Scientist know how to party

Posted on Sun Oct 24th, 2021 @ 10:32am by Ensign Debbie Larson & Ensign Zachary Chandler

Mission: The Silent Scream
Location: Various
Timeline: 11th April 2395- 0630hrs

Fresh from her breakfast Debbie walked through the doors to main engineering to start her days shift; no doubt it was going t be a boring one. There hadn't been much for them to do on their simple cruise and she doubted there would be much to do when they actually got to their destination.

She headed to the jobs board to see what she'd been given for the morning. 'hhhmmmm the new guy' she thought on reading that Zack was assigned to work with her today. She'd heard of him but hadn't got around to meeting him yet.

Having a quick look around the lower engineering for any faces she didn't recognize she eventually approached a gaggle of fellow engineers. "Morning guys, I'm looking for Ensign Chandler."

"Here!" Zack chirped as if it was role call. "Good morning." Zack walked over, carrying a large screen PaDD. He couldn't help but appreciate the good looks of the other Ensign. He stuck his hand out. "Zack, please." He introduced himself.

"I'm Debbie Larson, you're assigned to work alongside me today." Debbie smiled and shook Zacks hand, it wasn't unusual for her to get fresh faced crew assigned to work with her, some of the newer folks liked someone their own rank to work with while they learned the ropes.

"Ahhh. Well good morning." He smiled. "Do you prefer, Debbie or Larson or Ensign?" He asked.

Debbie turned and headed away from the gaggle of crew and beckoned Zack to come with her. "Debbie is fine, unless we're infront of the bosses."

Zack grabbed up his engineering kit and followed. "No problem. I go by Zack, but I answer to Chandler."

"Alright." Debbie checked the Padd she'd taken from the jobs board. "We're heading for science lab 3, one of our madcap scientists blew out half the power systems with an experiment last night."

"Experiment, or wild poker party?" Zack snickered playfully. "I assume the lab has been cleared by medical for anything toxic?" He asked right after though, right back to professional.

Debbie gave a small smile as she walked, heading in the direction of the main exit. "The board says it's all safe, it's probably a mess in there though."

"Can't be worse than my quarters." Zack commented. They made their way to the lab. The door opened, but barely. The place was indeed a mess. "Ok, yes it can be worse than my quarters."

Debbie poked her head through to look inside. "Wow, they really made a mess of this place, lets start by getting this door open, I'l take the top"

"Might be easier if I take the top." Zack commented. "I'm taller, and crouching is very awkward."

"Alright," Debbie said, the remark of crouching being very akward was unusual but she'd leave asking about it for now. They swapped places and with a bit of an effort forced the door open enough they could get through.

The science lab was a mess, black scorch marks adorned the wall where the primary power system conduit had been, two of the computer consoles were in peices and most of the lights were non functional, several Padds and chunks of debris littered the floor.

"Well if you're going to blow something up, might as well make it a good one." Debbie remarked as she navigated her way through some of the debris.

Zack nodded his agreement. "Geez, they really did make it a good one. Nobody was injured?" He asked curiously, as he righted a chair, the beginnings of making a path to the far wall where he could start on repairs.

"No idea, probably nothing major if anything or we'd have heard about it by now." Debbie make a beeline for the busted power conduit, taking an engineering scanner from her kit she examined the wall. "Looks like the conduit is bust all the way up through the sub deck, we'll have to go into the jefferies tube and replace the whole length of it."

Zack made his way far less gracefully to where Debbie was scanning. He made his way into her personal space, but clearly he was only trying to see the screen of her tricorder. Once he had, he moved back. "I'll go." He offered. "You can make sure I don't do more damage." He teased. He eased himself to the deck, then opened the hidden access port to the Jeffries Tube.

Tidying up a little of the debris while she waited Debbie gave Zack a few minutes to get near the damaged area before opening a com channel to him. "Are you there?"

"Man it's tight in here." Was his reply. He described what he could visually see, verifying what the tricorder had shown. He detailed what he was doing as he went, he had done this type of work before, but not since the academy, so he had no problem having a more experienced Ensign in his ear to guide him if he went astray.

After sending a parts request back to engineering Debbie stripped off the panelling so they could feed the new length of conduit down through the subdeck. "Mind if I ask you something Zack."

"Go ahead." Zack replied, the background noise of him removing fried parts could be heard over the comm.

"I noticed you have quite a bit of a limp and you looked rather ungainly when you got into the jefferies tube, do you have a false leg?" She'd noticed the limp as they made their way down to the lab and his other movements below the hip were very stiff.

Zack chuckled. "That was a polite way of saying it. Yes, left leg from about 6 inches above the knee. I kept rejecting the bio-neural implant, so it's just a prosthetic. A well designed prosthetic mind you." He added. "I'm from Starbase Aurora, and during my cadet cruise, a freak accident caused a ship to crash into part of the base. So my cadet cruise was called in to help with repairs. You know those huge portable force fields generators we use for temporary hull patches? Somebody got a trigger finger and didn't wait for the all clear. I'm lucky I only lost the leg, and the transporter chief was quick to grab me from space. Halloween is going to be awesome! I have the perfect excuse to go as a pirate."

"You got spaced too." Debbie exhaled heavily, she'd seen the effects of exposure to open space, even a short exposure wasn't good for you. "You're definitely lucky."

"That I am." Zack continued to work as they talked. "What about you? How long have you been on the Wolff?"

Debbie thought for a moment. "About 18 months now, though apart from when I went to the academy on earth I've been on starships pretty much all my life."

Zack grinned. "Another space baby. I've actually never been to Earth. I'm not sure what I'd do with open sky and real gravity."

"I was born during shoreleave on earth during the war but don't really remember any of it, first time I ever went planetside after that was when I started the academy." Debbie said pausing for a moment as some memories surfaced. "It was really weird getting used to day and night, real gravity and the sea."

"My folks keep bugging me to visit Earth now that they are teaching at the Academy, like I wasn't busy the last four years. But at some point, I do want to visit San Francisco." Zack paused in his repair. "Ummm, what the hell am I looking at?" He asked. Surprised to be dumbfounded.

"You alright in there, need to me come up?" Debbie asked after a few moments waiting to see if he could solve whatever problem he'd encountered.

"Don't cut the red wire, right?" Zack teased. "No I've got it, and don't judge me for opening the engineering guide for this." He could be heard shuffling around, then a quick "Oww." But it clearly was minor. "Ok, can you give me a scan please?"

Debbie grabbed her scanner. "Looks like we're good, just need to feed the new conduit through and attach it to the labs supply." As if on cue there was a call from the doorway.

"Your parts Ensign." A crewman said as he entered the room.

"Thank you, put them down over there please." Debbie replied motioning to one of the destroyed computer tables. When the crewman left she started attaching the connectors to the replacement length of conduit "Getting the conduit ready for you Zack." Debbie told him.

Zack began handling things on his end. "It's looking good so far. So do you guys get a lot of fixes like this?"

"Crazy scientists blowing their labs up, not all the time." Debbie replied as she finished the last connection. "Mostly maintenance these days, the girl is starting to get old."

"Well she may be getting old, but she's solid. I'm not sure I'd want to be on a ship really long term, but she's grown on me. At least I'm learning new things. But when we get to the warp core, feel free to slip me the answers." He chuckled.

"We had a big refit recently, she got her ass kicked in a rather one sided fight last year, nearly got scrapped entirely but they decided to fix her up instead. So some of her is newer than other parts, but she's nearly as old overall as both of us." Debbie said recalling the battle that nearly destroyed the Wolff, she fed the new conduit up through into the subdeck for Zack to attach at his end.

Zack hadn't known that, and felt more affinity for the ship with that knowledge. A bit like himself; not in age, but in the sense of getting your ass kicked physically and being 'fixed up'. "Well we'll have to make sure we keep her in shape." He finished up. "Ok I think we're good. Can you do a final scan?"

"One sec." Debbie said, she attached the new conduit at her end then grabbed her scanner. "Looks good to me, leave the shut off connected till we're finished with the other jobs."

"Yep." Zack acknowledged. He closed up his panel and stowed his tools, then very ungracefully made his way out of the Jeffries Tube. "That was fun." He commented from the floor. Then he looked at his options. There was nothing within reach to lean on, so he reached out a hand and sucked up his pride. "Give me a hand?"

Debbie made her way over to Zack and gave him a hand getting up, she knew it wasn't easy for him to ask but he knew he'd need help occasionally. "So what do you want to tackle next?"

"Thanks." Zack adjusted his prosthetic, then looked at their list.

OFF:

Ensign Zachary Chandler
Engineer

Ensign Debbie Larson
Engineer [npc Taliserra]