Star Trek Into Darkness Page 0,55
why he had allowed his chief to talk him into resigning along with him. As much as he respected Scott, the Roylan was glad the table was wide enough to keep the chief from poking him in the face as Scott punctuated each new sentence with a challenging jab.
“You know what bothers me the most?” the chief was saying for the third or fourth time. Keenser couldn’t be sure, because his own absorption of alcoholic liquids had rendered suspect his usually infallible ability to crunch numbers. “The modifications I made to standardized equipment. The enhancements I made. And then just like that, I’m off the ship! Just for trying to do what’s right!”
Across the table the squat Roylan nodded solemnly, still staring into his glass. Within its amber depths the lightly tinted liquid held mysteries unknown, not to mention the shattered fragments of his own aborted future.
Peering across the table, Scott bellowed accusingly. “And what did you do, anyway? You just stood there like an oyster, lookin’ at me, ya wee sleekit cowerin’ beastie!”
An insistent chirping interrupted the unfounded but nonetheless energetic harangue of his silently stoic assistant. What was that damnable noise? Was the bloody universe itself now intent on driving him mad? It had to be the focused emissions of a dying pulsar, aimed with fiendish precision at the back of his head—or else someone was calling him. Unable to decide between the two or influence the first possibility, he opted to try his communicator. It required three fumbling tries to snap it open.
“What?” he shouted into the pickup.
The connection was not the best, suggesting that it was being bounced along via multiple relays.
“Scotty,” came the static-distorted but now familiar voice, “it’s Kirk.”
“Oh, well now!” As he leaned against the back wall of the booth, an expression of enormous satisfaction spread across the engineer’s face. “James Tiberius Kirk? Savior o’ the galaxy and dismisser o’ all rational thinking? Callin’ me? A lowly an’ self-disgraced engineer? To what do I owe the pleasure . . . sir.”
“Scotty, Uhura had to work a minor miracle to make this tight-beam transmission possible, not to mention secure.” There was a pause, then Kirk’s tone turned uncertain. “Is that technolo I hear in the background? Where are you?”
Scott dismissed the captain’s question with an airy wave of his free hand while a morose Keenser dipped a thick forefinger in his drink and commenced stirring memories.
“At present, I’m somewhere between heaven an’ hell, Captain. Otherwise known as San Francisco.” The chief chuckled at his own humor.
Burdened with concerns of somewhat greater import, Kirk did not join in the amusement. “Are you drunk?”
“Is that an engineering question? Are you now questionin’ me ability to handle liquids as well as me job? What I do in me spare time is entirely me business, Jimbo. And in case it has escaped your notice, I am no longer a member of your crew, and therefore no longer subject to your orders.”
From a very long distance away, Kirk took a deep breath before resuming the conversation. “Scotty, I’m starting to have my doubts about those torpedoes.”
Kirk’s unexpected words managed to penetrate the alcoholic haze that had taken up residence in the chief engineer’s cerebrum. “I will consider that an apology.” Scott sat up a little straighter. Or at least that was the instruction he passed along to the muscles of his lower body. As he remained slumped, it was likely that the message got lost somewhere between his brain and his behind. “And I will consider that apology.”
“Scotty, I need you to check something out for me. Will you take these coordinates down: 23, 17, 46, 11 . . . Are you recording?”
The chief glared at his communicator as if it were personally responsible for his current situation. “You think I kinna remember four miserable numbers . . . What was that third one again?”
“Forty-six. I need you to go there and report back. I don’t know exactly what you’re looking for, but I have a feeling you’ll know it when you see it.”
Communication concluded, Scott flipped the communicator shut and proceeded to exchange the device for the larger, rounder, and altogether more solid glass sitting on the table in front of him.
“Damn senior officers,” he muttered as he downed a fresh shot.
By way of response, the stocky Roylan maintained his unblinking yet inquisitive stare.
Scott responded with a disturbing noise, not unlike the sound certain deeply installed components made in Engineering when the warp core was not functioning properly.