driftfleet | Twin Roses Mingle

Merlan has been exceedingly quiet and reserved since the rather disastrous but ultimately successful venture on what she's called Cannibal Planet. Repairs were made quickly but she was still in Engineering tinkering, holed up in a certain mage's quarters, or tucked into a chair tight with a blanket and tea just thinking all of it through. Normally, she'd be exploring the ship or chatting someone up but this is...weird and something she has to get used to as Fleet crew, she imagines.

A. Sometimes quiet is the best thing for recovery. And surviving the experience down on that planet had been trying to say the least. She could have lost Khadgar and nearly had. Merlan pulled the blanket up over her knees and hugged them to her chest. Hadn't she faced worse back home? After all, she was a Hunter and it was time to face things with a smile.

A quiet smile.

She put her chin against her cheek and floated her cup of tea into the air just because she could. No restrictions, here.

B. Merlan sat in the middle of Engineering, her eyes close, her pose relaxed as she crossed her legs and listened to the hum of the engine itself as it rumbled. Was the pitch of it off? Was there something left to fix? Her expression remained puzzled as she found the correct pitch in her mind and compared the two. They were essentially fine, airborne, no issues reported. But there was always a but.

"But what?" she grumbled under her breath. "Something still seems off, mm? What am I to do about that?"

C. Wildcard. Find her curled up somewhere like a lost kitten or something. Your choice!

[Kitty steps quietly into engineering and watches Merlan for a moment.] Funny place to try yoga. [Doesn't actually think she's doing yoga, but isn't sure what she is doing.]

I suppose it's zen enough to say that I'm listening to the engines' hum in order to figure out what I've missed. She sounds a little off, somehow.

[Merlan doesn't open her eyes as she wrinkles her nose a little bit.]

Still feels like she needs a little tweak somewhere.

Interesting. Technomancer? [Okay, it's a weird guess, but she's lived a weird life. And she's usually more about checking readings than listening for humming when she works on the engines.]

[She thinks about it, tilting her head slightly.]

Mmm, kind of? I'm a mechanical engineer an a mage, so, I guess it's a combination of things. With this thing they stuck in our heads, I know how the engine ought to sound but I still think it could sound better.

[Merlan shrugs slightly and then shakes her head.]

Then again, I really enjoy the technology we're getting to mess around with, so I guess I could just be overthinking things.

You were a mechanical engineer and a mage back home? Where do you find the time? [She smiles a bit before walking over to a control panel to check some of the diagnostics.]

Whatever keeps us in the lack of air. I spent a lot of time getting the ship back together after the crash, but some of it was a little more down and dirty until we can get some more uncrashed parts in.

I suppose I'm pretty much a collector of knowledge, really. [Merlan shakes her head a little.] I just kinda soak it in, you know? Mechanics and magic have both been so fascinating that combining the two seemed like a genuinely fun goal in life. I do consulting work to find the, ah, hobby.

There a nod as she rises to observe Kitty with curiousity.

Anything I can do to help with that? I mean, this is more your ship than mine so I'm not really doing anything but listening at this point. I'm sure if we put our heads together, we can come up with something pretty cool. I'd wanted to work with hydroponics on the SS Bloodsport but that requires some sort of upgrade.

[She absently touches the thing attached to her head with a grimace. It didn't hurt when there was an upgrade or a switching of posts for that matter. It was just really weird ]

[She winces slightly at the word "upgrade."] Vision set up a pretty impressive garden here. Well, he set up one on the Windrose. I'm not sure who set it up on the Three Twins, but now we have both after the merge. [Just moving right along without asking if she's familiar with that history.] So, there's definitely some hydroponics structure to start from already and fortunately, it's not Atroma-based design so anyone can learn it without our generous overlords having us pay them so they can more deeply infiltrate our minds with our consent. [Someone may not be too fond of that concept. It might show? A little? She's also a little extra...well, "extra" about it right now since she's also feeling a little guilty about choosing to switch her augment from pilot to engineer after Winn left so she could better work on plans to get to him.]

Whenever I set up something new I try to put together my own tech using what I can find on the planets. It doesn't affect any of the ships' vital systems, but I can show you that stuff too since the augments won't cover it. And as far as the rest goes, the ship still needs some help after what slamming into the ground did to it, [Giving her a smile] so it's a good thing I'm not the only engineer anymore.

[The wince doesn't go unnoticed and Merlan tilts her head slightly, trying to figure out just what she'd said that had provoked the response. Ah. The crap attached to their brains. Merlan finds herself at odds with Kitty's thinking on that but puts it aside in favour of working with the woman.

While gaining the proper knowledge to navigate the Atroma technology would have been useful, there's no reason to antagonise her fellow engineer by suggesting the upgraded workspace might be particularly useful.]

If we already have the basics then getting the workspace seems like overkill. I wouldn't be opposed to working on enhancements to whatever we have. I definitely have no objection to using my own skills for any of this. Collaboration has always been my forte. So, by all means, let's put our heads together and figure out how to get fresh fruits and vegetables into our menu, yeah?

Maybe some flowers as well. The only thing I'm a little concerned about is that we haven't anything for pollination.

[It's one of those things she feels strongly about. On most things she's very willing to consider all sides. Not that she hasn't considered other sides of this, but she still comes back with a pretty rigid stance whereas she's normally more relaxed. It reminds her of too many of the bad parts of home with the brainwashing and too many of the bad parts of her last interdimensional prison with the virtual reality world they were living in and didn't realize wasn't real for most of their stay. So, the general mind warping and manipulation. Plus, you'd have your days when you'd wake up and think you'd been married to someone the whole time or suddenly have new emotions overriding your real ones. They liked to get creative and play with them. Keeping some semblance of control over her thoughts and agency is vitally important to her especially after those experiences.

She's relieved when Merlan doesn't push the idea of getting the upgrade. Because as important as it is to her she also hates the idea of holding the ship back or putting anyone in danger because she didn't want an upgrade that would affect her. She manages to keep it to herself when someone upgrades security or another division she isn't in even though she worries they'll be compromising themselves. She works hard to keep improving things in other ways instead.]

Yeah, most of our stock right now is herbs—medicinal and otherwise. [Though definitely heavy on medicinal since that was Vision's aim on the Windrose as well as Ander's aim on the Three Twins.]

Though we do have some bacon-flavored kelp. It's surprisingly bacony though the texture is not even close. They help perk up flavors, but fruits and vegetables would be good. Flowers too, sure. It'll depend a lot on what we can find on the planets we visit, but I think expanding is a good idea. Anything's better than the space food.

Agreed. Adding fresh fruit and vegetables to the menu already makes my mouth water. Fingers crossed for the next planet. I'm definitely interested in expanding the herbs and spices if only to improve the quality of our food.

[She smiles slowly, thinking about it.]

That's definitely within the realm of possibility

I appreciate the food-forward thinking. Who needs medicine, right? [It may sound sarcastic, but she's serious. The ships seem to provide for their medical care. They care less about flavor profiles and the previous plant curators on the ship had all been focused on medicine. Not that she was about to pull those plants out or anything.]

I keep hoping we run into a planet where they have ice cream plants or pizza plants. [Kidding...and yet they find a lot of weird stuff.]

Mm. [Merlan offers a slight shift of her shoulders.] There's something medicinal about fresh food, too, I guess. Mostly, I've been thinking about growing food because when we're drifting out here, who knows what the next planet will be like.

Ice cream and pizza plants aside.

[She smiles.] Tell me about it. When we hit February I'll have been here two years. There were definitely some food droughts. I mean, there's always the space food. Not starving is good [and back home that wasn't a foregone conclusion. Food was scarce and not always safe] but I wouldn't mind some better storage capacity for keeping things preserved in between too.

We can work on that as well. All we really need are parts and housing or I can work on a preservation warding. There are all sorts of alternatives, especially if we want to be creative about it.

[She's all smiles at the idea of creativity.]

I'm all about getting creative. I can't say I understand the magic angle, but I saw it be pretty useful back in my last home away from home, interdimensional abduction. And here too.

It's been pretty fascinating learning more about magic, here, that's for sure. Back where I'm from I enjoy the engineering aspect of it because that's pretty much what magic is, well, that and cooking - I enjoy that as well. It's a challenge, like building or adding onto a hydroponics set up.

Cooking? You should've lead with that, my new favorite person. [Smiling.]

Twin Roses Mingle

OTA

B

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