Posted by Captain Alexander Cochrane (Commanding Officer) in Auxiliary Bridge- Late Night Tinkering

Posted by Lieutenant Faye Calloway (Mission Specialist) in Auxiliary Bridge- Late Night Tinkering

(snip)

Faye had reached into the crate and pulled out sections of fibre-optic cabling that were attached to little connectors similar to the ones he had just been working with. She grinned. “Well, your willingness is very much welcome at the moment. Because now we’re going put this altogether, so if you can just hold this, I can feed the cabling through quickly and secure the pieces. Then I seal the one end. The other side will be left open until I am ready to hook it up to the power systems. But I have a few things to take care of tomorrow before I’m ready for that stage,” Faye explained.

With him holding the piece steady, Faye gently twisted the many strands of fibres and fed the whole lot through one of the holes, screwing in the end. “I actually could have had this all done for me before I arrived, but I insisted on changing the design slightly and there wasn’t time for prebuilt parts. So… I get the fun of doing as I go,” Faye said with some amusement. “It’s a good thing I don’t mind a bunch of tedious labour.”

~Faye Calloway, Data Specialist

“You sound like a bureaucrat. Taking joy in the tedious… not my strong suit. At all.” Cochrane replied while holding the device steady. After she had screwed on the piece, he said “So when is this magic of yours coming on line? I need to know when to release the streamers and issue the noise makers with the little curling and uncurling paper thing.”

Cochrane, CO

Faye stopped what she was doing and looked at him seriously for a moment before holding up her index finger. “One, I am not a bureaucrat and I the thought of it makes deeply offended.” She went back to adding more cabling. “Two, the repetition of the activities I call tedious isn’t about joy, it’s about being meditative,” Faye said matter-of-factly. “When I do that, it calms my brain down at times and helps me get along better with everyone. And three, there won’t be a moment like you’re expecting when I flip a switch. I started this back in the lab under controlled circumstances where I could run tests and simulations to make sure it was going to work the way we think it’s supposed to. This whole putting it together on the ship for real part goes in sections. And if I’m doing my job well, you won’t even know when any one section goes live.”

Finishing with the cabling, she screwed on a cap on the end and held out her hand so he could give her the entire thing. “But if you really insist on blowing up a balloon, how about I tell you when the last section is about to go live and if that too doesn’t do something terrible to the ship, then we can celebrate?”

~Faye Calloway, Data Specialist