She's Gonna Blow!

Posted on Wed Feb 7th, 2024 @ 1:39pm by Captain Malcom Llwyedd & Warrant Officer Arlan Harlan & Petty Officer 2nd Class Thomas Lopt & Petty Officer 2nd Class Fhiri
Edited on on Wed Feb 7th, 2024 @ 1:55pm

1,415 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: Mission 1: A Long Hard Road Ahead
Location: USS Firebird, Main Engineering Deck 4
Timeline: 23 August 2396, 1730 Hours

[ON]
Alarms began to blare with a deafening noise as lights plunged into the red. The red was easily Harlan's least favorite thing; it made system checks so much worse because of the changed light.

"Get the lead out, engineers! We've got a major crisis on our hands! I need someone checking flux capacitors, now! You there," he pointed at a rating whose name escaped in the moment, "Get on the warp drive. And you, cloaking device, ASAP. Find out what happened. I am not letting this ship blow up while I'm in charge of its insides! Lastly, someone get me a full status report!"

Fhiri looked for Lieutenant Soto but then immediately remembered that he'd been selected for the crazy EVA mission. At least they wouldn't all die when the ship blew up. She tapped quickly on her screens, pulling up that master overlay that showed all the systems and how they were functioning.

"Chief, it looks like activating the cloaking device has created an inversed polarity on the field dampeners and that is causing even more issues. Basically, the ship is drawing more power than we are producing. Looks like it is draining the battery reserves to meet the sudden demand," Fhiri said.

Thomas scrambled around engineering, trying to find the console dedicated to the cloaking device. It was off on the side, all by itself and he'd never actually touched it. Although, he had read a lot about it. Just for fun. He finally made it to the console and in the red light that illuminated everything he activated the screens. The image that came up was the schematic for the device. A large segment was blinking, indicating some kind of fault.

"Chief! There's something wrong with the cloaking device!" Thomas yelled. "There's a failure in the field containment module."

Harlan nearly threw a PADD across the room. "Dang it!" he shouted. "Check the quantum flux bubble and see if we can reverse the polarity back to where it was!"

Thomas felt his knees quake just a little. He was a high-strung person under normal conditions and this was far from normal. He wasn't used to dealing with this kind of stuff. Why did Lieutenant Soto have to be gone?

He pulled up a 3D model of the quantum flux bubble and modulated the polarity. Nothing changed. "Fhiri can you check and see if this is a programming error?"

Fhiri sighed. Her fingers flew over her console. "Chief, there's a hard-coded issue. I think we are going to have to get hands-on. It looks like the access panel for the cloaking device is... through the Jeffries tubes. Section 43 panel Z3A4," Fhiri said.

This time, Harlan did throw a PADD but it was to a person whose name he didn't want to think of in the moment. "I'll take this one. We need someone who can move fast through the tubes."

He walked with speed to the nearest junction and dove in with a quick shout to Fhiri. "Make sure everyone stays on task. Tell Lopt to try giving orders if more things go wrong. I should be back shortly."

And with that, Harlan vanished into the darkness, barely lit by blinking indicators and running lights.

[Main Engineering]

"You're in charge," Fhiri said.
"No, you're in charge," Lopt said.

They both looked at the direction that the chief had gone and then locked eyes.

"I wish Lieutenant Soto was here," Lopt said. His voice was just shy of being whiny.

Fhiri opened her mouth and let out a slow hiss. "Fine! I'm in charge. "So what's the situation?"

"Well, the ship is trying to intense maneuver and use the cloaking device at the same time and the result..." Lopt started to say.

"I know what the problem is!" Fhiris shouted.
"But you asked..."
"It was rhetorical!"

Thomas opted to say nothing. It seemed the safest thing, even though the ship was trying to blow itself up.

"We have to buy Chief Harlan some time. We need to create some extra power somehow," Fhiri said.

"I have an idea," Thomas said.

[Jeffries Tubes]

Harlan was wriggling through the tubes furiously. It felt just like the old days, but he couldn't move like he used to. Every movement felt more constricted, forced. It was like an army crawl from a 20th-century movie he had watched ages ago. Was it J.I. Jane? Maybe Platoon? Eh, didn't matter. What did matter was getting to the issue at hand.

It took more than five minutes before Harlan was at Section 43. Now, to find that panel. "Let's see...we've got Z25B, Z3 7G, Ah, there we go, Z3A4!" He began rerouting circuits and even hit the panel with his fist once when things weren't moving fast enough. It took about four stressful minutes before Harlan saw a green light. He pinged out to his team. "Harlan here, we're green. Reboot and let's get going."

Right as Harlan made that statement, another light went red, a spark flew, and something clunked in the tube. "What was that?" he thought. He crawled to the next exit, only to find it blocked. He hit the access, but nothing. Checking the wiring produced nothing. Harlan was trapped in the tubes. "Hey!" he screamed into both his badge and the aether. "Get me out of here! Something is wrong!"

What was going to happen with the lanky engineer? Could Fhiri or Lopt figure it out fast despite the impending danger of the attack?

[Main Engineering]

Lopt looked down at his feet and then back at the engineering console and then back down at his feet. He could just see Fhiri's boots. The acting chief engineer was buried into the main computer console, which looked out over the warp core. Lopt tried not to focus on how unstable the core looked. But it was hard as the normal rhythmic thrum was replaced with a shimmering, undulating light that ebbed and surged as Lieutenant Tor maneuvered the Firebird.

"Ok," Fhiri's muffled voice called out. "I think I have it set. Go ahead and initialize."

Lopt grimaced. his plan, in layman's terms, was to use the instability in the core to create a warp feedback bubble, which would create additional energy. But would also be incredibly hard to control.

Thomas glanced around engineering, willing someone else to walk in and take over. Nobody came.

"Hey!" Fhiri shouted and kicked Lopt in the shin. "Do it!"

"Yes, sir," Lopt muttered and pressed three fingers against the graphical display, sliding two bars upwards and two down. The warp core actually groaned something Lopt hadn't even known was possible.

"Uhhh, Fhiri? I think it is working."

The Ferengi squirmed out of the console's innards and popped to her feet. "Yes!" She yelled, taking in the warp core. "Computer, what is the current energy output of the warp core?"
=^=The warp core is running at 115% of maximum output. Danger! This level of output will cause permanent damage within seven minutes=^=

Fhiri grinned at Lopt. "We did it!"
Lopt frowned.

=^="Harlan here, we're green. Reboot and let's get going."=^=

"Fhiri... if we reboot the system while it's in this configuration..."

Fhiri waved her hand. "It's fine. As long as we get it restarted in time, everything works."

"But if it doesn't the ship will explode," Lopt said.
"Don't bother me with details," Fhiri said. "Computer, initialize mainpower rolling reboot."

=^=aknowledged=^=

Around engineering consoles began rebooting one at a time. The rolling reboot allowed the secondary systems to momentarily take over, which kept continuity of systems intact. When the last system rebooted, the warp core thrummed, dimmed and then resumed its normal appearance. The entire process took four minutes.

"Yes!" Fhiri said again.

Thomas' knees were weak at the thought of how close they'd come to destroying the entire ship. Fhiri saw the look on his face and laughed.

"We had two whole minutes left, Lopt. That's a lifetime," She said. "Let's go find out what is happening with Chief Harlan.

[OFF]

Warrant Officer Arlan Harlan
Chief Engineering Officer
USS Firebird NCC-88298


Petty Officer 2nd Class Fhiri (NPC by Llwyedd)
Computer Systems Specialist
USS Firebird NCC-88298


Petty Officer Second Class Thomas Lopt (NPC by Llwyedd)
Communications Specialist
USS Firebird NCC-88298

 

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