Sunday Snippet: Jammed In

Crap. It's December. I'm not even close to being holiday-ready. Then again, it's been a really weird year. Update from last week. The youngest is negative for Covid. She's home and having fun with the dogs. The middle kiddo? Well, he ended up back in the emergency department again. The acid reducer seems to be working, but we've discovered he's got kidney stones. There might be more going on but we won't know until he follows up with a urologist. All I know is he's tired of feeling like crap. Fingers crossed we get whatever is up with him figured out.

Kind of a slow week in television. I watched several more episodes of Silent Witness. I'm almost finished with season seven. I'll start eight this upcoming week and then I'll be at the place I originally started watching the series.

Started a new episode of Blue Heelers and got about halfway through. I'll finish it up this week.

Also plan to watch Gabriel's Inferno part three and some holiday quickies from Passionflix this week. Looking forward to diving into those!

Tonight's post is from Jammed In, a novella that got a start with a writing community prompt.

Here's the mini-blurb:

A simple clean up goes awry when a junior officer mixes the wrong chemicals together, leaving senior officers, Barrie Scott and Walsh Clinton, to sort the mess out. The two ranking members have to fight their feelings when they're forced to double up and share a bunk until the contaminant is cleared.

And a sneaky peek…

Walsh took pity on Barrie. "You're looking bleary-eyed." He jerked his head toward the exit. "Go on. You can make up your ten minutes by grabbing some coffee and bringing some down to C-deck."

She gave him a quick nod. "Thank you, sir." Ducking out, she headed for the mess hall.

Walsh stopped by his office and gathered the inventory sheets for the three stations. Sometimes being the CO's son sucked. The elder Clinton often loaded Walsh down with projects because the older man trusted his son would get the job done. And, okay, Walsh always did get the job done because no one wanted the CO in a bad mood.

He snorted. "Including me." But ... the constant state of being busy meant Walsh never got a break. "At least I'll have Barrie to help out." She'd been around the old man long enough to know and appreciate the admiral's thought processes.

She'd pick up any slack Walsh might leave behind. He never had to ask. She always covered his ass.

His lips quirked. "Someday, I'll have to do something really special for her." He huffed out a breath. "And hope she accepts graciously instead of thumbing her nose at the gesture." He didn't know when she decided to get prickly about everything, but lately, she got all twitchy when he tried to give her kudos.

He made his way down several decks to meet with her in the first armament station. She waited there with two piping cups of coffee.

He took one and set the clipboard aside. "Thanks." Taking a sip, he studied her a few moments.

She raised her eyebrows. "What? Two sugars, no cream. I added the packets myself."

He shook his head. "Coffee's fine. You, I'm not sure about." He placed the cup on the shelf outside the large locked station.

She shrugged. "You know I hate morning briefings, especially after a late patrol." She waited until he keyed in the lock code then undogged the hatch so he could grab the inventory sheets.

He entered the space and bit back a sigh. Completely disorganized, the weapons and ammunition were haphazardly heaped in numerous piles, lining the deck to ceiling shelves. The new system would make finding armaments so much easier.

But it would be a—

"Gonna be a nightmare to log this crap." Barrie gave voice the thought rolling around in his head.

He grunted and turned to the last inventory sheet. "So, I'm thinking we need—"

Barrie rattled off a list. "Six crewmembers, working two per station doing a strict inventory count with you and me supervising and entering the logs to give the admiral daily updates." She tagged one of the lockers with a label. "We'll start here in each station and tag each shelf with the count to make it easier to barcode when we're through."

Walsh blinked. "Damn. Did you listen to anything I said during the briefing this morning?" She had to have been plotting all of this while he did the daily rundown.

She smirked. "Did you say something particularly spectacular and out of the ordinary?" Grabbing the clipboard, she glanced up to meet his gaze.

He chuckled. "Not really. But I might have to start if you're not gonna pay attention." He lifted his chin. "But I wouldn't change anything you've already thought of." He strode over to the comm panel and brought up the day's schedule. "You're supposed to be on detail for the monthly disinfect and cleanup in the junior officers' quarters. I'm moving you to supervisory and inspection only. I'll add Callis to the crew there." He entered the change form then turned toward her. "Who did you have in mind for the armament project?"

She gave him a list of eight names. Walsh added six and put two in reserve. He printed the information and added a breakdown for a schedule.

Carrying the sheets over to the clipboard, he added them to the inventory lists. "Let's get a schedule together."

The overhead comm system kicked in. "Captain Clinton, report to the CO. Captain Clinton report to the CO."

Barrie laughed. "His timing is scary accurate." She took the clipboard. "Go brief the admiral. I'll get a schedule together and leave it on your desk."

He gave a nod. "Great. Thank you." He started for the hatch.

Barrie quipped before he left. "I can't wait to inspect the junior officers' work." The gleam in her eye flashed with humor.

Walsh smirked. "I'll bet you can't." He exited, leaving her to put the schedule together.

He cocked his head to one side. "She definitely didn't do the prickly thing this time. Progress at last."

I'm excited about finishing this one up. I like Walsh and Barrie and they have fun with a not very fun situation.

That's it for this week. Catch everyone on the flipside.

ML Skye