A Return to Normalcy

Posted on Thu Aug 14th, 2025 @ 6:05pm by Senior Chief Petty Officer Jadizon Enor & Lieutenant JG Katie Kellerman

Mission: Lower Decks
Location: Jadizon's Quarters/TBD

Katie gave a slight yawn as she walked down the corridor, padd in hand. She'd been crawling over their captured satellite with Jenna most of the day, and was eager to get out of her uniform. She also wanted to check on Jadizon. He'd been relatively good the past few days about recovering, but she knew he was getting cabin fever, and she didn't want him suffering with his thoughts alone.

She walked up to his quarters and tapped the code he'd given her. As the doors opened she stepped inside, smiling at him relaxing in bed. "Hey," she said, walking over and leaning over to give him a kiss. "How are you feeling?"

Jadizon was sprawled in bed, propped up on one elbow, surrounded by a small battlefield of scattered PADDs like he’d been waging war with the ship’s supply manifest. He didn’t even glance up when Katie came in—just tapped through one screen, made a face, and swapped it for another. Jadizon then finally glanced up from the small fortress of PADDs spread across his bed, one eyebrow arched over a faint grin.

“Like a man buried alive in reports,” he said, setting one down on the blanket and patting the spot beside him. “Half of these are actual work… the other half are people thinking their problems are my problems.”

He shifted slightly, careful of his shoulder, and gave her a more genuine smile. “But aside from that? Better. Still itching to get out of here before I start naming the bulkheads… but better.”

He tilted his head toward the scattered PADDs. “You, on the other hand, look like you’ve been wrestling with that filth all day. Which of us is supposed to be recovering again?”

"You are," Katie said, sticking he tongue out as she kicked off her boots. "Which is why you're lying in bed." She leaned over again, inhaling. "And Kally's perfume wound indicate you weren't just buried in PADDs all day." She smirked and removed her uniform, folding it up and putting it with his dirty clothes to be recycled. "But, I don't blame you for being a bit stir crazy. So, how about this." She sat down next to him and held his hand. "I'm going to take a much-needed sonic shower, then I'll replicate something to wear and we can see about a short walk to the rec lounge for a bite to eat and some socializing."

“Or…” he said casually, “you could take an actual shower. Hot water, steam, the kind that fogs up the mirror so bad you could hide a Ferengi debt collector in there and nobody would know.” He flicked his eyes down at the PADD again and groaned. “Who in the hell put in a requisition for thirty-two kilos of dehydrated kelp? and someone decided we needed three dozen emergency raktajino mugs with the ship’s registry etched into them. I swear, half this crew treats the quartermaster’s stores like a damn flea market.”

He tossed the PADD toward the foot of the bed, grabbed another, and muttered something about “someone wasting replicator credits on plush targ toys” before setting it aside. “I’ll join you in the shower,” he added smoothly, still pretending to be absorbed in the reports. “Purely for safety reasons, of course. Wet decks, high heat— Plus it'll give me a chance to get my mind off these damn requests.... Everyone needs a new enlisted personnel it's like we that easy to conjure up.”

Finally, he looked up at her with a sly grin. “You know… we’ve never actually talked about this,” he said, gesturing between them. “Since I’ve got Kally, does that mean I’ve got you too? Are we a throuple? Or like… two separate couples who combine into some kind of relationship Voltron when we’re together? And what about the crew—do they think I’m a legend… or just the guy who accidentally pulled rank on the galaxy’s strangest domestic arrangement?”

He gave her a mock-thoughtful look, then smirked and tossed the last PADD onto the pile. “Anyway…” he said, leaning back, “about that water shower…”

"I'm surprised you have access to a real shower," Katie said. She was excited by the idea, as she greatly preferred real water, but that thrill was overshadowed by what he said after. She gave him a long, serious look. "You're right," she said. "We haven't talked about it. I suppose we were all too busy just having a good time." She looked down at her lap. "And I guess I assumed a few things." She sat still for a moment, then looked at him. "I'd like to think it's the other way around," she said. "You have me, and you get Kally too. Maybe that's just me being a bit selfish, but...I've been letting myself think we have a connection, and something a bit deeper than just sex. Correct me if I'm wrong, of course," she said. "And as for a throuple?" She gave a small shrug. "Nothing we haven't done before, but Kally isn't usually in it for the romance."

She gave him a slightly scolding look. "And we aren't going around the ship advertising this arrangement," she said. "But we both know how gossip on a ship is, so I'm sure your 'legendary status'" she made quotation fingers, "will be common knowledge at some point." She looked at him, feeling a bit vulnerable. "So I guess I want to know...what do you want?"

Jadizon smirked faintly, still flipping through a PADD. “Perks of the job, — I get the sonic for duty days and the water for when I actually want to feel human again. Chief of the Boat has to keep the crew squared away, and you can’t do that if you’re running on nothing but recycled air and vibration baths.”

He stopped mid-scroll, the words hanging in the air. His brow furrowed. “Damn,” he muttered, setting the PADD down with a small thud, “I just sounded like a complete ass, didn’t I?”

"Little bit," Katie said, dryly.

Sliding over, he closed the space between them, his tone gentler. “Katie… you’re not wrong. About any of it. I wasn’t trying to diminish what we’ve got. Hell, if anything was going to give me ‘legendary status’ around here, it wouldn’t be the relationship rumors—it’d be the fact I beat death at its own game. Came close to losing, but… I didn’t. And I’m not about to take what I have now for granted.”

He reached out, his fingers curling around hers, eyes locked on hers. “I’m sorry if my words made it sound casual. It’s not. I hear you—and I feel it too. That connection you’re talking about? It’s real.”

Then his gaze softened even further. “Here—close your eyes.” When she did, his own lids lowered, and the air between them seemed to still. He didn’t push deep—just enough for a wash of warmth to slip into her mind: safety, trust, the quiet certainty of being wanted. She could feel the echo of his heartbeat, steady and strong, and the unspoken truth threaded through it—You matter. You’re not temporary.

He opened his eyes again, voice low. “That’s what I want. Us—whatever form that takes. And I’ll be damned if I let crew gossip define it before we do.”

Katie kept her eyes closed, trying to sort out everything she was feeling. When she felt his mind pull back she gathered herself and blinked away a couple of tears, then opened her eyes, giving him a small smile.

Jadizon let the moment linger before leaning back just enough to smirk at her. “I want you both,” he said plainly. “And if anyone short of the Captain’s got something to say about it… well, they might want to remember I control the drills around this ship. And the duty rosters.”

Katie gave a small laugh, sniffling slightly. "You think you can roster them into silence?"

He tilted his head, that sly edge creeping into his tone. “Officer or enlisted, I’ve got some pull there. Amazing how fast a person can find themselves on a double-shift damage control drill at oh-five-hundred if they start running their mouth.”

He gave her hand a squeeze, the grin softening into something warmer. “Point is, Katie—I’m not hiding, and I’m not letting anyone else define what we’ve got.”

Katie nodded. "All right," she said. She squeezed his hand and smiled. "Sounds good. And I can assure you, Kally's on board. And being the ship's doctor, she can assign them all physicals once per week and make them uncomfortable. And I can turn the holodecks off. So, basically, as trio, we have total control over the crew." She gave a slight giggle.

She watched him in silence for a moment more, pushing her fears and her uncertainties back down. She stood up and removed the rest of her clothing, adding it to the clothes for the recycler, then turned back to him. "I'd appreciate your assistance," she said. "You know...for my safety." She smiled and disappeared into the bathroom.

Jadizon stared at the half-open bathroom door for all of three seconds before the decision hit him like a phaser shot.

The padds slid off his lap in a messy cascade to the deck as he swung his legs over the bed, ignoring the twinge in his shoulder. “To hell with this,” he muttered, pushing himself up and moving—fast enough to make it clear he had purpose. Steam shortly swallowed them both as the door hissed shut. The sound of the water rose, and into the shower they went—padds, ranks, and everything else forgotten in the heat.