[Last Round 2008] Assistants and Briefings

[Salak]

(( Intelligence Liaison Offices, Starbase 118 ))

::A bleary-eyed Quinn wandered into her office later than she had intended,

yawning and rubbing her face. Her first port of call was the replicator to

the left of her desk, and a ridiculously strong coffee along with it, before

settling in to do some work.::

TSAO: Good morning, sir.

::Having utterly failed to notice the other person in the room, Quinn

stopped dead in her tracks and performed a classic double-take.::

REYNOLDS: Who the hell are you?

::The sharp comment was followed up with a wince at her own bluntness and a

thought that perhaps she might be spending a little too much time with

Walter and his bad habits. The other woman, however, simply held out a PADD

as if nothing had happened.::

TSAO: Petty Officer First Class Tsao Xiu Li, sir. I'm your new assistant,

courtesy of Admiral Pearce.

::Quinn shot the other woman a way look as she took the PADD. Black hair,

honey-coloured skin, brown eyes, a flat-bridged nose and noticeable

epicanthal folds... Even without the obviously Chinese name, it easy to see

where her ancestors had come from, if not the woman herself. But there was

something suspiciously off about her appearance; the skin had another shade

in that honey and her ears...::

TSAO: Half-Vulcan.

::Half-breeds of Starfleet, unite? Quinn looked down at the PADD, her

cheeks colouring pink at how easily Tsao had read her. Paging through the

woman's service record, embarrassment gave way to a mix of caution and

awe.::

REYNOLDS: You've... Had quite a service history. Over half of this is

still classified.

::The Petty Officer chose not respond and continued standing there, hands

clasped neatly behind her back.::

REYNOLDS: ::Quietly.:: Right. ::She dropped the PADD onto the nearby desk

and moved toward the replicator.:: So I can understand needing an

assistant, but I wasn't expecting an Admiral to hand-pick one for me.

TSAO: I'm sure Admiral Pearce had his reasons.

REYNOLDS: Keep your friends close and your enemies closer?

TSAO: I couldn't possibly comment, sir.

::Quinn snorted softly in response and ordered a double-strength black

coffee. As the drink sparkled into existence, she was surprised to hear the

Petty Officer continue.::

TSAO: ...Though my first thought was that your recent brush with the Breen

was indeed the motivating factor.

REYNOLDS: I had an extensive debriefing, Tsao. There was no sign of any

kind of mental condit-- ::She sighed. Tsao wasn't the one who she'd need

to tussle with over this:: Never mind. Drink?

::Tsao shook her head and Quinn plucked her own drink from the replicator,

walking over to her desk.::

TSAO: I took the liberty of scheduling your day - subject to your approval,

of course.

::This was something new. A schedule? Any schedules she had in the past

had depended on what systems needed a service or what parts were due to be

swapped out - and often were thrown to the wind as soon as trouble reared

its ugly head. Which was all too often, for ships stationed in the Ithassa

region. They'd also always been something she had done herself, as

delegation had never been one of her strong suits.::

REYNOLDS: :: Cautiously.:: Okay... So what's first?

TSAO: You have a senior officer briefing in the Situation Room in...

::She glanced at the chronometer on Quinn's desk and raised an eyebrow.

Brightly coloured and childish, with cartoon characters crawling all over

it. What Tsao didn't know was that it had been a graduation gift from

Quinn's father - a reminder to "take the time to have a little fun".

Unfortunately, Quinn never had been too good at following his advice.::

TSAO: ...seven minutes.

::Quinn visibly startled - it wasn't like her to oversleep when there was a

briefing the next morning, much less forget about it entirely. Grabbing a

couple of things from her desk and taking a slurp of coffee, she started

toward the door.::

REYNOLDS: I'd best get going then.

::Tsao nodded and picked up the PADD that she had earlier handed to Quinn,

tapping a few things into it before once again offering it to the

Intelligence Officer as she rushed past.::

TSAO: This is the rest of your schedule, provided the briefing doesn't

require any changes. Have a good morning, sir.

::The only reply were the doors swishing shut on Quinn's rapidly retreating

form.::

(( Situation Room ))

::After a frantic dash that nearly resulted with coffee being spilled down

the front of her nice new uniform, Quinn burst into the Situation Room - to

find that only Rocar and Pedro were there. Shooting a thin smile at each of

them, she dropped herself into a nearby chair and immediately starting

tapping away at one of the PADDs in her hand, intermittently taking sips of

her coffee.::

--

Lieutenant Quinn Reynolds

Intelligence Officer

Starbase 118 Ops

[Salak]

How easy would it have been to write only the final paragraph? How many times have you seen people write just that in order to fulfil the purpose of getting a character to a briefing?

An enjoyable sim, injected with a bit of humour, that shows a somewhat unusual turn of events at the start of a day. A good dose of background where in so many cases, we get little, if any. A sim that not only sets up the character for the briefing well, with an idea of how their morning has gone so far already, but with the addition of a new character also sets up for potential future exchanges to occur after the briefing, etc...

Nicely done.