First Impressions

Posted on Thu Aug 25th, 2011 @ 2:03pm by Lieutenant Commander Aral Aix & Ensign Nathan Davis

Mission: Tomorrow's Arizona
Location: Promenade, SB900
Timeline: Prior to Departure from SB900

The more or less repaired the Arizona had briefly docked at Starbase 900 to affect a crew rotation and take on new supplies. The vessel would be there less than twenty four hours and Aral Aix had decided to take advantage of the opportunity and his new found seniority and take in a spot of shopping. Shopping, although hardly an obsession, become considerably more interesting since his joining. He remembered how Zalia Aix had loved to traipse the market squares and department stores of Trill, even in her dotage she had acquired vast numbers of catalogues that she had spent hours flicking through.

Aral suspected that the banality of shopping had appealed to Zalia, a materialistic distraction from the intellectual world she had woven for herself. For him shopping was a domestic, familiar distraction from the terrors and mysteries he encountered in deep space. After his internment on Archadia III he was glad to avail himself of a well lit promenade and all the irrelevant retail opportunities it afforded.

Having just spent twenty minutes admiring a series of unusual indigenous artworks and trinkets, including a suspiciously shaped fertility idol, he turned about to go in search of a replimat and found himself nearly falling over an Engineer.

"Excuse me Ensign." Aral apologised. "Your first assignment? Such a long way from home?"

Nathan stood motionless for a moment as he collected his thoughts. He had been so focused on his design that he wasn't paying attention to where we was walking.

"Y-yes sir." He answered, stumbling over his words as they came out, "FIrst time I have been out of the Sol system, let alone the Alpha Quadrant. I was just on my way to the USS Arizona." He shifted from one leg to another, getting anxious to finally board his first star ship. He had made designs and run holo programs of his ships and run tests, but they were nothing compared to the real thing. Or so he had been told.

"You wouldn't happen to be Lieutenant Commander Aix would you?" He asked, realizing who the officer was that he had almost run over. Running over a superior officer was bad enough, but a superior officer from your assigned ship. Nathan shuddered at the thought.

The Trill nodded somewhat startled at how his name had preceded him. "Anything you've heard about me is a lie, unless it's flattering in which case it's all true." Although he had spent a couple of hours that morning looking over the Arizona's crew rotation schedule he had absolutely no idea who the young man was. "So, you are our new Engineer?"

"That would be me." Nathan smiled, "Ensign Nathan Davis. I'm sorry for the lousy first impression. If you would allow me I would like a chance to start over?"

Aral shook his head. "I once mistook the high priestess of Vulcan for the evening's entertainment. That was a bad first impression." Shuddering at his ancient faux pas he gestured in the direction of the nearby replimat. "Would you care to join me for a coffee?" He paused. "The only drink the Arizona's replicators do well is sweet tea for some reason."

"Thank you sir." Nathan breathed a sigh of relief as thee two moved towards the replimat. He looked over the faces of the crewmen and civilians that they passed, making note that none of them gave him so much as a second look, and it felt good. For the first time in a long time no one seemed to know or care he was the son of an admiral. He was just one of the crowd.

Seated across from Davis, with a mug of Vulcan spiced tea in hand, Aral was able to assess Davis properly. His initial assumption that Davis was in his early twenties was quickly disregarded, he was older, closer to Aral's own age. "You must be about twenty nine." The Chief Science Officer began. "Quite old for a human to be a rookie Ensign. What's the story?"

"Believe me, i'm not your average rookie." Nathan took a drink of his coffee. "I didn't actually get a chance to join the academy until I was 25. The disappearence of my father in 2366 sent my mother into a depression and I had to take care of her and finish my schooling. She died in her sleep in 2380. It was too late when we found her to try and revive her." Nathan stared down at the steam rising from his hot beverage, remembering.

Aix listened carefully, his face showing a mixture of sympathy and intrigue. The story was a sad one although he struggled to empathise; his family - Aral's family - were very much alive despite the deep ambivalence he had developed towards them since his joining. "Was your father at Wolf 359?"

"Oh yes, sorry." Nathan said, snapping back to reality, "My father was Admiral Charles Davis. I had always been told that he was one of the greats. Right up there with Picard and Kirk." He chuckled, "My mother always exaggerated things when it came to my father. I don't really know what is fact and what's fiction."

Aral smiled politely and nodded in agreement, half remembering references to the man from his Academy days. "Some of his missions were required reading when I was at the Academy." He took a sip from his mug, "I imagine they still are."

"They are, but I had heard them all before so I just skipped over them." Nathin shook his head and took another drink from his cup. "Anyways where was I?"

Aral smirked at the man's sudden change of direction and mood. The Ensign still seemed to ride an emotional rollercoaster. "Your mid twenties," Aral helpfully added.

"Oh right." Nathan felt slightly embarrassed by losing his place. "After my mother died I joined the academy, being much older than most of the other cadets, and went into engineering." He wanted to cut to the chase and not bore Aix with full detail. "I graduated from the academy and started working in the starship design and retrofit department at Starfleet Headquarters on earth. I was there for a couple years, even managed to make it to lieutenant. But then I was transferred out here and I guess the ranking system is a bit different on starships." He idly played with the single gold stud on his collar as he finished. It was going to be interesting being an ensign again.

"In the Delta Quadrant there is one rule," replied Aral, "try not to die."

"I plan on living sir." Nathan smiled. "So where exactly is the Arizona? I would like to get aboard and get comfortable in my quarter; the directions I received led me to a dead end in the bowels of the station." He chuckled.

"She's at docking port twenty." Aral replied, smiling. The immense class starbase was well named. As a scaled down spacedock with two ancillary spacedock facilities the new class had a scale and complexity of internal layout that was deeply disorientating to even the most able navigator.

"Perfect." The Ensign stood, and smiled at Aral. "If you will excuse me sir, I would like to board immediately and get familiar with the Arizona's systems and layout." With that, Nathan left the Trill to his tea, and made his way towards the his first starship assignment, and his new home.