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Where’s Your Sense of Humor?
Day 1
The Enterprise rocked back and forth, the ship and her crew valiantly trying to recover from the blast that had sent them spinning at Warp 14 back the way they came. No one had expected a mere ship to have such power, but then, they hadn’t expected the ship—or whatever it was—to be there in the first place.
By the time they had managed to slow to a stop, they were over four solar systems away from their last recorded position but, amazingly enough, they didn’t seem any worse for the wear.
Captain James T. Kirk gave his crew a minute before he expected professionalism from them—after all, he was the Captain, and he was speechless, too. Which was…strange, come to think of it.
“Chekov.” The word came out in a croak, and he cleared his throat, attempting to make his voice come out properly, and failing remarkably. “What do your instruments read?”
There was silence, and then;
“In Soviet Russia, instruments read you.”
Jim coughed, and wondered if his hearing had been damaged. It had been a hell of a ride, after all.
“…good, Mr. Chekov. Engine room?”
“Lieutenant Kyle, sir. The engines are in pretty good shape. We had a bit of a rough ride, but we managed to pull through.”
“That’s what she said.” Jim blinked. And blinked again. No. No way had that come out of him.
“Sir?”
“Er…that’s what she said?” It came out sounding plaintive and vaguely sheepish, but the fact remained that it came out. He glanced around, and saw his bridge crew staring at him with an expression of astonishment. He sympathized, and would have explained…if he’d been able to.
Instead, he pointed at Sulu, trying his best to ignore the strangeness of losing control of his own mouth for a moment. The message was clear. Report!
Sulu opened his mouth, and started speaking.
“Who the chariot of Leutha guides, since the day of thunders in old times—” was all Jim caught before Sulu clapped a hand over his mouth. Giggles arose from various corners of the room, and Jim sighed.
“That sounded like poetry, if you know what I mean.” This from Uhura, who seemed slightly less horrified if equally shocked by her unintentional adage. Jim glanced at her.
“I mean, it sounded like William Blake, if you know what I mean. Maybe this isn’t as big of a problem as it seems. If you know what I mean.”
Jim sighed, and was about to speak when Spock spoke first.
“Fascinating.”
Jim smiled, beamed really. At least someone was unaffected by…whatever it was.
“That’s what she said!”
Spock opened his mouth to reply, closed it, opened it again.
“Fascinating.”
Or maybe not.
Day 2
By the end of the first day, Jim had managed to find a suitable way to communicate with most of his crew—either by written notation, which seemed unaffected, or through Uhura, who at least managed to get her point across before the speech anomaly took over.
“Captain, Dr. McCoy would like to speak to you, if you know what I mean.”
Jim scribbled quickly on his notepad.
Alright, put him on.
“Dr. McCoy, Uhura speaking for the Captain, if you know what I mean.”
“This definitely rates about a nine point oh on my weird-shit-o-meter.”
Jim rose his eyebrow at that—it almost sounded like something Bones would normally say, except Jim had heard everything from “In space no one can hear you scream” to “God, you’re beautiful” from him in the past twelve hours, each of them making less sense than the last.
To be fair, though, at least Bones got some variety, even if Jim had no idea what pattern his speech was following.
“That’s what she said.”
Uhura. Ask him what the hell he means.
“Dr. McCoy, the Captain would like to know what you mean, if you know what I mean.”
“I got signals. I got readings, in front and behind.”
Jim perked up at that—the words might have been wrong, but the meaning worked. He had found something.
Uhura! Did he find the problem?
“Doctor McCoy, did you isolate the problem, if you know what I mean?”
“Drake, check your camera. There seems to be a malfunction.”
Jim paused, and thought about that for a second. Malfunction…he smirked, an idea crossing his mind that actually, maybe made sense. A little bit, anyway.
“That’s what she said.” So saying, Jim clicked off the communicator, and hurriedly scribbled on his pad.
Uhura, get some of the engineering boys to have a look at the universal translator. A damaged one sometimes results in miscommunication even among people speaking the same language, right?
Uhura nodded.
“It is, of course, only supposed to translate into a specific language, not mutilate your speech patterns, if you know what I mean.”
Yeah, well, it’s worth a shot, right?
“As you wish, Captain, if you know what I mean.”
Uhura relayed the order as quickly as possible to various engineers, each response slightly more jumbled than the last, but Jim was hopeful.
Of course, if it was the universal translator, that didn’t really explain why Uhura was mostly unaffected. He scribbled on his pad some more, and tapped Uhura on the shoulder to get her attention. She only glared a little bit, which was a definite improvement over some of their past interactions.
Why weren’t you affected as badly?
“Possibly because I’m a communications major, if you know what I mean. My brain waves move through many different languages, if you know what I mean.”
Spock glanced at them, rose an eyebrow, and held out a hard disk for Jim to take.
“Fascinating.”
And what’s his excuse?
“The universal translator operates off translating brain waves, not what you actually say, if you know what I mean. Since it was over in an instant-“
“That’s what she said.”
“-most of us didn’t have time to figure out what was going on, if you know what I mean. Spock must have, and attempted to circumvent it, so now he’s stuck.” A pause, and then a sigh. “If you know what I mean.”
Jim nodded sagely, and patted her on the shoulder. This time, she didn’t glare at all, and that made the whole weird situation almost worth it.
Day 3
It was the universal translator, as it turned out. Jim would have thanked his brilliance if he’d been able to, but as it was, knowing the problem wasn’t half as hard as fixing it. Computer chips, as it turned out, stayed well and truly fried when hit by a blast of several billion watts, and not even Scotty’s personal attention seemed to help.
In fact, it was almost more of a headache than it was worth.
Scotty, any progress?
“You’re like an exothermic reaction—you spread your hotness everywhere!”
Scotty, just use the pad.
“It’s not the length of the vector that counts, it’s how you apply the force.”
Jim sighed.
“That’s what she said.”
Okay Scotty, we’ll just have to hurry back to the nearest Starbase. Don’t worry—there’s nothing you can do without the replacement parts.
Scotty looked almost disappointed, and frowned up at him from amidst a thousand scattered parts.
“Let’s discover our coefficient of friction?”
No, Scotty—let it go. Back to the engine room.
He did, and the silence was relaxing, even though there was an occasional “ba dum tish” from one of the engineering men, and some equally bad jokes. Jim glanced at Spock, who tilted his head and silently wrote the command for Starbase 13 on Chekov’s pad.
Jim smiled, and scribbled.
Huh. Looks like we can communicate without words after all.
Spock almost, almost, smiled.
“Fascinating.”
Jim smiled to himself, and took the pad that was being offered to him from one of his new yeomen. He read it, signed it, and handed it back with a quiet “That’s what she said,” meaning ‘thank you.’
She replied with a polite “Your mama” and then went on her way, leaving the bridge once again in silence.
Uhura sighed somewhere in the background.
“I tell you, I’ll be relieved when we get this taken care of, if you know what I mean. I think I’ll scream if I hear another engineering joke, if you know what I mean.”
The bridge was silent, peaceful, for several minutes, and Jim was overcome with a strange feeling of peace. It didn’t last long.
“In Soviet Russia, joke hears you.”
Jim sighed—it was going to be a long journey.
********
End