The halls of the unknown starship were filled with people. Humans, if the Doctor was right, and he normally was. The corridors were spacious and dimly lit, with white floors, grey floors, and blood-orange ceilings. The people passing by walked like they had somewhere to be, and they did not speak, save for respectful head nods and a few 'good afternoons'.

They all knew exactly what they were doing.

The Doctor did not in the slightest.

Doctor tapped the shoulder of some poor sap in a gold shirt who happened to be walking by at that moment.

"Hello! I'm John Smith," he flashed the psychic paper under the young man's nose. "I was just transferred to engineering. Would you mind telling me where that is?"

"Take zee torboleeft to zee fifth floor, geet off, and eets at zee end of zee hall. Incredibly noisy. And dirty. You can't miss eet," he shrugged and began to walk away, but Doctor held him back.

"Thank you so, so much. And, I'm terribly sorry to bother you, but where is the… um… the turbolift? I get lost rather easily, you see."

The boy raised an eyebrow, a scowl overcoming his features. He pointed to the big set of sliding doors right next to them. "You mean zees torboleeft?"

"Yes! Precisely! That's the one! Thank you very much!"

Doctor gave the sulking boy a quick smile before turning to the large set of doors.

There was no handle.

He frowned, running his long fingers up and down the smooth metal, trying to find some type of mechanism to unlock, or a keyhole… maybe it needed a fingerprint? He pulled out his psychic paper, flashing it around at the wall in case it needed some sort of identification. When all else failed, the Doctor pulled out his sonic screwdriver, hiding the bright blue light with his body.

"Vat are you doing?" the boy asked slowly, gazing at him suspiciously, a rather baffled expression on his pointed face. Doctor stowed the screwdriver in his belt.

"I… oh, you're still here. Well, I… um… forgot how to get in."

Looking at him even more strangely, the boy pressed a big red button that sat a little to the right of the doors. The door hissed open with a shhk and revealed a small room with bright lights and large triangular-shaped panels.

"Thanks!" The Doctor grinned. He slid into the small, cylinder-like room, eyeing the controls warily. The triangular panels on the sides looked a lot like handles and the sides were painted in bland colors with a few blinking panels on them. The inside hummed at a different frequency of the main engine; the turbolifts must have some engine of their own.

Seemed simple enough.

"Oh, and one last thing," Doctor slid his foot between the sliding doors, halting their close.

The brunet glared at him, his scowl deepening. "Vhat?"

"You wouldn't happen to know what the head engineer's name is, would you?"

"You vere twansferred to engineering and you don't even know zee head engineer's name?" he cried, his patience obviously at its end. "You didn't know vhere the turboleeft was, you didn't know how to get into said torboleeft… Ees there anything else you don't know?"

"Well, I-"

"I have never seen such incompetence!" the boy threw his hands in the air. "How deed you ever pass your final exams?"

"I just need a name-"

"Vy deed Keptin Kirk transfer you? Are you really good at engineering or sometheeng? You must be because otherwise you never would have been transferred. You certainly didn't get here on your common sense. Vhat is Meester Scotty going to say-

"Scotty? Is that his name? Scotty?" The Doctor asked quickly, and when he saw the affirmation in the young crewman's eyes, he removed his foot from the turbolift's door and it began to close, but the young man stuck his hand into the doors and forced them open again, pointing his finger angrily at the Doctor.

"Keptin Kirk only picks zee best of zee best. I am one of zee best, obviously. But you? No! I graduated from Starfleet Academy vhen I was twenty one! Only twenty one! No vone else graduated vhen they vere twenty-"

"Okay, thanks, it was nice talking to you!" Doctor rapidly pressed random buttons on the panel in front of him.

The doors slid shut.

The Doctor sighed in relief and glanced around the… turbolift… again. He hesitantly reached and pulled on one of the triangular handles.

Nothing happened.

Confused, he pulled harder on the handle, but the turbolift didn't budge. The Doctor looked over at all the buttons on the panels and began to press them all one after the other.

After pressing a particularly large one, a noise blipped overhead. Doctor's head snapped up, and then he jumped as a smooth female's voice spoke.

"If you do not know where a section is located, or you need assistance, please ask by saying 'computer' and then phrasing your question."

The Doctor paused, perplexed, and then grabbed a handle again.

"Computer?" he asked uncertainty, and the blipping noise came again. He licked his lips. "Where is Engineering located?"

"Engineering is located on Deck Five."

"Okay. Take me there."

The turbolift gave a soft lurch and began to seamlessly lower him down.

It was a man/machine operated elevator. In space! On a spaceship!

"Brilliant!" Doctor cheered. "Bloody brilliant!"

The turbolift only took a minute or so to arrive at Deck Five, and when it opened, he immediately understood what the disgruntled brunet boy with anger problems had said.

Engineering was dirty. And noisy.

The large room was the same color scheme as in the halls: white walls, grey floors, and blood-orange ceilings. Behind glass to the left side housed a large engine that just had to be the main propulsion drive: the whooshing sound it was making was what he heard when he first stepped out of the TARDIS. The rest of the room was completely covered in control panels, each of them manned by a crew member, and they tapped and typed furiously, and they didn't stay at their stations; they flitted around like butterflies, going from station to station with a screen in their hands, narrowly missing colliding with other crewmen moving about.

But even in the chaos the entire floor seemed to have an order about it. Everyone knew their jobs and were doing them to the best of their ability, and no one argued or crashed into one another. A few crewmen walked around, checking the others' work and nodding approvingly.

Trying not to look too out of place, Doctor sauntered over to where a dark haired man in a red shirt was giving instructions to a few other people in red shirts and dresses. He had more gold fringes on the sleeves of his shirt; perhaps that determined rank?

"Hello, I'm John Smith. I was just transferred here by Captain Kirk," Doctor said, remembering the name the boy had said earlier. He held out his hand for the man to shake. "I'm looking for Scotty?"
"Aye, that would be me," the man replied, smiling easily and shaking the Doctor's hand.

Doctor held back a laugh. His name was Scotty and he was Scottish. Classic! He wondered whether the name Scotty was his given name, or if it was a nickname.

"You say you were transferred here, eh? I didn't get a notification," Scotty said doubtfully, his brow crinkling.

"Right, there was a bit of a mix up. I was supposed to be transferred next week, but something went wrong with the paperwork, and they didn't have time to send you an email."

"Email?"

"Uh… as you can see here, everything is in perfect order," The Doctor handed him his psychic paper. Scotty took it, still looking rather skeptical.

"I see. Well, you can just tail me for a wee bit, I suppose. Learn the ropes. You can start by helping Ensign Johnsen clean the regulator on the impulse drive," Scotty turned away, dismissing Doctor with a wave of his hand.

Doctor ran up to him. "Actually, I was sent to help manage the quantum flux regulator," he lied. "Where is that?"

"Slow down, laddie," Scotty held a hand up. "That'd be a mighty fragile piece of technology there. I'm not going to be having a rookie taking care of her."

"But Captain Kirk did send me too-"

"This may be Captain Kirk's ship, but this here is my engineering deck. I say who does what."

"I passed all my exams with flying colors back in Starfleet," Doctor said, once again thinking back to the words of the angry young man. He mentioned something called Starfleet, right? Some sort of school? "I know I'm doing."

"Just because a chicken flaps it wings and jumps on top of a barrel doesn't mean it's gonna be signed up for a horse racing derby. Now if you'll excuse me."

Doctor stood there, confused, for a good thirty seconds.

Did he just get compared to a chicken?

He quickly shook his head, clearing his mind.

All he had to do was find the quantum flux regulator, steal it without anyone noticing, get back to the TARDIS, and wait for Jack and Rose.

Easy, right?

Right!

As soon as Scotty was out of earshot, Doctor turned to a lady in a red dress with a fancy updo. Her face was peeled to a blue computer screen.

"Excuse me, I was sent to take a look at the quantum flux regulator; we heard that there was a chance it could be malfunctioning. Could you send me in its direction?" Doctor showed her the psychic paper, just in case, but she didn't even look up.

"Take two lefts, down the stairs on the second right," she replied in a monotone.

"Thanks!"

He followed her directions, only getting lost twice.

"Quantum flux regulator… quantum flux regulator… quantum… ah ha! Come to papa!"

He had come to some sort of mechanical locker, made of a thick metal and protected by a keycode on a panel to the side.

Nothing a sonic screwdriver couldn't handle.

He hummed as the screwdriver did its work, glowing blue and whirring. After a moment, the locker clicked open, and the Doctor looked around and started to search inside. He rifled through hyper-spanners, gravic caplers, thermal regulators, and even more tools he could not identify. After about five minutes of searching, he found what he was looking for: the quantum flux regulator, which was about the length of a banana. It was cylindrical and heavy like a club. It was also a bit too big to hide in his red shirt.

As long as everything went according to plan, after he took the regulator, he'd have approximately one hour before they noticed it was missing. More than enough time to meet up with the others, fix the TARDIS, and leave. Maybe Doctor would even have enough time to write a little thank you note.

Doctor desperately hoped that everything would go according to plan.

Just this once.

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