This story, which is quite long and is complete, was written to meet a challenge from SitaZ: someone had to say something, someone else had to... well, I'll tell you all about it later on, not to spoil your fun!
There is humour and drama, and adventure in it, and the whole crew; I hope you'll enjoy it.
My most grateful thanks to my beta readers: Gabi2305, who helped me smooth out many inconsistencies; and Roaring Mice, who did her usual wonderful job.
§ 1 §
Oh-seven-hundred. Captain Jonathan Archer loved a good breakfast. As he watched his Second in Command, Subcommander T'Pol, unhurriedly bring a spoonful of plomek broth, the traditional Vulcan morning meal, to her lips, the Captain felt like rubbing his hands together in anticipation. Breakfast meant the beginning of a new day, with all that it implied for a ship of explorers: new adventures, new worlds to discover, perhaps even new first encounters. Archer's enthusiasm was briefly dampened as he remembered a particular adventure following a particular breakfast, with his Armoury Officer, when they had wandered into a Romulan minefield. Well, he supposed some of their adventures were bound to hold a few unwelcome surprises - it was all part of the deal.
"Your scrambled eggs, Sir."
"Thank you, Manetti." Archer unfolded his napkin and spread it over his legs.
"Anything interesting on long-range sensors?" he asked T'Pol, just to make a little conversation – he had never liked to eat in silence, which, as opposed to him, was what his Vulcan officer definitely preferred.
T'Pol's spoon stopped in mid-air but not a drop of broth fell from it. One of her eyebrows shot up briefly. "As a matter of fact, yes. I was waiting for the senior staff meeting to make my report, but since you are asking... There is an M-class planet on our direct course, a few hours from our current position. Scanners have detected platinum ore."
"Ah!" Archer beamed, shaking the salt-cellar energetically over his eggs and wondering how it was possible that they had invented warp drive but not salt that actually came out of a shaker's holes. "That will make our Chief Engineer happy."
"Indeed."
"Trip's been asking me to find him some platinum."
"I believe the Commander intends to stock up on it as an exchange good, in case he needs to purchase any spare parts from alien species," T'Pol supplied. "Platinum is highly sought after in this part of the quadrant."
"So I heard," Archer commented, scowling at the salt which had suddenly decided to collaborate, pouring out in excessive quantity. Shrugging it off, he took an enthusiastic forkful of eggs and shoved it into his mouth.
"Hmph." He froze with his mouth full.
"Captain?" Head tilted gently to one side, T'Pol looked at him while a slight frown creased her brow.
From behind a hand Archer mumbled an indistinct apology. Then, pushing his chair back, he got up and hurried out of the messhall.
"Open wider, Captain, if you please," Phlox instructed, without bothering to hide his amusement. In over forty years of career he couldn't remember ever treating anybody who had injured himself eating breakfast. "Scrambled eggs, is that correct?"
"Hmm..."
It had taken a good deal of deductive reasoning to figure out what the problem could be with the moaning and gesticulating man who had bolted into sickbay a couple of minutes before, but not to understand what his morning meal had consisted of.
Archer's expression was a peculiar mix of embarrassment and irritation, and Phlox had to remind himself that he was supposed to inspect the man's mouth and not stare at his face. He focused back on his job, dabbing away a bit of blood and saliva. "Ah-ha, there! I see the culprit. It's a sizeable piece of eggshell that has become wedged in your palate. It appears to have cut your tongue too."
"Hmm!"
That second 'hmm' was low and rumbling. Uh-oh, Phlox thought.
"Don't move, Captain..." The Doctor reached for his tweezers and tilted the head of his patient, who was lying on a biobed, a little more his way. "And... here it is," he said with open satisfaction, turning the offending and sharp piece of shell around in his gloved hand. "Resequenced eggs seem to come with harder eggshells," he commented blithely.
Archer closed his mouth, his brow furrowed in irritation. "Chef is goin' to hear from me," he grumbled around his sore oral cavity. "We have enough surprises without him addin' any to the food."
"Now, now, Captain," Phlox said in a conciliatory tone, handing him a disinfectant mouth wash. "Everyone can make a little mistake."
Archer sat up and grabbed the glass, wincing. As he rinsed out his mouth, the Doctor watched the lines on his face gradually smooth out. He had expected nothing less of the good-natured Captain of the starship Enterprise. In the fifteen odd months he had spent with this crew, he had studied human nature and discovered it differed greatly from one individual to the next. This particular individual, he had learnt, was not one to hold grudges for very long.
Sighing, Archer hopped off the biobed. "Just thinhh what might happen if Chef left a piece of ehhshell in a dish for some aliens we are meetin' for the first time," he mumbled, finding it painful to pronounce a few consonants. "We might end up mahhing enemies!"
"Captain," Phlox said with a low chuckle. "The likelihood of something like that happening is not very great at all." Glancing at the clock, he saw that he was running late feeding his menagerie, so he pulled his face into one of those ear-to-ear grins which, he had come to realise, were an almost infallible human repellent. Indeed...
"Maybe I'll see if I hhan still hhet something done before the eight o'hhlock senior staff meetin'," Archer mumbled, with a guarded look. "I'll be seein' you, Dohh."
"Not too soon, I hope, Captain." Phlox saw the green eyes turn even more wary, so he added gleefully, "In my capacity of physician, that is."
"Of hhourse." Archer's mouth turned up into a forced smile. He triggered the door open and was gone. Phlox chuckled to himself and proceeded to feed his hungry bunch.
"Of course I left eggs in the Captain's scrambled eggs." Chef huffed, regarding the crewman before him as if he were an idiot. "What would you suggest I use to..."
"Eggshell, you left a piece of egg shell in the Captain's scrambled eggs!" Crewman Manetti cut in with emphasis, racking his brain for the Italian word; he was sure when he was a kid he'd heard it from his grandma, when she had prepared him uovo frullato. If only he had put a bit more effort into learning the language...
Chef's eyes narrowed in concentration. "Egg shell? Shell? You don't mean guscio, do you?"
Manetti snapped his fingers. "That's it, guscio! You left a big piece of guscio in the Captain's scrambled eggs, and apparently he had to resort to Doctor Phlox's care."
"Dottor Floss!" Chef pressed both hands to his cheeks, pushing his mouth into a narrow round shape which made him look like some kind of tropical fish.
Manetti shook his head at Chef's mangled version of the Doctor's name. "Phlox, the name's Phlox," he said with a chuckle. Enterprise's physician was not exactly thread-like.
"What happened then?" Chef asked nervously, ignoring the lesson in pronunciation.
"I don't know. If anyone does, that will be Commander Tucker. Ask him. In any case, he won't refuse to put in a good word for you." Manetti winked. "You know, he's friends with the Captain."
"Ah, yes, Commander Tucker." Chef glanced at the clock. "He always has breakfast at seven twenty. Five minutes! Just enough time to warm up a nice big slice of pecan pie. The man loves pecan pie."
Manetti rolled his eyes. "Even Porthos must know the Commander likes pecan pie."He watched the flustered man-in-white hurry to a refrigerated storage compartment. He opened one of its higher doors and got the pie out; he turned and he bent down, got a saucer from a lower shelf, turned again and sprang back up.
"Ouch! Dannazione…"
Chef glared at the door he had left open and erupted in a string of colourful expressions Manetti was pretty sure his grandma had never used. At least not while preparing him uovo frullato. Someone in the family obviously had, though, for he had no trouble recognising them; and for some reason they had stuck in his memory better than the parts of an egg.
"Want to end up in sickbay too?" Manetti asked the rotund Giuseppe, prying Chef's hand away from his head and inspecting the fast-forming bump.
Chef sighed.
"I don't think you'll need to visit Dottor Floss," Manetti reassured him. "Just put some ice on it and you'll be fine."
"Aw, Malcolm, do we have to discuss that now? I mean – can't a man have breakfast in peace?"
Lieutenant Malcolm Reed looked briefly away before returning narrowed eyes to Commander Charles Tucker III. "I honestly fail to see how your agreeing to spend a very reasonable amount of your working hours in the Armoury to upgrade a few tactical systems, which are – may I remind you – of vital importance to our very survival, should prevent you from having breakfast in peace," he said in his sharp British accent.
Trip rolled his eyes. "Because. We aren't even on duty yet. We oughtta talk about -- I don't know, yesterday's movie, or how best to convince the Capt'n that we need some shore leave... or... the weather. Anything but your damn Armoury!" He glanced at Reed, who was staring at him with his facial muscles hardened in a determined expression, and couldn't refrain from chuckling. "Ah, why do I even try!" he exclaimed, throwing a helpless hand up in the air. "You probably look at your waffles and see a targeting grid."
"All you need to do is say a simple 'yes'," Reed replied levelly, ignoring Tucker's gibe. "And you'll be able to give your waffles your undivided attention."
"But I don't want to give my waffles my undivided attention," Trip countered with a huff. "I wanna have breakfast and a little friendly conversation. Sheesh! Is that so difficult to understand?"
"Well, then I suggest you have breakfast with the Captain," Reed said peevishly. "The man actually welcomes idle chat between a sip of coffee and a bite of toasted bread."
Trip was going to respond with a venomous retort when his eye was caught by an uncommon sight: Chef was coming his way with a big smile plastered on his face and a plate carried high on the palm of one hand, like some kind of offering to the gods.
"Commander," Chef called from a distance when he saw that Trip had noticed him, "I have something for you."
He wound his way to their table and, with a flamboyant move, made the plate circle once and land right in front of Trip. On it was a huge and fragrantly warm slice of pecan pie.
"Well, look at that," Trip said, a little taken aback by the unexpected attention and glad that the messhall was still rather empty. In a year and a half of their mission this was the first time Giuseppe had done something of the kind. He smiled back at the man, and saw, out of the corner of his eye, Reed's brow crease in a suspicious frown.
"What's the occasion - this isn't my birthday, is it?" Trip asked genuinely puzzled, turning to his friend.
"No," Malcolm answered, as he narrowed his eyes in thought. "Therefore either Chef wants to have a fling with you, or to ask you a favour."
"A fling... what does this mean?" Chef asked, eyeing Reed distrustfully.
"It means that..."
"Ah, nothin' important, Chef," Trip cut in. He gave Malcolm's shin a light kick under the table, which only earned him an amused grin.
Chef shuffled his feet. "Have you seen Captain Archer this morning, Commander?" he enquired in what he probably wanted to be a casual tone, but which failed miserably.
"Here we go," Reed muttered under his breath.
Trip landed him another kick – a harder one – and was rewarded with a wince. He put on one of his winning smiles for the uneasy man before him. "The Capt'n? Why, no, not yet," he replied, wondering where this was going.
"Oh," Chef said, wringing his hands. "I see." Suddenly his face crumpled. "I need your help, Commander," he murmured in a distressed voice.
"Told you," Reed sing-sang softly to the side of his raised cup. He lifted his eyebrows innocently and sipped on his tea, looking as if he had forgotten all about the Armoury upgrades and was having a great time.
Trip noticed Malcolm had wound his legs tightly around the legs of his chair. "Sure thing, Chef. What can I do for ya?" he answered mellifluously. "Need me to come fix somethin' in the galley? Just say the word." With his peripheral vision he caught the Armoury Officer's face as it darkened. This approach was more effective than a kick.
Chef's expression, on the other hand, was still rather concerned.
"No, no. It's not that," he rushed to say. "You see, I left a piece of eggshell in the Captain's scrambled eggs – I don't know how that could have happened – and he got hurt and had to see Dottor Floss – Manetti told me that – and I suppose he must be mad at me, the Captain, that is, Commander, and I'd like you to, you know, check just how much mad he is, and tell him that I'm terribly sorry, for I would do so myself but I'm not sure he would like to see me right now, besides the fact that, depending on his mood, I don't know if I want to see him, and knowing that you are..."
"Woah! Wow. Breathe, man!" Trip shook his head as if to clear it, laughing heartily. Malcolm's eyes twinkled, but the man was keeping a perfectly straight face. Damn him, how did he manage such self-control? The thought of Jon running to Phlox because he had cut himself on scrambled eggs... Now he wished he had eaten breakfast with the Captain this morning, to have seen T'Pol's reaction to that. Certainly better than sitting with a paranoid Armoury Officer.
"Don't worry, Chef. I'm sure the Capt'n understands that it was just a mistake," Trip offered, biting his lip to sober up. "But if necessary I'll be glad to put in a good word for you."
"Ah, I knew I could count on you, Commander," Chef said, sighing in relief and visibly relaxing.
"Is that why you brought him pecan pie?" Reed asked deadpan, tilting his head and indicating Trip's plate with his mug.
Chef frowned. "Lieutenant, are you suggesting I brought Commander Tucker pecan pie to… buy his help?"
"That is exactly what I am suggesting," Reed replied, jerking his head sideways.
Chef pulled a face. "What? Are you jealous, Signor Reed?"
"Maybe he'd like ya to have a fling with him," Trip mumbled around a bite of pie.
"Have a..." Chef smirked. "I'll have to ask Hoshi about that," he murmured to himself.
Malcolm returned, with interest, one of the kicks he had received before. "You can't deny that you make pecan pie much more often than pineapple cake. You definitely favour the Commander, Giuseppe." He sounded dead serious.
Chef looked at him in frozen incredulity for one long moment. "All right, all right, I'll make you your pineapple cake," he sighed eventually, shaking his head. He picked up Trip's empty plate and left, muttering something about little children.
Trip shot Malcolm a disbelieving look.
"What?" Reed said defensively. "It's the plain truth. Chef churns out so much pecan pie that one would think the warp drive runs on it."
"Actually, it does," Trip said, leaning back in his chair and placing a satisfied hand on his stomach. He smiled smugly.
Malcolm smirked in response, then sprang up. "So, Commander: are you going to give me a few hours of your precious time?"
"Malcolm, for Pete's sake!"
Malcolm grinned wickedly, tapping a finger on his watch. "Well, Trip, time to get down to business: our shift started several seconds ago."
TBC
