| ...Sulu waited until Kirk was close enough for their conversation not to be overheard by anyone. "The emergency evacuation valve on the main fuel tank has been opened. And someone carried out a maintenance cycle on the system while it was open. We haven't lost any fuel but it's contaminated with exhaust residues. We can't use any of it."
"The reserve tanks..."
"Someone's pumped them through into the main tank. We've got about four hundred litres of usable fuel. Enough to achieve a low orbit, not maintain it. Not even long enough for someone from Hamidi III to come out and pick us up."
"I don't think they'd come anyway," Kirk said grimly. "I think they'd interpret our problems as divine retribution. You said 'Someone'..."
"It had to be Chekov. No one else would have known how to override the fail safes without setting off alarms."
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