Lieutenant Amelia Semara - The Knock

[Max]

(( Crew Mess, Deck 4 - USS Khitomer, Dry-docked at DS33 ))

For once, there was another Betazoid officer on the crew.

Of course, Amelia knew this for some time already, but she'd been flouncing around too frenetically playing at first officering during the mission, and then the never-ending reports after (decorating was worth it)... And it wasn't like she could just crash this guy's lunch hour like a total fangirling dork desperate to have a normal telepathic conversation for the first time in over a year... Could she?

And that's when it hit her.  She could.  Not so much the fangirling dork part, but she absolutely could crash his lunch hour.  Sometimes wearing black was awesome.  All she needed was...

Yup.  There it was.

oO Thank you very kindly, PADD full of reports! Oo

Best of all, he was already brooding over a meal.  Right.  There.  Strange that he hadn't noticed her aura by now, but then again with castle walls and a mental moat like that, it was probably hard to see out.  Alright, that was a little weird, but... Okay.  Still.  Another Betazoid!!!!

!!!!

She really needed to get it together.  So she took a breath, straightened her uniform, tussled her blonde hair, and did her very best to stay very ladylike and elegant as she crossed the mess.  It wouldn't do to skip over.

When she reached the table, she stared at him with a smile rated in the terawatt range until...

...Until...

--- Until?

...There!  Until he acknowledged her with at least a mental flicker of awareness.

Semara: Lieutenant Commander Valeris?

Once she had his attention, she did what she did best.  She curtsied.

Semara: Lieutenant Amelia Semara, at your service.  How do y' do, sir?

Valeris: Response

It was uncertain if it was her heirloom pin, her manner, her accent, or all three he noticed, but he most certainly noticed something about her.  Most homeworlders clocked her as colonial the second she opened her mouth, if they didn't hear the drawl a mile away in their paracortex.  But not all.

Semara: I'm well, thank you.

Had he asked?  Oh well, too late now.

Semara: May I sit?

She was already sitting.

Valeris: Response

Semara: Thank you SO kindly.  :: Pressing a couple buttons to lock the PADD to the report, then sliding it across. :: I was hopin' you might help me out on somethin'.  I've been followin' up on some reports on Sencha research.  I noticed a repair report on the SDA with your name on it.  :: beat :: Just a coupl'a questions, if that's alright?

And maybe lots more, if they hit it off.  Ooooooh, she hoped they hit it off.

Valeris: Response

She settled primly across from him, her friendly smile unwavering.

Semara: I hope you won't mind... I took the liberty a' lookin' up your record.  Says you were on shakedown duty for a while, and... I'd love hearin' your thoughts on how the SDA installation compares to other new construction you've seen.

And when she said 'thoughts', she meant it quite literally.  To make it clear, she knocked.

"The knock" wasn't perhaps the most common way to ask another Betazoid to talk telepathically, and had largely gone out of fashion, but it was still a very quintessential and extremely proper gentry greeting - especially among more old-fashioned colonial Betazoid families like Amelia's.  It was challenging and time-consuming to master the balance of projecting strongly enough to be clearly felt, but softly enough to be an invitation rather than invasion.  That alone was part of the point: to demonstrate total control.  In part, for the status it conferred the practitioner, but also to help set the other person at ease.  Besides inviting telepathic conversation the most courteous way among other telepaths, a knock was meant to subtly show another telepath: "It's safe.  I won't give you anything more than you can handle.  And I can handle anything you need me to."

The knock also had one other function, and that was to allow a Betazoid Lady to put her own flair to the telepathic greeting.  In Amelia's case, she used an especially tricky technique of projecting a mental image the way it was passed down in her family for generations.  The image, perhaps predictably, was...

Semara: ~~ :: A genteel curtsy :: ~~

Valeris: Response

Tag / TBC...

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Lieutenant Amelia Magnolia Semara

Intelligence Officer

USS Khitomer - NCC-62400

A239710MA0