Ensign Keneth Nakada - Admiral Horta?

[Keneth Nakada]

(( Engineering Workshop 3, Deck 12, USS Ronin ))

 

Nakada: Well :: grinning :: Admiral Wren has a nice ring to it … not to mention :: holding up the masque :: we always have this.

 

Delphina paused, looking at the Masque, which was coiling and moving again, and grinned, standing up. She wiped her hands against her skirt a few times, before taking it, looking at Nakada.

 

Wren: ::Hand on her hip:: You know, I don’t think I ever really wanted to be an admiral. Not really suited for me. You’re sure you won’t try the Masque again? I can make you look like Worf this time.

 

Considering that 10/10 Admirals eventually died, this was a respectable notion. Keneth had, however, had had enough of the mask for a day or two. It was nice being able to feel the breeze on his skin. Or ventilated air, or whatever the computer was pumping out of those ducts. He eyed the vent warily.

 

Nakada: As much as I would enjoy ordering the computer around as Worf, :: magnamious hand gesture :: I’ll leave you the honors.

Wren: Alright, fine. More science for me. ::Putting on the Masque:: You know, I’ve always heard Necessity is the mother of Invention, but I’m pretty sure that Stupid Shennanigans is also somewhere on that family tree.

 

He rolled his eyes as he poked at some isolinear chips.

 

Nakada: I’m pretty sure ninety percent of Starfleet’s R&D output is shenanigans.

 

He had once read a paper involving a run of the mill colony-has-a-fungal-infection situation. Instead of an antifungal spray down or a sterilization beam, the intrepid engineers aboard the colony ship Laundry had decided to remove the engines, fill the shell with hydrogen, float it to the top of the surprisingly dense atmosphere and expose the fungi to high levels of – off all things – trilithium gas that collected there. This frankly insane plan had spawned a whole field of barely comprehensible “high-altitude” anti-microbial study.

 

Wren: How do I look?

He turned back to Wren, who had apparently been fiddling with her appearance. It took all his willpower not to jump back and he swallowed heavily before speaking.

 

Nakada: Well, the good news is your uniform has admiral pips.

 

Unfortunately, it seemed the mask had hit its limits there, and decided the rest of her face should be a strangely misshapen blob. It was kind of frightening, actually. There were strange curved lines running down the face where the computer had apparently decided to squish two noses, three ears and what looked like the rear side of a cornea.

 

Nakada: The rest of your face however … :: mimes weirdness ::

 

Perhaps they could use this to their advantage though.

 

Nakada: Perhaps if we made you a species without a face?

Wren: Response

Nakada: A Horta maybe?

 

It was true that no Horta had ever served in Starfleet. But there were ways into Starfleet other than the Academy – work assignment, transfers from Vulcan and Andorian space agencies, bar fights in front of a sympathetic admiral …

 

Nakada: What about ex-borg? Ninety percent of single species members of Starfleet are ex-Borg.

 

Deassimilation yielded a lot of people who fit Starfleet soul searching well. It would be perfectly reasonable to assume the Borg had assimilated a Horta, considering they assimilated anything that stood still for over a second.

 

Wren: Reponse
Nakada: :: defensive of his brilliant idea :: Au contraire. An ex-borg Horta Admiral is so out of wack, the computer can’t doubt us. Just act extremely offended if it does.

 

There were limits to what the computer could be convinced off, but with a little “help” from a friendly engineer fiddling with it, they could do a lot.

 

TAG/TBC

 

Ensign Keneth Nakada

Engineering Officer

USS Ronin

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