Shuffling berths

Posted on Sat May 6th, 2023 @ 7:42am by Chief Petty Officer James Calmara

Mission: The Archan Job
Location: Dock Control

Staring at the display board of the starbases docking berths and layouts, James Calmara let out a slight sigh, the last few days had been quite busy, with the starbase operating very close to capacity as far a berth space went, at present he had two active spaces, kept for urgent short notice docks. He sipped flavored water from his mug, at the urging of the medical officers, he was making a conscious effort to hydrate and take a little better care of himself, he smiled as he recalled the duty doctors council, ‘advances in medical technology are supposed to complement self-care programs not replace. Still a warmer drink would be better received right now, his train of thought was broken when a petty officer called across for his attention.

“Boss, The refit team has just come back with a ready report for the ‘Helvellyn’ she’s good to go.”

“Perfect, get on to the poor sod standing watch and have them pass up the chain the ship can depart when ready.” He paused glancing at the time readout in the top right corner. “Out of interest, when was the scheduled departure?”

“Oh-Eight-Hundred, tomorrow.” Came back a short reply, the officer continued speaking, but into the now active comm line with said vessels watch officer, rather than James. He pulled a face, it was now just after eighteen hundred, as much as he would have wanted the berth, getting a ship underway at this point was going to take a few hours to the point where it probably wasn't worth it. Besides, if he were of that crew and expecting to be on leave that evening he would have made sure he was among the last on board. Deciding to let things stand, he elected to take a look at the progress of other repair, resupply or refit jobs being undertaken, have some sort of plan in place for the next few days he and the duty dockmasters could follow.

He turned to go just as two alerts flashed onto an adjacent screen, two more ships listed as inbound and critical. The first, a civilian vessel transporting refugees, the second was a Steamrunner-class that had taken severe damage to its deflector, enough to need starbase support to repair. Both could not be turned away, but would put the base at capacity.

Looking across the board for where he could make space, his eyes settled on the elephant in his docking area, the bloody merchantman-ship that was tied up in legal tape and one no-one seemed to have an interest in. Now he finally had an excuse to move that off the active dock berths and into reserve berths, these were usually kept to to hold starfleet reserve ships, among others. But this was one instance he could make an exception, and bypass some of the legal requirements for moving said vessel.

“Petty Officer Kar’mlan, get a hold of the Flight Ops duty officer, put in a urgent request for a pair of shuttles and crew for an in base reposition.” He said calmly, after touching the communications panel on the screen in front of him, the system picked up the person he was addressing and activated a voice link. ‘Will do.’