<USS Avalon> Unauthorized Reapirs

 
Unauthorized Repairs
by Joshua Garrity & Li Vilya
 
Joshua stepped into the shuttle bay and smiled. Look at that ship! he  
thought. Sprinting over to it, he climbed aboard, examining the systems and  
grinning like a kid in a candy store with a pocket full of money. He started  
with a 
quick diagnostic of her entire system, then shook his head almost  laughing. 
No wonder...he breathed, still grinning as he looked at the  results. 
Rudimentary warp drive, no impulse to speak of, just thrusters. The  constructs 
were so 
oddly done in parts, he wondered if perhaps it hadn't been  copied from an 
already wrecked cruiser or, more likely given the construct  patterns, a 
Dominion vessel. He shook his head as he looked at parts of it that  simply 
made no 
sense to have been built as they were. What were they  thinking? he wondered, 
laughing as he began to effect repairs. 
 
He started with the environmental controls, scanning through system logs to  
determine "normal atmosphere" and correcting any flaws he found that might 
cost  them that. Next he moved to propulsion and navigational issues, resisting 
the  urge to do too much tweaking, instead limiting himself to correcting 
design  flaws and repairing what they had. No revamping,  he had to keep  
reminding 
himself You're repairing what they already have, not upgrading  it. It was so 
tempting, though. There were so many flaws, and so much to  work with. His 
mind wandered to easy upgrades to her propulsion systems that  would make her 
easily three times faster than what she was now, sensor display  changes that 
would make the universe significantly clearer. Could it really hurt  to tweak 
it 
just a little?
 
Slick move, Josh.  Got out of the tour with the spider but your wife's  going 
to kill you, Vilya thought with a smirk as she watched  Annabelle.  Stupid 
grav boots.  Josh got out of those, too, just so he  could go play...Vilya's 
eyes widened and she clomped over to Mac as quickly as  possible.  
 
"I have to get down to the bay, Mac.  You know he's down there all by  
himself with a less than Fleet perfect rig," she said, shaking her head.
 
Mac looked at her at first quizzically, not quite comprehending, before his  
friend's occasionally serious OCD issues came to mind. "Oh, shit." he laughed. 
 "go...go go go..."
 
Vilya kicked off the boots as soon as she was under the access shaft then  
almost giggled as she floated up to it.  She let herself slide down until  
normal gravity took effect then crawled the rest of the way out to the  
corridor.  
She dropped to the floor, making a mental note to have somebody  put the grate 
back, and bolted for the nearest lift.  "Shuttle Bay," she  said, a bit out 
of breath.
 
Mac watched Vilya go and roared as she took off, the superman theme coming  
abruptly to mind as she sailed up to the access panel. "Go get him, Supergirl," 
 he called, laughing so hard he could hardly breathe.
 
Vilya fairly ran to the shuttle bay but stopped short of actually bursting  
in.  That would startle Josh for no good reason. Instead, she forced  herself 
to walk in at her normal pace.  "Hello!" she called out.   "It's your friendly 
neighborhood Bajoran."
 
Large blue eyes peered out of the shuttle and a hand, holding a pair of  
channel locks, waved her in.
 
Vilya smiled as she approached. "I came to see how you were doing," she  said 
easily as she sat on the edge of one of the legs.  "I hate tours but  
Annabelle seemed to be doing very well."
 
Josh nodded as he returned to work. He'd been sure she would do just fine.  
Placing the channel locks carefully back in their designated slot, he grabbed a 
 very fine -pointed pair of tweezers. 
 
"Josh," she said with a slight warning tone, "I'm no Betazoid but you  
wouldn't be thinking about ..oh, I don't know...making unnecessary improvements 
 
would you?"
 
Josh looked at her guiltily before asking, "Define unnecessary?"
 
Vilya grinned.  "Ones that would break the Prime Directive and send my  son's 
godfather to end up scrubbing nacelles," she said with a warm smile.   "You 
know we aren't supposed to make it any spiffier than it was when it got  here."
 
"They'd have to know how it was before to determine that, wouldn't they?"  
Josh asked seriously.
 
Vilya held one finger to her lips.  "I'm not saying anything but do  you 
suppose the guest might notice?"
 
Josh shrugged, grinning sheepishly. "Maybe?" he answered at last, very  
quietly.
 
"Now..now..." she said with a merry look in her eyes.  "How's their  tech 
different anyway?"
 
He showed her the diagnostics, and all the problems which he'd already  
examined and prioritized. The potentially life threatening flaws were  
highlighted 
in red, the marginally dangerous in yellow, and the non-life  threatening 
flaws were in green. He'd made numerous notes in the margins in tiny  Tauriian 
glyphs.
 
"So...you, being the studious engineer that you are, are seeing to the red  
and yellow, right?"
 
Blushing brightly, Joshua nodded. He was seeing to them first.
 
"Josh!"  She looked around, even though she knew they were  alone.  "You'll 
catch way too much hell if you do anything."
 
"I could have it done...right...by the end of shift..." he told her  quietly, 
looking longingly at the PADD. Gods, but he hated leaving a job half  done. 
She couldn't really ask him to, could she?
 
If he had been anybody else, she would have poked him in the chest.   As it 
was, she leveled those warm brown eyes at him.  "And then we'd both  catch 
paper because they'd ask me."
 
"Or not," he answered hopefully.
 
Vilya rolled her eyes in a gesture of sarcasm. "And since when have you  
known the powers that be to not love paper pushing?"
 
"Well..." Josh began quietly, a slight smile on his face, a hopeful gleam  in 
his eyes. "I'm not technically upgrading...see...just..bringing it up to  
current specs...for safety reasons..."
 
"Preaching to the choir, as Ming would say," she said with a sigh.   "How 
about bringing to top specs as if this were current tech for us?  You  know, if 
it were, say...2005 and bring it top 2005 specs?"
 
Joshua shrugged, but something in the gleam in his eye told her that just  
wouldn't be enough for him.
 
Vilya shook her head fondly.  "Did you sleep through the ethics  classes in 
engineering?"
 
Josh considered a moment, then shook his head slowly, his expression  
confused. He didn't think so.
 
"Prime Directive and all that about non-interference," she reminded  him.  
She tapped her lips with one finger, thinking.  She understood  his 
frustration. 
 There had to be a way around it.  "You know...you  could make a whole list 
of what can be upgraded and then present it to the itsy  bitsy spider as an 
educational possibility."
 
"can't..." Josh admitted quietly at last, avoiding her gaze. "I sort  
of...already...did...stufff...."
 
Vilya clapped a hand over her mouth.  "Josh!" she said in a strangled  
whisper.  "You...oh, you're terrible."  She ran a hand through her  auburn 
hair, 
making the earring she wore jingle.  "Alright then....how  about writing up the 
list but don't say how it got done.  Leave the  educational possibility that 
way."
 
Josh grinned, nodding slightly, a conspiratorial gleam in his bright blue  
eyes. "So...you want to help finish?" he asked at last, almost laughing.
 
Vilya held out a hand, wriggling her fingers with just a touch of mischief  
in her eyes.  "Give me what ya got," she said brightly.
 
Smiling brightly, Josh quickly split the list of what was left to be done  
then all but ran back in to work.

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