Should've stayed in Bed (open)

[Alliana Porter]

- Ally -

It had been roughly two weeks since the the panic of the virus had struck the crew. Ally had escaped it's clutches, but she wasn't same for long. Today, oh today, she should have never rolled out from her bunk. In fact, she wasn't even sure why she did. Thursday was her day off, that and Saturdays. Her plan was simple, sleep as long as possible, eat then go hang out with Luke on the flightdeck if he wasn't busy. The sleeping didn't last long. At 9:32 am, she rolled over with a groan of discontent and kicked off her covers. She had grown restless and uncomfortable, suddenly craving warm milk with cinnamon and vanilla. It sounded obscure, but she was her own person, who did her own things.

Rubbing her face, she changed into something slightly more decent and padded to the dining area. With a heavy sigh, she sat down into one of the booths, milk in hand and plopped her head down onto the table. Her stomach wasn't exactly in the best mood either which didn't help. She groaned again, then more so when she head the air squish in the seat across from her. She rose her head slowly, a scowl of discomfort upon her face, her grey eyes intense and clearly annoyed. "Hey, you busy?" The fellow across from her barely gave her a chance to reply, before running his mouth a million and two miles per hour. His girlfriend had just broken up with him, he wasn't getting enough hours on his shift and he wasn't getting along with his advisor. Ally, could have cared less. With an aggravated sigh, she plopped her head back down into her folded arms with a thump. He got tired of her ignoring her and left in a huff to complain to someone else.

The milk wasn't helping her stomach, but she refused to let go of it. Her hair was already in a wild mess, and she looked, quite literally, like hell. Then, her stomach lurched and she vomited into the closest trash can she could find. The explosion 2 days before, had left the medical bay a mess, so there remained little chance to get in and see someone. "Should've stayed in bed." she whined pathetically, slumping down onto the floor. Today was possibly the worst day she had endured in over a month.

[attenwood]

"She's not real."

Jay's voice filled the room eagerly. With those words spoken and without much conscience thought or effort on his part, Jay sat upright in bed palms firmly planted into the mattress at his sides and looked around the dimly lit room sprawling before him. Without the added effort usually accompanied with nightmares forcing the unexplained to riddle the mind and cause worry in the hearts giving away to doubt, Jay swung his legs lazily over the side of the bed planting his feet to the floor and placing his elbows stacked digging into his thighs and lacing his fingers just shy from his chin. There wasn't much to see, he could hear his labored breathing and feel dark apprehension begin to make its move. Jay craned his neck to review the chrono sitting near atop the nearby bed-side counter. 9:34, the large numbers blinked back at him.

Now, shuffling over to the closet holding his accouterments including his officer fatigues and various other civilian clothing mocking the set behind it Jay pushed aside each hanger with discomfort refusing to belittle himself with thoughts of the past. He was trained for this. Gripping one hangar he pulled it free sliding the door closed. In one swift motion he had managed to switch out the pajamas he had been wearing for civilian clothing. A plain white-T-shirt and denim blue jeans. Traversing the halls listening to the ship-wide newscoms and catching snippets of passerby conversation always seemed to further irritate Jay during the morning. Times like these he had wished he was back in the mountains, retired to his small smokey cottage. Sipping on Jack and Jill and dreaming of the stars, he rubbed his eyes furiously. Yeah, he never really had that sort of imagination.

Turning a corner brought him dangerously close to stepping on a technician, female, drilling, or what it looked like into the bulkhead. Jay spun, stepped backwards against the wall behind him allowing two hurriedly passing ensigns to shuffle past clipboards in hand. The technician cast him a glance and smiled one of those today-has-me-running-all-over-the-place-fixing-stuff while Jay raised his eye brows in mock response. Hallways were always a death trap and as he brushed an invisible fleck of cotton from his shoulder he turned to give the friendly technician one final glance before having the mess hall doors slide open. It was a normal day nothing really out of the ordinary. People were sitting huddled in esque-cliched groups talking about the days events or the most recent holodrama they had see the night previous and gossiping over which characters should have gotten laid, so on so forth. Jay crossed the threshold approaching the protrusion where the cafeteria met the kitchen.

Stopping at the counter and placing his elbows down against his curdling his face between his fingers and digging his fingers into his hear to push the angry thought demons from sucking out his brain was the only thing he found himself doing. He didn't even remember having caff placed in his hand. Nor did he remember walking back in the direction he had come wishing to get out of the mess hall as fast as humanly possible and get back to his safe confines to study intertravel space documentary on his debilitating palm sized television screen. It was a normal day; except for the engrossing sound of somebody puking their guts out. Jay turned knowing that sound all too well. Sipping from the small hole engraved in the lid he crossed over to the table faintly sensing cinnamon. His face scrunched in disbelief while stepping around another panicked ensign.

"Yes, you should have.", his voice was flat having risked his left leg just to walk to the table. "Don't kick yourself over it either.", he said now reaching it taking another sip and feeling the hot caff scald the back of his throat he extended one finger pointing at the cinnamon source and trying his best to not sound as if he had just taken more than he could swallow, hiccuping faintly. "You should try something less.. provoking." Maybe this day wouldn't turn out badly after all. He found himself turning to the garbage can. Well, except for the express line to the bathroom. Everything always had a habit of turning sour. Jay scrunched his nose.

[Alliana Porter]

Alliana rose her weary head to the voice. It was Jay. She wasn't incredibly familiar with him yet. She knew his face well enough to pull him out of a crowd, but she couldn't tell you any specifics, other than he was the first mate. The milk was comfort to her, but the fact that her stomach was out to get her, made it turn against her. her first waking thought was not that she was going to get sick today. In fact, she already was sick, the morning milk just topped it off.

"Don't judge okay?" she replied in a snippy tone. Human interaction and manners for anyone, especially supervisors was a stretch for her today. "I'm pretty sure I have the bloody damn flu anyway." she groaned, using the wall to brace herself as she worked her way to her feet. maybe the medical bay would be..open? Apparently she stood up to fast, because the room suddenly began to spin and she slid back down to her feet. Her stomach turned again, making it's unfortunate noises. Even if she had stayed in bed, she would still be as sick as a dog today, except now, she was simply sick in public.

[attenwood]

Jay's full turn brought him directly facing the table swaying dangerous on the balls of his feet batting away the retort with another simple forced down struggle with his coffee. Peering over the top and down the side of the plastifoam cup his eyes fell upon the retching form struggling with herself and while he brought the cup back down to waist height he found his shoulders sagging with the effort having to force out a long-winded quietly-conceived hallow sigh held chained around his tongue escaping in short pockets of hot air infused with the coffee making the inside of his mouth feel like Hell. The single, short moment that descended between them gave Jay the opportunity to mask his doubt; the pungent odor now mashing his tongue against his lower jaw portion like an adhesive. This cinnamon wasn't going to be her savior, not today.
Not to mention that it smelled. "Nobody is judging, precious." It's just that it tends to puncture our hull if used in great doses. Jay risked another glance at the source while he peered down from his own cup.

Before he could do any real damage the woman was on her feet and much as Jay wanted to throw the cup over his shoulder and instinctively pardon his fear that that might not be such a good idea she managed to stand about halfway up before slinking back down quickly. Jay lowered the caff slinking one eyebrow far up the side of his face. "I'll tell you what." Sink or float. "I will stop bitching about your mutated milk if you promise to come see a doctor with me." Jay mentally crossed two fingers in his mind's eye curdling the cup between two hands comically.

The matter stood. Given his training he just wasn't about to leave somebody behind enemy lines especially not to sickness. Call it instinct, call it whatever. It was said and usually theorized that reaching out to people in times of need was healthy for the soul. Not that Jay could account for anything regarding that sudden disposition. That stench was intriguing. Cinnamon, milk no doubt. Jay wanted to guess some others additive that he couldn't quite place. Mocha. Jay began to raise the cup once more giving his hands a much needed retreat. "It'll be fun. I promise." The lower half of his face was hidden by the mouth of the cup.

[Alliana Porter]

Ally clenched her jaw looking hard up at him. He was far too cocky, and she was way to pissed. Today was just wretched. "Fine...fine whatever." Her accent clung heavily to her words, making her seem more pathetic than she actually was. Well, she was a rather big mess anyway, so it hardly made a difference. Her colour was fading, her muscles beginning to tense. all the indications that she had the flu.

Fun? Really. Since when is ever going to the medical bay fun? She pushed herself up again, and successfully made it to her feet. "You can pour out the milk, but that's my favorite mug mate." She reached out for it, as if it were her only connection to comfort right now. Luke would be if he was here, but he wasn't. That and she didn't want to get him sick again. She had caught the flu unexpectedly, and so far had been the only one who had come down with it. She walked slowly behind, then next to jay. Being taken care of wasn't something she was fond of. Her pride wouldn't let her live it down, but she hardly turned down people were being nice just because they felt like it.

[attenwood]

Jay's eyes scoured the surface of the cup noticing that Alliana had clenched her jaw in retort. Jay's reserved doubts were hidden while last of his caff slewed the back of his throat. Swirling the contents around in the empty cup before him his eyes flickered back to Alliana who, evidently, also held her reserves in check. Not that there was anything wrong with that. Everyone was guaranteed their speculations. Hell, the minute you were born you received your ticket. Jay raised his eyebrows again as if stumbling upon something amusing. Everyone was also limited to their beliefs and Jay, deep down past the danger of cinnamon which he had so fondly grown a displacement of figured that it was a 50/50 chance that somebody somewhere was gorging themselves with the stuff. Jay usually never really gambled things on chance. It was the invariable that gnawed him.

The wild card. Jay peered at Alliana studiously. His reservations were gone while she managed to stand on her own free will. Jay curdled his lips in deep mediation while the heat from the plastifoam cup had all but seceded leaving it warm and durable. Now that he thought about he was itching for some action, or something to do that would excuse himself from going back to his little corner of the ship and studying flight manifestations until the breaking hours of the night. Something he wasn't looking forward too. Violently he was snapped out from beneath his reverie and he stood shaking his head. His approach was harsh this he knew. His own reservations were kept under lock and key for the duration of their meeting. "Ah, don't listen to my nagging. Eh. Clearly you feel very strongly about your cinnamon, and quite frankly I assess."

The military does funny thing to a man. Especially one who invests so much time into intelligence. They tend to break down each situation and seek out its worst possible element and use that against the person in question. Very useful for interrogating terrorists and by looks of it, Jay risked looking Alliana up and down very quickly, this stingy person was not a terrorist. Just somebody who desperately sought medical attention for that ugly bug causing her abdominal retching. Jay mused to himself quietly while bringing the cup back to his lips only to chew thoughtfully on the rim holding it from beneath. Probably saying that the doctor would probably hand her a nice juicy lollipop for being a good patient was probably asking for it and luckily the cup concealed his critical smirk. While she managed to stand beside him looking like she had just seen a ghost...

Jay was quick to judge, in his mind, that quite possibly cinnamon might not be the agent here and by the sound of her voice it seemed like she truly did indeed favor her spiced milk. Jay brought the cup down now riddled with teeth marks and held it chest high and blowing in from one nostril and out the same one he cleared his throat. "Let's not get off on the wrong foot," to be honest with himself, he didn't know where he was going with this, "Rank doesn't mean anything. As of now call me JJ." There would be time to beat himself up later. Maybe submerge his entire head until freezing cold water and flog himself for desert. Right now someone need abrupt medical attention and it was his duty to make sure the crew worked to the best of their capacity and then some.

[Alliana Porter]

Jay or 'JJ" as he had titled himself was slightly more talkative than she expected. He seemed more decent of a guy than she expected, but then again she hardly knew him. She watched him glance her over, figuring out what to do with her. She knew she was defiantly easy on the eyes, but one would have to be blind or stupid to not see she was head over heels in love with the Pilot. She could tell that wasn't what he was after.

It wasn't that she was rude or had a grudging nature, she just literally felt like hell and anyone who tried to make contact or be nice was just in the danger zone. She bit her lip hard, forcing a drop of blood to release on her tongue. Ally sucked on the wound she had created for a moment, walking with jay in silence. She was slow, but he seemed to be staying by her side.

Alliana rubbed her forearm absently, feeling the dull, weary ache beginning to consume her. She was incredibly desperate to return to her bunk again, but they had finally reached the medical bay and her moment of healing, well if not moment if antibiotics, was upon her. The place was till a frantic mess with victims form the explosion but she found an empty medical bed in the room and pushed up shakily with her arms. Every little bit hurt, but she was managing.