"Captain as I completed my scan for biosigns, I am not certain, but I believe that for an instant my scan did reveal there to be some, but it was only for an instant, and not before I could localize it. 'Great now we're ghost hunting' Jon couldn't dismiss this as a malfunction. The "Expanse" has redefined the term "normal", with spatial anomalies that would pass through the ship and wreck havoc on all the systems. The laws of physics just don't seem to always apply here. "It's just about the end of the shift let's have one more seniors meeting before the next shift comes on. Malcolm would you call Trip up for us?" "Yes sir." 'God I completely forgot about Trip, wonder how he's holding up.'
Once the entire senior staff was there even worst news came into light. "Cap'n we don't have warp engines! Not even a minute after ya got the sensors workin' again the warp engines shut down. I'm a leanin' to someone put some sort of energy field around us. 'Cause no matter what I try I can't get the engines to create a stable warp field. All we got is impulse and we ain't goin' anywhere fast with them." "So we're stuck here with an alien species that we can't see... what are our options?" "Perhaps if we took the shuttle pods out to explore the other derelict ships; they may have tried themselves to escape from here and designed their own methods of detecting the unknown species."
"You suggest that we go on to other ships to see what the other ships might have found out?" Jon was a little taken back. Even with his ship in working order with the exception of the warp engines. "I don't think we have such of a choice. We're stuck here with broken engines-""They ain't broken!" Trip shot out. "Ok non-functioning engines" Hoshi was hurt by Trip's outburst, but at the same time understood. Trip was very protective of his engines. He treated them like human beings almost.
"So sir how do you suggest we go about searching the ships? We only have one exolinguist." Jon thought for a sec before answering. "She'll stay here, the search parties can send the text they collected from the ships here and Hoshi can work on both of them."
Following the debriefing the two teams were decided to be T'Pol and Malcolm; with Jon and Trip for the other. They were going to remain in constant communication with Enterprise. Nothing out there quite followed the laws of physics so who was to say what they would find out there. While they were stuck here the Xindi were building the weapon that could destroy all of Earth. Once again it was Travis who was staying to command Enterprise while the rest were gone.
"Sub- Commander where do you think we should start? I mean to say how will we chose which ones to investigate?" Malcolm trusted T'Pol, even though she was Vulcan she was very capable of the command position she was given. "We should begin with the closet ship and work our way to the further ships." T'Pol had been content with being teamed with Malcolm, he had a better control of his emotions then either the Captain or Commander. "Sub- Commander-""Mr. Reed you do not always have to refer to me according to may rank." "Yes ma'am. T'Pol does the Vulcan database recognize any of the ship out there?" "Several are unknown to the database. Why is it that the crew assumes that the database will hold all the answers?"
"I don't think of it being an answer to all our problems. I guess that it's useful in several situations with identifying ships, species, and planets that we might come across." T'Pol now understood, it was a guild for them, something to help. Even so the database that they have has been "censored" it doesn't cover as much detail as it should. Something that T'Pol wasn't very proud of.
"We're reaching the first ship Enterprise. Preceding to dock and begin investigating. Reed out." One the shuttle docked with the ship, T'Pol and Malcolm both donned the EV suits and proceeded to enter the ship. Once inside they were appalled to find the remains of the crew were preserved in the vacuum of space. They were sitting lying or floating exactly where they died. Nothing changed. They pulled out their scanners and began to search for a computer terminal. It took them a little while to find it, but they eventually found what seemed to be a terminal. Because of the lack of power they connected a portable power cell to the terminal and watched it come to life, with horrific interest.
The last thing that the terminal was doing; was that it kept repeating the last log of the ship's Captain. Over and over it didn't stop until T'Pol stopped it. "I believe that this will suffice for Ensign Sato to begin her translations." "I agree. Reed to Enterprise." "Hoshi here go ahead." "We're sending you what appears to be the final log of the Captain of this ship." "Understood receiving it now; Hoshi out." "So what are we going to do while we wait for the translation?" The sudden realization of there being nothing to do while they waited. "Perhaps we could explore the rest of the ship Sub- Commander?" "I agree with you Lieutenant we cannot just sit and wait for Ensign Sato. Let's proceed with extreme caution."

****

As for Jon and Trip; Jon was hoping this time he would be able to talk to Trip without too many distractions while waiting for Hoshi. They were able to find a computer terminal and access a section of the computers database. Not a lot of it but enough for Hoshi to translate. With nothing better to do then wait for Hoshi Jon put his plan into action.
"So how are things in Engineering? We don't need any supplies do we?" 'Start with small talk Jon, don't reveal your hand too soon.' Trip looked at Jon and thought for a second. "We're doing good I guess. No major problems. 'Where is he goin' with this?' Trip couldn't understand why Jon was so interested. "So how long until we will be forced to re-supply?" "Before we left space dock we supplied this mission for six months of supplies. Jon is there somthin' bothrin' ya?" Jon was shocked when Trip asked the question. "I'm fine, just a little curious. Don't want to go so far into the Expanse only to find out we're running out of supplies." John tried to act natural, but his best friend wasn't buying it for a second.
"John ya can't lie to m. What's on yer mind?" Trip was getting worried about where this could lead. The first thought was Malcolm. He trusted Malcolm to make right choices and to keep a level head Like Trip though he was releasing some very volatile repressed emotions. "Trip is there anything going on between you and T'Pol?" Jon was stabbing blindly into the dark to find out what his best friend was doing lately to have less time to spend with him. "T'Pol?! No! She does the occasional Vulcan neuro-pressure so I can sleep, but that's it." Trip then realized that Jon had no idea what was going on. His secret about Malcolm was safe a little longer.
Jon was getting very confused. 'If it isn't T'Pol could it be Hoshi? No Hoshi seems pretty close to Travis right now...' Jon himself was pretty lax about the non- fraternization of crewmembers. It was a good idea, but when put to the test proved to be something that could not be done without. Humans needed the emotional bonds of family, friends, or lovers. Being in deep space removes family; friends are the friends that you can make on the ship. Lovers, well relationships are bound to be formed. Not much can stop them from forming. Jon was getting very curious about Trip's relationship.
"So who was it that stole you from me?" "From you? Geez Jon I didn't know we were going steady." "You know what I mean." 'He's trying to evade the question.' Trip was silent for a while. 'Should I tell him? No! God no! Malcolm might not like Jon knowing and shut himself into his shell and I'd lose him forever. Gonna have to talk to him about this.' "Can't say just yet Jon. When the time's right I'll let ya know." Jon was slightly put down by this, but quickly recovered. "Whenever your ready." They left it at that, until Hoshi signaled to tell them that she was finished the translation and was uploading it into their scanners. "There you have it. It wasn't that bad. Could have been a lot worst. I'm still working on the Sub- Commander and Lieutenant's, Hoshi out."
With the capability of now reading the consoles and anything written, they both made their way to the bridge. Along the way both just remained silent.
So Jon... how are things with Porthos? Did he recover from that incident where the doc had to do that weird surgery to him and an iguana?" 'Well someone must be desperate to start a conversation, try a little harder why don't ya!' "Porthos is great. There were no complications with the procedure and there doesn't seem to be any complications now." Jon knew small talk when he heard, and he was hearing small talk. Then suddenly the ship jolted to the left. Tossing both Trip and Jon against the wall.
"We'd better hurry if were gonna get to the bridge and get that info." Trip was now very concerned with getting off the ship with dead bodies was more then enough to make his stomach to turn inside out. Their original scans showed it to be safe to dock with this ship. There were spatial anomalies that they could detect. Now speeding up the pace they saw the bodies of the crew. Perfectly preserved in the vacuum of space. If this did anything it only encouraged them to move faster to the bridge.
Once they got to the bridge, which was no easy task considering that they had no power to work the lifts. They had to crawl through the ship's equivalent to Jeffery Tubes to get there. Once there they quickly tried to get a computer console working that might have kept the info on this region of space or the people responsible . They didn't find anything that they needed, but it became very clear to them that there was a ship involved. "Maybe T'Pol and Malcolm had better luck." Trip replied as they began to leave for the shuttle, then for Enterprise.

A/N: Well now this is the close of another chapter, and defiantly not the end of the story. Just do what you do best...... Review!