08-13-2016, 07:15 AM
Ok this next little section we meet for the first time Miss Parker's troops so to speak and also a bit more into Imperial society as whole to include the place aliens (non humans) hold within the Empire and the military. The Empire may be sexists but they are not xenophobes by a long shot.
My first Command: As Officette in charge or Mistress of Starboard-2-5 I was held accountable for the actions and welfare of 10 souls. Not an overwhelming number but still daunting considering in Salon although we were nominally responsible for the party or circle or even the sorority the cadre would step in if something bad was about to happen. Not so here, if Miss Johnson or Kim or Laurie had to step in, or even worse one of the SPERS, there would be serious negative repercussion to the guilty parties.
Since my gals were all on Deck J, and Wendy already got to the after galley, I decided that the largest area for a impromptu meeting was the Lavatory. I have never met any of my charges except in the most formal manner as we all stood at parade in the shuttle hanger bay. Since I wasn’t quite sure which Sarjenette was senior, or where exactly frame 29 J was, I asked the first permanent party member I could find. It turned out to be Sarjenette Vort.
“Um excuse me Sarjenette?” I asked the tall black furred canine looking alien.
“Yes, oh yes Ma’am how can I be of assistance, by the way Miss Parker, you really should call me Chief, the others of your kind are especially particular about these things.” She smiled showing off rows and rows and rows of sharp teeth, her naked rat-like tail swishing behind her modified uniform.
“Right, thank you Chief Vort or is it Urmidio?”
“Chief Vort will do, as I am the only Vort of that rank aboard at this time, however we have two Junior Sarjenettes and eight rookie Vorts so that might be a bit confusing.”
“Er are you all related or something” I asked lamely, never having seen a Wandii before.
With that Chief Vort laughed, or more like barked with extreme mirth, her tail wagging furiously, this drew the attention of Sarjenette Travis.
“What’s all the racket, oh Urmi, what are you laughing about?, this trainee do something she shouldn’t have done?” She said ignoring me for the moment.
“No Chief, she asked why we have so many Vorts, by the way have you met Miss Parker?”
“Oh no I have not had the pleasure, hmm welcome aboard Ma’am.” She said while tossing a very causal salute, What watch and section are you?”
I returned a crisper salute and said “2nd of the 5th, Chief..”
“Ah, you are one of my young ladies, very good, hey Urmi which of you drew 2nd?”
“That would be Chief Engineer’s Mate Marshal.”
“Ah right Iron Bun’s herself, word of advice Miss Parker, our illustrious Engineering assistant instructor can be quite ruthless on her evaluations. Now Urmi please enlighten the young Miss Parker why the Montessori is crawling with so many Vorts. Ma’am, nice meeting you.” She said throwing another salute and headed aft.
“Well you see Ma’am I am a Wandii, and well we come in three types, Val, Valmant and Vort. Vals and Valmants are restricted to very select roles in AIDOF as they happen to be the males of my species, Vorts are the females, and so we have the same rights as any female in the Empire, however the Vals and Valmants do have more rights than your own species of male, but we are here to serve AIDOF not to discuss the social institutions of Her Imperial Majesty. Wandii have two, maybe three names, the first name is the common name, the 2nd name is the honor name, if awarded, and the third is the gender name. In my case I have a common and gender name only, so my name is Urmidio Vort. I believe you have a Rookie by the name of Uvoki Vort in your section, it would best to call her Rookie Vort unless there are two than you should say Rookie Uvoki Vort, is there anything else I can help you with?” The tall alien SPER said now more seriously.
“Yes Chief, could you tell me where frame 29 J is?”
“Ah right, ok we are located at frame 16 E, frame 29 J is five decks down and 15 frames aft, if I am not mistaken that is a lavatory, if you need to use one there is one at 18 E, two hatches down.”
“Oh no that is close to the berths of my shift, and looks like the best place for a meeting with the whole shift, since another shift mistress has the galley.”
“I see ok, well then, Miss Parker the best way is to head back to 8 E take the lift down to J deck and from there make your way aft to frame 12. There take the ladder down to K deck and make your way to the other ladder at frame 32 and go up to J, then head forward to frame 29.” The Chief rattled off the confusing directions almost faster than I could record them in my data pad.
“Why can’t I go directly to frame 29 from J deck?” I asked her.
“Well you could but between frame 12 to 14 is the main weapon’s control and except during general quarters rally passage through there is restricted, you could do it, but cycling through the triple airlocks would take more time and trouble than it is worth. If you have nothing further Ma’am I need to be on my way.”
“Right thanks Chief, that was a big help.” She saluted and walked off forward towards the Nanny Locker, or where the SPERS reside.
Following her directions I made it down to frame 29 with little trouble. I was walking towards the lavatory when the hatch in front opened and I nearly banged into a girl about a year or two older than me she had a single heart on her sleeve. She quickly looked at my sleeve and noticed nothing on it, but failed to look at my collar. “Hey you! Watch where you are going, I thought I said stow your gear first, but I guess you thought you could use the lavatory, don’t they tell you silly sods anything at Primary anymore?”
Taken aback by her tone, I stammered a bit, and then regained my composure. “Er sorry Junior Sarjenette McAndrews, having never attended Primary, I would not know, but at the Salon they did teach me a few things about respect and curtsey….”
“Junior Sarjenette McAndrews then looked up and noticed the twin orange V’s and snapped to attention and saluted, she then shouted “Attention Officette on Deck!”
“Ah much better, you are Port shift right?”
“Er yes Ma’am…”
“Good then I can overlook this incident and not report you to Miss Travis, carry on Sarjenette McAndrews.” She saluted did an about turn and headed back towards frame 14.
I waited a bit then calmly strolled into the berthing area, on both sides port and starboard the rookies and junior sarjenettes were lined up at attention. “Port shift carry on Miss Travis will be down shortly, Starboard shift fall out and report to the lavatory, bring a data pad and stylus. Fall Out!” The orderly lines dispersed as young girls darted to their lockers to find the data pads, I noticed several were still in their shore duty dress. About five minutes later all ten of my girls were in the lavatory sitting down on the cool floor.
“Right just like you, this is my first assignment, and like you I am learning what we all need to do to function in SAN. I am Miss Parker and have the honor of being Starboard Shift’s Mistress. Have you divided into fore and aft sections? Oh good, so Junior Sarjenettes Andrews and Hollister have their responsibilities. Just to give you a heads up, for the first week or so we will be familiarizing ourselves with the basics of the Montessori, then we will leave port and conduct some basic drills. The first stage for us is bridge operations, then we move to gunnery, then engineering, then damage control and ship functions. I have no clue what area I want to specialize in, and I am sure many of you are in the same boat, however we are blessed to have two veterans amongst us so listen to your Section supervisors and to the Chiefs and we will all have productive training rotation. Sarjenettes Andrews Hollister stand fast, the rest of you return to your duties, oh and by the way Shipboard is the uniform of the day, dismissed!”
Waiting for the 8 rookies to leave. I sat down next to the two JPERS. “Ok so tell me your take of the girls and your own experiences please.”
It turned out that Andrews was rated for engineering and plans on returning there when she gets her senior rating certification. Hollister is bridge certified, helm and sensors, she wants to transfer to gunnery if possible. In the brief time they had with the Rookies, Andrews thinks that Waters and Ichorne are her best girls, and Dambroux might be a bit of a problem. She has no opinion one way or the other on Hunt, as she seems to be very shy and keeps to herself as much as possible. Ichorne has expressed a desire to be a helmsgal, while both Waters and Dambroux want anything but services. Hunt isn’t sure maybe engineering. For Hollister’s group, she told me that Gierson seems to be a xenophobe and wants nothing to do with Foxy Girl or Vort, as for the two aliens both seem very competent and professional, although Foxy Girl is not overly friendly. Ling is the enigma for Aft section. As for career aspirations, Foxy wants gunnery or weapons division, Vort is fascinated with communications or navigation, and Gierson wants to fix things, she says mechanics run in her family. Ling has no preference. So based on their highly informal reports it looks like Gierson, Dambroux need to be watched, while Hunt and Ling need to be challenged, Ichrone and Waters look like potential leaders, while the alien duo have the possibility of being most technically competent. I thanked them and told them that Starboard 2-5 was to report to the visual navigation bridge for our first class at 1900 hours.
My first Command: As Officette in charge or Mistress of Starboard-2-5 I was held accountable for the actions and welfare of 10 souls. Not an overwhelming number but still daunting considering in Salon although we were nominally responsible for the party or circle or even the sorority the cadre would step in if something bad was about to happen. Not so here, if Miss Johnson or Kim or Laurie had to step in, or even worse one of the SPERS, there would be serious negative repercussion to the guilty parties.
Since my gals were all on Deck J, and Wendy already got to the after galley, I decided that the largest area for a impromptu meeting was the Lavatory. I have never met any of my charges except in the most formal manner as we all stood at parade in the shuttle hanger bay. Since I wasn’t quite sure which Sarjenette was senior, or where exactly frame 29 J was, I asked the first permanent party member I could find. It turned out to be Sarjenette Vort.
“Um excuse me Sarjenette?” I asked the tall black furred canine looking alien.
“Yes, oh yes Ma’am how can I be of assistance, by the way Miss Parker, you really should call me Chief, the others of your kind are especially particular about these things.” She smiled showing off rows and rows and rows of sharp teeth, her naked rat-like tail swishing behind her modified uniform.
“Right, thank you Chief Vort or is it Urmidio?”
“Chief Vort will do, as I am the only Vort of that rank aboard at this time, however we have two Junior Sarjenettes and eight rookie Vorts so that might be a bit confusing.”
“Er are you all related or something” I asked lamely, never having seen a Wandii before.
With that Chief Vort laughed, or more like barked with extreme mirth, her tail wagging furiously, this drew the attention of Sarjenette Travis.
“What’s all the racket, oh Urmi, what are you laughing about?, this trainee do something she shouldn’t have done?” She said ignoring me for the moment.
“No Chief, she asked why we have so many Vorts, by the way have you met Miss Parker?”
“Oh no I have not had the pleasure, hmm welcome aboard Ma’am.” She said while tossing a very causal salute, What watch and section are you?”
I returned a crisper salute and said “2nd of the 5th, Chief..”
“Ah, you are one of my young ladies, very good, hey Urmi which of you drew 2nd?”
“That would be Chief Engineer’s Mate Marshal.”
“Ah right Iron Bun’s herself, word of advice Miss Parker, our illustrious Engineering assistant instructor can be quite ruthless on her evaluations. Now Urmi please enlighten the young Miss Parker why the Montessori is crawling with so many Vorts. Ma’am, nice meeting you.” She said throwing another salute and headed aft.
“Well you see Ma’am I am a Wandii, and well we come in three types, Val, Valmant and Vort. Vals and Valmants are restricted to very select roles in AIDOF as they happen to be the males of my species, Vorts are the females, and so we have the same rights as any female in the Empire, however the Vals and Valmants do have more rights than your own species of male, but we are here to serve AIDOF not to discuss the social institutions of Her Imperial Majesty. Wandii have two, maybe three names, the first name is the common name, the 2nd name is the honor name, if awarded, and the third is the gender name. In my case I have a common and gender name only, so my name is Urmidio Vort. I believe you have a Rookie by the name of Uvoki Vort in your section, it would best to call her Rookie Vort unless there are two than you should say Rookie Uvoki Vort, is there anything else I can help you with?” The tall alien SPER said now more seriously.
“Yes Chief, could you tell me where frame 29 J is?”
“Ah right, ok we are located at frame 16 E, frame 29 J is five decks down and 15 frames aft, if I am not mistaken that is a lavatory, if you need to use one there is one at 18 E, two hatches down.”
“Oh no that is close to the berths of my shift, and looks like the best place for a meeting with the whole shift, since another shift mistress has the galley.”
“I see ok, well then, Miss Parker the best way is to head back to 8 E take the lift down to J deck and from there make your way aft to frame 12. There take the ladder down to K deck and make your way to the other ladder at frame 32 and go up to J, then head forward to frame 29.” The Chief rattled off the confusing directions almost faster than I could record them in my data pad.
“Why can’t I go directly to frame 29 from J deck?” I asked her.
“Well you could but between frame 12 to 14 is the main weapon’s control and except during general quarters rally passage through there is restricted, you could do it, but cycling through the triple airlocks would take more time and trouble than it is worth. If you have nothing further Ma’am I need to be on my way.”
“Right thanks Chief, that was a big help.” She saluted and walked off forward towards the Nanny Locker, or where the SPERS reside.
Following her directions I made it down to frame 29 with little trouble. I was walking towards the lavatory when the hatch in front opened and I nearly banged into a girl about a year or two older than me she had a single heart on her sleeve. She quickly looked at my sleeve and noticed nothing on it, but failed to look at my collar. “Hey you! Watch where you are going, I thought I said stow your gear first, but I guess you thought you could use the lavatory, don’t they tell you silly sods anything at Primary anymore?”
Taken aback by her tone, I stammered a bit, and then regained my composure. “Er sorry Junior Sarjenette McAndrews, having never attended Primary, I would not know, but at the Salon they did teach me a few things about respect and curtsey….”
“Junior Sarjenette McAndrews then looked up and noticed the twin orange V’s and snapped to attention and saluted, she then shouted “Attention Officette on Deck!”
“Ah much better, you are Port shift right?”
“Er yes Ma’am…”
“Good then I can overlook this incident and not report you to Miss Travis, carry on Sarjenette McAndrews.” She saluted did an about turn and headed back towards frame 14.
I waited a bit then calmly strolled into the berthing area, on both sides port and starboard the rookies and junior sarjenettes were lined up at attention. “Port shift carry on Miss Travis will be down shortly, Starboard shift fall out and report to the lavatory, bring a data pad and stylus. Fall Out!” The orderly lines dispersed as young girls darted to their lockers to find the data pads, I noticed several were still in their shore duty dress. About five minutes later all ten of my girls were in the lavatory sitting down on the cool floor.
“Right just like you, this is my first assignment, and like you I am learning what we all need to do to function in SAN. I am Miss Parker and have the honor of being Starboard Shift’s Mistress. Have you divided into fore and aft sections? Oh good, so Junior Sarjenettes Andrews and Hollister have their responsibilities. Just to give you a heads up, for the first week or so we will be familiarizing ourselves with the basics of the Montessori, then we will leave port and conduct some basic drills. The first stage for us is bridge operations, then we move to gunnery, then engineering, then damage control and ship functions. I have no clue what area I want to specialize in, and I am sure many of you are in the same boat, however we are blessed to have two veterans amongst us so listen to your Section supervisors and to the Chiefs and we will all have productive training rotation. Sarjenettes Andrews Hollister stand fast, the rest of you return to your duties, oh and by the way Shipboard is the uniform of the day, dismissed!”
Waiting for the 8 rookies to leave. I sat down next to the two JPERS. “Ok so tell me your take of the girls and your own experiences please.”
It turned out that Andrews was rated for engineering and plans on returning there when she gets her senior rating certification. Hollister is bridge certified, helm and sensors, she wants to transfer to gunnery if possible. In the brief time they had with the Rookies, Andrews thinks that Waters and Ichorne are her best girls, and Dambroux might be a bit of a problem. She has no opinion one way or the other on Hunt, as she seems to be very shy and keeps to herself as much as possible. Ichorne has expressed a desire to be a helmsgal, while both Waters and Dambroux want anything but services. Hunt isn’t sure maybe engineering. For Hollister’s group, she told me that Gierson seems to be a xenophobe and wants nothing to do with Foxy Girl or Vort, as for the two aliens both seem very competent and professional, although Foxy Girl is not overly friendly. Ling is the enigma for Aft section. As for career aspirations, Foxy wants gunnery or weapons division, Vort is fascinated with communications or navigation, and Gierson wants to fix things, she says mechanics run in her family. Ling has no preference. So based on their highly informal reports it looks like Gierson, Dambroux need to be watched, while Hunt and Ling need to be challenged, Ichrone and Waters look like potential leaders, while the alien duo have the possibility of being most technically competent. I thanked them and told them that Starboard 2-5 was to report to the visual navigation bridge for our first class at 1900 hours.