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 Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 9:01 pm
( 'Would that fix it?')
If there was anything that Assistant Officer Serenity Lupus had figured out about her Commanding Officer... it was that he was really boring to her about eighty percent of the time. Not in a 'You don't interest me at all' sort of way..
....
but in a 'You don't DO ANYTHING' sort of way.
Though that was also a bit of a stretch in terms of 'Natie's personality. He actually did quite a lot. At least, quite a lot of one thing, from what Serenity had been able to tell. He did a lot of 'Not Caring' and sometimes some 'scowling'.
There was only so much she could insinuate from a scowl in her general direction and then a glance at her jacket.
Yes.. it was a nice jacket, but hers wasn't any different, outside of his 'medal of honor', than her own. So it couldn't have been a 'GIVE ME YOUR JACKET' leer.
But alas, there was only so much she could guess from such a look, so she'd passed it off and gone to make a round about the ship, checking to make sure there were no proverbial, or literal, bodies to put into a closet or a crime scene to hide.
Which of course, there weren't.
That made the walk back to the bridge very boring, pausing only momentarily to have a thing of yarn shoved off onto her, earning her 'savior' a puzzled expression.
"Why do I-" "You'll see..."
....
Oh she hated reassignments.
But it wasn't long before she returned to the bridge, holding the cucky-yellow colored ball of yarn out in front of her like an unwanting male would a child, and announcing.
"Sir, would you know why on earth it would be presumed I need a ball of yarn?"
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Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 9:32 pm
((I went post happy. Sorry.))
It was probably for the best that Serenity had left the bridge when she did, else Nathaniel would have worn his teeth down from all the grinding he was doing as he stared at her jacket for the millionth time. He felt like a dog trying to tell someone via charades that something was wrong and he would have sooner barked than outright have told it. It was the POINT of the matter. She was second in command. She should have god damn well KNEW what was wrong with her uniform, specifically the two buttons that where left undone and left her entire uniform in a state of complete disaster. The skewed angle irked him to no ends and his already edgy fingers clenched over a ship’s inventory file as he watched her leave, shirt end dangling.
Apparently Serenity hadn’t gotten the memo to not bother entering his cabin, for it was now on full alert that their officer was on one of ‘his trips’ again. He knew very well that they could tell when he was pissed. HE MADE SURE OF IT! If he was suffering, it was the ship’s duty, as far as crew loyalties went, to be just as miserable as he was.
True, a simple light up would have made him right as rain once again. A good deep inhaul of that pungent, smoking ash from a cigarette would probably make him as perky as a bright-eyed little schoolgirl, but the last incident that someone even suggested he light up had resulted in a emergency maneuver in one of the single man patrol troopers to fly down and scoop up a ship-hand gone overboard. Luckily they had passed water. Right now, they where over land and no one was about to say a word on the matter and wind up a Koshka patty.
His fingers painfully ached for something to do with themselves, and he shoved, moved, packed, crushed, and tore at papers on his desk as he ‘sorted’ reports and wondered why the hell no one had done their job to make half this mess vanish from his table.
No, it wasn’t just the need for a smoke that troubled him. He ran out of yarn late last night and completely forgot to pick up anything to last the trip. Why? He was busy. OF COURSE HE WAS! No one did a goddamn thing around here for him not to be busy. If they DID do what they were supposed to do, he would have remembered, so in essence, it was there fault!
Fuming, he looked mournfully as his barren needles inside one open desk drawer, and wondered how much force was needed to stab someone with them. First person. He swore it. The first person to come in here with some damn stupid question would get it right in the eyes.
And Serenity (her name was a cosmic joke, right? It had to be. At least a joke on him.) came in and he reached out for the needle in his desk, holding it white fisted in his gloved hand. He was distracted by those damn buttons before he looked up and noticed her holding the yarn ball.
Instantly he shot up and, leaning over the desk, snatched it out of her hand before she could say a word. He plopped back down in his seat, a flicker of fiendish delight that quickly masked to aloof indifference, as if the yarn ball was nothing for him to care about. A look he gave most of his crew (the rest were glared at).
A thick yellow, course fabric. Not much, but it would have to do.
He didn’t care how it came here or who gave it to him. He also didn’t care to think WHY they gave it to him, as that usually just made it evident that everyone knew he was angry, but instead took whatever was given. No ‘thank yous’ mind you. THAT was for people who deserved it. This was just a toll everyone paid. Either yarn or a very pissed captain.
“You don’t need the ball of yarn.” He said, answering her question as he reached into his desk and set two long knitting needles onto the table without any sort of embarrassment. Taking the end of the thread, he glanced up at her and then the jacket, before continuing. “ I take it everything is fine on the ship, else you wouldn’t be delivering things instead of just leaving it to the cabin boys. Should I care to ask if everyone is doing what they are suppose to be doing?” he said, not caring to look up at her as he grabbed both of the needles and leaning in his chair, fixed them in both of his hands and started to twist the yarn over one needle.
A soft release passed through him to have his fingers working on something that could take his mind of smoking. Addiction was a hard thing to kick.
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Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 9:57 pm
"............................................"
As if in the typical 'what just happened?' response, Serenity did the little grope-y fingered 'I was holding something just a minute ago' gesture, staring at where the little ball of yawn had been several seconds previously with an almost perplexed expression, before sighing a bit and crossing her arms across her chest, pausing a moment before hand to adjust her jacket so it sat better, though she still didn't fix those buttons.
She didn't see the point in it.
"I'm seeing that, sir." she replied lightly, her tone laced with something resembling the twisted lovechild of sarcasm with amusement having a grandchild with utter confusion. For her, not a normal tone, to say the least. But Serenity had never seen a full grown man suddenly throw himself at a ball of yarn like a....
...
Like a cat. Oh how she wished her mind hadn't thrown itself into that pun. It was rather horrible.
But somehow she was able to refrain from the desire to giggle that had just thrust itself into her brain, twittering with delight like some crazed little fangirl squealing off about something in some half-language she didn't understand. Frankly, a thought that didn't really need to be entertained for what it wasn't worth.
And it wasn't exactly worth a lot.
Besides, you didn't laugh at a man who was holding something that could have probably stabbed itself through your head and had looked half ready to until she'd entered with the yarn.
Sigh.
"Nothing worth noting." she replied, uncrossing her arms and instead crossing them behind her back in a more formal manner, feet together.. and oh god, she needed to fix how her pants were tucked in to her boot. But she couldn't do that in current company without highlighting the fact that it was trying to make a run for it as was.
Ah well, she'd pretend as though nothing was wrong.
There was a pause as she bit the inside of her lip to try and keep from commenting on anything that she may have regretted in a few seconds after expelling the words from her lungs. It was something she did well at, though, holding her tongue. For her own personal causes though.
But oh did she want to ask about the yarn, finding herself staring at the strange little....
...
Was he knitting? s**t, even she couldn't knit. Then again, she held very little practical 'feminine' skills. If asked, she could live on her own and not die from food poisoning or being in a layer of filth.
Didn't make it practical, however.
"What's next, sir?"
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Posted: Wed Aug 20, 2008 6:34 pm
The officer had already worked out two lines, having decided that a pair of mittens would work nicely with the small amount of yarn he had. Well…maybe just one mitten. After that, he would make another tiff and await another ball of yarn from any mysterious benefactor. He hoped it was a similar color.
He paused when Serenity spoke, still at attention and looked down at his knitting. It seemed he was perplexed as to what to do himself, which was pretty much true. Not that he didn’t know what needed to be done. He ALWAYS knew what needed to be done. As an officer, he always had a mental list of major projects that needed to be done and a longer list of minor ones he could throw at anyone at random to always ensure that people were moving and working. If you stood still for too long, you where assigned something to do.
No, the reason he stalled was that he finally received yarn and had been eager to work on it to calm down his agitated nerves. He actually wanted to at least spend 5 minutes working on it, but wasn’t about to show himself giving himself the luxury when his second in command was showing herself to want to be productive. If you let anyone slack, it usually passed like a plague and then the entire ship would be one lazy mound of utter chaos. Couldn’t have that, now could he?
He gave a large sigh and slowly opened the drawer to his desk and lowered the yarn and the needles back into the confines delicately for something that really didn’t need to be handled so tenderly. Shutting the door, he looked back to the mess of paperwork on his desk, unorganized by the usually tidy officer from his nicotine-slash-yarn fit.
Ears down, he gave a appropriate ‘ahem’ to himself before rising from his seat and grabbing a small pile of documents, lifting them and holding them out for her. “We need to reevaluate the ship’s inventory before our next docking. During our last expedition, too many close calls and last-minute fixes were made because we did not have the necessary supplies. We have to go to each department and reassist each head and update our ah….”
EEEERRRRRUUUUUUUURRRRRRRRR!!!!!
The ship gave a sharp jolt that forced everything, including his desk, to slide sideways two feet, spilling papers about the room. Nathaniel, having been setting his hand on the desk, moved sharply with it and held upon it as if trying to hold it in place. The lantern chandelier, a modest addition to the captain’s bridge to give a ‘Aviation Class’, shook; it’s glass lanterns chiming violently and one falling over and popping on the ground, shattering.
The ship stabilized and a commotion of feet was heard from the ceiling above, along with the distant whine of the calling whistle signaling something was wrong.
Then again, you didn’t need to understand the system of long and short whistles to understand that much when half your office was skewed two feet from where it originally was and the other half was on the floor!
Teeth clenched, he stood up, having gotten over quickly from his flash second of “OMG! DID WE JUST CRASH!” that always caught you when a airship shook suddenly, and glared up at the ceiling. He was either glaring at the crew above the ceiling boards or asking upon a higher power to give him strength to not kill said crew. It was hard to decide, even for him.
“OR..” He continued, his voice laced with venom that more civil officers (who suffered less crew-related headaches) would call primal, “… We can see why our entire ship just stopped in mid air when there is absolutely NO mountains or obstructions that would cause such a thing.” ….aside from Koshka stupidity! Which Koshka (or Koshkas) that was, he had yet to murder find out.
His eyes fell on the cabin of his office and walked straight through where his desk USED to be towards the door, passing Serenity in a way that, without words, suggested she should follow (namely to assure that he didn’t throw TOO many people overboard).
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Posted: Fri Aug 22, 2008 8:05 am
She had been nodding and making slim notes, as frankly she was sure she'd be able to re-think of some of these things on her own, as Nathaniel was making his list of things to d-
Then the sudden jolt practically threw her into the commanding officer's desk in all the ruckus, causing her to hiss two very well placed curses as she straightened herself up, doing a quick 'pat down' of herself to make sure none of her bodily systems had flown out of her body by some strange fluke of fate, finding them all in tact.
That was a very good thing.
Naturally the moment of panicked expression on Nathaniel's face went unnoticed in exchange for half-peeling herself up off the ground and feeling the very first signs of what would be a bruise the next day or so.
Oh goodie
A light frown answered his other 'command' of next orders, waiting patiently as he passed her before taking two seconds to fix that loose pantleg then quickly following after him, using a light jog to catch up the distance she'd missed by taking the time to fix her uniform (kinda).
She only paused one more time, at least completely, to peer out one of the small circular windows that allowed her to see outside, scoping out the present location (it seemed they were still more-or-les airborne at the time) of the ship, before sighing lightly.
Then her mind went into hypothesis and 'How do we fix this? Why do I care, I'm not an engineer!' mode.
It was a very unproductive thought process to say the least.
But then again, her current job was to make sure she didn't need to hide any bodies in the closets or throw them off the ship anytime soon. Damn if she wasn't going to need a smoke-break by the end of the day, though. If only to keep herself sane.
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Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 8:24 pm
((Long post. If I get long winded, hit me.))
Idle fingers were the devil’s playground. Nathaniel might not of been on for religious beliefs, but he felt those words held true enough. No smoking meant knitting. When he wasn’t at least given at least what would serve as an equivalent to one smoking break in the time that would be knitting to subdue any murderous thoughts, he was just stern and could give orders without MUCH of a short fuse. Luckily for the crew, HE DIDN’T MET THAT TIME REQUIREMENT, and his fingers twitched at his side, whispering other alternatives. Knives. Swords. The gun, no matter how displeasing it was for him, was calling out a nice sweet tune. Still, strangling some people to death sounded best.
Down the corridor, several crewmembers in less decorated attire were racing down and skidded to a halt to salute when spotting the two officers.
“Report.” Nathaniel barked, fuming as his eyes noticed an overhead pipe that looked like it would nicely bludgeon someone.
“The ship’s engine is going haywire. I don’t know the specifics, but we’re slowly loosing altitude.” A orange tabby Koshka said, eyes avoiding the officer’s stare as he stayed in a firm, clenched salute stance.
“How far are we from the coast?” the officer asked.
“We should be there in about 15 minutes, Sir.”
Nathaniel groaned. There ship wasn’t made for landing on land. If they crashed down, and he did mean CRASH, they could be stranded for some time before another airship came. It would be especially worse if they happened to damage a lot of foreign soil and cause more headaches and paperwork for everyone. Even Nathaniel had someone he reported to and he didn’t like the idea of being barked at my his superiors as little as his own crew did. (Though he wasn’t about to make the connection and empathize with his crew enough to be a softer officer.”)
“Try and make it 10. If I see us touch soil, I’ll be burying those responsible.”
This got several large swallows from the two men before they where dismissed and raced off to put forth their officer’s orders and hopefully save their lives.
So ship’s engines it was. Turning, he made his way down the metal corridors to the darker caverns of the ships. Each step caused it to become progressively hotter the closer they came to the engine room though Nathaniel never saw it fit to even stray from his strict uniform regulations and undo one button to give relief. He’d sooner DIE of a heat stroke than that. Luckily, he didn’t seem to show that he saw it too much of a nuisance (which caused some crew members to kid that he had was a relative to the devil himself).
After turning the large gear handle that closed off the engines, they entered the ship’s engines to a chaotic mess. The main room, a large cavern of the ship, was full of rows of large revolving gears that moved various belts. Steam escaped from a network of pipes that climbed the walls and covered the ceiling. In this, the faint glow of crystals that powered the ship glowed from various pipes and underneath various grated floorboards.
What caught the eye was a crowd of men shouting from their moving gears. A man, his uniform only consisting of a white undershirt and uniform pants and shoes, came up, dripping sweat and oil.
Giving a tired salute, he whipped his brow and spoke. “Engine 53 is binding up and the sudden force caused 43 and engine 71 to give out. The rest of them are trying to compensate, but we keep loosing them one after the other from the stress. We can’s keep up the pressure to keep us afloat. We need to turn the entire thing down to even be able to fix them else they’re all going to grind themselves out OR shoot out and destroy the ship from the inside out.” He rasped, wiping his brow again in an already sweat drenched shirt.
Turning off his ship was not something he liked and his tail lashed behind him in disagreement. Still, the sound of the ship’s engines moaning as gears and belts were pulled to their limits hurt him in much as the same way that other men heard their favorite vintage steam machines be manhandled the wrong way. He could tell it was in pain and the sound was one that tore at him.
“We’re bringing the ship down to water in 10 minutes. By then, we should have cleared the coast and have deep enough water to turn the ship off. After that, we better be up and running as soon as we can.” He said, turning as he walked to the turning engines. “…and tell me what the hell is going on?”
The man jolted, turning and moving after him.
“Something’s binding it up. Something’s stuck and we’re trying to pull it out, but it’s down in there.”
“Where?”
“In the engine.” He said, not sure he was being clear.
“I KNOW THAT.” He barked, shoving the man aside as he moved to the thong of people working on the broken engine. Steam was wafting off the entirety of the engine and the main gear, a massively thick bronze gear with vicious teeth, continued to turn slowly having not yet slowed down. It’s connecting black belt flapped, torn to shreds and smelling of burn material.
Upon seeing the officer, they stepped aside, the wave of crew workers parting like a sea as they stepped back to expose the back of one man who was peering inside the open engine hatch.
“Move aside.” Nathaniel barked, his voice caring even in the loud chamber. He did not have to say it twice and the crewmate jumped back from his perch to show an open engine, it’s gut of steam pipes and gears still. Inside, a ripped lump of burlap was being moved about the gears, twisting and crushing. A pungent smoke was coming from it.
The crew seemed wide-eyed as they watched Nathaniel roll up his right sleeve and, biting the end of his glove. He didn’t look twice as he stepped up and reached in, working his hands through the gears before grabbing the bag and giving it a hard yank, pulled a burlap bag out. Holding the card remains, he started to walk away.
“Get this all fixed.” He said, as he started to open the bag. Really now, why did they worry so much about an arm? It was their job first, not their body parts. If he waited on timid workers all day, his ship would burst into flames!
He started to walk away before he paused and turned, looking back to the man who first reported to him in the engine room.
“Who’s in charge of this engine?”
“Uh… Michael Robbins, Sir, but he become ill and is in the ward.”
Sick, huh?
“Perfect. Just perfect.” He said, growing as he tossed the bag over to his second officer. The bag, hot from the engine, was full of a dank, purple weed.
Salig’s special hybrid.
Illegal Menga.
Drugs.
He had a guy to see in the infirmary.
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Posted: Wed Aug 27, 2008 5:53 pm
Well. So far she hadn't had to pull anybody back on board the ship, yell 'Run for the hills', kill someone herself, go out on a smoke-break, or yelled 'I quit'.
Perhaps she did have some chance at holding this job for longer than she would have liked to admit. Something about following around Officer-stick-in-the-a** all day didn't really seem all that appealing to her on a special level. Especially when they were in the engine room and the bag was tossed to her, prompting her to hold into it awkwardly, bouncing it between two hands to keep from burning herself, holding it away from herself.
Oh god, now she had something else to worry about.
'Natie's' arm.
Not the 'is it still on', but the 'is it bleeding?' Portion of it, practically walking blind as she followed behind him with the bag, earning odd stares from the mechanics in the engine room as she passed them by, trying so hard not to respond to their curious mumblings.
Dammit, she would have rather been walking through the ship naked (yes, as one of the few, if not the only, females on board) then been in this state of.... wait, they were headed for an infirmiry?
s**t, she couldn't go in there!
This little concern became more and more obvious as she had to put more and more effort into catching up with Nathaniel, not so much dragging her feet than using excuses to slow down and not keep up with him. Such as looking out the windows to check the progress.
s**t s**t s**t. She was already getting jitters at the very idea of being in a room full of injured people. Not good, not good!
Oh yes, out of all the habits she'd un-learned, this was the one she had yet to have let go of.
Prompting her to take a position in the hallway once they'd crossed the ship to the infirmiry, saluting her commanding officer a little more awkwardly than she normally did (which was tell-tale (tail?) sign of trouble for her), doing her best to be respectful (and even having taken advantage of one of their pauses to button up her jacket-shirt) despite the grim look on her face.
"I'll be here if you need me, sir."
Oh she so was ready to stay in hiding.
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Posted: Wed Aug 27, 2008 7:15 pm
No one could dig their hand into a network of turning gears and not get injured. It was just the extent of how injured you got. For Nathaniel, he knew that hesitating would wind up loosing a limb, but doing it quick and with the strong confidence he did most everything with, he managed to go unscarred. Oh –
He rubbed his exposed elbow and noted melted fur and a cut. Okay, maybe not completely unharmed, but nothing heating a blade wouldn’t cure. Yes, he was going to the infirmary, but he would soon thrown their medic out of the window then let that lunatic go near him with a syringe. (Heaven’s knows where he would put it.) Nathaniel didn’t even take off his shirt in a boiling engine room. He wouldn’t take one off for a doctor to look at.
Pulling his shirt down (he’d deal with the cut later when he less to deal with) he approached the infirmary, but paused when he saw his second-in-command stand at salute and say she would stay outside.
This was..puzzling. Why would she stay out here?!
“I don’t need you out here. I need you inside with me.” He stated firmly, already opening the door, but stopped mid-opening to turn to regard her. “They are only men. Nothing that you should be embarrassed about seeing. Remember, you’re an officer. You SHOULD remain professional in these situations.” He said, chalking up her apprehensions to the primarily male crew and an infirmary that might have slightly nude men. Honestly, she should be use to it now. Women!
Gesturing for her to follow (female apprehension needed coaxing, right?), he walked inside and left the door open for her.
There where several beds in two rows, adorn in starch white sheets. A few men where sleeping in various casts or just general state of sickness (steam and changing weather this high in altitude made colds a common thing). A few others were awake, entertaining one another with playing cards, using tongue depressors as chips.
The medic, a seasoned Koshka that was pure gray that went by the name of Donald, was arranging some vials that had apparently spilled out from the sudden jolt. It seemed he cleaned up, but there was still a lot of debris on the ground. Luckily the beds were bolted to the ground. (Damn, he needed to have his desk bolted too!)
The doctor looked up and his agitation dropped when he regarded the officer. “Sir?” he asked.
“I’m looking for a Michael Robbins.” HE said, already looking at the beds.
“ He’s resting.” He said, wiping his hands on his medical apron as he started to head through the ailse to the back. There, a man was sleeping, one arm completely in a cast and a cloth on his brow. “Seems he got sick. Can see why. Holding a lot of infected burns on his right arm. Guy says he was trying to continue working without coming here. Crazy in my opinion. Good thing he got a flu.” He said, laughing lightly at his own humor.
“Thank you. That’s all..and Donald?”
“Yes sir.” The medic said, sidestepping to move around and head back.
“Take a break for 30 minutes. Now.”
“Sir?”
“I said now. That’s an order.”
“Yes sir.” The medic turned and saluting his goodbye, slowly left. The other patients watched with wary interest, slowly playing their game but not really paying attention to their hands anymore.
Michael Robbins was sleeping soundly in his bed, breathing deep. He seemed to be a man in his late 40s, with paling stripes on an large, orange face.
Nathaniel tilted his head for a moment, as if thinking the man endearing as he slept, before his face went rigid with a frown and he gave a hard kick to the bed’s occupant. If the bed wasn’t bolted, he would have kicked that, but so was Michael’s luck that it wasn’t, making his a** the next target.
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