Space, the grand frontier. Honestly, to any normal human, this would be a dream. It's not like it wasn't to him, it was just…well, you get a bit sick of space sometimes when you've been in it for so bloody long.
Captain Nicholas "Nick" L. Nelson of the Starship Enterprise watched the bridge around him from his current post, his gaze still on the screen every half second before diverting again, making him groan, rubbing the back of his neck in tiredness as time grew ever slower. He was slacking off and he knew it. Lucky this wouldn't be forever. The Enterprise was heading home after almost a full 12 months in space. Nick hadn't seen his family in so long and was looking forward to the break, same with most of the crew he was sure.
Given technology, most would be using Earth as a recharge spot for a few days before they moved onto their home planets for the rest of the time with a flash of light from some teleporter or travel device, physics be now fully damned.
It had certainly come along in leaps and bounds since he was a kid. He'd been a rugby player back in the UK, a star-studded pick for the draft season that had been upcoming when he was 18, but after a career-ending injury to his knee, he was left lost until Starfleet came along he managed to find his feet again, somehow. He'd busted his arse over years to become a Captain, just not the kind of captain he used to be and at the moment, it seemed to be working out. He was making money at least. he could be been something a lot worse, like a French translator for example. Thank god.
He would have let his mind wander more into the transgressions of his life and how he managed to end up here, but the sudden sound of the speaker coming to life made him pause, looking up as the automated voice announced:
"Permission to enter the bridge, Captain Nelson."
"Permission granted." He curtly replied before the doors automatically opened and in stepped Doctor Tao 'Mushu' Xu stepped through, followed by scientist Elle Argent. "Ah, Mushu, Assistant Scientist Argent, what am I owning pleasure to seeing you out of your stations?"
"It's Dr. Xu and you know it. /Dr/ Xu, not Mushu." The British-Chinese muttered with a scowl, highlighting the frown lines around his eyes and looking him up and down before reluctantly grumbling. "You seen Head Scientist Spring?"
Nick frowned back, a heated blush attempting to make its way onto his features before he cooled it down, not wanting to give off the wrong impression to the rather abrasive doctor and of course, the woman beside him. Head Scientist Charles Spring was a Vulcan, one of several different alien species that worked on the ship and he was a rather elementally smart and educated man. The way that Nick had found he even existed was that his human mother was actually from the same hometown as Nick's own mother in Herne Bay and after running into each other at the Starfleet Academy during a class, they had met on several occasions both in Starfleet and now on the ship as coworkers.
Consequently from this, they became close, the quiet and dark-haired alien both confusing and corralling Nick into analyzing the various impressions of himself over several months, coming to several revelations he hadn't shared publicly or privately. Yet.
He also was genuinely concerned for the whereabouts of Head Scientist Spring as a whole, as while the ship was not small, he usually could be found with either of the two humans in front of him, being Dr. Xu was his best friend earthside with Assistant Scientist Argent since they were all in the Academy. He had only met them at the mission's commencement.
Seeing them still looking at him, Nick cleared his thoughts quite quickly before he shook his head. "I'm sorry, but I haven't. Have you checked with Head Engineer Henderson that he isn't in Maintenance and Repair? Sometimes he goes down there and gets lost."
"No." Elle shook her head. "He hasn't been down there since Assistant Engineer Hope attacked him at the beginning of the mission, remember? He was in the med bay for a week."
Nick almost let out a sneer, his blood boiling at the very memory. Assistant Engineer Hope as well as Assistant Repairman Greene were two people he couldn't wait to see the back of. Both belligerent, entitled and racist against aliens (how they'd even made it in Starfleet was a question no one still had an answer for), they had cornered Head Scientist Spring in an engine chamber under the guise of a problem with one of the bio components and proceeded to beat him up, only stopping when Head Engineer Henderson intervened.
Nick can almost remember how fast he'd flown down to med bay after hearing about the incident on the bridge and seeing Charles's bloody body had sent him into something only described as sheer, unadulterated rage. The captain persona had left the ship for the time being and he was about to mow his way down through the ranks to the lower half of the ship in order to rip himself two assistants that would be stripped of their commands if they even made it that far when his arm was set upon by a shaky hand and he turned to see Head Engineer Spring holding onto him, a handkerchief covering the remains of a very bloody nose.
"Captain-" The pointy-eared man swallowed, green blood still dripping onto the rag across his nose as he spoke. "-they aren't worth losing your rank over. You go down there now and Starfleet will make sure all 3 of you lose your jobs. Make a report instead.
"Char-" He was about to protest, but Head Engineer Spring shook his head.
"Please-" He begged, looking him dead in his brown eyes, the rage slowly ebbing away under his skin, replaced with more concern as they seemed a paler shade of green around his bright blue irises. "Just do it. Starfleet will look upon you better if you do when we go back home to Earth and it'll be sent to the higher-ups as soon as it's entered in the ship's log. I'm sure Head Engineer Henderson, as well as Assistant Repairman Olsson and Assistant Engineer Jones, will provide testimony along with Mushu about my injuries at their hand."
"You are damn right I will provide testimony when pretty boy launches a system report, Spring-" Xu growls as he and one of his nurses continue to treat him, pushing on his chest aggressively, but gently. -now lie the fuck back down before you bust open a stitch and for the love of God, stop calling me Mushu. I'm not having that on my back for the rest of time."
That's where that conversation left off and despite his wanting to go downstairs and use the bones of the two men to fuel the engine, Nick did as he asked, even being helped by Commander Heaney, a woman under him of great intellect and even sharper tongue (he may have crushed on her once, but it had long since faded) to gather all the interviews that he'd used the system to record as well as footage up and he'd gotten a rather terse letter in about 3 days after the whole thing basically saying in not so many words that both Assistants Hope and Greene would be facing disciplinary action depending on the outcome of an investigation.
But of course, he wasn't going to tell Hope and Greene that. He'd decided to let them find out themselves when security came to arrest them once the ship landed at its docking station. He almost got more excited at seeing the looks on their faces when it did happen.
Back in the present, however, he sighed, shaking his head. "I'm sure Head Scientist Spring hasn't wandered off too far away from his department. I'll ask Commander Heaney once she returns to the bridge if she can call on Operations Commander Singh to check the CCTV system on the ship and spot him that way. For now, you both need to return to your stations as we'll be in Earth's gravitational pull soon and it might make the ship jerk."
"Of course Captain Nelson." Assistant Scientist Argent nodded before dragging a still rather annoyed Xu before he turned back to his post and clasped down on it, head hanging as he fought to remain in control of his emotions.
A captain, no matter how sentimental or how experienced he is in his job, does not show his entire emotional range in front of his crew in any size of crisis. Even if it affected him on a rather personal level. He attempted to continue monitoring the screens from his position, but almost breathed a sigh of relief as Commander Heaney appeared on the bridge, her voice easing his worry slightly as he walked over to her.
"Commander Heaney, I am in need of some assistance. It seems our Head Engineer has made himself scarce and Medical are worried about him. Could you please log a request for Operations Commander Singh to check the ship's cameras to locate him?"
Thankfully, Operations Commander Singh came through beautifully only half an hour later when she did, as the message icon was blinking on the operations log and upon opening it, he saw the text: 'Atten: Captain Nelson - Head Scientist Spring located in Conservatory.'
The conservatory? Nick furrowed his brows as he read the message once more. What in spaceship rudder was Charles doing in the conservatory? While it was a nice place to go to get away from all the hustle and bustle of the busy ship, there was scarcely anything to look at other than miles and miles worth of useless stars.
Plus, as Head Engineer, Charles could never really leave his post. The only time he had was when he was recovering and in a rather secretive lunch meeting with Nick later after being allowed to go back to it, he'd bemoaned that the entire sector was in bedlam and it would take days to fix the frankly abhorrent number of mistakes that occurred without him.
(Nick didn't tell him this, but he almost laughed. He was sure the Vulcan knew, however, given the frown as well as the bristling when Nick made a noise indicative of a snicker behind his quite meager Shepherd's Pie and chips.)
Sighing at the memory, Nick passed the controls over to Commander Heaney for the time being and exited the bridge, walking down the halls to the side of the ship which housed the conservatory and allowing himself access, walking in.
It seemed they were almost to Earth's field of gravity as, before his eyes, his home planet shined in all its glory, clouds swirling on the surface of the blue oceans and browny-green land masses awash with other colours, Nick forgetting for a moment what he'd come here to do and stepping up to the window to view it in almost awe as it slowly moved and turned.
"It's beautiful, isn't it Captain?" Nick startled, only to turn and see Head Engineer Spring beside him, almost shoulder to shoulder, his pale face illuminated by the bright light outside coming from their home. Looking around, he noticed they were thankfully alone and nodded in acknowledgment. "Charlie."
He couldn't help but smirk back when the other did, obviously also aware that they were indisposed before nodding in reciprocation. "Nick."
"Managed to get Xu and Argent a little hot under the collar I see." He had to chuckle, both turning their attention back to the view outside. "Mind telling me why you're in here?"
"I wanted to see home. It's been so long." Charlie shrugged. "I just got a little excited, as you know well. I'm guessing Tao was a little bit…snarky?"
"He was practically breathing down my neck like he wanted to eat me." Nick grumbled in return and Charlie actually laughed, his face suddenly burying itself in Nick's neck, the blonde putting an arm around the wayward engineer. "Seriously, you need much better, less wanting-to-rip-my-bullocks-off-me friends, you know that?"
"They are the best friends I've ever had, so you'll just have to deal with them."
"Mean, so bloody mean. We dance around eachother for almost 5 years with crushes on full display and then when we finally get together just before graduation, they want to kill me."
"Oh Captain, you aren't getting too jealous are you?" Charlie joked and Nick cast an evil eye down towards the slightly shorter man before he rolled his eyes and lent up to kiss the blond, pulling away only to snuggle into the crook of his body closer, their uniforms almost melding together in their different colours, badges proudly on display at their lapels as the Earth become slightly closer towards them.
"Wait till Mum finds out I'm bringing the famous Captain Nicholas L. Nelson home with me for the break and that you live like three streets away nearby. She'll practically wet herself."
"Oh god." Nick closed his eyes in horror. In his entire time on the ship, almost like he was playing rugby on the ground, he was always referred to as something, whether it be handsome or trouble or star athlete. That's how he'd always lived. Currently, given his audacity, personality and of course, his preference for executing maneuvers not exactly up to Starfleet code to get out of some hairy situations, the news earthside was toting him around headlines as the next eligible bachelor.
If only they knew. "Can we just…you know…pretend I look like I'm Captain Nicholas L. Nelson, but I'm not?"
"Nope." Charlie grinned, popping the 'p' on the end of the word. "You are going to be the famous Captain Nicholas L. Nelson from Starfleet and the most resilient ship in the world universe, The Enterprise and you are going to have to like it."
"Ugh…" Nick winced, the thought even made his stomach turn a little. "I just hope they don't have any paparazzi or worse, reporters, at the dock when we land."
"Eh, Starfleet would have chased them off by now." Charlie snickered at the growing embarrassment and teasing on Nick's part. "Plus, I might have some plans in place."
Plans? That got Nick's attention, raising an eyebrow. Spring never had plans. "Oh yeah?"
"Uh-huh." Was all Charlie said about it before the voice sung out: "All heads must return to their posts. Captain Nelson, you are required on the bridge for final landing preparation."
"I guess that's our cue." Nick sighed, but made no move to well…move, too content with Charlie at his side to just take off.
"Oh, go on you sentimental old Klingon. Go make an example out of us." Charlie grinned, sliding out of his grasp and redonning his newsboyish hat with a salute, Nick returning it. "I'll see you on the ground, Captain Nelson."
"As to you, Head Engineer Spring." Nick nodded with a grin as the Vulcan scampered off back towards the Engineering sector, smacking himself in the cheek in order to knock the grin off his face and return to stoned faced as he made his way back to the bridge. He had a job to do. Starships don't land themselves after all.
(Then again, if he had known that his glass of champagne they'd opened once they'd safely docked on the ground was rigged with a Red and that he would wake up a few hours later freshly liberated from prying eyes inside a specimen case at the airport with a travelator ticket bound for the UK, he might have reconsidered. Lucky Charlie was there waiting for him or he would have walked on that plane with no pants thanks to Tao.
He'd be a goner without him.)