Posted by Commander Mason Black (Executive Officer) in Arrival on Barlon V

Posted by Commander Mason Black (Executive Officer) in Arrival on Barlon V

Posted by Lieutenant Commander Paris Carisi (Armorer/Physicist) in Arrival on Barlon V
https://www.star-fleet.com/core/stf5/odin/posts/112545/ Original start of the post

Paris leaned against the wall of the hangar waiting for Mason to get done talking to the officer at the desk. She was hot, tired, and irritated. One week ago they were lying in bed excited about the future they were starting. Jumping to the present the air of excitement and adventure had worn off. This was the third planet they had been to searching for Harper. Negotiating the child welfare system of the Federation was turning out to be harder than finding an enemy ship in a nebula with no sensors. Everyone said they had Harper at their facility until Mason and Paris arrived. So far they had found Andorian Harper, Ferengi Harper, and Betazoid Harper but not Harper from the big planet. It took everything for Paris not to just call up the girl. She had been on the verge until Mason pointed out that it would be best for them to show up with the paperwork in hand and not more promises.

“H-A-R-P-E-R,” Mason spelled out, slowly and clearly for the man behind the counter. “An orphan brought here only a few months ago from that disaster on the colony world, the one that blew up from volcanoes and was then swarmed by giant insects?” His voice was tight, and Paris would be able to tell that it was barely controlled aggravation that was resting behind the words. “Uh, sure, let me look that up,” the main behind the counter nodded, chewing his lip and then beginning to search the database of children at the facility. “You have the forms filled out and ready to submit?” He asked Mason as his eyes moved to the blonde leaning on the wall, paused for a moment and then moved back to Mason.

“Yes,” Mason’s answer was short and sharp, with a flurry to the final part of the word that could of cut butter like a whip. “I already submitted that on this date, here,” he leaned over and pointed at the screen that showed the forms had been submitted by a Mason Black and Paris Carisi regarding a foster adoption of a little girl named Harper. It was the same process at every stop, and Mason had about had enough of the Federation record keeping system that was touted as foolproof. Problem was, it was operated by fools. “Douglas, yes?” Mason asked in a rhetorical question as he picked up and then dropped the staffers name plate back into place on the desk. “What does it tell you, is she here?”

While the situation lacked all humor, Paris could not help but fight a smile edging the corner of her lips. Oh Douglas he has the rank to kill you and the friends to help him bury the body, she thought to herself. Mason was charming and friendly, he was also the XO which meant he was not laid back and lackadaisical on the job. Mason tended to only speak once. Mason having to repeat himself and using the tone as if he were addressing a half-wit first-year cadet was wearing on her fiance. He rarely got angry but when he did, Mason could turn your blood to ice water without raising his voice. If this Douglas thought Mason’s calmer and more subdued tone indicated the officer before him was calm, Douglas was sadly mistaken. Letting out a deep sigh, the small ounce of humor from the scene at the desk left Paris.

The calls and videos with the little girl had become harder and harder to manage. Mason had spent weeks trying to cut through the red tape for them to foster her. He contacted everyone he had ever had a conversation with that could help them along in the process only still had things crawling at a snail’s pace. While this frustrated Paris and Mason, it was starting to also affect Harper. Hanging up was getting harder and harder when she begged for a date as to when she could come live with them. The soft words of soon and we are trying had begun to end the calls with tears first with the little girl and then with Paris.

Glancing at the screen, Douglas squinted as if he were one hundred years old and half-blind. “Well, sir it says we got a shipment of children in about a week ago.” Douglas was talking for the sake of talking. He had nothing to say of value at the moment but these officer types tended to like to hear words as you worked. Everything for them was needed yesterday and on Barlon V things moved at a far far slower pace. “Aitch. Aitch…aitch,” Douglas repeated the letter he was looking for as he scanned the list of the children. “Hilde, Henna, Hallie..,” pausing he looked at Mason. “Are you set on a girl? We have a Harland Blackwell. The name is close and might be easier to adjust to?” Douglas’ comment was so impossibly stupid it was hard to know if he was joking or serious. The only logical response would be to ask him if the village he came from had lost it’s idiot. Luckily Douglas left the question rhetorical and short enough that there wasn’t time for a reply. “Okay okay okay,” Douglas returned a large smile as if he had accomplished a major feat. “I think we found her. Hagh’pur came in last week on the transport from Celtatan III. Seems she had trouble fitting in there. Would you like to me arrange a transport for you to find her?” Now the pause was long enough to show Douglas was looking for a response.

“What the hell do you mean?” Mason’s voice was barely below that of a full blown rage quit. “No, we aren’t here looking for a Hagh’pur, Harper is not a Klingon! She’s Human, Douglas, Human! Like you!” Leaning over the desk, Mason and Douglas began talking in quieter tones, though the tapping of Mason’s hand on the counter top belied a growing impatience.

“It’s not my fault,” Douglas took a step back eyeing the counter separating him from the irate man on the other side. “Our system underwent some maintenance a few days ago. One of our data nodes collapsed. You know how it is. We lost a buncha records but,” he hooked a thumb behind him, “We have some paper copies. I could go cross-check them if you want?”

Paris hated how much pressure was on Mason right now. He had just gotten the promotion of second in command of basically a floating city. This came with so many more responsibilities and stress. She should have been doing all she could to lessen the stress but right now all Paris wanted was their family. Pushing off the wall she walked over to Mason hoping that this time he would have more information than just a different planetary address.

Standing up as Paris approached, Mason stood with his hands on his hips chewing his lips while Douglas also stood up and began to collect a few PaDD’s that he needed for something. Mason was quite aware of how much Paris had invested in Harper, and in him. Her dreams of a family were something that Mason also wanted with her but with his medical condition, he had been unwilling to risk having a child and passing on the illness he had inherited, and in fact had been told that he wouldn’t be able to have children in any case. It was something that Mason hadn’t been sure he and Paris could get past, with her deep dreams of having a family of her own and Mason not being able to ‘deliver the goods’. Then, Harper had quite literally fallen into their lives. Paris believed in signs, and Mason did as well.

“So babe tell me they know where she is at,” Paris tried to keep the edge out of her tone, “or is all you got was another destination.” It was getting hard not to take out her anger on him. Deep down she knew it was not Mason’s fault but he was the only thing she was able to vent her frustration to and on. The last time they had this conversation Paris completely melted down. This resulted in neither of them speaking for three light years as they traveled to the next destination. The sun beating down on them from the subtropical climate of the planet was not helping either. They were both hot, sweaty, exhausted and hungry.

Paris Caris

Turning to Paris, Mason smiled but it was a tight and frayed smile. “Well, it isn’t a no yet,” he explained. “Their system underwent some maintenance a few days ago and one of the data nodes collapsed, so they lost a bunch of records. Douglas Dingleberry there said they couldn’t check their systems, but they had paper copies.”

“Uh, I’m still here you know,” Douglas said behind Mason. He had turned to go as Paris had approached, but had paused in case she wanted to speak to him. Thus, he overheard Mason’s invention of his last name. Spinning back around, the look on Mason’s face would have skewered a dozen crew from the lower decks as if he had just found them around an unauthorized still hidden in Engineering.

“Why? Why are you still here Lieutenant?!” Mason said through clenched teeth with enough acid to melt latinum. “My Fiancee is tired and grumpy, we have hardly slept in a week and have traveled light years to get here only to find that your system is down, your coffee is terrible and sure, we can have a Klingon kid named Hagh’pur. I do not want a Klingon kid named Hagh’pur, Douglas, I want a Human girl called Harper that was brought here only a few months ago and is named on all of that paperwork right there in your hot little hand. So I fail to understand Lieutenant why the hell you are still here. Run along, before I get cranky.”

“How ‘bout I get a few more officers to help me. Be right back,” Douglas said hastily. “Franks....Johnson....McNetti, I need your help…now.” Douglas’ tone was not at all challenging or snarky. I had the oh god I am going to transferred to a hell hole worse than this quality to it as he desperately called for a few of his other office mates to assist him. Come hell or high water they would find a human with the name Harper and give his Mason an address.

Turning back to Paris, Mason almost snarled at her. It wasn’t her fault, he knew, but he couldn’t keep the tone from his voice. “Of all the god forsaken holes they send us to they send us here, what the hell is here? Nothing. They running a slave camp or something?” Leaning his back against the counter he folded his arms and kicked his heel firmly against the grain with a thud several times. To be honest the planet was actually gorgeous with sun, beaches and stunning scenery but to Mason at that moment, it could have been Mercury in summer. “I’d offer to get coffee, but it’s probably swamp water. You wanna sandwich?”

Cmdr Black, XO

“Sandwich? Sandwich! I want my baby Mason.” Paris had no reason not to melt down. Mason was the one of the pair required to keep a cool head right now. “I do not want a sandwich or coffee or cookie. This is ridiculous. She is a child. Our child that we have promised to love and be there for yet,” Paris threw up her hands, “I don’t see her. I don’t see the little girl we have read stories to or got up at three am after working the late shift just so that we could comm in to see her twirl a flag for two minutes in the hour-long school play she was participating in.”

“I told you we should never have let her leave us. I told you,” Paris took on an accusing tone. Anger and frustration were bubbling over creating a near frantic Paris. The room felt as if it were sucking the air from her lungs. How something as advanced as the Federation could lose one child was blowing her mind. If they could not find her how did Paris know they were actually taking care of her.

“Oh god, McNettie. The blonde is gonna rile him up. You know what happens when the missus cinches her hair up too tight in a ponytail. Cuts off reason to the brain. She,” he hooked a thumb over his shoulder at Paris whose tirade was becoming more animated in the middle of the office, “is gonna get him in a tizzy and I ain’t gonna tell him he has to take her back to wherever they are staying tonight without a kid,” Johnson began to toss PaDD’s around the desk like he was mining for gold in a river.

“I hate when they get stuck on one kid in particular,” Franks agreed. “If we don’t find her you think there is a chance in hell that we can roll them into one of the group homes and let the heart strings take over so they just pick out another one?”

“I am not going to settle down Mason. Harper is not a puppy. You just don’t stroll in to the orphanage and say wow that one looks cute. Let’s take her.” Paris was preaching to the choir right now. Mason was as upset as she way only he was the man. He was supposed to fix things. That is what men did. They fixed problems. Since there seemed to be no end to problems with this adoption, Paris had to take out her frustration somewhere and vent to someone she knew cared as much as she did.

“Ya’ I don’t think that is gonna fly Franks,” McNettie dumped another box of PaDD’s out on the table frantically opening, swiping each device’s faces a few times before tossing it over his shoulder.

“Harper Dowe,” Johnson shouted out as if he were in a Bingo parlor and not sure he had won. “Harper Dowe. Female. Six years two months. Forty five inches. Forty-five pounds. Dark hair and brown eyes. Originally entered into the system after a volcanic eruption destroyed her colony.” If there had been information about long walks in the park or preference on lollipop flavor, Johnson would have read that out too. Even if this wasn’t the right kid at least the brooding officer behind the counter trying to deal with the blonde officer with him would know he had been working to find the kid.

“Umm yep. Yep, I think that is her. She ain’t no Klingon right,” Douglas asked for clarification just to be safe.

“You found her,” Paris’ attention immediately snapped to the men working and off her fight with Mason. “Gimmie,” she extended her hand making a waving motion for one of them to deliver the PaDD to her. “There is a picture right?” Paris struggled to keep her hope this was the right kid to a minimum. This had not been the trip she envisioned as they laid in bed on the Odin. If this wasn’t her, Paris would break.

“This her,” Douglas handed the PaDD over the desk.

Paris held her breath as she looked at the image. Harper was clean but still in the same yellow dress she wore when Mason and she rescued her. Paris could not speak. Staring at the image gave Paris some comfort that at least they would have their daughter soon. Nodding as a response, Paris reached out with one hand finding Mason’s and holding it tightly.

“Well, then I got good news and bad news. She is on the other side of the planet. It’s about a three-hour flight which is going to put you over there about nine at night. I can set you up at a local hotel in town tonight and you can get her in the morning,” Douglas asked. “The offices there will be closed anyway at that time so it’s not like you could take her home even if you went there.”

Paris Carisi