Relics - Michael Jan Friedman [34]
But no sooner had Scott touched the controls than the monitor table suddenly sounded an alarm. The man looked around helplessly.
Moving quickly, Geordi corrected the situation. It didn’t take much, but it was yet another delay. And he didn’t have all the time in the universe to get this done.
“I dinnae understand …” Scott began.
Geordi explained, trying to hang onto what was left of his forbearance. “We use a five-phase autocontainment field now. It’s meant to operate above three percent.”
Scott seemed rattled-but only for a moment. Then he was his confident self again. “Ah,” he replied. “Well. That would make all the difference in the world now, would it nae?”
“Commander La Forge?”
Geordi turned in response to Bartel’s call. She and two other engineers were working on the darkened warp core.
“Yes?” La Forge responded.
“We’re nearly done with the recalibration, Commander. We can restart the engines in ten minutes.”
“Thanks,” said Geordi. “Glad to hear it.” He watched as Bartel and the others returned to their labors.
“Ye know,” Scott interjected, “speaking o’ restarting the engines … I remember a time when the old Enterprise was spiralling in toward Psi Two Thousand. The captain-Captain Kirk, that is-wanted to try a cold start of the warp engines. But I told him it was nae possible. Without a proper phase lock, it would take at least thirty minutes, I said.” A sigh. “And even that was probably an understatement. In fact, when …”
As Scott went on with his story, undaunted by the flagging attention of those around him, someone stuck a control padd in front of Geordi’s face. He traced it to the engineer that was holding it out.
“Commander?” said Moreno, a petite brunette.
La Forge nodded and took the padd. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome, sir,” said Moreno, and stood there awaiting his reaction. As he studied the padd, trying valiantly to concentrate, Scott continued his story.
” ‘Ye cannae change the laws of physics,’ I said. But of course, he would nae listen. So we had to come up with a new engine start-up routine … easier said than done, considering the situation we …”
Finally, Geordi managed to focus on the padd. He grunted. “The alpha-band radiation is pretty high, isn’t it?” Making a notation on the padd, he looked up at Moreno. “We should run a complete-“
Suddenly, he heard a loud, urgent voice Captain Scott’s. “Mr. La Forge! Do ye know that yer bloody dilithium crystals are about to fracture?”
The older man had moved off toward the warp core while Geordi was occupied with Moreno. Having opened the dilithium chamber at the center of the core, he was examining the dilithium crystals with a critical eye.
“Excuse me,” he told Moreno, thrusting the padd back at her. Hurrying over to the warp core, he shut the chamber door, eliciting a startled look from Scott.
“Laddie!” the older man sputtered. “Do ye know what ye’re-“
Geordi’s patience was starting to wear thin. “We recomposite the crystals while they’re still within the articulation frame,” he explained, in a somewhat terser tone than he’d intended.
Scott’s brow furrowed. He looked puzzled.
“Aye, lad … that would save a lot o’ time. But how do you manage to-?”
That did it. Geordi had tried, he really had. But it was absolutely impossible to humor Scott and still get anything done.
“Mr. Scott,” he, said, “please. I’d like to explain everything, really. But the captain wants this spectrographic analysis done by thirteen hundred hours. So if you’ll excuse me …”
With that, he turned his back on the older man and retreated into his office. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Scott watching him for a moment. Then, uninvited, he went in and quietly moved to Geordi’s side.
Is there no end to this? asked the chief engineer. No relief?
“Would ye mind … a little advice?” asked Scott.
Geordi decided he would mind. He didn’t want any advice at all. But he held his tongue, hoping that once Scott gave it to him, he’d leave him alone.
“Starships’ captains are like children,” the man said in an avuncular tone. “They want everything