"It's no 'El Taco' but it's the best I could come up with." Garek put the dish down infront of the unsuspecting "victim." Kim cautiously looked over the food infront of her. She picked up her fork and started prodding it. Garek took a seat across from her at the small table in his quarters. He quizzically watched her as she poked and prodded like a scientist disecting an animal specimen.
"It's not going to eat you."
"Sorry," she smiled. "Never had chicken kiev before." She took her knife and was about to jam it into the side of the dish before Garek stopped her.
"I wouldn't do that." Garek looked her in the eyes.
"Why?" Kim replied, continuing to cut while looking at Garek. Instantly, hot, melted butter spurted out from the incision that she made in the side of the dish.
"That's why," Garek replied. Butter had spurted all over the front of her uniform, staining it.
"Great. I ask for dinner, and you give me a time bomb," she teased. She walked over to the replicator and ordered a new uniform. "If you don't mind, I'm going to borrow your bedroom."
"Be my guest." Garek continued eating. His commbadge chirped. "Figures," Garek commented, his mouth half full of chicken. He tapped his commbadge, swallowing the last of the food. "Commander Loran here."
[Sorry to bother your dinner Commander.] It was Jo Schmidt. [I was thinking that you and I could talk about the upcoming mission when you're done. Unless you and Kim have something else planned,] she hinted with an air of amusement in her voice.
"No, after dinner will be fine. I'll meet with you in stellar cartography." Garek tapped his badge again, closing the communications channel.
"Who was that?" Kim asked, entering the room.
"Jo Schmidt. She wants to go over specifics on the away mission we're going on."
"Sure. That's exactly what you two are going to be doing," Kim replied, with a mock tone.
Garek grinned. "Come on. I've got all the woman... plus ego... I need right here." He returned back to his food when a glob of mashed potatos hit him in the right eye. He wiped it away, and looked up to see mashed potato remnants in the saucer of Kim's spoon. She had a sly smile on her face, and she went back to eating.
Garek entered stellar cartography to see Jo already standing behind the controls. The circular room was flooded with multiple stars, and there were holographic projections scrolling of details of different planets.
"Seems as though you made yourself at home," Garek commented, entering the room.
"Are you kidding? Starfleet preformed a miracle by putting this lab on this ship. I'm surprised that the warp core produces enough power to run this thing."
"Technically it doesn't. There's a seperate fusion reactor dedicated to powering this lab."
"Touché," Jo replied. She zoomed in on one particular star system. The system grew and grew until it displayed the system that the Arizona would be visiting. "Here's the planet that we'll be stopping at. I've given it the code name of Caeser.
"Caeser? What are the other planets named?"
"Crassus and Pompey."
"How convenient," Garek commented.
"It was that, or Huey, Duey, Louey." She smiled. "I figured that three Roman rulers sounded better then three cartoon ducks."
"Good point," Garek replied. "Anyways, go on."
"We lucked out with Caeser. Caeser appears to be a fairly moderate Class M planet much like Earth. There's forests here in the upper hemisphere, but it appears that most of the planet is grassland. There is one mountain range here," she said, rotating the planet infront of them. "It runs like a vein down the landmass from the uppermost to lowermost of the continent."
"That suggests some volcanos or some seismic activity," Garek added. "What about atmosphere?"
"Seventy percent nitrogen, twenty oxygen, five helium, and the rest small amounts of other gasses. A few of them appear to be some very odd compounds of flourine and a gas I've never seen before."
"Is it enough to be toxic?"
"I don't believe so." She looked over her shoulder at Garek. "I'll know for sure when we get closer to the planet. I've also wanted to know who the two other people are going to be with us down there."
"Well," Garek started, "Tarik said that he'd gladly assign Sargeant Hartman as security, so I've taken him up on that offer. I'm also gonna take Kim to pilot the runabout."
"Looking for you two to get some 'alone time' on a weird planet?" Jo smiled.
"With a clown like you and a hard noser like Hartman there? I wouldn't have time to do anything."
Jo gave him a playful shot in the arm. She then went back to her work. On a new holographic projection, she brought up schematics of the four Runabouts carried onboard the ship. "Well, we've got the Chicago, Amazon, Nile, and Hudson to choose from."
"Actually, only three to choose from. Rich has chosen the Nile." Garek stepped up next to Jo and began entering commands into the computer. The three available Runabouts appeared and underneath them, the technical schematics and information was displayed. "The Chicago was recently maitnenced before we left the station. I've also taken the liberty of increasing the shield and sensor capacity on that one." Garek entered a few codes, and the Chicago disappeared as available. "That settles that problem."
"It appears so." She closed down the screen. "So when do we leave on this trip?"
"Tomorrow afternoon. In the mean time, I'm going to go to the Chicago and get her prepped for flight. In the mean time, call up Kim and get in contact with Hartman. Assemble the necessary materials and send them down so we can get them loaded.
"Aye aye sir," she replied, half mockingly.
Garek grinned, and made his way out of stellar cartography, heading to the shuttlebay.