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[[USS Challenger - Deck 7 - Sickbay]]

CPO ShranLahr ch'Verret
[USS Challenger - Deck 7 - Sickbay]

After completing his work in Sickbay in getting all their equipment up and running - and after seeing that Tora would be well-taken care of and soon would be returning to her own duties, Lahr called to Main Engineering (by that time comms had been made functional by someone else).  He updated the Ensign that was in change while Neva was away, and received his next section to reboot.   He was to join a handful of others in resetting the Main Computer.

Giving Tora a wave in parting, Lahr left Sickbay and headed down the corridor.  The Main Computer Core was on Deck Seven - which was handy - no need for more climbing. Though he supposed someone else might have already fixed the turbolift.  It had been several hours since all this began.

When Lahr got to the computer core, one look at the vast, vast number of isolinear chips that needed to be pulled and reset, had the Andorian groaning in misery.

His groan drew the attention of Petty Officer T'roth - a former member of Damage Control Team One with Lahr, but who got transferred a while back to DCT6.  The Vulcan woman raised a single slender eyebrow at his groan and spoke.  "If you must make vocalizations, it would be better for the morale of all present if they were more your usual caterwauling that you call singing than such a discouraging groan."

The musical request was a bit back-handed but Lahr ignored that as he moved to the next section and started on the top row of chips.   "You are so right.  Thank you for pointing that out."

The Andorian then cleared his throat and started to sing.  "A hundred bottles of beer on the wall, a hundred bottles of beer.  You take one down and pass it around, ninety-nine bottles on the wall.  Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall, ninety-nine bottles of beer. You take one down and pass it around, ninety-eight bottles of beer on the wall...."

[Ensign Tora Zalos | Shuttlebay | USS CHallenger]

Lovely second mission of her career this was turning out to be. At least twice now she'd been thrown pretty damn near the doors of death. Tora had accepted (albeit somewhat begrudgingly) that this might just become her life, but really? Really? This early on? At least warn her a little first, right?

Nonetheless, as much as she would've loved to lay there all mission and be a lump of scales, Tora knew she'd wasted enough time. After checking briefly with the medical staff that she was clear to leave if she liked she began to leave - and no sooner had she set food out the door that the announcement came through:

"Bridge ta sickbay. Medical emergency on the planet. I need a doctor and a medic ta meet me in the shuttlebay. Galloway out."

Medical emergency. Planet. Tora's mind raced. She had no idea how Hyperion really was, though the chief had told her he was okay - but at least she could be useful on this mission. She couldn't remember if they'd made first contact with the people of this planet, but if they hadn't, she was just the person she needed. The Cardssian loped off down the hallway towards the turbolift. She'd been waiting to be useful in ways other than sorting data and this opportunity was ripe!

The medical team was already arriving when she got there. No surprise there. She joined them and waited for the captain to arrive. She only hoped she didn't look like death warmed up in front of him thre and then.

[[USS Challenger - Deck 7 - Sickbay]]

CPO ShranLahr ch'Verret
[USS Challenger - Deck 7 - Sickbay]

Lahr had gotten nearly a dozen of the Biobeds up and working when he first noticed the pair of cadets (who had he left down on deck 15)  come in with the Cardassian science officer that had been unconscious in Stellar cartography.  Oh roozh! Had she not woken up yet!?   He realized belatedly he probably should have told someone in medical that she was down there.  Oops.

Because all other beds were filled, the Cardassian woman was placed onto the last available spot - the dreaded 'haunted' biobed.. or Biobed 13 as Lahr called it.  Even when the ship had no power issues, this biobed only worked part of the time despite being constantly checked over by engineers.

Because Lahr had left that bed for last, Chloe had to do her initial assessment of the Cardassian with only a medical tricorder.  The head nurse marked the Cardassian patient as a yellow (delayed treatment for non-life threatening injuries),  put her in queue for treatment and called on one of the enlisted medics to keep an eye on the woman, with instructions to inform her if her condition changed.

That had been 5 minutes ago, and the medic had been called away by one of the doctors.  Lahr had finished working on Biobed Twelve and all that was left was the haunted biobed on which Tora lay.

Not to be rude, Lahr talked to the unconscious woman as he started his work.   "Don't mind me Ensign, I'm just here to fix the Biobed you are on.   I just need to pop open the panel on the side here." Pop.  Arrayed in front of him was a tray of at least 200 chips to be pulled.  "And you see all these chips... they need to be reset by pulling them out and poppin' them back it.  It's kinda like a hard reboot." He explained as he began the long tedious process.   At this rate, he'd be needing treatment for carpal tunnel syndrome - with all the repetitive moment he'd been doing lately.

Then the Ensign lying on the bed, suddenly moved and tried to talk.  Lahr paused his work and stood up, ready to prevent her from sitting up if needed.

"Whoa whoa.  Just stay still. You're in Sickbay.  I think you hit your head when you collapsed. Lemme call one of the staff."   Lahr stayed by Tora's bedside while he looked about for someone not already treating someone.  But everyone looked kinda busy, so he opted to press the 'CALL' button on biobed... only to recall in a facepalm moment.. that he hadn't yet fixed the biobed.

So instead, Lahr pursed his lips and gave a shrill whistle.  Several people glanced his way.  Lahr gave a slight wave.  "Um, she just woke up. he said pointing to Tora.

[Ensign Tora Zalos | Sickbay | Deck 7 | USS Challenger]

"Hgh. Wh- What happened to me?" Tora's hand drifted to her nose. Yep, definitely still there and still the correct shape. It seemed. And hopefully unbroken. Now that'd have sucked. Had she fallen on her face? Was that why her face smarted? Wow, such coherent thoughts!

"Chhh- Chief? Uhhh. Did- did something hit us?" She burbled, fighting through the thick mental fog that seemed to have settled over her brain to form coherent thought. "Hy- Hyperion? How is he? Is he alright...?" She whispered. "And... uhhh. Water. Please?" Her throat felt parched. It probably was, to be honest. Ugh. She was grateful for the glass of water that someone in turquoise placed in her hand. She made a valiant attempt to sit up, which only resulted in her spilling half the glass. Whoops.

[[USS Challenger-A - Deck 7 - Sickbay]]

CPO ShranLahr ch'Verret
[USS Challenger-A - Deck 7 - Sickbay]

After following Chloe and her 'groupie- - a junior nurse - down a level to Sickbay, Lahr was put to work pulling/resetting chips in the biobeds to get them up working again.

[Ensign Tora Zalos|Deck 7|Sickbay|USS CHallenger]

One picosecond. For one picosecond Tora had experienced the most incredible, yet most disorienting experience of her life. She didn't even notice when the temporal pulse had hit at first. Then, for that single picosecond, she was everywhere and nowhere all at once. Risa. Cardassia. Starfleet Academy. The Challenger. A rush of sensations assaulted her brain, and then all went black. It was an incredibly disorienting experience, to say the least. She barely registered her knees liquefying underneath her and the thump of her head against the floor as she fell.

She honestly had no clue how much later it was when her brain un-fuzzied itself, and she began to regain consciousness. Where was she? Definitely elevated by the feeling of it. Was she on her back or on her side? It was so hard to tell. Scrunching up her nose she grunted and made to straighten her legs as the world around her came into focus. Sickbay. This was sickbay. "Wh- What happened...?" She grunted to anyone that would hear.

[Ensign Tora Zalos|Mess Hall|USS Challenger]

"My uncle took me away from Cardassia when I was young. He said to me at the time that he needed to do business there and father and mother would be busy, so they'd entrusted me to him to look after. I didn't know any better. I followed him and my aunt and we basically never left." Tora shrugged. "He never really told me why we didn't leave until I was... fifteen? Mother and father had died in the Dominion War fighting for Cardassia." Tora exhaled slowly. "I'm still processing that, actually. Never really had it figured out."

"How I got here, though? Well, that's a long and rather unorthodox story." Tora smiled mischievously. "One which is best told when I've got more deliciously soft bread and peanut butter filling my belly... so if you coud be so kind?"

[[USS Challenger - Deck 12 - Main Engineering]]

CPO ShranLahr ch'Verret
[USS Challenger - Deck 12 - Main Engineering]

Within the ship's new Chief Engineer gone on an Away Mission, the remaining staff were still tasked to work on coming up with a solution to the folding space problem.  This would have well and fine with Lahr (who normally would sit back with his feet up and toss in unrealistic suggestions) if there had been some leadership left behind, but as it was right now with no engineering position higher than Ensign on shift the engineering staff were looking to Lahr as CPO for that leadership; even the newbie ensigns were coming to him with their ideas since in their eyes he had he experience.

But there was a flaw in that deduction; Lahr being an enlisted had never gone to the Academy for years of theory... he'd done his time in Sec/Tac bootcamp. While he was okay at the mechanical side of engineering, the theories behind why things worked the way they did mostly went over his head.

Yeah, the Chief SO had provided Neva with a ream of data to 'help' the engineers figure out a plan but Lahr needed help deciphering it.  That's where his buddy Hyperion would be helpful.

"Alright folks listen up!" Lahr called out to the other engineers. "I'm gonna take a 15-minute mental health break; step away and ponder these wonderful suggestions.  Petty Officer T'roth, please watch my station.  I'll be back in a bit."

Lahr beat a quick retreat from Engineering and headed down to Stellar Cartography on Deck 15.

[USS Challenger - Deck 15 - Stellar Cartography]

As the doors to the Cartography lab open, Lahr didn't waste any time blurt out his problem to the AI typically working there.

"Hyperion, I need your help 'dumbing-down' the basics of space folding." he called out, only to realize a moment later that Hyperion wasn't alone.

"Um... hello." he gave an embarrassed wave to the Cardassian Science officer.

[USS Challenger - Deck 15 - Stellar Cartography]

Oh god, the one thing Tora didn't really like about scientific work: what you did with data once you'd collected it. Anthropological studies yielded interesting stuff, like information about the subject culture's performance culture and so on at least. Astrometric data, on the other hand, was oodles and oodles of numbers and readings from anomalies and the like and combing through it had been one of her most hated necessary facets of her training.

At least, though, she'd had Hyperion to help her. God, did he do things fast. Well, he was an AI, of course he did things at the speed of a computer and then some. The work itself was mind-numbingly boring even then, though, and she'd honestly been ready to put her head down and nap before the Andorian walked in.

"Oh, uhm. Hello!" Tora smiled tiredly at the chief petty officer. "Dumbing down the basics of space folding? I'm sure we can manage that, chief. Hyperion?" She glanced sideways at her 'lab partner', who was still dilligently working away as usual.

[ USS Challenger - Deck 15 - Stellar Cartography ]

"Unfortunately, the new personnel aren't going to get the opportunity to settle in." He shook his head, sensing Tora's concern at the intrusion. Honestly, he wasn't entirely certain how the duty of greeting them had gotten shuffled over to her, but he wasn't going to complain. It made his life easier, and it seemed she was ecstatic about the duty.

"But don't worry, you'll have plenty of time to help them out, we're going right back up. But, we have about thirty hours to come up with some answers for the Captain, and adding in a proper welcoming committee to that is complicated." He stepped further into the room, motioning for Tora to do the same if she chose to. "Especially with half of our senior personnel getting whisked off. So," He motioned to Hyperion, who by now had made his appearance. "Reinforcements!"

Allowing the bot to introduce himself, he shot a muted smile to the AI. "Glad to hear it. You're still mobile, right?" Unfortunately. "I'd like to bring you up to deck 8 to make it easier to coordinate. Ensign Zalos is helping out with acclimating a few new recruits with our labs before they get to work, and I thought to best streamline the process, you could confirm and forward any data that is catalogued from the labs. Savar and Randell are swamped, and I have to go through the new personnel files for them to all get their codes and schedules."

With a nod, he turned back to Tora to further explain his reasoning for dragging her off. "Since you will primarily be teaching and helping them with how to properly document everything, I thought it best you meet Hyperion first. I imagine there will be a bit of a fuss in the labs once they see him."

[Ensign Tora Zalos|Stellar Cartography|Deck 15|USS Challenger]

"Oh. Right." Tora smiled at the android. They had an android on board? Now that was interesting. Very interesting. Maybe, just maybe, she'd have to find some way to find out more - not only as an anthropologist, but also out of personal interest. His views of the world would tell her plenty about where he'd been and the cultures he'd met with - or perhaps been programmed with. Now that was fascinating.

"I'd be happy to help introduce him, sir." Tora replied. "Just in case some of them get antsy around him. Is there anything else you require of me?"

[USS Challenger - Deck 1 - > Deck 8 - > Deck 15 ]

Jettis nodded to Cordon at the request. "Sure. I meant to send some over anyhow once I made some more sense of the readings. Distortions and electronics don't typically mix, so I may give you an officer or two to try and head off any future complications before they arise. And you may know a bit more on what type of power source this could be."

With that settled, he jotted down a few notes on his PADD, before standing as they were dismissed. Headed off by Ian before he could escape to start his busywork, he shot the man a tight-lipped smile. "I feel eternally relieved. Hopefully we don't encounter any full-blown wormholes, though. I can't promise my best behavior." He laughed, shaking his head as he re attached his PADD to his side. "But I think he'll be great for the cadets. Maybe he can even scare them straight with threats of abandonment and airlocking."

Slipping out of the room back to the turbolift, he had three stops to make. The first was to track down all of the brats he had to monitor, which was thankfully made easy by all of them being crammed into the labs currently. He was a bit surprised at who was leading them - Zalos, was it? He'd met her briefly a few times, and gave her a small nod.

"Ensign Zalos, thank you for taking over the tour in my stead." Flashing a wide grin to all of the science officers, his eyes briefly scanned them all for ranks. "I'll give you all half an hour to familiarize yourselves with the labs and ask questions, and then another hour to eat and prepare for the most spreadsheeting you've ever done in your lives. There'll be a special guest once you get back."

His gaze scanned around labs for his unsuspecting next-in-line. Gaze falling on Randell, he grinned and moved to clap two hands on the man's shoulder. "And this will be your designated questions man!"

Ignoring the panicked glares being thrown his way, he marched the Lieutenant out to the sea of wide and fresh eyes. That's what he got for skipping out on welcoming them and making the newbie do it. "Ensign Zalos, you're with me." He grinned, checking his PADD once more before motioning her over to the turbolift.

"Since you seem to be well acquainted with the labs so far, and basically all of the senior scientists are going to try to run away, I think you're the best person to collaborate with our specialist. Tomorrow I'm not going to be able to focus on just running scans, I'm going to be processing the information as we try to track down what exactly is causing it. So..."

The door slid open on deck 15, and he moved over to Stellar cartography. Eyes scanning almost cautiously, he tried to track down the little ant. "Hey, Hyperion! You swimming in data yet? Because you're about to be."

[Ensign Tora Zalos|Science Labs|Deck 15|USS Challenger]

Tora's facial expression morphed into one of confusion as her department head decided to take over the entire show and send away the people she was supppsed to be on-boarding. Talk about tossing a huge wrench in the works. She opened her mouth to say something, but then he shepherded her into the stellar cartography lab - the seemingly empty cartography lab. Her amber eyes darted round the room, searching for whomever this Hyperion person was.

"Um, sir-" Tora finally managed to get out at last. Honestly, she felt a bit miffed that he'd interrupt her like that without warning. "Commander Kyan asked me to help the new personnel settle in, actually. About thirty minutes ago. Do you need me to put that on hold, or-"

[ENS Paulsen, Andrew Q. Astrophysics. Human Male, Age 29]

Tora's enthusiasm was infectious. Kyan couldn't help but smile. That, and the sight of a Cardassian grup sitting on a bean bag chair was something that he had never seen before. He wondered if he could get one of the Vulcans in here too. THAT would be hilarious. He couldn't help but laugh as he imagined the stoic Vulcan trying to sit straight-backed and getting swallowed up.

Yeah. He was definitely going to find a reason to meet with a Vulcan in here.

"Well..." the Onlie responded finally, after keeping himself from breaking out inn a fit of giggles. "Ye can be getting started now so ye can. All the new people are down in the shuttle bay.... and..."

He picked up the padd and brought up the roster and specifically the science people. He was about the hand Tora the padd when a name caught his eye.

ENS Paulsen, Andrew Q. Astrophysics. Human Male, Age 29

It can't be him! Kyan thought, staring at the name.

As he did so, memories from his short tenure aboard Starbase Columbus surfaced. The time on the USS Gibson, when Paulsen tried to take over the ship after Kyan had ordered the helmsman to put them between some Alien ship and the station. And then later, when Paulsen had gotten so angry about having to do Security training that he assaulted Kyan in Sickbay....

He hadn't thought about the chubby Scientist in years and would have been happy to carry on not thinking about him. And he'd never admitted it to anyone, least of all Paulsen or the other idjits that ran the station, but he HAD been afraid when the Ensign had put him against the wall. For an instant, he felt helpless. Of course, the Medical Officer had broken it up before anything else had happened, but for a moment Kyan felt like a scared little kid. If there was one thing that he hated more than anything else, it was being afraid. And he despised Andrew Paulsen for making him afraid, even if it was just for a moment.

After a few moments, and realizing that he was still holding the padd, he shook free of the memory and handed it to Tora. "Here's all of em." He said, working to get back to being jovial. "An if you have any problems with anyone... Just let me know."

[Ensign Tora Zalos|First Officer's Broom Closet|USS Challenger]

There was something off about the way the first officer seemed to freeze as he scanned the list of names he was passing to her. Had he seen something he didn't like? Was there something irregular she should take note of? Nothing seemed out of the ordinary as she scanned the nominal roll herself - the sheet was a list of names, ages, gender and species and little other information and that was all. Weird. Tora glanced up one last time at the Only, searching his boyish face for any sign or indication of something more - and seeing none, smiled and stood up with the PADD in hand. "I'll get right on it, sir. I will keep you appraised." She promised, as the first officer let her out.

[Shuttlebay|Deck 9|USS Challenger]

Welcoming visitors to Risa was a much easier affair than welcoming colleagues to a Starfleet vessel, that much was for certain. Back home Tora would've scrawled the name of the person or group she was to link up with on a bit of paper or a whiteboard, held it up at the transporter pad and offered them a hug as they arrived. Starfleet, however, expected quite some modicum of professionalism, and so she opted to simply turn up at the shuttlebay with just herself and her PADD.

Finding the new officers wasn't hard; they'd all clustered together, a gaggle of people in blue uniforms standing and talking off to the side, of a cornucopia of races. Briefly, Tora was reminded of herself on her own first day aboard, standing and conversing with her future colleagues while they each waited to be assigned quarters. Funny how things had come full circle, she thought to herself, as she approached them with a welcoming smile. Some aspects of a Risian welcome didn't have to stay on Risa.

"Right! Could you all get around me so I can check off who's here? Thank you!" Tora felt a ball of nerves wriggle in her belly as she went down the nominal roll, associating each new arrival with a face. She'd have to memorize them all, she'd promised the First Officer - which she hoped her memory would not fail her in. She could just hear her aunt's admonishment in her ear as she contemplated the possibility that she might forget one of them: Come now, Tora, I taught you better than that. He would've been so disappointed.

"Right! That'll be the whole list! My name is Tora, and I'll be bringing you all to the science labs! Don't worry, they're not hard to get to." She promised, and led them out of the shuttlebay, much to the visible relief of the beleaguered-looking shuttlebay manager.

"...and here we are. Chemistry, biology, the archives-" Tora pointed out each room in turn as she shephered her entourage down the hallway. "-the replicators have good menus, don't worry. Just don't replicate anything illegal, of course." Tora smiled. "Now, if there's any questions..."

When Tora followed him into the office Kyan deposited himself back on the bean bag chair where he'd been before and indicated the another one for the Cardassian Ensign. "Have a seat." He offered casually.

Kyan hadn't really gotten to know Tora since she'd been on the ship, because he wasn't really a "people person", and even less so when it came to grups. And since Challenger had dozens of people his "age" on the ship, he tended to socialize with them moreso than his colleagues. It wasn't that he didn't like the grups per see, but he found them boring more often than not. There were exceptions of course. The Klingons and Tellarites were always a good time, and there was Jalen and his husband... but they had Leran, with whom he and Max had become good friends. But now that he'd taken over for Nira though, he was going to have to spend more time among the grup population.

He hadn't yet decided if that was a downside to the job or just something to get used to.

"So.." he began, drawing his legs up to sit cross-legged on the bag chair. "Sure and ye ken we just got a whole bunch of new folk today an they're gonna need someone tae help them get settled into things on the ship. Some of 'em are in Science and everyone says yer a umm... " he paused, searching for the right term..then found it. "...people person. Yeah.. so I figured ye could be the one tae help the new science people. If yer wanting to that is."

[Ensign Tora Zalos | First Officer's Broom Closet | Bridge | USS Challenger]

Her. The first officer wanted her to settle the new arrivals in. She, an ensign who was just barely out of the Academy and had only gone through the first ever near death experience of her career. Whoa. That was big. Tora was silent as she sat down on the beanbag chair across from him, which she had to admit was really, really comfy indeed. I have to get one one day, she decided.

"Well, I certainly can! When do I get started?" She asked for a start. She'd need time to prepare onboarding programmes and maybe a welcoming dress-down dinner with the relevent department heads invited and somesuch, but she reckoned she could come up with something on the fly if need be. "If possible, could I have a list of names? I'll remember them by heart by evening."

[[Lt. Commander Kyan Mackenzie | XO's Office/Broom Closet, USS Challenger]]

[Lt. Commander Kyan Mackenzie | XO's Office/Broom Closet, USS Challenger]

As sitting on the bridge when nothing was going on was soul-crushingly boring, Kyan had retreated into the converted broom closet that Challenger's designers were pawning off as an office. Luckily, he didn't need a lot of space. After Nira had gone, he'd removed the desk and uncomfortable chairs. In their place was a small round transparent aluminum table and four "bean bag" chairs. He'd kept the rug that Said had.

One of his old captains had said "Your office is your turf. So make it comfortable for you... and no one else. Before now, Kyan hadn't given this much thought. Every other time he'd had an office he wasn't the only one using it, so he couldn't do much with it. But this broom closet was his and no one else's. So he'd decided to see if the old grup's advice was good. Even if it wasn't, Kyan liked the way things looked in here.

Kyan picked up a padd and looked at it. It was the new crew transfers. He had already assigned sponsors to most of them, but there were still a few who needed one. Luckily the person he needed to talk to was already on the bridge. Kyan got up and walked over to the door and leaned out when it opened.

"Hey! Tora, can you come in here for a minute?"

[Ensign Tora Zalos | Bridge | USS Challenger]

Tora had not expected to be asked for help today - not that she minded at all, really, she did like to put herself out there - but she sprang up from her bridge station and trotted over to the first officer's office anyway. She couldn't see the whole room, but judging from the crack open she felt sorry for the man it belonged to. Sure, the first officer was an Only and needed a bit less space than her but that office was criminally tiny!

"Yes, sir! How may I be of assistance?" She asked. Part of her wondered if what he needed was assistance with interior decoration - with a broom closet for an office it'd better be homely.

[Ensign Neva Cordon|USS-Challenger|Mess Hall]

Neva sat forward, arms crossed on the table before her. She smirked and raised an eyebrow. "Really? That's sort of what my dad would call 'fightin words'." She laughed and shook her head dismissively. She sat back against the window ledge and her seat, smile intact. "I learned to bake from my mother and Dad made his own contributions now & again. We're going to have to commandeer a corner of the Mess Hall to see what we can do."

Neva sat straight again, grabbed her sandwich, and set up to eat. She looked a little embarrassed now. "That's if you want to. I'm not gonna hold you to it, Tora. Honest." She looked Tora in the eye to show her sincerity.

Neva waved her sandwich toward her new friend. "We should eat. Your food is probably cold now cuz of me."

[Ensign Tora Zalos|Mess Hall|USS Challenger]

"No, no, don't you worry. The conversation's part of the fun of it." Indeed Tora's food had gone lukewarm by the time she had another mouthful, but somehow she didn't mind. The newfound company was the perfect additive that made having it much more enjoyable. Besides, it still tasted good, so she wasn't about to complain.

"So, Neva. Tell me more about you. Why are you in Starfleet, where've you been, what your opinion on life and things is. Anything." Tora's amber eyes gleamed. "I'm all ears."

[Ensign Neva Cordon|USS-Challenger|Mess Hall]

Neva laughed amiably. "I'm Neva Cordon." She picked up the bread and put the two halves together. As she set up to eat, she added, "So you like peanut butter & jelly too? Great! And Chocolate chips? Never thought of that!" She tilted her head slightly, considering Tora's question. "Well, it's kind of funny actually. The replicators never quite make the kind of consistency I liked."

Neva shrugged and put her food on the plate again. "So I contacted my mother and she got me one." She smirked. "SOMEhow. Mother always seems to find ways to get what she wants." Neva's shoulders bounced in a silent chuckle. "I've got other recipes I can do. I can replicate most of the ingredients. The others I typically get on shore leaves."

The young Engineer suddenly slumped a little, looking slightly embarrassed. "Sorry, I'm dominating the conversation. I do that sometimes." Sitting back up, she smiled and asked."So, how're you enjoying the ship? I know you got a trial by fire in the last mission. I hope you don't think we're usually going into such do or die kind of missions."

Ensign Tora Zalos|Mess Hall|USS Challenger]

"I'm told big happenings are par for the course for any Starfleet assignment. Or most, anyway. I signed up for this, didn't I? So honestly, it's fine." Though Tora smiled at the other, she really wished that her first ever mission would've gone much differently. Like, really, who expects to die horribly thrice over on their first ever assignment and within the first few days? Tora had not expected puppuee and sunshine and rainbows, but the events of the past few days had been all the way on the other end of the spectrum of dangerousness.

"Other recipes, you say? Other types of bread?" Tora's eyes, bright amber, gleamed with interest. "Chocolate and coffee brioche with chips in? Because I love that kind of thing - Risans do pastries and confectionery like nowhere else, I swear by that assertion."

[Ensign Neva Cordon|USS-Challenger|Mess Hall]

Neva looked up with a grin when she heard the woman's voice. "I make the bread myself. I got a bread maker tucked into my stuff." She put down her sandwich and pulled over a cutting board. "Have a seat & I'll cut you a piece." She held out a hand to indicate the empty seat across from her.

Neva carefully cut a 1/2-inch piece from the loaf and handed it to the Cardassian woman. "It's whole wheat bread. I know some people don't like that, but I find it a perfect choice with my kind of sandwich." She gave a slightly embarrassed grin. "My sandwiches are an acquired taste. I make peanut butter and banana sandwiches." she gave a conspiratorial smirk. "A babysitter made them once for us and I got hooked."

[Ensign Tora Zalos|Mess Hall|USS Challenger]

Where had this lady been keeping that cutting board and knife, Tora wondered. The puzzlement was momentary, however, replaced with excitement at getting to try a slice of that wonderfully pillowy soft bread. "Whole wheat, white, darker with chocolate chips in, it's honestly all the same to me. I personally don't really care for what some people say about which kinds are healthier than others; it's bread! It's good for the soul." She quipped as she moved over to sit across from the other, taking her plate with her. She didn't want to waste food, after all!

"Peanut butter and banana are a match made in heaven to me - behind peanut butter and any kind of chocolate and peanut butter and jam. I think you're perfectly fine. Acquired taste or not." The Cardassian grinned at her new friend. She'd invited her over and offered her a little part of her meal, so she could call her that - easy. "My name is Tora. What's yours, and what got you into breadmaking?" Tora did not wait for the answer to come before taking a bite of bread. Slightly chewy, light, pillowy. This woman had done a splendid job.

[Ensign Neva Cordon|USS-Challenger|Mess Hall]

To Neva, nothing was better than fresh baked bread. She'd finagled a small bread maker into her quarters and it wasn't uncommon for crewmembers just "happening" to visit her on days she'd made a loaf...or 2.

Through a process of elimination, she'd learned thick slices of wheat bread were a perfect platform to put on the ooey-gooeyness that was creamy peanut butter. A banana just past the hard green stage made the perfect hardness as counterpoint to the nutty condiment.

Having managed another replication, Neva sat at a table, tongue sticking out sideways as she carefully put the concoction together. A glass of Uttaberry Juice sat on the table next to her, untouched. She always reserved the 1st sip to be the cleansing after the 1st bite.

This was a meal to be savored.

[Ensign Tora Zalos|Mess Hall|USS Challenger]

Tora's eyes were glued to the woman's sandwich instantly. Apart from being convinced that peanut butter was one of the best things humans had ever created (behind bubble tea and the Federation itself), she was a huge fan of it in sandwiches (and that dish Filipino humans called kare-kare); her aunt had painstakingly made sandwiches for her to bring to school every morning - usually with Cardassian ingredients she could find at the local street market, but also with peanut butter and jam on occasion, which she would beg her to make. If living on Risa had taught her anything (it had, multiple things in fact) it was to enjoy whatever she could find in life, wherever she could find it.

"That looks good! Did you make the bread yourself?" It helped that the other was seated only about two tables away across from her. Tora leaned towards her, dinner momentarily forgotten. "I always find that replicated bread's a little bit too dense, you know? That looks perfect."

[Ensign Tora Zalos|Mess Hall|USS Challenger]

Things had finally begun to settle down. No indestructible planet-eating cones of death, no trigger-happy Romulans, no Orion ravagers, no Romulans shooting to kill. Tora could only have wished that she could have had a little of this when she'd first come aboard before her career went from one to a hundred and fifty. After everything that'd transpired since she'd come aboard, a mundane after-duty dinner was, funnily enough, just what the doctor ordered.

Maybe this was what her instructors had meant by how constantly having things to do would make you miss having nothing to do. Until she'd first come aboard Tora hadn't really missed having nothing to do.

Some kind of crop top, a colorful sarong tied round her waist, sandals. That was her usual getup when she was off duty and wanted to let her hair down, very much more Risian than Cardassian. It'd scared the daylights out of her aunt when she'd first worn the outfit out. Tora had never paid her much mind. While her uncle had been significantly more liberal with the lengths she could go with her appearance, her aunt had always wanted her to stick to her roots. Evidently she hadn't gotten what she wanted. Her top was red today, and her sarong the colors of the sun; amber, red and orange blended together beautifully in the fabric.

She strode confidently into the mess hall and ordered the first thing that came to mind: a heaping plate of fried rice made Risan style with yamok sauce drizzled over the top. Hell, it surprised her that the replicator could even manage the outlandish combination of ingredients, but then again replicators were capable of far bigger things than that weren't they? She could've sworn one or two people blinked and held their noses as she found her way to an empty table and dug in. The smell of yamok sauce, never mind the taste of it, seemed to drive anyone who wasn't Cardassian away and she'd never figured out why.