A Start, A ship, A Shrine

Posted on Fri Aug 11th, 2023 @ 3:42pm by Lieutenant JG Keti Korcus

Mission: Getting Ready (Character Development)
Location: USS Chuck Norris
Timeline: current
Tags: Secret Shrine,

ON:

Keti glanced up from his datapad as he crossed the threshold onto the his new home the USS Chuck Norris. He paused to open an inspection paned and looked at the bulkhead, reaching his hand in he touched the hull and closed his eyes for a moment thinking back to his first time aboard a Defiant class over a decade ago.

An Ops division Andorian crewman with a phaser on her belt rounded the corner and jumped startled by Keti's presence and reached for her phaser.

"Steady! Chief Engineer Keti Korcus here to report for duty" Keti said loudly and confidently as he gestured with his datapad for them to check. Cautiously they checked it and nodded and went onto double check the ship and then stations records before nodding at him and giving a curt "Sir" as he walked away and started to turn the corner she called after him "Sir, How did you come aboard the doors are locked" without pausing Keti continued down the corridor and called back "I'm the Chief Engineer Crewman, Chief Engineer! " Chuckling to himself at himself.

As he made his way through the ship it felt eerily deserted, but that's what he wanted, no interruptions or distractions while he got to familiarise himself with it and get a real feel for it.

He was pleased to see that his personal effects had been stowed in cargo bay 1 as per his instructions. Over the next half hour he set up his locker the way he liked it, stowed things away in his bedside storage and with his toolkit and a small hessian satchel bag headed to engineering to begin his quiet lone inspection of the ship and its systems.

Room by room, deck by deck and Jefferies tube by Jefferies tube he familiarised and inspected it all, making careful notes on the work to be done. He had lost track of time entirely and started to feel the edge of sleep claw at the back of his eyes and a slight rumble in his stomach.

Collecting a wheeled hard case from a repair station, he made his way to deck 3 at the rear of the ship underneath the Deuterium tankage and cryogenic fluid storage, in the central plane of the ship there was a little used small room that existed as a necessary throughway for components crossing from left to right and visa versa.

It was here he had decided he would build a small and secret shrine to the prophets, carefully he began to cutaway some of the decking in the wall, to exact measurements, to open up a small and unused void. With great care he welded in a crude box in place and waited for it to cool.

With great reverence he removed the hand illuminated scroll, blessed by 9 Vedeks, and bonded it to the back of the box. It showed a beautiful traditional artistic rendition of the celestial temple in gently self illuminating inks and fibres. Pairing the ancient Bajoran tradition with some clever modern hi tech manufacturing to gently bathe the room in soft multicoloured lights.

Next came the electro candles he had hand made which should wirelessly draw miniscule amounts of power to give a flickering light, he said a prayer as he attached each one, 3 upside down in the ceiling of the box, 3 on each wall and 1 on the floor. Together they represented the Prophets and their emissary

Keti then withdrew from the satchel bag a series of thick discs which were micro holo emitters that when activated would represent all of the known Orbs of the Prophets, the recreations should be micron perfect but reduced to a fraction of their size. As they bonded to the box floor the first light confirmed they were securely bonded and the 2nd that they were attuned for wireless charging.

Finally a small and delicate brass dome was placed wither side of the emissary electro candle and and he placed a supply of incense in the back slot of each before beginning to chant a prayer as he removed one from each and placed them in the side slot and lit them. kneeling he continued the dedication for almost an hour when he heard the gentle fall of the incense ash which marked the end of the dedication.

Standing with stiff legs he took the final item from the satchel bag, a small ceremonial brush and pan and swept up the ash and closing the pan to keep it from spilling. Keti turned to the hard case where the cutting and welding equipment was stored and took out a self sealing temporary inspection hatch, carefully placing it to close in the shrine. Happy with the seal and the fir he tapped in a few additional commands into the inspection hatch to warn anyone removing it, that this was authorised by the Chief Engineer and should not be opened unless for critical repairs, with any and all contents stored without damage and delivered to Chief Engineer Keti Korcus without delay.

Smiling to himself he was happy and felt the Prophets smiling down on him too as he made his way back to his locker, storing the hard case en-route.

As he went to leave the ship and finalise his affair aboard the station he spotted the Andorian was actually at her post this time, nodding to her as he headed for the exit she huffed out a "Sir" as she opened the door for him to leave.