Not So Clear Clearances

Posted on Sun Oct 24th, 2021 @ 2:27am by Lieutenant Damian Mateo & Lieutenant Commander Felicie Rivero

Mission: The Archan Job
Location: Main Security Office

Felicie was in her office, head down on her desk on top of folded arms, jacket over her head to help shield her face from the light, eyes closed. Sleeping, no... but definitely resting very tired eyes. It had been another long night. There had been a subtle shift in the night life on the station in recent times and it was quickly becoming tiresome.

She heard the doors to her office open and sighed inwardly. "Unless you have coffee or cake, I'm busy," she groaned.

Damian's day started fine but took a turn when he was trying to get around the department for his fighter's needs, in particular was equipment and diagnostic storage. He realised that, after being told by the computer, that he didn't have proper access. His codes had not been approved for 332 duties yet. While for the task in hand the delay would prove to be a minor one he knew all to well that he'd have to get his access sorted out and completed if he was to function as per his duties and position. So he headed to the stations security office to wrap things up.

"You wouldn't want what is pilots call Coffee and cake is a bad treat, too much and I lose my flight status."

Felicie smiled under her jacket, having recognised the sound of Damien's voice. "Fat people are harder to kidnap. Stay safe and eat cake," she shot back quickly.

Glad that his retort was taken well he stepped into the room some more. "I'm sorry to be a bother but my accesses have not yet kicked in for my assignment and I still have some old ones from my previous assignment that can be cancelled. "

"It'll cost you coffee," Felicie responded as she pushed the jacket back, letting it fall back behind her chair as she sat up. "Replicator's back there." She sighed, sliding her chair forward. "You're lucky I like you."

Keying in her access code, she brought up his file on the computer system. "I know there's been some problems lately with transfers going through in the system, I'm not sure why. We've reported it but it keeps messing up."

"A fair price." Damian's reply came as he moved to the replicator. Lucky she liked him, he tried not to look too much into that but it did make him wonder.

Armed with Coffee in hand he placed it next to her on her desk. "Payment, 1 Coffee." Though listening to her explain about the delays it pretty much summed up how things generally were regardless of assignment.

"OKay, what was your last access code? And the assignment? I should be able to remove them manually from the system here, then it shouldn't be too hard to push through new clearance for you, it just might take a couple of hours for everything to feed down through the systems." She wrapped her hands around the mug, taking a sip before sighing softly. "Caffeine, nectar of the Gods," she murmured.

Damian gave over the information, the code, what it was for and the assignment. There was not many but he knew it needed to be done. He watched as she sipped at the beverage. "Let me guess, your day doesn't start till you have one?"

"Not if you want to survive the interaction," Felicie replied with a grin as she glanced up at him. "Last night was a long night, not a lot of sleep. Believe me, if I could have caffeine being delivered via IV today I would be."

So that explained the mood he walked into. He could tell she was a hands on woman, left nothing to chance, saw it through. He had to admire that level of dedication to the job. "Well I'm sorry to have yo trouble you with this, I only found out when I tried to access the diagnostic systems locker for my fighter and my access didn't work. "

"Yeah, it happens, unfortunately. I know there's a plan to start rolling out updated systems, but, well, I guess we aren't that high on the priority list." She took another sip and smiled, visibly relaxing slightly. "Lucky for you, you've got me." She set the mug down, tapping at the console in front of her. "Okay, your old codes are removed, just give it a few minutes for that to populate through and I can give you some new security codes."

"Great." Good news and progress, at least now he wouldn't be glared at like last time now with current codes and permissions. Knowing from past experience that this would take a few minutes he sank into a chair in front of her desk. It was good however to close the book on that chapter of his life, a fresh page to start a new.

Felicie leaned back in her chair, smiling at him. "So, other than recalcitrant codes, are you settling in okay?"

"Slowly but yeah. It's a big place so I'm in no rush to explore it anytime soon. Got a few things for my quarters but most of my time has been spent on duties down in the hanger. A few hours today with my tech ground crew getting to know them." Every pilot knew not to mess with the ground crew, treat them well and they will look after the equipment.

There was a soft laugh that was interrupted by a series of beeps from the console. "Looks like the first part is done," she said, taking another sip and scooting forward on her chair. "Okay, give me a second and I'll get your new security clearance programmed in."

"No rush, I told the team it might take a while, after they stopped laughing at me for getting rejected by the computer. " He had a laugh himself but it was also a little embarrassing.

"So, do you want a rush job, or are you looking for a way to play hooky for a while?" Felicie asked with a laugh. "I mean, I'm happy to go either way, it's just the price that changes," she added with a wink.

That got a chuckle out of him for sure. "Alright, I'll bite, show your hand Commander." He spoke as he looked her in the eyes and waited for what she had in mind.

"How do you like Italian?" Felicie asked. "I don't know about you but I'm absolutely starving. I skipped dinner last night and breakfast this morning... and there's a place on the promenade that does a parmigiana the size of a small planet."

"You're on." Damian replied after a little thought, he'd not had much Italian before but what he did, he enjoyed but being a pilot kept him too busy to really each much variety. "When?" Dinner with a lovely woman, kinda hard to refuse an offer like that.

"How about right now? We'll make it lunch. I can set this to run while we eat, and by the time we get back it should be done."

"Deal." He spoke standing up from his chair, Lunch was even better, why wait for later when now was acceptable.

Felicie ran the command in her console and set it to run before locking the station and standing up. "Great, let's go. I don't know about you, but I"m starved!"