Tali adjusted the seal buckle on her right arm and pulled the sleeve up tighter. Always that one seal, the only one that wouldn’t fasten tight enough for her liking. Or maybe it was just her nerves.
It was third tour and, despite having borne the rank of Lieutenant-Commander for some time now, she still felt like it was a boot that she couldn’t quite fit into. It seemed like only yesterday when she had still been an Ensign, stepping into the Engineering section for the first time.
And today, she was going to serve aboard the Enterprise.
The doors finally slid open after clearing her for entry and she stepped right into a bustling corridor. She liked the ship already—she loved it when a ship was a hive of activity. Tali fell in step with her fellow crewmen and made her way towards Engineering. She had memorized the ship’s floor plan the day before as part of her exhaustive preparation for her new tour, but several steps down it occurred to her that she was seeing more blue shirts move in her direction than red ones—oh no, had she been mistaken? She had. Thoroughly mortified, she turned around abruptly to go back the other way—she was sure now that it was that way—and walked right into another person.
"Keelah! I’m so sorry!" Her mouthpiece had taken quite a bump, but it was probably nothing compared to the unfortunate soul she had hit. "Are you okay? Did I bruise anything?"
