Cleaning up

Posted on 29 Jul 2022 @ 4:39pm by Commander Scarlet Blake & Lieutenant Aria Rice & Ensign Amanda Turell & Petty Officer 1st Class Gabriel Stark
Edited on on 29 Jul 2022 @ 4:56pm

2,292 words; about a 11 minute read

Mission: Episode 18 - Cold Station 31
Location: USS Galileo-A - Deck 3, Armory
Timeline: MD 06, 1605 hrs

[ON]

"You know, after a while, my fingers start cramping," Aria Rice said, holding up the phaser, inspecting it. She had called in Stark the second that Tarin had finished with Security, because it would be all hands on deck. Blake would come back, she knew that, but for now it was the three of them. Aria had opted for the floor, a sheet spread out on it, with the disassembled phaser on it, plus all she needed to clean it. She looked over at Amanda, giving her a small smile. "I usually ended up on brig duty before I got the bigger chair."

"I was usually the first person they would call if someone needed shooting." Amanda replied from her much more comfortable seat at the armouries workbench. "But other than that, mostly walking from place to place, scanning anything that looked shifty."

"Shifty, huh?" Gabriel chuckled as he looked to Amanda across his work with knowing eyes. "I bet you sorted those anything shiftys out, huh?" he grinned. He got the sense that Turell was a no nonsense sort of security officer. The type you didn't piss off or push your luck with.

"Of course." Amanda said nodding slightly. "Found a stowaway once, that was quite a fun one."

"Nice," Aria shook her head, putting the now cleaned phaser back together. "I didn't really get stowaways. Mostly, when I was on patrol, it was smugglers and the sort." She paused, thinking. "Although we did have a stowaway on the Galileo, but...it wasn't really a real stowaway."

"What do you mean it wasn't a real stowaway?" Amanda asked setting down the part she was cleaning for a moment.

Gabriel glanced to Aria with a soft chuckle, his dark eyes shining with amusement. Although, not many people found it funny at the time. "The Captain's sister," he whispered in an over loud, dramatic way.

Amanda looked visibly confused. "For what reason would the Captain's sister need to stowaway on the ship?"

"Escaping an arranged marriage," Aria said before she frowned. "Just...you know, it's Saalm's sister, not Tarin's. Want to make that clear..." Two Captains was very confusing.

"Oh, ok that makes some sense," Amanda picked up the part she had been cleaning again. "I guess the Captain wasn't too happy when you found her sister hiding onboard."

"Rumour has it you could hear the shouts all the way down in the mess," Gabriel laughed, shaking his head slowly. "Which, incidentally, is where the younger sister has ended up working. So I guess it didn't end too badly for her."

"Well...we'll see about how the food goes," Aria said lightly, smiling. "I am donating her a recipe for cupcakes. I think she'll enjoy making them."

"Hm...I want pancakes," Gabriel chuckled as he absently took apart a rifle with practiced hands that knew what they were doing. "Replicators just can't get that bitter edge right when they've just caught on the outside, the bit that tangs against the syrup," he sighed, shaking his head. "What do you miss out here?" he asked Amanda. They hadn't had much chance to talk. With so few of them, they were spread across the shifts.

"As a fine English lady..." Amanda said chuckling slightly. "I'd have to say roast beef and Yorkshire puddings, the Exeter's replicators did them beautifully, the Trial's weren't too bad. The Galileo's.... too soggy."

"Now *that* is a crime," Gabriel laughed softly to her, shaking his head as he watched her with interest. "You hear that, Lieutenant? That's two of us English in the team now. You don't stand a chance."

Aria groaned, closing her eyes dramatically. "I am doomed...doomed by my Luna heritage..." she chuckled, looking at them. "I have never had Yorkshire puddings. Think I have had roast beef in a sandwich once. Hey, if someone gets me a recipe, I can try and make it...?" sh looked at Amanda and Gabriel. "Could have a cooked dinner together, the three of us."

Amanda carefully started reassembling the parts she was cleaning. "Then just as we all sit down someone calls a red alert."

"Standard! Then we take out whatever needs taking out, come back, and find the food cold and soggy," Aria countered before she finished with the phaser, checking it over, before putting it away and taking another one.

"Or scattered all over the floor because someone decided spinning the ship around would be a good trick." Amanda put all the cleaned parts back into the rifle she'd been cleaning and started to run a functions test on it.

"Oh, yes...the classic internal dampeners and gravity goes during some firefight..." Aria said, shaking her head as she thought about it. "You know, once I was in the sonic shower when that happened. It took me weeks to recover my dignity with the room mate at the time."

"Is that what I miss when I'm on the bridge?" Blake moved in to join them, the doors hissing shut behind her. She let out a long breath as she moved to sit with them, tugging the cuffs of her sleeves up as she looked over what they'd already done. "Looks as though you're a good way through already."

"Well, Commander Blake," Aria smiled as she looked at her, shaking her head. "You miss the gossip and stories of slow, boring shifts. But also, you miss getting various fluid under your nails as well, so there's that. As for our progress...Stark's trying to set a new record, and Turell is really quick as well. I'm afraid I am the one holding everyone back."

"Dad was a marine." Amanda remarked. "I could strip, clean and reassemble a phaser by the time I could walk."

"Mine was too. He wouldn't let me near one," Aria said, and met Amanda's eyes with a weak smile. "He said he'd teach me when I got older." But he had died when she was seven, so there was not much to be done about that. She hadn't picked up a phaser before she went to the Academy.

"A dozen generations on my dad's side were military, so me and my sister didn't really get a choice if the matter." Amanda explained a little more. "Discipline and training as soon as we were old enough to understand it."

Aria gave a small nod, glancing over to Blake before she looked down to disassemble the phaser before her. "Yeah," she said, her voice soft. "Well, it's proving useful now."

"They made us do this a lot in the more recent training I did," Gabriel chuckled, shaking his head as he put his back together with quick, sure hands. "Over and over again, in fact. It may or may not have awoken the competitive streak in me. Not that I've ever had one single practical use for it. Do you think it's a hang over? From the old days?"

"It's a repetitive task, to teach us to appreciate our tools," Aria said, and looked at Stark with a fond smile. "I suspect it is a hang over from the old days, where...weapons were more likely to fail. It also instills...a bond. People doing the same task, again and again. Or, if you hate it...it breaks your spirit."

Gabriel shook his head with a slight tsk, his eyes shining with it. "Come on now, takes more than that to break the likes of us, huh?"

"I should hope so, Mister Stark," Blake shook her head with a slight chuckle, reaching to take a rifle. She broke it down easily, her hands moving almost of their own accord. "Not everyone has the privilege of serving...even the dull bits."

"Getting into Starfleet, regardless where...it's a lot of hard work. Have the grades, get the test scores...the psych eval..." Aria tutted, before she smiled. "I almost didn't make it, to be honest. And there was a semester I felt I was failing, and then I realised I wasn't and we were all feeling the same way."

Gabriel looked to Aria with surprise at the words, not having known that about his friend. "What...was the later officer course like?" he plucked up his courage to ask.

Aria looked at Amanda for a moment before she looked at Gabriel. "I can only speak for myself and my year. It was rough, but...once you make it far enough, the tactics change. The instructors are trying to shape you to...adapt your strengths and improve on your weaknesses. I got put on extra hand to hand, that sort, because of...my size. But I knew others who weren't naturally as good shots who had to do extra on that. Or some who were better at the tactical side and not as good on...the other bits. By that time, they want cadets to graduate. The first two years, in my opinion, was about them pushing us. To see if we...would get through it. But no one ever told me it would get better until I realised it was. I wish someone had told me during my first year." It would have saved her a lot of tears. She had stuck it out more due to stubbornness than anything else.

"I barely scraped through academy," Amanda said, she noticed the glance from Aria. "I wasn't too bad at flying, was bad at science, bad at engineering, hated science, but if you needed someone taking down I was your woman."

"Well don't look at me," Blake shook her head with a small smile pulling at her lips, but her eyes were on her work. "I was in the Marine Officer training. I only did the regular fleet training as a condensed course. It seemed...more classrooms, from my point of view," she added dryly.

Aria chuckled, and cleaned the phaser with sure movements. "Of course you only got the class room evils, you were a Marine. Nothing else was needed, right?" she shook her head before she looked at Stark. "So as you might gather...we all had different experiences, in different years. I found it hard. But I found being out here harder. Had to learn a lot very quickly, because the Academy was nothing like the real thing."

"I bet you wouldn't swap it for a civilian life though," Gabriel chuckled, shaking his head with a small, knowing smile. "A planet locked life."

Aria met his eyes, grimacing at that idea. "I'm a Luna girl. Planets are...you know...fine and all that. But it's not really what I am about."

"So what's the retirement plan?" Gabriel asked with a grin, pausing for a moment to watch them with interest. "Buy a moon of your own? Or a freighter? Find a quiet planet in the middle of nowhere?"

For a moment, she looked confused before she laughed. "You know what, Stark? I got no retirement plan. I suppose...I don't think I'll be in a position to retire? Or, I still think myself so young and invincible that I have plenty of time."

"I doubt getting grey and riding a desk somewhere is in my future." Amanda told the group. "A blaze of glory would suit me just fine."

"See, the romantic in me would be high-fiving that. My training tells me we both need to see the counsellor about that 'retirement plan'," Aria said, but her voice was playful as she looked at Amanda.

"I.... don't have a 'death wish'" Amanda quickly added "but if I had to choose between going grey or a blaze of glory, blaze of glory every time."

"Are you sure you all didn't start life in the marines?" Blake teased softly as she shook her head, her eyes on her work. "You sound like it."

"Marine parent, so I might as well have." Amanda said reminding Blake of her earlier familial connection.

Aria gave a quick, small smile at the words before she shook her head. "Well, as hardcore as it sounds...we chose to do Security in a service where exploration and peace are the main objectives. So maybe we are a bit crazy."

"Or the realists..." Gabriel chipped in with a shake of his head, frowning slightly as he set his finished rifle down. "I mean, not every cave you go looking in is going to be an exotic lagoon or full of treasure. Some are going to have sheer drops and bears in."

"Or an evil mastermind with an oddly attractive assistant who the Captain has to seduce into helping them defeat said mastermind." Amanda added.

"Now I feel as if I am on boring away teams..." Aria said dramatically, shaking her head before she glanced over at Blake before back at all they had left to do. She considered it for a moment. "Think we'd be in trouble if we put on some music?"

"Music has been proven to improve productivity," Blake replied lightly as she glanced across the sights of her rifle to look her way. "You could call it an effective tool..."

"Alright..." Aria rubbed her hands together before she looked at Amanda. "You get first pick. Put some music on, Turell." She stood, going to the replicator to get more coffee.

"Computer...." Amanda started as she figured out what to have it play for them. "access 20 to 21st century music database, play Ghost love score by nightwish."

[OFF]

--

Lt. Aria Rice
Chief of Security
USS Galileo-A

Ensign Amanda Turell
Security Officer
USS Galileo-A
[PNPC Mimi]

CMDR Scarlet Blake
First Officer
USS Galileo-A

PO1 Gabriel Stark
Security Officer
USS Galileo-A
[PNPC Blake]

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