“Sorry, Quinn,” Pennington said with a measure of sincerity. Glancing toward Armnoj, who was studying them both with his customary air of condescension, he leaned closer to the pilot and asked in a low voice, “You think we’ve been here too long?”
“Dunno,” Quinn replied. “The damn thing’s probably sent some kind of distress call by now. Whether the Klingons actually answer it is another matter. Let’s hope that doesn’t mean it’s already transmitted its sensor logs and purged its data storage core.” He adjusted the grappler’s targeting scanner and set about resetting the device for another attempt.
It took only moments for the Rocinante’s autopiloting system to maneuver the dilapidated Mancharan starhopper into position. Pennington watched as Quinn manipulated the grappler’s controls with ease. The audible signal of the target scanner locking its crosshairs on the drone had only just begun to sound when the pilot pressed the trigger, and Pennington saw on one display monitor the image of the drone as the grappler slammed into the unmanned probe, locking on and holding against the device’s weathered, beaten hull.
“Nice shooting,” Pennington offered with genuine admiration.
Ignoring the compliment, Quinn instead keyed another set of switches on the grappler’s control console. “Now, we bring it into the hold and get this over with,” he said. “That is, assuming its thrusters don’t fire again.”
Pennington frowned, renewed concern edging into his voice. “You think they will?”
“Sure,” Quinn replied, shrugging. Glancing back toward Armnoj and speaking loud enough for the Zakdorn to hear, he added, “It’ll probably drag us into the nearest star, where we’ll blow up real good.”
“ What?”came the shocked reply from just outside the cockpit, evoking a satisfied smile from the pilot.
After locking Armnoj inside the one part of the ship where he was likely to cause the least trouble—the shower stall—Quinn and Pennington made their way to the Rocinante’s hold, where, thanks to Quinn’s skilled marksmanship with the grappler, the now inert Klingon sensor drone lay in the center of the small cargo bay’s dull, scuffed deck.
“Don’t worry,” Quinn said as he paced a circle around the probe. “The grappler’s electromagnets were strong enough to jam any outgoing comm signals. There’s no way it got off any kind of distress signal.”
“If it didn’t send one during our first three tries to nab the bloody thing,” Pennington replied as he scrutinized the drone. Essentially a cylinder lying on the deck, it measured two meters in length, its outer shell a series of rectangular plates. The seams between the hull sections were visible, and he even noted a few that had been creased, breaking their seal. Had the grappler caused that?
“According to T’Prynn,” Quinn said as he walked over to a nearby worktable and retrieved a piece of equipment Pennington did not recognize from a worn leather satchel, “this little gizmo should take care of the hard part.” The device, whatever it was, looked to be slightly larger than a Starfleet-issue tricorder. Rectangular and sporting a silver finish, it possessed a flap that Quinn opened as he walked back to the probe.
“What is it?” Pennington asked.
Quinn replied, “Some kind of scanner thingamabob. If I set it up right, it’ll download the drone’s data, then replace it with some mumbo jumbo T’Prynn made up.” Shrugging, he added, “She explained the basics, but I was nursing a warp-five hangover at the time. The salient details may have eluded me.”
“Fancy that,” Pennington replied, rolling his eyes before returning his attention to the sensor probe. “I wonder what this thing has that T’Prynn wants so badly.” He frowned, remembering what Quinn had told him of the assignment the intelligence officer had given him. “If it works the way you told me, then whatever data it was set to transmit had to have been collected from that system it passed through most recently.” Did the Jinoteur system harbor some value to Starfleet, particularly with regards to the presence of Starbase 47 in the Taurus Reach? Might it have any connection to why the Tholians were so agitated by the Federation’s encroachment into the region?
Is there a connection to what happened to theBombay? To Oriana?
“That’s what she told me,” Quinn replied as he tapped a few controls into the keypad set into the top of the scanner. “I don’t get paid to overthink these things, you know?” The unit began to emit a series of tones, which increased in pitch and intensity as he moved closer to the drone. Kneeling next to the drone, Quinn held the scanner against the burnished metal hull plating, and Pennington heard a metallic click as the unit attached to the probe’s housing. That accomplished, the pilot looked up. “Not sure how long this is supposed to take.”
By way of reply, a surge of blue energy crackled across the scanner’s faceplate. Quinn, one hand still on the unit, was thrown back by the shock to land heavily on the deck. Pennington saw smoke belch from the unit at the same instant its keypad and miniaturized display exploded.
“Quinn!” he shouted as he crossed the deck to the fallen pilot, who already was pulling himself to a sitting position. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah,” Quinn replied, rubbing the back of his head with one hand. Allowing Pennington to help him to his feet, he added, “Damn. I forgot about the built-in anti-tampering system.”
Pennington walked over to the probe, noting the burnedout husk of what only moments ago had been T’Prynn’s mysterious scanner. “Well, it looks like you’ve got another problem here, mate.” He pointed to the ruined device. “As my grandfather used to say, this furshlugginer veeblefetzer’s gone all potrzebie.”
Squeezing his eyes shut, Quinn shook his head in evident disgust. “T’Prynn’s going to have my hide.” He nodded toward the sensor probe. “Want to bet it managed to pop off a distress call that time?”
Pennington sighed in exasperation. “We’re nevergoing to make it to Boam II, are we?”
“We are if you let me figure this out,” Quinn slurred, still shaking off the effects of the shock to which he had been subjected. Muttering another string of noteworthy profanities—which Pennington recognized as originating on Argelius—Quinn moved to a storage locker on the cargo bay’s far bulkhead. He returned a moment later carrying a dented toolbox. Setting it down on the deck next to the probe, he removed from it a laser torch and a pair of goggles.
“That ought to make for an undetectable infiltration,” Pennington remarked.
Quinn grunted. “We’re past our deadline for ‘undetectable,’ I think.” Donning the goggles, he activated the laser torch and went to work on what Pennington recognized as the only hull plate along the drone’s exterior which featured an access panel.
What is this idiot doing?Pennington raised a hand to shield his eyes from the glare of the torch as it began to slice through the probe’s thick hide. “How is this helping us?” he shouted over the cutting tool’s dull whine.
“I’m trying to remove the memory core before this thing starts transmitting and wipes it clean,” Quinn replied, his attention focused on his task.
Clearing his throat, Pennington said, “You’re just going to cut it out?”
“Looks that way, huh?” the pilot replied. The air of the cargo bay was now tinged with the smell of heated metal, an aroma Pennington found only slightly less offensive than Quinn himself.