Something Clever

Posted on 08 Jun 2012 @ 3:58am by Lieutenant Lilou Zaren & Command Master Chief Markum Quinn
Edited on on 08 Jun 2012 @ 6:50pm

2,606 words; about a 13 minute read

Mission: Episode 01 - Project Sienna
Location: USS Galileo - Deck 7, Chief Engineer's Office
Timeline: MD07 - 1000 hrs

[ON]

Lilou had allowed herself to be dragged to the shuttlebay to guide Rothgra through a pre-flight check of the shuttles. She didn't really anticipate they'd be needing them for a while, but it didn't hurt to be on the safe side and the kid needed something to keep him busy. She listened attentively as he listed all the systems checks and watched over his shoulder as he went through each one in turn. She only had to correct him once, reminding him to check the sensor arrays after drive core and not before. And all the safety precautions he'd listed as part of his process... he'd calm down about that eventually, she knew, but in the meantime it was nice to know he wouldn't be shoving his bare hand into any active arrays without considering ways to prevent it. She remained silent while they went through the steps, only speaking up to ask little questions, and when she finally turned to him, it was hard not to grin. "Nice job, Rothgra," she said in her best attempt at a stern voice and watched the kid bloom. "Now move. I need you fed, rested, and clear-headed for sixteen hundred." She needed to figure out more projects for him. Keep him learning. Quinn would know what to do.

As she watched him hurry off, she rubbed a hand over her face, shook her head, and laughed silently as she headed back down to Engineering. As the turbo lift ferried her to the bowels of the ship, she thought about the night before and her smile widened as she brushed her fingers idly over the metal band around her arm. She'd had the nightmares again, that was true; she'd woken in a cold sweat at the sound of her alarm, just like almost every other morning before, but as she'd lain curled on the floor of her quarters shaking and trying to think of happy things, the memory of the night before had filled her mind's eye. The exhilaration of the the test results and what had happened after... and eventually her heartbeat had slowed to something reasonable and her hands had stopped shaking. Maybe it hadn't happened faster than usual, but she'd felt warm and not entirely alone at the end of it. That was something new. She considered the Mark 3, the small seemingly benign brushed silver band around the middle of her forearm. Maybe it's a morning for show and tell all around, she thought, leaving the lift and winding her way to the office.

When she didn't see Quinn in main engineering, she stuck her head into his office and waved. "Got a second, Chief?" she asked.

Chief had his face buried in a report from fleet about the launching of a new class of ship. He looked up and smiled broadly at his assistant. Leaning back and stretching. "Peers. I always have a second for you. What's up?"

She ducked her head as she crossed to his desk. "It's this..." she trailed off, clearing her throat. Now that she was here in front of him, all his experience and intelligence, she was starting to second guess herself. Four rounds of prototype testing. She could have done more. Should have at least gotten more data. She only had two prototypes that didn't blow up, and one of those threw people across rooms. But that was the point, wasn't it? If anyone could see what she was missing, it would be him, wouldn't it? "I've been working on a side project for the last few months and... Well, I was wondering if you might look at it?" she rubbed her thumb protectively over the band from her arm.

"Hmmm," replied Quinn as he looked the design over. "Interesting indeed." He looked up to Lilou. "Your constant desire to push the barrier of the unknown never ceases to amaze me Peers."

"It's probably easiest if I just show you," she decided and tapped the band against her combadge. A little fissure of energy leapt from the badge to the band and the dim golden cone began to grow from the center point if the band until it formed an ephemeral plane about one meter by one meter in front if her. "Personal shield technology, only it strengthens the more kinetic and pulse power is used against it." She tapped the golden cone and it grew brighter where she touched. "We got it to take level sixteen bursts from a compression rifle last night in the holodeck. This one's the Mark 3, built to continue absorbing and resupplying energy to the shield to the limits of the matter on its planar line. Worked up energy to fuel a shuttle for a couple minutes... I need to work on expanding the capacity, but... I have the data for the other three variable prototypes if you want it." Pressing her thumb to the inside of the band, the shield dissipated and she unclasped it, gently setting it down in front of him. "It's just a second string prototype," she explained, "I know there's a lot more to do and some of it I- well, I guess I wanted to see what you thought."

Quinn picked up the band and looked over it. He then reached into his desk top drawer and pulled out magnification spectacles and put them on, making what would look like old Earth reading glasses. As he adjusted the magnifications on them he looked up to Peers over the tops of the lenses. "Tell me, what are you using as the primary energy transfer relay on this? Also, how many blew up once you figured out not to use quantum energy?"

She sighed, feeling a little like a guilty student, "Nine," she admitted. "Then I moved onto photosynthetics, but they weren't able to recycle the kinetic force the way I wanted. These use a solenoid made of monocrystal beryllium silicate infused with semiferrous polycarbonate. Not quite the energy transfer of quantum, but they don't blow up... as much. This variation doesn't anyway, as far as I've tested it. Part of that's the contact weight. Most of it's the programming. Of course, it needs more testing. More variables." She bit her lip to keep herself from blathering on.

As Quinn used a set of small tools, he removed the back of the band's control pad. "Hmm, this is a good set up Peers. I once worked on something like this years ago on a classified mission that you will probably never hear of, or read about." His thick fingers still maneuvered with surprising dexterity. He looked closer as he ran a tricorder over the control pad. "The mono-crystal beryllium silicate solenoid is a great base to build on. The problem is the semi-ferrous polycarbonate is the problem, though. Ferrous will hold a charge from a positive feed well enough, and the field produced as a shielding agent is good, but won't last long, and once it hits above its Curie temperature, it becomes unstable, and not only loses it's field, but can become volatile."

"Yeah," she said, thinking about the reverse beam that had slammed back and burned Lamar. "Saw that."

Quinn put the band down after replacing the backing. Then picked up a PADD and typed away on it. "I would suggest a solenoid made of mono-crystal beryllium silicate infused with a Multiwall carbon nano-tube supported polypyrrole/manganese oxide with nano-composites." He handed the PADD to Peers. It was full of the chemical compound properties and elemental instructions. "You might find that the polypyrrole/manganese oxide mixture will act as a Super-capacitor, and will be able to absorb the energy from several disruptor bolts, without going critical. You'd get maybe, four, five at the most, of direct hits before you'd have to change out batteries."

Scanning the PADD, Lilou chewed her lower lip thoughtfully. "That's brilliant," she muttered to herself. Of course polypyrrole/manganese oxide would solve the overload issue. She hadn't even considered the option of working a nanotube in with a chemical composite. And that was why he was the Chief, and she was... well... her. "Do you think that would keep it from sending reverse pulses down phaser beams? We had a little glitch with that last night with the Mark 1 and I'm still not totally sure how it happened. At first I thought it was a shield expansion issue, but the longer I looked at it, the less it seemed like that was what happened."

Quinn shook his head and scratched his beard as he leaned back into his chair and placed his feet on the desk after crossing them at the ankles. "It may cut down on it, but not entirely stop it. I'd hate to be the poor bastard that was doing the shooting when that happens. Besides, luckily for us, most anyone that would be shooting at us will be using a disruptor, and that will work wonders against those....in theory."

"It wasn't very pretty." She nodded, "I'll start building the nano-tube to fit along the solenoid. Then figure out whether the theory works in practice." Lilou rocked back on her heels a little, scanning the plans he'd written out again. "I had problem with kinetic backlash in hand-to-hand scenarios, too. On the higher gauge prototypes. This one and the next variation up..." She set his PADD down and pulled her own from her thigh holster, opening the testing data from the night before and handing it over to him, pointing out the relevant facts. "See - the Four was actually doubling the kinetic force and reversing it back on the assailant. I didn't program that and I haven't been able to figure out why."

Quinn looked intently at it. All the numbers presented to him did not show why that would happen....unless..."This is with the silicate infused with semiferrous polycarbonate....so if the assailant was of a race with high iron and ferritin in their system, then it could just be the magnetic field responding to another magnetic filed intruding on it. And the you know what happens when two magnets with equal poles meet." Quinn sat the PADD down and looked up to Peers. "The polypyrrole/manganese oxide will stop that. Now, it may cause some scalding internally to races with high copper content."

Lilou couldn't remember which races had high copper contents or high ferritin, but she was pretty sure that a shield that scalded particular races' insides would be an invention the federation would frown upon. For a moment, she wondered if all her work had been for nothing. "What about a yttrium/manganese/aluminum oxide?"

Quinn hit the keys on his desktop and a holographic display showed with the molecular formula: Mn2AlO3Y2

"Hmm..." Quinn did a comparison to the first molecular formula used on the shielding. The holograph spat numbers and symbols all over the entire area over his desk. "You may have something there, Peers. Very impressive idea."

She shook her head, grinning shyly as her gaze eagerly leapt across the formulas and equations. "The manganese oxide was your idea. I was just trying to figure out variations on your theme." She bit her lip, swiping her PADD over his desk and collecting the data to her portable screen. "Quinn... the personal shield tech you worked on before... why didn't it become mainstream for Starfleet security officers? Was there a design flaw or...?"

Quinn tapped a button on his desktop and the door to his office closed, then locked. "Have a seat Lilou. What I'm going to tell you is so highly classified that most Admirals aren't privy to it." He sat back and exhaled. "We made them, and they got some use in real time combat situations. The only problem was the radiation let out after a concussion- force was absorbed by the shielding. It had a habit of becoming extremely volatile when introduced to a static shock. The manganese oxide would let out nanomolecules that were capable of de-molecularizing everything in a ten meter circumference with a minimal amount of electric current. We were ordered to cease all works, and destroy all information in its replication/design features. So," added Quinn, hit that baby with an electrical current to be sure that the aluminum oxide will cleanly disperse any electricity, therefore eliminating the big booming."

"Note taken. But why wouldn't they let you make that change before? Why stop the research?" she asked. Sure, de-molecularizing everything in a ten meter radius would be a scary side-effect, but that was what holographic test subjects and low intelligence androids were for. The positive things that could be gained from such a discovery far outweighed the drawbacks if the research was allowed to be conducted in a safe way. If a personal shield were standard issue for all Starfleet personnel, it would make everyone safer. Not just the security department or away teams. She'd seen a couple crewmen in a fist fight the day before. If they'd both been shielded, the fight would have been moot to begin with. If she'd had a shield, she might still be able to sleep through the night. "It doesn't make sense."

"During war, it seldom does." replied Quinn somberly. "I have no idea why we were shutdown from that experiment. Maybe funding. It was not long after the Dominion War, so anything is possible. I'm just glad you brought it up,"

She rubbed her thumb along the edge of her PADD thoughtfully. "Would... I mean, if you're interested, if I did some new work ups, would you be interested in taking a look? When there's spare time, of course."

"Peers," he said with a broad smile, "I'd be upset if you didn't, my friend. Anytime, just call. You know you are always welcomed to call on me."

"Thanks, Chief." She ducked her head, blushing out of pure gratefulness and tucked the PADD under her arm. "Rothgra's getting back into the swing of things. His hands are still a little stiff looking, but it looks like he'll be fine in a few days."

The old chief shook his head with a childish-like grin. "That dumb-ass. He's lucky you were there. He won't make that mistake twice. Oh, Peers. Before I forget, I signed you up with the Academy to take the Advanced Starship Propulsion and Design course via subspace. You can work at your own pace. It's usually only for mid-level officers that are serving in the role of Assistant Chief Engineer, and are promotable. The chair of the Engineering Curriculum was once a young, snot-nosed Ensign that I mentored back on the Galaxy, and then again in the XRD." Quinn smiled as he stood and stretched. "Anyway, you're enrolled in it. Check it out, and see what you think of it. If you hate it, don't do it, but I think you will love it. Good-luck"

Lilou blinked. And then blinked again. The Advanced Starship Propulsion and Design course was nearly impossible to get into for officers, let alone enlisted personnel. "You- I-" She swallowed hard. "Thank you, sir."

Quinn smiled, "You're welcome, and don't call me sir Peers. Now get the hell out of here and do something productive." he said with a wink and a boyish grin.

"Yes, Chief," she nodded, adding, "Thank you," again before grabbing her band from his desk, checking she had the right PADD and bolting in search of productivity.



[OFF]
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MWO Lilou Peers
Assistant Chief Engineering Officer
USS Galileo


Chief Warrant Officer Markum Quinn
Chief Engineer
USS Galileo

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