August 15th, 2154, 0800 hours. Linguist ensign Hoshi Sato stepped into engineering of the Enterprise NX-01, where the hum of the warp engine immediately greeted her. Trip was standing on the elevated area in front of the engine controls. He leaned over the railing, looking down and talking to Captain Archer and Sub-Commander T'pol. She stopped within hearing range, about 5 paces behind Archer and T'pol.
"Remember that last anomaly, as we were leaving the Delphic Expanse? It really it us hard, as well as those Xindi Cruisers. The starboard nacelle is offline 'cause half the coils are fused. The EPS manifolds are another questions, half the power cuplings have been destroyed, and the power grid is severely damaged. The best warp I can give you now is warp 1.7."
Hoshi's eyes widened in surprise. "What are you talking about?" She asked. Archer and T'pol turned around, noticing her for the first time. "The power grid is perfectly fine! If it were damaged at all wouldn't most the stations and lights and everything be offline? And the engine is humming like a baby! It's perfectly fine! The starboard nacelle barely got a scratch."
Archer stepped up to her and whispered in her ear, "Thank heavens you're here. Trip has been rambling like this all day. T'pol and I can't translate his techno babble at all, we think even Trip doesn't know what he's saying."
"How could Trip not know what he's saying? He's only the engineer."
"By the looks of it he's not skilled in techno babble. We need you to help translate."
"But… but I don't know very many of Trip's engineer terminology!"
"Hoshi," Archer asked beggingly. "We need your help."
Hoshi sighed, taking in a deep gulp of air. "Has Phlox taken a look at Trip to see if there's anything wrong with them that might be meddling with his speech?"
Archer nodded. "Says there's nothing wrong with him."
Hoshi nodded. She brushed past the Captain, stopping to look up at Trip beside T'pol. "Hey, Trip. How's it going?"
"Don't tell me you paced through 17 corridors and 2 turbo lifts just to question me by the neon glow of the engine?" Trip smiled playfully.
"Ummm," Hoshi stammered. "That's not really the answer I had in mind."
"I'm sorry I didn't please your neural net."
"What?" Hoshi asked quietly to T'pol.
"I'm sorry I didn't please your brain." She said, the best she could make of Trip's gibberish.
"What time is it?" Hoshi asked suddenly. She promised Phlox to visit and feed his animals at 0900 hours.
"According to the ship's chronometer, it is 0800 hours, but the chronometer was knocked out of alignment when that last Xindi vessel fired it's photon torpedoes and hit the forward hull plating, near the O2 recycler." Trip babbled.
"Huh?" Hoshi asked. She turned back to Archer. "Captain, I'll need more time to study Trip's terminology, grammar, and vocabulary. I'm going to write a techno babble dictionary."
"Sure. You have all the time you need, but try to be quick." Archer smiled at her, the kind of smile that seemed to stay 'I trust you, I believe in you, I have faith in you,' but really said 'I feel so, so, so sorry for you!'
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I myself don't know very many Star Trek terms. I don't know what EPS manifolds are, or what power cuplings do, etc. So any help on Star Trek terminology would be greatly appreciated!! (Just list some stuff and tell me what they do. Please.)