Jimmying the Lock

Posted on Wed Apr 18th, 2012 @ 1:00pm by Captain Elsie Halliwell & Captain T'mpest Michaels & Commander Cailean Fox, M.D. & Lieutenant Commander Dylan Blake & Lieutenant Cedric Shepherd & Lieutenant Jimmy Cooper & Lieutenant JG Lucy Carter & Anaia Viel (Halliwell) & Captain Alexsa Kendrick

2,349 words; about a 12 minute read

Mission: Fishing
Location: Briefing Room, Deck 1
Timeline: Current

ON:

The Briefing Room seemed darker than usual. Despite the vacuum of space being expansively open and unlit, the mass now pressing against the hull seemed to enclose the atmosphere about them in an oppressive, darkened hue that had since started to play on Halliwell's mind. With the engines off-line, the gentle hum of engineering was eerily absent. The only sounds now filling the void was the unnerving and disturbing rumbles of the ocean about them.

Halliwell sat at the head of the table, her small chin in her hand as she listened intently to Lieutenant Prudentia's report on the device they had but an hour ago beamed aboard into one of their cargo holds. She seemed distracted. But focused her attention on her crew as best she could. With one thing or another, this mission would seem to end in a confrontation with the Romulans and Elsie and her actions now seemed powerless to prevent it.

"... have determined distinct fold lines here, here and here," Prudentia reported as she tapped on the screen in the briefing room containing an image of the object, "which is unlike any other known technique in the Starfleet database. Finally, the core was saturated with a very specific mixture of Dilithium, which is only used in specific parts of the Delta Quadrant as reported by the USS Voyager. To summarize, the team is about 80 percent confident that the device is a prototype made by the Taylforthians themselves."

Snapping her attention back into the room, Elsie cleared her throat and trained her focus on the Assistant Science Officer. "Eighty percent confident that the device is indigenous to Taylforth seems positive enough for me. Crewman Sessan," she then switched, now looking at the small Bajoran, "considering the earlier cartography scans of the planet, in your opinion is this warp fracture a likely catalyst for the planet's present state?"

Birsi nodded. "It's a good bet, Captain. The alternative is accepting this as the one in a decillion chance that a natural tectonic event exerted just enough force to cause millenias' worth of geological shifting in just a decade, yet didn't destroy or leave the planet uninhabitable." Reflection weighed heavily upon her tone, blunting the quip. Barely awake an hour, the myraid of events that transpired while she slept thickened the fog of her revival. Along with the mission developments presently up for discussion, her department picked up Lieutenant J.G. Prudentia from Engineering right after losing Lieutenant Cooper for reasons that while not totally clear, correlated with Birsi's brief, strange exchange with him in the lounge.

Elsie nodded and thanked Birsi silently for the input. The evidence, at least to her own mind, was stacking up in favour of her first hypothesis: That the Taylforthians were on the brink of achieving warp speed. This comforted the captain somewhat. There was still a very important conversation to be had with Lieutenant Mailloux concerning how this development affected a possible First Contact situation with the planet's inhabitants but that, at least for now, could wait until all members of the senior staff were back onboard Ranger and in agreement. For as strong willed, determined and headstrong as Elsie Hermione Halliwell was, the support and assistance from her crew was important to her. Walking into the wind posed its own set of problems and Elsie knew that with Captain Kendrick onboard there was enough adversarial muscling already on ship.

She inhaled controlledly and then looked to Shepherd. "Thoughts, Lieutenant?" she asked. During this mission, Captain Halliwell had seemed to rely on Cedric's advice and perspective on situations. And now was no exception.

"The conclusion that this device is a warp prototype fired by the indigenous people makes things easier should we find ourselves in a First Contact situation," said Shepherd evenly and thoughtfully, "but it's still your call, Captain. On one hand, they've fired a warp device, which should facilitate First Contact with no issues. However, they aren't warp capable. It could be argued that they're not sufficiently advanced to merit contact yet. The mitigating factor is the current situation on the surface. If a First Contact is the way you want to go, the fact that the planetary population is living in town-sized survival flotillas may allow us to do it under General Order 16. The debate on the precise legalities could go long either way," he smiled and shrugged, "but planetary distress coupled with the Romulan presence supports the notion that this is a population in peril that needs aid, and initiating First Contact is the best way to provide it. And General Order 30 provides you some wiggle room on the decision either way."

'It appears that Mister Shepherd is well versed in playing the regulations against themselves' Kendrick thought as she listened on from her darkened corner. And it seemed as though Halliwell was swayed by his opinion--not swayed, her own thoughts confirmed. They were attempting to use the letter of the law against the spirit of the law, and while not directly up to Kendrick on this occasion given her operating out of the water so to speak, the prosecution if it came to that, may not see things in the same grey space as the others. She made a note of it regardless as the meeting went on.

Prudentia had reseated herself after her explanation, and was now silently following the conversation. She had little opinion of politics, and the Ranger already had research work piled up for weeks - First Contact would, most likely, only increase that further. Still, she didn't want to be a spoilsport, nor that she really objected to the prospect. She made a mental note to prepare the little data the Ranger had gathered on the Taylforthians themselves, and to prioritize this, together with the further study of the crude propulsion device. In fact, she mused, they'd probably want it back, so best to start with the propulsion. The voice of Commander Michaels brought her back to the discussion.

"Launching a potentially warp-capable device is not the same as achieving warp," T'mpest interjected. "But there is more than sufficient evidence to show that the inhabitants of the planet are in desperate need of our assistance. If we do nothing, there is an 88.32% chance of extinction. I personally am not willing to live with the knowledge that I walked away and let them die."

Elsie agreed and nodded in consideration. "That won't happen," she said pointedly. "But this is where we need to explore how we're going to save them, and how we can prevent the meddling Romulans from interfering further."

"We have more investigating to do, then," muttered Birsi, shaking her propped head at the realization of drawing yet another task they could've already made a lot of ground on. She kept the gesture brief, however, ending it with a glance to Prudentia. "We haven't studied Taylforthian society that deeply, and I'm doubting we've gone much past Tactical and I's brainstroming session as far as figuring out why those Romulans miners are even here or how they've contaminated these people."

"The shuttles in orbit are banging away with their active sensors," Shepherd checked his PADD. "We should have even more detail on both the planet's activity and the Romulan operation by the time we get back into orbit. Plenty of data to crunch."

"Luckily," Elsie added, now steepling her fingers just beneath her chin, "the Pelican shouldn't be too far off by the time we do surface. And so whatever path we choose and whatever method we utilise should come from a stronger foothold, tactically speaking. But time's running out," she then said, looking now towards Birsi, "and 'data crunching' may come too little too late. This is now a time for action. And our first priority is to stabalise this ecological disaster. Somehow. And until further discussion, without showing our hand to the Taylforthians or our Romulan friends."

"What do we know about what's happening to the planet itself?" asked Shepherd.

"The natural dilithium veins in Taylforth's crust have been activated by the warp field, and this is slowly consuming said dilithium - Essentially a barbecue which keeps the tectonic plates moving." Prudentia answered.

"Then," Elsie interjected, "how do we stablise that? There must be a way to extinguish the burn. We are, I don't need to remind you, in the prime location for geographic access."

"I read a report not long ago on a counter-warp torpedo," said Shepherd, thinking out loud more than addressing the room. "The theory goes that it puts out a pulse at a counterfrequency to an active warp field, dissipating it and bringing a ship to a halt without damaging it. Is that a principle that can apply here? Can we create a cancelling wave of some kind and halt this burn?"

Halliwell turned to Prudentia. "From what you've learnt from the device itself in Cargo Bay Two, can you determine what the warp frequency generated would have been, Lieutenant? If we can ascertain that, then Mr. Shepherd's suggestion may just work." She rose to her feet and then turned to look out beyond the murky water beyond the glass. "If we can reverse this, and engineer a torpedo to detonate at a carefully determined geological location, we could, in theory, cause a chain reaction through the planet's dilithium veins, using the crystalline properties as a conductor for the counterfrequency."

"Creating a counter-warp has the potential to destabilize an already tenuous seismographic situation. There are other, proven ways to cool a dilithium burn without the risk of causing more harm," T'mpest said, still not convinced.

"I also think this may not be the best solution," Prudentia said, "A planet is massively bigger then a ship, and the frequencies will not be the same everywhere. We may quench the 'fire' at one position, while increasing it at another." She paused for a bit, then added, "It would be safer to use the Deflector Dish to put out the pulse, but it would be on a smaller scale. Captain, can't we request Starfleet to send ships to slowly stabilize the planet this way?"

"I disagree," Elsie replied, almost matter-of-factly. "We're here now. And the Taylforthians need our help. I'm not willing to wait days, weeks even, for Starfleet Headquarter's scientists to deliberate on a much grander scale than what we are doing now. We need to act. And we need to act today." She turned to Prudentia and narrowed her gaze upon her. "A deflector pulse wouldn't have the impactive energies required to make this change global. And stablising just one tectonic continent would be pointless and ineffectual for the indigenous inhabitants."

"I can do it."

Heads turned to find Lieutenant Jimmy Cooper standing otherwise unannounced in the doorway. "I've got experience with the warp fields, and I know I can set up a low-yield torpedo spread to stabilize this planet. I owe it to this planet."

At that point, a yellow-collared Security Officer appeared behind him, with a hand on his shoulder. "You are not supposed to be here, sir."

Elsie waved off the security guard with a brush of her hand and a small shaking of her head. "Lieutenant?" she asked, enquiring about his state of health.

"I'm fine, Captain. I haven't dreamed about the sea as much since the.. 'accident'."

Birsi regarded Jimmy quizzically as he dodged the security officer behind him and stepped towards the table, his answer to the captain only serving to further confound the Bajoran. Dreams? An accident? There was something to be said for missing out on such seemingly pivitol events despite working well past her shift, though she wasn't quite sure what.

"I've had a lot of time to think, and in that time I've worked on a little simulation. At first I've been looking at using the deflector, but as you said, Captain, that wouldn't do much at all." Jimmy then walked towards the main monitor, with the security officer half-confused keeping an eye on him still. "In the end this is what worked best," Jimmy worked the monitor and showed the planet's core. "We phaser our way through here and here, and we send modified torpedoes through these make-shift tubes. By adding a subspace sensor to the torpedoes we can program them to make fine-tune adjustments towards their destinations, in order to maximize their use. Of course, we'll still need to pre-program them with the frequencies found on the device."

Elsie looked about the room, convinced somewhat by Cooper's epiphany. "How many simulations have you run, Lieutenant?" Elsie was finally glad that more members of the senior staff seemed to subscribe to her way of thinking, but she could appreciate how risky this procedure was, even with the finest officers of the Fleet at her current disposal.

"I lost count - It's not as if I had anything better to do," Jimmy answered simply. "This plan had the highest rate of success."

"And how long would it take for you to reconfigure the torpedoes needed?" she asked, raising her eyebrows at him.

"I'll need to scan the device again for a period of time. As we only have a single shot, better make sure we got the right frequencies and variance. How long do I have?"

Elsie, without skipping a beat, replied, "I'm giving the order to surface in six hours. Have it ready by then."

"Will do. Thanks, Captain." Jimmy made a curt nod. "Jenna, I'm gonna need your help on this one."

Prudentia, sulled into shocked silence by the sudden entrance of her superior, looked up at him with annoyance. No-one had the indecency to call her by her front name on this ship, but she still knew better than to make a scene in front of her captain. "Very well, Lieutenant, but I hope your calculations are correct, or the planet may not live to tell the tale."

"We all hope that they are correct, Elsie added, shooting a look to Cooper. "Most of all, the Taylforthians."

OFF:

 

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