Gabriel (Macross) - Into the Void, Part 2

Gabriel had been about to explain to the Captain very calmly that such a thing was simply not possible when he was cut off before the words were even allowed to issue forth from his mouth. What? He hadn't time to do or say anything at all really, when the blast came. It was good that he was stuck in such a small space, as it minimized how much he was jolted. It was also bad, as the wound in the ship still festered and he was sent hard into a piece of twisted metal. His sharp cry was swallowed by the sound as he felt the serrated edge bit deep into the flesh of his arm.

It was dubiously that he pulled himself off of it, his own blood now welling up and seeking to find the engineering bay floor. Using his free hand he ripped the torn sleeve from his suit and tied a makeshift tourniquet around the wound before he ended up passing out. The pain in just moving was enough to make him want to stay perfectly still.

This was serious. There was no way that he could charge the fold cannon now, not with all of this. Who did the Captain think he was anyway? He couldn't work miracles like...

And it was in that moment, he found his answer, his mind clicking on it without him even having really been searching. Making himself move he half crawled out of the hole, calling to the first man who wasn't on the floor.

"Ensign Favian!"

"Yes sir?" The very young man snapped to attention, though he looked surprised to see his boss just popping out of nowhere. He was covered in soot and grime, like most of the others.

"Go to the Core and prime it." He did a few quick calculations in his head. Power, but not to much power. No sense in killing everyone. "Four rotations, no more, understand?" The Ensign nodded and hurried off to do his bidding. When he was gone Gabriel slipped back into the hole, moving a bit ways down to find a small tube console. It wasn't good for much, or so people thought. You just had to know how to use them. He pulled a small keyed device out of his pocket and pulled a cord from its innards, connecting it into one of the ports of the console. While he waited for the telltale signs that the prime had been successful he tapped one handed on the personal device and on the consoles controls with the other. His wounded arm cried out in protest but he ignored it and forced his fingers to move with as much speed as he could muster.

Within the first week of coming onto this vessel, he had tapped into its computer system and had made himself at home. Not exactly regulation, but it helped to have an intimate knowledge of the technology that kept you alive.

He slipped through the system, connecting to his personal computer which rested in his quarters, always on, always connected to the ships systems. He could do most anything from the comfort of his own room. Patching through his own system he had only to wait, and luckily not for long, as the console in front of him beeped a warning that a portion of the ships power had been cut and drawn out of the Core. It was certainly not the first choice in a situation like this, but it would be suicide to try and do what he was planning with all of the ships power. Relays were built for a reason. Just enough to power the fold engines and get them out of here.

He had the power, now he just had to figure out a way to move it.

Unfortunately, that was the hard part.

Gabriel slowly slipped into his quite space. The place he went to whenever he hacked something new, watched his favorite episode of Star Trek, or picked up a particularly beautiful piece of electronic equipment. A place where it was only himself and what he was doing at that very second. In this time, in this place, it was just him and the ship, and what he had to do.

His fingers moved now without regard to the pain that shot up his arm from the forced movement, as he called up systems, patterns, paths, one after the other, running through them far faster than a human probably should have been able to. But at the moment, he could have been merely an extension of the machine.

One, two, three...

He linked the path together, running through it like a maze to try and find his way from the beginning in the Core, to the ending in the Fold Generator. Even though they were so close in proximity, with the proper channel cut, he had to go the long way, through systems that weren't designed to carry that sort of power. He had to be careful to pick them wisely.

Four, five, six...

He steered away from those that were most important, even if they were faster. Life Support, Navigation, Weapons. They would be lost anyway without those. Every time he found a dead end he had to turn back and go another way, leaving markers in his wake so he could follow the trail back. How many seconds had it been, how many minutes? There was no time here.

Seven, eight...

Finally, after what must have been a forever, he found the light at the end of the tunnel and staked his last flag at the power cells of the Fold Generator. Then he looked back over the line of red dots that indicated the path he had taken. It was the best he had been able to come up with and though there was no room for error, somewhere in his mind he prayed that he had not indeed done just that.

There was a moments hesitation before a finger dropped on a key and the program was executed. The floodgates of power that held the supply stripped from the Core opened and rushed from their holding along the path he had prescribed for it. He watched as the torrent of power crashed into each way station, each system he had chosen to guide it. Alarms over the ship warned of sudden power spikes in a seemingly random pattern. The first system held and it moved on, the second didn't and throughout the ship the lights went off as they were overloaded, plunging them all into the semi-darkness of consoles and emergency lights. The third went to as did the fourth, both nonessential systems when it came right down to it. The fifth held, and so did the sixth. The seventh crashed harder than he would have thought, and an alarm sounded as they lost one of the impulse engines. The eighth, and last, barely held before sending the power to its final destination.

It hit the Generator cells hard in its rush to be home and for a moment he thought he might have miscalculated and the entry points would short, but they modified themselves and sluiced in the power. There, in his place, and on the bridge the power in the Fold would spike to full and hold, giving the Captain what it was he needed. He had done his part. It was out of his hands now.

He fell back against the side of the tube, breathing hard and hurting all over as his high left him. Somewhere in his muddled mind he realized he had lost a lot of blood. He said a silent prayer to a certain Engineer God who went by the name of LaForge and then went still as he felt the blackness pulling him down.