Deflector Engineer Briefing

Posted on 07 Feb 2015 @ 4:41am by Lieutenant Asahi Kita & Command Master Chief Markum Quinn & Chief Warrant Officer 2 Arthur Willis & Chief Warrant Officer 2 Vasily Sokolov Ph.D. & Lieutenant JG Grayson Jones

1,646 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: Episode 07 - Sojourn
Location: USS Galileo - Deck 7, Main Engineering
Timeline: MD 38 :: 1900 Hrs

ON

The Starbase 84 docking bay was the last place Asahi wanted to have a meeting on anything happen. At peak hours, it was noisy, the staff were more than rude, and no one seemed to mind their own business. Luckily for him, the Galileo had been vacated of any potential Starbase crew long ahead of time, making the Main Engineering room perfect for debriefing whoever was about. It had only been a few hours from his own debriefing, but he liked to keep his own crew informed.

His collie sat faithfully nearby as the man twirled about in his chair, waiting for those he had contacted to pop up, reading up on the new set-up they would have had to account for. Already, he had determined it was going to be a complete disaster, both from installation and operation standpoints, and was making adjustments as to what would need to be done. Whoever wrote up the specifications didn't account for any modification or updating of starship equipment, as if the designs were taken from an earlier model of Nova class. That was the trouble with engineering; communication was always difficult when everyone had their own opinions.

Dr. Vasily Sokolov was both early and somehow hungover at 1900 hours. But then again, it was still shoreleave, so who cared when and how he did his drinking? The important thing was that he was here. Here with a pounding headache and blurry bloodshot eyes, but here nonetheless. Dragging himself over toward Asahi, he grunted a greeting and then motioned to the dog next to the chief engineer.

"Dog is engineer now, hm? Good, good. Maybe productivity increases around here for once."

Hojo gave a happy yip toward the Russian man, tail wagging at the arrival. His engineer owner, on the other hand, quirked a brow at Vasily. "If he had the capacity to be an engineer, he'd end up poked and prodded by the scientists by now."

"Yes, scientists are always poking and prodding things they do not understand, like aliens in haunted mines," Vasily grumbled.

Quinn and Willis entered into the meeting area, just as Quinn punched his younger sidekick in his left arm. "And that's for not telling me."

Willis was laughing and apparently had been for quite some time as his face was red and he was wiping the tears from his eyes. "Ouch! For an old timer, you still hit pretty hard...and...hey, that was your robo-arm...you old geezer!"

Quinn nodded to Vasily, "Hiya, Doc. Ready to get your hands dirty?"

Vasily cut his eyes to look at Quinn and grunted in reply. Why was he speaking so loudly? Everything was loud in here. The thrumming of the warp core, the steady beep of a monitoring station, the breathing of that dog. Didn't anyone have any respect for a man's hangover? More importantly, why hadn't he stopped in Sickbay before coming down here?

Following a little later behind Grayson strode in, feeling a little more fresh than the past few days. A weight was lifted off his mind and he was much more happy and content that he ever had been. "Hey everyone, nice to see you all," he called as Grayson headed towards the group.

"Oh, look, Assistant Chief Pretty Boy is here, now we can begin meeting of Beautiful People's Club," Vasily grinned.

Grayson shot over a look of contempt as if to say, "Not today," and continued to look on to the conversation with an easy smile. He was not rising to any bait and fuel the fire.

Now that everyone was gathered, Asahi hopped up from his seat. "I'm glad you all could come by a little early from your shoreleave. If it could be avoided, I probably would have done so, but the work ahead of us is extensive and requires just about every hand possible to make sure it's done properly." Turning, he pulled up an on-screen blueprint of an entirely too complex looking installation. "We've been given a secondary deflector array by the fleet, and we're scheduled for a refit of it before we go off to our next mission. This array is equipped with plenty of new features, and is specially designed for the Nova Class starship."

"There's a Starbase team who is meant to be responsible for the installation, but we've been charged to lead this refitting, as we, naturally, know the Galileo much better." He pulled up a closer display of the array, focusing in on a component labeled 'SDA-23.' "The unit this array is fitted with has an AESA sensor unit, which contains a brand new warfare and reconnaissance package." The second pause was one that he only meant to last a split second, but seemed to last longer as he read over the schematics on his PADD. "I'm sending you all copies of this to your PADDs so you can look over whatever you wish, but we can go over whatever you have questions for now as the refit itself begins at 0600 tomorrow morning."

Quinn was feeling giddy, as the chance to get his fingers dirty again, started him thinking.

"Warfare? Really need to get a look at that. Never heard of many deflectors being used in this way before." Grayson questioned as he went to his pocket to pull out a small PADD.

"You've got to be shitting me," Vasily said, holding up his PADD to look over the forwarded document. "Warfare and reconnaissance package on tiny little science ship? Why? They are hoping maybe we are so small we can slip past someone and they don't notice or what? Galileo is giant, fancy floating sensor, not warship. I'm thinking someone has made mistake..."

"Not a mistake, Doctor Sokolov." Asahi shook his head, shrugging. "The Nova's capabilities may not make it all that optimal for any form of war strategy, but it could come in handy for scooting through a team of hostile warships."

Quinn cleared his throat before talking. "She has advanced sensors, Doc. With the new set up, we'll be able to pick up things that the others can't, and we are small and nimble and this old girl can take a pounding if it's needed. Plus, our skipper has balls the size of Mount Seleya."

Vasily shifted bloodshot eyes from Asahi to Quinn and back again, looking completely unconvinced. He'd served on ships that could actually take a pounding and had the capability to do more than just "pick up things." They could pick them up, acquire targets, and obliterate the enemy. In his mind, the Galileo was little more than a glorified sensor platform; at the very least, they seemed to be playing into the specialization, so there was only so much complaining he could do.

Asahi straightened up, pleased that the whole situation hadn't turned into a giant uproar of sorts. "We would leave the installation of this task to the Starbase crew, but the schematics they have are of a Nova Class starship fresh out of dock-not the Galileo. Chief Quinn pointed out that he was extremely familiar with the wiring systems-which is a lot more than I can say. As much as I'd like to think I have the confidence to successfully organize this whole endeavor, I don't. Simple as that. Instead, I'm going to oversee the general, make sure everyone's going where they're supposed to be going, and that the starbase's team doesn't give you the wrong parts at the wrong time."

It took a skipped beat and a clearing of his own nerves, before Asahi nodded. "Chief Quinn here, though, he's going to be in charge of the details for this installation. My hope is that we'll coordinate together, but he knows the Gal better, and I'm not getting in the way of that."

"Point me and my tool kit in the right direction, we can get it done." Grayson contributed, feeling positive around the whole matter, the first time he had felt positive about anything in a while.

Vasily cut his eyes to the side to look at Assistant Chief Pretty Boy Grayson Jones. He sounded chipper, and that was annoying to Sokolov. In fact, nothing except his ex-wives made him more annoyed more quickly than a chipper person. Despite how annoying it was - and it was annoying - he remained quiet on the matter. They had fallen into a good working relationship that involved Grayson saying things, Vasily giving responses in his head, and then Vasily giving responses out loud. Thus far, it had managed to insure an amicable workplace. Aside from that, he was willing to admit - begrudgingly - that Jones was a passable engineer with the potential to be decent one day.

Asahi grinned. Despite Vasily's grumpitude, it seemed that everyone was ready to get back to work. "Good. I'll see you all tomorrow morning, then. Dismissed!"

Grayson nodded to his fellow officers and was one of the first to leave. He wanted to get a relatively early night for what would lay instore in the morning.

Vasily grunted at the dismissal and shuffled around a nearby console. It was bad enough he'd been called down here while he was supposed to be off-duty, he wasn't about to just shove off without putting in a few hours of work. He was sure the weapons system needed some tending to given how relatively unconcerned everyone was on this ship about a surprise Borg attack or the like.

OFF

Lieutenant Asahi Kita
Chief Engineering Officer
USS Galileo

Command Master Chief Markum Quinn
Chief of the Boat
USS Galileo

Lieutenant JG Grayson Jones
Assistant Chief Engineer
USS Galileo

Warrant Officer Vasily Sokolov, Ph.D.
Engineering Office
USS Galileo
[ PNPC - Mott ]

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