The Walls Have Ears...And Eyes

Posted on Fri Dec 15th, 2023 @ 4:18am by Commander Kevin Lance

Mission: CSI: Chuck Norris
Location: USS Chuck Norris
Timeline: Current

on:
{Deck 5, Port Landing Thruster Bay}

Kevin dropped down through the access hatch from the deck above into the port side landing thruster bay. The temperature was noticeably cooled than when he had left a couple of hours ago lending credence to the theory that the excessive use of computer core assets was linked to the transporter transceiver.

The maintenance chief was about to speak when Kevin held up a hand to stop him. The Chief Flight Control Officer removed his comm badge and set it on the module adjacent to the disassembled transceiver. He activated the badge and said, “Computer, play random Klingon Death Metal, highest volume.” Almost instantly, the bay was filled with growling Klingon vocals, discordant stinger instruments, and aggressive drumming that was near to deafening. The chief looked questioningly at Kevin and in response he shouted, “The walls have ears.” The chief nodded and Kevin waved him towards the disassembled transceiver.

Now that they were closer, heads almost touching, Kevin was able to speak in a tone only a little louder than conservation in a crowded room. “What are we looking at?”

“The entire guts of this module of the transceiver has been removed. Must have happened after we beamed the delegate aboard and broke orbit from Vulcan. We haven’t needed the transporters since but if we had we would have experienced fluctuating power. Funny thing is that we didn’t observe any fluctuating during routine diagnostics.”

“The computer was probably programmed to report everything was normal,” Kevin concluded, “Seems to be a running theme with our adversaries. Isn’t that a laser?” He pointed toward a part of the modified transceiver that extended towards the aft bulkhead.

“Good eye, sir,” the maintenance chief replied, It is a laser but not powerful enough to be a weapon. My guess is that it is a tight-beam communication laser. Real old school.”

And hard to detect. Warp communicators, like the one based on the ship were “noisy” systems, warping space to allow near instantaneous communication but leaving an enormous wake for anyone even casually looking. The communication laser, in contrast was invisible to anyone not directly in the line of fire. But the laser was extremely short ranged only effective out to one hundred thousand kilometers. Whoever was receiving a signal would need to be within the ship’s sensor range.

“The laser wouldn’t account for the excess heat, would it?”
“No”, the maintenance chief replied, “Even at constantly emitting at full power, it wouldn’t change the air temperature more than a half a degree or so. It was these babies.” He indicated a row of isolinear chip banks that took up much of the interior space of the transceiver as he continued, “I can’t be for certain until we power up but it looks like these chip bank convert data into an information stream that the communication laser can broadcast.”

Kevin stroked his beard, “The more data processed, the more heat generated?”

“You got it,” the chief beamed, “For a fly boy, you’re not that dumb.”

With the music blaring from his comm badge, Kevin sensed rather than hear the approach of someone from behind. “We’re not alone,” he muttered to the chief. As the chief raised a hand to his ear, Kevin reached behind himself to grab the interloper and yank.

Unable to see his target, Kevin wasn’t able to fully get ahold of his opponent but the sudden, powerful attack cause whomever it was to lose balance. Kevin turned about and lunged up from a crouch to knock the humanoid down. The alien’s camouflage dropped and it was a bald female with greenish-gray skin of an unusually dappled texture.

Kevin grabbed the female in a choke hold designed to put pressure on the arteries in the neck rather than crush the air pipe. The alien struggled against the hold but she wasn’t sufficiently strong enough to break it. Kevin held the position while his opponent clawed at his arm and kicked vainly. After 15 seconds, the body went limp and he released his hold.

He grabbed his comm badge a terminated the Klingon music. Activating it once again, he called out, “Security, this is Lieutenant Lance. I have subdued one of the intruders. Meet me at the port side access hatch between Decks 3 and 4.”

:off

Lieutenant Kevin Lance
Chief Flight Control Officer
USS Chuck Norris