cthia wrote:I wonder how many crushes there are, but protocol, as in chain of command, or age, comes into play. How many Captains or Commanders must fight with a hankering to have a hunk of Ensign? Or vice versa.
How many would develop a crush on Abby but tread lightly about her Grayson heritage, or her armsman.
Sort of like trying to approach a President's older daughter. What are you bringing to the table. I'm just a college student, she's the First Daughter.
Somehow, "I like you for who you are," no longer works as something you'd say to her, and coming from her might sound condescending.
So, is Abigail approachable? Is Michelle Henke?
It may be difficult to muster up the courage to ask someone fifth in line to the throne out on a date. Most guys would be afraid of the old rejecting giggle. You know, when a girl puts her hand to her lips trying to cap a laugh.
That's got to be a factor. Then again, both Abigail and Mike leave their aristocratic statuses far away from their personal lives and demeanor. Mateo's presence may make for a mixed message though in that case - goodness knows, the junior officer who wants to fling a proposal at Abigail with Mateo looming there, a chaperone with a license to kill, has got to have big brass ones far beyond his/her years....
Beyond that though, military protocol, facts of life, and in Abigail's case cultural distance can interfere. Anyone seeing Abigail regularly is stuck in the same small ship: it's not only a small dating pool, it's one where you cannot get appropriate distance if things go poorly. (Also - nowhere to hide from Mateo if things go really badly.) How a Manticoran man is supposed to approach a Grayson woman - who is also Miss Owens - is not something that's general knowledge.
If a Manticoran
woman may at all is probably not merely not general knowledge but, given Grayson mores, maybe something that anyone's afraid to ask. Anyone not in the same small ship is not seeing her regularly. And anyone below her in the chain of command (and as tac officer, that's potentially most of the crew) is off limits. Even if Article 119 is frequently disregarded on the sly, that's not something
Abigail Hearns would do.
That enters into it even worse for Mike. 10th Fleet is also flying all over the place all the time, so opportunities to see the same people outside it are few.
If she's going to be at Mesa for awhile, you could try shipping her with Jurgen Dusek. That would at least make a lot of Conservative heads on Manticore explode. Good times!