The Bear and the Dragon.

[arvg]

The eccentric doctor uttered a curse, flipping through charts and reports that were piled all over his work bench, trying to find the one he needed.

"You!" he bellowed at an engineer, "stop drooling and start being useful, Tea, hot and sweet..."

He lit a cigarette as he found the chart he needed.

"Well that isn't going to work," he remarked, looking up. "Someone take our main power flow convertor offline, and bloody quick, if you don't mind. I'd rather not join the XK-2 in vapourization."

He stuffed the chart under Ling's nose, tapping it with the pair of fingers holding his cigarette, spilling ash over the paper. "You see these numbers, they aren't supposed to be into those ranges. I warned the chief engineer of the XK-2 not to accept anything with a variance of point two or lower. This is alien technology we're playing with here, not some kids lego kit. Somethings are not plug and play..." He shook his head.

"We're going to have to strip out the whole system and try to find somekind of mega-resister just to regulate the powerflow. Though... temporary stop gap, flood the entire deck with coolant. Suspended in coolant we won't blow up."

He looked expectantly at the Commandante.

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