Walking the Stars

Acting Captains

Stardate 2259.56

The Enterprise was progressing quickly and smoothly towards Klingon space when she suddenly dropped out of warp, causing all her passengers to feel the sudden change in inertia.

Sala, who had been standing at the time, was thrown towards the front of the bridge, near the Captain's chair.

Despite the suddenness of the stop, Jim seemed to be aware enough to throw out an arm in an attempt to catch the female Vulcan, while he himself was being thrown forward as well.

Without needing to ask, Sulu had an answer for what had just occurred.

"Engineering must have manually dropped us out of warp," Sulu explained, checking the readings on his console.

"Mister Chekov, did you break my ship?" Jim asked on a channel to engineering.

"Sorry, sir. I don't know vhat happened!" Chekov said in a frantic tone, "Ze core overheated. I had to actiwate the emergency stop. It must be a coolant leak. I need time to find it. Sorry, Keeptain."

"Damn it," Jim muttered, closing the channel, "Mister Sulu, time to our destination."

"Twenty minutes, sir," Was Sulu's answer, "But that's twenty minutes in enemy space we weren't counting on."

"Alright. We better hop to it," Jim said, starting to move to leave the bridge.

Finally having a moment, Jim quickly turned to face Sala, "Are you okay? Nothing hurt?"

"Yes, Captain," Sala quickly answered, "Is the same for you?"

"Yeah," Jim said with a short nod before going back to what he was before, "Where's Spock?"

"Here, Captain," Spock said, re-entering the bridge from the corridor.

"You're coming with me to Kronos," Jim said before shifting his gaze to Uhura, "Lieutenant, how's your Klingon?"

"It's rusty, but it's good," Uhura responded.

"Good. You're coming, too," Jim said before taking a few small steps towards the Commander and the Lieutenant, "This isn't going to be a problem, is it, you two working together?"

"Absolutely not," Uhura said in a flat tone before moving to leave the bridge.

Spock watched Uhura leave before he answered, "Unclear."

"I'll meet you in the shuttle bay," Jim said with a sigh as McCoy approached him.

"Jim, you're not actually going down there, are you?" McCoy asked in a hushed voice, "You don't rob a bank when your get-away car has a flat tire."

Jim moved slightly to his right to open a channel to engineering through the Captain's chair, "I'm sure engineering will have us all patched up by the time we get back. Isn't that right, Mister Chekov?"

"Yes, Keeptain. I'll, do my best, sir," Chekov answered.

Jim closed the channel before turning to face Sulu, "Mister Sulu, you have the conn. Once we're en route, I want you to transmit a target comm burst to Harrison's location. You tell him you have a bunch of real big torpedoes pointed at his head if he doesn't play nice, you're not afraid to use them."

Sulu was quiet.

"Is that a problem?" Jim asked.

"No, sir," Sulu answered, "I've just never sat in the chair before."

Jim paused for a moment before saying anything else, "You're gonna do great."

Jim then started to leave the bridge.

"Jim! Wait!" McCoy said, once again in a hush voice, as he chased after Jim, Sala behind him, "You just sat that man down at a high-stakes poker game with no cards and told him to bluff. Now, Sulu's a good man, but he is no Captain."

"For the next two hours, he is," Jim said curtly before continuing in a slightly annoyed tone, "And enough with the metaphors, alright? That's an order."

Jim then once again turned to leave the bridge, "Mister Sulu, make sure that K'normian ship is ready to fly."

This time, only Sala chased after Jim, "Captain."

"Yes, Commander?" Jim asked, sounding slightly exacerbated.

"I can reasonably concluded where your feelings of aggravation can be coming from but I must be frank."

"About?"

"Why did you appoint Mister Sulu to be acting Captain when the logical choice would be your Second Officer, who is me, as your First Officer is leaving the ship with you."

"Because of the situation, the acting Captain may need to lie. And, as it stands, Vulcans don't seem to have a good track record of doing that," Jim said, not looking over his shoulder at Sala.

"Captain, if this is about the actions of Spock, then I-."

"Now is not really the time to be talking about this, Sala," Jim said with a sigh, "Report back to the bridge and help Mister Sulu."

Sala's feet stopped when she heard this.

The lack of extra footsteps caused Jim to look back at Sala for a moment.

"Aye, Captain," Sala said in a flat tone before turning about and returning to the bridge.

Upon returning to the bridge, Sala took a seat at what would typically be Spock's station. It was several minutes before any word came from the shuttle bay.

"The away team as departed from the ship, Mister Sulu," Sala relayed.

"Thank you, Commander," Sulu answered simply.

It was several more minutes of silence before a transmission came from the captured shuttle that the away team was using.

"Mister Sulu, I think we found our man," Jim said as information was sent to the Enterprise from the shuttle, "You let him know you mean business."

"Aye, Captain," Sulu answered, before opening his access to the target comms burst, "Attention, John Harrison. This is Captain Hikaru Sulu of the USS Enterprise. A shuttle of highly trained officers is on its way to your location. If you do not surrender to them immediately, I will unleash an entire payload of advanced, long-range torpedoes currently locked onto your position. You have two minutes for confirm your compliance. Refusal to do so will result in your obliteration. If you test me, you will fail."

Sulu then closed the transmition.

While he was speaking, Sala had gotten up from the seat she had taken and was standing to Sulu's left, while McCoy was standing to his right.

McCoy looked to Sulu before drawing a deep breath, "Mister Sulu, remind me never to piss you off."

The thought of a chuckle drifted briefly across Sala's mind at this comment.