Peak Efficiency

Posted on Fri Aug 13th, 2021 @ 5:00am by Lieutenant Commander Emni t'Nai & Lieutenant Sharrina Blackstone

Mission: The Place of Skulls
Location: Sickbay
Timeline: Mission Day 2 at 1530

The path between Sickbay and her quarters had become extremely familiar to Emni in a very short window. Perhaps it was just the fact that the Sojo was a smaller vessel, or perhaps it was simply that she had only visited a small handful of locations in the last two days, but she found herself navigating the path to her new place of work without even thinking.

The doors swished open revealing Nurse Lal standing behind a console tapping notes rapidly into its interface as an officer outfitted in operations gold donned his jacket, sliding off the edge of the biobed where Dr. Ryan Walsh had been completing his physical. She nodded to her ACMO and Nurse Lal, before making her way into the office. Not bothering to sit she tapped a few components to bring the appointment list up on the screen. A female face appeared next to her appointment--a new security officer bearing the telltale soft ridges of someone of partial Klingon descent. She flicked her hand to open the woman's file, skimming as she went.

After meeting with the captain, Sharrina had found her quarters, but she had only stayed long enough to drop her bags off to the side of the door, change the door code and ensure that her uniform and hair were still in place. Then she opened her PADD and looked at her list of to-do's. Medical Eval next. She marked it as 'in progress' and left her quarters, making her way to the Sickbay.

She had never understood why people avoided these evals; they were not invasive as they had been hundreds of years ago. And Starfleet medical personnel were usually fairly warm and assuring, at least to those who needed it. Sharrina was not one of those; nor was she one who avoided the evals. Instead, she treated them like everything else, met them straight on.

It took her only moments to reach the Sickbay and enter. Stepping off to the side of the doors to allow others to enter ort exit, she looked around for the Chief.

A Trill woman looked up from where she stood at a console just in front of the two biobeds against the back wall. "Dr. t'Nai," she called, drawing the Romulan doctor's attention. Emni looked up from the file, noting the arrival of Lieutenant Blackstone and rising to exit the office.

"Lieutenant," she said, by way of greeting. "Emni t'Nai. Welcome to the Sojourner." She turned and indicated the biobed to the left. "Shall we?"

Sharrina studied the woman for a moment before following her and sitting on the indicated biobed. "Thank you, Doctor. It's nice to meet you," she reciprocated the greeting.

Emni nodded, a light smile on her features. "You as well, Lieutenant," she replied. "Shirt off, you can keep your pants," she noted before pulling the new security officer's details onto her PADD and opening up the notes portion for the appointment, giving Sharrina a moment.

Sharrina had long since gotten over any form of body shyness, not that she'd had any to begin with. She took good care of her body, and it showed, so she was proud of it. No, she wouldn't have been bothered had the doctor asked her to remove all of her clothes, but she did as asked, eyes on the other woman.

"Arms straight out from your sides please," Emni asked, as she turned back to the other woman. "I'm going to push your arms down. Don't let me." Applying pressure on her patient's outstretched arms, she noted shifts in her musculature and the force with which the half-Klingon kept her arms in place.

"How are you settling in?" she inquired as she removed her hands. "Arms straight up above your head. I'll try to push them apart. Same process," she added by way of instruction for the next step of the physical.

Sharrina would have shrugged, but the current examination method made that impossible. "Okay, I guess. I have put my things away, but I haven't, as yet, had the chance to meet this ever-elusive roommate I am supposed to have," she said with a smirk, keeping her arms straight above her head and refusing to allow them to be moved. "I'm starting to think I've been billeted with a ghost," she joked lightly.

Emni chuckled lightly, finishing her notes and then picking up the small bar she used to test reflexes. "That's quite an accomplishment in a ship this size," she noted. "I wasn't aware of any crew members who presented as deceased so I imagine they must be around somewhere."

She indicated the rod, adding, "I am going to tap your knees now to look at your reflexes."

Sharrina chuckled with the doctor. "Agreed. I should think you'd be one of the first people to know if any crew had changed states from living to dead, after all." Her eyes flicked to the rod as she put her arms down, and she nodded. "Go ahead, though you might not want to stand directly in front of me when you do," she teased, suspecting that the doctor knew better than to do that.

"First lesson of basic crew physicals at Starfleet Medical -- do not stand directly in front of the limb whose reflexes you are testing," Emni quipped with a smile. "Well, maybe unofficial lesson, but still generally good advice."

She tapped lightly, but with enough force to elicit the appropriate reaction on the woman's knees, watching as each leg jumped in response.

"If you would stand, walk to the other side of the room in a straight line and back, please," she noted, tapping quickly into her PADD. "You can put your shirt and jacket back on afterward."

Sharrina nodded. "Especially with species like Klingons and Nausicaans, I'm sure." She stood when asked to and walked across the room, did a little pirouette just for fun, then walked back to where she had started from with a grin. Like her mother, sometimes she did little things that people didn't expect from Klingons just to be unique. "Was that good enough?" she asked with the grin still in place as she put her shirt and uniform jacket back on.

A look of amusement settled on the Romulan woman's face. It was evident that Sharrina was extremely comfortable in her own skin, something that Emni could appreciate. "I may have to add that to the physical list in the future. Although I'm not sure how many of our crewmen would be able to execute a turn like that without falling over."

She moved to pick up the pre-sanitized headset that was waiting by the biobed. "Do you dance?" she inquired, curious.

Sharrina laughed a bit at the remark about what might happen if she added that pirouette to the eval. She could picture at least one of the men on the ship -- okay, she'd only really met two so far -- trying to do that. She could imagine the captain, on the other hand, executing it very well. And before that thought train went down a forbidden track, she cut it off and moved on to the doctor's question.

"Only my father's people's native dances really," she answered easily. "Every child of Native American descent learns them; halfbreeds are no exception," she informed. Her smile had gone a bit nostalgic as she said all of that.

Emni nodded, taking that information in. "Well, you're certainly very sure on your feet. It's a good quality to have," she moved into position, setting the PADD to the side so she could assist with the headphons. "For this next test, the computer will play a series of tones. Raise your hand on the side where you hear the tone when you hear it," she instructed handing the headset to Sharrina to situate over her ears.

Sharrina nodded, sitting on the biobed once more and taking the headphones from the doctor. Placing them over her ears, she gave a thumbs-up to signal that she was ready. Sadly, this test forestalled any more interchange between them until its completion.

Although the hearing test was not terrifically long, it was always an odd break in the doctor-patient banter. Emni watched as Sharrina completed the required steps, raising her hand on each side dependent upon the tone played. She had resumed holding the PADD and took notes as she went. When the test had finished she indicated that the Klingon woman could remove the headset and accepted it back from her, setting it on a small table to her side.

"Last test," she noted with a smile, tapping to bring up the holographic letters and numbers for the vision test. She calibrated so it was the appropriate distance from the lieutenant for her shared human and Klingon physiology. "Could you begin at the top and read across each line? Stop when you're no longer able to reach them.

Sharrina nodded. She was starting to get restless; her Klingon blood didn't like being cooped up like this, but her father's heritage also got a vote. For that reason, she shifted slightly but gave no other sign of being displeased. "Both eyes open or first one then the other?" she asked before beginning the test.

A small smile played across Emni's lips. "Both open is fine," she remarked as the woman before her read down the list stopping at the appropriate place to indicate vision within the required ranges.

"All looks good here, Lieutenant," Emni noted, adding some last remarks to her official record. She tapped once more, then settled the PADD before her abdomen, both hands wrapped around the bottom. "You're free to go. Hopefully, we will see each other around?" she stated, the comment as much a statement as a question.

Sharrina smiled as she got off the biobed. "I hope so," she stated sincerely. The lady was quick-witted and warm, and Sharrina found that she already liked her. Oh, she knew that most people were different off duty than they were on duty, but that was half the fun, getting to know both sides of the person. "Maybe we can get a drink some night." Yes, she was aware that said drink would likely be limited to that hideous synthehol, but the drink wasn't entirely the point anyway. "Or something else, if you prefer."

Emni raised a slender Vulcanesque eyebrow at the woman, a small smile playing across her lips. "I'd like that," she said. "Name the time and place and I'll be there."

=/\= A Mission Post By =/\=

Lieutenant Emni t'Nai
Chief Medical Officer

Lieutenant Sharrina Blackstone
Security Officer