Worries about Asahi
Posted on Thu Aug 17th, 2023 @ 4:39am by Commander Martin Sorenson & Lieutenant Njalia Sayffier
Mission:
Shakedown Shake-Up
Location: Captain's Ready Room
Timeline: MD2?
985 words - 2 OF Standard Post Measure
Njalia stood before the door to the ready room and checked her uniform one more time before pressing the chime. "Lieutenant Sayffier to see Commander Sorenson.'
Inside, Martin was staring at the seemingly endless list of reports, requests, incidents, and continually updating schedule notices that seemed to be his lot now. The door chime brought a moment of 'What now?' but hearing Njalia's voice replaced it with relief; the Ops officer had been a real bright spot in terms of being someone who solved rather than added to problems. "Yes, enter," he replied, hitting the key to open.
Njalia stepped in and saw the layered mess of holographic displays. "Sir? Let me," she said fingers dancing over her datapad as the holographic files flickered and rearranged themselves into orderly columns with color-coded tabs. "You need an administrative assistant, Commander. Would you like me to set up a hologram for that role?"
He sighed inwardly, thinking how much he missed Yeoman Marix. A hologram would be hollow compensation for losing her, but far better than nothing, which was what he had now. "Yes, please," he said with a grateful smile. "Did you come to check on something that got lost in...' he gestured at the freshly ordered but long columns of items on his to do list, "...all this."
"Surprisingly, no," Njalia said, suddenly looking unsure of herself. "It is about Lieutenant Commander Kita." She sighed, obviously uncomfortable. "Before we left the Vesta, I had some soup with the Lieutenant Commander. He was acting a bit strange, I mean, he made the soup himself and heated it over a kludged heating unit. But we had all been under such stress, it did not seem . . . fair to complain about it too much. After all what harm could he do to the Vesta at that point with a fire?" She stopped and took a breath. "Sorry for the rambling. He was acting strange and while we talked, it was obvious that he had entirely forgotten the circumstances of our first meeting. I am worried that he may have suffered some sort of trauma during the events on the Vesta. Has he been into medical for a check-up? I am increasingly worried about him."
"Kita, come in for a medical check-up?" Martin puffed a laugh. He'd spent weeks trying to get the man to just show up for his medical check in when the intel officer first arrived on Vesta. "If he did come in on his own, that's when I'd be worried." He paused a moment, recalling that amid the chaos in medbay during their shattered multiverse experience, Asahi had come in, and for something relatively minor. Of course, he'd bolted before Martin could get a real scan... Could easily have been a crossover. Heavens knew he'd seen enough of those - including one of himself - so he wouldn't blame the real Asahi in the slightest for being traumatized if he'd run into another him, even the reasonable friendly one he'd encountered in medbay. Still, in his opinion Njalia had good instincts, and he doubted Asahi would come into medical for any head trauma short of half his skull caved in. "But after all we've been through, it warrants checking. Was there anything besides possible memory loss and extreme cooking?"
"He was acting like a tili-tili," she replied and immediately saw that Martin did not have the cultural reference. She drummed her fingers on the datapad and then her eyes lit up. "Squirelly! He was acting squirrelly. All Intelligence Officers are hiding something but he was hiding something he knew could be revealed at any moment!" She then deflated a bit. "But I was too tired and burned out to follow up at the time. If this does turn out to be a problem, you should reprimand me."
Squirrelly honestly sounded like Martin's experience Asahi 90% of the time. "Lieutenant, there is zero chance of me reprimanding you, or anyone else, for being too exhausted after this last mission for personal follow up. Particularly when it comes to 'tili-tili' intel officers." He smiled, always happy to learn a new idiom, and liking the way the sound fit the concept with this one. "I'm pre-exhausted just thinking about trying to track him down and make him allow an exam." His smile went a little sideways. "I don't suppose you could assign a couple holograms to grab him and bring him to medbay for me?"
Njalia considered the question. "No, not unless he was actually flagged as being a danger to himself or the ship. The holograms have very high Asimov inhibitors, which is good really. I could set them to act as barriers and direct him to medical that way? But he would definitely notice that he was being herded."
"I figured as much," Martin sighed. "I'll try the direct approach and just try to talk to him first." He got up, dismissing the lists of lists. "But if that doesn't work, a line of holosecurity to keep him from fleeing might be in order, or ...hmm... maybe internal shields. I think I can order those now."
"Yes, with your Level Seven authorization," Njalia said with a smile. "Did you want to work on a holographic assistant now or later?"
With a backward look, Martin realized he was avoiding - fleeing even - the work that he was piling up here. "Perhaps best to set it up now and get it started so something will get done will get done while I'm trying to track to track Asahi down."
"No problem, sir," nodded Njalia. "Is there any particular appearance you would like?" And so the setup began.
Tempting as it was to request a digital Marix, that somehow felt wrong. "No real preference on appearance," he replied. "Humanoid, I guess, though I could see the advantage of having more than two hands..."
