—- Captain’s Quarters —-

The chair was uncomfortable after a certain amount of time. A few hours was fine, but it was not meant for sleeping in, and for all their advancements in technology they had not yet figured out how to cure a leg that had fallen asleep. Captain Adriana Cruz slept in the chair next to the bed of Captain Nathan Hawthorne who was on oxygen at least until they arrived at Starbase 72 for a lung transplant. Captain Cruz had been promoted to see the ship home, given command, but this was still Hawthorne‘s ship at heart, at least in her mind.

She stirred and stood up trying to shake her sleeping leg awake, and restore the blood flow to it.

”You here all night?” Hawthorne asked from the bed. She had not realized that he was awake, but her movements must have awoken him. As if sensing that he was awake the Emergency Medical Hologram activated to take his vitals and interrupt them. A small balding man appeared and began to take the Captain’s blood pressure.

“Trying not to wake you,” Cruz said watching as the Medical Hologram did its work.

Hawthorne tried to sit up but failed, and the Medical Hologram had to restart taking his blood pressure. He looked up at his First Officer, now a Captain in his place who had taken his command out from under him and felt a mixture of pride and sadness. He always knew she’d surpass him some day, but he had assumed it would be years from now, and with another ship. That it was now, and with the USS Seattle was something of an attack on his pride, though he knew it was not her fault. She’d have done anything she could to avoid this, him lying in bed needing new lungs while they raced back to Federation space.

”You can’t Captain during the day and watch over me all night, you need a life Adriana,” Hawthorne said. She was a dedicated officer, and one of the few people he knew would have his back, but the fact was that anyone needed downtime. Even Captains.

”I can do whatever I damn well please I’m the Captain,” Cruz said.

Hawthorne coughed, and took a deep breath of oxygen, “I used to be young and stupid too.”

”You were never young,” Cruz said.

”I take it from the EMH that we’re down staff?” Hawthorne asked.

”All male crew except Lieutenant Commander Young and Doctor Va’Tok are out of service. Most are doing better than you, but won’t be back for a while,” Cruz said sitting down on the bed, she brushed his cheek tenderly.

“I’ll be back,” Hawthorne said.

”New lungs, yeah you’ll be back,” Cruz agreed.

”I think I’ll get an athlete’s lungs,” Hawthorne joke speculated.

”Vulcan lungs,” Cruz said.

Hawthorn chuckled then closed his eyes, “Getting old, and poisoned sucks. Try not to do either.”

”That’s good advice. I left your coffee stuff in the Ready Room, you’ll be back soon,” Cruz said.

Hawthorne was not sure if he was coming back, but he would wait until they were all safely back in Federation territory to raise that. With his eyes closed it was easy to drift off to sleep which is where he went. Cruz sat on his bed for about thirty minutes longer and then left the room, heading to the bridge for lack of anything better to do. As much as she may be told to not work all the time, they were running out of people to be Captain.

—- Bridge —-

When Captain Cruz arrived at the bridge Lieutenant Commander Tashai was sitting in the Captain’s chair reading a PADD. Everyone seemed a little lazy, which was to be expected given that this was the late shift. They had had to abandon the idea of shifts with over half the crew out of action, and so now everyone worked when they could.

“Captain on the bridge,” Tashai announced moving to a secondary seat.

”At ease,“ Cruz said taking the center seat that had recently been vacated by her newly appointed First Officer. She watched the star field on the view screen, as they travelled at warp six back towards Federation space. 

Cruz was quiet then asked her First Officer, who was also the Chief Operations Officer about staffing and got her answer. Adjustments had been made, changes had been made. The crew was being stretched with less than half the active staff they were having to make do with far fewer officers and non-commissioned officers. 

The Seattle had been wounded In a way that none of them had experienced before. They had lost people who were important to them, and now half the crew was there to carry on and get them home. Not one of the women who now crewed the Seattle had not had someone important to them affected. Perhaps, like Tashai, they were not romantically involved with someone but their coworkers, superiors or inferiors they were all connected in ways that was only becoming clear now.

After about an hour the Captain grew restless, and excused herself.

—- Gym —- 

In a t-shirt that red Seattle on the front and the ship’s serial number on the right sleeve. Adriana Cruz wore stretchy track pants. The new Captain entered the gym and found a stationary bicycle and started to peddal. It was nice to do something, to work out her frustration and anger. The activity was the answer to a restlessness that she felt, no more of less than anyone else but the Seattle had been hurt and while there had been a fight against their pirate attackers, there had been no way to get revenge against the Prime Minister of Maya who had lead the attack on the ship.

She knew that she had done the right thing. Nothing was to be gained by harming a woman who was just trying to look out for her people, even if she had done it in an evil way. Cruz had worked up a sweat, trying to find something to do apart from sitting at Hawthorne’s bedside, wondering what to do next.

Lieutenant Claudia Jara entered, “Captain.”

“Lieutenant,” Cruz said between pants.

Jara set down her water bottle and went over to the weight, “You look good sweaty.”

”I needed an outlet that doesn’t include launching photon torpedos at astroids,” Cruz said.

”I can suggest one, if you still have your hall pass from Hawthorne,” Jara said lifting two forty pound hand held weights.

Cruz stopped cycling, “I thought you said I would never be happy again.”

”Well, you might not find salvation, but you can sweat a little more,” Jara said.

Cruz got off the stationary bike, “I can’t promise anything more than…”

Jara shook her head, “Captain, Adriana. I know, I’m just offering you something to burn off some steam.”

—- First Officer’s Quarters —-

Captain Cruz lay not sleeping. Beside her the form of Lieutenant Jara slept. She looked up at the ceiling, wondering when she’d get to rest. She had been assured that none of this was her fault, and yet she still felt guilty. Nothing felt like how it was supposed to. She had been on a pathway to command and yet it had just been handed to her, a ship that was not hers, and would never feel like it was hers. 

She was just a stand-in, and the real Captain would be back soon. So she hoped, though in her deepest fears she worried that was not the case. She feared that Hawthorne who loved this life more than most she met, would be stuck behind a desk, made to end his career pushing virtual paperwork.

Cruz closed her eyes, waiting for sleep to come. It eventually found her, after much delay she finally slept.