Taking care of Business

Posted on Tue May 14th, 2024 @ 6:08pm by Captain Elijah Rutherford & Commander Dominic Aldrich

Mission: A New Beginning
Location: Ready Room
854 words - 1.7 OF Standard Post Measure

Elijah looked out towards the stars and towards the outside of DS9. They were here, getting some new transfers for the ship as well as picking up some supplies as well. They were going to be needing to drop of some to the next stop. He turned from the window and tapped on his commbadge. "Commander Aldrich would you come to the Ready Room please."

Dominic had been looking over manifest reports of transfers and setting rotation schedules when the call came to him. "Yes, Sir. On my way." He stood up, stretched and headed to the Bridge. It was quiet as the ship was docked. He approached the door, rang the chime, and waited.

The door swooshed open at Elijah's command, and he smiled when Dominic stepped in. "Good to see you, Commander. Thank you for coming. Can I get you something to drink?" walking over towards the replicator. "How are things with you and Zeria?"

"You know, a root beer sounds good," Dominic replied taking a seat. "Things are well. Today is the first day I'm fully back in the groove of things following our four days of leave. Which, by the way, thank you again for that. It is well-appreciated."

Elijah gave a bit of a smile. "You are most welcome." ordering the rootbeer for Dominic and for himself a tea. He brought over the beverages and handed Dominic the rootbeer, then sat down to take a sip of his green tea. There are two reasons why I asked you here. One was to see how you are doing and two..." he let the pause go on while he took another sip of his tea. He lowered his cup and then said casually, "You have been raised to a full commander." his face deadpan as he raised his mug of tea up towards his lips, and impish smile in his eyes.

Dominic raised an eyebrow, not to be outdone with his own typical straight-faced nature, "Is that so, Sir?"

"Indeed, I've seen your records, and this isn't something that I do lightly, Dominic." Elijah dropping the ranks. "Will you accept the rank raise or are you going to fight it? I thought I would have to truly argue the point of giving one of your people, Lieutenant Sempton the full rank of lieutenant. He accepted it, though I feel that he didn't think he deserved it at all." Elijah shook his head. "I am in the midst of some rather humble crew, it seems."

"The humility of this crew is a feature, not a bug, Captain." Dominic stood and said, "I'd love to fight it, but you'd keep hounding me about it for the next weeks if I did. Probably creating situations to prove you right. No, Sir, I will not fight it, though I will accept it under protest." He smiled and then saluted the Captain.

Elijah outright laughed. "Dominic, you are very correct, I would be hounding you. Besides... I do have a question for you. What would you think of raising T'Par's rank to Lieutenant Commander, and also at ease and take a seat." motioning for Dominic to have a seat.

Dominic sat and nodded, "I see no reason not to give T'Par a promotion. Among the crew, you'd be hard pressed to find someone that works harder. Plus, with my XO duties being what they are, she deserves the weight of a heavier collar since she has mostly run the day to day of Science as of late."

" I am glad to hear this." Elijah drew in bit of breath and let it out slowly. "This ship has been through a lot, before I accepted the torch from Jane. And I am grateful you agreed to be my XO. Means a lot. Well now, we've got our next leg of our journey where the holosentients are concerned, and we'll be going through the wormhole into the Gamma Quadrant. "

"I will admit that I am not excited for this next step. This whole situation has not sat well with me, or the others, since we were on that station. I have been haunted by the memories at times and I just wonder what awaits us on an unforeseen horizon," Dominic replied candidly.

Elijah leaned back in his chair, gazing contemplatively at Dominic. "Well, with matters of exploration, and discovery of things yet to be known that is what we will be looking forward towards. We all will get to expand our knowledge. I am looking forward to this, exploration out in the wild west of space." giving a slight chuckle.

"And that is why we work well together, Sir. You help to push my reservations to be uncomfortable and I restrain your over-exuberance," Dominic said with a grin.

"We will see about that." Elijah giving a impish wink at Dominic. "my exhuberance. I've not yet let down my hair." chuckling. "For now though we will be moving forward. And I should probably call this meeting to an end. My wife is waiting for me to arrive to my quarters soon, for dinner." giving a smile to his XO