Seventeen

PERANDA LOOKED from Cooney to Travis and frowned.

Then he looked past them to his own engineers, standing in a knot just behind the two men.

“Is this possible?” the colonel asked.

One of the engineers stepped forward.

“It seems like a workable plan, sir. A way of, at the very least, determining what the problem is.”

Peranda sighed. “I’m not asking about the plan. The plan makes perfect sense. I’m asking about this device, the transporter. Is this possible that it does what they say?”

“Ah. Forgive me, sir. Yes, the device is possible in theory. And the circuitry-at least as far as we can tell-appears to match that theory.”

The colonel nodded.

He focused his attention again on Cooney, who Travis had let do all the talking since they’d arrived on the bridge a few moments before, their plan in place.

“You propose to use this transporter to beam a remote sensor to the manifold, and then-“

“It’s very simple, Colonel,” Cooney interrupted, sounding exactly as exasperated as Travis would have expected him to, had their plan been genuine. “We beam out the sensor, and we take readings. No more, no less.”

“And if it tells you there is a blockage in the manifold?”

“We deal with that then. We may even be able to use the transporter to deal with it, in fact.”

Peranda nodded and turned to Travis.

“Providential you should think of this transporter, Mayweather. At precisely the time when we need it.”

Travis shrugged, doing his best to sound-and seem-casual. “Can’t tell you why it occurred to me. I suppose it’s because we’ve used it to get out of a few sticky situations before.”

Peranda nodded. Travis could tell he was still suspicious-of both them and their plan. He was counting on the colonel’s obvious desire to stay in General Elson’s good graces-by delivering Enterprise and its mysterious passengers on schedule-to overcome those suspicions.

“We’re ready whenever you give the word, Colonel,” he added.

“All right,” the colonel said finally. “Let’s try your plan.”

Cooney nodded. “Yes, sir.”

He and Travis left the bridge together.

Not surprisingly, two of the Denari soldiers rode the turbolift down with them.

 

The soldiers followed them to E-deck. The transporter lay at the end of an access corridor near engineering.

Without a word, he and Cooney got to work.

It was all part of their ruse, of course, as was nine-tenths of the equipment they’d picked up along the way from one of the science labs. All they really needed, in fact, was in the smallest container they’d brought, a square metal case a meter long and as thick as an old-fashioned dictionary.

Travis put that case to the side now, and continued assembling the sensor device they didn’t intend to use.

Minutes passed.

The two soldiers had initially taken up positions along either side of the corridor, directly behind Travis and Cooney. Now they began pacing and talking to each other. Relaxing.

Travis glanced over at Cooney, who nodded imperceptibly.

It was time.

“That’s a problem,” the man said suddenly, sounding frustrated. “The slots don’t align.”

Cooney made a show of setting down the equipment he had in his hands harder than necessary.

“Now what?” he asked, glaring at Travis.

“You’re the engineer.”

“It’s your ship. How do you usually do this?”

“It’s not something we usually do.” Travis snapped his fingers. “Wait.”

He bent down and opened the square metal case.

And pulled out a pair of Starfleet-issue communicators.

“We could use these,” Travis said, pulling them out. “Same circuitry.”

One of the guards stepped forward. “Hold on a minute. Let me see those.”

“Sure.” Travis handed them over.

“These look like our communications devices.” He handed one back to the other guard, who nodded. “What do you need these for?”

“Because they use the same interlocutal circuits as the sensors,” Cooney said. “Here. I’ll show you.”

He got to his feet and held one out to the guard, who moved forward to take the communicator.

As his fingers closed around it, Cooney reared back and decked the soldier, who went down like a sack of potatoes.

The other guard brought his weapon to bear. Travis was already moving, though. He took hold of the barrel as it was coming up and used the man’s own momentum to wrench it out of his hands.

He brought his knee up into the soldier’s stomach, knocking the wind out of him with a rush. The soldier bent over double.

Travis brought the butt of the weapon down on the man’s head, and he joined his companion on the floor.

“That went well,” Cooney said.

Travis turned to him and smiled. “Interlocutal circuits? Where’d you come up with that?”

“What came out of my mouth. Believe me, no thought went into it.” Cooney picked up the other guard’s weapon.

“All right, kid,” he said. “Go to it.”

Travis walked to the console. He took a minute to gather the information he needed from Enterprise’s computer-the size and internal configuration of the ship he suspected was out there, in particular the amount of headroom above the seats. He made his calculations, took the best guess he could about its most likely position relative to the manifold, and punched in a set of coordinates.

He took the two communicators, reset their frequencies, and placed one on the transporter platform.

Then he stepped behind the console and sent it on its way.

As it finished dematerializing, he realized he’d almost forgotten something. Something very, very important.

He opened a channel to the bridge.

“Mayweather here. Sensor is away.”

The Denari engineer’s voice came back. “Yes. We can see that. But we’re not picking up any telemetry. Please advise.”

“Hold on. We’ll be right back to you.” He cut the circuit. He’d respond to them in a minute. But first…

Travis opened the communicator and took a deep breath.

He was about to find out if he’d guessed right about all this, or if he’d just set himself and Cooney up for several long, unpleasant sessions with Colonel Peranda and his shock rod.

“This is Ensign Mayweather. Is anyone out there? Please answer.”

He waited. Nothing but static.

He heard a noise behind him, and turned.

On the ground, one of the Denari soldiers was stirring.

Cooney stepped up behind the man and dragged him to his feet. He placed his weapon against the side of the soldier’s head.

“Not a word. Or you’re a dead man.”

Travis lifted the communicator and spoke into it again.

“This is Mayweather. Over. Are you there?”

Nothing. This was not good. Had he guessed wrong? Had he simply beamed the communicator out into open space? Were the power fluctuations being caused by something else entirely?

The console beeped.

“It’s the bridge,” Travis said. He turned to Cooney. “What do I tell them?”

“Tell them we shut down the sensor so we can reboot it. Tell them it’ll take…ten minutes to get a signal.”

“Ten minutes?” That seemed like a long time to him. “To reboot a sensor?”

“Who’s the engineer here?” Cooney shook his head. “All right, tell them five, then.”

Travis reached out to open the channelAnd the communicator beeped.

“Travis, you there?”

He drew his hand back from the console and broke out into a big smile. He’d recognize that voice anywhere.

It was Commander Tucker.

“Sir,” he said. “I can’t tell you how good it is to hear from you.”

“Same here. I was starting to think you wouldn’t pick up on our signal.”

“Sorry about that. It took a while for me to remember about the Xyrillians.”

“That’s all right. What’s the situation there?”

“Not…perfect. Hold on a minute.”

Travis closed the communicator and called the bridge. He gave the engineer who answered Cooney’s story.

“A reboot shouldn’t take more than a minute,” the man answered.

“Uh…” Travis turned around to Cooney and gestured for help.

Cooney frowned.

“Tell him we had to jury-rig something together. It’s not a standard-issue sensor.”

Travis told him.

“That doesn’t sound right. Let me speak to Cooney,” the man said.

Travis turned around again.

Cooney shook his head. “I don’t know. Let me think.”

“You’re both dead men,” the soldier sneered.

“Shut up,” Cooney said.

“Let me go,” the soldier said, “and-“

Cooney clocked him in the jaw, and the soldier collapsed to the ground again.

“I told him to shut up.”

Cooney strode past Travis to the console, and punched the channel open.

“What?” he said.

“Cooney?” the Denari engineer’s voice came back.

“Cooney here. The reboot’s going to take five minutes. I’ll let you know when we’ve got a signal. Understood?”

Without waiting for an answer, he punched the channel closed.

“Best defense-good offense,” he said to Travis.

“Let’s hope so.” Travis opened the communicator again. “Commander?”

“Right here. What’s going on?”

Travis told him.

“Sounds like we don’t have a lot of time.”

“No, sir. Ten minutes at the most before all hell breaks loose.”

“You better get us on board, then. Use your previous coordinates as a guide, take us one at a time. Start with me-in ten seconds.”

“Yes, sir.” Travis moved to the transporter console and set the coordinates. He called up Commander Tucker’s profile and poised his hands over the controls.

He was, truth be told, a little nervous. Beaming a communicator from place to place was one thing. Beaming a person…

That was something else entirely.

The communicator beeped again.

“Travis?”

“Yes, sir?”

“I just remembered something. I don’t recall you being trained on the transporter.”

“Not formally, no, sir.”

“Ah. You know about the different settings for molecular and quantum-state transport?”

“Uh…no.”

“Oookay.” Commander Tucker was silent. “Molecular level is what we use for cargo. That’s the default. Quantum-state is what you have to use for living organisms. People.”

“Oh.” Travis’s blood went cold. “Sir, I’m-I don’t know what to say.”

“It’s all right,” Tucker said. “We can do this. Access the operator screen. You got it?”

Travis did as he was told. “I got it.”

“All right. Here’s what you do.”

The commander guided him through the process. Travis felt like an idiot every step of the way. He didn’t know what would have happened if he’d beamed over Commander Tucker with the wrong settings-nothing good, he was certain of that.

It was a relatively simple adjustment to the controls. Travis started the countdown again, in his head.

At two, he began initialization of the primary energizing coils. At one, the targeting scanners began to verify the target coordinates-he had to override the automatic shutdown protocol, which kicked in when the scanners hit the cloaked ship.

At zero, he activated the matter stream transmission.

A nanosecond later, the outline of a man began to appear on the pad before him.

“Holy…” Cooney said, stepping slowly forward to stand with Travis at the console. “It really works. Son of a gun, Mayweather, it really works.”

Travis shook his head. In the transport chamber, the man began to materialize completely. “Where did you think that communicator went?”

“A communicator’s one thing, kid. A man-that’s something else altogether.”

Travis couldn’t disagree with that-especially after the lesson he’d just learned.

The man finished materializing. A whip-thin, bearded man in a green-and-orange jumpsuit.

Travis barely recognized him.

“Commander?”

Trip stepped down from the platform. “I know. The beard. The clothes. Let’s put it this way, Travis. It’s been a rough few-“

The commander stopped in his tracks and stared at Cooney.

“Chief? The professor and I thought you might be here.”

“Tucker?” Cooney said, as if he couldn’t quite believe his eyes. “The professor? You mean Brodesser? What-“

Right then the console beeped. “Cooney? Mayweather? What’s happening down there?”

That was Peranda. The mood in the room changed abruptly.

Travis turned to Cooney. “You should take it.”

Cooney shook his head. “If I take it, he’ll want answers. Maybe you can stall him.”

“Go on, Travis,” Commander Tucker said, stepping behind the console. “Talk to him. I’ll get the others on board.”

 

Hoshi came next. She wobbled a little as she came off the platform, but there was a smile on her face as she took in the ship, and Travis.

Trip knew how she felt. It was almost unreal, after all this time, to be back on Enterprise again. But they had no time to celebrate-Travis’s talk with this Peranda had not gone well.

The colonel was sending two engineers down to see what was happening.

“He’ll send more soldiers with them,” Cooney said. “We’ve got as long as it takes them to get down…”

His voice died out as Brodesser materialized on the platform.

Cooney looked at him, and shook his head.

“Professsor. Who else you got out there? Captain Duvall?”

“Hardly,” Brodesser said. “It’s good to see you, Chief.”

“And you. It’s like old home week around here,” Cooney said as the two men shook hands.

“Not exactly.” Trip set the controls to bring Malcolm over.

“Not exactly?” Cooney asked. “What does that mean?”

“It means-oh, never mind.” Trip shook his head. They didn’t have time to talk about parallel universes right now.

Reed stepped off the transporter platform. “I used the mooring clamps,” he said, tossing Trip a phase pistol. “They should hold long enough for our purposes. We still pressed for time?”

“We have no time,” Trip said. “We have to get control of the ship-now.” He looked to Travis and then Cooney. “Engineering is just down the corridor. We’ll-“

“I know where engineering is,” Cooney snapped.

“Then let’s go,” Trip said, biting back a sharp retort of his own, realizing that whatever it was that had always set him and his universe’s Cooney at odds, this man apparently had it as well.

“Trip,” Malcolm said, stepping past him. “Please. You stay back, all right? Let me-“

Malcolm never finished his sentence.

Four Denari-two in uniform-turned into the corridor, directly in front of them.

Reed fired. One of the men in uniform went down. The other tried to backtrack, but Travis took him out. The other two Denari froze. Phaser blasts struck them as well, and both toppled.

The door to the engine room was straight ahead. Malcolm ran toward it. Trip and the others followed.

Malcolm paused at the engine room door.

“I’m going in first. I’ll take out any Denari I see on the main level. Travis, you come in behind me, target the upper level. Hoshi, you do the same. Commander, you and the professor stay behind me, watch for stragglers. You”-he pointed with his weapon at Cooney-“secure this door.”

“My people are in there too,” Cooney said. “Make sure you don’t hit them by mistake.”

“I know who they are,” Travis said.

“Okay.” Malcolm nodded. “Let’s go, then.”

He flung the door open, and charged.