Meeting the Chief of Engineering

Posted on Tue Aug 18th, 2020 @ 11:06pm by Lieutenant Commander Angus Murphy & Lieutenant Lily Marlow

Mission: End of Line
Location: Engineering
Timeline: MD 1
2031 words - 4.1 OF Standard Post Measure

Lily left Medical, having the desire to explore the new ship she was a part of. She carried with her a small satchel that held some fruit from her little treasure trove. On her previous ship, the USS Nighthawk, she had from time to time visited engineering to talk with friends that worked there. She wasn't certain how things will pan out, or whether the Chief Engineer would be amenable to her coming to Engineering. Deciding not to worry about what may or may not happen,she definitely wanted to see what Engineering was like and how it compared to her former ship.

Following the directory, she stepped into the lift, "Deck Ten please." she said once the doors slid shut behind. At the requested deck, the doors opened, Lily stepped out, conferred with the directory and made her way to Engineering. Once she stepped inside, Lily gave out a low whistle, this place was amazing!

Lieutenant Commander Angus Murphy clearly thought every ship's engineering decks were unique, like thumbprints or DNA readings. Sure, there were similarities among ship classes. Every Federation starship featured a warp core at its heart, one that hummed and pulsed as it mixed very precise amounts of matter and anti-matter and fed the resulting white-hot energy out to thousands of distribution nodules, subsystems, and stations across the ship.

Most starships of any significant size also had a master systems display and Majestic's was a large octagonal work table in the prominent area just outside of the warp core reactor room. It wouldn't be accurate to compare the MSD to the brains of the ship, but it was true that just about any function on the ship could be accessed from its integrated workstations.

For all these reasons and a hundred more, including that he wasn't always the most social person, Murph had been rather selective about who had access to the engineering decks. It had even been a contentious issue with the ship's chef once when, for a very brief period, the chef insisted on bringing meals down to him in his office. So it was not out of character when Murphy looked up from the MSD and watched the clearly-on-the-wrong-deck-blue-shirt enter into his domain. His jaw tensed and he took a breath as he walked over to her. His voice was still calm, though, when he asked "Can I help you?"

Lily looked up into Murphy's eyes,noting his stature was a few inches taller than hers. She didn't flinch when he came up to her. She noted the tell tale signs of protectiveness displayed by engineers who loved their jobs and the ship. It reminded Lily of the engineer on the USS Nighthawk, he was a mama bear when it came to anyone coming in,and interrupting the functions. A slight smile appeared as she thought fondly of her friend.

"I'm the new Chief Medical Officer, Lieutenant Lily Marlow."she replied calmly. "I wanted to take a look at the heart of this fantastic ship."

"Mmm," Murph replied, "welcome to the Majestic then, Doctor. Sorry, I haven't dropped in to introduce myself sooner, we've been a little busy, as I'm sure you can imagine. I must have missed the memo that we have a new chief in sickbay." Last thing he needed was to make an enemy within the senior officers and so it was best, he decided, to not come across too strongly. "Lieutenant Commander Murphy. Everyone just calls me Murph, please." He let out a sigh as he turned around and waved to what everyone seemed to always want to see, the big blue strumming reactor. Clearly, the sooner he showed her around, the sooner she'd go back to harassing people about missing physicals-- not that he ever missed a physical, he respected the rules too much to hide from the medical people.

"Let's walk," Murph suggested as they stepped off. "You're the only chief medical officer I've ever met who introduced themselves with their rank. I knew one who hated the entire idea of military ranks in Starfleet. Just wanted to be called 'doctor'."

"It's okay, I had just arrived today without fanfare and such. Don't have to apologize, Murph. And if we are going to not worry about formalities you can either call me Lily or Lil,or doctor. just don't call me late for dinner." following after Murphy. " As for my introducing myself with my rank, its a habit. My most recent post was on a military ship, the USS Nighthawk. Would probably have been on there longer if she wasn't heavily damaged in a fight with pirates." gazing about with great appreciation. "My brother, Stephen, would be green with envy right now."

"Ah, I've always appreciated the Nebula-class. You can't beat the versatility," Murph said, acknowledging that he knew a bit about Nighthawk, even if only by name. "Your brother? Does he serve in Starfleet?"

"I have two brothers who are serving in Star Fleet. My brother Stephen is an engineer on the USS Alameda, he's the oldest.The second oldest, Morgan is a helmsman on the USS Merrimack. It's funny hearing them verbally spar as to who has the best ship. All in good fun though." she chuckled remembering that incident. "Ended up in a wrestling match between them, as usual."

"The Merrimac is a Nebula-class, but I'm not familiar with the Alameda," Murph admitted, eyebrows knitting. "I must be slipping. I'm sure it was a lively match-up. I have three older sisters, no brothers. We didn't really do wrestling at home," he grinned.

"The Alameda, is a Miranda class ship, a frigate." Lily explained. " One of the classics, my brother Stephen told me. Hmmn let me see if I remember what he told me of the history of said class ship. It's first incarnation was in the 23rd century as a complimentary class to the... Constitution class ship. " she paused as she dredged up the specifics her brother told her. "Both the Miranda class as well as the Reliant class ships got updated. I guess you could say that the Miranda class ships were the predecessors to the Nebula class ships. Anyhow, It seems that the Alameda took part in the Dominion War, and still going on strong, from what Stephen told me."

"Sounds pretty accurate to me," Murphy nodded appreciatively as they walked past the reactor. "So, I'm still hung up on the fact that you just got here today and you're already touring engineering. Sounds like you're as much a ship fanatic as your brothers. How's sickbay? Meeting your standards?"

Lily laughed, "I guess I am." as she looked at the reactor then back at Murphy."Medical's all right for now, still getting my bearings. I just need to work out a place for my potions, pills, elixirs, powders and plants I will be using in my treatments of my patients, besides using the modern medicine too. "

"Potion, pills, elixirs...?" Murphy looked over curiously. "Seems a tad archaic, but what do I know. Like me wanting to install a steam engine to replace the impulse thrusters," he commented lightly and somewhat jokingly, but he did find the mental image of a steampunk Majestic to be rather amusing. "Well, you have the medlab, which I would think would suffice for mixing up just about any compound. And.. I suppose you could should talk to Tox or Zeria and I'm sure they could find some solutions for your plants."

"It may sound archaic but at times there needs to be a natural way of healing besides the modern medicine. Not everyone can utilize the modern medicines." she paused as she imagined what it would look like if the impulse thrusters were replaced. "A steam engine to replace the impulse thrusters... That would be interesting to see. It sounds very Jules Verne to me." giving a nod. She pulled out her notepad, and wrote the names of the recommended crew. "Who is Tox and Zeria?"

"Uh," Murph had to think a moment. "Petty Officer Tox Chara. She's a botanist, I believe, in the science department and Crewman Zeria we picked up on Marga III. You might start with one or both of them. We have an aeroponics lab, a hydroponics lab, an arboretum... I don't know, they've probably dug out a few more spaces and filled with dirt since the last time I was down there."

Lily's eyes widened, "Oooooh...those are definitely a couple of crewmen I would love to meet. Thank you for the recommendations. That will be another part of my exploration and adventure." she grinned.

Looking back around main engineering, Lily had wistful expression in her eyes, then looked into Murph's eyes. "Since it seems my tour of engineering is drawing to a close. I was wondering if I could come down and visit from time to time, with your permission of course. Its just something I ended up doing on the Nighthawk, when I get the pangs of missing my brothers. Strange as it may sound, it has a calming effect on me. In fact, I do have a recording of the sounds especially the engine. Still just being in the area.." her thumb and finger played with the strap of her mid sized bag.

Murphy sighed. "As long as you're not a distraction to my crew and we're not under an alert, then I suppose that wouldn't be a problem," he allowed with just a bit of reluctance. Then he had another thought. "You should join us for dinner sometime soon. Assuming you don't know many people here. My partner does a mean lasagna and I would love to have an excuse to request it."

Her face lit up,a smile traveled from ear to ear."Thank you, and don't worry, if there was an alert,I won't be down here. I'd be manning my own stations" doing a mental dance of delight at his permission.

"I would love to have dinner with you and your partner sometime, currently,I can count on one hand how many people I have met and know the names of. You and Sekat." she paused for a moment, he said lasagna. " And did you say lasagna? I wonder if your partner would be against swapping some recipe's. I love to cook and would love to find out what other recipes people make."

"I don't know if he'd share recipes," Murphy smirked, "but Patrick is a professional chef and I'm sure he'd enjoy talking with you."

"Oooh, I wonder if there would be a friendly rivalry between Patrick, my father and my sister, Olivia. My father is a professional chef and my sister, Olivia is in culinary as well, but at the moment, those two are back on Earth,while Patrick is here" an image of her father,Olivia, and another person, in a kitchen much like the Iron Chef competition.

She smiled, gave a shrug, it was definitely getting time to go. "Oh before I go, would you like an apple or an orange? My sister.Madeline and Aunt Corinna had given me quite a few pieces of fruit so I'm sharing. Or I can save that for when I have dinner with you and Patrick."

"I'll have an orange," Murph replied with a nod. "We didn't have real oranges on Boradis, but we did have this disgusting orange-flavored protein powder. It made the worse breakfast smoothies, but then I got hooked on the real things at the Academy. So much better."

"In that case, here's two." handing them over to Murphy. "Thank you again for the tour, and for your patience with me." giving a slight chuckle. "However, I feel that it was important for us to meet, since you are the Doctor, of the ship and I am a doctor for the crew. And in truth, you are the doctor of the ship, since you take care of the USS Majestic and keep us all safe." giving Murphy a nod and a slight bow of respect.

"Thanks, Doc," he replied, returning the nod and looking appreciately at the fruits he held, one in each hand. "Have a good evening."