Reporting for duty

Posted on 09 Feb 2012 @ 9:46am by Captain Jonathan Holliday & Rear Admiral Lirha Saalm
Edited on on 09 Feb 2012 @ 6:31pm

1,422 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: Episode 00 - Pre-Deployment
Location: Starfleet HQ - Briefing Room Exterior
Timeline: MD-02 0930 hrs

[ON]

Striding along the corridor, John Holliday made his way towards the last reported position of his new CO, at least, as far as the computer HQ knew. The briefing rooms made sense, after all, any new captain is going to have to pick up their orders before leaving.
He was needless to say, a little apprehensive about meeting her for the first time, it was a while since he had been required to adapt to a new command heirarchy, even if it was now the one in which he served as XO, rather than as Tactical Officer as he had been before now. Protocol was definitely something that John was going to stick to, he had done it since the first day he had entered the academy, and there was no way he was going to stop just because he had changed ship.

HQ was always an odd place to him, so many people, and everywhere you looked there were flag officers, fleet admirals, captains, you name it, they were here, in fact right now, having passed nobody less than a full blown Commander up to this point, he was feeling no better than a brand new Ensign fresh out of the academy, the most junior person in the room.

Upon reaching the briefing room exterior, he noted that the doors were currently sealed - his CO must have obviously not quite finished picking up her orders yet, a set of orders that hopefully he would become privy to in the near future, after all, how else was he expected to serve as XO without a better understanding of what they were going out there to do.

"Knowing my luck....catagorise gaseous anomalies and examine a few asteroids..." He mentioned to himself with a visible lack of enthusiasm - he made a note to ensure he found out who exactly it was that had recommended him for this transfer, so that he could thank them personally. His father might have been a man of science, but he certainly wasn't, he had left that life deliberately over 15 years ago, and had no desire to go back now.


Eventually, he noticed the door controls unlock themselves, whoever had been issuing the briefing inside must have finally finished, and subsequently dismissed all concerned. As the doors slid apart, he noticed a pair of flag officers coming towards the corridor, he instinctively snapped to attention as they passed, a good officer knows to respect an Admiral as the pass, be it on a ship, or in a corridor on a planet.

Eventually, a Lieutenant Commander walked past, and he felt he could relax, at least in this situation they were of equal rank, and he had no need to show any kind of particular protocol. At least he had narrowed down his choices for his new CO, he knew she would be wearing the pips of a Commander, and nobody of that rank had yet walked past.

Keeping an eye on the door, he soon spotted a thin sillouette moving towards him, with a skin tone that didn't quite match what he had expected

"Green?" he thought to himself silently "Damn the woman's an Orion...thats all I need, a pirate or a dancer, or worse, a combination....this is going to be interesting"

By this time the Commander had managed to pass relatively close to him, and he decided now was the time

"Commander Saalm?" He stated in an inquisitive voice, ensuring to maintain decorum as he did so, no point making himself look like a first year cadet.

He waited for her eyes to focus on him before continuing any further

"Lieutenant Commander Jonathan Holliday reporting ma'am, I'm your new XO"

He awaited her reply...

Lirha looked up at the man and gave him a tired smile. She was severely hungover from the previous night but tried her best to look presentable to the new officer. "Ah, Commander Holliday," she said, "What a pleasant surprise... I wasn't expecting you to arrive until tomorrow."

Glad that at least his CO could remember his name, Holliday allowed himself to stand a little further at ease, either consciously or subconsciously, he felt he could relax around this particular captain, although whether or not it was due to her rather...unique physiology, medically regulated or not, he wasn't sure.

"No ma'am, I caught an earler transport from Deep Space 3, managed to get back planet side a little swifter than I had originally planned, I hope it isnt too much bother."

He was well aware of how annoying it could be when the best laid plans are ruined by people not doing exactly what they had been expected to do, although he hoped that in the interests of efficiency and with the aim of getting this ship out into space as fast as possible, Commander Saalm would not have been overly put out by his early arrival

"No bother at all, Commander, and welcome to San Francisco." she replied while forcing a friendly smile on her face. Her headache had gotten worse during the briefing and she was beginning to feel nauseous. Despite her woes, she was impressed that her new XO had managed to find her outside of the briefing room. It was a good gesture, she thought, and showed her that he was a man to take the initiative, not sit back in his quarters and wait to be summoned.

"I..noticed that you were in there with several flag officers ma'am, would that have been to issue our standing orders perhaps?"

Lirha gave him a slow nod and sighed. "Yes, and I wish we had time for a shakedown cruise before we get thrown into the mix." she said. The briefing now had her concerned for a number of reasons and she had several doubts about their upcoming mission. But first things first, she needed some food in her belly to calm her agitated stomach.

"I'm going to the cafeteria for some breakfast, would you care to join me?" she asked her new XO. It would give them a chance to discuss matters pertaining to the ship as well as get to know each other.

It seemed to John at least, that his new CO had a lot on her mind, understandable given the rigors of command and the stress that any new ship launch must cause. He was glad that he hadn't caused her any additional trouble by arriving early, and was glad to see that for now at least, she was more than devoted to her ship.

"No shakedown cruise ma'am? Seems rather against standard procedure? I guess we'll just have to hope that the Engineering Corps weren't half asleep putting any of the systems in! Might be worth running a set of diagnostics before we even think about leaving the dock"

Lirha glanced at him out of corner of her eye giving him a cautious yet approving look. "Trust me, I completely agree with you, Commander. Unfortunately, our mission doesn't give us the luxury of time and we need to depart as soon as our final systems are installed. I have our Chief Engineer working with the dock crews to help speed up the process, but like you just said, I think we need to run a couple systems checks before we lift off." she said. Her mind turned back to breakfast as her stomach grumbled.

An offer of breakfast with the CO on his first day? Well this was a turn up for the books, it seemed he was going to have to get used to these kind of events more often, afterall he was probably going to be issuing reports to Saalm on a daily basis anyway, let alone the time they would be spending occupying the two centre chairs on the bridge of the Galileo.

"Breakfast sounds great ma'am, I'm not too au fait with the layout of this place though, been a while since I was last here...would you care to lead?"

"Sure...but just to warn you, I'm starving. I hope you can keep up." she replied with a grin, and began to walk at a brisk pace down the corridor towards the turbolift. After a short ride to the second floor of the HQ, the doors parted and they stepped out and walked down another series of corridors before finally arriving at the main cafeteria.

[OFF]

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CMDR Lirha Saalm
Commanding Officer
USS Galileo

LCDR Jonathan Holliday
Executive Officer
USS Galileo

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