Cradle Robber

Posted on Thu Oct 17th, 2024 @ 10:30pm by Lieutenant Commander Harrison Knox & Chief Petty Officer Gildran Trusk

950 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: A Silence of Friends
Location: Brig
Timeline: MD01 - 0445

Only a few hours ago, Lieutenant Commander Harrison Knox had been having a difficult time getting to sleep. He had wrestled with his conscience and rode the choppy white cap waves of emotion. It had been his visit to Lieutenant Stormy Knight's quarters that had helped quell the tempest within and permitted him to get some sleep. However, sleep would be a short lived relief from the inevitable. Tap. Tap. Tap. SMACK came a series of noises that eventually ripped his from somewhat pleasant dreams to a harsh reality. He sat up from his bed, shirtless and in his boxer briefs only to find unfamiliarity around him.

Cold. That was the first thing he knew. His duvet was not on him, no sheets, and no sense of warmth of comfort. The lights. The room was bright and he never slept with lights on. Again, the cold. Were the environmental controls on the fritz again? TAP. TAP. WHACK his attention drawn and he realized he was not in his bed nor his quarters. The firm and uncomfortable hard furniture beneath his buttocks as he swung his legs around and sat upright was not his bed at all.

"Good morning, Lieutenant Commander Knox, or shall I address you as what you are? Major Disappointment" came the gruff tone of a very familiar and very particular drill sargeant of a yeoman. The noises had been the part Tellarite known as Trusk hammering away at a bulkhead between holding cells with the edge of his PaDD. A holding cell was exactly where Lieutenant Commander Harrison Knox was.

Knox stood up and immediately covered himself, crossing his arms, touching his shoulders. "Trusk? What the hell. It is cold in here."

"Quite right, Commander. It is. Extremely uncomfortable isn't it. I learned it from our new friends the Cardassians years ago. They have such artistic ways to interrogate persons of interests to them" quipped Trusk with a snort.

Lieutenant Commander Harrison Knox did not know what had possessed Trusk, but he knew this had to be related to the mission. "Is that what I am to you now, Trusk? I'm a person of interest?"

"No," snarled Trusk pressing his face practically right up to the containment field he had enacted, causing it to sing an unnerving buzzing. "You are of no interest to me, Commander. I don't find dereliction of duty the least bit interesting. I find it sad, and I find those that comic it, pathetic."

This was a holding cell, the one place Knox thought he has escaped being by the skin of his teeth, but evidentially, Trusk had other plans for him. "Did you do this to the others, Chief, or just me?"

Trusk let out a low growing noise before a full belly guffaw. "It is just you. The others did what they did, but you were tge First Officer. You were to maintain order and lead by example, but the only example you gave was how to ignore your orders and create your own little mission."

He's not right, but I can't say he's entirely wrong either thought Knox. "The Captain already stripped me of my position, Trusk. I'm not First Officer, and I may never be again."

"Good," Trusk replied spitting on the ground. "You don't deserve to put the uniform on. You are fortunate the Captain only did that much,lucky the Cardassians aren't digging any deeper or looking for you. You are getting away with treason."

"Chief Petty Officer Trusk, what the hell do you think are even doing? You've abducted a superior officer which I'm going to imagine was done with a site-to-site transport and you are holding me prisoner against my will? What makes you think you'll get away with that?"

Trusk walked over to a station with a console and tapped away, lowering the containment field. "Because you are not going to say a word to the Captain or anyone. If you think lowering the temperature is bad, you don't want to get into a Cardassian counting game called how many lights are there" snorted Trusk.

"Alrighght, fair enough. I don't say anything to the Captain about you playing warden and prisoner with me, but what do you want Trusk? An apology? I've tried with the Captain. I am sorry. I did not mean to betray him, or apparently you."

The Tellarite shook his head. "I didn't do this for an apology. I did this because I care, and because I want to know why. Why would you jeopardize everything?"

Knox sat back down on the bench. "I trusted someone that meant a lot to me. A former Captain that supported my career, got me into Officer Training School. I thought she'd just help calm my nerves about my first away mission as First Officer, but she fed me information about the Cardassians and the Bajorans..."

Trusk grunted. Containment field lowered, he extended his arm and took Knox's hand pulling him up to his feet. "Faith in one's Captain is important even former ones, but you need to remember you are on this crew now. Captain Gray is the only Captain that you take orders from, Lieutenant Commander Knox."

Knox nodded. "Does this mean you are letting me go?"

The Tellarite snorted and stepped aside. "Go" he said.

"What makes you think I won't report this?" asked Knox.

Trusk shrugged. "Because you deserved it and because you won't."

Lieutenant Commander Harrison Knox sighed. "Alright. Beam me back to my quarters?"

"You'll walk" Trusk said walking towards the doors causing them to open. "At this hour, you might make it back without giving the crew a show. Now, get walking."

 

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