Mission One: "Not Until Tuesday"

The firelight flickered off the ancient stone walls. The light was muted and the shadows danced slowly over the table. The walls were crumbling and blackened where the torches sat slowly flickering away. It was a backwater tavern on a backwater world tucked between Cardassian, Breen and Ferengi territory and just past a lonely Tendril of Federation worlds. The stone was a holdover from a forgotten people, a civilization that had burned itself out in it’s equivalent of the low middle ages. . A grizzled Lethian rubbed one of his ridges looking at his cards and pondering the latest spin. An enterprising but ill equipped Ferengi had added wood tables and torches to the edifice and declared it a tavern.

And had done surprisingly well for himself.

Strategically the world was too poor and just slightly too far away from all of the local powers to be useful as a base, but that resulting lack of authority made it a travelled stopover for traders. The local authorities stayed out of anything that did not result in violence, and stamped down heavily on anything that did. It resulted in a unique variety of races co-existing peacefully with a palpable undercurrent of barely concealed contempt.

Petty officer second class Andrev Thosk glowered from where he stood, the new property of the Lethian as of three hands ago. He was dressed in an entirely ridiculous collection of hides that made him look slightly less like an out of his depth Federation crewman pretending to be a backwater trader.

The Lethian mumbled something incomprehensible to most of the room and oddly too colorful for the universal translator. He placed two strips in the exchange and the strange glowing bauble he had kept out of risk for the majority of the evening.

Tyrlai Zade’s eyes fluttered and she dropped her cards. “Confront.” She interrupted before the Lethian spun her off blue zeph which gave her a minor consortium. The two on her left dropped and cut their losses, the Childra threw up his hands in exasperation and the Lethian glared as she collected her winnings.

“Thank you very much for your donations to the Federation orphans fund,” Tyrlai stood, to the visible irritation of more than one of the players, it was polite to leave on a losing hand but she was not about to risk another spin. She heard a desperate muffled squeak as she walked away and turned back to the Lethian. She pulled four strips from her winnings. “I’ll buy him back, trust me you don’t really want him.” The Lethian glared and stood adopting a threatening posture.

After a short round of haggling they agreed at a price of six strips and Tyrlai headed out into the refreshing chill of the autumn night. She turned at the end of the wall and set her winnings down and began splitting them into two piles, one about half the size of the other.

“You bet me in a game of tongo and lost!!” Thosk had taken that long to get past his apocalyptic rage to a place where he could speak.

Tyrlai raised the strange glowing bauble between her thumb and index finger a moment before placing it an inside pocket of her jacket. “I needed to raise the stakes and for some reason he took a liking to you.”

“But you lost!!”

“I was lulling him into a false sense of security.”

A Ferengi quietly walked up to where they were standing collected the smaller bag of latinum, nodded to Tyrlai and returned the way he came.

“You meant to tell me you were lulling him into,… why did he take the latinum?”

“It was his cut for fixing the game.” Tyrlai replied.

“You were cheating!??”

“I don’t really know how to play tongo, not well at least.” Tyrlai admitted, looking over at Thosk sympathetically.

Thosk sputtered for several more moments. “You bet me in a game you don’t know how to play!!??”

“The Federation sent us to get a tolic shard and we got one, that’s the important part.”

“I am done. Absolutely done. I have put in for a transfer out of this madness. The Federation sends you to weird places and every ship you are posted to explodes.”

“That last one didn’t explode.” Tyrlai picked up her satchel and began the long trudge to the clearing at the center of a low rise at the edge of the village.

“It was boarded by Klingons.” Thosk stammered, looking around into the darkness and making sure to stay close to Tyrlai despite all his protests.

“Im a psychologist, Klingon boarding parties aren’t really in my realm of responsibility.”

“Then why did you fight them with a sword?”

“They were bad.” She looked at him like the answer should have been obvious.

“A phaser would have been more appropriate.”

“I didn’t have a phaser.”

“Why did you have a sword!?”

“Swords are cool.”

“I am done with this. When I get my orders, this time I am free,…”





* * * * * * *





Tyrlai’s hands flowed over the controls as she readied the runabout for departure. She tapped the comm panel and spoke in an even pleasant tone. “This is the USS Trill Sucks, requesting departure on vector one eight eight, two one four.”

[Departure approved.]

“I think this is the Yukon.” Thosk said trying to be helpful, looking at a wall panel as they lurched out of orbit and shifted into warp drive.

She had just about finished plotting their course back to Federation space proper when the chime rang out again. The face of a middle aged human commander appeared on the viewscreen superimposed on the blurred starfield.

[Congratulations on the successful completion of your mission, lieutenant Zade. In recognition of your fine service you are hereby promoted to full lieutenant. Report directly to the USS Portland as their second officer under the command of Alenis Maru. She will take custody of the shard.]

“Understood, and thank you Commander.” Tyrlai smiled. It had been a long three years as a junior grade, ticking off every single XO she met hadn’t helped any either.

[Well deserved, lieutenant. Starfleet out.]

“They promoted you.” Thosk said in an even tone slowly fuming once more. “You gamble me into slavery and they promote you for it. Unbelievable.”

“It’s not just this, Thosk, it’s been three years,…”

“A promotion! The Federation must be run by rabid madmen just randomly tapping consoles, I have had enough,…”

[Congratulations on the successful completion of your mission crewman Thosk. In recognition of your fine service you are hereby assigned as councilors aide. Report directly to Tyrlai Zade aboard the USS Portland. At the recommendation of Lieutenant Zade you are hereby promoted to Petty Officer First Class.]

Thosk gazed in shock at the prerecorded message displayed on the viewscreen, tearing slightly at the corners of his eyes. Tyrlai smiled softly and looked down at the console to try and figure out where the USS Portland was and how to get there.

[Well deserved, technician Thosk. Starfleet out.]

Tyrlai laid in the new course and kicked the engines into a slightly higher than optimally safe speed and leaned back to watch the stars streak past.

“So what is a Portland?” Thosk asked.

“I have no idea, some earth thing I expect.”

Bistro 302
Starbase 302
Somewhere in Federation space


From her window seat, Lt. Cmdr. Alenis Meru watched the work bees busily buzzing around the USS Portland.  The ship was being retrofitted as part of the Miranda Service Life Extension project, a wide-ranging initiative to bring all the Miranda class vessels in the fleet up to modern standards.  Privately, Alenis wondered what the point was – surely for all the effort put into extending the life of aging vessels like the Miranda and Excelsior classes, the Federation would be better suited to building state-of-the-art vessels like the new Sovereign and Anubis class starships.

Not that she was complaining.  A command was a command, and she would have been thankful for the opportunity to command a garbage scow.

“Ma’am, are you ready to order?” A tall Bolian waiter was standing over her table with a PADD in hand, which was connected by data link to the back of the house.

“Yes, let me see here,” Alenis put down her PADD and took a quick glance at the menu, quickly settling on the first appetizing thing she saw.  “I’ll have the chicken sandwich and your soup of the day.”  Though she was a Bajoran, her taste buds had been thoroughly humanized by years of growing up as a refugee on Earth.  For many years, her only tastes of home were her mother’s generally unsuccessful attempts at “improvising” traditional Bajoran dishes out of ingredients commonly available on Earth.

“Good choice, ma’am. Anything else?”

“No, that is all.” As the waiter turned to tend to another table, Alenis took a sip of her tea.  The one exception to her adopted palate was her fondness for Bajoran teas. She’d rarely be found far from a mug of tea, and insisted on keeping a stock of teas from her homeland wherever she went.  And it had to be real, not the poor excuse for Deka tea that one can order from the replicator.

Turning back to her work, Alenis reviewed her orders.

[The USS Portland is to rendezvous with the USS Fox and the USS Quebec City in sector 377 on stardate 68288.4 to serve as the testbed for Project Mongoose. After testing, the Portland is to turn over an artifact to the Bajoran government. The artifact is currently in the possession of Lt. Tyrlai Zade, an officer assigned to the Portland, and will be transferred to your care]

Alenis reread the orders several times.  She’d not been back to Bajor since fleeing with her mother as a child.  The truth is, though she was a proud Bajoran at heart – like most of the Bajoran diaspora scattered among the stars – she wasn’t sure if she wanted to go back home.  Her only memories of Bajor were the brutality of the occupation.

But this time, she didn’t have a choice in the matter.  Orders were orders.  Not to mention that her curiousity was piqued by the artifact.  It could be anything from a piece of old jewelry to an ancient tome.  For all she knew, it could even be a Tolic Shard.

Her speculation was interrupted by a beep emanating from her PADD.  She’d received a message.

[Due to unforeseen delays, the retrofit project on the USS Portland has fallen behind schedule.  The USS Portland will not have all systems installed until next Tuesday.  Please accept my apologies. –Cmdr. Hiro Nakayama, Shipyard Maintenance and Retrofit Supervisor, Starbase 302]

Alenis sighed in frustration.  By orders of Starfleet command, she had to be in sector 377 on Monday.  Now, she was being told that her ship would not be ready until Tuesday.  She couldn’t delay the mission; to do so would hold up the Toulouse and the Bolarus.  Not to mention that Starfleet was getting anxious to commence testing on Project Mongoose.

This kind of routine stupidity was par for the course in any large organization, and Starfleet was no exception.

As her food arrives, Alenis quickly fired off a reply on an encrypted channel.

[Expedite work on the USS Portland.  We will be departing Starbase 302 on Monday at 0600.  Ensure that all critical systems are online and the Mongoose is in the cage. Remaining retrofits will be installed at the facilities on Deep Space 9.  –Lt. Cmdr. Alenis Meru, Commanding Officer, USS Portland]

Bistro 302
Authors:  Lt. Cmdr. Alenis Meru and Lt. Cmdr. Timothy Rouse


Alenis squinted, trying to match up the incredibly presumptuous man who now sat in front of her to a personnel file. She'd reviewed her crew files en route to her assignment, but after reading a dozen or two files, all the pictures and names became jumbled in her head. "Mr. Rouse, is it?"

“The one and only” he responded with a smile after the waiter brought his coffee. “Everything ok?” he nodded to the padd in her hand. “Don’t tell me we’re going to be behind schedule. The look on the engineers face I spoke to yesterday didn’t look good.”

“Fine, I won’t tell you,” replied Alenis, jokingly. As she placed her PADD on the table, her voice turned serious. “We’re to be in sector 377 on Monday, but now they’ve told me that the retrofits won’t be ready until Tuesday. I’ve told them in no uncertain terms to expedite them. But so long as we’ve got all the critical systems online and Mongoose is installed, we can finish the remainder of the work at Deep Space Nine after our tests.”

Turning serious he asked. “And how long do you expect that to take?”

“The initial tests should be about a day’s work,” replied Alena. “After that, we’re going straight to Bajor to deliver an artifact, so we can stop at DS9 for a couple days to complete whatever they didn’t finish here.”

“And what about the rest of crew. If I remember correctly, some are scheduled to arrive after monday. Should I send them a notice to board at DS9?” He looked grim, the lights were way too bright. He tried to write a imaginary note, so not to forget stuff, but it wasn’t really working.

“We’ll be able to run the ship with the crew we have for now. As for the rest, yes, arrange transport directly from here to DS9 for them; we’ll meet up with them after the tests.” Alenis could detect that Timothy wasn’t feeling all that great; his voice was strained, and she could see bags under his eyes. “Are you alright? You look like you have a headache.”

“A headache is a understatement. I feel like there is a herd of cows trampling around in my head.” he said as he rubbed. “I think I had a bit too much fun last night, sort of speak”

“Ah, I understand,” replied Alenis. “Spare me the details, and allow me to assist. Waiter!”

“Yes ma’am, is there something I can help you with?”

“Yes. Get this man a Bajoran Deka Tea, lots of honey.”

“Right away, ma’am.”

Tim smiled. “Your joking, tea and honey?”

“It works, trust me” replied Alenis. Deka tea and honey was an old home remedy for a hangover that helped Alenis recover from many an academy party back in the day. “Believe it or not, I was young and impulsive at one point.” Of course, since then, Alenis had largely given up drinking -- she was not one of those officers who would get themselves plastered as soon as they got onto shore leave. Rarely would she have more than a glass or two of wine with dinner. Control was very important to her, and losing her composure was something that she feared.

“I’ll take your word for it.” He quickly finished his coffee before the waiter returned with Alenis brew. “Just to get thing straight. This isn’t really me.” he paused a moment. “I had the anniversary of a difficult day yesterday. I guess I let myself go too far.”

“I see. Well, if you ever need to talk about anything, my door is always open. I’ve been an XO for three years, and I know how lonely these sort of positions can be.” Alenis always took care to keep an appropriate distance from those under her command. Unfortunately, when she became an Executive Officer, that meant that the only person left on the ship that she could relate to was Captain Baxx. For her, loneliness came with authority, but she took it as the price she had to pay to accomplish her dream of becoming a Starfleet captain.

“Well, loneliness is something I did not experience last night.” he said with a chuckle, still wondering who the woman was he spent the night with.

Starbase 302
Guest Quarters

["Bonjour, Mon Grand Frere. "]

"Bonjour, Ma Petite Soeur, what do you want, Yvette?"

["Can't a girl just call her big brother to say hi?"] Yvette asked with a pretty smile.

"Sure, but you never do?"

["Fine." She said the smile now gone. "Papa received a message from a teenage girl who was looking for you."]

"What? Why would a teenage girl be looking for me?" Jason asked puzzled.

["I have some ideas." Yvette said. "Anyway, she said her name was Colm Jena and that you knew her mother. I did some digging and found out her mother was a Starfleet officer, a Bajoran Lieutenant Commander Coln..."]

"Tela." Jason interrupted. "We dated at the Academy, but lost track of each other after graduation. Did this Jena, say how she was doing?"

["Coln Tela is dead, she was killed in action two months ago. I'm sorry, Jason."]

"Do you know how it happened?" Jason asked sadly.

["The Tulsa, the ship she was serving on, was destroyed while trying to protect a merchant fleet from an attack by Orion pirates. At least that's the official story."]

"What's the unofficial story?"

["The Tulsa was doing covert surveillance, I can't give you any details, but I can tell that 'your old friend' Admiral Graham Cresswell authorised the mission."]

"Cresswell, they made that pompous, self-righteous bastard an admiral?"

["Yeah, but isn't that how you'd describe half the admirals you've met?" Yvette said. "But forget him, you're missing the point, I saw a copy of Colm Jena's birth certificate and guess who's listed as the father?"]

"I don't know." Jason replied his mind clouded by anger.

["You, you dolt, I thought you science types were supposed to be smart. Congrats, you're a Papa."]

"What? How could this happen?"

["If you don't know, I'm not gonna be the one to explain it to you."] Yvette said cheekily.

"Very funny. I meant that she never even told me she was pregnant." He said. "So, I'm a father?"

["Technically, you've been a father for the last fourteen years, but I can understand how it could come as a surprise. Papa will be so happy to be a grandfather again. What do you think the 'bitch' will say?"]

"Mother, will probably give me a lecture about how I should be more responsible in my 'sexual liaisons' and then order me to get a paternity test."

["Yeah, that sounds like the heartless bitch, but enough about her. So, are you going to meet your daughter?"]

"I'll have to, even if it's just to explain to her why I wasn't in her life."

["That's good, because she's on her way. She should be knocking on your door in a couple of hours. Have fun. Au revoir, Mon Grand Frere."]

"Au revoir, Ma Petite Soeur." Jason said and closed the channel.
-----------------------------
2 hours and 30 minutes later

Ding dong!

Jason was awaken by the door chime.

"Un instant, s'il vous plaît?" He said as he adjusted his uniform.

When he opened the door he found a young Bajoran woman standing in the doorway. "Are you, Lieutenant Jason Beauvoir?" She asked.
"Oui. I mean, I am he." Jason replied.

"I'm Coln Jena, your daughter." She told him matter-of-factly.

Even with Yvette's warning Jason was understandably taken a back and stared unbelieving at his visitor, unsure what to say.

"May I come in, before someone gets the wrong idea?"

"What? Ah yes, of course. Come in, make yourself at home. Can I get you something to from the replicator?"

"No, thank you." Jena said as she looked around the living room. It was decorated in the default style, so told her nothing about the man that was her biological father.

"Heard about your mother's death, I'm sorry."

"I don't want your sympathy. Why didn't you follow my mother, when she left?"

"She told me not to. She said she'd found someone new." Jason said.

"Didn't you love here?"

"Yes, very much." Jason said overcome by emotions as he remembered the time he and Tela shared together.

"Then why didn't you fight for her?"

"She made it clear we were though."

"She didn't tell me anything about you, you know? Until about 2 weeks ago, I thought my father was Peter Vaughn. I found out about you when I was looking though my mother's belongings and found her diary and a photo of you." She said seeing if she could get a rise out of him.

Jason didn't know what to say. Did he have the right to ask her if this Mr. Vaughn had been a good father to her?

"So this Mr. Vaughn is he good to you?"

"He was, he died when I was 10."

"Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't know."

"For a Linguist, you done seem to be very good at talking to people." She said.

"Come on, give me a break. This is new to me. I only found out you existed, 2 and a half hours ago."

"So you don't have any other children?"

"No. The closet I have is a nephew named Dylan, he's 6. He's my brother, Jean-Pierre's boy."

"So I have a cousin and an uncle?"

"Yes, and two aunts, Yvette and Bianca. Grandparents, great grandparents and two great uncles. "

"Wow, all my life, it's only been me, Mom and Peter. When do I get to meet everyone?" She asked unable to hide her excitement.

"Well, I don't know, everyone's pretty spread out and I'm leaving on a mission soon."

Jena's face fell. "So, you're going to leave me too? I knew this was a mistake, you don't need a teenage kid cramping your style. It's okay I just take the next shuttle to Bajor and you won't see me ever again." She said as she headed for the door .

"Stop!" He said.

She stopped and turned."Why?" She asked.

"Because you're my daughter and I want to get to know you. Now I still have to leave soon, but I'll talk to my new CO and see if I can bring you along. If not you can go to Earth and live with your Uncle Jean-Pierre, aunt Bianca and cousin Dylan. What do you say?"

She stared at him for a while trying to ascertain whether or not he was being genuine. Finally she said. "Okay, you're on."

"Good, now let's go find some place to eat. If you're good we can get ice cream."

She thought about telling him that she wasn't child, but instead she smiled, said. "Yumm, Ice cream." and followed him into the corridor.

Introducing Coln Jena.

Tyrlai covered her mouth, her eyes beaming as she gazed over the railing and out the refit bay windows of Starbase 302. "Thosk," she grabbed his arm in excitement, "do you know what that is?"

Thosk goggled and tried to extract his arm, his sanitizer was still packed away with his belongings. "I most certainly do. It's a deathtrap! That hull has to be eighty years old!!"

"One hundred and twenty, possibly a hundred-thirty if it has been renamed." Tyrlai gazed out at the Miranda class vessel. She had seen one of the first being built at Earth spacedock on her first trip up as an ensign back in the 2250's. Well she sort of had, it was a pre-joined Cedria Zade but she could still remember it.

"Hulls start breaking down at eighty years, microfractures, residual radiant damage, particle scoring! A spanner could probably knock a hole in this piece of junk."

Tyrlai rolled her eyes, she was far to used to Thosks negativity to let it alter her mood. "It has had at least two full structural refits based on configuration and nacelle shape. No doubt countless lesser upgrades, oh this is going to be wonderful. They never got better stylistically than the post Constitution-refit days. I wonder what it looks like on the inside, maybe they kept some of the details intact here and there."

"We can only hope to be sucked out through a void breach in an aesthetically pleasing bulkhead." Thosk deadpanned still looking at the Portland with deep suspicion.

Tyrlai turned in a circle and did a little hop still smiling and beaming like a ten year old who didn't get the sort of solstice presents that Thosks mother gave him. "We have to go aboard, how do I look?"

Thosk scrutinized her as she stood still smiling like a crazy woman. "Well, you are out of uniform. What you are wearing is inappropriately tight and looks torn,..."

"That's part of the design."

"Well then the design is also inappropriate, your hair is too long and its dishevled,..."

"It's styled that way."

"Well I recommend a nice tight bun if you mean to keep it that long. You are too tall for those boots."

Tyrlai looked down at her boots, she had replicated them for the mission. "I thought they looked adventurous."

"You need to do something about those spots."

She decided to abandon the rest of Thosks advice and headed for the airlock whistling for her hoverpallet with her stuff to follow. Thosk scampered to keep up having to guide his on pallet manually because he didn't trust the pathing on that particular model. He managed to keep up with new suggestions until well after she had left him in his quarters with his horrified looking new roommates. She made it to her own quarters and unpiled her stuff and then went looking for her new commanding officer. She visited two lounges, engineering, sickbay, one of the holodecks, communications and the cafe. Afeter an hour, she checked with the computer and headed for the bridge.


* * * * * * *


Tyrlai hit the chime and heard what seemed to be an angry and frustrated 'Enter!' echo through the substructure in reply. She realized she hadnt changed from her combination backwater trading, mildly revealing outfit and quickly shined her combadge, the only regulation part of her outfit and walked through the door.

The CO was a Bajoran, average height, wiry strong build with expressive dark eyes and hair that almost matched Tyrlais. Tyrlai usually read bios before reporting places but it was a Miranda and she had to see everything, now she was stuck not remembering which name she should use as a surname or how she was going to avoid completely ticking off her superiors on yet another ship. 'Wing it,' her inner voice said to her. She called it Zade, though recognized it was probably more Tyrlai.

"Tyrlai Zade, reporting for duty, Captain. Sorry about the outfit, and my hair and umm, whoever was just on the comm. Aren't Miranda's awesome though." She smiled hopefully.

Deck Six
USS Portland
The day before launch
Authors:  Lt. Cmdr. Alenis Meru and Lt. (JG) Jason Beauvoir


As she made her ways through the hallways in the underbelly of the Portland, Alenis walked like a woman on a mission, blowing by a gang of workmen repairing a plasma conduit. Tightly clutched under her arm was an object wrapped in black cloth. Easily finding her destination, she walked briskly into the centre of the science lab.

“Mr. Beauvoir, I presume.” Alenis continued without even giving the man a chance to respond. “I have something very important that Starfleet Command wants you to take a look at.”

Jason looked up from his work as Alenis entered the lab. He found her quite attractive, he'd always had a thing for Bajoran women.

"Okay, ma'am, let's see it then." He said.

Brushing aside some PADDs, Alenis found space on a desk for her package. Carefully, she placed it down and unfolded the cloth around it, unwrapping the shard. The faint glow that illuminated the shard was absorbed by the black cloth around it. "This here is a Tolic shard. It's a piece of an orb which was broken up and smuggled off of Bajor during the occupation." Alenis paused for a moment. Though she found the Admiral's orders distasteful, she was bound by duty to carry them out. "Starfleet command wants us to study it and find out as much as we can before returning it to Bajor. Now, I'm sure I don't need to tell you that these orbs are very unpredictable, so you will need to take proper precautions. Further," Alenis' voice took on a sterner tone, "this is a religious artifact. It is very sacred to the Bajoran people, and is an important part of Bajoran culture. You will only use non-intrusive and non-destructive investigatory techniques, and you will treat it with the proper respect at all times. Understood?"

Jason looked at the Tolic shard as Alenis explain what it was and what he was to do with it. The shard shone with a beautiful inner luminescence. The Science officer had heard of the shards, but this was the first he'd actually seen. As an honorary member of the Bajoran Archaeological Institute he'd been shown some of the Bajoran Orbs.

He could tell she was unhappy with these orders. "Ma'am, I am aware of this artefact's significance to the Bajoran people and I assure you I'll treat it with the respect it deserves. " Jason told her.

"Thank you," replied Alenis. She could see in his eyes that her science officer was understanding, perhaps even sympathetic, to the situation. Relaxing her chest, she let out a deep breath, allowing a little bit of tension to escape. "As for tomorrow, you will be on the bridge, ready to monitor the testing of Mongoose, right?"

Energy fields weren't exactly Jason's speciality,but as Chief Science Officer you had to be a jack-of-all-trades so to speak, so he spent the majority of his off-duty time getting up to speed on any new experiments or fields of discovery he was meant to oversee.

"Aye, Ma'am, I've familiarised myself with the Mongoose system and I'll be on the Bridge, bright and early." Jason said with what he hoped was a reassuring smile.

"Excellent. I'll leave the shard in your capable hands. Oh, and welcome aboard."

"Thank you, Ma'am, it's great to be on a Starfleet vessel again." Jason said.

As the Captain left, Jason watched her go, she was indeed an attractive and an emotionally strong woman, one that he'd like to get to know better.

He filed those thoughts away for later and began working on his 'new project.

Floren's Bar, Miami, Earth
Three Months Ago


"Y'know," Rawlings drawled, "it's a real shame, seeing the team fall apart like this. We stuck together through two ships. You guys are like family. I ever tell you that?" She rapped her knuckles on the table, accenting each word. "Like. Family."

Tobin smirked. "I think you're drunk." Mimicing Rawlings, he banged his fist on the table. "Very. Drunk."

"No, really!" Rawlings insisted. "All that time staring across the Neutral Zone, waiting for the Romulans come test our sensors with their latest cloaking toys." She downed her Andorian ale. "And then -"

"Oh, you remember that sensor ghost?" Malos interjected.

Rawlings doubled over with laughter. "Yeah! And when Captain Novik thought it was a Warbird?"

Malos chuckled. "And when it didn't answer our hails, and he threatened to fire if it came any closer - did you ever see that vein on his head get so big?"

Practically giggling, Tobin slapped Roberts on the back. "I thought he was going to get us all killed. A Nova threatening a D'Deridex! And there he was, shouting like the eighteenth fleet was right behind us!"

Malos let his smile fade. "I guess you're right, Rawlings. I'm gonna miss you guys. I'm going to Starfleet Headquarters, Rawlings is going to the Heusen, Tobin is... Geeze, I forgot."

"The Portland. It's a Miranda, believe it or not."

Malos frowned. "So it won't be a dedicated intelligence ship? Wait, aren't Mirandas the ones with the little thing on top, kinda looks like a roll bar?"

"Roll bar?" Rawlings smirked. "What's a starship gonna do with a roll bar?"

Tobin shrugged and lowered his voice. "Laugh all you want. But mark my words - someday, somehow, you're gonna wish the Heusen had a roll bar."

Once again, Rawlings doubled over with laughter. "Yeah, sure. I'll call you the minute it happens."

"I'll be waiting." Tobin replied.

---------------------

Starbase 302
Present Day

Tobin walked over to the replicator. "Omelette."

The replicator chirped in response. [Please specify.]

Tobin sighed. "Omelette, like I had yesterday."

His breakfast materialized, and Tobin took it back to his desk. "Computer, resume log." He poked at his meal as he spoke.

"The Portland is just about ready to begin her shakedown. I've just boarded two days ago, since the ship's computer finally recognized my security clearance - until that, I was more productive on the starbase."

He began cutting the omelette into strips. "I've begun reviewing the ship's logs. As I understand it, the Portland has been tasked with returning an artifact to Bajor. Coincidentally, the captain's Bajoran. I'm beginning to wonder if Command arranged this on purpose."

"At any rate, there shouldn't be much for me to do on this mission, at least after I'm finished with the ship's records. I suppose I'll take a little tour of the ship, get to know everyone. Maybe I'll check what holonovels are installed here. Computer, end log."

He dug into his meal. It was only now that he realized he hadn't eaten dinner the night before. Instead, he'd spent the night digging through the ship's systems, checking for holes in the computer's security. He was relieved to find none. As old as the design was, the Miranda's upgrades seemed to be comprehensive enough to keep intruders out.