Luck Be A Lady

Posted on Wed Sep 2nd, 2020 @ 5:50pm by Lieutenant Bonnie "Bon-Bon" Durnell

Mission: Welcome Aboard!
Location: Enroute to Starbase 234
Timeline: Current

Roughly an hour passed and Bonnie relished the concept that her day and her mini adventure were nearing an end. Her mind dwelled on what she considered to be her misfortune or bad luck that seemed to follow wherever she went. It was a subject she knew all too well. Since she was very little, rarely had a day gone by when things would go as planned. Quite the contrary in fact as sometimes it seemed the more she planned things out, the more those plans fell to disorder and chaos.

Cody stirred, again. In the past hour, Bonnie had documented 7 rotations, 2 scratching sessions, 3 snoring events, and at least 1 unworldly emission. He was vulgar. He was repulsive. So then how did she find him so charming? He scratched as he abruptly sat up, smacking his lips. "I could use a drink."

He turned and opened a cabinet on his left marked ALCO, paused for a moment as he internally questioned which bottle to pull out, then grabbed one marked Lager and looked brown. It was cool to the touch but not chilled, not quite as it should be.

Her voice brought him back, as she eyed him over the edge of her tablet, "Is that real alcohol?" Of course, it was. Everything about Cody screamed alcohol for breakfast.

"Yeah, what of it? Want a sip?" He held it out to her but she shook her head no. " Suit yourself." Then he popped the top and took a long deep swig. It was warm. He eyed the bottle then looked at Bonnie with a perplexed expression, then back to his bottle.

The consol flickered and Bonnie noticed. "On approach to the system. Starbase 234 in communications range." She announced.

He perked up and moved into the pilot's seat. Scanning the readout he noted "Earlier than I expected." Then he added, "Must be our lucky day."

She eyed him with a questioning look as the tiny shuttle dropped out of warp. There were several ships docked as well as many other cargo ships moving through the area. "How do you figure?" Her sense of self-doubt was fully engaged.

"We made it here didn't we and in one piece too." He was a little too surprised by that fact for her comfort.

She shrugged and looked out the window towards the ships circling the starbase. "It's just that bad luck and I are old companions and this trip," she paused and looked at him sipping his warm beer. "has so far been less than ideal."

He scoffed, "Ideal? For me this trip has been a blessing." He entered coordinates into the console and Debbie began movement towards the Starbase. "Besides what good is a journey without a little adventure, huh?" He was eyeing her in her self doubt.

"Listen I'm no guru or anything but, you're just not seeing both sides of the coin. So you ended up in Fresno, you still got a ride, and with The Cody no less." He gave a smug shoulder roll and showed a grin the size of a large steak. Where there is bad luck there is often good luck. It's about perspective."

She gave a half-hearted grin. "The only flaw in your logic is that I am always the tails side of the coin."

“You’re not part Vulcan are you?” He asked, smiling. If she had a bar of latinum for every time she’d heard that line.

She looked back out the window. "I don't see the Liberty anywhere. She's supposed to be here right?"

Cody activated his comms channel. "Hold on we will find out, got to report in any way." The comms tweeted and beeped for a second like an old radio transmitter. "Little Debbie to Starbase 234 I have a passenger to deliver to U. S. S. Liberty, request flight clearance and verification of coordinates."

What he got back was far from regulation Starfleet. “Cody Devilrall how dare you show up here, of all places!” The voice on the other end was female and she seemed a tad perturbed.

Cody seemed to recognize the voice. Amused Bonnie asked, “Is this one of those women who love The Cody?” She put The Cody in air quotes.

“Maybe,” he replied with a shrug of his shoulders. “Amber is that you darlin’?”

“Amber? Who the Hell is Amber? This is Lucy! Three dates, two holo movies, a goodnight kiss, come meet my parents no-show Cody, LUCY! Remember now?”

Cody looked at Bonnie, “Nope. Not a fan of The Cody, never heard of her really.” He flat out lied with that smug grin of his. “Listen, Lucy is it? I’ve got a passenger here for the Liberty if you could just tell me where to go, that’d be grand.”

“I'll tell you where to go! You can go straight to Hell Cody Devilrall.”

Bonnie stifled a small snigger. Then she addressed Lucy, “Miss, for the sake of both our jobs, could you please give us the coordinates for the Liberty?”

There was a pause. Cody sipped his beer. Then stared at a new flashing red light on his console. For a moment there was silence. Then an audible alarm cut through, a loud thoughtless alarm. “Why is there an alarm Debbie? And why is my beer warm?” He looked at Bonnie. “What did you do?”

Bonnie shrugged, feeling a weight of personal guilt wash over her. “I rerouted the warp coolant from a non-essential system, that’s all.”

“Non-essential system! That’s me beer you’re talking about.” His eyes then went large. “Rerouted ya say? So when we shut down the drive, the system was flooded with extra coolant? So now shes got too much pressure building in the core?”

Bonnie understood what she had done. There was just the right pressure balance before, now with the beer cooler shunted off, there was too much coolant pressure in the warp core, and it was building. “Don’t worry I can fix this.” She reached for the console, but it sparked. Then behind them, a junction conduit blew spraying plasma.

Cody reacted, “Shuttle Debbie to Starbase 234, emergency transport, two to beam out. We are 30 seconds from a warp core breach.”

As they began to disappear Bonnie looked at Cody and just said “Tails.”

They reappeared in a transport chamber with large windows. Just outside the window, the tiny shuttle Debbie exploded in a tiny fireball. Cody fell to the floor and began to cry aloud.

Still feeling bad, Bonnie added salt to the wound. “So guru, what were you saying about luck?”

TBC