<USS Avalon> =/\= The Engineer's Hands =/\=

=/\= The Engineer's Hands =/\=
by Tavi


Tavi had some good hiding places on board the Avalon.  Two of them she'd 
chosen as favourites.  The first was the library, where there were three 
different 
ducts she could kip into at a moment's notice.  The other was riskier, but 
afforded the most excellent view of the chief engineer's office and 
workstations.

He was a strange one, that engineer.  Like Tavi, he seemed to prefer to be 
alone.  He worked lots of extra hours, too.  When everyone else went off-shift 
and the night crew came in, he stayed on and worked alone, often going off to 
fix things in remote corners of the ship.  

The little stowaway followed whenever she could, whenever she could avoid 
getting caught.  She liked to watch him fix things.  Sometimes his hands would 
just pass lightly over a piece of equipment and it would start working.  
Sometimes his fingers flew, moving and adjusting and straightening.  Or bending 
and 
twisting, making tiny parts do things no one else could.

Tavi would sigh quietly and look at her own small hands, wishing they could 
do those magical things.

Sometimes the engineer went into the holodeck, where she hadn't figured out a 
way to follow without being detected.  Then she wished she could see what he 
was doing, imagining a program filled with marvelous tools and gadgets, a 
place to try out the wonderful innovations she saw him do when he worked.

Back in the library, late at night when the librarians weren't there, Tavi 
persuaded the far corner terminal to yield an engineering text, and slowly 
started reading her way through it...

=/\=

Other related posts: