Lt. Cmdr. (?) Jason Smegg - "A question of rank"
Blue Dwarf
Captain's office
A day or so before landing on the station
Commander Nipels walked into the Captain's office. "Sir, I have something
I wish to discuss with you."
"All right," the Captain said, "but make it quick, 'Robot Wars' comes on
in 15 minutes."
Nipels shook his head in disgust, the captain of a huge mining starship
couldn't even remember how to use the VCR. "Well sir, it's about the
promotions you gave out last week. While I don't intend to question your
authority as captain," (he grimaced) "I do believe that I was left out."
"Please continue," the Captain said.
"Well sir, I have been just as instrumental on board this ship as anyone
else, and I am especially concerned about young Mr. Smegg. While he is a
fine crewman, I'm concerned that at this rate in a few months he will be
ordering me around! No offense, sir."
"You have a good point there, Commander," the Captain said, scratching
his chin. "In fact, I was just thinking of that myself. That's why I
decided to give you an honorary promotion to a new rank I made up. I'd
give you a 'real' promotion but the only position I could promote you to
would be captain, and, well, we can't have two captains on a ship, even
one of this size - just look at the 2000 US presidential election!" He
chuckled.
"Thank you, sir."
"So here you go. You are now a Commander Emeritus. Congratulations!" He
handed Nipels a plaque.
Nipels looked at the plaque.
"COMMANDER C. MORE NIPPLES
in commendation of his exceptional Dedication to the Service of the Space
Corps
is hereby awarded the rank of
COMMANDER DMERITUS"
"Uh, thanks," Nipels mumbled, leaving the office.
After Nipels left, the Captain looked at his word-processor software.
"Whoops! I forgot to run spellcheck on that danged last line!"
--------------------
Planet Vega 22
Jungle Sector Gamma
2 days or so after landing on the station
Smegg took the shuttle in for a landing, hoping to meet up with the rest
of the Blue Dwarf paintball team. He hoped he wasn't late; it had taken
forever to procure a shuttle to get down to the planet, and the shuttle
he'd got just happened to have its drives broken. But after two sleepless
days he'd finally arrived. He looked around for the Visiting Team base;
then found it off to the left amidst a cluster of trees. Pulling the
shuttle over, he noticed the rest of the team waiting for him.
No, wait, they weren't waiting for him. They were shooting at him! Why
would they be doing that? The flimsy shuttle rocked with small-arms fire
for a few seconds; then Major Harris, who was standing right in front of
the shuttle, fired a bazookoid at the windshield.
Smegg ducked for cover instinctively under the pilot's chair, knowing it
would be useless; but a few seconds later he realized he was still alive.
He stood up, looked around, and noticed a big blue splotch of paint all
over the shuttle's windshield.
He opened the hatch and shouted out over the loud hum of the hovering
thrusters, "HEY GUYS!!! WHY YOU SHOOTING AT ME???"
Harris shouted back, "OOPS, SORRY!!! WE THOUGHT YOU WERE THE ENEMY!!! WE
STARTED THE GAME THREE HOURS AGO!!! NOW GET OUT OF HERE BEFORE THE REAL
ENEMY FINDS OUT WHERE WE"RE AT!!!"
So he was late for the game. Closing the hatch, Smegg started the shuttle
on a course back to the station. Just then he saw some military troopers
ambushing the base firing green paint in precisely aimed packets. Smegg
had a green shuttle. No wonder the Dwarfers been firing at him!
But if they ever hid behind a tree that was really a tame Polymorph on
the opposing team... Nah, he thought, I'd be just as scared!
--------------------
Space
The final frontier
No, really, Smegg's borrowed shuttle
10 minutes later
Smegg decided to check his messages. He hadn't done that in the two days
he'd been trying to find the paintball team. He pulled out his
communicator and hit the "Read" button.
The communicator said, "You have two messages in mailbox 1. Message one.
Sunday, 12 AM." (Damn! The clock battery had died again.) "Hello, this is
SUPER ENG- uh, Steev. We're gonna have fun playing paintball here. I
invented a new rapid fire paint gun using some of the dimensional portal
technology. This is really cool! Uh, this is really cool, sir!" (Delete.)
"Message two. Sunday, 12 AM. Lieutenant Commander Smegg, this is the
Captain speaking. It appears I have made an error regarding your
promotion. According to Space Corps Directive 99376, you are too young to
be promoted to the rank of Lieutenant Commander. However, due to your
exceptional dedication to the service of the Space Corps, I am able to
award you the honorary rank of Lieutenant Emeritus. I'm sorry for the
disappointment, but the rules are the rules. Captain Cannon out. snork
snork kachoo HEY! Where's the off button! Does anyone realize how
uncaptainlike that sounds? I had to hold that sneeze for 30 WHOLE
SECONDS! Hello??? Isn't there anyone here who can stop this recorder
thing?"
The captain went on rambling for 10 more minutes until the memory
capacity of the communicator ran out. Smegg thought, how many messages
did I miss because of that buffoon? He'd have to check back on the ship
where all the messages were stored.
And one more thing - according to his handy-dandy Portable Book o' Space
Corps Directives, number 99376 said absolutely NOTHING about age
requirements for the rank of Lieutenant Commander. He read the full text
of the directive out of the manual:
"I. Be it so resolved that any Applicant to the Space Corps Academy who
is currently or has priorly been a member of the Boy Scouts of America,
Britain, Armenia, Slovakia, Antarctica, or any other nation, country,
state, municipality, or planetoid, shall be required to take ten (10)
mandatory Credit-Hours of Diversity Training in the Space Corps Academy,
in order to remove all Biases against human beings, GELFs, unidentified
aliens, or other beings of the homosexual, bisexual, transvestite,
Wiccan, or other maligned persuasions.
II. This Directive shall be passed with the consent of two-thirds (66.6
repeating percent (%)) of the Space Corps Board of Directors, and
two-thirds (66.6 repeating percent (%)) of the High Admiralty.
III. The phrase "66.6 repeating" (q.v. section II) is not at all intended
to reflect upon Satan, Lucifer, the Devil, Mephistopheles, or any other
creature of the demonic persuasion.
IV. Not to malign those of the demonic persuasion or their worshippers,
followers, minions, or otherwise obviously brainwashed total SMEGHEADS
who are actually stupid enough to follow them.
V. Whoops, did we actually say that?"
Still, Smegg thought, being "demoted" wasn't such a bad idea. He thought
of having to command the ship if Cannon, Nipels, and all the Lieutenant
Commanders in the Command track were away or killed. Nah, what are the
odds of that happening? Besides, he'd probably make a better commander
than Cannon, at least. Time for an appeal! Perhaps. After he got some
sleep.
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