieutenant Commander Number One came into Captain Pike’s office while he was attempting to explain his filing system to Mia. He and One had had about half a garbled conversation about shore leave and rotations, and then she’d left, and he’d sighed.
It was a very expressive sigh.
It took her about three months on the ship before she felt she knew what was going on well enough to broach the subject with Dr. Boyce and Lieutenant Commander Barry. She’d seen them sigh and roll their eyes when Captain Pike had said something particularly ridiculous to Lieutenant Commander One more than once, and had figured out that they knew how both the captain and the first officer felt.
Meanwhile, it was taking almost all of her considerable skills to get the captain’s work life under control. She didn’t like to say impolite things about the recently deceased, and the captain seemed to miss his previous yeoman a lot, but whoever he was, he’d let some things get to the point where they were just a mess.
Nonetheless, Mia finally managed to find Dr. Boyce and Lieutenant Commander Barry in the mess hall, eating lunch, with no one else around. “May I speak with you for a moment, sirs?” she asked, bobbing an instinctive curtsey.
Dr. Boyce chuckled. “Sit down, yeoman,” he said. “Where were you trained, an English manor house?”
“I don’t know where that came from, sir,” she admitted, and Lieutenant Commander Barry laughed as well. “However, I wanted to speak to you about something that, I believe, is of interest to all three of us.”
“Oh?” Lieutenant Commander Barry asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Tread carefully, Colt,” Dr. Boyce advised.
Mia took a deep breath, and said, “I think perhaps a little . . . nudging . . . wouldn’t hurt, in regards to, um, certain people on this ship and the, um . . .” She trailed off.
Boyce looked at Barry, and said, “She is in a unique position.”
Barry nodded and said, “Your place is closer.”
A few minutes later, she was perched on the very edge of Dr. Boyce’s desk chair, listening to Lieutenant Commander Barry complain. “We’ve tried before,” she said. “We’ve tried locking them in the turbolift, but One fixed it before it had been more than a minute or two. I tried to get her to say something, but she absolutely won’t. Phil’s been working on Chris, trying to get him to be more romantic and less . . .” She waved a hand in the air. “He’s just a disaster.”
“He knows it,” Dr. Boyce said. “That’s one reason that, most of the time, he won’t even try.”
“So how can you help us?” Lieutenant Commander Barry asked.
“Well, the two of you know both of them so much better than I do,” Mia said, demurring, “but I control his schedule.”
“And apparently you’re not afraid to use your powers for good,” Barry said, and grinned. “Okay. How are we going to do this?”
They came up with a plan, and mere minutes later, Mia set it in motion.
Friday, 2250.130
Alpha shift
- 0830: Meeting, senior staff (with 8 others)
- 1130: Meeting, Casperia Prime health committee (with 3 others)
- 1400: Conference with Adm. Nogura (with 4 others)
- 1900: Dinner, Del Rey’s (with 3 others)
--
TO: [email protected]
FROM: [email protected]
SUBJECT: Reservations, 2250.130 1900 Pike
Please be advised that it is the first anniversary of Captain Pike and Lieutenant Commander Number One. They prefer not to have it announced but they would very much appreciate an upgrade to the champagne. They will indicate that there are four members to their party but there will only be two; it is our gift to them. Please charge the entire meal to account number XXXXXXX-XXXX.
Sincerely,
J. Mia Colt
Yeoman to Captain Pike
--
Mia had the captain’s civilian suit cleaned and returned to his closet in time for the dinner. She also borrowed a tie from Dr. Boyce, because frankly, Captain Pike’s tie collection was astonishingly bad. She would be fixing that on Casperia Prime, thank you very much, but she wouldn’t have time until after the dinner.
Into the pocket she slipped a very small bug that Lieutenant Commander Barry had designed, solely for the purpose of monitoring their conversation during dinner. It was immoral, Mia supposed, but the other option was hacking into the security system in the restaurant and that would have been significantly worse.
Also, there was no way she was leaving it all to chance. If she did, Captain Pike would undoubtedly fuck everything up.
They’d debated whether to clue in Number One, but Lieutenant Commander Barry had shot that suggestion down, saying that One wouldn’t play along unless it was essentially too late. It made Barry’s job more difficult, though--she had to make sure that Number One got to the restaurant on time and yet had to disappear herself before she was actually seated. No matter, though; that was what Mia’s schedule was for.
- 1800: Barry to One, dressing
- 1830: Boyce to Pike, dressing
- 1850: Barry and One to transporter
- 1853: Barry and One to surface
- 1859: Boyce and Pike to transporter room
- 1900: Medical to contact Boyce; minor medical emergency
- 1900: Barry leaves restaurant; One seated at restaurant
- 1901: Pike to surface
- 1901: Barry to Yorktown
- 1903: Pike to restaurant
She’d built in a certain amount of time for human error and had the manager of the restaurant on an open comm line, but surprisingly, everything worked.
Lieutenant Commander Barry lent Lieutenant Commander One a proper dress and helped her do her hair; Dr. Boyce talked Captain Pike into wearing the suit and the blue tie. Mia, for her own part, was supervising from the captain’s ready room. Barry and One, both properly dressed, made it down to the transporter room on time; they made it to the surface even a minutes early.
The waitstaff knew better than to seat the women early, and they’d agreed to put four place settings around the table and then unobtrusively remove two of them later. One and Barry were left cooling their heels, out of Mia’s surveillance, for about ten minutes.
Dr. Boyce and the captain were next in the queue at the transporter, and Mia signaled Na at exactly 1900; she called Boyce down to Sickbay “just for a moment.” Captain Pike looked lost for a moment, but on his way out the door, Dr. Boyce said, “Chris, just go down without me. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
Mia checked to make sure that One was seated and that Barry was not at the restaurant; the chief engineer was apparently hiding in the lavatory. Mia sent a quick confirmation to the transporter tech, who beamed the captain down and Barry up a moment later.
Next, she activated the bug in his pocket. Captain Pike was apparently talking to himself; he said, “Well, at least Cait will be there,” in an undertone. A moment later he greeted the maitre d’; Dr. Boyce and Lieutenant Commander Barry entered the ready room, still dressed in their formalwear, and sat down on either side of Mia.
“Everything going according to plan?” Dr. Boyce asked, and Mia nodded. “Good. I thought he was going to balk for a moment there when I got called away.”
Mia nodded again. She’d accounted for that and it wouldn’t have been a problem, but still.
“One,” Captain Pike said through the speaker, obviously surprised. “Ah, where’s Cait? I mean--you look nice.”
“Thank you,” Number One said. “So do you. I presume Phil was delayed as well?” It was obvious from her tone that she had figured out what was going on, and just as obvious from his that the captain had not.
“Medical called him,” Captain Pike said. “He’ll be along in a few. Oh, a glass of whatever she’s having,” he said, obviously to the server. “We’ll wait a moment for the rest of our party.”
A few minutes later, One said quietly, “I don’t think they’re coming back.”
A tinny clatter sounded; Mia thought the captain had knocked some piece of cutlery off the table, and his hasty apology seemed to confirm.
“Oh, dear God,” Dr. Boyce said. “I think I’m going to need alcohol to get through this. You want anything, Cait? Colt?”
Lieutenant Commander Barry’s eyes were closed and she was rubbing her temples as if she had a headache. “Make mine a double,” she said.
Mia shook her head at Dr. Boyce’s inquisitive look. “I’m fine, thanks.” She had some celebratory cheesecake stashed away in her room, if this worked out.
“Chris,” One said over the speaker. “Is this so bad?”
The three held their breaths, even though Dr. Boyce was standing partway up.
“No, no, of course not,” Captain Pike said, and all three exhaled together. Crisis averted, for the moment. The captain inhaled as if he were about to say something else, but fortunately the server came to inquire about their order.
Dr. Boyce brought back martinis for himself and Barry; they sipped at them and sniped at Captain Pike’s attempts to keep the conversation going.
“It’s a good thing we like him,” Barry said at one point.
“And a good thing that Number One is smart,” Dr. Boyce agreed.
Mia knew better than to comment.
About forty-five minutes of near-misses later, including what had to be Number One kicking him under the table when he almost protested the single dessert with two spoons, Captain Pike requested the check, and Mia sat forward in her chair. He wasn’t going to get a check, of course; he would get a padd with a note they’d written.
Captain Pike, it said,
Follow these directions exactly.
When you leave the restaurant, offer Number One your arm. She will take it.
Suggest a walk. It’s nice out. There is a garden at the end of the block, to the west. She’ll say yes.
Don’t try to talk about anything other than how lovely it is out and how much you enjoyed dinner. Especially don’t talk about work.
There will be music playing in the garden. When the third or fourth song starts, say, “May I have this dance?” Dance with her. Don’t try anything fancy; arms around her and rock back and forth.
At the end of the song, suggest going somewhere more private, even just to talk. If all has gone properly, she’ll ask if you’re sure you just want to talk. All will have gone properly.
There’s a hotel on the corner of A and 16th--catty-corner from the garden; there’s a room there booked in your name. From this point on, you’re on your own. Don’t screw it up.
Sincerely,
Barry, Boyce, and Colt
Mia had wanted to put it in a bulleted list format, but the other two had vetoed the suggestion. She still thought it might have been more readable her way, but it was irrelevant now.
The captain took a couple minutes to read the whole note; Number One excused herself to go to the restroom at that point. Very quietly, just loud enough for the bug to pick it up, Captain Pike said, “Oh, hell.”
There were a lot of things that could go wrong at this point: he could refuse to play along; he could get mad at them; he could storm out of the restaurant and demand transport. Even though Boyce and Barry had reassured her that he would play along, they all froze in place until they heard him say, “The weather is lovely tonight. Do you want to take a walk?”
“That sounds wonderful,” One said, and Barry reached over to turn off the surveillance.
“That’s enough,” she said. “The rest is up to him.” She grinned. “But we did it!”
“Yes, we did,” Boyce said, and they all exchanged congratulatory hugs.
Mia returned to her quarters, flushed and a little bit high off her success, and set up an alert to tell her if the captain or first officer requested transport back to the ship. Next, she took out her slice of lemon-berry cheesecake and savored every single mouthful. She fell asleep watching a bad holovid and woke up a few hours later, checking the alerts before she was fully awake.
It was 0200 and no, neither Captain Pike nor Lieutenant Commander One had requested transport back to the ship.
Good.
Now, about Barry and Boyce . . .