Personal Log 3-8: Whispered Secrets

How I Flunked Out of Starfleet Academy: Part 8
"Did you hear?" Nicole waved her cronies in close. She sat on her bunk as if it were a throne and the curlers in her hair were a crown. She whispered something too low for me to hear. The other girls sat back with squeals of alarm.
"I heard it was one of us, too." Nicole slid her gaze to my end of the room. Her friends copied her. All of them stared at me.
I pretended I didn't notice. They huddled together, whispering.
"What's all that about?" I asked Christine. I'd spent most of the day locked in the staff break room with the broken replicator. Turns out the thing just had some wires crossed and an old piece of toast jammed into the heating coil. Once I cleaned that out and checked the circuits, it worked fine. DeSoto was impressed. Maybe. It was hard to tell with her.
Christine tugged a curl. "There's a rumor that our training flight might be cancelled. I heard there was a spy in the Academy, selling secrets to the Romulans. They might hijack our ship when we go."
“That would be just my luck if they cancel it.” I didn’t want to admit it, but I was looking forward to the training flight. DeSoto promised I’d be in engineering, although I suspected I’d be spending my time fixing replicators and scrubbing toilets.
Christine’s eyes were huge. “We were supposed to take the Phoenix, but last I heard, we’re being reassigned to the Voyager and Admiral Williamson is personally taking command.”
Annika, the cadet across from us, leaned forward on her bunk. “They’re only putting us on the Voyager because they’re going to scrap it. They don’t care what you break, Adrian.” She smirked.
I stuck my tongue out at her.
“Cadets! Attention!”
We scrambled off our bunks at the sound of Sergeant Warner’s voice. I tugged the blanket straight then took the stance - arms at my side, eyes staring at the wall above Nicole’s head.
Sergeant Warner frowned as she stalked down the aisle between our bunks. “Out of uniform, out of order, you make a disgrace of Starfleet. But, it’s out of my hands. You have fifteen minutes to report to the shuttle dock. The Voyager leaves orbit in two hours.” She paused to glare at me, then across at Nicole. “I expect you to act like officers of Starfleet, not children at summer camp. Prove to me that Admiral Williamson’s faith in you is not misplaced. As of this moment, you are all promoted from cadet to ensign. Don’t disappoint me.”
She marched from the room, trailed by her assistant, Corporal VandenBerger. They stopped again at the door. Warner turned to study us one more time. “Did I mention you may not be coming back? Pack your things, ladies. You’re down to twelve minutes, thirty seven seconds.”
The door shut behind her. We stared at each other. The room exploded in a frenzy of packing.