CONTINUING EDUCATION

Door 13

By Kiddo

In Loving Memory of Jonathan Brandis

Disclaimer:

I don't have any rights to the TV show "seaQuest DSV," and I am not making any money by writing this.

A special "Thank You" goes to my wonderful beta-reader Jackie and Lynnp for the Review.

By evening, every team had finished the "Experience Path" and was sitting in the dinning room to eat. Christmas songs were playing in the background, and a few of the seaQuest crew were telling each other about their best Christmas and holiday memories.

The computer genius stabbed his fork into a potato on his plate. "If they don't change this music soon, I'm going to freak out!" The others looked at him in surprise. "These songs must be designed to get on people's nerves! It's like they have only 5 songs on the CD, and they're playing them over and over again. They always play them at mealtimes and in the elevators." When it came to music, Lucas could be very particular.

Krieg shrugged his shoulders. "I hadn't noticed."

The teenager gave Ben a look that said it all. "I thought the moral officer would notice everything."

Ben was stunned for a moment; he wished he'd kept his mouth shut. "Oh, they normally do, but I was kind of... distracted."

Miguel Oritz smiled. "Oh, so that's what they're calling it nowadays."

The CD started at the beginning again, giving Lucas a reason to come back to the original topic. "If they don't change this music soon, then I will program their computers so that they play anything BUT this music. And every computer will show an "error" message if they even just put the Christmas CD in again."

The red-haired doctor looked at the boy in shock. "You can't do that!"

The teen shrugged. "Why not?"

Westphalen hadn't expected such a quick response. "Because you just shouldn't!"

Bridger looked seriously at the boy. "You can't just mess with someone else's computers or hack into them because you suddenly feel like it, even if it is easy for you to do. You could get caught doing that and bring a lot of trouble down on you and your parents."

Lucas decided to play the rebellious teenager for a little longer. "But it's alright to hack into something for the seaQuest? That's illegal too, you know!"

The captain groaned inwardly. "There are diffrences with that kind of hacking."

"Such as?"

"For example, there's the difference between just doing it for your own entertainment and doing it to help others," explained Nathan as calmly as possible.

The computer genius said nothing and decided to return to his dinner.

After a while, everybody began to relax again and started talking about their Christmas memories. Lucas didn't take part in the discussion; he just ate in silence.

But just as before, the CD came back to the beginning again.

The teenager put his fork down. "That's it!" He stood up and took his plate in his hand.

"Where are you going?" asked Kristen.

"I'm going to put my plate away, and after that, I'm going to Grey's office."

Bridger looked at him severely. "Lucas, you just can't..." he started.

The blond boy rolled his eyes. "I didn't say that I was going to do anything to the music. I just want to go in Grey's office and take a look at his computer. After all, that's what he wanted." And with that, the teenager left the table.

The others looked after him suspiciously. He wouldn't dare... or would he?

Written November 2004 – Translated November 2005