~ Arriving ~
Lt. Summer Williams stepped from the beaming platform and had to suppress a shudder. She had a strong dislike for beaming, especially trans-warp beaming, yet she knew how important it was. She would have never made it in time. So, she had gotten beamed from a shuttle to the USS Endeavor which travelled at warp speed. Feeling a little topsy-turvy, she greeted the posted officer, registered for duty and received her first orders and indications of how to get to her room and office. The ship was not very big but she had always had the ability to get lost.
During the shuttle flights, she had made herself familiar with the crew, and even though she was late, there were still some positions unassigned. That was normal, as far as she was concerned. From what she could read, everybody in the crew was capable and concerning the latest medical and psychological check-ups they were doing just fine. She would still have to schedule individual meetings with the Chiefs of each station, to get to know them and to establish trust. After all, she would be the ship's counselor, a trust person and morale officer, a member of the so called Omega Team, a bunch of specialists chosen very carefully for this mission. The automated doors slid open and she entered her new office.
It was not unusual for her to not go first to her quarters. For her, the office was as important as the quarters with her personal belongings because she knew that she would spend a lot of her time here. The first thing she did was have a nice cup of tea, green tea with pomegranate flavor. The smell alone made her feel comfortable. While she took a sip, she already started decorating in her mind. With the cup half empty, she finished the new design of the practice.
Once she had settled in, she started out on a tour throughout the different departments of the USS Endeavour. First, she started in Sickbay, because she and the medical staff would work together very closely. There was no Chief Medical Officer yet due to a delay in transportation from Space Station Castro but the crew – three nurses - was working dutifully towards the beginning of the mission. In case of a medical emergency there would be immediate response.
Then she ventured to the Science department and ended with a short visit of Engineering. The other stations and departments would be functioning mainly from the bridge, as far as she knew.
In Engineering she noticed that the Chief Engineer was not present, but the rest of the crew was busily working. Some seemed pretty young but just from watching them, they appeared competent and sure about what they were doing. One though, an Ensign - telling from the insignia pips on his uniform - caught her eye, and not in a very positive one. He was a tall and handsome man, dark haired with intense blue-grayish eyes and a strong attitude. It was not that this normally would bother her, but his behavior around the others made her take a mental note to cite and have him come over to her office first thing in the morning tomorrow.
She remembered the soft humming of the engines and it made her sigh, bringing back memories from a past long lost. Quickly, she turned around and left the engineering department, hurrying to get back to her office. Over another cup of tea - this time black tea with lemon - she sent the citation for a counselor's date to Ensign Jonathan Myers to see her at 0900 tomorrow morning.
There was one last thing she had to do on her first day on board, she had to schedule a meeting with the captain, John Murdock. It was standard procedure, for her as well as for the commanding officer. Summer would be responsible for the mental wellbeing of the crew and she wanted him and the rest of the commanding staff to be able to fully trust in her.
The captain was willing to meet her right away. She gave him her first evaluation based on reviewing the medical files of each officer. But she reassured him that she would get an insight on each and every one of them on a personal level and report any negative results back to him. She was content with how the meeting went, Murdock, being an El Aurian, was a reasonable and intuitive person, quiet and compassionate, a person able to give trust to his crew. He was quiet, determined and seemed a bit reclusive. Summer also concluded him being stern, decisive and very matter of fact in his ways and judging from her experience, those characters were often considered rude or uncaring, even though she was sure that he was not like this. He seemed to be a person who was willing to accept the opinions of his crew, a trait that Summer appreciated much. All in all, she wrapped it up, he was a compassionate leader who ruled with a no tolerance demeanor.
Passing through the bridge to get to the Captain's ready room, she also made the acquaintance with he First Officer Commander Kristen Hunter and the Chief Science and Intelligence Officer Kuros, who was an intriguing character. He was a human, yet he had been raised by Vulcans on their homeworld and after an accident in the Kahs-Wan ritual in the Vulcan Forge, parts of his brain and auditory system had to be replaced by cybernetic units. Williams had heard some Ensigns refer to him as a walking and talking supercomputer due to virtually unlimited storage possibilities of his positronic brain.
Straightening out her uniform, she took the turbolift and for the first time here on the USS Endeavor, she went to search her quarters.