The Dickhead in the Henhouse (Backpost)

Posted on Mon Sep 22nd, 2025 @ 12:27am by Lieutenant JG Jenna Jade & Lieutenant Trey Fletcher & Lieutenant JG Jeanine Jeffries & Lieutenant JG Katie Kellerman & Petty Officer 2nd Class Sakura Tanikawa

Mission: Lower Decks
Location: Main Engineering

Trey was sitting at the Chief Engineer's desk, shaking his head, making notes on several padds. He hadn't quite recovered from his extremely frustrating incident the day before and a sore back (not to mention balls) had kept him in a rather lousy mood. He looked up at the sound of footsteps and nodded to the newcomer. "You must be Lieutenant...." he checked his personnel padd. "Jade? You've been the acting Chief Engineer?"

Jenna watched as there was someone behind her desk, she hadn't been warned that there would be someone there, but she knew someone was going to be coming at some point, "That would be me, suh, Lieutenant jay gee Jenna Jade, last year's graduatin' class."

He stood up and came around the desk. "Lieutenant Trey Fletcher. I'm here to relieve you."

There was a fair amount of relief in her voice as she smiled broadly, "Thank God, suh, do you know how long Ah've been tryin' to get the Captain to find someone with some experience to take over Engineerin'? Ah've been the Actin' Chief since Lieutenant Davenport was... Removed by the Captain for cause. Ah've been a bit out of my league, but Ah think Engineerin's been running rather smoothly under my watch."

Trey nodded. "Yes, you've done a satisfactory job of holding things together," he said. "I'm glad to see you've been able to finally start catching up with the repair backlog over the last few months, long as it is. With some hard work, we'll be able to improve on that progress and have Engineering up to par with the Enterprise, Herself."

Satisfactory. He'd called it merely decent and Jenna knew how long she and her officers and crew had worked to get the ship to this level, "Suh, when we got this ship, she had been bein' refurbished in the junkyard over by Mars from spare parts that weren't needed by one of her sister ships out in the field. Given her history, Ah think my people have done an absolutely amazin' job gettin' her to where she is today. Ah'd back her against the Enterprise right now, even if she's not as powerful. The Captain would give her a run for their money, too, Ah've got no doubt about it."

Trey smiled. "I like confidence, jay gee," he said. "But let's be honest: it took way too long to get this ship where it is, and it's still half patched together. Frankly, we need to put into a drydock and completely overhaul half the ship. Short of that, we're going to need to rearrange some staff and see about getting more boots on the ground." He snapped his fingers as he remembered something. "In fact, I'm calling a meeting of all the Engineering crew so we can discuss some changes." He went back to the desk and sent out the summons, having everyone report to Main Engineering immediately. "All right, let's head to the upper rail and we'll address the troops." He beckoned her to follow and headed out of the office.

"But suh, Ah need to go over the-" Jenna had to scramble to follow him out of the office. This wasn't going to any sort of plan for a handover that she'd carefully mapped out, "We have to go over the project plans Ah put in place for the next week, Ah've got everythin' and everyone already scheduled for the projects!"

"Not to worry, I've already canceled them, so there wouldn't be any schedule conflicts," he said as they rode the lift up, his tone implying this was reassurance. As they walked out along the catwalk by the MARC, he gestured to the bay. "One of the big problems here is that your schedule isn't efficient enough, and doesn't prioritize the main systems correctly, given the patchwork nature of this ship that you are so keenly aware of. I've developed a much more aggressive schedule that should get us humming so fast the ship can butt up against Warp 10." He smiled proudly at her.

"Suh, this ship can't go that fast, we've got a max speed of nine-five, because our emergency speed shouldn't be too much more than that or else the ship'll shake apart. We got her up to nine-eight a few times, but we need that overhaul you're talkin' about to get up to our theoretical max speed." Jenna was trying to argue her point, "But my schedule puts the right people on the right shifts to make sure we've got people available at all times that can cover anythin' that goes wrong, besides, the Captain doesn't want more than one major system down for maintenance at a time."

At that moment, the bay began to fill as all four shifts of Engineering staff came in, some of them yawning from having to miss their bedtime. Trey waited for everyone to gather and looked down at the group, putting on his best "thanks for coming" smile. "Hey, everyone!" he said. "I appreciate you all being here. For those of you who don't know, my name is Trey Fletcher, and I am the new Chief Engineer of this fine ship."

He paused as the crew murmured to each other, then pressed on. "You all have been doing a fine job, and Lieutenant Jade is to be commended for that, but we're going to be instituting a few changes in order to try to get around, and ahead, of some of the repair issues on the ship.

Katie's eyebrows went up and she looked around to see everyone else doing the very same thing. She looked at Jenna who looked like couldn't decide if she wanted to jump over the railing, or push their new boss.

"Changes to the duty roster will go into effect on Sunday," he said. "All shifts are going to be extended for the time being as we have several HOIs to do with some of the systems that will take several hours at a time. While those are being completed, secondary teams will be working to cover repair duties, and begin better integrating some of the conflicting systems. You'll find your new schedules in your roster files by tonight.

Next to him, Jenna was silently fuming, her face red and she knew the others could see if even as she tried to settle herself down. He didn't even have the courtesy to have done more than inform her of his plans on their walk down, no consultation, no chance to do anything.

Katie felt the way Jenna looked. Restructuring the entire work schedule wasn't going to speed them up it was going to throw all her existing projects into chaos. She understood the idea of razing to the ground and starting over, but some notice would've been nice.

"I know, no one's a fan of hands-on inspections and no one likes overtime. I don't blame you, but I promise, some hard work for the next few weeks is going to pay off in dividends for a long while to come. And, I'm going to be right there working with you. I'm not asking anything of you I'm not willing to do myself. We're going to make this ship the absolute pride of the fleet when we're done, and we're going to show them just how well a ship can run!" Trey pounded the rail for emphasis, looking around.

JJ raised an eyebrow at the "speech". She stood with her arms loosely folded over her chest, and raised one hand. "Sir? Yeah, hi. JJ. Warp Coil expert. Two things. Who said no one likes overtime? And... We're in the ass-crack of nowhere. Starfleet is weeks away by subspace. Who are we showing off for?"

"How about our own pride?" Trey said. "Or have you all lost the ability to take pride in your own work?"

Sakura’s head seemed to float as she listened to the new chief. He had plans apparently. Goals. She wondered how long those would last. “We can be proud of what we do without killing ourselves over it,” she observed.

JJ pointed at the Comms specialist, agreeing with the objection. "You want to upheave the duty shifts, destroying existing working relationships? Maybe work with us as we are first, then decide if the shift dynamic isn't to your liking."

"Because complacency in how you've been doing things can be part of the problem," Trey said. "You'll establish new working relationships and have a more integrated workforce and we'll improve our dynamic overall in the process. I've done this on other starships before this one, and it's revolutionized their staff. Look, folks, this isn't a discussion, this is an announcement. We all need to work together and give things a good honest try. Stick with it for a couple weeks and I think you'll see that the payoff will be worth it, alright? Dismissed."

JJ saw fire at those words. "Complacency? You walk in here, with all of zero experience on this ship, and snap-judge us? Tip: insulting us isn't how you get the best of us,"

This was going to have to be done quickly, especially in the light of how angry SHE was, but it was partly her job and Jenna reached out to try to forestall any other comments, trying to be the island of calm that was needed, “This is all just a learnin’ process right now, Jay Jay, things will adjust as he gets to know us and we’ll show ‘im what we are all capable of doin’.” She looked over at Trey, “Isn’t that right, suh?” She put an emphasis on the last words.

It was at this point that the First Officer cleared his throat from the back of the room.

"I believe your superior officer said 'dismissed'," Alexander observed. "Return to your duties."

"All right, y'all, let's go get ourselves started." Jenna gave Alex a look that carried a lot of meaning, "Ah'll work out the little details as y'all are gettin' ready." She shepherded the engineers out.

Trey followed her to the lift and back down to the main deck. He approached the man who'd backed him up and noted the pips on his collar. Must be the XO he thought.

Once they were alone, Alexander closed the gap to Trey and extended his hand. "Lieutenant. I was glad to hear that we had a new permanent chief down here. Even if it was someone who set fire to my classroom twice in two weeks."

Trey looked confused then shocked as he realized who he was shaking hands with. "Professor Espersen," he said. "I mean, Commander Espersen. Good to see you again Sir," he said. "And I still maintain that second time was not my fault. That power regulator was faulty to begin with. He looked around at the dispersing Engineers. "Hopefully the rest of the team will come to be as appreciative as you are. Lieutenant Jade has done an admirable job, but I look forward to taking this ship to the next level of engineering efficiency."

"I do appreciate a drive for efficiency," Alexander admitted. "But keep this old adage in mind: if something is not broken, it does not need to be fixed."

"I appreciate the sentiment," Trey said, "but if there wasn't a need to fix something I wouldn't be here in the first place. I know they don't want to be out of their comfort zones, but it's not forever, just until we get a few things polished up."

Alex studied the young man carefully. Trey seemed to believe this to be true, that he was sent here for the purpose of shaping up the engine room, possibly more. “Is that what your uncle told you?” he asked, before smirking. “I’ve already spoken to the Captain about your arrival.”

Trey frowned. "Admiral Towers is a family friend, that's all," he said. "He said he had a new assignment for me that could use my talents. He didn't tell me he had a prior relationship good or bad with anyone here. If this is going to be a problem tell me now. I'm here to work not get put down because the captain doesn't like him."

The XO considered the young engineer. He could respect the man standing up for himself. “Do your job well and you won’t have to worry. Our Captain is many things,” he thought about saying ‘but petty isn’t one of them’, but in this extreme case he wasn’t sure about that, “but she won’t stop you from running the engine room if you do it well, and if necessary I’ll make sure of that.”

Alex looked over at the nearest group of engineers, working out of earshot. “But these people whose routines you’re disrupting, if this doesn’t work then they’ll eat you alive. The credit goes to you if we see major efficiencies, but you get the blame if it all goes wrong.”

"Yes Sir. I'm aware of what it means to be in charge of something," Trey said, his good humor gone. Not bad. Not even forty-eight hours and this place is already souring me, he thought. "If there's nothing else Commander? I have work to do."

"Absolutely," Alex replied. "Carry on, Lieutenant, I'll be in touch." The XO quietly left engineering, nodding to Jade and Tanikawa as he passed them.

Trey sighed quietly and went back to work.


END


Lieutenant Commander Alexander Espersen
Executive Officer

Lieutenant Trey Fletcher
Chief Engineer

Katie Kellerman
Computer Specialist

Lieutenant (jg) Jenna Jade
Assistant Chief Engineer

Lieutenant (jg) Jeanine Jeffries
Power Specialist

Petty Officer 2nd Class Sakura Tanikawa
Engineer