Deprived

Date: 1 January 2019
Setting: The Shed
Inspiration: This comment by ALC is the seed text.
.
Marshal Thomas Nguyen shuffles papers, prepares for his second meet-and-greet of the morning: his new Fightmaster.
A cautious knock and Officer Nothling calls, "Officer Vos is here, Marshal."
"Send him in, please, Officer."
Shuffling footsteps.
Nguyen sets aside his paperwork, stands. "Good morning, Officer Vos. It's a pleasure to—" The massive dark circles around Vos' somewhat vacant eyes register. "What on earth happened?"
Vos—buries a yawn in his shoulder—taps on a mobile he fumbles from a pocket, shows it.
- Traveling -
"Dear god, you poor man, please, get some more sleep." Nguyen smiles kindly. "Dismissed."
Vos salutes, tromps out, nearly trips over Chantell and her dark sunglasses in the process.
"Who's the zombie?" she mumbles.
"Takes one to know one, Officer." Settles behind his desk, shuffles papers. "Our new Fightmaster."
"He gonna be okay?"
"With some sleep. What about you, Officer?"
"Had maaaaybe a little too much to drink last night."
"And the Jones brothers?"
"Wouldn't wanna be /them."
Nguyen gazes heavenward. "At least they're not the triplets," he sighs.
.
""Good morning, Joneses!"" sings Walker, a little whiskey rasp to his voice.
""Fu' u'f,"" grumbles Ace from his room across the hall.
Against Nate's chest, Spock groans.
Nate pushes up on an elbow, coos, smooths his bedhead.
Spock sighs happily, wiggles closer, tightens his arm around her waist.
Walker sticks his head in the doorway, blinks bloodshot eyes, greets, "Morning, Ms Barclay-Harvey."
Nate smiles, bobs her head, continues carding Spock's hair.
"I have to know: how are you so ... /sparkly after last night?"
"Trade secret, Walker," smirks Nate.
"Which I will extort from you someday."
"You shouldn't get your hopes up, Jamie dear. Bedding Rangers isn't my only skill."
"Which leaves me wondering why you're not running the family business already."
"Perhaps I'll change my focus once I have my bedpost fully carved."
Walker snorks loudly.
Spock startles at the noise, pries his eyes open, peers blearily at Nate. "Where'd ye come fr'm?" he slurs.
"I'd love to say 'straight out of your dreams', honey, but that would be rather presumptuous of me, don't you think?"
Walker snickers, flicks a salute, and disappears.
Spock flops onto his back, scrubs a hand down his face. "Seriously. How'd you get here?"
"If you don't remember taking me home after last call—and what we got up to after we got here—I'm /clearly losing my touch."
Spock furrows his brow.
"You have no memory of how I came to be wearing your pajamas instead of that scrap of lace—"
Spock makes a strangled noise and turns bright pink.
"So you /do remember."
Spock heaves an arm over his eyes, whines.
Nate leans in, whispers in his ear, "What happened afterward was worth much more than a negligée, Handsome."
Spock drops his arm back onto the mattress, raises an eyebrow.
Nate kisses his forehead—
Spock winces, whimpers.
"Headache?"
"God, yes."
"A nice, warm shower will help."
"Shouldn't you—"
"I washed up last night." Shoos. "Get going before your brother beats you to it."
Spock grunts, rolls himself off the bed, staggers through the door.
Nate watches him go, sighs wistfully.
The sound of running water drifts through the air.
Nate eases to her feet, stretches her back. Spare clothes from her bag go on, Spock's pajamas are folded and placed at the foot of his bed, negligée and panties returned to the bag. A quick twist and her hair is ready, a toothpaste tab takes care of her morning breath.
Satisfied with her appearance, she steps out, stops face-to-face with Ace.
He looks down his nose at her.
"Good morning, Ranger," she purrs.
Ace grumps unintelligibly, shuffles toward the washroom.
Nate tiptoes from the suite to the main door, lets herself out.
Three turns and yet /another possible tack to try on Ace and Nate collides with someone solid wearing general staff colours.
The officer stumbles badly; Nate catches them by the upper arm, her hand gripping well-defined muscles. Her hunting instinct twitches to life.
The officer flails back to an even keel, hands fluttering, dark-rimmed eyes wide and apologetic under a mop of fluffy blond curls.
"Are you well?" asks Nate.
Fluffy waves their hands a bit.
"Do you know where your room is?"
Fluffy pats their pockets, something occurs to them, they show her the back of their hand.
"Okay, I know where that is." Takes their arm. "Let's get you to bed."
Fluffy oozes against her in gratitude.
Nate leads them to a single-person suite for Tier Two staff.
Fluffy fumbles with their ID—
Nate offers—
Fluffy accepts with a relieved smile.
—swipes the card through the lock, pushes open the door.
Fluffy makes a beeline for the bedroom, paws at their laces, kicks off their boots. A twist and they're face-down in the pillow and, by the depth and evenness of their breathing, dead asleep.
Nate pads to the closet, retrieves the standard-issue extra blanket. She drapes it over Fluffy, kisses their temple, whispering, "Sleep well, lovely." 
She pads out of the suite, quietly closes the door, and resumes her journey to the main exit, looking forward to researching the lovely new officer.
Category:Ficlet
Category:Nguyen
Category:Nguyen (ficlet)
Category:Pietr
Category:Pietr (ficlet)
Category:Pietr (description)
Category:Chantell
Category:Chantell (ficlet)
Category:Jamie
Category:Jamie (ficlet)
Category:Logan
Category:Logan (ficlet)
Category:Jackson
Category:Jackson (ficlet)
Category:Nate
Category:Nate (ficlet)
Category:Jackson has a thing for lace
Category:Nguyen's POV
Category:Nate's POV
Category:Sydney Shatterdome (setting)