Cloaked In Secrecy

[John Randall 0]

OFFICIAL LOG

ENSIGN JOHN RANDALL

USS CHALLENGER

 

(continued from Feb. 4 log)

 

Personal Log, Stardate 13172.3

 

John watched his panel closely in the Altair's engineering room; the Altair being the ship he had transferred

to for this covert mission into Romulan space. His gut tightened every time he thought about it. Here he was,

a definite hater of just about anything Romulan, and he was actually in Romulan space on a top secret mission.

How ironic was that? He told himself not to think about it; just do the mission, and get back home to Challenger.

He and Eddie Freeman, the acting engineering chief of the Challenger, had beamed over to the Altair just a short time ago, and the ship immediately began its mission. Freeman was actually going to get minor plastic surgery to impersonate a Romulan Tai'Shiar operative, green skin and all. John shuddered even more with revulsion at the thought of it. Freeman had told the captain of the Altair, Captain Creighton-Ward, that Randall didn't want any part of the operation; Freeman wanted John to stay onboard Altair to study the engines and the cloaking device aboard the ship. Ward thought it was a good idea, and thought also, since Randall was the number two officer in engineeringaboard Challenger, and the Altair engineering crew was pretty much cadets just graduated from Starfleet Academy, that John could help out Lieutenant Parker, the Altair's chief engineer, with breaking in the new junior officers performing real-time engineering tasks.

 

The ship made its foray into Romulan space undetected; performed its mission in acquiring the Romulan informant, and the ship then set out for Federation space. John kept noticing a residual power bleed-off in a

junction box in a nearby corridor, and thought eventually it might affect the cloaking device performance; and

they certainly didn't need that at this stage. He kept trying to trace the problem, and didn't notice Lieutenant

Freeman sit down at a panel next to him. "Problems?" asked the chief engineer. John didn't hear him at first, but then noticed movement out of the corner of his eye, and glanced over at him. "What? Oh, hello, sir, welcome back. The mission must have went well; you're still alive." Freeman smiled wryly. "Well, we got the guy we were supposed to get." John then looked fully at him, not liking the tone of the chief's voice. "Not exactly a ringing endorsement there, sir," he observed.

 

"No, it isn't," agreed Freeman. "I can't tell you too much, but what I can tell you is; Starfleet didn't exactly give us all the information they had." John snorted in half-disgust. "When have they ever? Especially when it comes to dealing with those green-blooded bas--, er, beings." Freeman looked at him in amusement over the correction. John half-smiled, and continued, "Glad to see you're still in one piece, sir." Freeman started to make a comment, thought better of it, apparently, and shrugged. "Yeah, I'm still in one piece. It was close, though. Anyway, you looked irritated. Having any problems?" John gestured at his panel, and said, "There's a residual power bleed-off in junction ZX-147, and for the life of me, I can't figure it out."

 

Freeman thought a second, then said, "You already check all the components? Sometimes if some of the connections are degraded, it can bleed some energy. I've seen it happen where they had something drawing power from places it shouldn't be, and it shows up as a bleed off." Randall shook his head. "I haven't checked all the junctions, but Lieutenant Parker says they should all be the latest versions you can get." Freeman cocked his head. "I think I'd check them myself if I were you." John looked at him a second, and nodded. "Point taken, sir. I'll see if I can track down the location of the box, and take a look myself." Freeman nodded. "I'll see what Parker is up to. See you later." "Aye, sir," said the ensign, and went back to his panel to try to ascertain the location of the malfunctioning junction box.

 

After a few moments, John located the junction box in a corridor wall not far from engineering. He called over Parker's number two officer, showed him the problem, and told the officer he, Randall, was going to fix it.

The officer smiled and nodded, and John went to his locker, retrieving his toolkit. He buckled it around his waist, and went to the cargo bay to get a replacement part. He then walked to the corridor wall where the junction box was located. He removed the panel concealing the box, and knelt down to take a look. The problem was obvious; a slight but noticable crack ran down the entire length of the casing of the box. John set to work; isolating the box, removing it, and installing the replacement. About a half hour later, he was finished. He replaced the corridor wall panel, and scanned with his tricorder. The readings came back green, and he stood up, replacing the tricorder on his belt.

 

He walked back to his locker and put his toolkit inside. He then went back to engineering, where the Altair officer greeted him with relief. John smiled at him and nodded, then went to his station. He called up the program, and nodded in satisfaction as the panel read green across the board. He then thumbed the intercom.

"Randall to Lieutenant Parker." "Parker 'ere, go ahead, lad," came the unmistakable Irish brogue of the chief engineer. "Sir, I noticed we had a residual power bleed off in one of the junction boxes. I took the liberty of replacing the box because I didn't want anything to happen to the cloaking device at this stage," said the ensign. "Hope you didn't mind me reporting until now." "Oh, quite all right, old chap," said Parker. "You probably saved me a few hours of work. Nice job." John smiled to himself, and replied, "Thank you, sir. Will continue to monitor here. Randall out."

 

The crew worked along for a little while, then John received a message on his panel. He read it, then got out of his chair, looked around, and spotted his destination. He walked over to a very nervous cadet who was having trouble routing power to a junction. John calmed her down, then talked her through it. "No, no, it's no big deal. Just reroute your power through here, grab this stream, and route it back to the original junction through this bypass here, ok?" The cadet nodded, and, a few moments later, sighed heavily in relief, smiling at him. John said, "You're good to go now. Just keep an eye on it for a few minutes to make sure it doesn't backtrack on you, which I don't think will happen." He patted her on the shoulder, got up, and went back to his station. A few minutes later, the captain's voice came over the intercom. "Captain Creighton-Ward to Engineering. Come in, please."

 

John waited for a few moments, waiting for Chief Parker to acknowledge the hail, but nothing happened. The captain's voice came back again. "Mr. Randall, we'll need to increase our speed to warp 9 to make it back to Federation space quicker. We'll need all the time we can get to prepare for our Romulan friends." John's eyes widened at that remark. "Please keep an eye on our warp engines and cloaking device to make sure they don't overload in transit." John thumbed the intercom. "Aye, Captain, I will. I will also inform the Lieutenant. Randall out." The engine whine increased almost immediately, and John turned to see Parker wiping his hands with a towel. "What a bloody time to take a leak," he drawled, and the crew all smiled at him. Randall turned back to his panel, fighting to keep the grin off his face.