Another face, another smile, another coffee

Posted on Sun Jun 30th, 2019 @ 8:55pm by Master Chief Petty Officer Hans-Peter König & Captain Abigail Laurens

Mission: Getting To Know You
Location: CO's Ready Room

Abigail had just finished with what felt like the eleventy billionth new face for the day and realised that yet another chai latte had been left sitting on her desk to go cold. Standing up, she carried the mug back to the replicator and put it inside, hitting the button to recycle the content. She was just about to replicate a new one when the now all too familiar chime of her door sounded again.

Closing her eyes and exhaling slowly to the count of ten, Abigail opened her eyes and looked up, forcing a cheerful smile on her face. "Enter!"

Chief König had ditched his seabag in his quarters and proceeded straight to the Skipper's office. When the doors parted, he marched to her desk squaring his corners. At the desk, he stood at attention, swapped his cane over to his other hand careful to not let the PADD containing his orders fall from under his arm, and rendered a crisp salute before announcing, "Master Chief Petty Officer Hans-Peter König reporting as ordered, ma'am!"

That was the one thing Abigail had started to notice about enlisted crewmembers, they were almost entirely sticklers for ceremony. "At ease," she said with a smile, holding her hand out toward him over the desk. "Commander Abigail Laurens."

She motioned toward the seat on the other side of her desk. "I was just about to get a drink, can I offer you a coffee or something?"

König dropped the salute and shook the Commander's hand before handing over his orders. Technically not strictly necessary in an age where computers dominated information transfer but König was a commtech by trade. He knew how computers worked in particular how they transferred information to each other. He, therefore, did not trust computers.

While easing himself into the seat indicated by the Skipper, he replied, "Thank you ma'am but no. I'm fine."

Keeping the PaDD in her hand, Abigail smiled again. "I hope you don't mind if I grab one, I think I've tried to get through at least a dozen latte's today and they all end up going cold." She replicated herself a fresh chai latte, carrying it back and setting it down on the desk before sinking into her seat. "Meeting new crew is a workout unto itself," she said with a small laugh. "All the standing and sitting, it's worse than mass."

Thumbing into the PaDD, she scanned through his transfers, before skipping to his service record, reading the first few lines before recognition dawned on her. "Oh, I remember reading your transfers now," she said, setting the PaDD aside and picking up her mug, blowing across the top momentarily before sipping at the hot liquid. "I was intrigued by your desire to transfer to a starship, especially with your records and your qualifications."

"I wanted to stay on Donovan because of Captain Graybill. He was a good skipper and a damn fine officer." König shrugged, "I suppose I was also getting sick of combat. Not that the move to Donovan really changed that. Part of the mission was to go looking for trouble.

"Speaking of interesting transfers, ma'am, I ran into Lieutenant Voroshilov on the way here. I take it you've signed him onto the crew?"

Abigail nodded slowly. "Yes, he has come aboard as our Chief Intel Officer," she said, almost hesitantly. "Do the two of you know each other?" she asked, sincerely hoping this wasn't going to be the start of a headache she would come to regret.

"He was one of my students," König didn't feel the need to expound. He clearly recalled having to repeatedly "explain" the concept of discipline to Aleksi. Reading the Commander's expression, however, he surmised that she had A) heard the stories, and B) already had at least one interaction with the man. He didn't want to give the CO any further reasons to question the L-T.

"Ma'am if you don't mind me saying, it is my considered opinion as one of his former instructors that you will find yourself, on many occasions, having intense regrets for signing him on," König shifted in his seat, leaning forward toward the desk. "But I think you will find that on the whole: you made the right call." Then König added, "Don't give him anything sharp, though. Unless, of course, you need someone stabbed."

Abigail laughed suddenly, unable to help herself. "Great, remind me then to have operations reprogram his replicator so he can't access sharp objects," she said before taking another sip of her latte and sighing. "I'm sincerely hoping that I don't come to regret my choices, but unfortunately it's something that only time is going to be able to tell."

König decided not to recommend regular strip-searches of the Lieutenant for shivs. That would get tedious and König doubted it would be effective.

"I tend to call bullshit on anyone who claims to know the future myself." And now for what König considered to be the most important part of this conversation, "Ma'am, what are your expectations for the crew and what additional support will you need from me?" A corner of his mouth twitched up into half a smile as he glanced at her chai latte, "Perhaps I should guarantee some peace and quiet for you so you can finally finish one of those?"

Taking another sip of her latte, Abigail exhaled slowly, a soft sigh of relief escaping her lips as she savoured the heavenly sweet taste of the liquid. "I don't see how you could make that happen, short of hiring your friend Voroshilov to take out the entire crew, and I suspect Starfleet might frown on that," she said with a smile. "I'll be honest, this is my first command, I'm still working this out as I go, so I welcome any advice you're willing to give. It's only been a few days and I'm already starting to feel a little in over my head."

"Well, here's what I've seen successful commanders do: don't try to run the ship. That problem belongs to me and your first officer. Focus on the mission. Set objectives. Set the direction. Set the victory conditions. We take it from there. Keep an appointment calendar so you can still have one-on-one time with the crew--on your schedule--and I can maintain that for you. But don't sweat the details. If you try, you'll lose your goddamn mind."

Abigail grinned. "You know, I think I'm going to like having you on this ship," she said brightly. "Welcome aboard Mr König, I think you and I are going to get along just fine. So, as your first official act, can you get operations to lock down Lieutenant Voroshilov's replicator? I'm sure it has a child lock feature you can probably get someone to program in."

"I'll see what I can do, ma'am," König stood from the seat, keeping the cane in his left hand so he could render a salute with his right, "Will that be all?"

"For the moment," she said with a smile. "Thank you, I appreciate your time." Watching as he walked out of her ready room, Abigail leaned back in her seat and sighed. Maybe this wasn't going to be quite so overwhelming after all.

=/\=

Commander Abigail Laurens
Commanding Officer
USS Astraea

&

Master Chief Petty Officer Hans-Peter König
Chief of Boat
USS Astraea