The Trenton was buzzing with activity in the last few hours before the Exercise was about to begin. Cdr Fields’ team was busy practicing rapid loading and combat landings in Hangar 1, while the runabout and fighter squadrons were preparing their vessels for the first Phase of the training which was to be some convoy escort practice. In the simplest terms, the Starfleet ‘team’ would be tasked with escorting a convoy of cargo transports for a four hour transit through a nebula at sublight speeds, while the Allied ‘team’ tried to intercept and destroy the convoy before it was able to safely exit the nebula.
Commander Mee IH was on his way to the bridge with the ship’s new Counselor. Though he had only been aboard for just over a week, the XO had already struck up a budding bromance with his new fellow white furred friend, to the point where the two were now gym buddies, having made a mutual assistance pact with each other to try and slim down and ‘get fit’.
As the turbolift doors wooshed open, Mee IH was giggling at one of the Counselor’s stories.
“Mmmmoopsy!(And it was only after we successfully completed the training flight, that someone on the team finally told her we weren’t lost in a completely different alternate reality.).” Lt JG Moop-sey exclaimed as the two began to walk across the rear of the Trentons command deck.
As soon as the Ops officer, Lt Spati, heard the Moopsy utter its only form of vocalization, he let out a high pitched scream of sheer terror and stumbled backwards before darting across the open space in between his console and tactical across the way, before leaping over the edge of Lt Singh’s comms console, “Oh my god, we got a Moopsy onboard, we’re screwed, we’re all gonna die.”
Mee IH started laughing out loud, “Well apparently, someone doesn’t read my daily newsletter. I warned you that there would still be a few people who would instinctually be afraid of you.”
Lt JG Moop-sey nodded his head and smiled at the XO, “Moopsy(You did brother.).”
Peaking from behind the console he was hiding behind, Spati asked, “Why is the Moopsy wearing a blue uniform?”
“Moopsi! (It’s nice to meet you Lt, I’m Moop-sey, the new ship’s Counselor.)” The short, round around the edges, creature said.
“I can hear it say Moopsy, but why is the computer translating for it, this is freaking me out!” The Orion kept peering out from around the corner of the console wall.
Wong stood from his chair and interjected, “Lt. Spati, get a hold of yourself, you’re speaking to a fellow officer and crewmate.”
“Uh, yes sir, s-sorry sir.” B’ret straightened himself up.
“I got this sir,” Mee IH hovered past the obviously frightened and witless Spati, “Follow me Lt.”
The First Officer led the young Operations Officer into the conference lounge.
“I don’t know what kind of history you have with our new counselors species, but it’s obviously something serious. So listen up, I want you to take the afternoon off, get your head right, and report back for duty at 1730h, you can man Ops for the second evolution of Phase 1, alright.” Mee IH squeaked in a soft compassionate tone.
“Are you relieving me of duty sir?” Spati sounded disappointed.
“Not at all Lt, you’ve been doing a fine job, I’m just giving you the afternoon off. Lt. Moop-sey has you scared milkless(a cetacean derivative of the more crass saying) for some reason. The Lt is from a world near the boundary of the Gamma Quadrant that is home to a highly advanced and intelligent offshoot or ancestor of the nightmarish creatures most people think of when they hear about a Moopsy. So take a few hours, deal with whatever you gotta deal with, and don’t ever let me hear you spewing any of the speciesist othering malarkey you just pulled out there. Lt. Moopsy is a sentient being, and a he, alright?”
“Yes sir. Understood sir.”
Back on the bridge Moop-sey was sitting to the left of the Captain and the two were sharing Academy stories.
“Moopsee. (I was actually the Academy Wrestling champion in the 70 kg weightclass in my Junior year. Lost the finals in the Sector Championship to a particularly ravenous Tellarite who went on to win gold at the Federation Games the next year)” The counselor said, taking a small amount of pride in the accomplishment, though three of his six opponents did forfeit their matches.
“Oh you don’t say, I was on the Zero-G Polo team in my Freshman and Sophomore years. I was on the Fencing and Rowing squads in my Junior year.” Wong replied.
“You were on the winning 10000m, 4- and 8-person skulls teams in 2388 right?” LCdr Dawes asked from behind him. It had been a memorable day.
“Yeah. How did you know?”
“I was in the stands at the finish line, cheering you on. That was my grad year.”
Wong laughed, “It’s not often the Academy beats Harvard and Yale but we had a great crew team that year.”
Mee IH floated back in alone, and took over at the Ops station. He flipped down and engaged his VR headset monocle, then reached out with his left pectoral flipper, crained his neck to look and make sure he was pushing the right one to transfer control to him, and gently pressed the button with what would be his thumb, if he were humanoid.
As he straightened up and began controllling the station in VR, bobbing his head around in various directions and flicking his flippers around as he managed the operations of the ship.
“Hail coming in from the Vor’nak, sahib. They will be arriving momentarily.” Singh reported.
“Let our CAP fighters know to expect them, the Bortas’qu and the vessels from Lakota Squadron soon.” Wong said as he returned to his chair and quickly typed a message to Mee IH that read; What happened with Spati?
Mee IH typed back; Gave him the afternoon off to clear his head. I’ll take care of Ops for the first serial of the Exercise.
Satisfied with the answer, Wong went back to planning the formation he planned to deploy for the training scenario through the nebula.
