Up in the Heavens

Posted on Fri Feb 10th, 2012 @ 12:05pm by Captain Elsie Halliwell & Lieutenant Commander Dylan Blake

865 words; about a 4 minute read

Mission: Fishing

ON:

Prissy little Ensign Winters sat in the pilot's chair of the Baden-Powell and sighed audibly. She shook her head as she leaned over to watch, with Lieutenant Blake, the Ranger sink beneath the waves of Taylforth.

"Well," she muttered incredulously, "that was my chance at piloting the ship in uncharted waters down the drain!" She sighed again, refreshed the scan and then turned to Blake. Raising her eyebrows she scoffed, "If I didn't have to babysit the situation up here, I could have be zipping about the aquatic environment. But no! Halliwell ordered me up here to watch from above whilst the rest of the crew has fun down there! It's not fair and I plan to file a complaint once we get back to a startbase of some kind."

"Save your breath, Ensign Winters," Blake responded without looking up from his research. "They'll be plenty of other opportunities in the future for you to excel. Feel honoured that you were chosen to this assignment, the view is much better and maybe yet you're have a chance to show off those piloting skills of yours."

Winters sighed again, looked from one blank readout screen to the other and then back again. She then fixed Blake with a stare and then raised both eyebrows at him. "Not quite the scope for zipping around up here, is there?" She shook her head and then relaxed back into her chair in a laxed, almost reclined position. "So..." she streamed off, exhaling loudly as she said it. "We just sit," she paused for drama," and wait?"

Reclining also, spinning his seat to look at Winter more closer Blake mirrored her sigh and placed his hands above him, cupping his head. "Pretty much, we keep our eyes and ears open or any abnormalities, keep in regular contact with Ranger, Burton and Speke, and look out for the Pelican too."

He paused glancing over to Winters whom still did not look impressed, "We could always play a game or something while we wait?"

Ella rolled her eyes at her superior but then quickly remembered her place and cleared her throat, taking a more apathetic expression than she intended. "I'd rather just scan," she said more to herself but still within ear-shot of Blake. She sat up, looked over the visual readout again and shook her head. Then, looking at Dylan from the corner of her eye, she never quite understood how he seemed to get so much male and female attention on-ship. But she couldn't deny there was a certain charisma that even she wasn't immune to. She sighed again and then turned to face him fully.

"Suite yourself," Blake sighed standing up and moving toward the rear of the flyer.

"So, Lieutenant," she said, a lilt in her voice that matched the intrigued raised eyebrow that now shot up above her right eye, "how is the 'dating scene' on the Ranger going for you? Any ladies on the scene?"

She knew that this line of questioning was rather personal, and most likely rather inappropriate. But without the watchful gaze of Halliwell boring in the back of her head and being somewhat removed from the formality of the bridge, Ella Winters felt she could dare to ask.

Oddly Blake chuckled, "Why, you thinking of gatecrashing, Ensign?"

"Why," she retorted, smiling broadly, "are you thinking of inviting me to?" Suddenly, out of the corner of her attention periphery, an annoying trilling caught her off guard. She cleared her throat and spun her chair around to her display panel. Her brow knotted as she read the screen. "Localised sensors are picking up a trace signal, Lieutenant. Something we've missed before."

In three strides Blake was at her side, the idea of fixing himself a drink now forgotten, "Can you claify on that?"

"No," Ella replied, casting off suddenly her jovial, flirting demeanour and now fully concentrating on the data. "Let me recalibrate the sensors for a more accurate reading of what we have." Her fingers danced lightly over the lights as she almost subconsciously performed the routine action. "No, nothing more," she said, looking up to face him with questioning eyes.

"Move us closer," he ordered as he returned back to his seat and reviewed the signal Winters had discovered. "How did we manage to miss it?" he asked.

As the Baden-Powell lurched forward in space, Ella kept her eyes on the controls of the Flyer but talked absent-mindedly. "It's just too weak a signal, Lieutenant." Now all familiaristic tones had dissolved into a professional retraction. "Also, our sensors can't seem to locate where exactly the signal is pin-pointed. Amidst the other comm. traffic from the planet and the fact that we weren't really looking so far out, it would be easy to miss. In fact, we've only now happened on it by chance."

"Lucky for us then, keep scanning I'm going to call in help from the Burton and Speke to see if they can locate it." Blake said keying the console before him to hail the other two vessels: "It could be the missing link to this mystery."

 

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