TITLE: Hidden Truths - Part Three
SUMMARY: When a mission goes fatally wrong for one of the Enterprise crew, suspicions arise about Trip's true identity.
DISCLAIMER: See Chapter One or Two
NOTES: We haven't even got to the mission yet! Are you intrigued? Lol. Thanks for the reviews they made my day! Here's two chapters for being so nice.
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Chapter Three
IMPECCABLE TIMING
The journey to Rigis Jata went painfully quickly. Before he knew what was going on, Trip found himself standing with Jon. T'Pol, Malcolm and Hoshi in the launch bay getting ready to leave on a shuttle. Everyone had received their injections from Phlox, but that didn't stump their enthusiasm.
Trip had tried everything short of breaking Hoshi legs to keep her on the ship but to no avail. There she was, standing with that look of excitement and innocence plastered on her face. Under normal circumstances Trip might've felt the same way - but these weren't normal circumstance. Hoshi and the others were completely unaware of the danger she was in (or would be in) if she were to go down to the surface.
Since Trip had run out of reasons why the translator should stay onboard Enterprise (and Hoshi was, quite frankly, getting mildly offended at his efforts) he swore internally that he would never leave Hoshi's side while they were down there. That much would have to do.
"You're clear for launch Sir." Travis said over the com.
"Thanks Travis." Jon replied informally. "Shall we?" T'Pol and Hoshi climbed into the shuttle first, closely followed by Malcolm. "Are you alright?"
The question had caught Trip off-guard, right in the middle of the mental pact he was making with himself. "What?" Came that time-buying beauty of a word. Trip used the opportunity to regain his posture.
"You've been virtually silent since we've been down here, are you okay?" Jon repeated.
Trip always admired his Captain's ability to relinquish his own feelings when it came to others. Trip let himself smile at this fact and masqueraded it as a reply. "Yeah, fine."
Jon looked at his companion in perplexity. He had known Trip so long he almost expected a wisecrack of some kind to follow, but it didn't. Maybe this was one of those times where 'Yeah, I'm fine' actually meant 'I'm not fine at all but I don't want to talk about it.' He understood, of course - everyone had moments like that.
"After you then." Jon compelled and the two men climbed into the shuttle. Trip couldn't shake the unsettling sensation that he wouldn't be seeing Enterprise again any time soon.
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Rigis Jata wasn't as homely as it had apparently been on the view-screen aboard Enterprise, Malcolm commented when the shuttle landed. The planet was indeed, rather rundown and well, dilapidated. The architecture looked neglected, as if it were going to collapse any second.
Everyone made their inward observations, but Trip had already seen enough. He already knew that Rigis was the place from his vision, but seeing it actually forced a sense of finality upon him. There were no doubts now. The three moons, arranged in the triangular shape, ridiculed Trip from orbit.
"Hello, I am Noma,"
Each crewman immediately put on their diplomat faces (With the exception of T'Pol, who permanently wore her diplomat face) and turned to see Noma, the origin of the greeting.
Noma was human in most respects, like many of the other species the crew had come across, with slight differences. Noma had a slight golden tint to his skin and eyes, shock white hair and a halo-like bone around his head. Jon poured out the usual introductions and polite greetings that had become ritual and Noma led them into one of the nearby broken-down buildings. Inside was only marginally less dilapidated.
Noma went on about his culture and some other Nistet (Who looked almost identical to Noma) introduced themselves. Trip was starting to feel at ease when another Nistet entered. This one was set apart from the others by his clothing. It was more elaborate than the others they had encountered.
"Telen!" Noma excalimed, clearly surprised - but not in a good way - to see him.
Telen pulled Noma away and whispered. Trip instinctively tuned his ear into the utterance.
"We don't have much time. The generator is almost at an irreversible level, hurry this along." He muttered threateningly.
Without thinking, Trip heard himself say "What generator?" In a more than curious tone.
Noma and the other looked momentarily alarmed, then calmed themselves. Trip received some odd looks from the others - they evidently hadn't heard - but Trip guessed the Nistet put his unusual hearing capabilities down to a human trait.
"We wanted this to wait, but it seems there is little time to do so. You must come with me now, I need your help." Noma told them.
"I'm sure we can see what we can do." Jon put carefully. He didn't want to make any promises he could not keep or commitments he couldn't carry through.
"I'm afraid you have no choice." And just like that, the tables turned - or rather, Telen did. He pulled out what was unmistakeably a weapon, and three others around him followed suit. "There is no time for discussion. You will come with me."
The five were stripped of their communicators and weapons swiftly. Jon sighed inwardly. Just for once, he would like to meet a civilisation that were, well, civilised. People who actually told the truth and didn't try to kill them for a change.
The five crewmembers were led forcibly out of the building and through an alley, into another. This one was also fatigued with age, it's walls were almost completely blackened by an unseen pollution and two turrets billowing a gas of some kind protruded from the roof.
Jon made his usual attempts to try to control the situation and when they failed, T'Pol stepped in with her trademark logic but this too was flagged down by their captors who didn't want to know. When they reached their destination (Inside the factory building and past numerous panicked Nistet) Telen, finally spoke again.
"This is the generator for our entire planet. Hundreds of our best engineers have not been able to fix it and it's going to explode." He said. He seemed more agitated than worried. "You will fix it." He ordered.
Engineering, that'd be my department. Great. Trip thought irritably. Telen strode off.
"Where are you going? You can't leave us here!" Malcolm shouted before Jon got the chance.
"I shall do what I please." Telen spat.
And before anyone could act, the room was sealed and everyone was gone.
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"Why can't we ever meet anyone nice." Hoshi muttered. Trip mused at the out-of-character remark. Hoshi usually took threatening situations deathly serious. Lord knows they'd been in a lot of them.
"Trip, see what you can do, we'll look for ways out of here. Hoshi, see if you can find out how long we have till this thing blows. Spread out." Jon ordered.
It was when the ground shook that the severity of the situation really sunk in. Trip approached the colossal machine not knowing where to start. Panels lined it's rounded walls so Trip pressed them randomly. There was no way he could figure out something this complicated in years let along however long they had - judging by the alarms and the quakes, Trip guessed it wasn't that long.
"These doors are sealed." T'Pol shouted.
"These too." Jon answered. "Damnit if they can't fix their own generator, what makes them think we can? And why the hell aren't they evacuating. T'Pol, you said they had warp capability?"
"Yes, but I don't believe they can evacuate. This technology clearly does not belong to the Nistet. I doubt their ships do either."
"What do you mean?"
"While they appear to have been using the generator for some time, I doubt anyone knows how it works. It was probably here when the Nistet arrived on this planet."
"How can you tell?"
"It was a logical deduction. Firstly, a warp capable species that doesn't travel is highly irregular." The Vulcan stated while continuing to search for a way out.
"Why would they build the technology if thy weren't going to use it?" Reed surmised.
"Quite. And secondly, this generator must be very advanced to power an entire planet."
"Yeah, and to make one hell of a big explosion." Trip reminded urgently.
"How are you doing? Can you fix it?" Jon finally acknowledged and went to Trip's side.
"Give me a month, and I wouldn't even be able to turn it off." The engineer replied, his patented humour-in-dire-situations seeping through.
"If the generator explodes not only will it kill us, it will destroy the entire planet and most likely cripple anything in close orbit." T'Pol declared. Jon's mind became one-track for a spilt second. Enterprise. It was one thing that these assholes were in all likelihood going to get him and four of his finest officers killed, it was another to lure his ship into orbit knowing full well of the repercussions. All in all, Jon did not much like the Nistet.
"Sir, I've found a door I think I can open, but I'll need some help." Malcolm shouted, saving Jon from coming up with some difficult orders.
T'Pol and Archer immediately went to Malcolm's side and slotted their hands through the small gap in the door. "We'd better hurry." Hoshi called from a panel a small way away. Her voice had a critical tone to it that Jon did not like one bit. When she continued he realised that it was justified.
"If I'm reading this right," She began. "we have less than one minute to get out of here."
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End of Part Three
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