Last Full Measure - Michael A. Martin [70]
I’ll do what I have to do when the time comes, Hayes told himself, though he still hoped fervently for a postponement that he really didn’t believe was possible.
A yellow light on Reed’s console began flashing, attracting Hayes’s eye. The MACO leader watched as Reed and the captain exchanged nods, after which Archer turned his chair so that he faced Trahve. He smiled broadly at the alien, a mannerism that Hayes found perplexing; after all, Archer hadn’t succeeded in his efforts to escape the Xindi tractors, as the continued approach of the Xindi trap attested. And yet he didn’t have the look of a man who was getting his affairs in order in preparation for death. Nor did Reed, for that matter.
Instead, they both looked like poker players who secretly held all the aces.
Several bright orange alarm lights on the flight-control console suddenly began flashing in a frenzied rhythm. Reed appeared unsurprised by this, and didn’t even glance down at the instruments in response. Seeming equally unfazed, Archer merely regarded Trahve with a cool, appraising stare.
Hayes also looked toward the alien pilot, who was no longer smiling, smugly or otherwise. Hayes felt nearly as confused as Trahve looked.
“Maybe you’re right about me, Mister Trahve,” Archer said, reiterating his exchange with the alien pilot from a few moments earlier. “Maybe I can’t bring myself to order my subordinates to simply kill you, or torture you. So I think I’ll propose something else instead.”
Though the manacles remained on his wrists, Trahve tried to rise from his chair, obviously intent on reaching the flight console that now lay behind the still-seated Archer. Kemper shoved the alien back into his seat, where he remained, splay-legged and goggle-eyed.
“Do you have any idea what you’re doing, Archer?” Trahve said, his brow furrowed, his eyes darting across what he could see of the forward flight consoles.
Archer nodded. “I think so. If I understood your instrument panels correctly, your warp core is now building up an internal feedback overload.”
Trahve was aghast, and made no effort to hide that fact behind banter. “That’s not going to break the Xindi tractor beams, Captain!”
“Of course it won’t. But that’s not what I’m trying to do.”
A knowing look crossed the alien’s face. “Ah. So this is merely yet another attempt at persuasion on your part. Either I somehow free us from the tractors, or you blow up my ship.”
Archer put on a passable imitation of Trahve’s carefree chuckle. “You still don’t seem to get it, Trahve. In a few minutes, the rising power levels won’t have anywhere to go except back into your multiply-redundant warp-core containment systems. At that point, there’s going to be a fairly enormous explosion aboard this ship. One that will rip through each and every layer of core containment.”
Trahve’s upper lip was beginning to glisten with perspiration. He held up his manacled wrists in a gesture of entreaty. “Listen to me. You’ve got to let me stop it.”
“If I thought I had a chance of breaking the Xindi tractor beam, I’d be tempted to let you try to do that.”
“But you’ll die, too, Captain. Everyone on this ship will die!”
Archer nodded. “And that’s just for starters.” The captain hiked a thumb toward the faux weapons-assembly facility. “Once your warp core loses antimatter containment, that entire structure out there will be blown to quarks, too.”
A pair of slender, elaborately articulated mechanical grapples crossed the forward window, then vanished from sight. The little vessel shuddered as the arms grabbed the hull, which in turn transmitted a loud, reverberating clang into the cockpit.
“Why are you doing this, Archer?” Trahve asked, his eyes huge and pleading. “Why?”
“Because there could be Xindi aboard that facility who’ll want to interrogate us. And Enterprise