Part 4: The Package Holiday Home

“Captain’s Log, Stardate…. um, well I’m not actually sure as my watch has broken after I put it in my mouth, and this Klingon ship hasn’t got any clocks that I can read. Correction, this Klingon ship hasn’t got anything I can read. Dr Jackson, with a fine sense of historical incompetence, has named our captured Klingon vessel Titanic. Hmm. For the past three weeks, we have been sitting around trying to do the sums for time travel to rescue Commander Hill from the past. So far, no success. We have had it proved once again that our navigator cannot navigate, and no-one else aboard ship can do the maths to compensate. As a result, we are in trouble. Added to this is our current predicament of having to remain in cloak to avoid detection by Federation Starships. Apparently we are wanted on several charges of violating regulations. Also, the Klingons are a bit upset after we stole their ship and killed the crew. All in all, things are not good. End log entry.”

Olding stalked the corridors of the Titanic, wishing he were somewhere else entirely. Even prison had to be better than this place. The crew had had to take a crash course in Klingon, which, in Lieutenant-Commander Wall’s case, was an entirely accurate phrase. He had just about figured out the difference between left and right in Klingon, but only after a few very near misses. They had come perilously close last week to annihilating not only themselves but a starliner cruising through the sector. On the upside, they had taken the opportunity to beam Astrophysicist Walsh aboard the other ship, into a cargobay containing plenty of food. The liner wasn’t due to reach its destination for four months, which the crew thought gave them plenty of time before Walsh could raise the alarm.

Olding entered the bridge, and sat down in his incredibly uncomfortable command chair. He twiddled his thumbs for a while, and began to whistle. He then pressed all the buttons in sequence on his armrest, then pressed them in reverse order, then pressed them so that the bleeps they made played the Federation Anthem. (Unbeknownst to him, Chief Graham’s wits, wobbly in the first place, were slowly disintegrating in Engineering as the comm signal was repeatedly sounded).

Finally, something happened to break the monotony. The communications station bleeped. Olding stood up and quickly read through the Post-it notes stuck to the console. Toggling the appropriate switch, he looked up at the screen. It flickered, then cleared to reveal the grainy image of the Federation President, Peter Tracey. His face was grim.

“To anyone receiving this signal. This is the President of the United Federation of Planets. Do not approach Earth. Another one of those probes has appeared. It is totally ionising our atmosphere. We’ve shown it the humpbacks, but it hasn’t taken any notice. Help!!!!”

Olding slapped down on the internal speakers. “Get to t’ bridge now!!!!”

The crew jostled through the doors to the bridge, and sat down, waiting expectantly. Olding re-played the tape of the President’s message, and the crew made appropriate ‘ooh!’ noises. They then sat in silence while Olding waited for one of them to make the inevitable silly comment. It came, perhaps unsurprisingly, from Damerell.

“Just one thing I don’t understand, sir,” he began.

“Yes?”

“What’s this got to do with us? I mean, we can’t do anything about the probe, can we?”

“We can try, Damerell. Think about it for a second. If we save t’ Earth, they’ll dismiss all t’ charges. This is our opportunity to get off t’ hook, as it were.”

“Eh?”

“Oh, never mind. Just play back t’ probe’s signal, and fiddle with it so it sounds like it would underwater.”

Damerell sat down at the comm station and fiddled until a suitably garbled sound came back through the speakers.

“Now, match that sound up with marine life-forms that are now extinct.”

Damerell did so, and after a few minutes of searching, the computer displayed the result. ‘Salmonus Smokedus’.

“A salmon? That really takes t’ Yorkshire puddin’ wi’ gravy! Oo’d be stupid enough t’ send bluidy probes millions o’ light-years just to talk t’ salmon?”

Olding couldn’t believe how ridiculous the situation was. He pulled himself together. His pension plan was on the line here.

“Are there any salmon left alive on Earth?”

Damerell, skimming through the file, shook his head. “They died out in the twenty-first century.”

It was too good to be true. They could save the Earth and recover Hill in one fell swoop.

“Mr Graham, are your computations for time-warp ready?”

“Well, I’m reasonably confident, but I’m not giving any guarantees. I mean, if you want certainties, then I can’t help you, but…”

Olding tuned out Graham’s technical dissertation, and turned to the helm console. “Mr Wall, find us a star and slingshot us around it, if you would be so kind.”

“Alright!!! Hang on to your hats, we’re going for it!!!!!!”

Damerell plotted the course that he and Graham had argued over for about four hours the day before, and changed the results so that they fitted the ones that he had worked out, rather than Graham’s.

Olding braced himself. “Here we go again. Engage warp drive.”

The Titanic shot towards the sun, juddering as she went. Inside, everyone’s vision blurred as the vibration hit them.

Olding had to struggle to make himself understood. “He-he-heat shields up-p-p-p-p-p!”

“P-p-p-p-p-pardon?”

“O-o-o-o-o-o-oh bluidy hell! He-he-he-heat shields up-p-p-p-p-p!”

“O-o-o-o-o-o-oh right!” The heat shields were raised, and the juddering decreased somewhat.

“Captain, we are approaching space-time breakaway point! Permission to activate computers?”

Olding looked round. Graham was actually smiling. Was this a good sign? Olding couldn’t be sure.

“Permission granted. Engage computers.”

No sooner had he said it than the world vanished, to be replaced by a white light. He heard snatches of conversations that made no sense, saw visions of his crew that he had never seen before, and finally, and most worryingly, he saw a vision of a girl holding a piece of chalk. She was sat next to a clown dummy, and behind her was a blackboard. A jolly tune seemed to be playing in the background.

Eventually, he woke up, and looked around the bridge. Everyone else seemed to be asleep, so Olding shouted, “WAKE UP!” at the top of his voice. The rest of the crew jumped out of their seats. “Thank you. Now, where are we?”
Graham glanced down at his monitors. “We appear to have arrived at our target time. It is late evening on the 21st of November 1996.”

Olding was gobsmacked. His crew had actually pulled it off! They had successfully travelled backwards in time, arrived at precisely the right moment, and not blown anything up. Amazing. Damerell looked insufferably smug.

“Right, lads, we’re going to have to go an’ find Hill first. Tek us down, Mr Wall.”

“Oh goody!! Atmospheric flight!!! My favourite!!!!!!!!!”

Olding braced himself. The Titanic dropped through the Earth’s atmosphere like the proverbial stone. Wall was obviously having a great time, but, for the rest of the crew, their descent was hell. Finally, they emerged into the night air over London, and everybody breathed out, only to suck it back in again when Olding issued his next order: “Set us down in Hyde Park.” Wall swung the Titanic round in a sickeningly tight swerve, missed Hyde Park completely, and dumped the ship down in the garden of a large house. A very large house in fact.

The screen flicked on. Olding looked at it carefully. “Are you sure we’ve arrived in the right century, Mr Graham?”

“Perfectly sure, sir. Why?”

“This place looks a little grand for the twentieth century.”

Graham consulted his computer. “It would seem that Lieutenant Wall has set us down in the rear garden of Buckingham Palace, the residence of the Monarch of Great Britain. The lack of a flag on the flag-post, however, would indicate the Queen is not at home.”

“And that’s supposed to make me feel better?!” Olding didn’t hit Wall. Satisfying as it might have been, it wouldn’t solve any problems. “I thought I said Hyde Park?!! Well, I suppose that this’ll have to do. Right, we’ll divide into teams.”

He looked around him, and decided that he didn’t want any of his crew to leave the ship unsupervised. “Lieutenants Wall and Damerell, you’ll stay here to monitor t’ ship. Mr Graham…” Olding didn’t like what he was about to say, but it had to be said. “…you will take t’ Doctor and go and build us a tank for our salmon. According to our data, salmon are still in plentiful supply at this time, so finding a few shouldn’t be that difficult. While I’m finding this chap that Commander Hill is, er, inhabiting, you can build the tank, then we’ll go and find the salmon.”

Ten minutes later, Olding, Graham and Jackson were standing at the foot of the ramp. “Everybody remember where we parked,” Olding said.

“Shouldn’t be difficult,” said the Doctor, rubbing his forehead. The effects of the cannabis cakes were starting to wear off now, and he wasn’t feeling very happy.

“How do we get out of here?” Graham asked, looking around.

“I don’t know… look, there’s someone over there. We’ll ask him,” Olding said. They walked over to the man, who appeared to be walking his dog. He was also clutching a machine-gun. No-one was surprised. They had all read stories of how violent this time was.

“Excuse me,” said Olding. “Could you tell us where the way out is, please?”

“Are you trying to be funny?” the man snarled, and did something with his machine-gun. Olding didn’t know what it was, but instinct told him it was not good. Clicking noises never were.

“I’d, er haha, just like to know how you get out of here.”

“And I’d like to know exactly how you got in here!” The man was obviously not pleased. His dog began to strain at its leash. “Well, are you going to answer me?”

“Well, ah…” Olding suddenly realised that his answer was going to sound rather stupid. “Ahem. We, er, we wandered in by accident. Now we’re looking for the way out.”

The man pulled a device that looked like a communicator out of his pocket, and spoke into it. Within seconds, the three of them were surrounded by more men dressed exactly the same as the first one, and carrying the same intimidating ironmongery. This was definitely not good.

“I can see we have a bit of explaining to do,” Olding said to the assembled army. “Look, we don’t want to cause any trouble, so, we’ll just be on our way now, okay?”

He started to frantically tap the emergency transport command on his communicator. The situation was deteriorating rapidly. He tapped the control again. Typical. Neither Wall nor Damerell were concentrating again.

On board the Titanic, Wall and Damerell were happily throwing peanuts at each other when the bleeping started. They ignored it in favour of honey-roasted. When the beeping began again, Damerell decided to check it out. “It’s the… ow! Stop throwing those damn nuts! It’s the transporter command! Hadn’t we better do something?”

Wall stopped throwing peanuts and came over to have a look. “Oh, blimey! I’ll go get them!” He ran down to the transporter room, and started to read the Post-it notes stuck to the console. There was a lot of them.
Damerell’s voice came over the intercom. “Hurry up!! He’s playing the Federation Anthem again!!! It’s driving me crazy!!!!!!!!”

Finally, Wall figured out how to turn the console on. He then started to read Chief Engineer Graham’s notes on how to operate the system. Unfortunately, the notes made little or no sense, so Wall struggled a bit after the introduction, which read, “Good luck! You’ll need it!” His struggles were not helped by Damerell shouting at him periodically.

Olding was dragged into the cell block along with Jackson and Graham, swearing bitterly. He had finally given up on sending the transporter signal, but not before playing all twenty-eight verses of the Anthem in a desperate attempt to attract some attention. If it wasn’t for the fact that they were operating outside Starfleet jurisdiction, Olding would have his helmsman and navigator up on charges so quickly they wouldn’t have time to breathe.

They sat down on the narrow bunk and considered their fate. At least, Jackson and Graham sat on the bunk and considered their fate. Olding abandoned that in favour of pacing backwards and forwards and swearing.

“I do wish he’d stand still,” Wall grumbled. After half-an-hour, he had mastered the basic operating principles of the transporter, and had found the comm signals of the Captain, the Doctor and Graham. But he couldn’t lock on to them, as Olding wouldn’t stand still for long enough. “Oh well, I suppose two out of three won’t be too bad.” So saying, he pushed the dials, and a few seconds later, Jackson and Graham reappeared on the transporter pads.

Back in the cell-block. Olding stopped moving. “Where the…?” he said out loud. Then he himself was swept up by the beam. He rematerialised in the transporter room of the Titanic. “About bluidy time.” Olding stepped down off the platform. “Right, we’ll try this again. Seeing as you seem to know what you’re doing, Wall, you can beam us outside the garden. No, wait, we’re goin’ to need money before we go any further. We have to come up with a scheme to make us some cash fast.”

The next morning, a funfair sprang into appearance in Hyde Park. All the crew except Graham were there, as he was standing by the transporter ready to beam them out just in case. Each of them had polished up their party tricks and were giving it all they had in the hope of earning money. Damerell and Wall were busking, frantically banging out tunes on their knees with a couple of spoons. They weren’t making much in the way of cash so far, and it was just occurring to Wall that maybe it had something to do with the fact that they were busking twenty-first century classics about fifty years before most of them had been written.

Olding had, reluctantly, knocked up a Punch and Judy stall, and was running through a mindless repertoire of “That’s the way do it!” and “Oh yes it is! Oh no it isn’t!!” and “Behind you, behind you Mr Punch!” in his own distinctive style. It was a roaring success, as most people were paying him to stop. He had reduced three kids to tears so far, and he’d only been going for twenty minutes.

Jackson was sat behind a table with a wig on, staring into a holo-generator. Behind him was a sign reading ‘Mystic Medic predicts your medical future!’ He had set the generator up to run through the Klingon medical encyclopaedia in order, so, as people arrived, he read out the next entry to them. The number of people fainting was starting to go down now, after a worryingly high casualty rate at first.

After two hours, they got together and counted up their money. Wall and Damerell reluctantly revealed their takings: twenty pence and a bottle top. Jackson and Olding, however, had fared much better, earning the grand total of thirty-two pounds.

“Right, lads, here’s what we’ll do. Wall, you and Damerell stay here and see if you can make some more cash. Jackson and I will go and find Hill.”

Wall and Damerell looked at each other. They didn’t know any twentieth century songs, and it looked like it was going to rain.

Olding and Jackson boarded the tube to take them to the site that Olding had identified as the place where they would find Commander Hill. The tube was a whole new experience for them, especially as they boarded it during the rush hour. They were swept along the tunnels by the rush of people in suits until they found, more by luck than judgement, the train they were looking for. Squeezing into the carriage, they found themselves surrounded by more of these people in suits. Olding suddenly found it difficult to breathe. Just when he thought it couldn’t get any worse, it did.

A man dressed in a ridiculous teddy bear outfit with a bandage draped over one eye climbed onto the train, and began to sing in a very loud and tuneless voice. The other passengers didn’t seem to mind, but Olding couldn’t stand it. His amazement at this bizarre ritual increased when some of the other passengers began to deposit money into the bucket that the ridiculous man was carrying. Finally, he could stand there no longer. He pulled his fist back and hit the man squarely in the jaw, or at least where he thought the jaw was. The man dropped to the floor of the carriage. Everybody looked at Olding with a mixture of anger and shock. Olding looked away, and saw that the station they were pulling into was their stop.

“Come on, Doctor!” he said. As they got off the train, remembering to grab the bucket of money the man-bear had dropped, Olding thought he heard a distant cry of “You hit Pudsey!” but he could not understand it.

They found the museum without too much difficulty. They paid their entrance fee, and entered. Once inside, however, Olding began to appreciate the magnitude of their task. There were at least four school groups in the place, with loads of teachers running around. Olding felt pretty confident that they could exclude the women teachers, as Hill would have been sure to tell them if he had ended up in the body of a woman. That still left plenty of men to go through, and Olding was at a loss as to how to eliminate them from his enquiries. He didn’t like the idea of going up to each teacher in turn, and asking them “Is this your body?”

Wall and Damerell were having marginally more success now. They had been halfway through “Moon over Rigel VII” when a young boy had walked up to them. He was wearing a small black box at his waist, which was plugged in to a pair of black fluffy things hanging over his ears. A tinny noise was emanating from them.

“Oy, why are you playin’ that shite when you could be playin’ stuff like this?” He took off the black fluffy things and placed them over Wall’s ears. Damerell watched closely. Wall’s eyes bulged for a few seconds, then he started throwing his head backwards and forwards at an alarming rate.

Damerell was shocked. “What on Earth are you doing?”

“EH?!!”

“I SAID, WHAT ON EARTH ARE YOU DOING?!!!”

“I’M HEADBANGING!!!”

“YOU’RE DOING WHAT?!”

“ER, UM, WELL, I’M NOT SURE ACTUALLY!!!” Wall took the black fluffy things off. His eyes glowed. “I don’t know what that was, but I want more of it!!!!!!!”

“Give me that!” Damerell snatched the fluffy things off Wall and placed them over his own ears. He flinched as the high-energy sound ploughed through his ears, then, as if he was possessed, he started to throw his head backwards and forwards in an eerily similar manner to Wall.

Olding and Jackson had spent the past twenty minutes looking very carefully at teachers as they walked past. None of them looked even remotely similar to Hill. Jackson had begun to hum some ten minutes before, a sure sign that he was bored. Finally, Olding could stand it no longer. He took in a deep breath, and bellowed: “OY!!! HILL!!!!! WHERE T’ BLOOMIN’ ‘ECK ARE YOU THEN?!!!” Heads turned, eyes widened, and Olding blushed. It had the desired effect, though.

“Eeeer, yeah, you know.”

Olding looked at the man approaching them. “Oh my God,” he muttered. “What is that? Is it human?” Louder, he said, “Commander Hill, is that you?”

“Right, so eeeer, yeah.” Then, in a completely different voice, the man said “Let me out of here!!!! I can’t stand it in here!!!”

“Hang on, Hill, we’ll have you out of here in a jiffy.” Olding and Jackson grabbed the man and dragged him behind an exhibit. Olding fished out his communicator. “Energise.”

Wall and Damerell had been making money hand over fist once they had mastered the new style of music. However, they had then spent most of it on a huge sound system and hundreds of CD’s to play on it. Their necks were also beginning to ache. They were having so much fun they didn’t notice the communicator bleep for quite some time. “Today is gonna be the day that…” bleep bleep “…they’re gonna throw it back to…” bleep bleep “…you. What was that?”

“By now, you should have somehow… I don’t know!” Wall fumbled in his back pocket and pulled out his communicator. While still singing, he responded to the call.

“Mr Wall, this is t’ Captain. Are you receiving me, over.”

“I don’t believe that anybody feels the way I do about you now. Fine, thanks.”

“Pardon?”

“What?”

“Look, enough o’ this rubbish! Prepare to transport. And how do you feel about me anyway?!”

Wall and Damerell picked up their sound system and were beamed out of Hyde Park without further ado.

Back on board the Titanic, they were confronted by the rest of the crew, and a stranger. “Who’s this then?” Damerell asked.

“This is t’ man who is currently being inhabited by Commander Hill,” Olding replied. “We’ve called you here because we have a slight problem. We’ve got him back, but we’re not actually sure how to get him back into his own head.”

There was an embarrassed silence. Wall began to hum one of those damn tunes again.

Finally, Graham spoke. “I know! I read one of those books about funky Vulcan stuff a few years ago! We can just do one of those knarly rituals! Super!”

Olding felt obliged to point out the flaw in the otherwise perfect plan. “Er, neither of our two subjects is Vulcan, and we don’t have a Vulcan on board to facilitate the transfer in any case!”

“That’s all right!” Graham said. “We don’t need Vulcans. We have jump-leads!!!”

Olding looked at him witheringly, but, in his enthusiasm, the engineer didn’t seem to notice. He rummaged around in the toolbox in the engine-room, and fished out a couple of jump-leads. He attached one of the crocodile clips to the man’s ear.

“So, eeer, ow!”

He then dragged Hill’s body out of the freezer, and parked it on the floor. He then connected the other end of the jump-lead to Hill’s ear. Then, he clipped the second jump-lead to the man’s other ear, and began to walk purposefully towards the warp core. Olding began to have a horrible suspicion he knew what was coming.

“I don’t think that’s such a great idea actually…” he began, but he was too late. Graham connected the jump-lead to the warp-core, and flicked a switch.

The lights went out in the ship as the power curve adjusted dramatically. The only source of light came from the two bodies, that had started to glow.

“Eeer, yeah, you know, this hurts!!!”

Hill’s body began to twitch, and Graham spoke. “It’s working!!!! Now for the mystic chants! In the townwhere Iwasborn, livedama nwhosail edtosea…”

Olding closed his eyes, and waited for the explosion. Surprisingly, it didn’t happen. Instead, Hill’s body sat up, and rubbed his head.

“That hurt,” he said.

Olding tried to summon up some enthusiasm. “Welcome back, Mr Hill.”

Hill looked around. “This isn’t the Psycho, is it?”

“No, it’s not. We, er, borrowed a Klingon Bird of Prey after t’ Psycho was destroyed.”

“Destroyed? How?”

“We really don’t have time to explain right now. Suffice it to say that we have a mission here in this time. We are attempting to recover two salmon to take forwards in time to save the Earth from a probe hell-bent on destroying the planet.”

“Oh, okay.” Hill seemed unimpressed. “Hey! Klingon computers! I’ve never had a chance to dismantle one of those before!” Before anyone could stop him, he had gone over to the nearest panel, lifted it off, and was fiddling around in its innards.

Just then, Graham looked round. “We have another problem. The Klingon crystals weren’t up to the strain. They’re giving up. Decrystallising.”

“Oh, bluidy marvellous. What do we do now?”

Hill looked around. “Oh, that’s easy to fix. All we need is some nuclear particles. We can get them from a nuclear reactor in this time.”

Olding looked relieved. “Okay, where do we get them from?”

“You could find some in a nuclear submarine.”

“Right, Wall, Damerell, that’s your job. Find me some particles!”

“Yessir!!” The two of them wandered off.

“Right, Commander Hill, you’re with me. We’ve got t’ find some salmon. Graham, Jackson, you’d better go and sort out the fishtank.”

The engineer and the doctor beamed out. Olding and Hill followed them, after depositing the rather surprised teacher back into his school group.

Wall and Damerell had spent an instructive half-hour consulting the memory banks. Unfortunately, the Klingon ship’s computer didn’t have much in the way of information on Earth history, and so they could only find a few random bits. That was enough, though.

“Look, here we go! A picture of an Admiral Nelson in full uniform! Computer, give me one of those uniforms.”

A uniform identical to the one on the screen appeared in the replicator.

“What about me?” Damerell asked.

Wall shrugged. “You can’t have the same uniform as me. You’d better find another one.”

Damerell continued the search, and the computer displayed another uniform, of sorts.

“That looks a bit uncomfortable,” Damerell said. “A bit, well, skin-tight.”

“Does it really matter?” Wall asked, struggling into the uniform jacket. “What do you think?” he said, buttoning the jacket up. Gold lace was hanging from everywhere, and he had row upon row of medals.

“Very nice. They’ll be impressed with that.” Damerell had called up his uniform, and was trying to get into it, without much success. Eventually, he managed it.

“What sort of uniform is that anyway?” Wall asked.

“I think it’s called a wet-suit.”

Olding and Hill were conducting a scan by tricorder for the distinctive pattern of a salmon. After half-an-hour of searching, they picked up the pattern. Olding followed the readings, towards a large building. Hill glanced up at the sign over the door as they went in. It meant nothing to him. “Who is this Waitrose guy anyway?”

They entered the building, and looked around. Olding tried to surreptitiously wave the tricorder around, and they slowly made their way towards the salmon signature. When they found it, though, it was a bit of a disappointment. The salmon had obviously been dead for some time, as it was wrapped in see-through plastic, and did not seem to be breathing.
“Damn,” Olding breathed. “Come on then, back to the ship. We’ll have to think of something new.”

Graham and Jackson had had slightly better luck in building a fishtank. They had managed to locate a company specialising in plastics. Their only problem was that the two pounds worth of change they had left wasn’t enough to buy them the amount of plastic sheeting Graham had calculated they would need. So, they had had to resort to dishonest means. Jackson had gone in first, to prepare the ground. He managed to bluff the company into believing that they were expecting a visit from a highly respected Professor Graham, who was interested in seeing the premises. There was some initial scepticism, but when Jackson broke down and cried in the office, that cleared up soon enough. Now it was up to Graham.

“I can’t believe that I’ve come all the way here just to be told that I’ve not been invited!!!!” Graham stormed.

Jackson blanched, and whispered in his ear, “We’ve sorted all that out already.”

“Oh, okay. Well, that’s different! Come on, let’s go. Can my, er, secretary join us?”

Jackson hit him. He was not exactly very happy about being paired with the engineer, as he still hadn’t forgiven Graham for the cannabis cakes. The pleb who had been assigned to show them around realised that it was not going to be a fun tour. In this happy mood, the three of them set off on their tour.

Wall and Damerell approached HMS Trafalgar with some trepidation. They were not as confident as they had been about the effectiveness of their costumes, particularly as Damerell’s kept squeaking.

“Can’t you walk straight?!” Wall asked.

“Mmf mmf mm,” Damerell replied. He took the respirator out of his mouth and tried again. “It’s very difficult to walk straight with these things on.” He gestured at his feet, which were encased in big plastic fins. “Also, this damn tank is killing me.” He was wearing a huge air tank, to which the respirator was connected.

Olding had just finished explaining to Hill everything that had befallen the crew since he had left them. The two of them were sat by a river bank, watching the floats on the end of their fishing lines bob gently in the swell. So far, they had only caught small fry, but they were persevering. Olding was confident that he could eventually pull a salmon out of this river. Maybe the boats were scaring the salmon away, he thought. Also, possibly all this pollution in the water might discourage them from appearing. Still, mustn’t panic.

Hill, on the other hand, was in the depths of boredom. He was miles away from the nearest computer, there wasn’t even anything remotely technical anywhere near him, and he was expected to just sit here and wait?!

Then, Hill’s line began to tug. Excitedly, he wound the line in a bit. The line tugged still more. He pulled back, bending the rod drastically. The line was tugging continuously now, and Hill had to get Olding to give him a hand. Together, they slowly pulled the rod back, winding the line in as they went. Their quarry refused to give in without a fight. It pulled harder on the line, but the two of them refused to give up.

“This is it!!” Hill gasped. “It has to be a salmon!!!”

Finally, with a last, titanic heave, they pulled their catch on to the bank. It wasn’t a salmon. It was, in fact, a very angry police diver. Olding and Hill looked at each other, then at the policeman, and ran for it.

Jackson and Graham were sat in the office of the managing director of the plastics company. They had realised early on that this was the place that would supply them with the materials needed to build a salmon tank. They had also realised that they did not have the money to buy such materials.

Graham decided to bluff it. “Now, all that was very interesting. Maybe I have something that would interest you.” He sat down in front of the terminal, and began to type rapidly. Chemical formulae appeared and disappeared with amazing rapidity. Molecular diagrams flashed up on the screen, changed, then were replaced by new ones, getting more and more complicated as time went by. Finally, Graham sat back, and waved at the screen. It was displaying a very complicated long-chain molecule.

“There you go!” he announced. “What do you think of that?”

The managing director leaned forwards. He polished his glasses, and stared at the screen.

“What would you want in return for this?”

“Well…” Graham began, but Jackson dragged him away.

“What are you doing?” he hissed. “If you give him the formula, then you’re changing history!”

“Formula to what?” Graham asked.

“I don’t know! Whatever it was that you just typed up on his screen!”

“Doctor, I just typed gibberish. It doesn’t mean anything. But he doesn’t know that.”

Relieved, Jackson returned with Graham to where the managing director was sitting. As they approached, the man turned round.

“What do you want?”

Graham explained, and the man eagerly typed out an order.

“It’ll be ready later this afternoon. I’ll put my best man onto it.” Graham was surprised. “So, you think that that formula could be useful to you then?”

“Useful?! I’ll say!!! It’s the formula for the protomatter compound I’ve always suspected existed!!! With this I can finally develop protomatter and supply the earth with a cheap, safe power source!!!!!!”

Jackson looked at Graham, and frowned. Graham blushed.

“Look, it was going to be invented anyway!! I just… well, ensured that it’s done properly!!!”

“You prat!!” Jackson said. “You have just invented the most dangerous substance known to mankind!!!!!!!”

“Well, er, um, maybe.”

Wall was encountering difficulties in getting aboard the submarine. For starters, he could not seem to persuade the sentry on duty that he was a real admiral.

“Look,” he spluttered. “I demand that you let me on board!”

“No way, chum,” the sentry laughed. “You don’t seriously expect me to believe that costume do you? Not even the oldest admirals wear that sort of clobber!”

“Ah. Well, I’m on my way to a charity function and I thought I’d just drop by and take a look round.”

The sentry was sceptical. “What about your friend then?” he said, indicating Damerell in his wet-suit.

“He’s, ah, he’s going to give a demonstration on current equipment and their uses.”

“Oh really? Let’s see your identification.”

Wall grinned nervously. He had been hoping it wasn’t going to come to this.

“Okay, I’ll just get it out for you,” he said, unbuttoning his jacket and reaching inside.

While he was doing it, he gestured at Damerell to go round behind the sentry. Damerell looked blankly at him, but finally caught on. He sneaked round the back and unbuckled his air-tank.

The sentry was watching Wall as he dug around in his pockets, and so didn’t see Damerell as he swung the air-tank high over his head and brought it down hard on the sentry’s head. The man dropped without a sound.

“About time,” Wall grumbled. “I was running out of pockets. Come on.”

They sneaked aboard the submarine. Locating the reactor wasn’t difficult. They followed Damerell’s tricorder readings until they found a big block in the centre of a dark room. Wall attached the collector to the side of the reactor and the two of them sat down and waited as the collector collected.

“Game of cards?” Wall suggested.

“Okay.”

When Olding and Hill stopped running, they found themselves opposite a sign directing them to ‘The Wonderful Sea-Life Centre! An educational experience for all the family! 100 yards further on.’

“Has to be worth a try,” Olding said, and Hill, not really caring one way or the other, agreed.

They found their way to the Centre, paid their entrance fee, and joined a guided tour. Their tour guide was an attractive young woman, but it wasn’t until she spoke that Olding began to take interest.

“‘Ello, lads and lasses,” she began.

Olding’s ears strained at the leash. That accent! At last, he had found someone who spoke in a civilised voice!

“My name’s Sonia Hebblethwaite, and I’ll be tekin’ you on your tour o’ t’ Centre today. Please feel free to ask questions at any time.”

In the distance, Olding thought he could hear violins playing.

Hill glanced at his Captain, then did a double-take as he noticed the idiotic smile playing across Olding’s features. He then looked at the tour-guide, and put two and two together. Wonderful. Olding was in love, and it was now up to him to get things sorted out. He began to look into the fish-tanks they passed, pulling faces to scare the fish.

Olding drifted through most of the tour in a dream. Totally oblivious to his surroundings, he had eyes and ears only for Sonia Hebblethwaite. Her voice was like sweet music.

“…piranhas aren’t as bad as all that, tha’ knows. They only really get annoyed if you tempt them, like by dangling your feet in t’ water within two miles of them.”

They arrived outside a huge tank, with hundreds of fish inside. Sonia launched into a spirited description of each of the fish in there. Olding gazed at her.

Suddenly, his daydreams were smashed. An old woman tugged at Sonia’s sleeve.

“Excuse me, dear,” she said. “Is that man supposed to be in there?”

Sonia looked into the tank, and Olding turned his head to watch her lovely face. He saw it frown, and looked round to see the reason why. Commander Hill was in the fishtank. He had one salmon tucked under his arm, and was frantically swimming after another one, which was out-running him with relative ease.

“Bluidy ‘ell!” Sonia screeched.

Ah, that voice! Like beef dripping dripping off of brown bread. Olding shook himself. They had a serious problem. Sonia began to run for the roof, where she could gain access to the tank. Olding followed.

When they got there, Hill was just climbing out of the tank. He was holding his jacket shut, and something was moving under it.

“What the HELL do you think you’re doing!” Sonia shouted.

“Who, me? Nothing, nothing at all.” Hill tried to act innocent.

The fish-tail flapping out of the top of his jacket rather gave the game away, though. He struggled with the fish, shoving back down inside his jacket. Sonia looked as if she was about to burst every blood vessel in her body.

“How dare you!!!!! Put that bluidy fish back now!!!!!!”

Hill looked at Olding, and said, “Okay.”

He pulled the salmon out of his jacket and threw it back into the tank. Sonia was about to walk away when she noticed that Hill’s right trouser leg appeared to be dripping. Then, it started to move violently. Hill tried to hide the movement by launching into an impromptu tapdance. Unfortunately, the second salmon suddenly flopped out of the bottom of his trouser leg and began to thrash frantically about on the ground. Sonia stooped, picked it up, and put it back in the tank somewhat more gently than Hill had done.

“You two can leave now, or I’ll call t’ police. Which is it goin’ t’ be?”

Olding stood there dreamily, gazing into her eyes. Hill had to forcibly drag him away.

Damerell and Wall had just completed their thirty-second game of gin rummy when the collector bleeped that it was done.

“Finally,” Damerell said. He unhitched the collector from the side of the reactor, and flipped open the communicator.

“We’d like a transport out of here now please, Mr Graham,” he said. There was silence from the communicator. “Er, hello? Is there anyone there? Cooee!!! Mr Graham!!! Hurry up!!!!!!!!!”

Finally, the communicator spat static and Graham’s voice said, “Oh, is that you? I thought that the warp drive didn’t usually talk to me.”

“Get us out of here!!!!” Damerell said.

“Alright, alright, hang on a second. I’ll only be able to take one of you at a time,” Graham grumbled. Wall and Damerell began to hear noises. People were coming their way.

“Mr Graham, now would be a good time!” Damerell said.

Wall was getting more and more itchy by the second. Unable to take it any longer, he said, “What’s that?” and pointed over Damerell’s shoulder. Damerell looked round. As he did so, he felt the collector and the communicator snatched out of his hands. He swung round again to see Wall say, “Energise now!!!” Before Damerell could do anything, Wall had disappeared into the transporter effect. Damerell looked around frantically. He stood up, and barely had time to wonder if there was an emergency exit when five men armed with primitive projectile weapons entered the room and began to shout at him. Damerell did the only thing he could do in the circumstances – pass out.

Wall arrived in the Titanic‘s transporter room to be met by Graham’s puzzled stare. “Where’s the other one?” he asked.

Wall thought fast. “He bravely volunteered to stay behind so that I could get away.”

Graham didn’t seem to believe that, but let it pass. He gestured at Wall.

“Come with me while I’m doing this, will you? I’ve got a job for you.”

Wall followed him into the dilithium reactor room, and watched with barely disguised boredom as Graham plugged the collector into the system. When Graham had finished, he straightened up, and brushed himself down.

“Right, time for forty winks I think!”

Wall moved to stop him. “Er, what about this job you had for me?”

“Oh, yes. Could you take these…” He handed Wall a pile of papers. “…to this address…” he handed Wall another bit of paper “…and bring back the sheets with this.” He handed Wall yet another piece of paper.

“What’s all this?” Wall asked, staggering a little under the weight.

“That’s a helicopter licence,” Graham said. “We need it for you to fly the plastic sheets back to the ship so that I can build the tank for our salmon.”

Wall’s eyes lit up, and Graham was suddenly struck by the horrifying thought that he had just unleashed a monster.

Olding and Hill were walking along the riverside, trying not to look too lost. Hill was trying to subtly wring out his sodden clothing, and Olding was fuming. He couldn’t believe that Hill had dragged him away from Sonia.

“Bluidy bastard,” he muttered several times over.

“Pardon, sir?” Hill said.

“You heard,” Olding replied.

Hill took the hint and shut up again. They walked on in silence for a while, watching the traffic go past, until a battered Ford Capri screamed to a halt next to them.

Sonia poked her head out of the window. “Bluidy ‘ell! If it isn’t Butch Cassidy and t’ Sundance Kid!”

“Pardon?” Olding said.

“Get in, will ye,” Sonia said.

After some hesitation, they climbed in. Hill was forced to climb into the back seat, where he was wedged between a pile of books and some groceries. The green tinge to the seating, and pair of fluffy dice hanging from the rear-view mirror made Hill suddenly and unaccountably home-sick.

In the front seat, Olding had found himself unable to string together more than two words at once. He could not take his eyes off Sonia, and she was starting to get nervous. It was very disconcerting to drive whilst some maniac was grinning at you. Eventually, she started a conversation.

“So what did you want with my salmon anyway?”

“Wzrtgfl,” Olding said.

“It’s, er, far too complicated to explain,” Hill added, seeing some qualification was needed to the previous statement.

“Well, you went swimming in my fish tank, and tried to steal my fish. Seems simple to me.”

“Kygtflx,” Olding added. Sonia glanced at him.

Seeing his CO’s current speech difficulties, Hill became more daring.

“I think what he’s trying to say is that he’ll explain it all to you this evening over dinner.”

Olding looked at him significantly. Something very like panic showed in his eyes.

“Oh, okay,” Sonia said. “Will you be coming too?” she asked Hill.

“Who, me? No, I wouldn’t dream of imposing.”

Olding’s look clearly said, “YOU BASTARD!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Wall had found the plastics company without much difficulty. Persuading the company to let them have their helicopter had been slightly more complicated, but eventually he had managed it. Now all he had to do was figure out how to fly the damn thing. The plastic sheeting was tied to the underside of the helicopter so it hung freely beneath the machine. Wall climbed into the cockpit and looked at the bewildering array of controls.

“I suppose this wouldn’t have an antimatter inducer anywhere, would it?” he asked the guy helping him in.

“Yerwhat, mate?”

“Never mind,” Wall said, strapping himself in. He flicked a few controls until the rotors started to turn, then grabbed the stick in the centre of the floor with both hands, and tugged backwards. The helicopter scraped its way backwards along the concrete without going up. Well, the nose tipped up, but it didn’t actually get off the ground. Ignoring the screams of the people around him, Wall glanced around to see if there was anything that would help him attain height. He found something that looked like a handbrake. He tugged at it experimentally. The helicopter leaped upwards.

He stopped climbing at about 200 feet. Collecting his senses, he quickly realised that the handbrake wasn’t a handbrake. The helicopter then began to spin, and Wall discovered that the bar he had been absently nudging with his feet also had a practical purpose. He resolved to stop doing that, and the helicopter clattered unsteadily off in the general direction of Buckingham Palace.

When Damerell came round, he found himself still aboard the submarine. He had been sat in a chair, and was being stared at by two men in suits. “Er, hello,” he volunteered, anxious to make a good impression.

“What’s this?” said one of the men, holding up Damerell’s identity card. He read from it. “Lieutenant-Commander Philip Damerell, Starfleet. United Federation of Planets. Service number: 565-3215-H. Visa Card number: 1239876. Ahem. Well, Lieutenant-Commander, what is your business here?”

“My, er, my business. Ha ha. Well, you see, I’m carrying out a survey, yeah, that sounds good, a survey on nuclear reactor types for, uh, um…”

“The Baghdad Times?” his questioner asked.

Damerell was grateful. This guy was being really helpful.

“Yeah, that’s right! I’m their roving reporter.”

The two men exchanged glances. “So what’s this `Starfleet’ business about then, hmm?”

“Ah. That’s just a little office joke, you know. Ha ha.” Neither man laughed, or even smiled for that matter.

“Right, well, Lieutenant Commander. I’m afraid we’re going to have to take you into custody now.”

Damerell panicked. He jumped out of his chair, and shouted, “If you don’t lie on the floor, I will have to stun you!”

“What with, your finger?”

Damerell looked down. He realised that he was not in fact holding a phaser, but only pointing his index finger at them. He decided to bluff it out. “That’s right,” he said, and ran for it.

He made it out of the submarine more by luck than good judgement, and began to run away as fast as he could. His progress was hampered by the fact that he was still wearing the fins, air-tank and wet-suit, and consequently was not capable of moving much faster than a crawl. This was counter-balanced by the pure terror that was driving Damerell, though, and he swung his legs wildly, picking up a surprising amount of speed. He could hear shouts behind him, and, risking a glance over his shoulder, he saw lots of sailors clutching more of the primitive guns he had been unlucky enough to have seen from extremely close quarters earlier. Damerell waddled a little faster.

Jackson was busy coordinating the search for Damerell aboard the Titanic. He had set the computer up to scan the radio frequencies of the time, and to bleep if it picked up any mention of Damerell. He then sat down to read his favourite book, ‘The Life and Times of Jack the Ripper’. He was so engrossed in reading that he didn’t notice the bleeping of the computer, or the relayed signals from the local police stating that they were in hot pursuit of a nutcase in a wetsuit. He did hear the helicopter sounds, though, and went down to Engineering to find out what was going on.

When he reached Engineering, he found Graham standing on some boxes, half outside the hull. He appeared to be waving at something. Jackson looked up. There was an old earth helicopter rocketing backwards and forwards, with a package swinging wildly beneath. Instinct told Jackson that Wall was flying the machine. In the distance, he dimly noticed that a rather large and elaborate flag now flew from the flagpost on the roof of the palace. He heard Graham shouting something up to the air.

“Slow down, you idiot!!!” he shouted. “Watch out for that… oh god.”

“What’s happened?” Jackson asked.

“He’s just clobbered some old woman walking her corgis.”

“Is she alright?”

“I can’t really tell. She’s probably just resting. Ah, he’s trying it a bit more slowly this time.”

The helicopter entered an almost-hover, and waited until the package’s oscillations had lessened a little. Then, it lowered the package in through the hatch. Graham stood back until the package had stopped banging against the sides, then guided it into its slot.

“Okay!” he shouted. “Off you go!! And try and be a little more careful next time!!!” The helicopter wobbled out of sight.

Damerell was beginning to tire. His pursuers were still shouting at him to stop, and he was beginning to get a little lost. Ahead of him was the river. Conveniently for him, there was a bridge crossing it. However, the bridge seemed to be getting steeper. Damerell didn’t bother to figure out this strange phenomenon; he was more interested in getting away. Ducking the barrier that had been lowered across the road, he panted up the rapidly increasing slope. Looking behind him, he was pleased to note that his pursuers had stopped at the foot of the bridge.

As he reached the top, he discovered why. There was now a very large gap between the two halves of the bridge, which were angling skywards. Damerell wobbled on the edge, arms flailing frantically. He fell forwards towards the river.

“Oh good,” he thought, “at least I’ll land in the river.”

Unfortunately, a barge passing underneath the bridge at that point proved him wrong.

Olding was brushing himself down. He had hired a dinner suit from a local tailors, and was trying to get comfortable. The suit was a size too small, so it wasn’t easy. The buttons on his shirt were threatening to burst off at any moment. Hill looked at him critically.

“Well, I suppose you’ll do. Now remember, the object of this is to persuade her to let us have the salmon. Keep that in mind at all times.”

“Jytkfgl,” replied Olding.

“Okay,” Hill said. “Mr Graham, energise.”

The transporter beam deposited Olding outside the Pizza Hut he had arranged to meet Sonia at. He fiddled with his suit once more, before going in. He ignored the shocked stares of the customers, all of whom had seen him beam down, and asked for a table. A few minutes later, Sonia arrived. She sat down, and looked at the menu. They sat in silence, until the waiter came and took their order. Sonia politely waited for Olding to order, then discovered that Olding was doing the same. Groaning inwardly, she ordered a Margherita with extra cheese, and a glass of Boddington’s.

Olding looked at his menu with total incomprehension, then said, “I’ll er, have that too.”

The waiter disappeared. The silence resumed. Finally, the waiter returned with their beers. Sonia delicately sipped hers. Olding picked his glass up, held it up to the light, sniffed it, then downed it in one. “That’s better,” he said.

“So you’re talking now, then,” Sonia said.

“Er, well, yeeeees.” Olding was still nervous, but, for reasons he could not quite fathom, he suddenly also had an urge to launch into a full-throated rendition of one of those nauseating songs Wall and Damerell had recently become hooked on. He shrugged off the nervousness, and prepared for small talk to begin.

“Look, I have to ask you, what on Earth were you and your friend doing today?”

“Well, um, we were examining your fish to see if they were suitable.”

“Suitable?! Suitable for what?!?!?!” Sonia looked ready to explode.

“Suitable for, er, a new home.”

“Where?” Sonia’s demeanour changed abruptly. Olding’s thought processes were slowing down for some unknown reason, but still the thought filtered through to him that he had found the chink in her armour.

“I’m afraid I couldn’t say.”

Sonia’s shoulders slumped. “You’re no bluidy good. You’re the same as all t’ others.”

“What others?”

“Those bastards from Sainsbury’s. They want to take my salmon away from me!!! They’re going to be turned into salmon steaks!!!” Despite herself, a tear trickled down her face.

Olding saw his chance. “Look, I could take your salmon somewhere where they’d never be turned into salmon steaks.”
Sonia smiled slightly. It was the most heartbreakingly beautiful thing Olding had ever seen.

“Same question. Where could you take them? Are you from outer space or summat?”

“No, lass, I’m from Yorkshire. I only work in outer space.”

“Oh, right. That makes a twisted sort of sense I suppose. Why don’t you tell me everything?”

Olding did so.

Hill was in seventh heaven. No-one was watching him, no-one was going to tell him to stop. He had dismantled most of the navigational computer, and had switched to the science station because he had got bored. The pile of computer chips on the floor of the bridge was growing steadily, and most of the displays were offline as Hill tugged out metres and metres of cabling from the innards of the science station. As he fiddled, he wondered idly how Olding was getting along.

Olding was sat in Sonia’s car outside Buckingham Palace.

“Look,” she said, “Do you really expect me to believe that you’re living in there?!”

Olding squirmed.

“Well, it’s only temporary, like, ’till we go home again.”

Sonia refused to dignify such a comment with an answer. She felt she had to say something, though. “Were you serious about helping my salmon?”

“Yes, I was. Does that mean you’ll let me take them?”

“How can I trust you? I ask you where you’re from and you tell me ‘outer space’!”

“Ah. Yes, there is that.” Olding stepped out of the car. He had a nasty feeling he’d failed. “Think about it, would you? I don’t have that much time.” Closing the door, he walked away.

Sonia drove off. She screamed to a halt a few seconds later when she saw a bright glow in her rear view mirrors. Looking back, however, she could see nothing.

Olding stepped off the transporter platform to be met by the others. Their faces were grave. “What’s happened now?” he asked resignedly.

They filled him in on events while he had been away: losing Damerell, Wall bumping off an old lady who had later turned out to be the Queen, Hill dismantling every computer station on the bridge and so on. The only good news was that the recrystallisation process was working, albeit slowly. In return, Olding passed on his news. Things were not going well.

“Dr Jackson, carry on searching for Damerell. Mr Graham, carry on with the recrystallisation process. The rest of you, get some sleep. Tomorrow, with any luck, will be a long day.”

The next morning, Sonia arrived at work early. Today was the day that her beloved salmon were due to be shipped away to Sainsbury’s. She wanted to spend a little time with them before they went. When she reached the tank, however, there was nothing there. She stood in shock. At that point, her boss, Mr Cholmondely-Smythe, joined her.

“Greetings, young Sonia,” he said in his poncy southern tone.

“Where are t’ bluidy salmon?!” Sonia growled.

“We shipped them off last night,” Cholmondely-Smythe responded. “We discovered that it would be cheaper to send them by the night truck.”

Sonia swung back her fist, and hit him as hard as she could. Cholmondely-Smythe dropped to the floor without a sound. Sonia ran out of the building and leapt into her car. She knew that she would only be able to get help from one man.

Wall had picked up the helicopter, and was carrying the last of the plastic sheets to the Bird of Prey. He was getting better now. He could fly it almost in a straight line, and he hadn’t killed anybody recently. He was approaching the back garden of Buckingham Palace, and was surprised to see someone climb over the back wall, and run across the garden for the Palace. He sniggered when the person bounced off one of the invisible struts of the Bird of Prey, and then concentrated again on his approach.

When Sonia came round, she put her hand out to find the obstacle that had impeded her progress. She felt it, but couldn’t see it. Running her hands up it, she could feel pipes, metal struts, and all sorts of odd lumps under her fingers. In an instant she knew that the impossible had happened. Olding was telling the truth! She began to shout. As she looked up, she saw someone appear from out of nowhere in the middle of the sky.

“OY!! YOU!! YEAH, YOU, LET ME IN!!!! I HAVE TO TALK TO OLDING!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Graham looked down at the interruption. He noticed the small person waving her arms around.

“Go away!” he shouted. “We don’t want to buy anything, thank you!”

She didn’t seem to notice.

Olding was down below in the bay. He looked up at Graham and shouted, “What’s going on up there?”

“There’s a small person shouting at me! What do you want me to do?”

Olding moved to a monitor, and activated it. The screen showed him Sonia standing outside, waving her arms and jumping up and down. Olding stepped over to the transporter unit, locked onto Sonia, and beamed her up.

He had caught her in mid-jump, so when she rematerialised on the platform, she fell heavily. Olding picked her up, and held her while she re-adjusted herself to her new surroundings.

“Bluidy hell,” she whispered, “you weren’t talkin’ bollocks after all!”

“No, lass,” Olding said, somewhat smugly, “This is for real.”

He was about to give her the guided tour when she grabbed his arm and said, “They’re gone.”

“What are?”

“T’ SALMON!! Sainsbury’s came and took them last night. I wasn’t told. If we don’t hurry they’ll be killed!”

“Oh, bugger.” Olding couldn’t believe his bad luck. “What’s t’ matter? Can’t you just grab them like you just did to me?”

“Not exactly, no. You see, one of our crewmembers is missing.”

“Can’t you get him back?”

“I’m not sure.”

“You’re not much of an astronaut are you, chuck?”

Olding gritted his teeth. The last person to call him ‘chuck’ had gone home with their ears in a bag. He was about to make a polite, if strained, reply, when the wall communicator bleeped. He went over to it and flicked the switch. “Olding here.” It was Jackson.

“Sir, we’ve found Damerell. He’s in hospital.”

“Hospital?” Olding’s eyebrow began its characteristic climb towards the heavens. “What’s he doing in hospital?”

“The details are a little sketchy, but it appears he, er, well..” Jackson’s voice faltered a bit.

“Well come on, man, spit it out!”

“It seems he’s managed to fall off a bridge. Sir.”

“Bluidy typical. Can we get him back?”

“If we do, we’ll have to work fast. He’s being wheeled into surgery now. Sir, you can’t leave him in the hands of 20th century doctors! You have to let me get to him.”

For a second, the treacherous thought crossed Olding’s mind that Damerell might be safer with the 20th century doctors than he would with Jackson. Dismissing it, he spoke briskly into the communicator. “Pick up your medikit and join me in t’ transporter, er alcove.”

“On my way.”

He turned to Sonia and asked her, “Do you think you can disguise us as bona fide doctors?”

“I think so. Can you get us to a storage room?”

“We can try. Mr Graham, energise.”

The transporter beam put them down bang on target for a change. They materialised inside a cupboard, and there were a few embarrassed shuffles as people untangled themselves. Finally, Olding managed to kick the door open. Once out, they quickly dressed themselves in the green scrubs that filled the cupboard, and set out into the hospital.

“We’ll split up. Jackson, you go down there, Sonia and I’ll go this way.”

Jackson wandered off down the corridor, looking around him with a trained eye. Actually, it wasn’t as bad as he had feared here. He stopped to gaze lovingly at a tray full of scalpels arranged neatly in a row. Pocketing a few, he moved on. Sticking his head round a door, he was overjoyed to find a patient under anaesthetic with no doctor attending. He quickly scanned through the notes and pulled out one of his newly-acquired scalpels. he was about to begin the operation when Olding stopped him.

“C’mon Doc, we’ve found him.”

Damerell was in a room on the top floor. By the time they got there, the operation was almost underway. They found their first problem in the shape of the two armed guards on the door.

“Sorry, chum, you can’t come in here.”

Olding opened his mouth to reply, but Jackson got there first.

“Are you mad?!!!! Do you not recognise Doctor Christopher Olding, finest osteoperondeutschebundesologist in the known universe?!!!!!”

Olding smiled weakly. “That’s me.”

“Sorry, Doctor, I didn’t recognise you there.”

Jackson and Olding brushed past them, with Sonia in tow. Once inside, they found themselves confronted with the sight of a doctor leaning over Damerell’s comatose body with some sort of device with teeth. The device whirred ominously.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing!” Olding shouted, and the doctor jumped away from Damerell. Olding marched over and grabbed the gurney.

“Thank goodness we stopped you in time. It’s t’ wrong patient.” He started to pull the gurney out of the room as the confused doctor consulted his notes.

“Hang on a minute!! It is the right patient!!!!! Come back you scoundrels!!!!!” But it was too late. Olding and his ad hoc rescue team were already out of the door.

They sprinted off down the corridor. Jackson fished out his medical kit and waved his tricorder over Damerell as they ran.

“You’ll have to slow down,” he panted. “I can’t operate at this speed!” He pulled out a scalpel.

“No, Doctor!” Olding shouted. “Use the proper tools!”

“Oh, how dull,” Jackson grumbled. “If you insist.” He fished out a protoplaser and turned it on. For a few seconds, the beam hit the affected area of Damerell’s head, but, as Jackson began to slow down, it passed over the rest of Damerell’s body, then back up again as Jackson caught up. Finally, he turned the machine off, and, between gasps, said, “That’s it! He ought to come round fairly soon.” On cue, Damerell’s eyelids began to flutter.

Olding leaned over the gurney. “Talk to me. Name, rank!”

Damerell grinned. “Name: Damerell, Philip. Rank: Admiral.”

“Not bluidy likely,” Olding told him.

Behind them, there were quite a few angry people in hot pursuit, most of them waving guns, knives, sticks etc. Olding risked a glance over his shoulder. As he did, one of the guards shouted, “Stop or I’ll shoot!”

Olding was about to reply when he suddenly ran out of corridor. They had reached the end of the building, and unknowingly ran straight out of the open wall-length window onto the scaffolding propped up against a wall. Before they could stop it, the gurney containing Damerell disappeared down a waste chute. The three stopped for a second, and looked at each other. “Come on then,” Olding panted, and dived down the chute. Sonia and Jackson shrugged and followed him down.

On the way down, Olding flipped open his communicator, and shouted into it, “Graham, we need an emergency beam out now!!!!”

“Pardon? No, only kidding.”

The next thing Olding knew, the chute disappeared and was replaced by the transporter platform of the Titanic. Within seconds, the others appeared around him. Damerell was on his feet now, but was swaying gently.

“To your stations, gentlemen. We’re going salmon-hunting.”

To Sonia, he said, “I’m sorry, lass, I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

Sonia stood her ground. “No way!!” she announced. “You’ll have to fight me to get me to leave.”

Olding grasped her arms gently, then screamed as she planted her knee firmly between his legs.

“Okay,” he said, his voice an octave higher than it had been, “You can come along.”

He turned to Graham. “Is your tank ready yet, Mr Graham?”

“Of course it’s ready!! As if I would ever do something and leave it unfinished!!!!! Of all the…”

“A simple ‘yes’ would have sufficed.” Olding turned and ran for the bridge. When he got there, the crew were back in their usual positions. As Olding sat down, he realised that this was the first time in ages that the entire crew had been together at one time. He was not counting Graham in that of course, as the engineer was never really with the crew anyway.

“Screen on,” he ordered, and Wall pressed the appropriate button. The main viewscreen came on to reveal some sort of formal occasion going on in the garden. Everyone there was dressed in black.

“Engage thrusters. Take us up.”

Wall cracked his knuckles, and, wincing at the pain, complied. The screen showed people thrown everywhere by the force of the blast. The Bird of Prey swung around and headed off in search of Sonia’s salmon.

After a few minutes, Hill reported, “I have their signal.”

“On screen.” The screen changed to show a lorry trundling along a narrow winding country lane.

Sonia gasped. “Bluidy ‘ell, they’ve almost arrived!! We’ve got to hurry!!!” In the distance, the crew could just make out the foreboding sight of a shopping centre.

“Full power descent, Mr Wall,” Olding said grimly, and an instant later regretted the order bitterly, as Wall threw the Bird of Prey earthwards, pulling out of his descent at the last possible moment.

They shot over the lorry, and Wall stomped on the brake, throwing everybody forwards. He swung the ship around, and they watched as the lorry drove straight into the still cloaked ship. It stopped, its front end stove in, and the driver wiped his face clear of blood.

“Disengage cloaking device,” Olding ordered, and Wall did so. The screen showed the driver as he looked up, screamed, and ran away back down the road waving his arms in the air.

“Mr Graham, beam those fish aboard.”

“You’ll have to wait, sir, I’ll need to draw power from all non-essential systems.” The lights dimmed as Graham began his work.

Suddenly, Hill shouted out, “Sir, the bridge life-support system is failing!”

Olding keyed the intercom.

“Graham, I thought you said you needed non-essential system power!”

“That’s right!” the cheery voice returned.

“Do you count life-support as non-essential?”

“Absolutely, don’t you?”

Olding and the crew sat in silence, hoping that Graham would remember to turn the system back on afterwards. Finally, the distinctive light of the transporter effect began, and the lorry disappeared.

Wearily, Olding turned on the intercom once more, “Well, Mr Graham?”

“Captain, there be salmon here!!” Graham was obviously well-pleased with himself.

Olding stood up and said to Sonia, “C’mon, lass, let’s go and look at yer salmon.”

When they reached Engineering, it was to find Graham staring into the tank with a beatific smile on his face. Olding stood next to his engineer, and involuntarily clenched his hands as he saw the inside of the tank. It was full of water, had a liberal sprinkling of fish-food at the top, and the lorry parked on the bottom. The salmon themselves could not be seen.

“Er, Mr Graham, are you sure the fish are actually in there?”

“Oh yes sir,” Graham gestured at his panel. “You can see the lifeform readings right there.”

Just then, the ship shuddered. “Captain, you’d better get up there,” Graham warned, “We’re having a power fall-off!”

Olding turned and strode for the bridge. Remembering himself, he turned back for a moment and said to Sonia, “You stay here lass,” then left, hoping against hope she would kill or at least maim Graham in the not-so-distant future.

Back on the bridge, the juddering was getting continuous now. As Olding threw himself into his chair, Wall shouted “It wasn’t me!!! I didn’t do anything!!!!”

“It’s alright, Mr Wall, I know.” Olding sat and waited.

Eventually, Graham came on the speakers to say, “That’s as good as its going to get!!”

“Mr Hill!!! Engage computers!!! Take us home!!!!!”

The last thing Olding was aware of was Hill shouting “COMPUTERS ENGA…” before his world vanished.

An eternity later, he came round to find that everything was still in one place. “Where are we?” he asked. As if in answer, the probe’s wail flooded the bridge.

“Oh bugger.”

The Bird of Prey fell.

“Can we get the screen on-line?” Olding shouted above the din.

“No, sir,” Hill shouted back. Olding groaned. He could feel gravity taking effect now, and the Titanic was beginning to break up.

“Mr Wall, have you got any helm control?”

“Some!!” Wall screamed, his hands flying over the console.

“Then, Mr Wall, our lives are in your hands,” Olding said, and tried to ignore the panicked shriek of “Jesus Christ!!!! We’re all going to die!!!!” from Damerell.

Wall was in his element. For the first time in his career, he was the linchpin upon which people’s lives depended. He’d always dreamt of being a hero, and now he was being one. He struggled with the Bird of Prey’s controls, trying to lift the nose. He could feel the ship dropping, and guessed that they were rapidly approaching the Earth’s surface. Time was now a little bit short. After what seemed an age, he felt the nose come up. He adjusted the wings to maximise their flight capability, and then started trying to slow their forward momentum. Wall was starting to feel really good about this. Provided they stayed airborne for a few more minutes, there was every chance of them being able to land safely.

In Starfleet Headquarters, the atmosphere was tense. All attempts to contact the probe had failed. All they could do now was wait for the end. Admiral Forster, Commander in Chief of Starfleet, stared gloomily out of the big panoramic windows across San Francisco Bay. He could just about see the Golden Gate Bridge through the murk. The Federation President joined him. They stood there in silence, each alone with his thoughts. Suddenly, the building shook to a sonic boom. A Klingon Bird of Prey appeared from out of the clouds and plummeted Earthwards. As they watched, the ship levelled off.

“Oh, gee!!! They’re heading for the bridge!!!!” Forster shouted.

“No, it’s all right,” the President said. “They’ll just pass under it, look…”

His voice trailed off as the Bird pulled up at the last moment and collided with the bridge. There was a massive explosion.

Everyone in the Titanic had been surprised, but no-one more so than Wall. He had managed to gain a bit of height so that he could have more time to slow them down, when suddenly there was an almighty great bang, everything went haywire, and the next thing he knew, his status monitors were telling him that the Bird no longer had wings. He debated with himself whether or not he should tell Olding. Before he could make his mind up, there was another bang as they bounced off something. They bounced again and again, before hitting the surface for the last time. Olding looked around. The Bird moved a little, swaying from side to side in a manner that suggested to Olding that they were afloat. Water flooding into the bridge from cracks that had just appeared in the hull tended to confirm this hypothesis.

“We’re in the water!! Blow the hatch!!!” he shouted.

Hill stabbed at his panel, and there was a dull thud as the emergency exit hatch popped open.

Spray poured in through the hatchway, which, in Olding’s view, was merely adding insult to injury.

“Abandon ship!!” he shouted, and watched in amazement as his crew fought to get through the hatch.

He tried to tell them that it would be a lot easier if they simply tried to get out one at a time, rather than all at once. They did not appear to hear him, especially as Damerell was still screaming “We’re all going to die!!!!!!!!!!!” at the top of his voice. Wall, who through all the excitement still had his teddy bear, was using it to batter people over the head with, trying to get himself to the front of the group.

Giving up on them, Olding turned his attention to trying to raise the engineering section. He had to know if Sonia was alright. He frantically pressed the button that activated the comm channel, but there was no response. He grabbed Hill, and shouted “See to the safety of all hands! I’m goin’ after Sonia!!!” Hill nodded, and Olding fought his way astern.

He reached Engineering to find that the big heavy blast door was closed. On the other side, he could hear Sonia’s voice shouting “Help!!!!” That spurred him into action, and, with a muscle-tearing effort, he opened the doors just enough to allow Sonia and Graham to pass through. Graham elbowed past him, and was intent on getting to the escape hatch when Olding stopped him.

“How are t’ salmon?”

“What? Oh, them. They’re still in the lorry. I forgot to open its back door. They’ll probably drown.”

“Oh for crying out aloud!!! Stay here and get ready to open the bay doors!!! I’m going to have to get them out meself. Lass, get forwards. Get ou’ while ye still can.”

Sonia nodded and left. Discarding his jacket, Olding climbed into the tank, took a deep breath, and dived underwater.

Underwater, the probe sounded a lot different . Olding was reminded of the noise Damerell had produced from the console when this crisis had first begun. Putting the thought aside, he grabbed the handle of the lorry’s rear door. He tugged at it frantically, bracing his feet on the lorry’s bumper, acutely aware that his lungs were beginning to ache. Finally, it opened, sliding upwards. Water flooded in, and Olding saw the salmon leave their small open-topped container, and swim out into the cargo bay. Swimming clear, he signalled to Graham to open the bay doors, only to find that Graham had left. Muttering an oath which shed doubt on Graham’s parents’ marital status when he was born, Olding climbed out of the tank and dropped into the water which was rapidly filling the rest of the cargo bay.

Taking another deep breath, he dived under again and headed for the panel which contained the cargo bay door’s explosive override. Once again, he had to tug at a blasted handle while his lungs screamed at him. When the doors finally opened, Olding felt the pressure wave sweep him upwards as water flooded in to fill the bay. Fighting it, he swam deeper, struggling to clear the cargo bay doors. As he struggled, he watched the two salmon swim gracefully out to sea. He could not help but think that they were taking the piss. He swam clear of the sinking ship and allowed himself to shoot back up to the surface by his natural buoyancy. As he broke the surface, Olding sucked in as much air as he could take, grateful for the chance to breathe again. He looked around, getting his bearings. His crew, and Sonia, were huddled on top of the bridge section. As he swam towards them, the engineering hull broke off and sunk.

He was dragged aboard by several people, and sat with them, gasping noisily. There was nothing they could do now except wait. They heard the probe’s signal change, as it carried out some sort of conversation with the salmon.

Eventually, the noise stopped, and was replaced by an eerie silence. The crew of the Psycho waited. And waited. Then, the sun broke through the clouds, and the wind reduced, and the temperature became warmer. Each of them looked at one another, scarcely able to credit it. For the first time in their lives, they had achieved something. There was a distinct possibility they were in fact heroes. Even Graham seemed cheerful. Olding allowed himself to bask in the glory of the moment, sitting calmly on the hull of the ship.

Then, the quiet was destroyed by Wall screaming “Yahooo!!!!!!!!”, and diving into the sea. Damerell followed, and before long the entire crew were in the water, shouting and screaming and splashing about, revelling in the moment. Olding hadn’t meant to be dragged in, but he couldn’t maintain his grip against the combined force of Wall, Damerell and Hill pulling at his legs. Once in, though, even he enjoyed it, although he had difficulty in persuading Graham not to try to push people underwater and hold them down.

Several hours later, the crew were assembled in an anteroom to the main Council chamber, dry and in full uniform. They had been fished out by a shuttlecraft and brought here to face charges. Hill, the only member of the crew who had not been involved in the theft of the Psycho due to being dead, was not with them. The others just sat and fidgeted while Olding stared out of the window at the Bay. Somewhere out there, his last command lay on the bottom. Olding had a nasty feeling that his time in the centre seat was up. There was no way Starfleet would ever let him have another ship after he blew the first one up.

Finally, an official entered. ” They’re ready for you now,” she said.

“Come on, lads,” Olding said, and they marched into the main chamber. Once in there, they lined up in an uncomfortable row, trying not to look too out of place amongst all the Admirals and Ambassadors and other dignitaries. Much to Olding’s surprise, Hill marched down from his seat in the audience, and took his place beside them.

The President spoke “Commander Hill, you do not stand accused.”

Hill looked around, first at his father, who was also sat in the audience, and then at the crew of the Psycho. “Mr President, I will stand with my shipmates.”

As he completed the sentence, his father threw a paperweight at him. It missed Hill by a couple of inches. Hill tried not to flinch. Olding grinned at him. It was reassuring to see that his crew were sticking together.

“So noted.” The President’s gaze swept them, passing Wall and Damerell, who were blushing and shuffling their feet, then Jackson and Graham, who were uncomfortable at having to stand next to each other, as Jackson had not yet forgiven Graham for the cannabis cakes, and finally over Hill and Olding, who were still maintaining their composure, although Hill was starting to sweat.

“The charges are: Theft of Federation property, namely the starship Psycho; disobeying the orders of a superior officer; damage to Federation property, namely the starship Extreme; and finally, and most seriously, destruction of Federation property, the aforementioned starship Psycho. Due to certain…” the President looked distinctly uncomfortable at what he was about to say, “… certain mitigating circumstances, all…” he could not bring himself to complete the sentence, and handed the datapadd over to Admiral Forster, who resumed the sentence. Even he had problems with it.

“All charges except one…” Forster paused, and Olding sucked in his breath. He had an inkling of what was about to be said, but didn’t dare allow himself to think it, in case it didn’t come true.

Forster tried again. “All charges except one have been dropped.”

There was a muffled whisper through the chamber. Olding fought back the urge to laugh, and tried to concentrate on the remaining charge. What was it? He had a choice of several.

“The remaining charge, that of disobeying a superior officer, has been aimed at Captain Olding alone. I am sure that the Captain appreciates the importance of maintaining discipline in any chain of command.”

“I do sir.”
“Christopher J T Olding, it is the judgement of the court that you be sentenced to a slap on both wrists with a wet fish, and furthermore, that you be taken from this place and sent to command a starship.”

Uproar flooded the chamber, but Olding heard none of it. His crew were all staring open-mouthed, but he could say nothing. A starship!

Forster had not yet finished, however. “Your present crew will go with you, and may God have mercy on your soul.”
Somewhere inside him, Olding was dimly aware that his punishment was probably going to be more serious than it sounded. He was stuck with the same bunch of losers. Right now, however, he didn’t care. He stood, unable to move, as the punishment detachment advanced towards him. One of them, masked so Olding could not recognise him, clutched a fish in each hand. Olding held out his arms, and allowed them to be whacked ceremoniously, one fish to each wrist. As the punishment finished, the silence of the court was broken by a well-remembered voice.

“OY!!!!!! THOSE ARE MY BLUIDY FISH!!!!!!!!!!!” It was Sonia. Olding looked down, and sure enough, they were the two salmon that Olding and his crew had risked life and limb to bring forwards in order to save the earth, and now were completely and utterly dead. He saw Sonia storm out of the chamber, and was about to follow her when Hill grabbed his arm.

“She never liked you, you know.”

“What?”

“She loathed you.” Olding was so tempted to hit Hill, but didn’t. In his heart of hearts, he knew his first officer was right. It was time to put the past behind them, and find out what the future held.

“C’mon, let’s go.” They turned to leave, but were halted by Admiral Hill.

“I wish to speak with my son,” he said. “You may go.”

The others were about to leave, but Hill stopped them, as he said, “Whatever you have to say can be said in front of them.”
Everybody clustered round. Admiral Hill cleared his throat. “You may recall I opposed your enlistment in Starfleet.”

His son, emboldened by the fact that the others were packed round him, and so were therefore just as likely to take the flak as he was, said, “No, you just opposed my enlistment in the operational arm of Starfleet. As I recall, you wanted me to join the accounts branch.”

“Yes, well, whatever. Anyway, it would seem that that judgement was… incorrect. Your associates are well-meaning people.”

“They’re the best.”

Olding raised his eyebrow at that.

“Hmph. Well, do you have a message for your mother?”

“Yeah, tell her to stop sending me those rock-cakes. They’re really disgusting.”

The Admiral then turned to Olding. “I’m watching you, Olding. The first mistake, and I’ll be down on you like a ton of P187459348s”

“Goodbye, Admiral.” Olding said, and the crew left the chamber.

They reached Spacedock, and were directed to a travel pod. Once they had boarded, the pod set out on a preset course, that took them past most of the starships currently in the dock.

Jackson, unable to bear the silence, said, “You realise we’ll get a freighter.”

“All due respect, Doctor, but I’m counting on Extreme,” Wall said.

Olding said nothing. There was no way they’d get Extreme.

“Extreme?!!!! Why would you want that piece of garbage?!” Graham asked.

“A ship is a ship,” Olding said, trying to be conciliatory.

“Yeah, well, whatever.”

They watched as the pod came closer and closer to the Extreme. Was it possible, Olding asked himself. Would they really get the Extreme? The pod slowed as it passed over the top of the ship. The crew held their breath. The window revealed another ship, beyond the Extreme. She was Constitution class, but subtle differences to her hull told Olding she was brand new. They read the name and registry number off the hull, and Olding suppressed a groan while the others cheered.

His new ship was the USS Psycho, SMC-1234-A.

It had to happen.

They reached the bridge, and Olding took his seat. It was totally different from the old bridge, and his new chair was of totally different design, and it was pretty uncomfortable. He reckoned he could get used to it in time, though. He had found sealed orders in his cabin, with instructions not to open them until he had gone beyond the solar system. This had meant that he was the last on to the bridge, and by the time he got there, he found that someone had put up fluffy dice and a green fur trim round the helm console. Wall’s body language was screaming out his guilt, but Olding decided to say nothing. Now that the original Psycho was dead and gone, the green fur and the fluffy dice were now tradition, and you couldn’t go against tradition, even if it was total crap.

Clutching the arms of his chair, he looked at Wall, who was wriggling in his new chair, which was smaller than the old one.

“Take us out, Mr Wall. One quarter impulse power.”

“Aye aye sir.” Wall operated his console, and the Psycho surged forwards unsteadily. Just like old times. They cleared the Spacedock doors with inches to spare, reminding Olding of the last time they had performed that particular manoeuvre.

Once outside, Olding gave the order they had been waiting for.

“Helm, warp four, engage.”

“Aye sir.”

Wall pressed the button, and the Psycho lurched into warp speed.