632: 48 Hours

by Rada Dengar and Salvek
81026.1900
Two Days Before To Sleep and Always Be Still

-=Conference Room One, USS Serendipity=-


Rada Dengar, Jamie Halliday, Lair Kellyn, Hok, Shayne Todd, and Commander Salvek crowded around the conference room table.

At the head of the table stood Keiran O’Sullivan, with a large aerial view of the area surrounding the future home of Liis O’Sullivan on the display screen behind him.

He nodded, grinning to each of his once-again crew mates as they settled into their seats, wondering what had prompted this spur of the moment meeting.

“Thank you all for comin’, it means a great deal to me.”

Everyone nodded, and waited for him to continue.

“I have a great favor to ask of you all. I’m hopin’ with your help I can put on a little fireworks display for the Captain after the wedding.”

“How little.” Salvek asked immediately, knowing that when humans used that adjective it usually meant the exact opposite.

“Wellllllllll.” Keiran began, as he tapped the display, and a series of cross-hairs appeared dotting the hills around the house. “Twenty launchers at these locations, installed by the expert hands of the finest engineers in all of Starfleet.”

“And our role?” Hok asked, wondering why Todd and himself would be needed for an assignment meant for the engineering staff.

“Welllllll,” Keiran stressed the word again, and coughed from deep in his throat. “Yourself and Ensign Todd will be piloting the shuttle craft overhead for the really high altitude shells.”

“We’ll need to load the shells into a hollow torpedo tube. Should be no trouble at all,” Todd said.

“We can be ready within an hour,” Hok added.

“I see no reason we can’t prepare right now,” Todd said.

“Then by all means don’t let me stop ya,” Keiran said. “With the First Officer’s permission of course,” He said, deferring to Salvek. It still took a bit of getting used to being part of a chain of Command again, after being the Captain himself for so long.

“Dismissed,” Salvek said, as he leaned back in his chair. He waited for the pilots to leave before continuing. “Your plan is quite ambitious.”

“Impossible is more like it,” Kellyn said. “Do you have any idea how long it will take the replicate the shells and launchers, let alone install the launchers? Do you have any idea how many safety protocols there are for a pyrotechnics display of that magnitude?”

“Not to mention the mounting locations. What are we going to brace these against? I’m willing to bet there isn’t a massive titanium infrastructure hidden under those rolling green hills,” Rada chimed in.

“Oh, na come on Commander Lair. Aren’t you and your husband the ones who just broke the time barrier? Didn’t ya once dismantle a bomb with that earring of yours? Didn’t ya once take on an entire Borg cube to save your husband from assimilation? You’re not scared of a few little tubes to shoot some fireworks up into the air are ya?”

Kellyn sat with her arms crossed, “You’ve been reading my bio.”

“Well I needed something to butter ya up with.”

“It’s still not possible,” She said, “Not in any reasonable time anyway.”

“It may be possible,” Halliday began, “If we make it interesting.”

“A bet?” Rada asked.

“A bet.” Halliday replied.

“Betting is not an appropriate motivational tool,” Salvek protested.

“But you haven’t even heard our offer yet,” Halliday said. “Rada, tell me you have an offer.”

“Oh, I think I’ve got an offer,” Rada began. Keiran very quietly inched away from the table. If the engineers were willing to talk themselves into doing this project, than he was more than willing to let them. Sometimes keeping your mouth shut is the best course of action.

Kellyn leaned over the table, intrigued to hear what Rada would say next.

“It seems to me that the best motivation has always been competition.” Competition wasn’t generally much of an incentive for Rada but if the stakes were high enough even he found the appeal. “That’s why I think that we should split the task into two groups with ten launchers to set up each. Whichever group finishes theirs first is the winner.”

“Alright that sounds fair, but the question is what do we get if we win?” replied Kellyn.

“Well, the Sera is due for manual confirmation of structural integrity soon. Checking every square centimeter of the ship twice with a tricorder and every time we find even the tiniest discrepancy between what the computer data and what the tricorder says we have to run a diagnostic and once we correct the error we have to start all over again.

"We have to spend hours stuck inside Jeffries’ tubes; many of which weren’t taken into account when the ship’s environmental systems were designed and so will be running at twenty degrees above optimum. We have to crawl through I don’t want to know what to gain access to some areas of the ship, and by the end we all end up tired, dirty and dehydrated. It’s my suggestion that this time only half of us will.”

Kellyn considered for a second then nodded that she agreed to this, Halliday looked excited about the idea and Rada was a little scared at just how confident Kellyn seemed that she wouldn’t be on the losing team.

“Your team against my team?” she said with a challenging look in her eyes.

Rada was afraid she would suggest that.

Halliday looked expectantly from Kellyn to Rada as if to ask which team he would be on. Rada saw the look in Kellyn’s eyes which said that there was only so much of Halliday’s constant smiling that she could stand.

“Okay. Jamie, you’ll be on my team,” Rada said. Kellyn mouthed thank you to Rada but still kept that look in her eyes like there was no way she was going to go easy on him.

Rada turned to Salvek. “Commander, I take it you will be joining your wife’s team?”

“I am,” confirmed Salvek, though he may not approve as gambling as a motivation he did think that it was only logical that he participate in this way so as to make sure that each team was sufficiently equipped giving the task the highest probability of being completed.

“Okay, once a team’s finished the other team will be contacted to check over the work and record the time. Then when the time’s up, assuming both teams are finished, it’ll be the team which finished earliest that wins,” said Rada. Salvek nodded that he found this acceptable.

“I will prepare a list of personnel I believe have equivalent skills for each team,” replied Salvek as he left to begin preparation.

“How about a bit of added incentive?” asked Kellyn.

Rada thought he had plenty of incentive already but apparently Jamie didn’t, as he said enthusiastically, “The more the better.”

“If both teams finish before the deadline then the bet stands as is. I imagine that the winning team will wish to have some kind of celebration of their victory. How about if either team finishes after the deadline, then the leader of the losing team has to serve the drinks?”

Rada wasn’t sure about this but Jamie quickly agreed for him. “Sure, let’s do that.”

Even though neither of them were Terran it seemed appropriate for a handshake to seal the deal between Rada and Kellyn.

“Good luck,” she said cheerfully with her hand extended, although the expression on her face said you’ll need it.

“To you too,” replied Rada and shook Kellyn's hand briefly before turning around and beginning to make plans with Halliday. They only had forty-eight hours to make this happen or he’d end up working as a waiter. He wasn’t going to waste a minute of them.

---------------
Commander Salvek
First Officer
USS Serendipity NCC-2012

and

Lt. SG Rada Dengar
Chief Engineering Officer
USS Serendipity NCC-2012