Chapter One:

Second semester of Nyota Uhura's second year of Starfleet begins at 0800 on the 4th of July. She is in Advanced Phonology (Professor Sprig), Advanced Klingon (Professor M'enganga) Interspecies Protocol (Professor Kim) and her second year Xenolinguistics major compulsory class. The day before classes, the 3rd, is warm and bright. It's a perfect San Francisco morning when she arrives back on campus from her month-long visit home to Kenya.

Gaila is waiting for her when Uhura swipes her way through into the quarters they share. It's a small cramped room with a smaller bathroom. The bathroom light doesn't work so there's a lamp dangling hazardously close to the wash basin. There's a kettle, some tea and a small sink where two mugs sit awful lonely. The room is then split up into two - Gaila's is on the left and is decorated with collectables she has illegally confiscated. To the right is Uhura's and compared to Gaila's it is very plain and boring - a desk, a bed, a bookshelf of text books, some photos of family, a money box that is always empty.

Gaila sits on the bed, flicking through a comic on her COMM but jumps to her feet when she sees Uhura enter. The cadet shuffles through the door, lugging her suitcase behind her as Gaila embraces her tightly.

"I thought you'd never get back," complains Gaila. "I've been waiting for you for forever!"

Uhura hugs her back and the woman smells like sweet soap and something she can't quite put her finger on. She knows it smells divine, and that it's supposed to.

"It was like, so boring here without you."

Uhura pulls the suitcase into her room and throws down her backpack on the bed.

"How long have you been here?" she asks, unzipping the bag.

"I went to South America for two weeks with Dru from xenobiology. I got back last Sunday. It was good but oh my god, he was so annoying. We went to the top of one of those Inca pyramids, which were really cool by the way, but the only think I could think about was how much I wanted to push him off the top of it."

Uhura smirks, "So, not going to see him again?"

"It will be too soon if I do," she huffs and then instantly perks back up again. Gaila has a habit of not letting anything or anyone get her down for long, Uhura has noted on more than one occasion, and instantly the beautiful Orion girl is bubbly again. "Let's go out for drinks, celebrate the new semester!"

"We're supposed to celebrate the end of the semester," she informs Gaila. "I should get the readings for my classes finished first. And unpack."

"Did you get me a present?" Gaila prods.

"Did you get me one from South America?" she turns, a small grin on her face.

"Of course!" Gaila beams, pottering over to her side of the room.

"Okay…," Uhura caves. "I might have gotten you something. Actually, my mum made it for you." She opens her suitcase and rummages around to a small knitted pouch and hands it to Gaila.

"Aw!" croons Gaila. "Aw man this makes me feel bad - I smuggled two bottles of Aguardiente onto campus for us to share, but it wasn't like, handmade!"

"Gaila, you shouldn't have done that!" she cries, but there are the bottles, large and full of a foul smelling liqueur sitting on Gaila's desk, as proud as punch.

"Oh this is super cute, thanks Ny!" she grinns. The present is a small doll her mother has crafted from dyed wool and strings with distinct features like red-hair and green skin. The doll has blue eyes and a little red Starfleet dress on. "It's a good likeness!"

"I really gotta unpack," she says.

"Okay," Gaila says, beginning to strip off for a shower. "Go unpack and we'll go out for dinner after."

It is easy enough to settle into their normal routine and Uhura does decide go out for dinner with Gaila as a chance to catch up before the stress of classes. They leave campus and walk to a small sushi place in causal civilian clothes. Gaila is dressed considerably reservedly for the dinner - short cream cut-offs that show her long, green legs and a simple t-shirt and sandals. Uhura is wearing a light yellow summer shirt dress that buttoned down the front and a pair of tan slip-ons when Gaila pats against her arm somewhat violently, desperately wanting to get her attention.

She frowns, looks over from where she is trying to read the score on a girls' basketball game in the quad to tell her roommate to knock it off when she sees Commander Spock approaching her with almost a dozen PADDs in his hand and a textbook hitched under his elbow.

"Do you need help with that, Commander?" Gaila instantly offers, stepping to meet Spock has he approaches.

"Cadets," he greets with a small nod but does not offer any of his carry load to Gaila. "Welcome back for the semester. Cadet Uhura, since I happened to see you now, here is your PADD for Advanced Vulcan and Interspecies Ethics assessments back from last semester." He took the top PADD from the pile and handed it back to her. "Interesting thesis for Ethics. Well executed. I found it satisfactory."

To anyone else, satisfactory is not a great feedback. Uhura quickly boots up the PADD and brings the paper on screen. He had taught both classes last semester - a workload which must have been challenging in itself.

"Thank you, sir," she replied. An 84 for Advanced Vulcan - a low High Distinction, and a 92 for Interspecies Ethics, not the highest marks she's ever gotten but the highest marks she's ever received from the Commander. Suddenly, 'satisfactory' doesn't sound quite so bad. "Your feedback is important to me, thank you for taking the time to write notes on the assessments."

"There is an application for a teaching assistant in the Xenolinguistics department closing in four days' time. True, the assistantships are usually reserved for third and fourth year students, but I would encourage you to consider submitting an application for it," he advises. "I would also like you to come by office during this first week when you find yourself with a spare hour. My office hours are from three to six in the evenings."

"May I ask to what you wish to speak with me about?" she asks.

"You may," he replies evenly and then adds, "When you visit my office." Uhura almost quirks a grin before Spock nods and shuffles his collection of PADDs again. "Enjoy your evening, Cadets."

The sushi is good. Gaila picks her dishes off the small revolving carousel of Japanese food and enjoys the novelty of it being a semi-challenge in successfully manoeuvring the piece from the carousel belt to her dish using the chopsticks. It has resulted in a few causalities; however, they are usually just scooped up by hand and make a short trip from counter to mouth without so much as a blink. Uhura picks at her sushi. The three chicken and vegetable hand roles are being rolled around on her plate by her chopsticks. She looks to Gaila, who is pouring more sake.

"What do you think he meant about submitting an application as his teaching aide?" Uhura asks.

"I think it means he'll hire you if you do," Gaila says matter-of-factly, before grabbing another piece of sushi from the train. "It's a paid position you know, Nyota. Go for it. If he says submit, then submit?"

"Paid?" Uhura echoed. "How much?"

"There's something about tuition, some little pocket credits on the side. It wouldn't be much different pay wise with my IT assistantships," she says through a mouthful of sushi. "I mean, it's not a lot of money, but it's more about the experience."

"Yeah, well I guess."

"Do you think he wants to talk to you about something dirty?"

"Not at all."

"Well, what can it be?"

"Maybe he's found an interesting book, or just wants to talk to someone - I don't know Gaila, I'm not a mind reader."

"Pity," she considers. "But yeah that's probably right. I can just picture you two talking about the variances of verbs in a sentence or something and getting all hot and bothered about it."

"That's your fifth sake, Gaila, and it's a school night," Uhura notices.

"Cool your jets," Gaila complained. "You know I can handle much more alcohol than this. If anything over the break, drinking all that South American booze, I've gotten better."

The evening goes on and they end up halving their bill for the sushi, though Gaila pays a little more because the restaurant has charged her for all the sushi that has fallen on the floor. They make the slow walk back to campus but not before stopping at an ice-cream vendor to grab dessert.

"Banana is my favourite flavour," Gaila sings as they walk home in somewhat silence, both preoccupied in licking from their ice-creams.

"Chocolate rules all," Uhura replies. "If you polled everyone on Starfleet, chocolate would come out supreme. Maybe that's an interesting experiment I could conduct. Certainly wouldn't win me any awards, though."

"What about vanilla?" asks Gaila. "It's like, everywhere, someone must like it."

"Vanilla is good, but it's boring. Vanilla ice-cream tastes the same everywhere pretty much. It's a safe option. Everyone buys flavoured ice-cream when they go out, especially flavours you can't get in the store, like, um well, salted caramel chocolate, or, banana raspberry swirl and stuff."

Gaila giggles, "I didn't realise the politics of ice-cream were so serious. Banana raspberry swirl sounds amazing. Maybe next time I will get that."

They swipe their way through the small pedestrian gate for after-hours access and then again into the large hall that house the cadet dormitories. It's a large square, ugly (in Uhura's opinion) building, but it's surrounded by small gardens and oversized outside chess boards, in which she's watched Cadet Chekov win three small tournaments out there on a Saturday afternoon.

Gaila opens the window to their apartment and the two sit on the small dining chairs they've moved out the balcony to enjoy their dessert. The night is so warm and breezy, and San Francisco is strangely quiet. It's everything a midsummer's night should be.

"Can you believe we're almost half way through our cadetship," Gaila says, rolling her head to look at Uhura and placing her feet up on the rails. "Soon we'll be out there."

'Out there' is space, big and dark and all-consuming.

"Nervous?" Uhura asks.

"We could be called on at any time to you know, do space stuff," Gaila considers.

Uhura laughs. "Space stuff?"

"Yeah. Space stuff."

"I would ask for a more specific mission than just "space stuff" before I signed on to go into outer space."

Gaila hits her playfully on the shoulder. "You know what I meant. Like rescue missions after receiving an emergency beacon, or first contacts or-"

"Translating space jumble from space static. Realising two Klingon personnel are only talking about their favourite foods and not planning to attack," she hums. "I'll be stuck calibrating translator after translator, wondering if I'll ever actually get to go out into the field."

Gaila looks to Uhura, "You should start to learn a language that no one else can speak, or not really. Like Orion."

"Many people speak Orion."

"Okay, take your pick. Maybe one not in the Federation. It would make it harder to find books and texts, but maybe you could actually write the book, as Humans say, about it and then you'd be out of the grunt work wouldn't you?"

She looks to her roommate. She considers the strong point and then nods. "Can we change the subject? So… who is on the list this semester?"

"I don't know…," Gaila hums which slowly turns into a small laugh. "I have to reassess my options. I was going to do Dru - might still if he doesn't talk the whole time. But only if I'm really bored. I will assess the talent and get back to you by the weeks end." Gaila nods, her mind made up.

"What are you aiming for?" she asks.

"Fifteen."

"There's thirteen weeks in a semester - that's more than one a week."

"Weekends count - I could double up some weekends," Gaila considers, mockingly counting on her fingers.

"I just don't know if you can manage it," Uhura laughs. "So much time and effort you dedicate to your sexual exploration."

Gaila squeaks a protest. "I'll do it with some spare for you, Nyota Uhura!" she says. "Don't think I won't give the friends to you. Oh, I will say, I have a really hot roommate back in the dorm… tall, skin like chocolate, beautiful… sometimes we make out a little… put on a show. Bring yourself, and someone for her."

"We have never, ever done that," Uhura replies.

"I have once but you weren't home," Gaila admits. "I had to handle it all myself. They were really cute too. Ugh, best night."

There is a chime from Uhura's PADD as all of her class timetables are published live onto the feed in preparation for the following morning's classes. Gaila leans over, into the window to her room and grabs for hers also. Surprisingly, Uhura's classes follow the same pattern - two classes at the start of the week and two at the end of the week. Her Wednesdays are completely and utterly free.

"I have a whole free day on Wednesday...," Uhura frowns, refreshing the feed to make sure it is correct. It comes back exactly the same.

"Ugh, lucky," Gaila growls. "I have a fucking Saturday class - what the actual fuck!" she tosses her PADD back into her room and finishes her ice-cream.

"I'm gonna go have a shower," Uhura says and finishes her ice-cream.

The light on the washbasin flickers a little and Uhura makes sure she is quick - management have promised to attend to the bad circuitry throughout their apartment, but that was at the start of the year. Tomorrow, Uhura will give them a personal visit, she promises as she negotiates the room in dim light.

Uhura flops down onto her plush bed and flicks through the PADD schedules - she has been given a very good timetable, she must admit. No Saturday classes, a Wednesday conveniently free for homework and then study and maybe some social events. She could meet with the Commander in his office tomorrow afternoon to discuss… whatever it was he wanted to discuss with her, and spend most of Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday studying.

Curiously, she flicks through the internship page on the cadet portal - perhaps there is something there which she could do to for some extra-credit this semester? She wonders of the Commander's invitation. If it's only usually for third and fourth year cadets, then why ask her to submit? Would she be disappointed if he considered her application not as strong as others? Yes, but not surprised. A little humiliated? Maybe.

There are a number of off-shore internships being advertised on the portal page, all beginning at the start of the New Year. Off-shore internships are reserved for third and fourth years, and even then it is difficult to be accepted into one. It is not uncommon to have graduated by the end of the application process and put-off assignment to complete an internship. As she scrolls through the opportunities, she knows she will apply to each and every one of them.

And then she sees it. The advertisement, sitting demurely between a desire for an apprentice engineer volunteer and a weekly announcement for the Choir:

12 June.

An opportunity arises in the Xenolinguistics department in the form of a teacher's assistant. This will be a semester-long, paid position out of class hours. Details and full job description can be found below. Please forward your student details and essay to this address -

She reads over the position requirements and is confident she is qualified to apply for the role. Uhura nibbles on her stylus. Does it mean anything that the Commander has asked her to submit an application himself? Does it really give her a better chance than other applicants? Or had he just been trying to make polite conversation or a possible icebreaker? That does make sense, he does seem to have some awkwardness in engaging in conversation outside of the classroom, Uhura considers, and he isn't known exactly for a shining example in politeness.

She would speak with him about it tomorrow, she resolves. For now, she has her first class to prep for and then a shower to take. Across the hall she can hear Gaila giggling almost madly - no doubt she had found her first candidate for the semester and then hears her tapping on her COMM. Uhura grins and rolls off the bed, grabbing her towel on the way out of her room.

It is sure to be an interesting semester, she thinks.

The lamp hangs precariously close to the wash basin in the sink. She needs to get that thing fixed.

So, if you guys haven't noticed, I've changed the whole tense of this story from past to present. It was just a personal preference thing, around 30K in I thought, this reads and writes so much better as a present tense piece. So I changed it. That means a lot of edits on my behalf and a lot of work to be done. However, I have completed A Day on the Planet already, so updates will be considerably quick and constant. ~ A.D. 3/12/2014

Please take the time to leave a review before you go! They help me out so much and only take 30 seconds!

~ Arlia'Devi