“Who were you speaking to, captain?”

Luke jumps, startled out of his brooding, and fumbles the headset.

Clark bends down and grabs it, dumping it back in the box easily before settling against the desk.

“Captain Whim, corporal,” Luke stresses the corporal heavily, and tilts his chair back so he can look the taller man in the eye without cracking his neck in half. “Why?”

“Well, I leave for a five minute bathroom break and come back to find you scowling at my desk. I’m understandably confused, I think.”

“How tragic for you.” Luke stands, scraping the chair against the floor, somewhat unnecessarily, and saunters out. There’s a bit of indignation in his step, because how can Clark even begin to think it’s his place to question him over something such as this? He kicks the door shut, and stomps down the hallway; so what if he’s throwing a tantrum, why the hell shouldn’t he? Because people seem to have forgotten that he’s a Fleet captain, not a corporal, not a cadet, and they need to treat him as such.

His mental tirade is brought to an early conclusion as the ship lurches to the left. Luke stops, waits out the erratic movement, and sets for the top deck. They launched at least two hours ago now, so no way are they still low enough for their movement to have smoothed out. They were out of the storm over Abevri within twenty minutes, the disturbance apparently quite localized, and he couldn’t sense another within fifty miles of their current position, so someone must have messed with the course settings. He takes the stairs two at a time, wondering exactly when his crew decided he was just a figurehead, not really to be obeyed.

“Lane! What the hell is go—”

This time, he’s interrupted by a ton of water falling on his head.

“What the fuck!?”

“Captain? Is that you?”

“Lane! Where are you?”

“Top deck, sir.”

Luke struggles across the deck, and it’s a near thing, but he hauls himself up to the bow, where Lane is prodding a glass sphere, tongue between his teeth. “What’s going on out here lieutenant?”

“I was hoping you could tell me, captain. Aren’t you weather?”

“The storm isn’t registering, Lane. It’s like it doesn’t exist. Which… is awkward. Speaking of, why haven’t you shifted the shield sphere?”

“I am. Nothing’s happening.”

“So far,” Luke says, pausing to glare up at the sky. “I really hate this week.”

Previous: Scene 2-II

Scene 2-III

Next: Scene 2-IV