Posted by Lieutenant Junior Grade Janna Kingston (CNS) in Counselor’s Office - Psych Eval

Posted by Commander Tello Anaar (Executive Officer) in Counselor’s Office - Psych Eval

Posted by Lieutenant Junior Grade Janna Kingston (CNS) in Counselor’s Office - Psych Eval
Posted by… suppressed (1) by the Post Ghost! 👻

(snip)

The first officer turned to see who Cherry was. The receptionist had been away from her desk when Tello entered, so she’d just chimed a random door hoping to get her eval done. However, she had apparently returned and the counselor was handing over something to her.

The Risian woman who did a great deal to keep things functional for the department settled into her seat and accepted the PADD from Kingston with a couple of nods.

Anaar returned her gaze to the inside of the Lt’s office and admired the shades of blue displayed there. Walking in, she chose to sit in one of the comfy looking chairs. Someone had told her over drinks once that it made a difference to some in the counseling field where their clients chose to sit. Refusing to drive herself crazy by overthinking that tidbit, her choice was random.

—Anaar, XO

Slipping back into her office, Janna wore a warm, if weary, smile. “All right, I’m all yours now,” she said as she moved over and took a seat in the other arm chair. Crossing her legs at the knee, Janna sat forward slightly and rested on arm across her lap, as her grass green eyes took in the new XO. “So, new posting Commander. Tell me what brings you to the Athena.”

~Janna Kingston, CNS

Tello’s smile was curious. “Actually, I’m not quite sure how it all shook out, but it was very sudden. I only had a few hours to pack once my orders were signed. Later, Command made sure to tell me I needed to get here ASAP but the transport they’d booked for me had been called elsewhere and they couldn’t find another until the next day. I didn’t know why it was important to get here so quickly, but I’m a team player so I called a friend and he supplied a pilot and shuttle to bring me to the Athena. The Sherlock Om—that was the name of the shuttle. My friend, Bernie, loves detective mysteries and yoga.” She smiled at the memory of her eccentric pal.

Janna mirrored the smile. “Sounds like a fun friend.”

Dark eyes examined the counselor. “You look tired, Lt. Are you sure you don’t want me to come back later?”

—Anaar, XO

Kingston waved her hand. “I’m okay, and I’m not just saying that. But our last mission was very traumatic for a lot of the crew and it’s been on the heels of other difficult and often traumatizing assignments. Lieutenant Iven and I had been coordinating the post-mission trauma evals of the entire crew. And it’s a big ship. We’ve had outside help doing the basic evals from a team from the Ogawa and they just wrapped up their help. But with Séan gone, we’re down to five of us and we still have not only trauma therapy followup for flagged crew members, but the usual sessions and boarding evals. So while we’re at the tail end of a very busy time, I know it’s temporary and that I have to take extra precautions to guard my own health.” She gave a slightly lopsided grin. “I’m just not getting nearly as much sleep as I’d like right now. But it’s temporary and I’m more than able to have this chat with you.” It went without saying that while the rest of the crew got to have downtime while at starbase, Janna and the rest of the counselling team had actually been working harder and longer hours. But such were emergency situations and a part of the job.

Instead of leaping into another question, Janna waited to see how Anaar would respond.

~Janna Kingston, CNS

“Well, I’m glad the ship got extra help when it needed it. What was traumatic about the last mission?” The XO crossed her legs and settled more deeply into the chair as if she was expecting a long story. “My assignment here was quick without a lot of detail, so I don’t have any specific history of what happened. Since so many were affected, it would help if I knew what happened.”

—Anaar, XO

Kingston nodded slowly. How did one sum it all up. “Well, very long story short, the captain got some sort of vision or message of some sort and the next thing we know we’re flying through an anomaly and find ourselves in a parallel universe. The gist of it was that something had happened to cause the two universes to begin to merge together and unless we did something about it, they would collide and obliterate each other. Suffice to say it was not an easy task. A group that included myself was trying to mediate some intense negotiations, there were abductions from the crew, some rather crazy battles and all in all it was just another day on the Athena,” she said with a laugh. “Par for the course though. Our last few missions have been very intense with incredibly high stakes. So I think it would be useful for you as you meet the crew to keep that in mind for those that were aboard during them. Some adjusted very well in the aftermath, others far less so and the rest are somewhere in the middle.”

~Janna Kingston, CNS

Tello nodded. “Thank you for the heads up. I’ll pay special attention while I read the past mission reports.” She smoothed the palms of her hands over the arms of the chair feeling the material. “It hasn’t been that long since my last psych eval—only about four months, so there really isn’t anything new to tell you. I’m fine and looking forward to this new assignment. Captain Wallace is much different from my last commanding officer and I am interested to see how the two of us work together. So far, I have a positive feeling about it all.”

—Anaar, XO