Not Mine, Never Mine, Usual Disclaimers.

He wasn't special, no he really wasn't. People would comment on his intelligence, only sixteen and already in Starfleet? You're going places, mark my words boy. Boy, if there was one word he hated, it was boy. He was sixteen and Russian, he could hold his vodka with the best of them, he was attending The Starfleet Academy, he was no boy.

'That is incorrect, can anyone tell the correct answer?' asked Professor Spock from his position at the front of the class.

Pavel Chekov did not need to look about his fellow class mates to know that none of them knew the answer.

'Contact engineering zen begin assessing ze damage.'

'Correct Cadet Chekov, can anyone tell me why and why contacting the captain first was incorrect?'

Again there were no takers, 'If zere iz an eletrikal fawlt, zen engineering vill be qualified to help, ze keptain vould most likely tell you to kontact engineering anyvay.'

'Correct. A Starfleet captain is unlikely to have the skills to be of any assistance. Furthermore, engineering will inform the captain in due course. Not every broken light-bulb is an emergency, and in an actual emergency, the captain's attention will be needed on the bridge. Engineering will be the ones to decide if the problem is worth alerting the captain immediately, as a broken light-bulb could be an indication of a larger problem, or a light-switch that hasn't been switched.'

Several people giggled as the bell rang, indicating the official end of the lesson, Pavel personally didn't see what was funny; the broken light-bulb analogy was very fitting.

'Tonight's homework, outline the proper procedures for when a ship-wide evacuation has been issued. As an added incentive, those who turn in the top three homework assignments tomorrow will have the chance to attend a celebration in honour of Cadet Hikaru Sulu, thrown by Captain Pike this weekend.'

Pavel froze in his seat; Hikaru Sulu was the cadet who had saved a test drone from crashing after another cadet had panicked when a guidance system had failed. The higher-ups had said that Sulu had shown great aptitude during an emergency. This party must have been a way to thank him, as saving a remote-controlled drone wasn't exactly award-worthy. Rumour had it that Sulu was a ninja with the helm, and from what Pavel had seen of his test scores, they weren't exaggerating by much.

Pavel wanted to be a navigator when he graduated, and he hoped that he was paired with a helmsman half as good as that of Sulu, but knowing his luck, he would be paired with the idiot who would forget to disengage the hand-brake on their first trip out. If he was being completely honest, Pavel had a hero-worship thing going on with Sulu's reputation, and after passing the cadet in question in the corridor, a crush as well.

Pavel chucked his PADD into his bag as the room emptied, brooding over his complete lack of a soundwave's chance in a vacuum to ever even be noticed by Sulu, let alone befriend the guy. Still, if he won an invite to the party, at the very least he would have the chance to see the legendary, in some circles at least, Sulu up close, possibly even meet the guy.

'Is there a problem cadet?'

Pavel snapped his head up and realised that he was the last one left in the classroom and Professor Spock was looking at him expectantly.

'Zere is no problem zir, I vas zinking,' Pavel answered and hurried from the room.

'I can't believe I'm going to miss out on that party invite! I'm never going to get one of the top three assignments; I'm barely passing the subject as it is.'

Pavel snorted to himself as he passed, how anyone could fail "Proper procedures of Starfleet" was beyond him. Tomorrow would be the second half of the "What to do when your work area begins to behave inappropriately" one of many useless topics in a useless subject, well useless to some at least.

'There's only one invite up for grabs, and as far as I'm concerned it's mine.'

'I thought you said that Spock said that there were three?'

Pavel halted in his tracks, curiosity overtaking him, causing him to peek into the nearby study room. He spied Nyota Uhura talking to what he guessed was an Orion girl whom he was certain he didn't know, although it was hard to guess as her back was turned to him. There were only three Orions at the academy, and if he had to bet, Pavel would guess that she was Uhura's roommate.

'Chekov will get one for sure, and Carol will get another because she's Marcus' daughter.'

'Spock's a Vulcan, he's not going to award credit where credit isn't due, he'll award them on merit.'

'Yes, because as an admiral's daughter Carol is completely stupid and wouldn't know the procedures of a starship, despite spending several years of her life on board one (!)'

'Alright, admittedly she'd get it based on the fact that she could quote the regulations while having her appendix removed, but what makes you so sure that Chekov will get it?'

'I'll tell you what, if Chekov doesn't get it, you can have my invitation when I die of shock, and go in my stead.'

'What makes you think that I'm not already going?'

'So who's the guy?'

'Who says that there's a guy? Do remember that I was on the team that help build the drone, our presence at the party is to show our thanks that we don't have to spend the next six months rebuilding the damn thing.'

Pavel slipped away before the two girls could discover that he was listening in and headed back to his dorm room. Checking to make sure that he had no other homework for the moment, Pavel grabbed is PADD back out of his bag and set to work on his emergency evacuation procedures for Professor Spock.

A/N: I'm no good with accents, so I've probably butchered Pavel's, which I apologise for and I promise to try to stay consistent with it.