Who's in charge around here? - Part 1

Posted on 16 Apr 2015 @ 2:45am by Commodore Da`nal of the House of Varal & Commander Travis Stone & Lieutenant Commander Fanvo Adtanis

1,504 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: M13-A: From the Old to the New
Location: USS Achilles
Timeline: Pre-Launch

-On-

It was the fourth time he had been electrocuted that day, and it was enough for Tyce to feel justified in unleashing a torrent of swear words in a colorful display of perverse eloquence. Every time he shunted power, either an OPS override or Security Interface re-instated power to the EPS junctions above the habitat sections. Four times running, four times he felt the conduit squirm through his body and ground out painfully. Thankfully his Engineering outfit was laced with refractive quartz and rubidium substrates to diffract electrical patterns.

He needed a Chief Engineer, someone with equivalent level access to keep other Admin systems from overriding him. Try as he might, no word on the CEO had come down the grapevine and Tyce was having to double both work shifts and Admin. He had basically already assumed the job, but was not happy with the way things were. Seeing as how he was the only Engineering Officer of rank over a field of ensigns and enlisted, Tyce slid from the Jefferies Tube and made his way to the Command deck....As he strode the hallway, the smell of smoke and burned hair followed him, his right cuff had been smoldering for some time.

Consider his temper and realizing he was the only one so motivated he restrained his ire and calmly tapped the comm badge.

=/\="Tyce to Bridge, has the CEO arrived? Who is on Deck right now I need command asap!"

Da`nal looked to his XO. "What could be so urgent we are still in dock. See what's going on down there."

"Knowing our engineers, probably authorizations or chain of command issues. Since the CEO hasn't arrived yet, I'll go take a look since I have a secondary degree in this. Don't get too bored up here with the paperwork Commodore." Travis commented as he stood up and went to the turbolift. "Engineering". He called out, and the doors hiss closed.

=^= Stand by Lieutenant the XO is on his way. What's the situation? =^=

=/\= I'm getting shocked by residual static fields as systems are powered despite my commands. If I had Command authority or a Chief to lock it down sir, it wouldn't keep happening. Safeties re-enable despite my order.

=^= Understood. An Ascension Class ship has a lot more power running through it than other ships. More power means more safe guards.=^=

=/\= More Safe Guards like these and we will need more engineers. Can you help sir, I'm at a standstill in my inspection?

[Transporter Room 9]

Fanvo materialized into the transporter pad, his immediate annoyance upon feeling the compression beams set to vertical orientations played out in the stern gaze leveled at the operator. Tangential beams were far more stable but required actual attention and effort; it was standard for other symbiotic species. He felt nothing from the Nosk, a barely evident bio organism; micro-hairs behind his earlobes were the only external component.

"Ensign Faliktavarios, please reset your board and torque arrays for 45th degree Tangential vectors. I'll check on progress in one hour."

The swarthy Greek behind the console stared down the smaller man. That is until the pips on the collar became evident, two glances to the breast pocket and belt confirmed this was the Chief Engineer and he wisely snapped to.

"Aye sir. If I may... have we met?"

Fanvo had nearly left the room, he was late, and needed to report in. He stopped to answer the man,
"How could I forget a name like Faliktavarios on a manifest..."

=/\= Lt Commander Adtanis to Bridge, Sorry for being late, Where is the Captain?

[Bridge]

Da`nal handed back the padd back and replied. =^= Commodore Da`nal here Commander. Report to the XO in Engineering then return with him to the bridge. =^=

The Commodore had that tone that Officers learned to listen for, the one that stated in no words at all, 'You are already failing to meet my expectations.'

=/\= Acknowledged, I'll have a full report when we meet sir. Until then."


[Engineering]

Travis arrived in Engineering to notice the usual chaos that accompanied a pre-launch, and looked around for the Lieutenant that called for assistance. "Lieutenant Backo!" He finally called out, too many people to track this down manually.

Main Engineering was the size of a shuttle hangar, and had more than the usual bedlam and thrum of pitched conversation. Inspection reports were stacked awaiting the CEO to peruse and approve, a days worth easily, and they launched in two hours. Ensign To-la, a Bolian in a radiation suit pointed at the Crystalline Manifold that dominated the Primary Stations. Inside a core containment unit there sparkled a fourth dimensional particle fountain contained in a Solidified Warp field. It was light years past simple Dilithium Matter antimatter reactions, this level of energy output was sufficient for coaxial warp trials.

Tyce had given up the EPS re-alignment for now, the variances of the bio-neural interface to the Quantum substrata had vexed his scanners for the past fifteen minutes. Measuring the data invariably changed the results as he input them, requiring the algorithms to update the shifting data to grow more complex by the second. After a quarter hour, he was computing over sixteen teraquads of data only to need a different computation of eighteen teraquads to analyze the first results... and so on.

=/\= To-la to Tyce... XO is here, you wanted it...

Tyce took a deep breath, he had to ask Stone to promote him or he would have to go to another ship. Since the last Achilles, god rest her soul, Engineering had been something that had fallen to him. A string of lackluster CEO's had leaned on him and he had developed skills outside his pay grade as a result. He slid from the small housing chamber for one the lattice access-ways and straightened his uniform. Trying not to feel like the nervous intern asking the big boss for a real job, he found the XO easily and walked purposefully towards him.

Fanvo knew had arrived at Main Engineering simply from the noise. Inside the cavernous main lobby, there were hundreds of personnel running dozens of stations on five floors with connections ranging to four warp cores all over the ship. It was loud, though during normal operation it wouldn't be so bad. The double doors parted to reveal main engineering, his home and kingdom. Fanvo marveled at the heights of engineering that were at work in front of him, he was ready to work miracles in this machine.

Fanvo saw the XO already inside deeper, he was surrounded by bedlam, though Stones background in Engineering likely helped him make sense of this chaos. He made his way to Stone, but along the way, he saw various works in process and had to insist on the orders be issued.

A modulator for the EPS field manipulators was being installed, "No Ensign, that unit needs to be at least 14 roentgens more before it catalyzes, sequence the older one first while you're at it. Waste Nothing!"

Two workmen were trying to twist the housing for the injectors on Core Matrix 2, it was a cold seal, but they had used the lancing beam to re-size the aperture on the housing coil. "Stop! Replicate a new coil; use the Zero-Finder to chill it to 2.1K. Do not re-size the housing or you'll kill the maintenance crews a month from now. Got it?"

Fanvo noted to check back on this, it was one of many things he regretted about being late to this command. It had been unavoidable though.

"Commander Stone?!" Fanvo called out when he was close enough, though his height made him head level with the masses. Jumping a little and waving his hand to try to catch his attention before the man walked any further away.

When he had seen where Tyce was, Travis chuckled. He was taller than and just as broad as the Assistant Chief, and hated those recesses where he barely fit. He couldn't help but grin as Tyce walked over “Lieutenant, trying to compact yourself again? So what's the emergency that had you call for help?" he asked while monitoring the chaos.

"What I wouldn't give for higher dimensional Jefferies tubes and hatches Commander, can we-" Travis turned in response to something; Tyce was interrupted for a moment but pressed on while he had the XO here. A deft twist step kept him the XO's line of sight; he needed to say his peace.

The yelling of his name and a flash of movement at his periphery stopped him, and Travis turned to face whoever was calling for him, giving Tyce a chance to complete his movement. Coming to a stop in Main Engineering was almost asking Murphy to grace you with an accident, so he was not thrilled at the moment. A quick glance showed the man was in Lieutenant Commander's pips, and a gold uniform,
so this narrowed the choice down to their replacement Chief Engineer, again. "Commander?" he called out.


TBC

 

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