Meeting the next-to-chief

Posted on Wed Dec 11th, 2019 @ 8:15am by Lieutenant Mica Rue & Chief Petty Officer Benjamin Thor & Lieutenant Commander William Rogers

Mission: Sounds of Silence
Location: Engineering

=/\= Engineering Chief's Office =/\=

Mica entered her newly-appointed office, not even glancing around before she took a seat behind the desk. The surface was still shiny and clean, not one stack of padds or miscellaneous tools marring it. She knew this was a temporary event - it wouldn't stay this way long.

Remembering a quick thought, she brought up her padd, tapping a quick request on it. :Lt Rogers, we are discussing how to find the alien ship, if you are available. Situational room, engineering.:

Hearing the footsteps into the room, she nodded to a chair. "So, it's time we meet. I meant what I said out there. The relationship between a chief and their assistant is very much a partnership. A little tit for tat. So communication needs to be open between us, and that includes the good and the bad. Understood?"

Ben stood fairly straight, a little nervous as prior to this promotion to Assistant Chief Engineer he didn't have that much engagement with the senior Engineering Officers, usually only engaging with the duty officer. "Yes Ma'am" Ben replied stiffly.

Mica noted his stiffness and smiled genuinely. "Please sit, Mister Thor, if only for a minute."

Ben takes the offered seat, although he still looked as uncomfortable as he did when he was standing.

"I am hoping we will be able to catch a drink later, after all this is done with the aliens. It would be good for us to be comfortable enough with each other that we can at least dispense with formality and call each other by name."

"That would be nice Ma..." Ben stopped midway through saying Ma'am after the last part of the sentence processed in his thoughts, "...Ms Rue" he finished, still not 100% sure on goings on.

Mica's smile widened. "Chief or Mica, please. Lt Rue if you must. "

"And you should know, there are already rumors about my presumed insanity flitting around out there." She glanced away, chuckling. "I have a bad habit of talking to the machinery and...giving it names. But I can assure you the doctor found me sound of mind and body. It's just a little quirk."

Ben looked a little surprised, he hadn't really heard any of the rumours having spent most of the time since Mica's arrival outside of main engineering. Although it could have explained why the duty officers mood was so poor earlier.

"Now that's done, Mister Thor, I believe we should get to our adoring audience."

Mica stood, leading the way through her doors and to the situational table. There the others stood, a brevity among them even as they considered how to find the ship of the race that had used them all as test subjects and donors the past three days.

Leaning her palms on the glass, Mica took a deep breath. "Alright folks, we are charged with figuring out how to find the alien ship since the people in the brig aren't exactly being outright with the information.

Opening into main engineering, a lone figure appeared. Mica stood, nodding to him. "I've asked Lt Rogers here as well, as I
d heard that he already started working on finding the ship. Lt, is that correct?"

"Certainly is." Bill replied. He snapped a salute when he entered the situational room. Falling back on the comfort of the familiar, now archaic, gesture to ward off quite how out of his element he felt in engineering. "They've been using a variable phase cloak to fly under the radar, but I can't pin down where they actually are."

"A variable phase cloak...." Mica stared at the people around the table. "I suppose that makes sense, considering they were able to wander as individuals with similar technology."

She leaned again on the table. "And I suppose we are expecting that they have refined the technology to be more reliable, since they used it fairly well INSIDE the ship."

"I'll take your word on that." Bill smiled slightly. "It's not perfect though. Something about it keeps pinging our warp field at semi regular intervals. Kept having to make small course adjustments to keep us on track." He glanced between the two engineers. "That's how we worked out the ship was there." The explanation felt redundant the moment he said it. He lapsed into silence feeling every bit the cave man.

Mica nodded. "So what we need is a way to either put those 'pings' on a chart so we can make out the size and shape of the ship, or..." she glanced up at Rogers. "To ping them back..."

Once the wheels had started, it was hard for Mica to stop them. Her fingers flew over the keyboard of the console, bringing up a overhead diagram of the Astraea. She spoke quickly, almost deliriously in her rush of thought. "If we could ping them back, similar to sonar, then we would have a clear picture of the ship, and possibly be able to follow it if it moved. But to ping against a variable phase cloak." Her gaze shot up to the collection of men and women. "Well? Any ideas at all, folks?"

Ben thought for a moment, "I'm no warp theorist, but couldn't we increase the size of the field briefly to where it interacts? and maybe attempt to use a couple of small craft to triangulate where the interference is?" Ben looked a little uncomfortable making the suggestion due to lack of knowledge specifically with Warp mechanics.

Bill laughed, a joyous oversized sound from an oversized human. He slapped Ben on the back, forgetting in his enthusiasm to reign in his enhanced strength. "I like the way you think!" He frowned slightly. It was time to ask a stupid question. "I thought they might be inside our warp field. You can't transport someone at warp if you're not, right?"

Mica nodded. "It certainly isn't advisable, unless you have one miracle worker of a transporter chief and a whole lot of luck on your side." she turned to the group. "Alright, it sounds like our best plan is to get our field stabilized and increased, and work from there to use their own field against them within it so we can triangulate their location. Agreed?"

around the table she watched the group nod briskly.

Lt Rue stood up straight. "Rogers, Thor, I'd like you two to work with me on this. The CO wants the aliens locations asap and I'd like to prove that we can do our first task and well." She smiled. "The rest of you, back to business, although come to us if you have any ideas that might help out. And we will need all of you to pull it off, once we have the plan in place. Now, Dismissed."