April Brainstorms Bring May Target-Locks

Posted on 08 May 2015 @ 11:33am by Commander Andreus Kohl & Lieutenant Jared Nicholas & Ensign Jaana Voutilainen & Lieutenant JG Kalos Jang Ph.D. & Crewman Apprentice Sigrid Thelin & Lieutenant Oren Idris Ph.D. & Ensign Arandon Khnailmnae Ph.D. & Trisant Myrddin

3,127 words; about a 16 minute read

Mission: Episode 08 - NIMBUS
Location: USS Galileo - Deck 7, Astrometrics Lab
Timeline: MD 01 - 0812 hours

[ON]

It felt like a waste of resources, in truth. That massive, curved viewscreen was the defining characteristic of the Astrometrics lab, and yet its holographic projectors were displaying nothing but a murky blob. Normally, the images produced by sensor composites were true-to-life representations of the universe outside, or metaphors for stellar phenomenon beyond the scope of humanoid vision. That wasn't the case this day. With most of those capabilities shut off to allow a pure test of one sensor system in particular, the assembled science staff were left with an amorphous blob to consider.

Positioned at the central LCARS interface was a petty officer who was expressing his frustration at this turn of events through an escalating series of huffs and sighs. Trisant Myrddin dragged his thumb across the touchscreen equivalent of a dial to make minute adjustments to the calibration of the sensors. "I don't know what I'm doing wrong," Trisant said. "That doesn't even look like the Atlas."

Jared was about as far from an astrophysicist as a scientist could possibly be. But he was pretty good at reading star charts and thinking three dimensionally, but he couldn't make heads or tail out of what he saw,

What Jared was good at was bringing people together and getting them to brainstorm, pitch ideas off each other and comet some conclusion, hopefully the right one.

Trisant shook his head and threw his hands up in surrender. "There's too much interference," he said and he took a single step back from the LCARS console. "I thought we were looking at the Atlas, but that could be a cloaked ship or passing gravitational radiation?"

"Perhaps what you need, " Jared suggested is a new pair of eyes, or several of them. Let me see what I can do. Maybe a meeting with all the staff is in order.

Sigrid had overheard Jared as she was passing by and stopped to hover momentarily to piece together what was wrong. She scooted up next to Jared and Trisant. She tucked blonde curls behind her ear so she could lean in without her hair falling into her eyes. "I have a fabulous pair of eyes, how can they help?" She asked brightly.

"Well," answered Jared, "take a look. This should be displaying the star system, not looking like some ancient Terran game of Asteroids."

Over-enthusiastically, Trisant said, "Yes! Yes, exactly, sir," in agreement, even though he didn't totally understand the Asteroids reference. The Bajoran stepped up to the LCARS console again, but kept to the right side, should any of the others decide to take a hands-on approach as well. Casting an askew glance at Sigrid, Trisant explained, "We've been calibrating our type-23 secondary deflector array to detect ships by mass alone. Or gravitational shifts, alternatively. I thought we were on to something but... well... That's the Atlas." --Trisant swatted his hand through the air, as if throwing a curse at the viewscreen-- "Or maybe Nautilus?"

"What if we calibrate the sensors to work in a narrow bandwith instead" Jaana added. It took her a while to find the gut to add to the discussion.

Trisant nodded and looked down at what options on the companel would allow him to make Jaana Voutilainen's suggestion come to life. "Yes, ma'am, we can give that a try," Trisant said. "I'll admit, I struggled with those calibrations in the simulations, but it may be our most advantageous avenue of research."

"Well that would give us an advantage, PO,I'm sure." Sigrid said winking at Trisant. Sigrid turned her body slightly towards Jaana. "That is an excellent suggestion, by the way!" She rode Trisant's enthusiasm like a surfer enjoying the wave. "Usually when I'm trying to poke around and isolate objects I like to step back and look at the big picture first, then dig on down deeper." She spun on her heels and looked up at everything in astrometrics around her as if in awe. She settled in beside Trisant at the controls, but she continued to speak all bubbly-like at Jared and Jaana. "If we're trying to isolate an object into a specific category like mass, then we have to get rid of all the other information coming in." She flicked off the EM sensors, and various other instruments that the lab used to gather it's data. "Then, I would use the SQUID--"

Sigrid stopped for a moment as she tried to remember what the acronym stood for, "stands for I think, superconducting quantum interference device. Woo! I still remember." She shot her hands up as if to shake invisible pom-poms. "Go me." She composed her self and continued, "I'd probably use that in combination with an infrared beam to list objects by mass, then use the SQUID to detect the gravitational waves emanating from the objects. They're hard to detect, so when you have all this other shot noise coming in it just makes things all messy and globby." As she was speaking she had started accessing things from sub-menus.

"I literally just did an exam on these functions, I'm totally not like a super-brain or anything so don't ask me to interpret the data, but...." Sigrid finished the last calibration. "That's the Atlas and that over there is Nautilus being detected by their gravitational wave and sorted by known mass of the ships on this side screen here. I'm not sure if the sensors are sensitive enough to detect gravitational waves from cloaked ships, but Dr. Jang is close to producing interferometers that can help with that. My suggestion would be to use that, maybe with the SQUID and say, the mangetometer, or oooh, we could also measure strain at the same time using the resonance scanner to calculate particle deformation. I'm sure with all those things the computer can predict mass, and location of a cloaked ship. I mean, come on, Klingons are still hiding from the EM band. Science totally can do better than that."

As Trisant continued the slow and precision work of adjusting intensity levels and directional components on the sensor pallets, he thought aloud, "What will this mean, sirs? If we really do find a way to track cloaked ships, will that mean we'll be the ones launching sneak attacks?" --Of course; of course Trisant found the most dramatic of all possibilities to worry about, when he had a perfectly reasonable problem in front of him-- "Will we be blowing up defenseless cloaked ships with their shields down?"

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves. First we need to make this idea plausible before we need to start discuss the ethics behind it." Jaana replied as she looked at the screen and noted some stuff down on a padd.

Trisant's gaze quickly drifted from Sigrid's calculations to the notes Jaana was recording on her PADD. Sounding chastised for his fancy, Trisant said, "What would you suggest, ma'am?"

"Well, let's start with miss Thelin's suggustion. Contact Dr. Jang to see if he can help us with the gravitational waves and focus on those first. While others get the SQUID ready." she replied.

Sigrid's mind had drifted while the other's spoke. She saw another group of scientists working on something and she had a strong need to go see what they were up to as well. As a crewman apprentice she was at the bottom of the education wrung, but she was an eager learner and an even more eager helper. Instead of joining them right away, she whirled around on Jaana and Jared; her blond curls following behind as they bounced about. "I just know how to use the system and the programs, I wouldn't have a clue if these things can be used the way we want them. I've located and isolated our ships using those instruments but mainly because I already know they're there. By the stars, I'd have no idea if it could find a cloaked ship with that. If you can find specialists then I think maybe you have a solid theory, but that's probably a job for the officers I suppose." Sigrid beamed a smile at them.

---

"-suppose it's about pattern recognition," said the computer-projected voice of Andreus Kohl. The Chief Research Officer's visage was looking out from one of the LCARS workstations set into the side bulkhead in Astrometrics. Kohl continued: "If we can use past behaviour to predict the flight patterns of Klingon vessels, we can come up with recommendations for how to best utilize the new sensor protocols."

Arandon looked over at Oren and then looked over to the side, raising his eyebrow and pursing his lips over just what kind of utility his being here possibly served. "Klingon ships have variable mission parameters, in fleet actions they form wings that behave like fighter squadrons." He said, raising a hand to one side of his nose as he opened a history book in his mind, ignoring the bits about pattern recognition and reframing it in a literary context. His "know it all" knowledge was instantly accessible, his knowledge on the sciences further away from his field and the various other aspects of Starfleet took slow and careful mental rereading.

"Hold this." Suddenly, Oren pushed a large amount of paDDs and an old book into Arandon's arms, oblivious to the hybrid's musings. Really, all he could focus on at that moment was the grating sound of Kohl's voice in his ears, like laser scalpels against his eardrums.

Holding another paDD in one hand, waving it around as he spoke. "You do realise I'm a cultural anthropologist and..." He turned to the other man, then remembered. "Arandon here, is a botanist. We are not exactly battle tacticians." Truth be told, Oren felt incredibly uncomfortable with the entire idea of planning how to use a sensor. It was about as far away from his chosen field of study as anything could be and he felt on edge from the moment Kohl made the ludicrous suggestion.

On the display, Kohl raised a hand and used the pads of his finger tips to rub at his right temple. Presumably, the sound of Oren's voice was giving Kohl a similar headache. "Oren, were you kidnapped from your home by Captain Holliday at phaser-point?" Kohl asked condescendingly. "Did Starfleet invent an indentured servitude program I haven't heard about?"

"Hello!" Sigrid practically dashed to get to the station that Oren and Arandon were working at, pretending to be oblivious to any tension. She'd moved from every station, trying to find things to help with. When she saw each of the men's expression's her eyes grew a bit wide. She'd caught the last thing that Kohl had said, and in a brilliant display of awkward social diffusion she laughed and said, "Sometimes, sir, when you're elbow deep cleaning the Matter and Waste Reclamation scrubber units, you'd think it was indentured servitude for sure." Sigrid giggled, then inserted herself between Arandon and Oren, taking a moment to size each of them up. She wondered for a moment if there might be something in the water on the Galileo that seemed to only attract hotties. With an amused smile she asked, "What are we working on here? Can I help?"

"Oh, we're all just neck deep in work we're not qualified for," Oren said, giving Sigrid a half-joking smile that didn't reach his eyes, hoping Kohl would hear that neither of them were exempt from his comment.

"But," he continued, deciding to not stoop further to Kohl's level of condescension. "You know what they say, a challenge is only an obstacle if you bow to it."

"Crewman, would you mind checking the ship's holodeck programs for Klingon battle simulations, preferably those based on actual battles fought within the last century or so? Then we can all divide them among ourselves and use the computer to see if there are any patterns that overlap."

"I wouldn't mind at all! Infact, that sounds super fun." She clapped her hands in enthusiasm before deciding how best to get the information to the men. She took out her PADD and began cycling through titles of holodeck programs, but it was quite clear she was going to have to do some tricky keyword searches for this one.

"Doctor, do you have any knowledge about the Klingon code of honour and ethics?" Oren then asked Arandon, completely ignoring Kohl now. After all, everything he seemed to be doing was pointing out the obvious, ignoring where they were lacking and then acting like a jerk when called on it.

Simply pleased that Oren was applying himself to anything other than excuses, Kohl left him to his assignment. He said a simple, "Kohl out." Kohl turned his head to consider the interferometer report on his other display, and he tapped the contact to close the communication channel.

Arandon wasn't entirely sure if the question was entirely serious and if it was, if he was still meant to answer it. "Ah wel..." He started, recalling some of his knowledge on Klingon culture, which amounted to a few database articles he had read in his spare time and a singular day in his anthropology class. Just then Sigrid walked back over and Arandon didn't finish his thought, making a slight movement of his eyes downward to perhaps indicate a weird sign of relief.

"I've found some luck." Sigrid said as she pushed the list she was starting to make to the main console where Oren was working. "I'm still digging though. Are there any specific historical battles I can cross reference? My history isn't as good as my science." Sigrid cocked her head and pulled her blond curls behind her ear. A habit she had when concentrating on something important.

Glancing at Arandon and deciding to give the young man a break, Oren turned all of his attention to Sigrid. "I doubt the Klingons would use any of the tactics we might have seen," he said thoughtfully. "So the ones where they battle Federation forces are probably out of the question. We should look into them last, just in case." Thinking for a moment, Oren made a decision. "Alright. These are wargames, and we don't have much time. Crewman, narrow your search down to the battles the Klingons took part in during the Dominion war, and Doctor Khnailmnae and I will divide the rest." Giving her a supportive pat on the shoulder, Oren turned back to the main console to work.

---

"--don't want you to think I'm standing over your shoulder," Kohl was saying, from where his image appeared on another LCARS workstation on the other side of Astrometrics, "But we're running out of time. I am, figuratively, standing over you shoulder. Have you made any progress?"

Sigrid bounced up next to Kalos. She held a PADD in her hands and was literally standing over his shoulder. She wanted to help everyone with their projects and had even considered just going from person to person to offer whatever help a Crewman Apprentice could. She waited for Kal to respond to Kohl before interjecting anything.

"I feel pretty good about it," Kal said, glancing back at Sigrid. "The interferometer tech is already pretty well-developed. It was just a matter of making it the right size. Simulated projections are promising. The range is pretty short, so the Klingons will have to get right into the net, but that's probably for the best. Out in space with all of us floating around, we'd get a ridiculous number of pings if they were any stronger."

A broad grin spread on the image of Kohl's face. "That's exciting. That's exciting to hear," Kohl said. "I'm not in the loop with your command staff these days. I'll need you to meet with Allydra and share your progress. Given what little time we have left, and the industrial replicators available, do you have any projections for what volumes of interferometers we can replicate before the exercises begin?"

Kal winced. "Well, that's the biggest problem. We start maneuvers tomorrow, which doesn't give us a hell of a lot of time for replication. We'll have to be strategic about how we employ the net. We might be able to manage several million, but in an area this vast, that won't cover much. It'd probably be most useful for pinpointing the cloaked ship after we have a rough idea where it probably is. But in conjunction with everything else, I think we've got a pretty good plan here."

That took some of the grin from off of Kohl's face, or at least gave it a lopsided twist. "Have you any ideas for a delivery method?" Kohl asked. "If we're not going to seed the whole sector, how would we disperse a cloud of them in short order?"

"Could we use the transporter system some how to disperse them?" Sigrid had no idea how that'd happen if it could, but she had a strong desire to help and if brain storming was a way to do it she was more than capable of that. She inspected her colourfully designed as she said, "Is that number also factoring in just Galileo's industrial replicators or did you factor in the other ships in our 'fleet' as well?" She flashed her fingers as air-quotes over the word 'fleet'. "Oh! We could also ask engineering if there are any replicators we can temporarily convert to industrial replicators on Galileo and the other ships. Would that also increase the available interferometers?" She stopped suddenly and then looked sheepish at the two men. They were both incredibly attractive and she had to mentally chastise herself to stay focused. "I'm sorry, I'm asking so many questions. I'm just so excited to be here and help." She flashed a smile at Kohl and a wink at Kal.

On the LCARS panel, Kohl had to laugh at Sigrid's enthusiasm. He literally laughed -- especially after the conversation he had just escaped from earlier. Shaking his head, Kohl remarked, "I don't even know where to begin... but I bet you have something to say on that matter too."



[OFF]



Petty Officer 3rd Class Trisant Myrddin
[PNPC Kohl]
Stellar Cartographer
USS Galileo

Oren Idris, Ph.D.
Archaeologist/Anthropologist
USS Galileo

Jaana Voutilainen
Stellar Cartographer
USS Galileo

Ensign Arandon Khnailmnae Ph.D.
Botanist
USS Galileo

Crewman Apprentice Sigrid Thelin
Scientist's Mate
USS Galileo

Lieutenant Jared Nicholas
Language Specialist
USS Galileo

Lieutenant JG Kalos Jang Ph.D.
Nanoengineer
USS Galileo

Lieutenant Commander Andreus Kohl
Executive Officer / Chief Research Officer
USS Nautilus / USS Galileo

 

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