A Deputy's Routine

Posted on Thu Oct 22nd, 2026 @ 12:15am by Lieutenant James Phoenix
Edited on on Thu Oct 22nd, 2026 @ 12:18am

545 words; about a 3 minute read

Mission: Creatures of the Night
Location: USS Washington
Timeline: Right before "So, You want to Command Do You?"

The past month had been quite the blur for Lieutenant Phoenix. He had been promoted and seen dragons, and there were no signs of the unique mysteries of space stopping for good. The past couple of weeks had been mostly routine for the Lieutenant. He had become used to the routine as Imik's number two; he'd actually settled into the role quite well.

In fact he had settled in so well to the role he had made the decision to make a unique request to Commander Grayson: to take the command test. Lieutenant was the minimum rank to take it, and while he wouldn't realistically need to take it for another grade or two, he wanted to get it over with since command was his aspiration for the future.

As Imik's deputy, he found himself manning tactical constantly. This was never a concern, however as a bridge officer there was always a slight sliver of chance the center chair would fall to him in an emergency scenario. It would probably never happen at this stage in his career, but with the amount drastic and intense missions the Washington faced, he didn't want to be ill prepared in an emergency. As such, he had asked Jon about the test as soon as it was possible.

Aside from studying, he had his normal duties to take care of. Right now, he stood in the center of the Washington's primary armory confirming the updated manifests and tactical inventories to give Imik. A mundane task, but an important one.

Except it was so mundane that if one wasn't 100 percent focused it was easy to space out. And today was no exception. James jumped when he heard a voice.

"Lieutenant?" a voice came.

No response.

"Lieutenant Phoenix?"

The Lieutenant jumped briefly before his gaze fell on the officer requesting his attention. A Trill. One of the new transfers in the security department. "Ah Ensign Kix. How can I help you?" He asked, trying to play off his brief loss of composure.

"I have my report from my beat today sir, requesting yours and Lieutenant Imik's signature" the young officer requested.

James took the report and glanced it over. "Thank you Ensign. I'll bring this to the Commander shortly. Anything else?"

Kix shook her head. "No sir."

"Dismissed" James said. As he watched his subordinate leave the room he spoke up, "You know Ensign, you should wear a bell around your neck. You won't startle me that way" he quipped, letting out his inner Leo McGarry.

Kix stifled her laughter as she quickly made herself scarce to avoid the Lieutenant catching that. Not that it'd bother him anyway. James found that he cared more about the job his subordinates did than focusing on formalities within reason; he didn't want the junior officers in his department worrying about how to address someone or what uniform to where in a crisis specifically. In those situations there was little to no time for that. Obviously, he didn't want them slacking off when it came to formalities, ESPECIALLY when dealing with all of the officers aboard the Washington who outranked him.

After that, James continued his reports before he was called to the conference room by Jon to begin his command test.

To be continued...

 

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