A Lesson in Patience

Chekov was very, very close to banging his head on the wall in frustration.

He understood why he had to be confined to the brig before. That was perfectly fine. The alien mind control had been making him a security threat.

What he didn't understand is why he couldn't leave now that the aliens had been defeated. Or why the guard outside the cell kept giving him suspicious looks when Chekov tried to reason with him. It wasn't as if he were a dangerous criminal or anything.

If someone would just call the captain, everything would be cleared up. Of course, as the security officer refused to even acknowledge him anymore, that was unlikely. Chekov doubted he would bother Kirk at a prisoner's say-so anyway, whether it was him or someone else stuck in the brig.

Heaving a sigh, he leaned against the wall and slid to the floor. Someone had to remember he was stuck in here eventually.

Sulu – he would notice. He and Chekov were best friends, sat next to each other on the Bridge, spent a lot of time together. He was sure to note the absence when he went off duty. But the shift didn't change for another two or three hours.

Maybe Scotty would see that he was gone, and not running the scheduled diagnostics on the thrusters. Probably not. The engineer was absent-minded about his own crew, let alone other departments.

What about Uhura? Chekov thought she might recognize his absence. At least, it would be nice to think so. She always said that the Bridge was more cheerful when he was on it. But after the mind control incident, cheerfulness was probably the last thing on her mind. No, she probably wouldn't notice.

Then perhaps Spock? His sharp Vulcan perception never missed anything, and he didn't hesitate to point things out. Chekov's pride still smarted from the incident where Spock drew attention to a tiny stray wrinkle in an otherwise perfectly starched dress uniform in front of a visiting diplomat. The question wasn't whether he noticed Chekov's absence, it was whether he would comment on it. And whether the others would take the absence seriously. Either way, he wouldn't come looking for him until after the shift ended.

He really, really didn't want to stay in this cell for another three hours.

Chewing on his lip, Chekov seriously considered sabotaging the forcefield. Not that he could, really. It was extremely sophisticated, and he didn't have any equipment, makeshift or otherwise. And he would get in a whole lot of trouble. Trouble wasn't good.

So instead he laid on the cot and stared blankly at the ceiling. He stayed like that for about ten minutes. Then he got restless and tried to calculate the speed of the ship based on how fast the stars hurtled past the window (Warp 2.3). That got old fast, so he started counting the specks of dust hidden in the corners of the cell and averaging them together (54 specks per corner). Then the hairs on the back of the security officer's neck (roughly 121.5).

Eventually he resorted to pacing back and forth. He made a game of it, trying to stay on the same exact path each time. A straight line to a foot in front of the forcefield, pivot left foot, a straight line to a foot away from the far wall, pivot right foot. Right, left, right, left, pivot. Step, step, step, step, pivot.

He couldn't stand it any longer. Chekov asked the security guard the time.

"It's 1400 hours," the guard replied gruffly after consulting a PADD. "You've only been in there an hour. Don't tell me you're already bored to death."

Chekov was already bored to death. But he just shrugged.

The guard shook his head, muttering something about the attention span of a goldfish.

"A PADD would be nice."

"You think I'm gonna give the genius kid a bunch of technology?"

"At least give me something to do. Please?" He gave the guard the look he saved for emergencies, the one that the captain called his 'nuclear puppy dog eyes.'

"Well..." The security officer wavered for a moment. "I guess it wouldn't do any harm." He called another guard over. "The kid's driving me nuts! Get him something to keep him busy, will ya?"

"Yes, sir," the other nodded and left. After a few moments the man returned with a small metallic object and handed it to the guard outside. He opened an aperture in the forcefield and passed the object to Chekov.

A calculator? he thought indignantly. Yes, give the genius kid a calculator to keep him busy. He really wanted to punch the guards in their jaws. That'd wipe those infuriating smirks off their faces. But instead he just pasted on a smile and thanked them, ignoring the snickers as they returned to their posts.

A calculator. Hilarious.

It wasn't even capable of making warp calculations. It was an older model, with a plasma battery and backup solar generator. It had the power to do many more complicated equations, but the program was lacking. You could probably take out the batteries and still be able to graph in up to six dimensions. Quite powerful, if you could actually use that power.

A crazy thought surfaced. Chekov's gaze flicked to the forcefield.

Hmm...a calculator...

Kirk was in his ready room when Uhura paged him.

"What's up?" he asked.

"Security reports an escaped prisoner."

"Are you serious?" he exclaimed. "That's supposed to be nearly impossible! And of course it happens the one day that I want some peace and quiet..." He took a deep breath. "Alright, who is it? The fake Andorian? Or did Crewman Nelson get drunk on duty again?"

She hesitated. "Sir, it's Chekov."

Wait, what? "I'll be right there."

That explains how a prisoner escaped in the first place, Jim thought as he entered the Bridge.

"Have you pinpointed his location?" he asked the Ops officer.

"No, sir," she replied. "Internal sensors can't pick him up."

Spock interposed, "He seems to have constructed a dampening field out of the cell forcefield."

"A dampening field?" Kirk repeated incredulously. God, the kid was in so much trouble. "Put Decks 4 and 5 on alert, and have Security teams standing by. He can't have gotten too far." He turned to his helmsman. "Anything you think might help us find him, now's the time, Mr. Sulu."

"Nothing I can think of right now, sir," he responded.

Kirk nodded, taking a seat in the comm. God, that kid was in so much trouble.

Chekov had anticipated some sort of response from security after he'd trapped two of the guards in his own cell. That was why he'd set up the dampening field in the first place, to keep the redshirts from finding him until he had made it to the Bridge. But he certainly hadn't expected the captain to get involved, let alone to send half the ship after him.

So he'd followed his first impulse and took to the Jefferies tubes. Perhaps not the smartest idea, now that he thought about it. They were very cramped. And hot. Especially after being stuck in them for two hours on end. His limbs were aching and his yellow uniform was drenched in sweat. He had to risk moving somewhere less sweltering, or he would end up with heatstroke or something. Where was the coolest passage?

Over the mess hall? Maybe, but it was nearly dinner time by now, and people would be just beginning to stream in. There's no way he could sneak in there without being heard.

Sickbay? The passages were quieter, and there were vents that opened into the main area. But that would be a blessing and a curse, since it would be easy to look right through the grate and see his shadow.

There was a rattle behind him. Turning quickly, he saw a hand, attached to a redshirted wrist grope up through a now-open hatch. Chekov swore quietly in Russian and scrambled away.

Sickbay it was, then.

Far away from the wild-Chekov chase, McCoy filled out paperwork in his office. That's about all he ever did anymore, fill out all the darn paperwork and get stuck treating Jim after every half-baked away mission. Heck, half the time he was on those half-baked away missions: just him, the hobgoblin, and the trouble magnet known as James T. Kirk.

Apparently someone'd done something, 'cause all these security officers kept rushing through his Sickbay, looking through all his stuff. For Christ's sake, he'd had to shoo the redshirts out of his office, just so he could fill out all this darn paperwork.

And now the ceiling above his head was rattling. Of course some maintenance crewman just had to be thumping around up there. It made perfect sense for everything to go haywire at the same time.

He yelled at the yahoo in the ceiling, "Hey, keep it down up there!"

The noise immediately stopped.

"That's more like it," McCoy muttered.

What he had to put up with around here. Good God.

He continued working for several minutes. He was to the point where he was actually getting some work done, when the rattling began again.

"Goddammit, what did I just say about the noise?" he exclaimed to the ceiling.

Accompanying the rattling was a long squeak. McCoy didn't comprehend what the noise meant until suddenly the ceiling collapsed.

Pieces of twisted metal and bent wires cascaded all over everything. There was a loud clatter as the vent fell noisily onto his desk. And on top of everything sprawled a certain Russian ensign.

"Um... Hi?" Chekov offered sheepishly.

"Kid," said McCoy, "You are in so much trouble."

A security officer rushed into the room at the noise, and, to McCoy's surprise, Chekov scrambled back up into the ceiling quicker than a wink.

"Doctor? Are you alright?" the officer asked. "Oh God... I am so sorry, my people are such buffoons. Here, I'll call Scotty to–"

"No, no, it's fine," McCoy said hurriedly. "You all have your jobs to do. I'll call Scotty, you get back to work."

At the odd look the redshirt gave him, he added gruffly, "Don't need any more buffoonery messing with my Sickbay."

As soon as the crewman was gone, McCoy looked to the hole in the ceiling. "Alright, kid. He's gone."

Chekov peeked his head out. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah."

The young ensign carefully picked his way out of the ceiling and clasped his hands in front of him, nervously rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet.

"Well?" McCoy prompted impatiently. "You gonna tell me how you got all them redshirts after you?"

Hesitantly, Chekov gave him a brief outline of his situation.

The doctor's scowl lessened as an idea came to him. "Kid," he said after he'd finished, "I think we can help each other."

A few minutes later, McCoy sauntered down the hallway, whistling a little ditty. He hadn't had this much free time in months.

Though, heaven knew what would happen when Jim found his navigator filling out all the medical paperwork.