PHD #135: Rainy Day Woman Number Twelve and Thirty-Five
Rainy Day Woman Number Twelve and Thirty-Five
Summary: Brought to you by Religious Rights and Freedoms, Section C, Paragraph 1, Clause (d) — Religious Sacraments and Permitted Substances. This was…probably not what they had in mind.
Date: 11 Jul 2041 AE
Related Logs: Directly follows Babble. Apart from that, just vague call-backs and references.
Players:
Cidra Gabrieli Tisiphone McQueen 
Undisclosed Location - Battlestar Cerberus
Post-Holocaust Day: #135

A battlestar is not a place a person can generally get any sort of long-term privacy. However, the good ship Cerberus is a large vessel, with many rarely-used cubby holes and neglected storage rooms where one can lose themselves for a few hours if they're reasonably subtle about it. The beauty of being on good terms with the Chief Engineer, who helped build this particular ship, is that he can tell you where pretty much all of those spots are. It's one of those rooms where Cidra's arranged to meet up with Gabrieli tonight. She's a little early and is waiting with a general air of patience. In her off-duties, sitting cross-legged atop a large box of something-or-other. Hair down, shoes off. Her boots are stuffed in a corner out of the way. Barefoot is probably not a generally advisable way to walk around the ship, but it seems comfortable for her just now.

You can bet one or two of the Cerberus' storage rooms have been earmarked from the start as spots the ChEng favors. At least one is strangely out of the way, the excuse being that it can hold emergency equipment accessible from an aft stairway, in case the main route is blocked. And it is true, that's what's in here — and it's even been used a few times; Gabrieli's no fool when it comes to future planning. During relatively quiet nights, though, it sits dead silent. Perfect for the CAG.

So this is where he sent her, with word he'd be down in about 45 minutes. Gabrieli's a little late, but who can blame a department head? His olive fatigues jacket's already unbuttoned in the universal 'off-duty' sign, hands freshly washed from whatever grease and ink he managed to get on them during shift. He jiggles the room handle in warning before he pushes it open. "Cidra?"

"Hello, Dominic." Cidra's accent does funny things to some names, particularly those common on more Standard colonies. It wants to put emphasis in off places, soften consonants, and dwell on vowels that don't really require it. It wraps easily around the syllables common to Gemenon, however. Her head rolls toward the opening hatch as he joins her. She has taken the time to shower, at least. Hair still a little wet from it. She's not long off CAP, so she likely very much needed it. Apart from that, she's not looking her best. Dark circles mar the underside of her eyes, and the little lines around them and her mouth are more prominent, as they tend to be when she's particularly tired. Well, who isn't tired these days? "Nothing too pressing did keep you, I hope?"

"Paper shuffling," Gabrieli replies, a little too dismissively. He pushes the door shut until it click-locks and leans over, bracing a hand on his knee while he picks at his bootlaces. With regulations on footwear on a battlestar, most people would never know that he abhors wearing shoes. Something Cidra may have picked up on during her times in his bunk. The heavy boots plus socks are kicked to the side without a mote of concern as to where they end up, and he crouches down in front of the CAG. Still wearing that drawn-on cap of his, the brim makes shadows just above his line-etched eyes. "How's flyboy land?"

Cidra slips her hand into her pocket and withdraws a small packet wrapped in delicate tissue paper. It's unwrapped, to reveal a decidedly less delicate plastic baggie beneath. It lacks for looks, but you really can't beat those things for storage. It holds, of course, the point of all this. Chamalla leaves, dried and refined to be well smokeable. Also retrieved from her pockets are some stauncher papers, for rolling. She smokes dirt cheap cigarettes and drinks Navy coffee without complaint, but when it comes to weed she's a snob who demands to roll her own. Her elitism is selective. At his question about the flyboys, she snorts. "I told you this was a Medicinal affair," is her only immediate reply to that. "Or…maybe we should claim it is spiritual. That one usually earns less questions. I do so admire the military clauses on Religious Sacraments and Permitted Substances." She smirks. "Makes you wonder who managed to get that into the rulebook. I cannot imagine it was a Caprican."

"If they'd wanted you to pay per puff, then you'd know it was the Capricans." Gabrieli rolls his weight backwards until he's sitting on the floor. The chill and thin layer of foot traffic debris doesn't even get an eyelash bat as he stretches out his long legs, resting them up against the side of Cidra's knee. "Imagine it was the Libran lawyers. Libran loopholes are the only way to go."

"Gods bless Libran legalities," Cidra rejoins, shifting a little so she can better roll. Her long, slim fingers go through the motions of it with practiced ease, the heady smell of the herbs unmistakable once her baggie's opened. She only bothers with two, for starters at least. One is passed to the ChEng. The other popped into the side of her mouth. She holds it there while she fishes for her lighter, talking around it. "If the rules permit it, then it is entirely right and proper." Tone a little rueful. There's a hint of either self-justification or self-mockery there. Maybe both.

"Takes half the fun out." Gabrieli reaches over for the offered bit of greenest grass, scissoring his fingers around the 'cigarette'. He tugs at the brim of his cap as though going to take it off, but at the last second his hand falls away again. "Remember the first time I realized everyone else in the Colonies but Sagittaron had such sticks up their asses about it. Back in ancient times."

Cidra fires up with her battered old metal lighter, straight out of a Navy surplus store on some bygone assignment. The lighter is then passed down to Gabrieli. She smokes languidly at first, breathing in small and slow. Eyes trace down as he near-removes his cap, lingering on his face for a beat. No comment when he leaves it on, though. His last comment earns a wry snort. It makes smoke come out of her nose. Which makes her laugh. "It is funny what binds us with the other colonies. Not a lot, it feels like sometimes. Felt like. I suppose things are different now. I never quite stopped feeling like I was wearing a different skin than everybody else. No matter how much brass they gave me to put on top of it. But. I know how to enjoy a good smoke. So lucky me, and frak the rest of them." Oh-so-rare, profanity from her. She must be loosening up.

"Not a lot," Gabrieli echos drily. He plucks the lighter from her and settles back, cupping his hand around the flame. The smoke that rises in a miniature mushroom cloud is high and sweet, mellowing indescribably once firmly lodged in the lungs and nose. He holds his breath as he puts the lighter down on her knee, finally exhaling after a practiced good while. "I don't know about a different skin, but you've definitely got a nicer ass. I'm just saying."

Cidra gets another laugh out of that, waiting a second for it to pass before puffing again. "Quite right I do," is her response. Head tilts down toward him at an angle. "Good? My brother, Cillian, sent it to me when I got the post. His congratulations. Grows it in his Temple's communal garden back in home." A beat and she has to add, "Grew it, I mean. Nothing else ever felt to me quite so well…" She trails off after that, smoking deeper, holding it longer.

"Smells like home," Gabrieli says in return. Mixed tone, a little nostalgic and a little something else that's hard to discern. "I didn't know your brother was ordained." Thought punctuated by a new drag off the cigarette, this breath coddled even further on the inhale.

"Anointed Brother of Asclepius, just like Father," Cidra affirms. "When I was growing up I figured entering service into one of the cults was just…what you did. She holds her joint between her lips, idly stretching out her right arm. Twisting it so she can following the twining of the olive branch tattoo around her forearm. "My mother never quite forgave me for not taking my vows to Athena. Gods, Dominic, I would have made a terrible priestess, though…" She doesn't really clarify what she means by that, but she sounds quite sure of it. A pause and she asks, "Did you ever think of going back? To Gemenon? I mean…to stay. Not many leave in the first place."

Gabrieli rolls up half onto one knee, grabbing a broken piece of tin and dragging it down to clank on the floor beside their legs. His index finger carefully taps a small knot of blackish ash into it. A short silence greets her question, until he shakes his head. "Too far from my boys. I was…" He sucks his teeth, eyes down on the ashtray. "…talking to Natalie about joint custody if I could get a land assignment on Tauron after this. Gemenon would've frakked that up." Without looking up, he drags off the cigarette again. "Did you?"

"I was never going back to Gemenon." Cidra admits it so softly it's barely audible. Like she's reluctant to say it aloud. Like it's the first time she's allowed herself to. But it's the absolutely truth. She speaks no more of her homeworld after that. "Picon, maybe. Daedrek and I used to have a house there. I sold it a long time ago, after…but…I miss the view of the lakes." She stretches out her fingertips, holding her smoke between them now. "You know, the last time I smoked this stuff was on Picon. One hundred thirty-six days ago…" That number's either significant or she's hardcore failing at a Twelve Step program right now. Probably the former.

"Always wanted a house on the water," Gabrieli muses. His speech is ever so gradually slowing down, gaining a heavier rhythm of a very rural Gemenese accent. Not that he hides it normally, but a certain tempering is always there so the others can understand him without straining. Now it's slowly going away. "I mean literally, a house on the water. Houseboat, you know?" As he talks he exhales smoke, making a finaly puff out. "Live like that, die out on the sea. Not up in a frakking floating tin can." A slight snort, head finally raising until the cap shadows don't hide his eyes anymore. "Hundred thirty six, eh?"

Cidra's lilt is pure city girl, for her part. The priesthood is as close to high-class as parts of Gemenon gets. "It was so beautiful in the mornings," she says, laying back on her box with a soft "Mmmm" sound. Legs stretching out under his, bare toes idly wriggling in the recycled air of the battlestar. "So green and so quiet. Daeds used to fish. I never really understood that. It looked dull as anything, and then he would throw them back…" Her head rolls so her blue eyes meet his greens. A little movement of her chin to suffice as a nod. "Yeah. Yes. It was after we jumped back from the games in Uram. Right before that gods-awful ceremony. I got a half-day's leave. I was going to take a shuttle to the Lake Country. Go see Daedrek's mother. She…she was always really nice to me. Even after he died. Sometimes I felt like she liked me more than my own mother did…" Something in the way she talks about it implies that visit never happened.

Gabrieli's attention strays from her face to her feet. He passes the cigarette into his right hand, reaching over the left to wrap around the top part of her right foot. His hand is warm and heavily calloused, the thumb rubbing a circle around the pad under her big toe. "Supposed to fight with your mother-in-law, aren't you? Thought that was a rule with women."

Cidra smiles. She tries to laugh, but it doesn't quite come. "Yes, well, report us to the in-law authorities, then. No. Brenna was sweet woman…very kind to me. We were going to have lunch, and tea, that afternoon. We did not see much of each other, even when I was serving on Picon these last years…but we had made plans and I…I just did not go, Dominic. I called and said…I do not even remember what I said. Some excuse. I just…I could not go. So I hung up, and I went to a park, and I smoked by a tree for hours and hours, and the day just kind of…passed. And that was the last time I talked to her…"

Gabrieli is still watching Cidra's foot, thumb continuing to press lazy circles into her skin. "And now you're beating yourself up that you didn't see her." His green-gray eyes come back up but his head hasn't moved, leaving him looking at her from under the brim of that cap. "You know if it wasn't that it'd be something else you didn't do. Never going to be a shortage of regrets."

Cidra doesn't reply to that right off. She just makes another of those low "Mmmmmm" sounds, holding her smoke in and then exhaling slow. "Maybe. I just wish I had been kinder to her. I am not always…kind to people I care about. Not as I should be." There's an apology implicit in that somewhere.

"You can't be kind to people all the time," Gabrieli points out, around another slow exhale of smoke. Gray dribbles from between his lips, rapidly swept away and up towards the hardworking vents and scrubbers. "People don't trust someone that's /too/ nice." He smirks slightly at her. "But it's the same thing, Cidra. Regrets. Nothing you can do about them. Unless you're Zen enough to make it a 'learning experience' or whatever the buzzword is. Gets some people through it all, but…it's not going to rewind time."

"Zen. Heh." More puffing is done. "I guess so. We were always honest with each other, at least. That is more than can be said for most people who frak each other." That, of all things, Cidra lacks any sort of propriety or illusions about. "I have been thinking about the Marsyas of late." Their last station together. "I..I do not know if I was happy there, exactly but…I was good at that job, Dominic. That is when I thought…maybe this will be enough. I did not imagine that would ever turn into this. I am not well-made for this…"

Gabrieli snorts quietly. "Who the frak is well-made for this?" His hand makes a sweeping gesture at the storeroom. "If they did practice drills on the frakking end of the world, I think I missed them. But good thing is, and…seriously don't tell anyone, but…" He squints one eye shut, wagging his finger at her. "Everyone else missed them too."

"And we are what remains…" Cidra reaches out her hand to grasp his wagging fingers. She sounds unsure how to feel about that. It's a refrain she comes back to often, even before the end of the worlds, but she never really explains what she means by it.

"Funny how that works." Gabrieli lets her have his fingers, his thumb squeezing her hand. He's silent for a while then, before an increasingly fogged mind lets spit the first thing that occurs to it. "Did you ever want kids?"

"Daeds and I talked about it. It was always a…year or so down the line thing. It never worked out," Cidra replies. "After all that was over I…I do not think I would make a very good mother, Dominic. It was easier just to…make it a non-issue. That part of my life was done." It's hard to tell if she's particularly sorry about that or not. There is a sort of regret there, but it's distant even for the sweet veil of chamalla. More of which is deeply, deeply smoked after that one.

"Yeah." Gabrieli sounds not disappointed by the answer. Not at all. "Luxury when you can step back and look at it that way. Make decisions. Live with those instead of whatever the frak just happens to you." The chamalla's made quite the dense fog by now, making the ChEng more and more oblivious as to whether or not he's completely making sense. "My mother was like that. Died regretting what happened."

"Mmmm…" That's Cidra's only immediate reply. She continues to hold his fingertips, sort of playing her own over them. "Everybody has regrets. Just a matter of what you can live with, I suppose. I will answer to the gods when they come for me…" She sounds unsure precisely what they'll make of her. But she's artificially relaxed to the point where it doesn't so much matter. "I am sorry about your mother…"

A long silence beore Gabrieli answers. "I'm not." For as callous as the two words are, there's not really much in his tone. He could be talking about a dead tree. His cigarette's down to his fingertips and he reaches over their hands to put it out. On the way up he finally slides his cap off, grasping it by the brim and pulling up. It's nothing Cidra hasn't seen before, but it doesn't make it pretty. His hair's never grown back in big patches, scalp too marred by whorled scarring from the fire and burning carpet that he ended up unconscious on. "This is the part I like. Done with the smoke…used to go sit by the river and stare at it like an idiot till it looked like things were floating up out of the eddies."

"Too much makes you numb. But just enough makes everything more beautiful…Just lets you level out for awhile…" Cidra slides herself off her box, probably jostling Gabrieli's sitting position a little, only to slide down on the floor next to him. Head going to rest back against her former perch. "Mmm…"

Gabrieli starts to move forward at the same time Cidra does, and ends up off balance as he tries to lean back. Ungracefully onto his back on the floor, a lazy crack of laughter erupting as his head lands on cold metal. "Shit…" He reaches up to grasp her hand again, tugging on it. "I designed part of this gravity algorithm and it's kicking my ass."

"The equations will always betray you sooner or later," Cidra says lazily, pulling herself in closer to him as she's tugged. Leaning down to kiss his hand as he grasps hers. She didn't come here just to float among the eddies.

"Frakkers lie." Gabrieli lets her have her dainty contact, then his arm's headed up next to his head — without letting go of her fingers. He didn't come here just to kiss her /hand/. "Why don't you bring yourself up here, and let me see if that program's working right."

"Just do not start babbling math equations," Cidra orders him. With that, she sort of rolls herself over to him. No more talking after that.

…Fade to a respectable but admittedly not particularly long time later…

It is beyond O'Dark Thirty. Even on a battlestar, where there are duty shifts rather than any real sense of day and night, there aren't many in the chapel at this hour. Cidra, however, is here. Rather than in her bunk. She's been off duty for hours but has pretty much deserted the berthings tonight. At the moment she's seated up at the altars. Cross-legged on the floor before them. Offerings burning to some of the gods. Though at the moment she just has her eyes closed and is sitting there. Shoulders swaying a little. Motions almost imperceptible, but you notice if you watch long enough. Like she's being stirred by the faintest of breezes.

McQueen arrives from the Deck 9.

Only the sleepless and the troubled tend to haunt the chapel at this hour, and given the gentle stumble of loose-laced boots and the shuttered, flat-eyed expression, Tisiphone may qualify for both. She's wrapping her prayer-beads around her wrist as she enters, the motions so well-practiced they seem nearly careless, the hollow clatterclick of bone beads drifting along with her.

Cidra is holding her prayer beads as well, wrapped around her right hand, but she's not really doing anything with them. She's just kind of holding them while she sits there. She may very well have fallen asleep sitting up, from the look of her. Eyes closed, posture slackened in something near pure relaxation. Tisiphone's entrance is not immediately noted.

Click clickclick click clickclickclick. Wound up and up, 'round and 'round, for subsequent unspooling, the long metal-tipped tassels swaying restlessly at the end. Tisiphone shakes her hand absently as she walks, making the metal flick and glint in the dim light, her steps scuff-slopping quietly — until she recognizes who sits in vigil before the altar. Her steps peter to a halt, the tip of her tongue sneaking out to prod uncertainly at a cracked and worried spot on her bottom lip.

Another latecomer to the party is a markedly somber-looking figure of one Trevor McQueen. He's in his fatigues, the green coat hanging open over his tanks indicating off-duty status. His fists are balled firmly in the pockets of his pants as he strolls along, wheeling about on one foot deftly as he turns to slip the hatch shut behind him. Careful-like to avoid making loud, distracting noises. He's starting to appear polite, even housebroken, lately.

Cidra is apparently not asleep, because the clickclick of Tisiphone's beads does finally make her roll her body around a little. Rather blurry blue eyes blinking lazily open. Abstracted smile coming to her face. "Tisiphone…hello…" Has she ever called the younger pilot by her first name before? Her drawling accent sort of wraps itself around all the syllables, drawing them out in a slowed down sort of way. Which is probably not all due to her Gemenese drawl. McQueen is not immediately noticed. But she's not at her most perceptive at the moment. As one gets closer to the altar, they would likely note the heady scent of chamalla heavily around her. She is well and truly stoned.

One might also note she has her off-duty tank-top on inside-out. And is not actually wearing any shoes. Her barefeet idly wriggle from her legs' folded position on the floor. Boots nowhere in sight.

A long pause, and a longer appraisal of the CAG, nostrils shivering at the heady, familiar scent, before Tisiphone nods once. Slowly. "Sir. You're well, tonight?" Sleety eyes flicker with a sort of cautious amusement. Again, she prods at the well-gnawed spot on her lip before spurring herself back into motion. Up to the first row of seats, a glance flicked either way. Looking for boots, perhaps.

Well, no sound from McQueen at first other than the sound of bootsteps as he plods his way up the aisle, idly glancing at the surroundings of the place. He's studying the room as if seeing it for the first time, and his head gradually whips about until — WHOAH, he stops, focusing on Tisiphone and the CAG, his face screwed up in a quizzical knot. Leaning against an unused seat, he splays out his fingers. "Well. Isn't that somethin' you never thought you'd see. Evening sir. Lieutenant." The greeting is soft, and delivered to both women. He makes a visible show of sniffing the air.

"I am a little sleepy," is Cidra's drawling reply to Tisiphone. "It is beautiful, though. Is it not beautiful, Tisiphone? That is such a lovely name, by the by. A hard name. But a beautiful one. Tisiphone of the furies. Avenger. Well. There is beauty in that. We live in the age of Ares now. Much as I pray the Wise Lady still guides my flight, I feel the heavy wings of the vultures upon me. Perhaps I am becoming a vulture, Tisiphone the Avenger. I only ever wanted to be the owl, though…" Blink, blink. And those blurry eyes focus, kind of, on McQueen. "Queenie. Trevor Cairn McQueen. Of Leonis born. Hello." She notes his sniffing and takes the opportunity inhale. Then exhale slowly, with a contented sigh. The air here isn't particularly thick with the smell. It certainly clings to her, but it does not appear she was puffing away right at this very spot.

"Tisiphone, Avenger of Murder, so say we all," the Junior Lieutenant murmurs, more to herself than anything, though the pale gaze remain upon the CAG. Her mouth quirks, the edges of her teeth flashing in a smile that doesn't reach her eyes. "You forgot your boots," she points out, before half-turning to give Queenie an odd, unsmiling look. She nods a silent greeting to him before turning back. "You were in a hurry? Did you have a vision?" Utterly practical questions with perfectly reasonable answers — at least to the Sagittaran.

Not really batting an eyelash, McQueen's response consists of a weighing nod as he tilts his head to one side, studying the CAG as she speaks. His pale blue eyes linger there a moment more, as he lets out a single chortle. "An' that's me. Straight out of the City of Newport, a jewel of industry and such an important place that it managed to get bombed not once, not twice, but three times in the last two hundred years." He shakes his head, sighing. "I can attest that it wasn't the nicest place even when it wasn't getting bombed. So there you have it." Finishing this line of thought with a shrug, he narrows his eyes down at Cidra a moment more. "I won't disturb you further, really. That's a pretty potent path to spiritual inspiration. Isn't for the timid, I'll give you that. Hope you find whatever blessing you're looking for."

An aside to Tisiphone, he adds, "You too."

"Ah…" Cidra stares down at her bare toes, blink-blink-blinking in muted surprise. "So I did. That frakker did not remind me, either. No manners whatsoever…" She shrugs. It does not seem particularly important now. She runs her fingers through her shoulder-long dark hair. It is, like the rest of her, sort of mussed at the moment. A shake of her head at the Saggie's question. "No. No. The gods do not speak to me. I thought they did. Once. But maybe I was wrong. Maybe I was just…high off my ass and looking for an excuse to do something stupid. Well. I was Cidra Nevarine of Shinkirsei. It is gone now, too. To cinders. All the holy places are cinders now. And I remain. Major Cidra Hahn. Toast. Names are important, Tisiphone. Trevor Cairn. Names give a thing form. Without them, all is ephemeral…"

Another look back at McQueen, lips primmed. Tisiphone's got a Bad Feeling about this. "Mmn," is all she says, though, before she starts slowly unwinding her prayer-beads to be replaced in her pocket, the motions more meticulous than usual. "We're the Lords' vessels, Sir, made in their likenesses," she ventures as she unwinds the beads, their black dye long since rubbed away to mottled bluish-grey. "We are all holy places."

"Oh, I'm sure they speak to you, Major. They speak to everyone. I think we're still hung up on grandiose, supernatural flash, expecting voices from the heavens and Gods made flesh walking among us, dispensing miracles and wisdom that we fail to notice the more subtle wonders which really, if you get down to brass frakkin' tacks, are the majority of it all. It's like Flasher chasing his bloody comet, yeh?" Flashing a tight smile, it fades moments later. "Guess that doesn't make it easy."

If Tisiphone is giving him the stinkeye, he's not making a show of acknowledgement. "It's like what she just said, here. It reminds me of the story of that shipwrecked hermit living out on this beautiful island. He kept buildin' a shrine, and it kept getting destroyed by fire, storms, what have you. Finally he got it into his head that he was living in a paradise, and his sad little shrine was a joke compared to the beauty the gods had already given him, all around." Pausing to reflect on that butchered fable, he makes an observation. "Then again, I don't know. Maybe the poor bastard just got sick of eating coconuts and went out of his head."

"Made flawed, and stupid, and with the free will to hurt one another. To try and play gods, and create abominations that struck at our throats…" Cidra sighs, rolling her neck around languidly, eyes closing again. She's staying seated, for her part. For all the rambling, she looks extremely comfortable. "We are vessels of the gods. And the Cylons are our vessels…and it all comes back around…" Another sigh. "Poor bastards us all. But I love you both, you know that? I really and truly do. I left behind the Sisterhood, but we are brothers and sisters. We dance with furies together." And she stands then. Leaning forward to clasp Tisiphone's shoulders. "I love you all."

Uh-oh. Uh-oh. Tisiphone gets that tense 'oh crap, unexpected touchings' stillness to her, reined-in from stepping away by some combination of person, location, and situation. "Ah," is all she can manage, at first, her brain spinning like some small rodent caught in a wheel. "Do you- would you like someone to walk you back to your bunk, Sir?" It's a twitchy almost-smile offered to Cidra.

A sort of dumbstruck look briefly flashes across McQueen's face, followed by an unexpected smile. "Ah! Now you're gettin' it! Now you're gettin' it, sir. You just made a connection, and a bloody important one at that, all in all." A bright flash of teeth is shot at Cidra. "And that, right there, is what I was talking about. Divine symmetry. Athena isn't going to yell down at you with some kind of cosmic bullhorn because she doesn't need to." He pauses to observe, further, "And this, right now and right here explains why I'm absolutely tickled to fly for you, Toast." Bemusedly, he looks between the two women again and is grinning like an idiot in spite of himself.

Cidra is not, for all her general reserve in most ways, averse to touching. Even in her non-altered state. Admittedly, she's usually more polite about not invading someone's personal space. "I am sleepy," she admits with a lazy yawn. "I have not been sleeping well, Tisiphone. I have had a lot on my mind. Sometimes you just need to go down to get some clarity. Just go…down, and see how long you can hold your breath. Yes, that is as good a way to put it as any." Not that she takes off just yet. She straightens a little from the junior lieutenant, reaching out to touch McQueen in a similar fashion. "And we shall fly together, Queenie. With the furies. Perhaps into the oblivion. But that is all right. The oblivion has taken my heart. It cannot take more than that."

Tisiphone looks like she hasn't slept well since the ill-fated CAP that left all of them barely squeaking past lovely, smothering deaths. She may well have been sneaking into the chapel to sleep — her last refuge when bunk and Observation Deck couches have both failed her. She clears her throat uncertainly as the CAG moves on to Queenie, shoulders hunched as she edges away a half-step. "Fight and fly and die, as they will it, Sir." Quietly said. Maybe not even loud enough to carry. "It's all any of us can do."

"Hmm. N' here's where you say 'frak oblivion.' Make enough of a loud, messy noise when you're goin' out that the Gods themselves take notice." McQueen observes, mildly. "It's really all anyone can do, all in all. Except, you know, not going out. I think the the motto to have is this - if you're going to do anything, do it with style." In turn, he reaches out and lightly taps Cidra on her free shoulder. "We've got bloody dangerous jobs."

"Fight and fly and die. That is duty. When all else is gone, duty remains. Duty is a reason to keep going. Until they stop you. Keep going until you start falling…" Cidra nods slow to McQueen. "Well. I am not falling yet. I am very tired, though. Bunk. Yes. Could one of you walk me back, please?" She looks down at her bare toes. "If he were a gentleman, he would have mentioned this…"

How many Meaningful Looks(tm) can Tisiphone shoot at Queenie this evening? Add one more to the count, when the CAG requests a walk back to her bunk. The privileges of rank, escorting one's Fearless Leader home, isn't it? "Sir?" she asks, however, as her hands slouch down deep into her pockets. "Mentioned what?"

"Nobody's getting stopped tonight, that's for sure." McQueen observes, settling into an empty pew. "I'd offer to help but it looks like you're in good hands." Those 'Meaningful Looks' are met with sly glances, as Queenie smiles coyly now at the younger woman. Then back to Cidra. "I've got some pondering to do, so I'll get on that." He slides over on the pew.

"My shoes…" Cidra says in answer to Tisiphone, a little mournfully. But in that half-bemused way of one sort of enjoying the feeling of mournfulness. "I seem to have lost my shoes…" She'll shuffle off wherever anyone takes her. Ideally, they'll be nice and not just plant her in the rec room or something.

And there we have it — Queenie's back to getting the stinkeye from Tisiphone. Her job, is it? Fine. It's /her/ job — and dutifully she'll step forward, murmur a quiet, "Here, Sir," as a narrow arm goes around the CAG's back. "I'm sure they'll be by your bunk," she assures, the sort of empty promise one makes at times like this, as she starts to guide the other woman toward the hatch, then the corridor, then the Pilot Berths far beyond.

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