Kobayashi Maru - Michael A. Martin [168]
FORTY-EIGHT
The Depths of Tezel-Orokos Kuiper Belt
P OWERLESS TO TAKE any direct action to stop the proceedings that were unfolding before him on the bird-of-preys bustling bridge, Trip sat with his back to the console where his captors had parked him. He watched in silence as Sopek finally gave the order that confirmed nearly all of Trips worst suspicions.
“The lead vessel has activated the arrenhehwiua telecapture system, Sublieutenant, the turncoat captain said to the youthful male officer seated at the forward helm console. “ Enterprise will come within the systems operational range when she closes with the freighter to commence rescue operations. The attack force will reveal itself then, while bringing the device fully to bear against the Earth vessel.
Trip watched. But he wasnt watching helplessly.
Despite the slight shaking of his hands, no doubt caused by the close presence of both Sopek and his crewnot to mention the disruptor-packing two-legged watchdog posted near the turbolift doorsTrip hadnt found it all that difficult to take surreptitious control of a couple of the ships more innocuous-looking systems.
The backup coolant valves that governed the dispersal of the life-support systems waste heat had taken only a few short minutes to figure out. Using those bursts to create a corresponding pulsation within the adjacent tertiary subspace communications backup systema little-noticed system that engaged automatically during signal-jamming operationshad taken even less time.
The trickiest part of the gambit had been trying to look casual while digging a finger deeply into his right ear in order to gently extract the small universal translation unit that the Adigeon plastic surgeons had concealed there.
Hate to lose either one of these things, Trip thought, remembering how difficult it had been to fix this one after it had temporarily failed a few weeks back. But I can get by with just the left one if I really need to.
Right now, what he really needed was to tap out a message on his improvised equivalent of a subspace telegraph. But any telegraph operator required the use of a telegraph key, of course, and Trip suspected that his ear-implant device would fit the bill nicely, given the right combination of skill and luck.
Pretending to stretch, he palmed the tiny, raisin-sized control mechanism, then allowed it to roll to a stop between his right thumb and forefinger. Relying both on his sense of touch and his memory of the repairs hed already once been forced to make on the unit, he found the tiny actuator switch that controlled the receipt of inputs from the jaw-implanted bone conduction microphone that allowed him to “converse with the device on a silent, subvocal level.
Too bad I cant just use the subvocal interface directly over a voice-channel link, he thought as the little unit began automatically running up and down the local wireless interface frequencies, seeking a match with the console-accessible systems Trip had just seized. But I suppose you cant have everything.
He could only hope that what he now had would prove to be enoughand that someone aboard Enterprise would notice that somebody here was sending them a signal, albeit an unorthodox one. Reasoning that his best chance to get Captain Archers attention quickly was to start with a familiar, easily recognizable message, Trip started by repeatedly sending the equivalent of the name “Lazarus, the code name he had used months ago, while trying to send Enterprise advance word of the attack on Coridan. Memories of the Coridan disaster, which had claimed more than a billion lives despite his last-minute warnings, filled Trip with foreboding.
As did the realization that whether or not Captain Archer received and understood his transmissions in time to act on them, at least one ship and crew was all but certain to come to a terrible end today.
Unobtrusively squeezing the ear implant in his hand in a rhythmic but