Posted by Lieutenant Junior Grade Hannah Lori Asimina (Doctor) in side-sim Unexpected Answers

Posted by Lieutenant Corinne Dalton/SARAH (Ships AI/Avatar) in side-sim Unexpected Answers

Hannah had been totally unprepared with Cori (or was it Sarah?) appeared in sickbay. Her sudden appearance had caused the static feeding through her implants to go crazy. And it was not a good time for her implants to go funky. She’d refrained from saying anything because she didn’t want Dr. Knight to think she was incapable of performing her job. She could still hear despite the static and the little tango it was doing as it fed through her implants. She had had senior officers before try to force her to get internal implants, and she had caved once. And the results had been disastrous. She was NOT going to do that again. So Hannah had kept it to herself. She’d work on it and get her implants calibrated and then it wouldn’t be a problem.

So now Hannah was sitting in her quarters at her LCARS terminal trying to get as much information on this Cori/SARAH that was part of the ship. Of course she didn’t know that Cori was actually a person. No one had bothered to explain that to her. Otherwise Hannah would have gone to her directly to ask about it instead of delving into someone’s personal life without permission.
Lt jg Asimina, Doctor

The file that came up was large, but only a portion of it was unrestricted. What Hannah did have access to was her general Starfleet personnel file that gave you the brief highlights.

Of course that was incomplete and possibly confusing:

Corinne Dalton (born as Vivian Hope Ballard 2361, on Hakton VII) was raised on Ajilon Prime by adoptive parents. She was admitted to Starfleet Academy at the age of 18, earning a degree in science, majoring in biology with a joint minor in geology and ecology. The USS Saracen was her second posting. Ensign Dalton was declared ‘dead’ in 2386 in a holodeck accident. While her public file fails to explain any details, it does mention that her physical was lost while her consciousness was not. She was to the rank of full Lieutenant her new state in 2388 and serves as an intermediary for the computer systems as needed but also as a scientist in the science department.

There was a small footnote that mentioned that Cori gained the freedom to move about the ship away from Sickbay and the holodecks (the only places on the ship with a grid of emitters) when a mobile emitter was created for her by the ship’s CE. She has assigned quarters on Deck Ten, Port Section Thirty-Six, Room Three-Six-One-Eight.

~Corinne Dalton

Hannah read the file a couple of times confused. She had assumed Cori was like the EMH. A very sophisticated program meant to help the crew. Hannah was wrong. Cori or Sarah was not a computer program at all. The ship was her prosthetic body. (and that thought moved to the back of her mind, processing and contemplating the implications of such and how that could be used to help others. Hannah’s expertise was in prosthetics.) Hannah felt awkward now. She’d been trying to learn more about the program and how it worked so she could adjust her implants accordingly. She’d also been rude to Cori. Not intentionally but after realizing she was a holographic rather than a physical person she had made the wrong assumption and she owed the woman an apology. Hannah knew what it was like for people to make assumptions about her due to her disability and it was unforgivable that she’d done the same to Cori.

A few minutes later, Hannah was standing outside Cori’s door, hoping she was there, and rang the chime.
Lt. jg Asimina, Doctor

The sound of the chime startled Cori. That had never happened before. No one had come to visit her before. And why would they? Royal could, but with everything going on they dealt with it all elsewhere on the ship. Gazing at the door, her unnaturally bright blue eyes all but tried to pierce through. Wearing her mobile emitter meant that while she still had database access, she wasn’t not connected directly to the sensors all the time and so she didn’t automatically know who was there.

“Enter?” she said warily.

Hannah entered. She was nervous. But even when nervous or even crying hysterically Hannah always moved forward. It was the only way to deal with whatever the problem was. She’d learned that long ago. So even though she was wringing her hands slightly, and her eyes darted around taking in the room, she stepped in anyway.

Dalton’s quarters were.... well, a space. When you didn’t need to sleep, eat, dress or shower, your living space became something else altogether. There were empty book shelves on one wall and plants everywhere. Images of star clusters and nebulae adorned the walls and the basic utility carpet had colourful handmade looking rugs in kay places. A soft knit blanket was draped over the couch and a dark blue one over an adjacent arm chair. Between the seating was a wood coffee table, but there was no dining table or chairs.

Hannah’s eyes landed on the space scapes and the colorful rugs. She took in the lack of a table and chairs and bed. And the state of Cori’s life registered a little more, but it was filled into the back of her mind with everything else she was contemplating rather than consciously registering.

For all the decorating it was quite possible that it looked generic, or staged. At least that was what Cori had decided with frustration. What to do about it was an entirely different matter though.

Sitting on the couch cross legged in black trousers and a black long sleeved sweater, Dalton eyed her visitor. “Hi?”

~Corinne Dalton

Hannah took a deep breath and looked at the woman. Hannah had seen that look in her own reflection many many times. “Lt. Cori? I’m jr Lt Asimina.” She stopped took another breath and her hands signed with her words, it always seemed to calm her, give her more confidence when she could use her ‘real’ voice, in her hands, rather than her actual voice. “No, sorry, I’m Hannah. We met in sickbay the other day.” Hannah flinched just a little because the static was dancing around in her implants again. And she couldn’t take them off because she wanted to talk to Cori and now that the static was going crazy again, she knew it was something with Cori or her emitter that was going crazy, and she needed to figure that out so they could work together on the same crew. “I…well this is going to sound so awful and I’m really sorry about that. I…well I didn’t know you weren’t just like an EMH and I really hope I didn’t offend you. That wasn’t very nice of me to assume and well, I’ve dealt with that kind of thing all my life, too and I…I just wanted to tell you I’m really sorry if I was rude or offended you.” Hannah very much felt bad and it was obvious she was very sincere. It wasn’t a protocol thing, and no one had sent her here, or even spoken to her about it. She just honestly wanted to be a good crewmate/friend/person to Cori.
Lt. jg Asimina, Doctor

Far too aware of everything, Dalton could see the edge of agitation in the doctor and how it was ever so slightly distracting her. So when she replied, she didn’t speak aloud, she just used her hands and signed back. Some days being the computer database and being able t know any language within it was useful. You’re hardly the first and I very much doubt you’ll be the last. There were many others she would have doubted the sincerity of, but there was something about Hannah that made her believe the woman’s words.

~Corinne Dalton