SOme things stay the same

Posted on Mon May 27th, 2019 @ 12:54am by Lieutenant Commander Peter Garabaldi & Maria Garabaldi

1,826 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Episode 98 - A Raid on Peace
Location: Starbase 400: Personal quarters and Curious Goods
Timeline: MD 1 Morning/Early afternoon.

Once they arrived back at the starbase Maria and Peter had been assigned quarters. Away from the shop. Roberto was still unsure. The strange man who came in was his dad?

So she had been dealing with that, he was 3, he had no clue who the strange man was, even though she had told him this was her father.

Plus Peter was getting used to being back in Starfleet, going where he wanted, not having to ask permission. Thankfully that was an easy habit for him to get to.

Peter was up early and looking around the new quarters they had been assigned. He took a bit to stare at the wedding picture then next to it was the flag, that had draped over his coffin.

Not many people would be holding the flag over their coffin. But it had been a weird few days.

He put the display case back then headed to the replicator, that was something he could get used to. They had begun to separate the households with Jaca, which was another reason Roberto was cranky, he missed Itchi, her Sehlat, who had been a friend to the young boy.

Peter had tried to explain that she could see Itchi whenever, he wanted, however, Roberto had glared at Peter and ignored him.

It was a work in progress Maria kept telling him. Things were getting better, He was staring out the window then he felt a soft warm hand on his shoulder.

“Hey.”

“Hey yourself.” Maria smiled, still getting used to having him back in her life. “Things in the head?”

“Yeah….I’m sorry we haven’t been…..y’know.”

She shrugged, “Babe, it’s like we’re starting from square 1, less than one because you’re also dealing with what happened.”

He sighed, “I know.”

She poked him in the ribs, “Though calling me mistress, is not necessary.”

“Sorry habit. You didn’t want to forget that.”

She paused, “I gotta ask. Everyone hears about Orion women being this….desirable thing, where no man can resist them.”

“Did I?”

“Yeah….” Then she paused, “I won’t be mad….”

Peter shook his head, “I was a slave, less then nothing, No woman would dally with a slave, it didn’t increase your power. Besides, you see them day to day, the cruelty doesn’t exactly make them appealing.”

She looked at him. “You mean that?”

“Yeah, when you see them beat a man for looking them in the eyes, or worst of all castrating one, because it amused them. Really takes the sex appeal out of Female Orions.”

She sighed, “Yeah I see your point.” She rested her head on his shoulder, “I hope I didn’t bring up some horrible memories.”

“It’s ok, we gotta talk about it.” Then Peter sighed, “I just wish Roberto would talk to me, he’s still mad about the move.”

“It’ll take time. As long as he sees he still gets to see Itchi and Auntie Jack will still be part of our life, he’ll calm down. You’re a new person in his life.”

“I know.” He sighed, “I missed so much,”

“It’s not like you went off to Risa to party. You were enslaved, and if the Federation found out.”

“Honestly, either Starfleet would get me out or they’d just cut my throat and dump me somewhere to avoid the chaos. Depending on their mood.”

There was silence. Then Peter spoke, “Hey, why don’t we head down to the shop, I’d want to see this anyway. I’m curious.”

“I’ll get Roberto.”

===

Jaca understood the change in arrangements. When it came to the concept of family, the Djabuul more than understood that. After all, her entire family and extended family managed to spread out to cover Mt. Nevercold in an arrangement of towns and cave settlements. She was keeping her room where it was, she left Roberto’s furniture still in his old room, the rest had all been moved. Only other change was her raising the base temperature of the apartment a few degrees.

She did have a few boxes shipped from home that after some arguing with customs had finally gotten approved that she still hadn’t gotten around to unpacking.

The three of them came in to the shop, and Maria was showing Peter around, Roberto was starting his search for Itchi.

She was showing him some items that had been acquired, including some old earth collectibles, including something called a Furby, which was babbling in the corner.

“So people collected these things?”

“Yeah, some argue it was the first AI experiments, it learned according to what I read.”

“Wow,” He looked at it. “Do these sell?”

“Oh more then you think. Especially to Ferengi.They love that Kitsch, I’ve got a list of Daimons who are waiting for any Monopoly games we find.”

“Do they care about replicated?”

“Some don’t some want the real thing. So we keep feelers out.”

“Well, Daimon Pazarth is singing our praises since I found that Troomph real estate game. Only a matter of time before we get a list going for that one.”, Jaca said as she came down the stairs, promptly followed by a bounding sehlat who was all hoppy feet happy to see Roberto.

“Not surprising.” Maria chuckled as Roberto ran to Itchi and hugged the sehlat around the neck. “They love those old earth Capitalist games.”

Peter watched his son interact with Itchi, he seemed happy. He then asked, “Who collects the old warbooks.” He pointed to the selection.

Maria chuckled, “Klingons usually, they love the stories of glorious battle. So apparantly someone named John Ringo is one of their favorites.”

“Romulans love antiques and clothes.”, Jaca added, “Speaking of, Captain Kyorl messaged ahead. He’s got a cargo hold full of some sizeable mosaics that need appraising and open for negotiation.”

Maria nodded, but she was feeling very awkward. The date had been nice but since their first evening together, she had found her husband, and she still loved Peter and wanted to be with him. Even when she was younger and single, she was never good at ending things, because she didn’t want to hurt someone intentionally.

“When’s he due for the discussions.” Hopefully she can get information to him so he would be forewarned.

Jaca shrugged, “Pretty much he said he was on his way with a lot of cheering from the crew so these have to be pretty good. I’m not sure where we’re going to fit them in the store.”

“Well, let’s see what we get, I’m sure we’re not his exclusive source so we can get the best selections, get them laid out and see what our order list has, I know we’ve had some requests.”

“Other than that, nothing out of the ordinary.”, Jaca said, “The hairpins made at the forge still sell like mad. I can practically make them while sleeping at this point.”

“People love em.” Maria chuckled, They were going through the orders and Peter was helping out, this time cleaning around and keeping himself busy, because he couldn’t just sit around.

Roberto was happy to play with Itchi again, though when Peter came too close, Itchi ‘ruur’ed at him warily, showing fangs.

That made him cautious, which still had Itchi show fangs, to where Maria would cast a glare at the Sehlat for his fangs.

Peter had an idea, “Why don’t I grab lunch, I got backpay anyway, so what does everyone want?” Then he looked at Itchi, “Even you.”

“Something meat’s good.”, Jaca said though Itchi still glared at Peter as if to say ‘You are NOT going to buy my goodwill with tasty food.”

He took the orders anded headed out. He passed through the crowd and dissapeared. It was weird to him, walking around the Starbase he could go out and eat, so he did.

Back in the shop Maria was reorganizing a display and sold a few books and some antiques to people who had come in.

Jaca was in her forge room, knocking out hairpins with enough showman flourish to draw the eye of passersby and get a few to come inside and browse.

For one of many times Maria wished she could have Jaca do smithing demonstrations and have folks forge something simple like hair pins or something, but as had been explained, it would be very difficult for a non-djabuul to do that.if not impossible.

Peter moved through with lunch and began to distribute it, having also gotten Roberto a milkshake, Itchi still glared as he put down a container containing a sliced up steak and some trimmings, not sure what would be ok for the selhat’s stomach.

Itchi bared fangs at Peter, but soon as he looked away, the sehlat ate. However, once Peter looked towards Itchi again, the sehlat made sure to bare fangs at him again. As far as Itchi was concerned, this new biped was going to have to earn his way into things and not bribe with delicious steak.

Jaca took a break from pin making to join them. She did take a moment to pull up Peter’s shirt from the back to take a look at how he healed before nodding in satisfaction. Moving over to Maria, she asked in not the most discreet of whispers, “Is he moving around okay? Everything working? Things rising as they should?”

She looked at her friends, “Yeah he’s walking fine, the other stuff…..we’re taking it slow, I’m still getting used to having him back.”

While Jaca had a fairly decent grasp of the concepts of death and grieving for non-Djabuul, this unique situation was reminiscent of years back when Maria mentioned her husband dying and Jaca oblivious that his essence wasn’t around to talk to. “Y’know, if my mother decided to resume flesh again, I wouldn’t be the baby of the family within a week of your time.”

Maria sighed, “It’s just…. Well, we don’t resume flesh, so when I was told he was dead, I had to get used to him being gone, as in I was alone, I had to get used to that., and just as I was, he’s back, I’ve spent 4 years missing him every day, it’s...overwhelming.” Maria put her hand on Jaca’s shoulder, “So now we have to keep reconnecting...and what he’s been through. We both need healing, before……”

“Fleshly delight is pretty healing too.”, Jaca said with a shrug, convinced that while she was much better than she had been with understanding humans, they were still always going to be a puzzle to some degree.

Maria shook her head and chuckled, Jaca would always be Jaca, No matter how things change.

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