[FIN] Lull

[Gwennythe]

Things were settling for Tambrey as much as things could given the recent events.
Stepped up security protocols governed lab activity, but it didn't bother her; as a grunt, restrictions were the 'norm' in a lot of the work she found herself doing.
She was grateful that Octavia had already grown enough to be outside experimentation; she doubted that she and Rory would have been able to continue with it. To be honest, she wasn't sure they'd have had time to continue with the cloning experiment like that and the thought that they might have had to abandon the project... Well, Octavia was in her pokéball; things were well on that front.

The dark haired grunt finished up clearing away, and counting in, the cleaned lab equipment, getting along with her assigned work, despite her mind lingering on what the more secure, inner sections of the, labs might look; what activity might be going on in them right at the moment?
There wasn't time to linger though.
Despite it all, Tambrey was excited to 'clock out' of the labs, wash her hands, and hang up her lab coat.
She was in uniform, but she still paused to fix her hair and look at self, fussing a little, in one of the bathrooms, on her way toward the canteen.

It was a little hard to have a date (and she wondered when she had, and even if she should have, started thinking of it in that term) within the confines of the base. Plus, their meeting place was a little public to consider it such a thing, but her emotions, and her mind, seemed to insist on treating it and calling it as such.

She realised that she was running behind and quickened her step; canteen or not, date or not, she was nervous enough to worry about being 'late' apparently.  

[LexThetaSigma]

Rory had been up in his room since his shift had ended; he had been put on shorter shifts in the labs that mostly consisted of cleaning while his shoulder healed. He had come up there when he was done and taken one of the pain pills the infirmary had given him after they had removed the metal from his shoulder and stitched him up. They had done a pretty good job, though they had admitted a stray sliver had broken off and they hadn't been able to get it out. Now he was on his way to recovery, though the wound was still tender; the stitches hadn't been removed yet.

He checked his Rocket-dex and noticed the time; he had promised Tambrey he would meet her for dinner after her shift was over. He forced himself up off of his bed and pulled a blue flannel shirt on over his black t-shirt, wincing slightly as the stitches tugged when he moved his arm.

Ignoring the snickers he could hear coming from the little mouse pokemon sitting on Shadow's bed, Rory rolled his eyes and made his way down to the canteen.  

[Gwennythe]

By some twist, perhaps thankfully, Tambrey thought, the pair would find themselves walking toward eachother, aiming for the same door, at the same time.

It certainly seemed to quell one part of the awkwardness that Tambrey'd felt she'd suffer upon having to spot Rory at a table and walk over there, or, had she, by some unlikely occurrence, found herself here first, the awkwardness of waiting for him at a table.

The situation did lead to an awkwardness of it's own though; she felt shy... anxious.. in that she couldn't keep a smile that she thought looked silly from her mouth.
Warm, pleasant, welcoming... and some other more intriguing words, she supposed after all, were terms she'd have been happy with as descriptives for her expression, but all she could think of was 'dopey', 'awkward' and 'anxious'.
She was sure she didn't look particularly interesting in her uniform and with such a smile, but it was too late now.
She could see him and she was sure he'd have spotted her by now, otherwise they were about to literally bump into eachother. Well, except that she was going to ruin it by speaking anyway.

"Hey!" She squeaked. Tambrey mentally blinked and frowned at herself. That wasn't what she wanted to do.
Her eyes moved up and down though, covered by the guise of 'adjusting her glasses' by her hand, as she looked Rory over.
Black t-shirt and the blue suited him well... She wondered briefly, about his injured shoulder, eyes lingering toward it; she remembered the blood, but she had to admit, looking at him now, he looked good.
A clear of her throat and her eyes snapped back to look properly at him, focusing back into joining with the 'silly' smile she'd been offering.  

[LexThetaSigma]

As he was walking, Rory managed to spot Tambrey heading right towards where he was going. A soft smile that he was sure matched her own as she caught sight of him. At her squeak, a quick chuckle left his lips.

"Hey yourself," Rory responded. He noticed her fiddling with her glasses, but the fiddling didn't distract from the feeling of her eyes watching him. He had noticed she had been doing that a lot lately, focusing mostly on his shoulder when she was staring at him. Not that he minded; it left a strange feeling in his chest and caused him to faintly blush when she did it, but he was fine.

He opened the door and motioned for her to go in ahead of him, "Shall we?"  

[Gwennythe]

A smile being returned was surely a good sign, she felt... The chuckle, didn't seem like it was meant to make her feel bad at all, and she'd have been surprised if it had been; it actually was... nice. Weird to find the sensation of amusing someone accidentally to be nice, but it was.
She fought, once again, the usual losing battle with a blush.

He opened the door and she acted on prompt, walking through as he gestured for her to, though slow enough that she wouldn't get too far ahead of him as she found she really, really wanted to ask;
"Thanks... Um, so how are you? And, um, your shoulder?" Questions that were pretty much daily at the moment.  

[LexThetaSigma]

Rory rolled his eyes at her questions as he walked along side her, "I'm fine and my shoulder's fine," To prove his point, he put his right arm around her shoulders making sure to bite back the wince when he raised his arm. "How are you?"  

[Gwennythe]

"Hrm."
It wasn't a satisfied noise, but there wasn't much protest in it either.
Rory's arm across her shoulders was a nice feeling, though she'd have felt guilty, most likely, had she caught the wince he'd bitten back.
"If you say so... Sorry... Just, there was a lot of blood."

"I'm okay." It wasn't really a lie, she told herself; she was 'okay'. Or what passed for it here on the base anyway. "Um. Labs are still all, y' know..."

Nightmares, near constant stress and a growing culmination of different guilts making her heart heavier when she couldn't, or forgot to, put enough energy in to suppress them. She was 'okay'.
This respite, time spent with him, however, made what she said near enough to the truth for her, for now.
They were approaching the food counter...
She blinked. This was a public place, she suddenly remembered, and here they were, Rory with his arm around her shoulders, about to eat together...  

[LexThetaSigma]

Rory sighed as they got closer to the food line and removed his arm from around her shoulders. "I know, I know. It looked worse than it was," Though the medic had fussed at him for not getting to them sooner, that he was lucky the metal didn't get in any further than it had.

"That's good," if she was willing to let his statements that he was fine slide, he would let her statements of being okay go without comment. "I can't wait until they let me back down there with everyone full time again."  

[Gwennythe]

That brought a smile, despite the disappointment of suddenly having 'empty' shoulders.
"Looked worse?" She shook her head a little. "Maybe but there was blood and metal and it looked really really painful... Just... kind of worrying, y'know?" She admitted.
This was strange; Tambrey was happy to be here, even happy about the stuff that they were just doing without thinkings... in 'public', yet it still felt odd to admit things like that out loud.

She took a tray from the stack available, and then picked up another to offer to Rory.

"I'm looking forward to that too," She admitted further "But it's... y'know... It's different right now. The security stuff is a pain and there's paperwork and mess and noise... Enjoy having a little break, um, while you can." Especially with that injury, she thought but didn't vocalise; it wouldn't be a hard addition to guess at, however.  

[LexThetaSigma]

Rory took the tray from her and got in the line behind her. "It was painful," he admitted, "but there were others down in the hall plus pokemon. They needed the attention more than I did; I was fine compared to some of them," he continued, remembering the agent he had seen down and the Umbreon.

"The break is nice," Rory said as he looked over the offerings for the day, trying to decide what he wanted, "but sometimes I'd just rather be doing something, ya know."  

[Gwennythe]

"Hrm." Tambrey bit at her lip; she couldn't really object to something that was technically true. He'd been able to move, function and work through his injury a lot more than some. Still, she'd have preferred it if he'd gotten seen to immediately, and the argument she'd been pressing for was that, as someone still able-bodied at that time, keeping himself so would have been better. It wasn't one that would do any good now though, and honestly, for the moment, she just wanted to enjoy the lunch date.

She smiled; the part of him that wanted to be active was definitely attractive.
"Well, um. How is Pinkie? Maybe there's some training or... recovery exercise that's, y'know, not too strenuous that the two 'f you could do together? Then you'd be doing stuff without hurting y'self right?"  

[LexThetaSigma]

The little noise she made at his statement caused him to bite back a grin as he grabbed a jello cup from the food offerings. It was nice to have someone that worried about him that much, even if the repetitiveness got aggravating. He hadn't had anyone like that in his life since he came to Kodo. Taking his cue from her, he dropped the subject and moved on.

"She's doing okay; her and Jace are healing quicker than I am," Then again, their injuries hadn't been as deep as his was. "I've been doing a bit of training with them, even getting Thor to listen a bit more and work with them. I tried going down to the exercise room, though, but that didn't work out too well."  

[Gwennythe]

Tambrey's tray, at a glance, looked a little 'green'. A cheap-looking salad joined an apple and a fruit juice.
Some culmination of feelings had, at least temporarily, driven her back into vegetarian habits for the moment.
She grabbed a little plastic fork from the dispenser, setting it atop her salad pot.

"That's good," She replied, with a pleased smile; her worry extended to his pokémon and she was glad to hear they were healing well "It's a pity we can't speed up our healing with the pokémed machines and stuff..." A scientific problem she often wondered if there was a solution to, but she couldn't see a way past it, despite the rumours of what some talented researchers had managed to do (though, usually accidentally and to themselves).
Immediately there was a touch of concern behind her glasses and, perhaps, to the tone of her question.
"What happened in the exercise room?"  

[LexThetaSigma]

Rory took his time deciding which of the meals to partake of before finally settling for what the place passed off as meatloaf and mashed potatoes. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted the desert offerings and grabbed a couple cupcakes to go with the jello he grabbed earlier.

"It would definitely be an advantage if we could," the grunt said as he rolled his shoulder to loosen it up. He grabbed his own plastic wear before gesturing the best he could for her to lead them to a table. "I just overdid it with the weights and popped a stitch or two. It's fine though."  

[Gwennythe]

The gesture was caught and she chose a table next to a wall, walking over to it at a slow pace. Surely she couldn't think Rory's injury would affect his walking speed, and yet, she was making sure not to get too far ahead of him after all.
Of course, it was also helpful that it meant she could continue to talk to him as they walked.

She spun around, mid-step, and took the last few steps backward to the table, upon hearing what he said. Immediately, she was fighting a frown as her eyes sought out his shoulder; almost as though she feared it would, now, suddenly be bloody again.

"But-" She started, caught herself, and shook her head. "Okay. Sorry... Stuff like that though. Please, be careful? I... I really don't like the idea of you hurting yourself." It was said like an apologetic confession, because she didn't want to annoy by fussing further, but apparently it was something she couldn't ignore or subdue within.