Something Something Engineering (Part 1/3)

Posted on Wed Dec 15th, 2021 @ 1:47pm by Senior Chief Petty Officer Victoria Aries & Lieutenant Commander Brandon Pratt

2,991 words; about a 15 minute read

Mission: Handling the Fallout
Location: Main Engineering
Timeline: Current

Victoria stood in front of the doors to engineering, clutching her PADD to her chest as she just looked at the doors. She knew that she was the most senior NCO on board, but she was ready for that. It would be her job to mentor the new enlisted, to get everyone working smoothly as a team to hand over to the commissioned officers. She was confident that she could do that, especially with her trusty PADD. She activated it and the front-facing camera to check herself out: Blonde hair, but boring brown eyes, uniform jacket sealed properly, since she had to make a good impression on the Chief for their first meeting. She knew her skirt was nice and neat, ending about an inch above the knee so that it teased part of a two-inch wide complicated circle above her right knee made of up Celtic knots.

She deactivated the camera as she once again hugged it to herself before she finally decided to move forward and trip the sensor to open the doors. Again she stood there for a few seconds, almost daring the door to close on her, but finally made it through the threshold and exhaled as she surveyed her new engineering section. Well, Lieutenant Pratt's engineering section, really, but it could be hers as well. She glanced around, seeing the not-very-familiar layout of the New Orleans class, she was used to larger ships, but there weren't that many people around, only a handful on this afternoon's shift apparently. But one of them should be... Her eyes flicked across the collars of everyone present, spotting the two solid pips she was looking for and glanced up and down the officer they belonged to and stopped breathing without noticing.

It was another several seconds before her lungs acted automatically and she began to walk jerkily towards him, clutching the PADD to her chest even harder and clearing her throat, "I'm sorry, sir, not trying to bother Victoria, I'm You Aries and I'm your Non-Senior Commissioned Officer." Her face flushed as she caught her own mistakes but didn't try to correct herself.

The afternoon was a flat one for the Engineering crew, as they had few things to worry about. The ELS storage tanks were starting to give some issues on the night rotation, so Pratt had to lock down the system. He had spent the latter portion of his early morning before the crew rotated, having to check out the diagnostics himself.

His first moment to take a breather. His new NCO had arrived. Happy his officer was an NCO and not a career officer, Brandon had found them to be more hands-on, more eager to fix things rather than worry about their future aspirations and current status. He was more comfortable with them.

He was turning to see the NCO. Brandon let his usual grin form. He was likened to an easy-going, frat type of leader. However, this didn't mean he compromised on quality, security, and attendance from his Department.

"Chief Petty Officer Aries. Welcome to Engineering." It was his first introduction. Halfway through, his brain had a short circuit, deep within. What was a standard review of the Officers transferring to his Department on the Myogi, a thorough inspection at that, had become a bungled loss for his own words. This never happened to the Lieutenant at all.

"Victoria. Aries. Welcome. Would you please come to my office? We can have a chat and discuss your transfer to the Myogi." He had cleared his throat. His Adam's apple reverberated through his morning clean-shaven skin.

Gesturing, Lieutenant Pratt led the Chief Petty Officer to his office.

"Please. Victoria. Have a seat." He immediately caught his reference of her out of the rank name. "Aries. That is."

Brandon then turned to his department readout screen as he held himself there for a split second turned away from Victoria. What on Earth had they sent to my Department. Is this some cruel joke? Has my mind been scanned, manipulated, and then sent the very image of what he… No. No. Hold yourself, damnit, Pratt. Hold yourself together.

"Can I get you a coffee? I understand you are from Lexington, Mass." Pratt broke into the conversation. He had wanted to cover so much on the NCO duties, logistics to be worked out on the day shift. He had plans for this NCO. Now, he could barely even speak to her!

For her part, Victoria’s eyes were wide open like a deer in the headlights, barely blinking as she followed him. Part of her had wanted to laugh and correct him that she was a Senior Chief Petty Officer, but nothing had come of it. And the way he was looking at her? The corrections he was making of his own words? Oh Christ, this was going to be bad, wasn’t it? Oh… He’d stopped talking, wait, what had he said? She had to think as the silence dragged out, then closed her eyes to focus for another two seconds, “Yessir, coffee, cream and sugar, please. I was born there, but my parents came over from Ireland about eighty years ago,” She watched at herself, the slight lilt in her voice, “And please, feel free to call me Victoria, or Tori, or Vickie, really anything.”

She flushed a bright red, but forged on, closing her eyes again and keeping them this way for the time being, “I was pulled off of Warspite at the last moment, I haven’t even unpacked yet, but I can do that later… On my own time..” Why had she mentioned that? No matter… “I’m a computer systems specialist, I like to think that I’m pretty good at it, the rumors that I can hack into secure Intelligence files are wrong, they use a rotating clear text system with its own AI manipulator that is as truly random as things get, but I’m pretty good at getting into systems I’m not supposed to.” Her eyes fluttered open, meeting his for the first time and her heart stopped again. “Shit.” She said almost under her breath.

"Of course. Victoria." Brandon as soon as he said that felt a shiver stating her name even. Remember. You are an Officer. Starfleet duty, rules, regulations and efficiency comes first. His mind was burning to not stray. Pratt returned with the choice of hot beverage. "One coffee, cream and sugar." Brandon placed the white engineering porcelain mug on the glass table top. His eyes taking a short glance over Victoria. Oh God.

"Have you had a chance yet to review current engineering logs?" Usually, the logs of the chief of the department had a nice layout of what teams were working on what systems. When, how long, what preferred engineering fixes were, according to regulatory actions. Also, probable alternatives and or comments, concerns about the project. This was all in a neat little daily compendium that Pratt had technical talk.

"I have not..." Victoria trailed off, "Seven hours ago, I was on a shift in Warspite's engineering room when I got pulled out and told to pack, because I was going to be dropped off in passing to the starbase for transfer here to Myogi. I had five hours to get everything wrapped up and get packed, then had to pass a hooker that's posing as a security officer," She waved off Tristana's appearance, "I haven't had a chance to even do any research on the New Orleans class..." She trailed off.

The two of them had all but just been staring at each other the entire time and Victoria tore her eyes away from him and looked down at where her PADD was STILL clutched to her chest tightly. She released the pressure and nodded to herself, because she could think of two ways to handle this and one *might* lead to the other, but this was... Weird. She placed her PADD facedown on his desk and stood up, "Come with me, sir." She said, with a slight smile on her face, "Trust me, please."

Pratt was perplexed. A. This was his Department. And B. She was directly under Brandon's chain of command within Engineering. "You need me to see something Victoria." He stated his own question aloud, as he slowly got up tall. He followed along with the Senior Chief Petty Officer enjoying the posterior view.

She led the pair out, eyes scanning the room and without Brandon in her field of vision (thankfully for the moment), Victoria sought another person with pips and pointed to an Ensign by the main status panel, "Ensign, I need to borrow the Lieutenant for a bit to check out a problem I discovered, I need you to take charge in here until I can get him back to you, sir." It was worded respectfully enough, but not to give the Ensign a choice and he looked to Brandon for confirmation, then nodded.

"With me, sir." Victoria said quietly over her shoulder, not daring to look back at him, walking quickly towards the main doors, finally half turning to make sure he was following her, "Just... Trust me, sir." She requested again, a slight smile on her face. Otherwise, she remained silent as she dropped back to walk next to him to the turbolift on Deck 14, keying in Deck 6. They exited about thirty seconds later and her spine tingled as they approached her quarters, the doors opening as she approached.

Once inside she glanced around at several crates and a duffel bag that had the handle of a hockey stick poking out of one end, her belongings that had been transferred over from the Warspite and sighed. "It's kinda hot in here..." She said mostly to herself, unsealing her jacket and tossing it onto one of the crates, leaving her in a gold-colored tank top as she selected a smaller crate and opened it. She rummaged in it for a few seconds before coming out with a bottle of rum, showing it to him with a smile, "This is what we need: A drink!" She bustled over to the replicator for a couple shot glasses and beckoned him to a table where she rapidly filled both glasses and handed him one, "Drink." She ordered him outright, no questioning allowed about it. As he upended his shot, she tossed hers back like an expert and placed the shot glass on the table.

She then took that one step between him and herself, rising to her toes and kissed him gently on the lips. Before he could get anything out, she pulled back, "That's because you were thinking about it, and this is because you were thinking about it because you're my senior officer." Her eyes glinted with... Something as her hand whipped out and she slapped him with a twist of her wrist. It wasn't a soft slap, it stung, but she didn't even pause as she stepped back up to him and wrapped her arms around his neck and rose to her toes again, "And this is because I want to as well." And she kissed him again, this time longer, her tongue questing for his inside his mouth.

That kiss lasted for a bit more than ten seconds before she released him, reaching out to first brace herself against the table and then to the bottle of rum, where with a shaking hand, she poured shots again for the both of them and downed her second shot of the day before collapsing into a chair and then pouring another one for herself, "Now... That wasn't quite planned."

Pratt's head dropped, if not for his mind that was exploding before him. What was happening? "Victoria!" Pratt spoke with authority and needed to be in control from deep within. Through Brandon's jovial exterior, he was able to communicate effectively. Brandon enjoyed the distraction, the drinks, the attention. Wow. This woman was a lot of women! Never had Pratt ever been 'led out of his own office as the way Victoria had the balls to do.'

What had come out as powerful, in a warning. Something else deep within. Pratt downed the second shot of Rum, letting the glass slide back and forth in his strong boney engineering hands. "Where did you get this shit?" Pratt cleared his throat as he had taken a seat, crashing into the comfy couch in Victoria's quarters.

Victoria shrugged as she crossed one leg over the other, "One of the other engineers on Warspite had a stash. He helped me get everything packed up and stuck it in there." She smiled as one of her hands idly played with the hem of her skirt, letting it ride halfway up one thigh.

"So… Why all of this?" Brandon had inquired. He leaned back as his face gazed in at Victoria's duffle… bag…. A Hockey duffle bag? In the "Corner of her room?! You have a duffle bag of hockey gear?" He nearly gawked, his eyes spotting the exquisite wooden slap shot stick of pure perfection.

"And why wouldn't I?" Victoria asked in some confusion, glancing over to the bag emblazoned with the number 21 and the image of a wolf howling on it, You're looking at the starting centerman of the Lexington High School Minutemen." She grinned at the memory of those three years, then the half-year she'd played elsewhere, "Scored twenty-seven points in my junior year, twelve goals, fifteen assists in thirteen games."

Brandon had grabbed at the bottle from Victoria in a playful commanding sort of way, as he poured himself another shot and downed it, as he wiped his hairy forearm across his face. "Damn it." Pratt had walked towards the stick that was half a 45-degree angle up against a sizeable horizontal black with a silver stripe across it of Hockey.

She watched him take the stick out of the bag and briefly considered asking him to NOT touch it, but he seemed to be treating it respectfully, the way his hands were on it... He might have been a player himself.

"So. We should have legally have started this after your shift was over." Brandon had sized up and play shot a few stances and checks to a nonexistent floor net at the wall. Pratt ensured that her blunt end of the stick had been taped off well and nice, getting a grunt and approval from Pratt. He grinned, smiling. "What else are you hiding from me, Senior Chief Petty Officer Victoria Aries!!!"

"I um..." She had to look away from him as she blushed a bright cherry red, then exhaled sharply, "I played hockey a lot when I was younger, even played a bit more than a half-season for the Hartford Wolfpack, fourth-line center, but I've always played alongside the boys. I had three goals and nine assists in twenty-five games for the 'Pack, but I quit after I found out that I wasn't going to be drafted to the NHL. I wasn't going to play in the NWHL, they're all prissy bitches, but after a couple workouts for a couple teams, they let me down as gentle as they could, so I quit and joined the Fleet."

Brandon had walked up and let his chin rest at the bunt end of the hockey stick, the classic NHL PLA Logos on it. "This excites me greatly." Pratt then let the stick gently, playfully tease at her skirt and start to rise it up. Brandon stuck his tongue stupidly outward as he then sat down next to Victoria.

"Your smart and damn cute. You must have your pick of everyone!" He narrowed his eyes, wondering if she had anything other than career aspirations from within. Pratt selfishly gave his exterior questioning, the Chief in him.

Victoria blushed again, shaking her head as she smoothed down her skirt once more before grasping the hem in one hand, "No, sir, I really don't." She sighed, "Shit, I'm sorry Brandon. Look, I know we're technically on duty right now, but we're in my quarters right now and..." She grabbed her shot and drank her third shot of the day, leaning over and across Brandon to grab the bottle back from where he'd put it down and poured another one for herself. "And I can't call you 'Sir' or 'Lieutenant' in this sort of situation. But no, I can't say I've got my pick of anyone, because sometimes I feel like a goddamned nun! Though I do like that you think I'm cute." She was definitely settling down due to the alcohol, this would have to be her last one if she were going to go back to Engineering today.

"As for smart?" She shook her head again, "Okay, maybe I'm not a complete idiot, but there's a reason I'm an N-C-O rather than a real officer like you. I failed the Academy exam twice, this was my only way into the Fleet. I wanted to play for the Academy team, give myself a few more years on the ice with the stick in hand, but it was a no-go." She'd been playing with the hem of her skirt again, then reached up and brushed some errant strands of hair behind her ear, "I'm good with software and I can sing and dance the tune with most everything across the spectrum in engineering, but that's it."

Brandon had an almost incredulous look on his face. "You are the quintessential female me. I cannot stand to say, but it has to be said. Hockey, Engineering… The whole needing to prove yourself thing with the Academy, and having been accepted as an NCO." He clasped his hands together—Pratts brow furrowing as he ran his hand across his lips as Pratt contemplated Victoria.

Post By:

Senior Chief Petty Officer Victoria Aries
Senior Engineering NCO
USS Myogi

&

Lieutenant Brandon Pratt
Chief of Engineering
USS Myogi

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