The silence in Harry’s office was deafening. He looked everywhere in the room except at the woman sitting in front of him. It’s been a few years since he last saw her, but nothing’s changed. She still had her red hair pulled back in a ponytail, her freckles still accentuated her green eyes, and she still looked like she wanted to kill him.

“Is this going to be a problem, Lieutenant?” Harry gestured between them.

“No, sir,” Sybil said through gritted teeth.

“Alright, you’re dismissed, first briefing is at 0900 tomorrow. Welcome aboard the Niagara,“ he said, holding out his hand.

Sybil stood up, keeping her hands clasped behind her back.

“Sir.” She tilted her head and walked out of the office, leaving Harry standing there awkwardly with his hand outstretched.

Harry let his hand drop and sat back down with a sigh. She hadn’t changed, and apparently, neither had her feelings towards him. It had been a few years, maybe she’ll soften up, maybe they could go back to the way things used to be.

A few minutes later, Harry picked up his PADD and stepped out of his ready room, the tan walls were suffocating him, and if he didn’t get a change of scenery soon, his thoughts would keep circling back to places he didn’t want to go. He needed the familiar hum of the warp core. He couldn’t fix the past, but at least in engineering there would be plenty for him to fix.

Several minutes later, Harry stepped into engineering only to be greeted by his Chief Engineer shouting.

“That console is on fire!” barked Piper.

Harry lingered in the doorway as an ensign ran over to put out the fire. The atmosphere down here was chaotic; he missed the chaos.

“Piper,”

“Okay, let’s re-route power to the third conduit on this line-”

“Piper!”

“What?!”

“What the hell are you doing to my ship?”

Piper poked her head out of a maintenance hatch. “putting lipstick on a pig and sending it off to the fair.” She flashed a half-smirk.

“…did you just compare my ship to a pig?”

“Our ship, and yes, yes, I did. Now bring me a hyperspanner. Unless you want to be sitting here for another day,” Piper raised her eyebrow.

Harry picked up a hyperspanner from a nearby toolbox and walked over to the hatch that Piper was working in.

“Make some room,” he said while grunting.

Piper moved over some so that Harry could fit inside the hatch. The two of them worked in silence for several minutes.

“Okay, spit it out,” Piper said, putting her tool down.

“What?”

“You’re the captain of a starship and you’re down here doing grunt work. I love you, but this is my department now. Your department is up there,” Piper pointed upwards.

The slight hum of the warp core lingered between them for what felt longer than a few minutes.

“Okay, I need you to take a deep breath and remember that I am legally obligated to throw you in the brig should you act on your gut instinct,” Harry took a deep breath. “You’ll be reporting to Sybil.”

Piper stared at Harry for a minute, then started laughing uncontrollably.