Sean's Start

[Sean Howard 0]

((OOC Note: An introduction log here. Sean will have come aboard the last time the Excalibur picked up crew and worked as the mystery man no one heard of on night shift ))

 

"You will try to enjoy yourself, won't you?" Asked Zak Howard from his seat the table.

 

"Of course, da," replied his son Sean, sitting across from him.

 

"Good. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate your drive, but you're too young to push yourself too hard. You don't have to take after your mother that much."

 

"Well he's the spitting image of you, darlin'," Deirdre commented with a smirk. "Except for the freckles, have no idea where he got those from." Sean and Zak both snorted. Deirdre may not have them herself, but the ginger genes struck again. "The least the boy can inherit from me is my work ethic," she added, and smiled at her men. "Your da is right though, boyo. I didn't turn into a workaholic until a bit later in me life. From what I've heard of that cursed Captain, he'll keep the ship in need of repairs constantly, so you'll be busy enough during your work hours not to need to bring the work home with you."

 

"I just want to make you both proud," Sean said. "I want to make me proud."

 

"You have already, a hundred times over," Zak said.

 

"If you're not proud of yourself yet, you're more of a perfectionist than I am, and that's pushing the envelope," Deirdre said. She reached over and grabbed Sean's right hand and gave it a squeeze. "Most of all be careful, Sean."

 

"I will, ma. I'm not reckless," Sean assured her. "Anyway you have too much on your plate to be worrying about me, don't you?"

 

"Another bloody power plant! I swear, you build one successfully and the rest of the universe wants you for the job forever more." Deirdre rolled her eyes.

 

"It's not an ice planet this time, my love. I've heard Avalon's lovely, actually,"

 

"Oh aye," Deirdre said. "I'm sure it will be a second honeymoon while I'm ass deep inside the reactor assembly and you're in orbit drinking coffee and looking at your numbers."

 

"My numbers?" Zak asked incredulously. "You've built a bloody conglomerate over the last quarter-century, it takes a bit of administration, which you so conveniently leave to me so you can fondle your spanner and get your hands dirty."

 

"Please stop!" Sean said before Deirdre could reply. "You can have this discussion, again, after I'm gone."

 

"Of course, darlin', I'm sorry," Deirdre said. She ruffled her son's hair. "You know your father and I argue..."

 

"Just so you can enjoy making up, I know. The walls were a lot thinner on the old ship, I heard plenty of 'making up' over the years." Sean remarked, rolling his eyes.

 

"Crap," Zak muttered, his face reddening. "I knew you were being too loud."

 

"It's the 24^th Century, Zak Howard, our son is not going to have psychological problems just because he heard us rolling in the hay when he was a boy," Deirdre said.

 

"No, but a sleepover was out of the question," Sean remarked dryly.

 

"Hah!" Deirdre exclaimed. She then rose, her short, petite frame at odds with her fiery personality. Her curly hair, still fire red thanks to chemicals, tumbled around her son as she walked over and gave him a big squeezing hug.

 

"Come on me boyo, I've got a present for you before we get there," she said, leading him out into the living area. A small box sat wrapped prettily on the low coffee table. "Go on."

 

"All right, ma." Sean stooped to grab the present, brought it up and started carefully unwrapping it."

 

"You'd think a replicator wasn't able to spit out more wrapping paper, the way you two peel it open like it's precious latinum," Deirdre remarked toward her husband who'd joined her, wrapping an arm around his wife's narrow waist.

 

"Shush, Dee."

 

When Sean finally unwrapped the box and pulled off the lid he saw a gleaming copper armlet, and a pair of matching earrings. Each was festooned with an emerald inside a triskeles, which was nestled inside a looping serpent. Outside of which was an ornately carved Celtic knot running the length of the piece. It was the design of the Ferguson clan, his mother's long-standing Irish ancestors. He looked back at her. She stood there, smiling, in a snug sleeveless tee, her own armlet worn above her elbow.

 

"You've always admired mine, darlin'," she said. "I could have just replicated on for you long ago but I wanted to get one done right, the old-fashioned way. Your father thought of the earrings though, the way you constantly wear the bloody things in that ear of yours."

 

"Thank you ma, da." He walked over gave them both a hug. Then he clamped the armlet over his right arm, just below the elbow. Swapped his plain gold earring loops with the new. "That'll take some getting used to," he commented to no in particular. They were quite a bit heavier than his usual choice.

 

"Now remember Sean we'll be here at Avalon for at least two months," Zak said. "After that we pop back through the wormhole for an aqueduct project on Bajor. Then..."

 

"For the love my sanity, Zak!" Deirdre exclaimed. "We have him the bloody itinerary and the boy does know how to read." She turned back to Sean. "What your father is trying to say is: make sure you check where we're at before you send a comm, no point in having some poor computer somewhere bounce the signal across half the galaxy trying to find us."

 

"Of course, ma. It's no different than when I was back at the Academy, except I'll be moving too this time," Sean said.

 

The communications array signaled an incoming call from CnC. Deirdre activated it with a voice command.

 

"Good morning, Mr. and Mrs. Howard," said the grizzled old man who popped up on the display, nodding to Zak and Deirdre. "Mr. Howard," he added, nodding to Sean. "We've arrived at Camelot."

 

"Thank you Deke," Sean said. "Give me five and I'll be on the pad."

 

"Will do, son. Good luck and safe travels to you," Deke said.

 

"Same to you. Oh, and keep my parents in line, would you?" Sean smiled as the response to that last request was hilarious laughter before the call was ended.

 

"You'd think I'd be used to sending you off," Zak said. He gripped his son's shoulder. "But I'm not. Dammit boy, keep yourself safe."

 

"I will da."

 

The Howards shared one last group bear hug before Sean made his way toward the transporter room where his duffel bags already sat waiting for him. He transported off the Thunderbird onto the station.

 

***

 

He spent the night at Camelot while his parents moved on to the nearby planet to begin the power plant project. The next day he was able to transfer onto the Excalibur after it arrived. After going around with the quartermaster in regards to his quarters, he moved in and greeted his roommates. The joys of being a junior officer.

 

He reported to sickbay, got his obligatory workup, was cleared for duties. His orders had him report directly to the night shift duty watch officer rather than the Chief. He did so, got his orders with barely a howdy from the man.

 

The hardest part the first few days was adjusting to the new late schedule. He wasn't a night owl by nature, in fact he was the only one of his roommates, or nearly the entire dormitory, back at the Academy that enjoyed the sight of a sunrise.

 

He worked in pleasant anonymity after the Excalibur set out on its next mission. One no one had bothered to inform him of, so he wondered if it was something top secret or if nobody felt the need for the night crew to know so long as the night-walkers didn't blow up the ship while they were sleeping.

 

Sean wasn't a very social creature, he'd spent almost all of his childhood learning as he rode along with his parents, schooled remotely through subspace communications during the day and the extra courses at night. When he wasn't doing that, he did simple jobs and learning the trade hands-on for his mother's company, McGowan Engineering Services.

 

Even when they moved back to Dublin so that he could attend high school in a more settled, formal way the routine continued mostly intact. The only change was playing football, as a left back but mostly on the sidelines, during his time there. Of course he was the youngest of his classmates, so they often saw him as the freakish interloper. There weren't many hands extended in friendship anyway.

 

He'd yet to see anyone ranked above lieutenant so far. He could just as easily be working on a remote sensor outpost as quiet and low-key as everything was. The traveling portion of any mission, he figured, wouldn't be the most exciting. Not that he wanted excitement. Like any good engineer he was happiest when something wasn't breaking parts of the ship.

 

The most difficult thing he'd needed to deal with so far was uploading a new firmware image to a wiped tricorder, and that of course was easy enough for a five year old to do. He wasn't exactly feeling challenged while on duty, and mostly looked forward to going off duty so he could work on his remote classwork.

 

All good things must come to an end, though. He'd be busy soon enough.