Friendships… it's an odd word to say the least…. Split the word in half and you get "fry end". There are also different types of friendships.
One type is when you are best friends. You have lots in common and are always having a laugh, sharing deepest thoughts and secrets, like the friendship between Lieutenant Malcolm Reed and Commander Charles Tucker.
The other is the complete opposite and most of the time it's arguing. And that's exactly the type of 'friendship' that Malcolm had with Crewman Evelyn Jacobs.
No matter what everyday there was some sort of argument between the two, whether it was about film night, the food, or even how the security officers were supposed to train. Of course the fact that Evelyn was a member of Malcolm's security force didn't help at all. It was very unusual to find them agreeing to anything at all. Their personalities were entirely different. The only thing in common the two of them had was that they were both from England.
So naturally when the rest of the Armoury crew knew that a storm was brewing between the two officers they knew better than to hang around, and always made an excuse that it was the end of their shift, or meal time, or something they had to fix elsewhere on the ship. They wanted to be as far away from the quarrelling pair as possible.
Once or twice their arguments have even evolved into a full out brawl usually resulting in a couple of days confinement, and Captain Archer not being pleased with them. And normally there were broken bones to go with the confinement, usually with Malcolm having Phlox tend to him.
Commander Tucker had once tried to get Evelyn to be 'nicer' with Malcolm and to try and stop the arguments, but her temperament on that occasion had the worst of consequences. She was suspended from duty for three weeks for having punched the chief engineer when she was aiming for Reed. He was then in sickbay for a couple of days with pretty sever concussion and a broken rib. Malcolm was only given a dislocated retina.
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Down in the Armoury, Evelyn was getting ready to end her shift. It had been a hard day for her and she was beginning to get sleepy. She began to pack away all the phase rifles that she had tested and was about to shut the locker when Malcolm entered. She had managed to avoid him all day and now, at the end of her shift, here he was. It was time for her to think of a something to argue about. But nothing came to mind.
She watched as Malcolm moved over to her. "Good afternoon Crewman."
Evelyn nodded slightly and closed the locker with a bit of a hard shove causing it to slam. "Lieutenant."
Malcolm folded his arms in front of him knowing what was going to come next. The rest of the crew in the Armoury looked at the pair and quickly headed for the exit, eager to get out of the way of the daily argument.
"Captain Archer wants you on the bridge."
Evelyn's voice suddenly rose. "What? I haven't done anything for crying out loud!" the only times the captain had ever wanted to speak to Evelyn was about the fights.
Malcolm quickly interrupted before she began to throw punches around. "I know." He said calmly and just stayed still watching the crewman.
"Well…" she began to stutter "What does he want me for?"
Malcolm smiled. "If you go to him you'll find out."
Evelyn looked at Malcolm and quickly left. He quickly followed after her, jumping into the turbolift before the doors closed on him.
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Evelyn was ready to hit the roof!
"No way!" She shouted at Archer in front of the rest of the crew.
"Why not?" He asked back.
"Because I'll punch the living daylights of him if the two of us are stuck in a pod!" She crossed her arms in front of her chest. "I won't do it!"
It was Archer's turn to raise his voice. "I'm giving you an order crewman! Or do you want to be confined to quarters, or thrown out of Starfleet?"
At hearing Archer's threats she didn't say anything. Behind her she could tell that Malcolm was smiling broadly. She just knew it. And indeed he was. In fact Archer was finding it very difficult not to smile at the young officer's actions.
Evelyn had worked very hard to get where she was. Her father and mother had been very proud the day she decided to join Starfleet. And there was one piece of advice that had stuck in her mind, a piece of advice from her mother 'Never get into any fights with superior officers.' Well, that hadn't helped at all. She was naturally a fairly aggressive young woman and there was nothing she enjoyed more than an argument or a fight. Some of the crew even thought she was a Tellerite.
"Well?" Archer asked. Watching Evelyn carefully.
She sighed and unfolded her arms "All right. I'll go." She replied. Loosing sleep was much better than loosing her place in Starfleet.
"Get ready then."
Evelyn nodded and left the bridge. Once she had gone Archer smiled and relaxed. He was lucky she hadn't tried to lash out at him.
Archer moved over to Reed. "You will be taking a phase pistol with you won't you?"
"Of course sir. I'll keep it set on Kill." The two men had a little laugh together.
Malcolm soon left the bridge and made his way to the launch bay where Evelyn was getting the shuttlepod ready for their mission.
She stepped inside the pod carrying a couple of silver foil cased ration packs. Malcolm's head popped in through the hatch and he watched her put them into the storage bins.
"What are you doing?"
Evelyn turned in surprise at hearing his voice. "Packing ration packs."
"We won't need them." Malcolm stepped in, moved over to the storage bin and began taking the packs out.
"Sir!" Evelyn immediately began to protest "Regulation 23A of shuttlepod travel states that there should always be ration packs in the storage bins."
Malcolm laughed slightly. "We're not going to be hundreds of kilometres away from Enterprise. If there's trouble they can just use the grapplers or the transporter to get us back."
"Lieutenant! We should have those ration packs!" She quickly grabbed them off Reed and stuffed them back into the storage bin. Malcolm did his best to grab them back off her but she was far too quick for him. Grabbing the lid she quickly placed it over the bin and sat ontop to prevent Malcolm from going anywhere near them. "They're staying put." She stated sternly.
"All right." Malcolm sighed. He was not in the mood to have a fight with her today.
Their mission was simple. The ship had found an asteroid which had dilithium in it and so Evelyn and Malcolm were to go and dig up the dilithium. A simple task that even two cadets would be able to do, but seeing as the task involved in detonating a couple of charges the chief of security was best for the job, and Evelyn had always wanted to go walking on an asteroid.
