Up and out.

Posted on Tue Oct 27th, 2020 @ 12:56pm by Lieutenant Commander Finley Chu

724 words; about a 4 minute read

Mission: S1E4: The Hills Have Eyes
Location: SFI Station DELPHI
Timeline: MD5-ish, kind of. Don't worry too much about it.

Fin looked back at her quarters. She had come to call it home. But it was time to move on. Time to find new adventures, new challenges, new puzzles. It was a mixture of sadness and excitement. DELPHI felt like home, and her teammates had become good friends. But all good things come to an end, and this was one of them. She had passage booked on the USS Rhae, a Ronin-class starship heading to Aldebaron 3, and would be dropping Fin off on Tarsas 2 on the way. She would enjoy a month of shore leave there before her new assignment.

Everything she owned that she had with her at DELPHI fitted in a big duffel bag and two transport crates. Fin threw her bag over her shoulder and activated the anti-grav on the transport cart and headed out. On her walk she passed one of the viewing rooms. DELPHI was situated in a cliff, under the water level. She always loved spending time looking through one of the vista windows at the fish and the simple appearance of tranquillity. She pondered it for a long moment, wondering if she did the right thing asking for a ship-board posting instead of a planet-side post. But what was done was done and the anti-grav cart followed as she made her way up the elevator and out the medical facility that helped hide DELPHI.

Seven days on the Rhea. Boredom struck Fin quickly. She had tried to tour the engineering bay of the Ronin-class, but a sour looking commander shooed her away two steps out of the turbolift. Even after explaining that Fin had the XO's permission to enter the commander, identified as the chief engineer, stated that she couldn't give a rat's left nut about who authorized her to go where, and if she wouldn't leave right this moment she'd have the big burly Naussican security officer to carry her out. Fin took the hint.

It also turned out, the Rhea was a dry ship. Not even synthahol was permitted to be drank on the ship, not by crew, not by command, and not by the guests. The replicators had it locked out, and the crew lounge had its bar removed for a bank of replicators. It was three days in that Fin, out of sheer boredom, ended up playing 3D chess with a Denobulan, and of course lost.

When the ship dropped out of warp over Tarsas everybody was ready to part ways. Fin beamed down on the small paradise world and sighed. Tarsas was beautiful. The resort she had booked had a massive pool with both slides and toys for youngsters, and bubble baths and jetstreams for the older swimmers. It was in a bay renowned for its aquatic life. And best of all, it was all-inclusive, including drinks and three massages per week.

Sixteen hours after checking in, just after a massage, Fin was back in her uniform. Two men in Starfleet uniform, a Vulcan and an Andorian, were escorting her to the shuttle and up to orbit. Fin had received her new transfer orders as soon as she entered her rooms. They had come in the form of the two Starfleet officers waiting for her in her rooms informing her that her downtime was rescinded and she was to report immediately to the USS Louhans in orbit for transfer to a OSI operation called Memory Theta. These men, under threat of a pointed Type 2a5 phaser exited Fin's room and kindly told to make love to themselves.

Fin then attempted to reach the Office of Special Investigations to request, or demand, information about her transfer and who cleared it. When that lead nowhere she reached out to her allies and friends in SFI. Even the highest ranking members, a Commodore in charge of Internal Security could not tell her who moved her around. When she reached the Personnel Office for the Engineering Corps they simply informed Fin that the transfer out came from an unknown but verified source and that it was out of their hands.

Finally, Fin sent a letter she had written before joining DELPHI. It was sent directly to OSI. The answer was swift, anonymous, and clear. 'Not accepted.' were the only two words.

So Fin was escorted onto a shuttle, onto the Louhans, and into the Badlands.

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