Peel Post - Engineering Fascination

Posted on Thu Jun 18th, 2026 @ 7:28pm by Lieutenant Marcus Flannery

Mission: SHAKE DOWN IN A NEBULA
Location: S/M: A New Hope
Timeline: Stardate: 79916.7

::ON::

~ New Hope Colony ~

Lieutenant Markus Flannery materialized aboard the Colony at the designated beam-in coordinates. Looking around he saw a rather attractive female walking towards him, hair up, dirt on her face and hands dressed in coveralls having a rag hanging out her back pocket.

Approaching seeing Marcus she smiled "You must be Lieutenant Flannery, I'm Chief Nora White....welcome to New Hope" she commented with a smile while extending her hand.

Shaking her hand "Nice to meet you Chief, and yes I'm Flannery but you can call just me Marcus" Looking around "This quite some place" he replied with a grin.

With a slight chuckle "Sure and you can call me Nora if you with. You haven't seen anything yet.....Please come with me and I'll give you the Industrial/Fabrication grand tour" Nora commented as the two headed towards their destination.

Walking along Nora inquired "So you're the Chief Engineer aboard the USS Peel?.....excuse me but you seem kind of young for that position."

Marcus chuckled at her statement "I'm older than I look.....I'm thirty nine" he replied "And speaking of age....you don't look all that old yourself to be running your department."

Nora grinned "Aren't you the charmer.....I'm forty two; although sometimes I feel older depending on the day I've had. Anyway here we are at our first stop....Module 4 - Deck 2 - Fabrication area. Here we can do 3D metal printing as well as Industrial Replicating. Basically we can produce any part needed to keep this Colony running. So...what do you think."

Marcus' head was on a swivel as he tried to take in everything all at once. The area looked very industrial with metal decking for the floor, large machines aligned in rows, and power conduits running on top of the floor "This place is amazing.....I could only hope to have a setup on the ship like this. I do have a large replicator for making larger parts but nothing to this extent" he replied.

"The whole concept was to make this deep space habitat as self sufficient as possible and I think they did a good job in that respect" Nora responded "Ready to see more; we'll grab the lift and go to deck 3." Exiting the lift they walked into another industrial looking area "Here we can fabricate any tool you could possibly ever need" Nora explained as they started walking around.

"This place is nuts! I've never seen anything like this before....I'd be spending all my off duty time in a place like this" Marcus relied with a chuckle.

"The nice feature of this place is anything that is remotely dangerous is handled by robots arms which really cuts down on injuries" Nora explained " Now we'll grab a lift and go to deck 4 which is our power distribution area,"

Once on deck 4 they walked into the Energy Distribution area. Turning facing Marcus "This is where we monitor and distribute all power to all different areas on the Colony" as they walked in "Watch your step we have power conduits running all over."

"With all theses conduits running everywhere at least it has to be easier to get at and replace if ever needed" Marcus observed.

"That's my thought exactly. The Governor had suggested to add another floor over all these conduits but I disagreed and so far have won out" Nora explained.

"That would definitely be a mistake.....it's so much easier to have this type of setup" Marcus replied with a grin.

"We have one more stop if you'll come with me" as Nora led the way.

Walking to the last area "This is our reactor that powers the entire colony with support systems. This is the area I watch and keep track of the most. If this ever failed it would be catastrophic for us....that is my biggest fear" Nora stated.

"As long as you stick to a regular maintenance routine I doubt that would be an issue. I have the same situation on the ship.....if anything goes wrong with the warp core we'd find ourselves in a similar situation.....that's why I make sure we stick to a rigid maintenance routine....that and I like my job" Marcus responded with a grin.

"I hear you there and yes I'm a real stickler for following a rigid routine for much the same reasons. That's the tour and I hope you found it worthwhile .....one Chief to another" Nora replied with a smile "If you have the time would you like to grab something to eat while you're here?"

"Yes, I'd like that" he answered as they made their way to the Mess Hall. Grabbing their meals they went and sat. Trying the food Marcus looked up "This isn't replicated is it.... it tastes too good."

"No all our food here is freshly grown and harvested right here on the Colony. Module 2 has four decks devoted to food production to keep us as independent as possible not having to rely on outside sources so we eat very well which tends to keep the population quite healthy" Nora explained with a smile.

The two Chiefs and sat talking for awhile before Nora commented "It was very nice to meet you Lieutenant but duty calls so I should get back to it" as she stood.

Standing was well "It was nice to meet you Chief and thank you for such an interesting and educational day" Marcus answered almost wishing the day didn't have to end. Walking out of the mess hall Nora headed back to her duties as Marcus tapped his comm "Peel this is Flannery.....I'm ready to return" as he vanished from sight.

::OFF::

Lieutenant Marcus Flannery
Chief Engineering Officer
USS Peel
NCC-71015

Nora White
Chief of Industrial Fabrication &
Power Distribution
New Hope Colony