Lieutenant JG Joyiru headed through the station to the Flight Operations Directors office. He rang her door and waited for her answer.

“Come in!” Nicorrina called out. She was busy with some reports and a little annoyed at the interruption. She looked up and saw it was Lieutenant Joyiru. “I’m rather busy, I hope this will not take too long.” She knew she came across a little abruptly but she was one of those people who prided herself in getting her work done ahead of schedule.

“You will have time for this.” Zako replied in kind. He handed her a padd. “I trust you haven’t received this communication from headquarters. I just saw it when I came into my office. We will need to make some adjustments to our traffic patterns for the next week.”

Nicorrina turned to her computer, ignoring his padd and opened up her mail. “Have a seat.” She said impatiently while she read the missive from Starfleet. “They want to enhance our transportation technology with new improved software and equipment.” She sat back and looked at him. “Do they not realize that we have just come online and we already have full days of shuttles and ships, both civilian and fleet coming in and out of here on a daily basis!”

“I believe they feel this is the perfect time.” Zako murmured. “And I tend to agree with them, however it will take some strategic planning on both of our parts. I will be overseeing the installation and while that is going on we are still going to be fully operating.”

“How do you plan to do this, exactly?” Nicorrina demanded. “Look, I am not trying to be difficult but we are at capacity at the moment. You cannot be installing equipment and software while we have shuttles and ships coming and going.”

“We actually can.” Zako said patiently. He thought Nici must be having a bad day because she was not handling this very well. “It will take some rescheduling on both our parts. We always reserve twenty percent of our docking bays for emergencies. While these upgrades are being fulfilled we will have to use one hundred percent of them.”

“And if there is an emergency?” Nicorrina asked him, raising an eyebrow. “What then”

“We will park them a little closer.” Zako returned. “We have done it in the past.’ He sat back. “Look, I realize that this isn’t the best scenario. It should have been done before we came on board but this is the corps of engineers and you know they never do anything to our convenience.” He smiled at her. “We need to work together to make certain this is completed as safely and quickly as we can.”

“We also need a plan, written out in detail, to give to Commodore Coleman and Lieutenant Commander Greenwood for their approval.” Nicorrina sighed. “I apologize for snapping at you, this was not how I expected to start a monday.”

“We all have our moments.” Zako shrugged it off. “You haven’t seen me when I am not pleased.” He paused for a moment. “I was not happy when I first saw the orders come through but the more I thought about it, it really makes sense and it will make both of our jobs better in the long run.”

“We are going to have to be even more on top of things.” Nicorrina said. “There won’t be hardly any margin for error.”

“We will also need to train our personnel on the new technology.” Zako said. “How it operates, safety concerns and reliability. This is cutting edge, we are one of the first to use it.”

Nicorrina laughed softly. “So basically we will work all the kinks out before they share it on other stations.”

“I want to do some investigating first.” Nicorrina said with conviction. “I want to know how it will make our operations more efficient. Is it going to actually make our traffic flow better or will it bog us down.”

“We can do that together.” Zako offered. “We will want to know if it reduces travel time, how it will integrate into our existing software. Where have they tested it and what were their results?”

Nicorrina nodded. “It looks like it will be about four weeks before they want to start.” She looked over to Zako. “That gives you and I plenty of time to research all the data and present it to our command officers.”

“Agreed.” Zako nodded. “I think we also need to know what happens if it fails. Is there a backup plan and if not, we will need to have our own. I don’t want to be caught with our pants down, so to speak.”

“We are going to have to come to an agreement on what is most important during this time.” Nicorrina replied. “My priorities will be ensuring that our traffic flows and stays consistent while yours will be getting this new technology installed. I don’t want us coming to heads over what the priorities are.”

“We are likely to anyway.” Nicorrina said, her eyes meeting his. “When this starts being implemented and there is some problem, which there inevitably always is, I will be pushing to have my traffic flowing seamlessly while you may be insisting that some docking stations will not be operational. We will need a plan for that, ahead of time.”

Zako admired how she thought ahead and did not mince any words. “What is your schedule like for next week? That will give us both some time to research and come up with questions or potential issues that could become a problem during the installation.”

Nicorrina looked at her schedule and then turned back. “Like you, my days are filled with the job, keeping track of what is coming and going in and off the station.” She thought for a moment. “It might not be ideal but would you be opposed to meeting in the evening to work on this?”

“I was going to suggest the same thing.” Zako said with a nod. “We can bring our padds and work in one of our offices, unless you have a better option for where we could do this.”

“Let’s start in the mess hall.” Nicorrina suggested. “Most of the crew goes to the promenade. If it appears to be too noisy then we can go to one or the other.”

“When I leave here I think it would be beneficial to let the Commodore and Lieutenant Commander know about the missives we received.” Zako said seriously. “I am certain they got them as well but just in case, I don’t want to be researching this without their knowledge.”

“The Commodore would not be happy with either of us.” Nicorrina nodded. “And I would not blame her one bit.” She smiled at Zako then, wanting him to see she wasn’t the shrew she had been when he first showed up at her office. “Thank you for bringing this to my attention. I was caught up in some paperwork and I wouldn’t have seen it until much later.”

“We may have our own departments.” Zako said with a warm smile. “But we work closely together. I want us to have an open door policy where we can discuss these things.” He paused. “And I expect we will more than likely not agree in the days to come on some aspects of this. We will be looking at it from two different perspectives.” He stood up. “I will let you get back to work.”

“I’ll see you tonight.” Nicorrina nodded. “Let’s hope the rest of our day goes without a hiccup or two.”