Posted by Lieutenant Commander Joe Milligan (XO) in Main Sim - Habitat - Away Team Arrival

Posted by Lieutenant Junior Grade Cara Meow (Ship’s Anthropologist) in Main Sim - Habitat - Away Team Arrival
[snip]

Joe smiled and looked at Cross and said, “Wow smart and cute you have it all Miri!” He then turned to try his luck. Other than being a minder for the junior officers he really didn’t see himself doing much while the captain was doing all the diplomatic things. He walked over to one of the tables got a plate and some silverware and said to one of the servers. “Let me try just a bit of the red stuff there, and a small portion off the green. No, no blue please. I will take that jelly looking brown though. I think that will do me for starters .”

Joe’s food was put onto his plate, the ‘red stuff’ turned out to be some kind of lightly glazed meat product, it had the taste of something like bbq beef, the ‘green stuff’ turned out to be a steamed vegetable which tasted a lot like a mix of an apple with asparagus, the ‘brown jelly’ turned out to be a dessert most likely, it was obviously jello like and wiggled a bit, its taste was quite similar to a light sweet chocolate but inside the jello were tiny brown dots which when tasted had a burst of unexpected minty like flavor and were somewhat crunchy. All in all he had no problem eating it nor would he feel any problems now or later.

As Joe left Cross looked around, she had no desire to sample any of the food but was getting rather bored and wondered how the Captain would react if she went exploring a bit.

If Cross was going to go wandering it would probably be best to get permission, and get accompanied by someone on the habitat, after all she wouldn’t want to cause an incident like their former vulcan CSO had caused with their First Contact with the militaristic Bolay Military District?.....

Meanwhile, Glen attempted to speak to the the Dol, and tried to appear very serious in the middle of what was fast becoming quite a circus, “Dol, we appreciated that you have entertained visitors from space before, and that your people are always very interested in learning about them, and that the news organisations are merely doing their usual job of getting that information… but, we have these rules that are our guiding lights, and I have made an oath never to break them, even to lay down my life rather than to break them. What that means, in essence, is that we cannot interfere in the internal politics of your world or to intervene in your world’s natural development. We cannot be put in a position where we are seen to favour one broadcaster over another, especially when you have local elections, as this could be seen as favouring particular candidates, and that just cannot happen. When our talks have concluded, then I would be happy to hold a news conference with all the broadcasters in attendance, and to which any could ask questions. Then they would all be on an equal footing. Do you think they would they agree to that instead?”

Dol smiled nodding, “..Of course Captain Glen! It is quite fine. Your beliefs are of course your beliefs as are they your guiding doctrine. We just got so excited to finally have more outside visitors that I neglected in my own internal excitement to inform you of this till the last minute. I hope this will not effect our future chat to come?” he said.

“Not at all,” Glen replied, “I understand why there is so much excitement about our visit.”

By this point the various media crews had filed out, as did their interviewers. This left Glen and company only with the five food/drink serving staff by the tables, Dol, his wife, and four other advisors at the table, plus a pair of helpers who seemed to assist in the care of drinks on the table or serving any requested food or any other task requested.

Glen would be happy not to be the only one of his staff doing all the diplomacy, but then he had specifically asked them to let him initially do the talking, so that was entirely his own fault. It was just that he still couldn’t find it within himself to trust Cross, even this ‘new’ version of Doctor Cross. He couldn’t believe she wouldn’t blurt out something inappropriate, or her to open some forbidden door just for the hell of it. Then again, he owed her his life for disobeying his orders in exactly that way once before. And few could understand, but that was why he always let her get away with so much.

Glen decided to introduce his officers to Dol anyway, and he guided the Dol, Sal and the four advisors towards Joe, Miriam, Tia, Wolf, Cara and William. “I’d like you to meet my team,” Glen said, working his way slowly along the line, beginning with his XO. “This is Joe Milligan, my right-hand man.”

Glen wondered about getting some food for himself, but one look at the movement of Joe’s plate and he decided he wasn’t quite hungry enough yet.

Joe saw Glen coming with Dol and all the advisors and was forced to swallow whatever it was he had been chewing on. He congratulated himself him self on keeping the stuff down. No matter what the skipper thought Joe was of the opinion that he was being more than diplomatic by not spitting the small portions of food that he had out. For he had found that no matter what color or shape it took it all tasted like dusty boot leather with a hint of something else which he refused to let his mind even guess at.

At the introduction Joe stood tall at attention and with a determination unknown to him since the time he had successfully escaped from the bedroom of his commanding officer at the time he forced his widest and happiest smile despite the aftertaste in his mouth and cut loose with a string of blarney his ancestors would have been proud of. “Why hello Dol sir!” he bubbled eagerly. It’s a fine thing to be met by such a grand set of people such as yourself. Why the way you have set your whole civilization like this living in this lovely habitat is indeed a wonder! And the food? Simply amazing, My congratulations sir.

Glen thought Joe had something on his chin. A strip of the red meat probably. He quickly moved down the line.

“This is my Chief Medical Officer, Miriam Cross,” Glen said, and checked she was still there.

Cross did not have time to slip away. On the Captain’s introduction the female doctor smiled and not knowing how they greeted each other she decided to do it the Japanese way by lowering her head ‘’Greetings Master Dol and thank you for the hospitality ‘’ she said in a cordial and soft tone.

She hoped she didn’t mess up and just for good measures Cross kept a smile plastered on her face.

Glen thought that Cross had never performed so well. He might nominate her for a Federation Actors Guild Award.

He moved the Dol down the line to Cara Meow, the Ship’s Anthropologist.

“Your Grace! I’m a scientist and I’m very much looking forward to learning about your species; your unique biology, culture, society, and linguistics,” said Cara, giving him a slight curtsey.

Glen then steered the Dol and his party towards, Tia, William and Wolf. “My Chief Engineer, Chief Science Officer and Chief of Security.”

• Cara Meow

As the captain was moving about and introducing everyone Joe looked across at Cross and was immediately disturbed. Since his mind was set to diplomatic mode, he pored over all the words and phrases available to him. Each one he threw out almost instantly. He’d know Miri too long and suspected that any sort of verbal quick step would just anger her.
So it was with this in mind he around to make sure there were no others close by as he whispered into Cross’s ear saying,” Miri do everyone a favor and stop grinning like that . I keep expecting you to growl and bite someone.”

Lt.Cmdr. Joe Milligan XO

Tia remained silent during the introductions. Unlike a couple others, she wasn’t interested in the food, either. As she was introduced by the CO, she nodded. “A pleasure to meet you.”

Stepping back to let the others speak, she fidgeted slightly. Her hand tugging at her clothes, occasionally. And every once in a while she reached up to be sure her hair braid hadn’t come loose. She was better suited for engineering crawl spaces than she was for soirees like this. Sure, she could smile and bat her eyelashes and play the diplomat if she has to. But it wasn’t her thing.

With any luck at all, the lights would go out and she could find something to be useful at.

Tia
CE