From: Live Long and Prosper
Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 10:45:43 -0500 (EST)
Subject: USS CHESAPEAKE: Spring Starts Today
SD 90415.1454
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CSciO's Office
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MD 4.1235
"Just don't bug me, Derek," said Anne pointedly. She was glaring
at her aCSciO as if he were some kind of insect. "Just *don't*."
"But... Anne..."
"Leave me alone, why can't you?" asked Anne, her voice beginning
to rise a little.
"Leave you alone? After what you did on the Bridge today? You
have *got* to be kidding!" exclaimed Fielding. "Look... I just wanted to
let you know that you won't have to run those review drills..."
"Go *away*, Derek."
Fielding could see that now was not the time to argue.
"Okay, okay, I'm going away," he said, rather placatingly. "I'll
just pop off to my office, then." He left, pretending not to look her way
as he did so.
Anne stuck out her tongue at him; the result satisfied her.
Fielding had flinched.
***** ***** *****
MD 4.1330
It was a rather nervous Fielding who ventured into the Chief
Science Officer's office nearly an hour later. He looked at his superior
a bit apprehensively; but, to his surprise and relief, she smiled at him.
"It's good to see a friendly face again," she said softly.
"Huh?" asked Fielding.
"Oh... nothing." Anne shrugged. She didn't think that telling
him about weirding out the Captain would be a good idea. "So... what can
I do for you, Derek?"
"I just came in to give you these reports," he said, holding out
the PADDs. They contained the afternoon status reports for each
division. Anne frowned at the one from the MLD.
"Derek? Did you read this?" she asked.
"No, why?"
"Serak is sounding like a first-class snob," complained Anne,
showing him the PADD in question.
It read, in part, "...I must admit, with all due respect, that the
orders given my division by the Chief Science Officer tend to be
irrelevant at best..."
"Irrelevant," muttered Anne. "I save the ship from a
knife-weilding Chief Security Officer and they call it *irrelevant*."
"He didn't mean it the way it sounded," hedged Fielding, though
he had no actual idea *what* the Vulcaan had meant.
"Sure, and I'm a hunk of Swiss cheese.... look, you'd better take
these. I can't handle them right now."
"Uh... okay, Anne," said Fielding. He took back the PADDs and
sighed. He hoped that Anne would come to her senses soon. It was
absolutely No Fun trying to play at being his boss's babysitter.
***** ***** *****
MD 4.1430
She must have gone to sleep again. Anne rubbed her eyes and
looked around. She was still in her office. Derek was across the hall,
in his office. He looked busy; perhaps he was poring over some notes.
She looked at her computer monitor. No new messages. Good. She closed
her eyes and went back to sleep.
***** ***** *****
MD 4.1500
"Anne?" said a voice, cutting into her dream.
"Hmm? What is it?" asked Anne sleepily.
"Sorry to wake you up, but I'm going to take a little coffee
break. I'll be gone in fifteen minutes, but I wanted you to know I'll be
gone for a bit. Okay?"
Anne nodded.
"I'll keep watch," she told him groggily.
When Fielding came back from his coffee break, Anne was sound
asleep in her office, her head still propped up in her hands.
***** ***** *****
MD 4.1700
"Anne? I..."
Fielding stopped. Anne was still asleep, her head now resting on
her desk. He stood for a minute, wondering if he should bother to wake
her up. No, he decided finally. That wouldn't be necessary. She hadn't
been able to do all that much while she was awake; better to have her
happily asleep than dubiously useful awake.
Maybe, he thought, sleep was what she most needed in any case.
Certainly, part of her recent foul moods and rapid temper flare-ups
could be attributed to lack of adequate rest.
He left quietly. He would stay put in his office until she woke up.
***** ***** *****
MD 4.1845
Anne woke up with a start. She had heard *something*... it was
still sounding, as a matter of fact. Frowning slightly, she looked
around. This had better not be another weird dream, she though.
No; it was not a dream this time. The *Urgent* message flag was
flashing on her computer monitor. She sleepily tapped the *open*
command. As she took in its contents, the sleepiness vanished.
She decided that a comm link wouldn't be necessary; he was just
across the hall, after all. Sitting straight up in her chair, she took a
deep breath.
"DEREK!" she called, loudly but not hysterically, "Boy do I have
a *MESSAGE* for you!"
Fielding had come stumbling in at the mention of his name; now he
stared at the message displayed on her screen.
"We're *launching*?" he asked, incredulous.
"Yes, Derek, we're *launching*," said Anne excitedly. "My, oh
my, we have *a lot* to do!" She stood up sharply, nearly toppling her
chair. "We'd better check out everything right away..."
"Hey, did you catch that bit about the mission briefing?" asked
Fielding, pointing at the message on the screen.
"Huh? What briefing?"
"You need someplace to *go*," explained Fielding, quite
patiently, "if you are launching."
"Oh." The thought had obviously not occurred to Anne. She sat
down again, took in the bit about the briefing, and was out of the office
within the span of fifteen seconds.
Fielding left the officc, shaking his head slightly.
"I think I liked it better when she was asleep," he said to himself.
Respectfully submitted,
Masako Goto
Lt. Anne Murray, Ph.D.
CSciO
USS CHESAPEAKE NCC-31813
mgoto@indiana.edu
<>
Okay, okay. At least it stayed in one room, right? *Right*?
Seriously, apologies for the rather -- um -- well, for this post. But I
*knew* she was up to *something*... it just took her a while to tell me
that she'd spent most of the day sleeping. Yeah, really *productive*
there, Anne. The day before launch, too. Speaking of which, the
Science Officer's take on the whole matter coming up shortly... :)
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Thought for the day: Why do children insist that they want to be adults
when the adults insist that they want to be children?
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