Disclaimer: see Chapter 1

A/N: Thanks for taking the time to review. I'm pleased people are still following this.


Chapter 6

The next day at breakfast, I saw Malcolm had managed to get a table all to himself by littering it with PADDs, plates and glaring at anyone who came anywhere near him. Most of the time, he was more concerned with his PADD than glaring. He was making funny little grunts and satisfied noises as he worked away.

I decided I could live with his target practice. After all, I had almost finished with the injectors. The Captain was right. It wasn't ideal, but the high warp testing could wait. So while Malcolm was planning away before his shift, I was running through the last part of the injector stuff in my head.

I took a last gulp of coffee and saw Malcolm was particularly engrossed in something. He was frowning at the PADD, his finger hovering over the keys, and had stayed in that indecisive pose for some time.

I finished off and made for the door. As I passed by Malcolm on my way to Engineering, I said loudly, "All set, then, Lieutenant?" I craned to see what was holding his attention.

He jumped, jerking the PADD toward himself before I could read anything. He said, "Uh, yes, thank you, Commander." He started to say more, but then merely nodded and got back to work.

Oh well, if he wanted to be uncommunicative…

x - x - x

In Engineering, everything was humming. Even me. Everyone had pulled all the stops out - gone above and beyond - to finish off the adjustments and make the tests. Once I had confirmed it was all working as it should, we would lock off and go back to the usual set-up. The buffers on the power drains had down their job in keeping the system stable, but it would be good to be able to get rid of them.

We were now making the final changes to the fifth injector assembly - the last one. I hummed some more. I thought this would've taken days to fix but my team had proved me wrong.

A small tremble underfoot told me that the starboard forward cannon had been fired. The power output of the impulse engines showed the corresponding expected dip. That had been going on for hours now. No doubt the dense asteroid field had taken casualties and was now a sparse wasteland, with any remaining asteroids fearful for their continued existence as they saw their companions meet messy ends.

I made another delicate alteration.

Then stared at the glitch in the output trace. What the…?

Before I could do anything - not that there was anything I could have done - the glitch morphed into a spike, the readings went haywire and the fifth injector assembly went into uncontrolled feedback, rapidly unraveling the fourth, then the third… all trying to self-correct and failing miserably. It was over in an instant - the entire injector bank in free-fall, from fifth to first.

I came to my senses and shut it all down. It wasn't dangerous, but all that effort, all those minute adjustments, tests, hours of detailed, painstaking work… all destroyed. I could've wept.

In fact, I did hear a sob to my left. And then another to my right.

We were all stunned by the disaster.

What had happened? Had the buffering failed? But there were back-ups, and back-ups to the back-ups.

No - I realized with growing anger as I checked out the system. No - the buffers were fine and dandy. What wasn't, was the unauthorized drain I had just found - a tap from the main power system. Unauthorized and hence un-buffered.

It didn't take me a nanosecond to figure out who on this ship would be interested in stealing my energy. There was only one person who was sneaky enough and arrogant enough to do that! I was furious. I was going to rip his head off and fire it into the nearest star, closely followed by all his other component parts.

But first I had to secure the system and get repairs - totally avoidable repairs - started.

I gritted my teeth and tried to speak calmly. "Right, people. Revert to standard settings for now. I know it's difficult, but we can't leave it like this."

They nodded dispiritedly.

I paused only long enough to comm the Captain. "Tucker to Archer."

"Yes, Tr-"

"Captain - we've lost warp capability, just to let you know. We should have it restored in an hour - low warp anyway. Tucker out."

I snapped the comm closed and went to confront the criminal.

x - x - x

Sure enough, when I got to the Armory, there is our resident gun-nut tweaking my plasma relays with his back to me. The power tap was there in full view with its obscene connectors. All the evidence I needed.

"And just what do you think you are doing, Lieutenant?" I growled, keeping from an undignified yell with immense difficulty. I was furious. He knows he does not tamper with systems-level stuff without my express say-so. I had been through this before with him enough times.

"Commander." Malcolm turned about and straightened up, giving me a self-satisfied smirk. "I am increasing the feed to the forward cannons by two percent. It should bring quite a satisfactory improvement. I didn't want to bother you, and as you can see…" he spread his arms wide, "… it is working admirably."

He grinned at me. He actually had the unmitigated gall to grin at me when he was messing with things that did not concern him - and when that messing had brought the injector assemblies crashing down around our ears.

"I have not given you permission to do that, Lieutenant." I glowered at him, thinking about all our wasted effort and wanting to fry him on the warp core.

It must have been impressive because he did actually take step back.

"I ran it by the Captain," he said, less confidently.

I snarled, "Unhook that now! That's an order!"

I have observed on many occasions that Malcolm follows the rules when it suits him, but give him a perfectly reasonable order that doesn't quite meet his own precise requirements and… well, you might as well not bother having that extra rank pip. Defiant, obstructive…

As I had anticipated, Malcolm simply ignored my order and said, "But it's all set now! It'll take ages to re-do it."

I couldn't believe he was telling me it was going to 'take ages to re-do'. What about the plasma injectors, huh?

I spat out, "I don't care. If you won't disconnect it, I will!" I started toward the jumble of wires that showed where he was stealing my energy from.

"Now wait a moment, Commander," said Malcolm quickly, pushing in front of me. "The Captain has authorised this."

"The Captain is not the Chief Engineer," I shouted at him, not caring that everyone in the Armory was watching our free show.

"No. The Captain outranks the Chief Engineer," he shot back, as quick as anything. See what I mean about obeying regulations when it suits him? Now the number of pips did figure, huh?

I worked hard to keep my voice even. "You do realize, we will have to do all those injector adjustments and tests again, because you altered the power balance in the system before we completed them, huh? Days of work - lost. You realize, we now we have no warp capability? I sure hope your guns are working, because we are in no position to outrun anyone! 'Course, you'd need to be able to fire straight too!"

Malcolm's eyes widened and his mouth dropped open. I don't think he had known what his meddling had done. But then he said, "Well, if you have to do the adjustments again, anyway, you may as well let me carry on, mightn't you? Wait until I've finished?"

No 'sorry', no 'I didn't realize', no nothing. Only his damned cannons! It took me all my self-possession not to knock him down.

I snarled, "I spent all of yesterday looking after your sorry ass, Lieutenant. I don't know why I bothered."

He said sharply, "I didn't ask you to, Commander. I would have been perfectly fine without your help."

"Oh, yeah? You think so? You should have heard yourself! I bet you would have shot Porthos!"

"I wouldn't have done that," said Malcolm uncertainly.

I pressed my advantage. "Oh yes, you would. What was it you said? Oh, yeah, the beagles were armed with their own phase pistols! That they were conspiring with Andorians. Not exactly what you want to hear from the guy in charge of Security! You were so crazy you fired off an unauthorized phase pistol in your quarters!"

That was a low blow, but his attitude had riled me. Riled? No - let's say I was incandescent with rage.

Malcolm flushed. His eyes darted around at his fascinated men then back to me. "You can't resist can you?" he said, with bitterness. "I was ill."

"Yeah, you were and I was happy to help you. But it seems you can't return the favor."

"But there's no point now-"

"I don't want to hear it, Lieutenant."

"You're being unreasonable-"

"I'm being unreasonable?"

"Yes."

"Forget it, Lieutenant. I want that thing disconnected - now!" I waved my arm at the offending contraption.

"But, Commander, the Captain said it was okay."

I lowered my voice so that only Malcolm could hear and not any of the onlookers. "Since when was the Captain an expert on injector systems testing? You know you should have come to me with this first, before you did anything. We've had this discussion before, Lieutenant. More than once. And are you going to trust someone to authorize you to mess with my systems when that person thinks 'Bedknobs and Broomsticks' is a classic movie?"

I know - ridiculous, but I was seething.

He clamped his mouth shut, unable to argue the point. I moved around him to reach the equipment, determined he was not going to profit by his cavalier behavior.

Then I saw a sly smile spread across Malcolm's face. I didn't like the look of that and paused, wondering what he had up his sleeve.

"How was that lozenge?" said Malcolm, too casually.

"Lozenge?" I could feel myself redden, even as I registered he was trying to distract me.

"Or was it two, Commander? You liked them didn't you?"

How did he know about the second one? "You didn't tell me it was your medication," I countered.

"You wanted to know where I got them from."

I felt a stirring of interest despite myself. I wondered how long it would be before the cravings disappeared completely. I bit my lip.

Malcolm gave a bark of laughter. "They came from Phlox of course."

Yeah. That made sense. Of course it would be Phlox, now I came to think about it. I guess I had been trying not to think about it, though.

Malcolm smiled more broadly. "I wish I had a camera here."

Huh?

Then he gave a satisfied grunt. "Ha! What am I saying?" He took three paces around me while I turned to follow - I wanted him in full view. He pointed upward. "Camera," he said, without taking his eyes off me.

I glanced above him and right into the maw of a security cam. So - was I supposed to be impressed that he knew where the security cams were located in the Armory?

But there was more to come. Apparently now the stage was set to Malcolm's satisfaction. He looked around triumphantly at his team, then back to me. He crossed his arms. "Think about it, Commander. I got those lozenges from Phlox."

"So?" I tried to sound unconcerned, but his manner was too confident. He thought he held a winning hand, although I'd got no idea what form that might take. The hairs on the back of my neck prickled.

"Guess what they were made from? No? Go on, hazard a guess."

"I don't know and I don't care."

"Perhaps you want to place a wager on it? You and how many others? What, oh, what could they be?" He gave a thin smile.

"A wager?"

He jerked his chin forward and unfolded his arms. His voice hardened. "Yes. You know, a bet - like you had going on me."

"That was just a little harmless fun. No need to get upset about it. Anyway, as I said, I do not care what the lozenges are made from. Now - stand down and let me get on with this."

Malcolm laughed softly. "Oh, I think you will care. What did those lozenges remind you of? Spherical, chewy, a liquid center…?"

Uhh, yeah, what did they remind me of?

He leaned real close and shouted, "Those lozenges were the eyes of alien centipedes. Bugs, Commander! They were bug eyes!"

Oh. My. God.

They were. They were bug eyes. As soon as Malcolm said the words, I knew he was right. Bits of bugs. In my mouth. I had chewed them. I had swallowed them. I remembered rolling one around in my mouth, taking my time, savoring its unusual texture and flavor. I spluttered, "And you knew that when… when…"

"Yes, Commander. I knew you would get a kick out of it! That's why I offered you one of my precious lozenges." His smile was pure malice.

I didn't care anymore what unholy union Malcolm was making between his corrupting cannons and my power output. I needed a bathroom - and quick!

x - x - x

I got off the comm call with the Captain madder than ever.

"Oh, I'm sorry, Trip. I didn't even consider that it might cut across your injector testing. Well, what's done is done. Never mind. Let Malcolm finish his gunnery practice - it's going well, don't you think? - and we'll re-run the injector work tomorrow."

We'll re-run the injector work? More like, I will, or rather my team and I will.

I sat down and let my annoyance with Malcolm build. So he'd had a difficult time recently, huh? Tough. He wasn't the only one.

Malcolm had not been the least bit grateful for me acting like a nursemaid to him yesterday, which hadn't been all fun and games. I'd been worried about the damned sonofabitch and yet today he'd treated my concern as if it were nothing.

Then he had deliberately bypassed me by going to the Captain. I had no doubt at all that it had been deliberate - he had known exactly what he was doing - solely so he could feed extra energy to the weapons from the main system. He knew I might raise an objection, a perfectly valid objection at that.

Then, when he had discovered he had wrecked the injector work, he hadn't even apologized - to me or to my team. His only thought had been for his precious cannons.

Malcolm had messed me around with Movie Night - again, I was beginning to suspect he had intentionally been misleading and it was all premeditated. Our 'deal' that was no real deal. It was totally one-sided.

As each point hammered home, I felt my indignation ratchet up another step.

Okay, I admitted, he might not have been firing on all cylinders when he foisted that lozenge on me, but there had to be something which prompted him to do it. And he certainly knew what he was doing when he told me what the lozenges were. That was unforgivable in my book.

I wished I hadn't thought about that again. My stomach attempted to crawl up my throat while doing a samba. I took another rapid tour of the bathroom facilities, facilities I was now acutely familiar with in the closest detail.

When I returned, I knew what to do. I was determined to get one up on Malcolm. Preferably two up - it would put me ahead of the game for once.

I went into main Engineering. Everyone was standing around listlessly, putting the final touches to the standard injector settings. Warp speed would be available again soon.

But with Enterprise being a mere 'weapons platform', as Malcolm had so rudely put it, there was little more to do. I couldn't ask them to start again on the adjustments – there was no point anyway with Malcolm's scheme still going.

Normally, my people would be glad of the freedom to catch up with important but non-urgent tasks. Not today. They knew they would be starting from scratch with the injector assemblies tomorrow, and we hadn't even had the fun of a top speed run.

A power spike on the main readout showed Malcolm had stolen another chunk of our output and squirted it through his cannons.

"Direct hit," said Vella expressionlessly, as she monitored the practice. "Again."

I had to do something about this prevailing attitude. "Okay, everyone. There's still plenty to get on with. Let's get going," I called, clapping my hands together to wake them up. "Otherwise it'll be shore leave on an asteroid and I'll let Lieutenant Reed practice on you! Where's that PADD?"

It was a poor joke but it raised a few smiles and people started to function again. I said, "You put in the effort now and I promise some fun later." And fun there would be.

I pulled up the comms system schematic on my terminal and isolated the panel in Malcolm's quarters. It would require finesse but it was possible to get an open channel. I regretted the lack of video, but I couldn't count on any cooperation from Security. I wasn't even going to risk asking them. Audio would do just fine.

I worked away at the task until I had fixed it, then retreated to my office. "I'm taking an early lunch. No one is to interrupt me unless it is urgent, you understand?"

"Yes, Sir," came the chorus back.

I shut the door and settled down for some real fun.

I'd got some useful material via Travis, who'd got hold of it I don't know how. I didn't want to know how. It was security cam footage from the night of 'Alien' - the night T'Pol will never forget. I spent a short time familiarizing myself with it. There was so much potential here! I couldn't wait to get started.

I pulled up an image from Cam B24 and clicked through frame by frame until I got to a good sequence, one where Malcolm looked a complete idiot, skulking around the corridor with his phase pistol at the ready.

Travis had been right - Malcolm doesn't really do 'rampage'.

I added in some music from 'The Good, the Bad and the Ugly', enlarging the image until Malcolm's face filled the entire screen.

A quick change of theme to a tune from 'Bedknobs and Broomsticks' and then I overlaid some fake cartoonish undersea stuff on top of the video, with fish weaving past and making goo-goo eyes at Malcolm.

Damn, this was fun.

More music… the theme from 'Jaws' to build tension as Malcolm stalked his terrifying prey: Crewman Smith, who frankly is not the most menacing of creatures. Still, he was all I had to work with, and the music did help the fear factor a bit. On the plus side, Smith was a little more realistic than the shark.

I intercut wildly from camera to camera, from Malcolm to Smith - from ahead, from above, from behind. We are so well equipped with cameras you could put a whole feature movie together without getting bored with the angles. I was finding latent movie-making talents I never knew I had. All that time sitting through the best moviedom had to offer was paying off. Oh yeah, I thought. This was good!

I found an excellent overhead shot as Malcolm crept back, uncertain as to what armaments Smith had. Then more of Smith, wandering aimlessly down the corridor waving a hose nozzle around, with a fertilizer backpack and clutching his stomach. Poor man. He had been quite vulnerable to the influence of 'Alien'. I must see if I can get him to watch 'Event Horizon'.

Then came T'Pol's grand entrance, walking as stately as ever and entirely oblivious of the peril she would soon find herself in. Some nice lighthearted music here.

Another shot of Malcolm looking stupid. Ha! There were so many of those to choose from. I added the Laurel and Hardy theme tune for this bit as he waddled along.

Then I cut to a close-up of T'Pol's catsuit as that was to feature later. Hmm. It was a little blurry, but not too bad. Then a lingering view from behind for Malcolm's benefit - I'm not totally unfeeling. I wondered what he'd say to that!

I made some more rapid cuts between all three protagonists as they came together on a collision course. Then I added more from 'The Good, the Bad and the Ugly'. I'd let Malcolm decide who is who.

I needed something pompous for 'Malcolm's theme'. Then, I had it - the theme from the 'Bridge on the River Kwai' - 'Colonel Bogey'. Perfect!

Now, I was sure I had a pic of… the alien from 'Alien'. Yeah, found it. Then if I teamed it with… hmm… a dinosaur. Yeah, Barney the dinosaur! Oh, I have so many influences in my work!

I found if I jiggled the video back and forth, it looked like Malcolm was doing a little dance. I had to stop there for a while because I couldn't see what I was doing through the tears.

Then I added some rap music for Malcolm to dance to. I couldn't stop laughing. I just had to play that again, and again, and again…

There was an uncertain knock at the door. "Sir, I know you said no disturbances, but are you all right? We heard some noises…"

"Yeah. I'm fine. Carry on!" I wiped a tear away from my eye and tried to stifle my guffaws.

In the next part, I cut it to make it look like Malcolm was running away from Smith, who was looking quite pathetic at this point. The power of the editor!

I had another laughter break.

Then I played the dance part again. I wondered if you could make that into a game of some kind?

Then I thought I'd try some arty, symbolic stuff. I started with an image of a phase cannon followed by one of Malcolm. He couldn't compete with that. Or a torpedo. Even better! I added the torpedo part in as well. He needed taking down a peg or two.

Then came the final assault. I added the '1812 Overture' over the video. It fit the action perfectly. Smith screamed his head off and sprayed T'Pol. T'Pol stood rigidly while the liquid fertilizer drenched her. Then Malcolm rounded the corner - too late - called a warning and fired.

I accessed the Science Lab notes and added in shot of T'Pol's catsuit from the investigation following the incident.

Then, over that last lingering shot of the catsuit, I added Malcolm's announcement over the shipwide comm, very serious in tone: "The threat has been contained". Then I gave it some echo and sampled it.

Then I showed the threat: Porthos!

I had to pause again to catch my breath. I decided I'd missed my calling in life. I carried on, adding more touches, but eventually I had to tell myself to stop work on it. I could've put together hours more of this material.

I knew I had a masterpiece.

I'd be ready to roll as soon as Mister Reed had finished stealing my energy output. I was planning to give Malcolm his own private premiere.


TBC