Check Anyway

Posted on Sat Jul 25th, 2020 @ 6:41am by Lieutenant Ronan St. Cyr M.D.

379 words; about a 2 minute read

Mission: To catch a thief
Location: Office of the CMO
Timeline: 30th March 2395

There had been a doctor. What was his name? Something with an -ing on the end. B ... Banning. That was it. Dr. Banning. Watery blue eyes that looked perpetually widened as though everything came as a complete surprise to him. Smart though with the kind of wisdom that comes from a hard life. Assume efficiency ... but check anyway.

There had been that talk at the Academy about how they were not to be mistrustful of each other as officers and members of Starfleet. How they were to start from a basis of trust. Work was performed. Reports written. The lecture had been delivered to a room full of doctors coming off twenty-four hours on shift. He had been neat and tidy, they were all sprawled in their seats, smothering yawns, still in scrubs and lab coats. At the time he'd been more concerned with the prospect of getting some sleep than any trust issues he might have had concerning the work of other Starfleet officers.

Still, something had penetrated. There had been a rousing discussion on the top later on which was when Banning who, like everyone else, had dark circles under his eyes. Medical school was not for the faint of heart. That's when Banning had come up with the first of the axioms they lived by.

Assume efficiency ... but check anyway.

What happened from this point forward was his responsibility. It would take a couple of hours to do the inventory checks but there was a replicator for hot coffee and music to keep him company. With everyone released to shore leave, Sickbay was empty. That had been another of Banning's truisms. The best hospital is an empty one.

Out of long habit, he shrugged into a lab coat and started the inventory that had two goals, independent verification, and an understanding of what they had and where it was located. His version of settling in to the job. He wasn't big on personalizing his desk because that wasn't where he worked. Unless the job called for it, his office would be the last place anyone would look for him.

Just the nature of the job. He ordered a cup of coffee from the replicator and got to work. The doctor, as they sometimes said, was in.

 

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