Operation: Onboard

Posted on Mon Apr 22nd, 2019 @ 9:07am by Commander Rita Paris & Lieutenant JG Rena Pacci

Mission: Detours
Location: USS Hera, Deck 10, Starboard Airlock Hatch
Timeline: 2396, docked at Artan Family Fortress

The new ops chief was a Betazoid, according to the dossier. Which meant that Commander Rita Paris was going to be able to communicate in shorthand. Which was going to be handy in authenticating a new department head when they were preparing to begin the Tribunal, which made any new arrivals suspect. Empathy and telepathy on a scale such as Sonak had once weilded was impressive. The old-school officer just hoped this one wasn't as psychotic as the last.

Pacing in the corridor, she tapped away at the ever-present PaDD in her hands with another tucked under her rm. The gold minidress of her era stood out in the modern uniforms of unisex tunics and blacks, save for those who opeted for a skirt. But her anachronistic uniform had a loose open V collar in black that serve as home for the three pips of Commander, although the two solid braids on her wrist would portray the same rank to personnel of her day. Black leggings added a modern flair as well, leading into the sturdy black knee-high explorer's boots she wore.

While her sandy blonde hair was cur into a short, almost boyish asymmetrical cut, nothing else about the woman could possibly be seen as boyish. An abundance of bosom bounced within the velour uniform, while it clung to a slender wasp wait, before stretching out over the fulsome curves of her hips. Only in her early thirties, Rita Paris was a bombshell of a bygone age, a literal Starfleet poster girl in her prime.

Rena was running behind, which almost never happened, in fact it shouldn't have happened but there was a misalignment with the transporter that tried to beam her things over to the Hera only to have the signal bounce back into utter chaos. The Betazoid had patience like a saint, but as the time ticked by and the transporter officer couldn't stop her thongs from literally bouncing off the walls she decided to cut her losses.

"Look just keep the damn things and when you get your anina together beam my things to the Hera," she had told the officer before grabbing the one bag she didn't beam over and made a run for it to the docking bay. The long black curls flew back as she ran, no more like sprinted towards the docking bay. If she was able to keep up this pace she might make it on time.

The operations officer slowed her pace as she saw the docking bay doors. Good thing she was in shape otherwise she'd be gasping for breath at the pace she was going. " Alright this is a new start Rena," she told her self with a little nod of her head and hit the button to open the door. When the docking bay door opened the Betazoid was greeted by the sight of Cmdr. Paris. "Yail'yla ni mytha," the telepath said out loud. Realizing she just told her new commanding officer that she was beautiful she was thankful it was in an ancient Betazoid language that only the houses spoke.

" I Uhh..Hi! I mean... ma'am, I am Lt.jr grade Rena Pacci. Sorry I'm late there was a transporter malfunction and my clothes were literally flying around the room. I mean you should have seen my...uhh...never mind." The woman cleared her throat and stood to attention. ~Could you possibly be any more awkward~ she told her self.

"Lt.jr grade Rena Pacci reporting as ordered ma'am," the Betazoid said officially. ~ She's going to tell me no thanks. Yup. 3.4857 seconds and you have already talked yourself out of a job~

There was bemusement in the bright blue eyes of the anachronistic astronaut, and she stepped in the path of the junior officer, sliding the tablet behind her back in a 'parade rest' stance. Looking down at the slender woman, the curious cosmonaut smiled, something of a wry affair. "There's a phrase, I seem to recall... one that Starfleet personnel who wanted to come onto the ship used to say. It escapes me at the moment but I swear I seem to recall there being one..."

"Permission to come aboard ma'am," Rena said matter of factually and continued to stand to attention. ~ Ok she is amused. Maybe I still have a job. Just breath, don't say anything stupid~

That wry smile gained a little twinkle in the eye. "What am I feeling right now, Miss Pacci? As an empath you should know, correct?"

"Correct ma'am. I can tell you what you're feeling, thinking, I can even tell you that the ensign down the hall just decided to call that blond girl he met at the bar after all," the Betazoid told her with a smile. " But to answer your question you are bemused, you know... puzzled lets say about my current state which appears to be a mess to you. But this is just my normal regular self," Rena smiled again. Even though she was a mess she was an organized mess.

"You're a smidgen impatient that most people forget that common curtsy of asking to come aboard the ship. You're a little old school that way and understandably so as it has been a common practice since the begin of sailing ships to require the permission of the XO or Captain to come aboard their vessel." Rena tilted her head a little as she thought of her next words carefully. Her gaze never breaking that of Commander Paris.

"Love is in the air...You're not giving up the particulars. I could dig if I wanted, but of course I would never do that. I am respectful to those who do not want to full divulge what they are thinking or feeling." The Betazoid shifted the ruck sack on her shoulder, it was becoming a little heavy with the lack of movement. She knew her answers would satisfy the other woman, who was looking at her through inquisitive eyes. How could she not? Rena answered everything she wanted and also gave her the peace of mind that she wasn't going to be a complete nut job.

"Well done, Miss Pacci, well done," the anachronistically-uniformed officer nodded, as a smile that could light up a room dawned on her face and she extended her hand in greeting. "Welcome aboard... I'm Rita Paris, first officer of the USS Hera. You need a hand with that?"

Rena shook the Commander's hand with a firm hand shake. "Thank you ma'am. I'm looking forward to this next adventure. No it's okay, but thank you for offering," the operations officer replied and switched the bag to her other shoulder. "I didn't realize I had accumulated so much stuff from my last mission," the Betazoid chuckled. "Have you had many new recruits? Am I the first one that didn't ask permission to come aboard?" Rena asked curiously.

That earned her a musical laugh as the Commander led the way into the starship's corridors. "Oh, sadly, I'm afraid not. But with a demonstration of your empathic abilities you proved that you weren't a changeling- caught one of those trying to sneak aboard. Just an excitable Lieutenant who got a little turned around. I don't see that you've ever worked for the Division of Temporal Investigations, so that's a mark in your favor. Why don't you tell me about yourself?"

As she walked, the curvaceous commander settled into a brisk military stride, her standard speed for locomotion about the starship, partially seeing if the gold and black clad ops chief would be able to keep up, partially because it was her standard speed. It was important to know if the new onboards would be able to keep up with her- literally.

"No ma'am, never worked for Temporal Investigations...and I didn't know we still had problems with changelings." Rena said with an obvious fascination in her tone. ~ That's a thing? Why would she be worried about being investigated? Maybe she's from a different time?! That is would be so amazing. Oh right she asked me a question. ~ The Betazoid's inner monologue was thankfully not showing on her face.

"About me...well…" she laughed as she easily kept up with the pace of the taller woman. "I am from a large family of five. Three sisters and two brothers. I'm also a twin," she beamed proudly, "I am from the Fifth House. My parents are very traditional, they don't believe in speaking out loud and were against me joining Starfleet. But I have a very inquisitive mind and adventurist nature, so Starfleet was a good choice for me."

“Good to hear- family ties can be important. So what are your goals on the Hera and beyond, Ms. Pacci? After all, a career in Starfleet tends to move along quickly on busy intel starships like the Hera. Also, how are you at dealing with… unconventional situations?” The way the buxom blonde phrased the question, it might have been a come-on. But it was clear that while friendly, the first officer was asking each seemingly unrelated question quite pointedly.

"My goals for the Hera are to be the best damn chief of operations officer you've ever had," her smile beamed before she continued. "As for my goals for the future, I had wanted to work for Starfleet HQ or maybe Captain my own ship. But to be honest right now I'm just kind of going with the flow. Ya know?" The Betazoid smiled. She took a long pause before she answered the buxom blonde officer.

"Unconventional situations... can you be a little more specific?" Rena was always up for anything but if it went against her morals she'd be bowing out.

“Let’s see… picking up stray crew members in the Bajoran wormhole, discovering time-tossed androids from the future, stopping terraforming titans by convincing them to leave peacefully, liberating a planet from the iron rule of an alien despot… that sort of thing. We’re an... unusual ship, Miss Pacci. This isn’t the Enterprise… they still have one, right? The 1701-E or something?” Casually she brushed the reference aside as she thumbed the button to summon a turbolift.

“In short, we’re not your usual Starfleet vessel, Miss Pacci. I can assure you though, we are still 100% Starfleet, and it’s my job to insure that. I think that you will find that I’m a very old-fashioned officer for the modern day. But I am also approachable and reasonable, so don’t hesitate to come to me with issues. Or Captain Telvan- we both maintain an open door policy.” As the lift arrived, she stepped in, waited for Pacci to do so as well, then called out, “Deck 8, officer Country.”

“The officer you are replacing was ambitious but had a rather huge chip on her shoulder and a superiority complex the size of the saucer section. So the bar has been set pretty low,” the friendly first officer offered. “So now that you have some expectations set…” The door to the turbolift opened again, and Paris strode out. “Ask your questions, Miss Pacci. I’m curious to hear your thoughts.”

"First question...does the ship run into temporal trouble often? You have vaguely mentioned temporal occurrence's twice now." The subject of time travel fascinated her. The Betazoid remembered reading the mission reports from Voyager and their run in's with temporal occurrences. She often wished they were able to include all of the information but the Temporal Prime Directive stopped that.

"A fair bit," the first officer admitted. "As well as odd alien technologies and lifeorms beyond mortal ken and so forth. I myself am a chronodimensionally displaced officer, and I am not unique in this aspect. Not on the USS Hera. Thus the uniform," Paris posed to show off the uniform like a model. "This was the one I was wearing when I got here, and I added the pips so you'd know how to read my rank. Captain suggested the leggings, and she's right, they are sharp."

Smiling at her own indulgence, Paris redirected to the point as they strode along. "We rescued an android who will be constructed 84 years from now in a Section 31 base overrun by Romeros in zero G. The ship herself has traversed time twice, to my knowledge though not experience. I asked about the DTI because the last full Betazoid we had onboard was very... direct about how she had worked with them and the awful things they had made her do that apparently left her with no compassion. She also mentioned that most Betazoids in Starfleet were approached at some point or another to work for the DTI. Which I honestly don't think she worked for them, I think she got duped by Section 31 or she was just delusional."

"Thus, to see if you were cut from similar cloth, I asked questions and gauged your answers. It would appear that you are a reasonably well-adjusted officer, Lieutenant Junior Grade Pucci. I know this is a lot to process, but I have confidence you'll manage. Your discretion with your telepathy is appreciated. Also, a number of our crew have experienced psychic trauma, so they tend to be a bit... twitchy about telepathy. You seem a principled telepath, so I am only relaying all of this so that will understand some of the reactions you may receive. Understood?" It was a long lecture, and the ship was damned huge. But the cheerful commander seemed content to roll out her speech as the welcome mat.

There were so many questions in her head, but she decided to just ask one "How did you get displaced here? That must have been quite a shock for you!" The historian in her was incredibly intrigued. She loved to learn about other times and other cultures. How lucky was she that she had a living, walking history book in front of her.

"Transporter accident- damaged transporter, jury-rigged to work, during solar flares and an ion storm," Paris relayed matter-of-factly. "When it all started going sideways Sonak turned off the compensators and took a chance. I ended up in this universe as living energy, and before my energy dissipated the Hera hit me. They figured out I was here, reassembled me and I started adapting."

"Which, as you say, was a shock. Eventually we worked out how to send my final report back to my old command, and that gave Sonak all he needed to come find me. He would be that love in the air about me... while we keep it professional on duty, he came through space and time to find me, leaving everything he knew behind. Is that not the most romantic thing you've ever heard?" Paris turned and eyed the Betazoid inquisitively. "You? Anyone?"

"That is incredibly romantic," the operations officer put a hand over her heart with a goofy smile on her face. She was always a sucker for a good love story. "Me? nawww, no one can handle all this," she laughed awkwardly while she made a gesture about her entire body. "Maybe one day, if it happens it happens. I'm not searching for it."

"The Hera might just surprise you, then," the enigmatic executive offered with a bemused smile.

"Have we been given our mission yet?" the operations officer asked, changing the subject.

"Yes and no... we're actually here to handle some personal business of the Captain's that might keep us occupied for a few days," Paris indicated. "Somewhere out there Commodore Meowlith is getting into trouble, and she'll call us in when she needs the cavalry. In the meanwhile," Paris handed over the PaDD she'd been carrying tucked under her arm. "Here's your welcome aboard package, including your quarters assignment, maps of the Hera, limited computer access and some appointments to keep. You need to check into the command in order to have full access, so that means a meeting with the first officer, a meeting with the captain, a physical and a session with the ship's counselor. Once everyone signs off, you'll be checked into the command, and be granted full access for active duty."

"What do you hope for from this assignment, Lieutenant?" Paris asked as she stopped walking and turned to face the young Betazoid officer.

"I hope to gain some new skills, make new friends, the usual," she read over the welcome package as she talked. ~seems like a lot of red tape~ The Betazoid thought before making eye contact with the first officer and smiling. "Thank you ma'am. Seeing as the Captain is preoccupied, I will make my appointments for my physical and a session with the counselor."

"Doctor Dael pulls both duties, so that'll be convenient for you- an all-in-one. So, if you've no other questions," Paris pointed to the nameplate on the door before which they were standing, where the backlit LED panel read, 'PACCI, R LTJG'. Then she extended her hand with a smile for a handshake.

"Welcome aboard the Hera, Miss Pacci."

"Thank you ma'am," shaking Paris' hand firmly before she entered her quarters. "This will do nicely," the telepath said out loud as she looked around her modest quarters and dropped the heavy ruck sack to the ground.