Engineering A Meeting

Posted on Mon Feb 8th, 2010 @ 7:21am by

682 words; about a 3 minute read

Mission: FORGING AHEAD
Location: USS Alabama
Timeline: 1330 Hours

ON:

Austin was learning a very important lesson: large man plus small Jeffries tube equals uncomfortable fit. He thought he heard someone saying something a time or two, but the plasma torch in his hand was very loud in the small space. He paused for a moment to listen but heard nothing. He shrugged and continued his work. Then someone tapped his leg. Suppressing a sigh, Austin turned off the power torched and tried to wriggle out of the tube. Today had been nothing but complications. He came out on his back to be looking at a blond human who looked like he was used to authority. Austin wasn't impressed. He'd seen worse stares.

"Can I help you, Lieutenant?" Austin drawled.

"Chaplin." Joey said with a nod. "I'm the Chief Engineer of the Asgard, now of the Alabama. I was bored, so I've decided to check on how well the repairs are coming along."

Austin stood up and dusted himself off. "Greenwood, nice to meet you,' he said, shaking the man's hand. "Well, the shields are giving us some problems but we'll get them sorted out; they were recalibrated so many times during the last mission that it's screwed them up. The phasers were on a setting where it made them overtax their power supplies and no matter what we do they go right back to the same damn settings. The mundane stuff like life support and replicators ain't been worked on yet. But everything else is coming along fine." He was almost to the point of repairing the shields himself even though he knew Flynn to be a good engineer; Flynn was great with everything but shields it seemed. Then again, everyone had their weaknesses...

Joey frowned. "Well, I know Captain James won't appreciate it if we aren't ready to rock and roll, on time. If you need a hand with anything, I can hunt down a few Cadets, and I'm sure Ensign T'vanna will be glad to pitch in as well. She's probably bored out of her skull somewhere."

Austin suppressed a smile. He remembered his cadet cruise on the Missouri. He still called it the Misery because he had been given all the mundane jobs and never learned a thing until two months in when the chief engineer was reassigned. "Yeah, we could use some help. Get them on over here and I'll give them some work to do."

"I'll do my best. There are a few cadets who could use the extra credit, so make sure you grade their work, eh?" Joey replied.

The large man nodded. "I'll do that. I remember my cadet cruise. Best time I had at the Academy," Austin said with a thick accent. "Don't you worry, I'll make sure they earn those grades."

"Good stuff." Joey said with a nod.

"I'll be here for a while then I'll be gone. They can find me by asking for Lieutenant Greenwood. Make sure they say Lieutenant because my brother is here too."

Joey laughed. "I know the feeling. A Security officer on the Pinnacle has the same last name I do, and we frequently have our' mail mixed up. That's fleet post services for you."

Austin laughed too. "Yeah, I know that feeling. One time my brothers and I were all posted on the same ship: me, Tex and Dallas and Dallas and I always got mixed up because we were both ensigns at the time. Confused visitors real good."

"I imagine so." Joey said with a laugh.

Austin smiled and said, "If you'll excuse me, I gotta finish this before too long. I need to get to the port shield array in the next ten minutes or O'Boyle is gonna blow up the ship."

"Alright. I'll leave you to it then." Joey said with a nod.

Austin wriggled back up in his hole, thinking of the kinds of tasks to put the cadets to. They were gonna work for those grades, sir. He smiled. He was liking this assignment.

OFF:

Lt Austin Greenwood
Engineer
SB Typhon

LJG Joey Chaplin
Chief Engineer
USS Alabama

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