Baen's No Good, Very Bad Breakfast
Posted on Wed Aug 3rd, 2022 @ 5:35am by Lieutenant Commander Asahi Kita & Chief Petty Officer Baen Sloane
Mission:
Between Realities
Location: Multiple
866 words - 1.7 OF Standard Post Measure
It seemed like it would have been a normal day when Baen awoke this morning. Even when he hopped out of bed to the ever-so-gentle Hojo barks, to which he greeted with a treat and a head pats. The dog came with a small device, containing a packet of information which Baen knew to hold his day's itinerary. Of all the intelligence chiefs he worked under, Asahi Kita had to have been one of the most bizarre.
And yet, the Lieutenant's idiosyncrasies were still considered normal for him. So he took the device, plugged it into his woefully under-updated PaDD, and the itinerary scrolled up. At least the Lieutenant cared about his crewmembers' sanity, as illustrated by the numerous break reminders added throughout the document.
But, this was still normal. Even when Hojo trotted off, leading a small hovering robot full of similar-looking small devices, Baen thought very little of what could be awaiting him past his room.
After appealing to the grumbles of his roommate, a late-shift scientist who seemed to have a dog allergy as well as an allergy to being rudely awoken, Baen dressed himself and left the room to make his way to the mess hall.
Entering the mess for Baen was met with what would be the first hint that his day was a little... odd. Sitting atop one of the tables was a reptilian creature, about the size of a large cat. It perked on it's hind legs as one of the crew members at the table made an attempt to remove the tray it was eating from away from it.
"Man, science must be experimenting with some real fossils lately," Baen murmured to himself, moving toward the replicators as the chaos erupted behind him. First the tremors earlier, now this? Maybe he should have gotten out more.
"Hey, what's with this thing?"
Baen tilted his head to the side as the replicator in front of him began to make his breakfast. Sure enough, standing nearby was his short-statured Lieutenant, wearing a uniform he had never seen before. "... The replicator, Sir?"
"Yeah, the replicator. You'd think in this day and age it'd be able to make an actual coconut."
"A..." Baen looked over at the Lieutenant's screen. Sure enough, there were options for coconut-related food and drink, but nothing for an actual coconut. "... Sir, why do you need a coconut?"
"To feed Ellie with."
Resolving that this was yet another of the Lieutenant's potentially hair-brained, mission-related schemes, Baen shook his head. "Did you try looking under raw foods, Sir?"
There was a pause, and after Asahi scratched his head, he tapped the buttons on the screen and grinned, "Thanks kid. Now Ellie can stop terrorizing those nurses." He turned, whistling toward the reptile on the table. The creature immediately zipped to his side, bouncing around his feet. Now that the creature was closer to Baen, he could make out the feathers under it's arms. "Lemmie get this from the replicator and we'll have something to snack on while we figure out where we are, El."
Or maybe this wasn't a normal mission scheme. Baen tilted his head to one side. "Sir, are you alright?"
"Yeah!" Asahi turned back to Baen as he pulled out a freshly replicated coconut, "Never better, especially now that we're out of that hell hole of a jungle. Hey, you can help me out here, can't you?"
"Sir, I-"
"You're Intel, which means you know about all the timey wimey shit, right?"
"Sir, that's not how that works-"
"Don't Sir me, that's creepy. It's Asahi."
"I know that, Sir." Baen paused. "... Sir, are you sure you didn't get hit on the head or something?"
"I'm sure I'm sure, but you do bring up a good point. I should go to the Doc and make sure I'm not carrying any weird prehistoric diseases or something. El too... I wonder if Bellie got zapped with us, she was pretty close."
"B-bellie?"
"Yeah, El's a velociraptor - I think, I'd have to ask a scientist or something - and Bel's a Deinonychus. We bonded while I was in the uh... whatever era." Asahi waved a hand, turning toward the small dinosaur, "This nice petty officer is gonna make sure we get to the doctor and update us on all the tech we've got here - when are we by the way?" Asahi looked about. "Judging by the replicators and the look of the mess, I'd say 24th century?" He grinned, eyes back to Baen. "How spot on am I?"
"Sir, I-"
"AH!"
"Asahi, I really think you need to see a doctor."
"And I will. We will." He gestured to the small creature next to him. "Once we get some food in us. So, unless you want El here to make a snack out of your leg, you'll let us do that - looks like you were gonna too, so we can get two things done at once."
Baen frowned. He couldn't help but wonder what would have happened if he had just stayed in bed and feigned illness today.
Or if he hadn't woken up, if the situation was going to be any worse.
