First Impressions mean Everything

T his was more like it. This was much better.

One should not complain about their old positions, but James would agree in a heartbeat that the Janeway made the USS Hubble look like a pile of old scrap. He had taken it upon himself to explore as much of the ship as he could (and there was still much more left to be unearthed) but he had gotten himself quickly acquainted to the three Main Engineering levels (much to his delight) and quickly made note of what things he would like to keep a particular eye on first. The ship was quite the beast, which he thought was appropriate considering its namesake (no disrespect meant).

This would do. Yes. This would do nicely.

It was at this point, James sought to slowly meander his way towards the bridge. Perhaps most crew members would have reported to their captain immediately upon stepping foot onto their new ship, but frankly, James didn’t see much point. Considering they would be spending countless days, weeks, months, aboard this craft, it seemed hardly worth rushing around desperately to meet your respective crew as if you weren’t going to spend enough time with them already.

He hoped no one would be too talkative. He could never stand the sorts of people who did not stop speaking.

Its why the engine rooms were generally a good safe place to hide out. When you were there long enough the heavy hum of everything working would block out all other useless noise, and you could happily get on with whatever you were doing with little worry of being distracted. Still, as Lieutenant, he expected he would be spending more time on the Bridge than he had originally anticipated.

He was still vaguely surprised by the Captain giving him such a position. Though the Captain surprised him in general. James could simply not suss the man out. Though, the brief time they had talked was only during an interview situation, so he wondered vaguely how the man might behave after days, weeks, months on board, exploring the unknown. James had barely thought of that aspect of it, and even now it was not something to concern him. He was doing a job, making sure the beautiful beast was working alright down to her innermost core. At least being in the position that he was he would be the one people would listen to this time when he told them they were being stupid for driving the ship wrong, or landing it incorrectly and so on.

The doors opened with the familiar ‘swish’ sound and James stepped onto the deck.

It was a quiet afternoon in the command centre and so the first officer took the opportunity to look over the latest status reports from engineering. She went through the pages and pages of information from the space station, which was giving the Janeway one last going over, with the knowledge of engineer. It had almost been a waste of time because everything was working at optimum efficiency, no surprise there considering the ship was only just out of dry dock.

Suddenly a short lived symphony of bleeps erupted out of the Ops station. Claudia cast her dark eyes in that general direction to see the junior officer on duty suddenly go into action.

“Report Ensign?”

“There was a minor fluctuation in the bioneural network, it seems to have corrected itself Sir.”

Despite the assurance from the officer, Claudia rose and went over to the vacant engineering station. “I’m sure it has Ensign,” she added so not seem faithless in his abilities, “I’ll just make sure engineering know.”

Her fingers danced over the console commanding the computer to run a quick diagnostic of the bioneutral network just to be on the safe side. In the background she heard the customary swish which beckoned the coming or going of someone but she didn’t pay particular attention until she finished off her work.

Looking up as the data poured in, she saw a young man who she recognised from his data file. She could never remember the entire crew compliment but she had gone through the senior staff for they would be the command team’s right arm. Deciding this would be a good opportunity to introduce herself, she got up and approached him.

Nevala extended a hand, “Commander Nevala.”

The journey in the turbolift to the Bridge was interrupted by an alarm sent to his command data padd; an alarm was registered on the bridge and addressed by Commander Nevala. If he hadn’t already been travelling to the bridge the lift would have diverted the Captain there so the last few seconds passed quickly as he wondered what the alarm alerted his first officer to.

As the lift slowed to a halt and the doors opened with a swish Andrew took in a deep breath readying himself to tackle the first potential crisis as Captain. A part of him relished in the chance to deal with this alarm but another part of him was terrified that his command skills were going to be tested now, and as captain he had to be the one to make the hard decisions without a safety net. He quickly exhaled before stepping out onto the bridge noticing Commander Nevala and his new Chief Engineer; Lieutenant Evans.

He threw a quick glance to a console he passed but gleamed no information off the read-out. Had there been an accident in engineering? Or something worse?

“Report,” he ordered stopping beside them.