/||\        -----------------------------------------
       / || \            Starfleet Command, Second Fleet
      /  ||  \             U.S.S. Coronado,  NCC-63100
   .-/   ||   \-.     Fleet Captain Brian Aldur, Commanding
   ./    ||    \.   -----------------------------------------
   .-_-. || .-_-.              Simulation Teaser
   .-_  \||/  _-.

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/ Simulation Teaser                                                             |
/ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ

 Operation Rainbow Five, Day 57

 "So, I hear you were on the Bridge when the Captain had his big idea."

 Walker looked over at Spec/1 Alex Jamison with a bit of irritation.  This was
 the fifth time that he had been asked about this, and was getting a little
 tired of telling the story.  "That's right," Walker said diffidently, taking
 another large bite of Chinese Chicken Salad before hiding his expression
 behind a napkin.

 The Specialist leaned forward in a vain attempt to read the Petty Officer's
 face.  "Well?" Jamison said at length, "what happened?"  Jamison's own dinner
 sat more or less ignored in front of him, and Walker was having a little
 trouble watching the younger man waste a perfectly good steak like that.

 Walker threw his napkin down beside his own plate, no longer making any show
 of attempting to hide his irritation.  "I'm sure you've heard this story
 already, Alex.  I'll bet it's covered half the ship by now."

 "Three quarters," Jamison said, grinning impudently.  "Doesn't mean I don't
 want to hear it from the horse's mouth.  Spill, Josh," the Specialist said,
 finally picking up his knife and fork and tearing into his dinner.

 Walker grumbled, but it *was* a good story, and it was growing with every
 telling.  "Well," he said finally.  "It happened like this.  I was at the
 Environmental Systems monitoring station, on the aft Bridge.  The Captain was
 running one of the two Science stations, but he was makin' it real clear that
 he didn't want to be disturbed, you know?"  Walker paused a moment to take a
 long drink of tea before continuing.

 "And you looked at the display..." Jamison prompted, grinning.  Alex lived
 for stories wherein one of the people involved did something not quite
 proper...

 The Petty Officer had the good grace to look a bit embarrassed.  "I might
 have glanced at it, in passing, as I stood up to leave the Bridge.  It
 showed known technical specifications on one of those Breen battlecruisers.
 What there IS that we know, that is..."  Josh snorted.  The list had been
 nearly short enough to read during his pass.

 Leaning forward, Walker grinned at the memory.  This was the part of the
 story that got a little better with each telling.  "So, I'm walking behind
 the Captain, minding my own business, when the man literally springs out
 of the chair he's in.  He *did* have a thoughtful expression on his face,
 but did that last long?  It did not.  He sprang up, pushing his chair
 back..."

 Jamison grinned even more broadly.  "The chair hit you..."

 Walker nodded.  "Slammed into me is more like it.  I reach out, looking for
 something to hold on to, to keep myself on my feet, right?"

 The younger man leaned forward.  "Did he really hit you?"

 Josh waved one hand in the air.  "Hit me?  No, no!  Nothing like that.  I
 happened to grab his shoulder, to keep myself from falling, and well...
 my grip wasn't all that good and I was tangled up in the chair..."
 Walker paused, embarrassed.  Why was he telling this story again?

 Alex laughed and leaned back again.  "You pulled the Captain down on top of
 you, didn't you?  You were tangled up in the chair, off balance, and you
 fell, and you pulled the Commanding Officer of the U.S.S. Coronado down on
 top of your sorry a--"

 Walker snorted loudly, interrupting.  "There's no reason for you to be
 rude, Specialist," he said formally, picking up his fork and jabbing it
 into his salad.  "If you didn't want to hear the story, why did you ask?"
 Coming up with a forkfull of greens and a mandarin orange, Walker popped
 them into his mouth, chewing in a short, jerky way.

 Jamison, somewhat abashed, went back to his steak, and the table was quiet
 for a time.  Then the younger man asked, "So, did you ever find out what
 it was the Captain figured out?"

 Walker could only shake his head.  "No, but he called Wallace and DuLac
 over just as fast as you like and started talking it over with them.
 Pretty soon, Marshall and the other officers... all of 'em were in a
 tight little circle in the middle of the Bridge with their heads
 together.  I had to leave after that."

 Jamison nodded.  "Well, I know a bit more -- I know that five minutes
 after that meeting broke up, Anderson came down to Engineering and told
 us we were going to have to be able to bring the engines up to maximum
 warp capability.  Wherever it is we're going, the rest of the Task Force
 isn't following, and we're in a big damn hurry to get there."

 The Petty Officer nodded thoughtfully.  "THAT, I didn't know."  He
 stood.  "Keep that story to yourself, would you?" he asked, almost
 plaintively.  "I'm tired of hearing the mangled version going around,
 but at least in that one, I didn't knock down the Captain."  He smiled
 ruefully.

 Jamison's smile was small and secret.  "Trust me," he said.

\_______________________________________________________________________________
\ End Simulation Teaser                                                         |
 ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ

----------
Ross Glenn aka Jester
Fleet Captain Brian Aldur, U.S.S. Coronado, NCC-63100
http://www.ussrenegade.com/coro2400/