[The usual disclaimer…I own no part of Enterprise or its characters…]
"There now, Mr. Reed…all prosthetics have been removed. You're back to your normal self again," Phlox said, humming merrily.
Reed sat up and stretched. "I don't know…I think I made a fine Suliban—" he was interrupted by a stifled giggle from the other end of Sickbay. Bloody hell! I thought I was alone! Reed felt himself flushing.
Hoshi walked up behind him. "That's the first joke I've heard from you in a while, Lieutenant…what was in that makeup, Doctor?"
The Doctor looked surprised. "Just the standard gelatin plaster with nontoxic coloring—is there something amusing, Ensign?"
Hoshi shook her head, "It's nothing, Doctor…anyway, I came here to take the Lieutenant off your hands. The Captain wants him in the briefing room."
Phlox held up his hands. "Who am I to refuse such a request? He's all yours, Ensign."
Hoshi went a shade redder at that remark, but Reed missed it. She looked expectantly at him, and he moved to follow her out of Sick Bay and to the turbo lift. Reed tried to think of something to talk about on the way there, but his brain simply wouldn't obey the command. He was relieved when Hoshi broke the silence as they entered the turbo lift. She thinned her lips and looked up at him.
"Why would the captain be wanting you in the B-room? I mean," she stumbled over it in embarrassment, and Reed couldn't help but be amused, "as a weapons officer."
Reed tried to look her in the eyes when he shrugged. "My guess would be that he wants to, one, be more alert as to other races' conflicts, and two, be able to better counter another race's offensives. Though I'd think you'd be better suited for the first one."
Hoshi raised an eyebrow. "Why would you think that?"
Reed flushed at his ignorance and his inability to avoid that trap. He tried to work his way out of it. "You would almost definitely be able to interpret…interspecies situations more accurately than I could." He almost breathed a sigh of relief. That wasn't so bad…
Hoshi cracked a grin. "Nice one, Lieutenant," she said as she punched him in the ribs.
Reed was surprised to say the least, but not unpleasantly so. He only noticed the turbo lift doors opening when Hoshi moved to step out. He also was grateful that their short walk across the bridge to the B-room was uneventful.
As the door slid open, Captain Archer looked up and grinned. "Only two minutes early today, Malcolm?"
Reed's glanced involuntarily towards the chronometer. 1158 hours…
Trip smirked. "Malcolm, I think these schematics are more interesting than a clock," he said, pointing to a torpedo-like weapon blueprinted on the central computer screen.
Reed could barely keep his eyes from boggling. "A point-two-six hull penetration gradient? Our torpedoes currently have a point-one-three-five…sir, this torpedo would need a power drive with an output—" Archer cleared his throat and Reed stopped speaking. Darn it, Reed! You're flushing again…
"Umm…thanks for the technical briefing, Malcolm. Starfleet's interested in testing out this design on the NX-02 due out 6 months from now. They want your opinion—do you want to say something, Malcolm?" Archer finished, amused by Reed's shifting in his seat.
"Ah, sir…it would be…quite inefficient to install such a weapon."
Hoshi's eyebrows arched. "You can tell that from just looking at it?"
"Well, judging from the size and mass of the torpedo, I would guess that it would require a fuel tank with a 15 cubic meter capacity—"
Meanwhile, Trip had been punching calculations on his pad. He looked up from it shaking his head. He elbowed Hoshi and let her take a look at it. 14.82… Hoshi mouthed a "wow" at Trip, and he silently whistled.
Archer cleared his throat again and nodded. "All right…with that out of the way, we've got to discuss our current situation.
Hoshi, is there anything we can do about…being more alert to other races' conflicts?"
Hoshi shook her head. "Anyway, sir, there are several ways that we could do this. We could hail each system as we enter its territory, or we could do it a more subtle way."
Archer looked thoughtful. "I'm all ears."
"We could tap into their television and radio waves. Earth's can be detected from light years away…"
Trip shook his head. "Frankly, sir, I can't see our UT being able to cover every species' language enough to listen to their nightly news reports. Secondly…" he grinned mischievously, "though I have the utmost trust in our communications officer's abilities, I think she would be a little overwhelmed if she had to learn a language a day."
Reed turned an amused glance Hoshi's way. She looked at Trip and said, "Why thank you for your concern, Commander. Back to the topic, Captain, I think it's unavoidable that we'll step into tightly guarded territories. It's what we do when we're in those situations that counts."
Reed silently congratulated her. Couldn't have said it better myself. Meanwhile, he stood up and addressed the captain. "Captain, the problem with us is that we aren't recognized. Do you think that the Tandarans would have detained a Klingon vessel? We need to…make a name for ourselves, captain! We've got to make tough decisions, and we've got to be respected for it. Reputation is a valuable thing…" he trailed off and sat down, thoroughly embarrassed.
Archer got up and paced. "Malcolm, I see what you're saying, but we just aren't equipped for the kind of fighting that'd come with such a strategy. We've got to bide our time…wait for new technology…" when he saw Reed anxious to respond, he waved his hand in the air. "That's about all the discussion that I can handle for today, you all. Back to duty…"
One by one, the crew left until Archer was alone. He sighed, crossed his arms, and leaned against the window looking out into space. His head spun with thoughts about interstellar reputations and weaponry. These complications were like a persistent hurricane, slowly blowing him away…
Archer turned resolutely from the window. "You can't be afraid of the wind, Jon." Smiling, he exited the briefing room to join his crewmates on the bridge.
***
Reed looked up at the mess hall's chronometer. 2330 hours. I really should get some sleep. He looked down at the table where his new hull polarization schematics lay spread out. Weeks of work had been put into them, and he really didn't think that another hour would make any real difference.
He spun around when he heard a yawn behind him. "Easily startled, Lieutenant?" Hoshi asked, amused.
Reed sighed. "It's been a long night. I really should be getting some rest."
Hoshi looked at the schematics. "What are those?"
Reed stepped away from the table. "Oh, those…they're just an idea I had a week or so ago. I'm about ready to present it to the captain…just a couple more nights' work…"
Hoshi looked around the table for a PADD, but didn't see one. "Don't you need a PADD for this kind of work? It looks complicated."
Reed looked around the room as if to find an escape from the question. "On some parts of it, you don't need one," he finished lamely.
Hoshi half-smiled. "I'm sure. Listen, about the briefing today…how'd you do…what you did with the torpedo? Trip did the math on his PADD and got the same thing…"
Reed sighed again. "How do you learn languages so effectively?"
Apparently, Hoshi was prepared for that one. She put on her most professor-like pose and said, "I utilize my superior upper and lower audio band detection along with my ability to recognize patterns."
Reed couldn't help but laugh. "Looks like you've got me on that one, Ensign."
Hoshi put her hands on her hips. "Well?"
Reed started speaking quietly. "One of the reasons I enjoy my position as a weapons officer is that I…understand the weapons I use. When I fire a torpedo manually, I already know exactly where it's going to hit. The gravitational fluctuations, the particle friction, it all fits to form a picture. Think of it as a sort of three-dimensional graph—all the factors that affect a torpedo come together at a point. I'm sorry, I can't explain it any better."
"Is that why the captain wanted you as the armory officer? Because you can do that?" While Reed spoke, she looked over the papers on the table.
"Actually, no one knows about this except for you. And…I'd appreciate it if it stayed that way," Reed nervously fiddled with his pen.
Hoshi patted him on the shoulder. "Okay, your secret's safe with me. I…I think I understand why."
Reed breathed a sigh of relief. "Thank you, Hoshi."
Hoshi grinned and turned to leave. "Good night, Malcolm!" she said as she left.
Reed turned to his papers and smiled. They can wait for tomorrow.
***
Captain Archer fiddled with the armrest of his chair. They say space is exciting, but it's moments like these that make you want to go to sleep. He smiled when he pictured Porthos doing just that. He was just moving on to T'Pol's facial
expression when Hoshi's voice brought him out of his reverie.
"Captain, I'm getting a priority one distress call from High Command. I'll patch it through to your ready room." Hoshi looked worried.
Reed looked at the captain. "Sir, we've got to act quickly about whatever they hailed us for. Due to transmission time lag, this message is approximately two and a half days old."
Archer grimaced and headed into his ready room. He saw the face of Admiral Forrest on the screen. "Jon, we've heard disturbing reports about the Klingons over the last few months. Rumors of a Terran system invasion have been floating around ever since we first encountered them. Now we have the sensor evidence to prove it. Our probes have picked up a fleet of at least a dozen birds of prey and five or six D-7 class destroyers on an intercept course with Earth. Jon, I don't think you need
Mr. Reed's knowledge of our defenses to know that we wouldn't last a day against that. We need Enterprise, Jon. The Vulcans have offered assistance, but even Soval looked worried when he saw the Klingon fleet's statistics. We've got to evacuate as many people as we can," his transmission started breaking up, "Jon, the Klingon forward scouts are already trying to scramble communications. They'll reach Pluto in less than a week—" the rest of the transmission was static.
Archer rubbed his temples and sat heavily in his chair. You know it's your fault, Jon. The Klingons would never have known Humans existed if you hadn't told them your home world and species. That's just one of the risks of adventure…Malcolm was right. Archer rubbed his eyes with his fingers and they came away slick. Oh God, Jon, what have you done?
Straightening his uniform, he moved towards his door with a new resolve. The Klingons haven't stopped Enterprise yet. You've got to have faith.