templemarker

by templemarker

Notes: Gaila/Demora Sulu, PG13. For jain in femslash09. Thanks to affectingly for being a willing ear. This borrows from Star Trek VII: Generations.

***

Gaila was running a few last minute checks on the intermix chambers when a young, single-minded face popped up on the other side of her console. A young, pretty face that reminded Gaila of someone, but she couldn’t quite place who. Faces without enough pigment always slightly confused her anyway, even if they didn’t affect the more interesting parts of hominid physiology.

“Hello,” she said warmly. “You’re probably not supposed to be here. It’s a skeleton crew running checks until this little young boat is ready to go out on her first run.”

“Oh,” the girl said, redness tinging her cheeks, making her far more interesting-looking. “I-I just–”

“Yes?” Gaila said, setting aside her PADD to watch the young one squirm a bit. She hadn’t thought, as she got older, how much she would enjoy the odd balance of power shifting to her because of her age. It was a quirk of the Federation that managing to live a bit longer than other beings gave you status; a quirk she liked rather more than the customs of her homeworld. Age, especially in females, was rarely something to boast of.

The girl looked down, and when she looked up again there was a strong flash of spirit in her eyes. “I was selected to pilot her out of drydock,” she said boldly. “I wanted to understand her a little better. That’s why I’m here.”

Gaila tapped her finger against her lips, a mannerism she’d picked up, delightfully, from Nyota all those years ago. Nyota would do it when she was trying very hard not to say something she thought would be taken poorly. It was unbearably attractive, and more than once Gaila’d managed to tug her into bed for a quick run of oral before Nyota could finish her thought about Gaila’s new fucktoy, or Gaila’s new undergarments, or Gaila’s new…anything.

When Gaila did it, there was the delightful effect on the other person of not quite knowing what she was thinking. It paid out a lot to exploit the Federation prejudice against Orionate culture; she’d climbed to the top of so many classes on the strength of what her coursemates thought she was thinking.

She watched the girl go still, and then even more still, under Gaila’s regard. Gaila thought she had come into her age rather gracefully, considering so few Orionate women ever made it past breeding age. She didn’t have much to compare it to, but she thought the streaks of deep purple complemented the darkening of her skin quite nicely. She had affected a short hairstyle out of curiosity one day, and found that the curls lying against her forehead was actually quite handsome. Even this young ensign, as unmoving as she was under Gaila’s regard, kept stealing glances at Gaila’s face.

Gaila smiled. She had some time. Ensigns often proved quite the diversion–they were young enough that they could still keep up with her.

“What’s your name, Ensign?” she asked, hitting a brief sequence of keys on the console to secure the bay doors.

“Sulu, sir. Ensign Demora Sulu. I apologize for disturbing you, sir, I’ll just take my leave.”

“Oh, Ensign, don’t you want to inspect the warp chamber a little more closely? The UP engineers did a fascinating rework of spatial displacement with the coils against the interior of the nacelles,” Gaila said, letting her voice waver between enticing and authoritative. She did so love being a Lieutenant Commander.

She watched Sulu’s face war between her desire to see the core and her trespassing in Engineering, and was satisfied as the ensign finally settled on her uniquely guided tour.

“Thank you, sir, I would appreciate that,” Sulu said, following Gaila to where the core’s dilithium chambers were pulsing a light, comforting blue.

“You see, how they integrated the fluidity of the design to maximize the generating output of the crystal angles?” Gaila said, placing a hand on the ensign’s new officer reds. She smiled when Sulu’s breath caught, slightly, and pulled her hand back to rest on her hips.

Sulu took another breath and then turned to face her. “Commander, would you like to show me the nacelle tubing? I have heard it is quite…intimate. And beautiful.”

Gaila smiled wider, raising a finger to trace Sulu’s lips, delighting in the shudder that ran through the ensign’s body. “I would love to, Ensign,” she said, and turned in the direction of Nacelle 1, knowing Sulu was not far behind.

In a moment they were bathed in the serene, purple light of the warp coils in off-mode. The warp drive itself wasn’t due to be calibrated and booted until tomorrow, giving just enough time to run diagnostics before the 1701-B took her first run of Sol’s system. Then, the coils would be a fierce, resplendent blue, and most hominids would have to take precautions against going into the J-tubes that ran the length of each of the Enterprise’s nacelles. Now, though, it made for a beautiful spectacle; and if Gaila had her way, an arousing one as well.

Gaila just barely kept herself from laughing at the joyous look on Sulu’s face; yes, this one was Starfleet through and through. How not, when her father was still the jewel in Excelsior’s eye? Young Ensign Sulu had a lot to live up to, but if her passion for starships was anything to go by, she would indeed go far.

“Demora,” Gaila said, using the ensign’s name for the first time, “I would very much like you to experience this…fully.” She rested her hands on the snap-brace of Sulu’s uniform. She had learned delicacy from Spock, the ability to speak her mind without putting it as plainly as she once would have, as a young Academy cadet herself. She had learned something of innuendo from Kirk, and the art of being forthright from Scotty. For males who were so untutored in the ways of sexual intercourse, they did come up with a useful thing now and again.

There was a breath of hesitation, and then Demora’s hand came up to rest atop Gaila’s own. “Please,” she said, and Gaila moved her hand to the side of the girl’s face, tilted it up, and met Demora’s mouth with her own.

She just barely restrained herself from saying, “Still got it,” but since she knew she would never lose it anyway, it was merely satisfyingly redundant.

***