He was lying in the dark, a soft light trickled in from the viewing window on the side of the wall. THe sound of the distant engines lulled him like the sweetest sort of lullaby rocking him gently to sleep, and shifting the covers of his bed so he was never quite still. It was neither hot nor cold at that moment, lying with a blanket half draped over his bare torso, though there was nothing on his shoulders, legs or feet.

It was a perfect inbetween.

Outside a glowing planet, bright white in the distance, almost seemed like the moon of earth when examined in the right light, not that he was examining anything at that moment.

His eyes were closed, his body still, and his mind no more than a blank pool of water, so still it may have been glass.

Time here had no beginning and no end.

A whisper came to him in this darkness. A sweet voice that didn't startle him towards wakefulness, but brought him plunging deeper into the warm comfort of dreams. He could not hear what the voice was saying through the tones seemed familiar, warping in and out of of two familiar languages though never settling on just one.

The voice wove patterns through his reams, and at one moment they seemed to knit themselves into a shape, a familiar shape that lay beside him in the darkness, a shadow of a shadow.

He sighed deeply, and a warm presence brushed over his skin.

Tracing fingers, and a hand which ran up the side of his body making him shiver. The pressure grew more intense as the gaining pressure brushed over his skin coalescing into a hand, which slid to lay on his chest.

He sighed deeply into the darkness as the hand rested against his chest, a warm and comforting presence.

He reached up a hand, searching for this other figure somewhere in the darkness.

And was violently awoken as the ships mechanical alarms began to scream.

He bolted upright, alone in the Captain's quarters, half dressed and being continually defined by the roaring of the sirens and the flashing red lights.

He stumbled to his feet, and immediately pitched hard to the floor as his body was suddenly and violently reminded that he did not have FEET but in fact a single FOOT.

He scrambled beside the bed searching for the prosthetic, which he strapped on in record time clawing his way to his feet half dressed as he sprinted form the room, the sole of one foot bare and cold against the floor.

The administrative deck was mostly empty, but not completely, and bleary eyed officers, working over-night peered from their open doors as he ran past.

"GET TO THE EMERGENCY BAYS!" He shouted as he ran, and they did as ordered, hurrying after him with bleary expressions.

His heart hammered inside his chest as he ran cursing internally.

He didn't want to loose his ship only a few days after having it. This was a disaster! If something happened he wasn't afraid to admit that he would cry like a baby, like big ugly crying, there was definitely no stopping it.

Admiral Vir knew all of the alarms to his ship, he had to in order to fly one, but never in his life had he ever expected to hear an alarm for mechanical failure. The harbinger had never had any sort of problems, so why would this one?

He plowed down the stairs, nearly bowling over a two of their three resident tesraki, who squealed and hurled themselves into the wall on his passing. After that, he almost trod on a Celzex, and was ford to leap over them with a yelled apology as he raced downwards and towards the engine bay.

When he finally reached the engineering on deck seven, the alarms were off, and a crew of gathered engineers were already waiting. Some of them were dressed in their nightclothes, but many of them were still i their jumpsuits as the ship was constantly monitored in shifts.

"Whose job was this!"

THe room was silent!

"Whose job was this!" Nairobi was livid, and despite her dark skin covering the blood that must have rushed to her face, he didn't need it to visualize the steam of absolute rage that must have built up inside her head.

"What is going on here!" He was almost surprised at the authority in his own voice as he marched up the deck and towards where Narobi was still stewing with rage.

From this vantage point, he could see one of the engineers holding his hand to his chest as two others had comforting hands on his shoulder

He looked remorseful and lowered his head, "Sir, I am so sorry sir.... I don't know what happened."

Admiral Vir took a deep breath and tried to calm his voice, "it's alright, just tell me what you remember."

He shook his head, "A pressure gasket blew on the coolant system, sir. I, my hand."

He was cut off as one of the others stepped in front of him, a hand still resting on his shoulder, "It hit him in the hand pretty hard, sir. We think it might be broken."

He frowned hands on hips only vaguely aware that he was shirtless in all of this, "A pressure gasket, don't we have someone who checks those systems every day? How could a pressure gasket have been blown."

Nairobi, still seething but actually calmer now that he was here interjected, "Yes we DO have someone who does that, sir, but whoever should have been doing it, hasn't been doing it."

Upon hearing those words, everything inside his head suddenly snapped into very clear focus. The bleary grogginess of his mind fell away, and he was left with his thoughts clear and unclouded.

He didn't notice the room as it shifted nervously before him.

"Someone hasn't been doing their job?"

His voice shot from his tongue like ice, and the room around them seemed to grow very cold very quickly.

On the other side of the room, there were a couple set of pattering footsteps as the Finnari came clattering onto the deck trailing behind Dr. krill and Dr. Katie, one in her pink pajamas and the other as bright and alert as usual.

All of them sensed something wrong almost immediately.

Dr. Krill dragged the finnari with him as he moved to the injured man, clearly holding his hand.

The finnari, sensing danger in the air shifted back at first, but hurriedly followed the Doctor's footsteps after a moment, coming up to where the injured human was grimacing and clutching his hand.

Krill had the man sit on the floor while the Finnari stayed out of his way, but still managed to squish up against the human their heads resting on either shoulder.

The human seemed surprised though not particularly displeased with the way things were turning out. Despite his pleasure, however, the rest of the room, well the rest of the room could not have said the same, and like the empaths they were, the Finnari could feel it.

The humans might have described the feeling as if the air had gone suddenly cold, but that was not really a good description. It was simply a secondary explanation of a primary fact: there was danger here, and everyone in the room could sense it.

Blood had drained from arms and legs and moved into the core. Sense had sharpened, hearing had improved and focus had been drawn in.

And that is why the room was cold.

The source of the cold?

The human standing at the center of the room.

Finnari huddled together at the back of the injured human watching the micro expressions on the lead humans' face as he toggled through emotions in quick succession.

When he ended, he ended in a place that was suspended between rage and calm. His face grew relaxed, the muscles in his body released, but the sheer anger in his single green eye was enough to make them cower.

The power of the human's unspoken rage washed over the crowd, until even Narobi the mechanic was silent with it.

"Let me see the evidence." He said

LIke the chill they were all feeling, his voice was clipped and soft. The edges unfeathered by slurs or mumbling, each word fell from the tongue like a shard of glass, sharp and precise with delicate cutting edges.

Nairobi came forward something held in the palm of her hand, "You see sir, these gaskets are supposed to be checked every day. This buildup around the head si something you only get when one of these has been left in for a while to allow it to accumulate. Judging from my experience, this gasket has not been checked for over a week."

Silence in the room.

Another cold wave radiated from the man's body, and the Finnari huddled even closer together.

A vein on his neck was clearly visible, pulsing along the side of his throat.

The delicate blue lines spidered under his pale skin in the unforgiving light of the engineering fluorescents from above.

The human stalked forward, his feet nearly silent over the floor despite one being made of metal. He was even on his feet, with no hitch or pause despite his injury.

His mechanical eye remained uncovered and quizzes around the group, its appriture opening and closing and whirring slightly in the silence as it turned on every face in the room.

They backed away.

He moved forward.

"Whose job was it?" He asked his voice as melodic as hissing wind through forest trees.

Narovi had to lean to the side snatching a clipboard from one of her subordinates before walking forward towards where the Admiral stood.

He glanced at the list, cheeks tightening imperceptibly as he did.

He glanced up

"And tell me, what is the worst case scenario for negligence like this."

Krill, finished with his work, looked up at the Admiral, having never heard him sound like this before today.

His working green eye flashed with barely contained rage.

"Sir, worst case scenario might have caused a fire of some sort. Someone could have died, luckily we have warning and checks and pressure releases to keep that from happening, but if it had gone on any loner, or if that gasket hadn't failed like it should have, than this man could have been killed.

Admiral vir paused thoughtfully for a moment before walking over towards the injured man.

The Finnari whimpered and backed away slightly as a hand came down to rest on the man's shoulder.

"You alright?"

"Yes sir."

"Head up to the infirmary and take a few days off."

The man nodded and then paused, "I just need a day sir."

"Whatever it is you need, you take." He said, the coldness in his voice replaced by the hints of something warm. He glanced down at the finnari, "Go with him, and keep him company."

They were only too pleased to leave, and did so without argument.

He waited until the last sounds of their footsteps had faded before turning to the crew.

"Corporal Ridger." His voice had dropped downwards into ice again, and the entire engineering crew shivered

No one moved for a moment until a soft set of footsteps came from the shadows and a single man walked onto deck his head down, "Yes sir."

"You're fired."

The entire crew flinched in shock and surprise. The older members of the crew looked at each other in near abject horror having never heard something so definitive pass from the man's lips before.

The man's head snapped up, "But sir."

"But NOTHING!" The Admiral roared. The man lept back in fear cowed by his sudden switch to aggression. When he was silenced, the Admiral switched back to quiet, "Your negligence could have killed someone."

"I will do better, sir."

The Admiral shook his head, "No, you won't. You have already proven that you don't care about your job. As an engineer I know you knew the potential consequences and yet decided to go through with your decision anyway, which means that a part of you does not care about the safety of this ship and the people on it. Therefore, I can only conclude that you cannot be trusted as a member of my crew."

"But-"

"Fired!"

The crew sat in stunned silence, "Petty officer, take this man to the brig, and Lieutenant! Set a course for the Europa station."

"Yes sir." Two voices chorused in unison before running off.

The man was escorted protesting from the engineering floor.

Nairobi had lost all of her anger brom before and was now staring at Admiral Vir was incredulity.

"Sir, are you sure-"
'Yes I am sure." He turned around to the rest of the silent room, his voice calm again arms crossed over his chest, "I know that this may seem harsh to the vast majority of you, but I need you to understand something."

He paced in a wide circle around the room making eye contact with each and every one of them as he passed.

"This ship relies on you to keep us in the air... you are the only people who stand between us, and death however much you would not like that to be true."

Silence.

He paced hands behind his back now, "I need you to understand that I will not tolerate negligence. Everyone on this ship needs to be here 100% and dedicated to doing more than the job requires and nothing less than what is asked. Someone could have died today because of what he did, and I will make sure that that does not happen so help me god."

Body stiff, back straight he turned to look at them one more time, "Now get back to work, or to bed, all of you."

It was at these words that the group of them scampered away, rattling over the ground and out the door with great abandon.

At the corner of one of those hallways, conn turned to look at Sunny who leaned sideways against the wall.

The look on his face was annoyed.

"Please never think like that when you are around me, ever." ANd then he floated off.

Admiral Vir waited till they were all gone and then sighed.

All of that just to ruin a nice dream.