Post 336: Commander N'Dura: Warrior Princess

Stardate:7030.1530
Title: Commander N'Dura: Warrior Princess
Authors: Fox Margolis and Lair Kellyn
Scene: Chief of Security N'Dura's Quarters
Time:1900 hours, (Evening of the same day as the runabout leaves for Trill)
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"Skip, Skip, Reverse, Draw Four, Uno!" Lair Arie cried excitedly, laying the last of her cards down on top of the pile on the table before her.

"That is not possible," her opponent complained. She still had fourteen cards in her hand. "You must be cheating."

"How?" the little girl replied, most logically. "You randomized the cards before we began drawing from the pile. I cannot control how they are distributed. Is it my fault that I picked up that draw four the last time you played a draw two?"

"But you always seem to pick up a draw four at exactly the right moment," The Klingon woman stood from the table and threw down the remaining cards in her hand in disgust. "You must be cheating."

"It's just luck, honored warrior. Don't be mad. Sit down. Have another cookie." Arie said. She happily swung her feet, covered in pink fuzzy slippers, to and fro as she talked. She was so short that when she was seated upon the chairs in the security chief's quarters, her feet did not reach the floor.

The anger lasted for just a few seconds. Much as N'Dura did not like to lose anything, she knew that little Arie was right; it was a randomized game, and there was more luck than anything to it. So she did sit down and had another cookie. This one was covered with chocolate and had a mint taste.

"Arie, what is this?" she asked.

"Don't know," Arie replied with a shrug of her shoulders. "I just asked the computer for a plate of cookies."

Still curious, the Klingon asked, "Computer, name the food in the last replicator order."



Arie giggled. "Those are silly names." She snagged a cookie, a chocolate one filled with peanut butter.

N'Dura continued. "Computer, where do these cookies come from?"



N'Dura strode over to the replicator and stood before it. "Thin Mint cookies."



"Twelve." An even dozen ought to see her through the evening, N'Dura hoped.

Arie took a swig of her glass of milk, leaving a little white mustache above her lip. N'Dura sighed, picked up a napkin and paused, not sure whether she should dab, or wipe. Here she was, a woman with years of combat experience, with awards for courage in battle and in recognition of her honor, and she was now wiping milk from a child's mouth as part of her duties.

She was only grateful that her mother, the great warrior Lursa, couldn't see her.
"Let's play another game!"

"Let's play a new game. One that I have just invented. It is called "Arie goes to sleep." N'Dura suggested. "I have reports that I must read and file before morning, child."

"But it's only nineteen hundred hours!" Arie protested. "Mother and father let me stay up at least until twenty, even on school nights!"

"I am not your mother."

Arie pouted softly, and with her lower lip puffed out, even the battle hardened N'Dura could not resist. "All right, we have time for one more real game. But then it will be bed time for you."

"I have just the game!" Arie jumped up from the table and ran over to her suitcase. She returned a moment later, her arms full of hair styling supplies.

Understanding what the little girl had in mind, N'Dura resisted rolling her eyes. It really did take a warrior's patience to handle one small child.

"Beauty shop!" Arie proclaimed as she dropped all of the supplies on the table.

"Very well." N'Dura thought this was good. It would not take a lot of time, the child would soon be asleep on her couch and then she could get back to her work. "Be seated. I will apply this make up to your face and then I will paint your nails."

"No!" Arie giggled. "Not me. YOU!"

"No."

Again, the lip. N'Dura wondered how it was that Lair Kellyn ever said no to that face. "Pleeeeeeease? Just this once. I won't tell anybody, I promise." Arie begged, hands clasped together tightly.

N'Dura was only grateful that TC Blane and Michael Windsor could not see her now. "Very well. But you must tell no one."

"We are warriors." Arie replied, most seriously. "We will make an oath." She held her pinkie finger out toward N'Dura. "I swear I will tell no one."

N'Dura watched as the little girl linked her smallest finger around her own, and tugged. "I certainly will not tell anyone." The Klingon concluded.

Arie procured a small silver tiara from her assembled swag. She put it on top the Chief's head, gently fluffed N'Dura's flowing hair a little, and began to apply glitter nail polish to the Klingon's strong hands. "I think you need some glitter on your cheeks, too, N'Dura. You'll look so beautiful. Just like a fairy princess!"

"Just what I have always wanted."

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Lt. Faustine "Fox" Margolis
Operations Officer
USS Independence

and

Lt. Commander Lair Kellyn
Engineering Officer
USS Independence NCC-90791