Abbot and Costello

Posted on Tue Jul 7th, 2026 @ 5:01am by Petty Officer 2nd Class Quinn Sullivan & Petty Officer 1st Class Kael Draven

Mission: Die Hard: Chimera Edition
Location: Shuttlebay
Timeline: Concurrent with Starship Ours et al

The difference between the shuttlebay at that moment and the previous day was striking. They'd ensured every shuttle was ready to transport crew and cargo, and had evacuated over ninety percent of the ship. Almost all organic materials had been removed, and now it was down to one more batch of cargo. Once that was finished, they could all fly down and enjoy the resort.

Quinn had to admit that while he enjoyed the quiet, he was looking forward to spending some time in real water and potentially walk through the museum exhibits. He also realized he was looking forward to spending that time with Jenna.

Until then, he and the Boatswain were tasked with overseeing the final cargo removal. The planet didn't make transporters easily managed, hence their construction of a space elevator, which made the shuttles essential. They had all flown out, a few remained planetside, and the others had returned and were parked, ready to take the last of the crew and cargo down.

Their head nurse had dropped off another cart of storage containers, and Quinn, Kael and Henry had made quick work of it. As Henry left the shuttlebay, Quinn made a note of the remaining crew who hadn't brought their final items yet.

Kael leaned against one of the cargo containers, watching Quinn update the manifest with the kind of focus usually reserved for surgery or defusing a warp core.

“So,” Kael started casually, folding his arms, “you always this talkative, Sullivan, or am I getting the premium silent treatment?”

"People get used to it," Quinn said, returning his attention to his padd.

He waited a beat, then nodded toward the last stack of containers. “Because if this is about Henry ditching us after the medical crates, I’d like the record to show he abandoned us with impressive speed.”

"He's getting back to his girlfriend, I'm sure," Quinn said.

Kael pushed off the crate and glanced toward the parked shuttles. “I’m just saying, you’re way too calm for a guy stuck doing final cargo checks with me while Senior Chief Enor skips planetside with Kellerman for what I’m sure is a very professional and mission-critical outing.”

He grabbed another container and slid it into place. “And somehow, before he disappeared, he hit me with, ‘Hey Kael, you’re looking to make Chief, right? Why not learn some extra responsibilities?’ Which sounds inspiring until you realize it means, ‘Congratulations, you’re Acting Chief of the Boat while I go enjoy shore leave.’”

Kael looked back at Quinn with a crooked grin. “So what’s your deal? Secretly judging everyone? Former shuttle thief? Man of mystery? Or have you just mastered the ancient enlisted art of staying quiet long enough that nobody gives you more work?”

He narrowed his eyes slightly. “Because if it’s that last one, I need lessons before Enor gets back and promotes me into more paperwork.”

"Lesson one: Ask one question at a time," Quinn said. "The simple answer is: I lived in a house with five sisters. I learned I can't compete with that. And down here, I work alone most days. I've learned to keep my own counsel. Silence is a tool few people truly understand how to use.

Kael paused halfway through moving another container, giving Quinn a long look before slowly nodding.

“Okay, see, that’s the kind of backstory you lead with,” he said. “Five sisters? Yeah, alright, suddenly the quiet thing makes way more sense. I’d probably communicate exclusively through facial expressions at that point too.”

He slid the crate into place and leaned against it again. “And honestly? Fair point about silence. Most people panic-fill quiet with nonsense.” He pointed at himself with a faint grin. “Case in point.”

A beat passed before he added, “Still, working alone down here all the time would drive me insane. I’d end up naming the cargo containers or starting arguments with the shuttle computer just to feel something.”

Kael glanced toward Quinn’s padd again. “Though I gotta admit, the whole calm, observant, quietly competent thing? Kinda intimidating. Meanwhile I’ve been Acting Chief of the Boat for, like, four hours and I already feel eighty years older.”

A beat passed before he frowned slightly. “Still, I gotta ask… why do they even call it ‘Chief of the Boat’ anyway? We’re on a starship. A massive starship. This thing has twelve decks, quantum torpedoes, and enough power to glass a moon.” He gestured around the shuttlebay. “But somehow we’re still using terminology that makes it sound like Enor should be standing on a dock yelling about fishing nets.”

Says the boatswain, Quinn thought.

He smirked slightly. “You’re probably one of those guys who actually reads regulations for fun, aren’t you?”

"Hardly," Quinn said. "I know my job, I know my domain, I leave it at that. I'd rather read an armchair mystery, preferably in a remote winter cabin."

Kael let out a quiet laugh and nodded.

“See? That’s exactly what I mean. Quiet guy, mystery novels, isolated cabin somewhere covered in snow.” He pointed lightly at Quinn. “You either solve murders… or secretly commit them. There’s no middle ground there.”

He slid another crate onto the shuttle and smirked. “And honestly? I respect the silence thing. Me, I talk when I’m uncomfortable. Which explains… well, most of my career so far.”

The shuttlebay doors opened again and Quinn put his padd down. "Let's hope this is the last of it," he said. As he came around the back of the shuttle, however, he stopped as he saw three men, two of them looking a bit singed around the edges, pointing weapons at them. He put his hands up where they could see them and looked at each of them. "Whatever you're looking to steal, it's already in sealed containers. We cannot access it," he lied.

The lead robber gestured to the shuttle with his weapon. "Who else is with you?" he said.

"No one," Quinn said, then went quiet.

The men waited a moment and then the lead one leveled his weapon at Quinn's head. "Tell whoever it is to step out, or we'll shoot you here and now."

Kael froze behind the cargo containers as Quinn’s voice shifted just enough to tell him something had gone very wrong. He peeked through a gap. Three armed men had Quinn covered.

“Oh, fantastic,” Kael muttered under his breath. “Cargo duty turned hostage situation.” His eyes darted around the bay until they landed on a nearby medical transport crate with a blinking label:

LIVE XENOBIOLOGICAL SPECIMEN - SEDATED

Kael stared at it for half a second. “…Perfect.” Keeping low, he slipped over and popped the magnetic latch. The crate hissed open and a groggy reptilian creature with too many legs slowly lifted its head. Kael pointed toward the gunmen. “Buddy, I need you to go cause a workplace distraction.”

The creature screeched immediately.

“Yeah, that works.”

Kael shoved the crate forward. It rolled out from behind the containers, slammed into the deck with a loud clang, and burst open. The animal exploded into the shuttlebay in a blur of claws, scales, and angry noises. The gunmen jerked toward the chaos just as Kael spotted an open deck access port nearby.

He bolted.

Crossing low behind the containers, Kael sprinted the last few meters and dropped feet-first through the opening, catching the edge with his hands before disappearing beneath the deck plating with a quiet grunt.

Hidden in the crawlspace below, he adjusted himself carefully and listened to the panic and shouting above him.

“Okay,” he whispered to himself. “Step one: unleash science nightmare. Step two: don’t die.”

Quinn heard the screech and, like the three men, looked around in confusion. When the container fell, he shouted, "shit, it's loose!" and ran away from the container. He only hoped whatever came out was as distracting visually as its screech had been.

The iguana-sized creature jumped around, hissing like an angry cat and leaped to the side as one of the men fired at it. It screeched again as one of its feet got singed, but the foot began to heal immediately and it made a b-line for the attacker.

Quinn used the moment to make as much noise as he could running for the door to the shuttlebay. The two other men ran after him, but when they reached the shuttlebay doors, he wasn't there, and the doors hadn't opened. They stopped and put their backs to the door, effectively trapping both Starfleeters inside the shuttlebay, but now at the disadvantage of not knowing where either of them were.

Beneath the deck plating, Kael slid to a stop beside a recessed LCARS maintenance access and quickly brought the panel to life. The blue glow lit up his face as he started navigating through internal shuttlebay controls with far more confidence than accuracy.

“Okay,” he muttered. “Please let one semester of systems training finally matter.”

He tapped into the shuttlbay's tannoy system, and lowered his voice.

The shuttlebay speakers crackled overhead.

“Attention armed intruders. This is Petty Officer First Class Kael Draven, Acting Chief of the Boat. You are currently locked inside a secured Starfleet shuttlebay. Lay down your weapons and surrender immediately…”

Kael’s fingers hovered over the forcefield controls.

“…or I disable the bay containment field and vent this entire compartment into open space.”

Silence filled the bay for a moment.

Kael smirked slightly beneath the deck plating. “Yeah, that got your attention.”

Then his hand slipped against the LCARS panel while trying to bring up the intimidation factor a little more.

A warning tone chirped instantly.

WARNING. SHUTTLEBAY FORCEFIELD SAFETY INTERLOCKS OFFLINE.

Kael’s eyes widened.

“…Oh.”

Above him, the faint shimmer of the bay’s containment field flickered once.

Then twice.

The sudden pull of escaping atmosphere tugged at loose containers and uniforms before the field stabilized again.

Kael grabbed the comm immediately.

“Okay! That was not a drill!” he shouted. “Next flicker’s the real one, so unless you want to become a very confusing debris field, I strongly recommend surrendering!”

There weren't many places to hide in a well-organized shuttlebay, but Quinn had managed to get behind one of the docked shuttlepods. It was locked down, and he'd gripped it for dear life as the atmosphere had been threateningly sucked out. The air still felt a bit thin in the bay although that could just be because he was struggling to catch his breath as his heart pounded. He wasn't sure how Kael had pulled off accessing the shuttlebay speakers, then realized where he'd hidden.

Quinn slowly moved towards the shuttlbay doors and watched them carefully. "Jim!" he shouted, using a fake to avoid giving information, "blow the bay!" He prayed Kael was smarter than he let on an would realize Quinn was bluffing.

There was immediate response in the form of pounding bootsteps as all three men ran out of the shuttlebay at full speed. Quinn wait a moment more then let out a scream that he immediately capped as if the air had been sucked out of his lungs. He rushed over to a console and sealed the doors, overriding the computer and listing it as a depressurized bay.

They wouldn't have long, however. If anyone went to the observation room, they'd see nothing had been sucked out into space and force their way in.

"Draven," Quinn said quietly, looking around the bay. "We have to get out of here."

Kael climbed out of the deck access port and headed straight for the nearest LCARS terminal. “Okay,” he muttered, still trying to catch his breath. “I was supposed to be moving cargo today.”

His fingers moved across the display as he pulled up personnel and evacuation data. “Over ninety percent of the crew is already off the ship for the Baryon sweep. Most of the senior staff are planetside. Transporters are down. The ship's practically empty.” He frowned and brought up internal sensors. “Then why are there more people moving around than there should be?” Kael zoomed in on several contacts moving through the ship.

Seeing no one was shooting at Kael, Quinn came over to join him.

“Maybe they're engineers. Maybe they're evacuation teams. Maybe I'm having the worst day of my career.”

He looked toward the sealed shuttlebay doors and shook his head. “Either way, three armed guys just tried to take us hostage, so I'm leaning toward the bad option.” Grabbing a nearby PADD, Kael downloaded the sensor data “You know, when Enor said this would be good leadership experience, I don't think this is what either of us had in mind.”

A thought suddenly occurred to him. “Also, we're two petty officers running around a mostly empty starship while armed intruders are apparently wandering the decks.”

He pointed toward the exit. “We need to find an armory. Right now. Because my current tactical plan consists of an angry lizard, a fake decompression, and a fictional guy named Jim, and I'd really like to upgrade from that.”

"Or," Quinn said, walking over to a security locker, entering his authorization code and opening the hatch, pulling out two charged phasers. He tossed one to Kael and held the other. "Do we head to the Mess hall and break the others out, or try to take the bridge?" While Quinn was in charge of the shuttlebay, past the exit, Kael outranked him, and Quinn was willing to defer for the moment.

Kael caught the phaser a little awkwardly, nearly dropping it before recovering at the last second. “Smooth,” he muttered to himself. He checked the charge indicator and immediately looked more comfortable.

“Okay, that's already a better plan than the lizard.” At Quinn's question, Kael paused for a moment, thinking it through.

“The bridge is the obvious target,” he said. “Which means if these guys know what they're doing, it's also the place most likely to be heavily guarded.”

He clipped the phaser to his belt and grabbed the PADD. “But the others? They're crew. Crew means more eyes, more hands, and hopefully more people who know what's going on.”

Kael started toward the exit before stopping and looking back at Quinn. “If this really is some kind of takeover, then every person they round up makes them stronger and us weaker. So we get the crew first.”

A crooked grin appeared. “Besides, I'd rather have a small army of annoyed Starfleet personnel behind me before I go charging at the bridge like a hero in a bad holonovel.”

He motioned toward the corridor. “Mess hall first. Then we figure out how to steal our own ship back.”