Keeping Engineering on their toes.
Posted on 17 Jul 2026 @ 1:51pm by Master Chief Petty Officer Harrison Madrie
734 words; about a 4 minute read
Mission:
General Sim Postings
Location: USS Tomcat’s auxiliary maintenance bays
ON:
Harrison Madrie had learned a long time ago that boredom was more dangerous than any enemy fighter.
Enemies were predictable.
Boredom gave him ideas.
Which was exactly how he ended up in one of the USS Tomcat’s auxiliary maintenance bays at an hour when most reasonable officers were either asleep or pretending they weren’t checking tomorrow’s duty roster.
The bay lights hummed overhead as Harrison sat beneath the open access panel of an old training shuttlecraft, a mug of coffee forgotten beside him. The coffee had long since gone cold, but that was irrelevant. It was mostly there for tradition.
The shuttle was not broken.
Not really.
It just had "personality."
At least, that was Harrison’s professional assessment.
He tightened the final connector, leaned back, and studied his work with a critical squint.
"There," he muttered. "Now you're only mildly unsafe."
A pause.
He looked around the empty bay.
"Which, honestly, is an improvement."
A faint smirk crossed his face.
The shuttle’s systems were not supposed to be modified beyond training specifications. The engineering department had made that extremely clear. The flight operations department had made that extremely clear.
The fact that Harrison had ignored both was merely a technicality.
He wasn't modifying weapons.
He wasn't overclocking engines.
He was simply improving the responsiveness of the maneuvering thrusters for a "more authentic flight experience."
At least, that was the explanation he had prepared if anyone asked.
Which they probably would.
Because Harrison Madrie had a talent for making people ask questions.
He climbed out from beneath the panel and stretched, his compact frame moving with the practiced efficiency of someone who had spent most of his life adapting to different gravity environments. His shoulders still carried the tension of someone who rarely allowed himself to relax completely.
The faint scar over his eyebrow pulled slightly as he frowned at the shuttle.
Something about the quiet bothered him.
Too quiet.
The kind of quiet that left room for memories.
The kind that reminded him of empty corridors on Gagarin's Reach. Of the weightlessness after losing his parents. Of learning far too young that space did not care how much someone had already lost.
His expression hardened for a moment before he pushed the thought away.
Not tonight.
Tonight was supposed to be fun.
And Harrison Madrie had a very specific definition of fun.
A challenge.
A little danger.
Preferably something that required a helmet.
He pulled himself up into the pilot's seat and powered on the simulator interface. The display flickered to life, bringing up a series of increasingly difficult zero-G maneuvering exercises.
The first run was routine.
The second was difficult.
The third was completely unnecessary.
By the fifth attempt, the shuttle was spinning through a simulated asteroid field with maneuvers that would have made most instructors visibly uncomfortable.
Harrison leaned into the controls, a grin slowly appearing.
"Come on," he whispered to the simulator. "You can do better than that."
The computer responded with an alert.
**PILOT MANEUVER EXCEEDS RECOMMENDED PARAMETERS.**
Harrison glanced at it.
"That's just a suggestion."
Another warning.
**STRUCTURAL STRESS APPROACHING LIMITS.**
He shrugged.
"See? Still below the limit."
A pause.
"Technically."
The shuttle completed the maneuver perfectly.
Harrison sat back, breathing out a quiet laugh.
For a brief moment, he wasn't the officer with disciplinary notes attached to his record.
He wasn't the kid who lost everything on Mars.
He wasn't the pilot everyone worried would eventually push too far.
He was just Harrison Madrie.
A pilot.
A tinkerer.
A man who still loved flying.
The hatch opened behind him, and he immediately looked over his shoulder.
"If this is about the unauthorized simulator modifications," he said before anyone could speak, "I would like to remind you that technically I haven't been unauthorized yet because nobody told me no."
A beat.
Then the familiar dry smirk returned.
"Besides, the shuttle is flying better."
He glanced back at the display.
"Mostly."
With that, Harrison reached for his coffee, took a sip, and immediately regretted it.
"Cold."
He stared at the mug.
"Tragic."
The smallest smile appeared.
"Good thing I know how to fix things."
And with that, Master Chief Petty Officer Harrison Madrie went back to doing what he did best.
Finding trouble.
Improving things that didn't need improvement.
And somehow making the USS Tomcat just a little more interesting because he was aboard.
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