Yellow Submarine

Le'letha

From Le'letha: Thank you to Hasty, BOC42, Jgston, and emilychristinad; your reviews absolutely made my day!

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Chapter Two: Bio-Goop And A Hyperspanner

The computer core, probably the most important place on Voyager, was acting strange. Again.

Wedged beneath a fried console, B'Elanna tested the limits of her vocabulary. "Stupid bio-technology, give me a nice normal Maquis ship with plain old normal wiring any day! Why can't something ever go right with this ship!

"You okay under there, Maquis?" Harry called cautiously.

"Say what? can't hear you?"

"I asked if you were oka-ow!"

B'Elanna's spare hyperspanner rattled against the sturdy duranium floor after colliding with Kim's arm, bouncing into yet another puddle of sickly blue biogel.

"What did you do that for!"

"Are you stupid? Do I look okay? Here I am up to my elbows in biogel, and you ask me if I am OKAY?" she exploded.

She tried to sit up to look him in the eye, banged her head on the console, and swore fluently.

"Well then why did you ask me to repeat it if you heard me the first time?" Harry asked to distract her.

"I hadn't gotten a proper fix on your voice yet. And fetch me my hyperspanner back, I need it."

"Don't throw it at me then," Kim complained under his breath, and went to fetch the hyperspanner, with the half-Klingon's "I heard that!" echoing around the room.

Harry grimaced as he fished the hyperspanner out of the blue goop and looked around for something to wipe it off with. Unfortunately, all he could find was his sleeve, but since it was already soaked, like the rest of his yellow-and-black uniform, it didn't get much cleaner, or any less sticky. "Yuck."

"I hate this stuff!" B'Elanna started anew.

"Biogel runs the ship," Harry tried.

"Right now the stuff's over-running the ship!"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. You want your spanner back or not?"

B'Elanna gestured imperiously with one hand. "Give me my spanner or else!"

He handed it to her patiently and sat down at an interface console. "Ready to try the partial restart?"

"No, but go ahead anyway. Let me just get out from under here."

She inched out from underneath and pulled herself stickily to her feet.

"Harry, what did you do to this!"

The ensign looked up from the computer screen. "Huh?"

B'Elanna was shaking her hand up and down in utter puzzlement. Her wrinkled Klingon brow creased even further as she stared at her hand. There was a hyperspanner stuck to it.

Harry cracked up, laughing near-hysterically until she whacked him with it. Luckily for him, the impact caused it to fly off her sticky hand before she could belt him another one. He wiped tears of laughter from his eyes, attempting to recover his dignity, and failed miserably when he discovered something new, if not altogether revolutionary; biogel hurts when it gets in your eyes.

"Ow!"

"Idiot."

"Gee, thanks, Maquis. You need a shower."

"If this doesn't work I'm going to need a bat'leth."

"You need a shower more. And the last time you got your hands on one of those freakish swords you destroyed half the Doctor's projection system," Harry observed as he pressed buttons rapidly. The computer core whirred and hummed as it rewrote a troublesome chunk of programming.

"He deserved it! He locked me in sickbay!"

"Yeah, and it took you a week and a half to fix."

The doors whooshed open.

"Building boats yet?"

"Captain! Er, boats?"

Captain Janeway picked her way between the omnipresent puddles of softly glowing blue gel, managing to ignore the troublesome spanner, which was now stuck to a bulkhead. "Never mind. Any progress?"

"Yes, Captain; we've reprogrammed the faulty data, but it's going to be a while before we know for sure."

"How long?"

Kim didn't need to consult the readout; he knew it off the top of his head. "Three and a half hours, tops."

"Good work. We don't want Tom and Neelix's party going wrong."

"Is that today? I thought it was two days from now."

"It is, but they're test running it now."

"If you go over there, can you ask them to leave it running until I get there?" B'Elanna asked. "I'd like to look over the programming, make sure it's not going to conflict with anything."

"Actually, I was on my way up there right now. I'll tell them."

"Thanks, Captain. I think I need to take a shower before I swing by; I smell of bio-goop and I swear I'm glowing blue."

"You're not glowing; the biogel is," Kim assured her.

"Shut up, Starfleet; I know that."

"Um, Lieutenant? Ensign? I give up. Why is there a hyperspanner stuck to the wall?" the captain asked on her way out. "Wait, don't answer that. I can guess. I wonder if we have a hose on board…you're going to need it."

Whoosh, went the doors, closing behind her. Thankfully, she managed to hold in her laughter until she reached the safety of the turbolift. Who needs a party? We could just frame poor B'Elanna and Harry.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

B'Elanna wailed pathetically, not seeing Kim's amusement at her vocalizations. "This stuff is disgusting!"

"Get out of here, B'Elanna. I'll finish up. Out! Before I throw you out!"

"You can't do that! I outrank you!"

"Yeah, well, it'd be worth it."

Torres ignored that, drawing herself up dignifiedly, still dripping biogel. "With the authority my rank of Lieutenant vests in me, I declare myself off duty and give myself a direct order to take a sonic shower. So there," she added, completely ruining the pseudo-dignity of the moment.

"You want me to site-to-site transport you there? It'll save us mopping the corridors as well."

"Yeah. Thanks, Harry."

"No problem," he replied, bringing up the transporter program on his (sticky, like EVERYTHING ELSE) console. "Energizing…"

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From Le'letha: I love biogel; it's blue and goopy and messes things up easily. Who wants to guess what's going to happen with the transporters…depending on what you say B'Elanna may be in for it… or not! Review, as always… Ok. flexes fingers Chapter 3…