Stardate: 70210:1347
Title: Chains of Command
Author: Marc Remmick
Time: Before 'Morning'
Scene: USS Horizon


By Standard Ship Time, it was before seven in the morning, and Remmick was prowling the corridors of his new... home. A late night, first-hand digest of the Horizon's crew roster had turned up a gut-wrenching new revelation that all of Dr. Matthews' medication couldn't tackle; an addition to the hybrid CMO, there was also a full-blooded Cardassian security officer! Some defector or other during the Dominion War, this... alien had now achieved a high rank aboard a Starfleet vessel. A vessel Remmick was working on, a tiny vessel, an oasis in the empty midst of space. How could he hope to avoid both of these... problems?

The gnawing worry had sent Remmick from his uneasy sleep and his tiny cabin to pace the decks of his starship. His feet, unconsciously perhaps, had led him to Main Engineering, three decks below his quarters. The facility was tiny, compared to the extravagant designs he had seen during his tenure with the Design Bureau at Utopia Planitia. The impressive-sounding title 'Main Engineering Station' referred simply to a Master System's Console built into a tiny cubby-hole carved into a bulkhead. Remmick's department head was neither present here nor in his office, and it was not surprising; his shift, the same shift that Remmick had been assigned to, did not commence for several hours yet. The thin-faced human folded his arms across his chest, and stared resentfully at the warp core pulsing sedately before him.

The CEO might not have been present, but Lieutenant Rafarr was; a Bolian, slight in stature, mighty in ego. What he lacked in physical presence, he more than made up for in officious pomposity. Right now, that displeasurable attitude was focused on the gangling Ensign currently wasting time in the middle of Rafarr's engineering section.

"I do hope I'm not disturbing your clearly busy time, Ensign?" Asked Rafarr in mocking obsequiousness.

Remmick glanced at him, shook his head. "No, not busy-"

"Good! Because you just BECAME busy!" Rafarr slammed a toolkit into Remmick's astounded arms, so hard the young man staggered back several steps.

"A bioneural junction point down in the antimatter storage bay blew out earlier - get it replaced."

Remmick's jaw sagged in astonishment. "Wh...wha...bu..."

"After that, there's a faulty console in Auxiliary Deflector Control that needs looking at and... Yes, what IS it, Ensign?" Rafarr's monologue halted as Remmick's stuttering finally came to an end.

"I...I'm a graduate of the Daystrom Institute, not some, some, some luckless handyman-" began Remmick.

"Pay attention, Ensign." The lieutenant pointed to Remmick's neck. "One gold pip." He pointed, smiling coldly, at his own throat. "Two gold pips. I say, you do. Now, Mr. Graduate, why don't you apply all that lucky education to the bioneural junctions? I'm sure the Waste Reclamation plant could do with a full overhaul. No? Not to your refined tastes? Well then, Deck Eight, Ensign, and NOW!"

Rafarr grabbed Remmick's shoulders, span the stunned, embarrassed and angry human around, and fairly propelled him out of Main Engineering. As his skinny form, tottering and cursing, disappeared into a turbolift, Rafarr smiled a deliciously evil smile...


==================
Ensign Marc Remmick
Engineer
USS Horizon
NCC-72400
==================