Tea Fixes Almost Everything

Posted on Tue Aug 20th, 2019 @ 8:57pm by Captain Abigail Laurens & Commander Ichiko Gail

Mission: War and Peacekeeping
Location: CO's Ready Room

Abigail had already replicated her chai latte and the tea for Ichiko, setting them both on the small table in front of the couch in her ready room and was back at the replicator for a plate of cookies when her chime sounded. "Enter," she called, not bothering to look up, knowing full well it would be her first officer. "I have your tea ready," Abigail said warmly as the doors opened. "And I though we could use some cookies too."

The rabbitess entered in what had quickly become a routine. "I have a fondness for ginger snaps." Ichiko mentioned with a smirk as she took her tea and sat. "So I know to worry when I see them." she took a cookie in her free hand.

"So, where to begin?"

Picking up her chai and sinking down onto the couch, Abigail turned herself sideways enough that she could look at Ichiko. "I think I've finally caught up on the barrage of reports... how did any of this happen?"

A long sip of tea. "It started with a misunderstanding, a lapse of judgement, a flash of arrogance. Then, after all that, then we got the call to bring both halves of a volatile political regime to their homeworld, together."

"I'm loathe to say 'this wasn't an accident' but..." a nibble of cookie first, then her tea. Ichiko must have been livid, but she hid it behind a well trained mask. "These people made me a liar, Abigail. A *liar*..." oh she was livid.

"No," Abigail said quietly. "I'll make sure you're well clear of all of this. None of this is on you in any way, not even indirectly." She took a sip of her chai, remaining silent for a long moment. "From what we've been able to work out, the incident in the lounge was caused by someone changing the scheduling. Security checked the schedule and allowed one party to go to the lounge, not realising the other party was still there. There's no evidence of who made the changes, just that it was changed." Pausing again, another sip, a silent moment and a contemplative expression. "The death of the Governor's advisor, again, all the security footage is gone. Security and Operations are still trying, but so far nothing has been able to be recovered."

Abigail rested her mug against her knee. "Ichiko, as much as I hate to admit it, I don't think we can ignore the possibility that there may be someone on this crew that is not as honorable as we would have expected."

"Thank you." Ichiko commented over her tea. "Though, I did promise them safety, and I couldn't offer that. It is somewhat comforting to know that it's someone, or someones, else's fault." a pause, "So the security recordings are wiped. My recommendation would be to go back before the wipe starts. We have to scour everything, Captain." the use of the rank gave the moment weight. "Reference access requests, see who was where they shouldn't be up until the moment of the wipe. See who was unaccounted for via biometrics."

"A guest was murdered in my house. I want to know who is to blame. Proverbial heads will roll." another sip, to calm the rabbitess down. "If we have an insider in the ranks, we have to find them. Perhaps..." a pause, "Perhaps we can enlist the aid of the dead. Allow a rumor to leak that the aide was able to be brought to sickbay and is in critical condition. He's expected to be able to deliver a full report once he recovers."

"Then see who visits him."

Abigail nodded slowly. "Security and Operations are working on the recordings and the rest of the systems to see what they can find, searching nearby areas for recordings as well. The body has already been taken to sickbay and the rumor mill is already in full force so it shouldn't be too hard to throw a little more fodder into the mix. I'll see about a trip to the lounge later for a drink."

She paused to sip at her chai, her lips pursing with concern. "It may pay to go through and vet our crew a little more thoroughly. Perhaps that's something we should task to Lieutenant Voroshilov? Especially if we start with those who came aboard right before we left, after we had been given our assignment. It might yield nothing, but it might turn up something, we won't know unless we try."

"At the moment we have an abundance of maybe's, what if's, and possibly's. Giving Voroshilov a bit of a task to clear some of the air would do wonders. Especially if our quarry is using all this obfuscation to hide in plain sight." Ichiko was a few moments away from bristling. Imagine that, her bristling? "I hate to sound like a Ship's Second when I should be your XO, but there's at least one criminal on this ship. If we get anywhere within transporter range of anything we may lose the chance to deal justice. Take the transporters offline until further notice, and see who starts to sweat. Double security once they're cleared. Clog the hallways with eyes and witnesses. See who balks."

A sip, and a deep breath. "I mean, that's just my suggestion. A lapse in security this massive, and a Ts'usugi Ship Master would already have called for the Head of Security's resignation."

"Good idea," Abigail said quietly. "We won't need transporters ourselves and until this mess is resolved, we don't want any chances taken." She sighed and picked her chai up, raising the mug to her mouth before lowering it again without taking a sip. "Something just doesn't sit right with this whole situation," she said quietly. "I think I'll just be glad when we can drop them off and be done with this whole thing."

"I agree, though when we arrive the local government will want answers for what happened." Ichiko reminded. "But we can handle that upon arrival. The important part is being able to add the footer of 'and we found the party responsible'." she motioned with her cup. "But you're right. Something is odd. This ... this feels too designed. Too... planned, for lack of a better term."

"Then I guess we better make sure we have that footer ready," Abigail said quietly. "We're going to need reports for Command as well, with some kind of explanation as to how the hell this happened." She sighed and took a sip of her chai. "How am I supposed to give them answers if we can't even figure it out for ourselves?"

"We wait to see who calls us first. As of now, no one outside this ship knows what happened. The first one to call for a progress report may already know the answer." she pointed out. "I imagine our problem of what to tell will become less and less a problem once we start piecing the pieces together. We have a collection of likely suspects, so lets see if we can begin tracing the path of where our other guests were at the time of the event."

"They may be the obvious culprits, but at the moment, they're our first solid suspicion."

Abigail nodded slightly. "You're right," she said with a sigh and then offered a smile. "Your wisdom is always appreciated Ichiko," she said softly.

Ichiko returned the smile, "I would say that my services are at your disposal, but honestly at this point I'd rather just say 'What are friends for'. Besides..."

Detective Classics, issue one thirty six, Casefiles of Judge Ooka, 'Stone Witness'

"... it's just something I read in a book once."

Abigail took a sip of her tea and smiled fondly at her Ts'Usugi friend. "Well, I guess we need to go start some rumors then?"