There Are Always Options, part 2
Posted on Wed Mar 9th, 2011 @ 4:16pm by Commodore Samantha York & Lieutenant JG Ronnie Wolfe & Lieutenant JG Jerreck O'Connor & Lieutenant JG Talri & Lieutenant JG Tramira Kyt
1,379 words; about a 7 minute read
Mission:
The Forests of Mythraeli
Location: Science Conference Room
Timeline: Current
ON
[OLD]
"What part of 'blocking every form of transmission' do you not seem to understand." Kyt muttered. "We'd have to actually fire something down, at the planet, connected by a very long, physical wire, to a satellite in geosyncronous orbit, And even that, we don't know if it will work, because we have no way of knowing whether electrical devices are still functioning on the planet. If they are not, it's a fancy satelite, with a very long earing."
[NEW]
Jerry shrugged lightly at Kyt's less-than-pleasant reaction. "Yeah, I see where you're coming from there, but maybe he's not wrong, because then we'd have definite knowledge, because we could take a... whaddya call it, a meter of some kind, one of the ones they have down in Engineering, and we could figure out where, exactly, the energy cutoff is. Because, is it the planet's atmosphere, is it something surface-bound, you know? And this is a Galaxy-class starship, man. Not some Oberth-class first-class research rustbucket. We have enough shuttles here that if we want, we could drop three more, with pilots, with one in the upper atmosphere and the others just within strong tractor range. Hey, if the probes don't work, why not use a shuttle?"
"Sure. Let's just throw more lives in danger." Kyt muttered. She walked over to the replicator. "Chocolate. And a bowl of chocolate ice cream. With a dish of chocolate fudge." She muttered to it. She decided this was going to be a long meeting.
"We all knew the risks when we joined Starfleet, unless you have something else in mind?" Mak asked.
"I like the idea of a probe, Sam interjected to forestall further arguing. "As to sending down another shuttle -- we don't know what's going on. The shuttle landed safely or we would have detected something. Or we would have detected them disappearing. Something happened after the away team landed. Before I send down another team, I want some sort of assurance that it'll be safe."
Kyt nodded to Samantha, glad that the lady in charge understood the point of her argument countering the suggestion to drop more shuttles, and thus, lives, into the trouble. She Grabbed a big spoonful of chocolate covered chocolate sitting on chocolate ice cream, and shoved it in her mouth, to keep it busy.
'To send another team now might be premature,' put in Talri. 'However, if we cannot find an alternate means of communication, it may be the only way to discover what has become of the first. As we have already established that we are not considering simply leaving them there, the option to send another team must not be disregarded entirely, regardless of our knowledge of risk.'
Mak spoke up. "I know what you are saying Miss Kyt, which is why I suggested having relays that would be lowered to the surface on a cable. The cable will house all it will need to function: power, data lines and so on from the Calypso. Another relay will be in the lower atmosphere and another cable between the first two relays."
Jerry sighed lightly and sat up a little straighter and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "I wasn't suggesting sending a team "down", to begin with. There's a big difference between a shuttle with two or three people coasting along at the thermopause with two more flanking it in the exosphere with tractor beams on standby. Dropping a relay from said shuttle gives us the ability to see where and when the cutoff occurs, if the cutoff does occur to a cabled connection."
Maybe he's not a complete, and total, dunce after all. Kyt thought to herself. She looked to Talri, and Ronnie, for their opinions.
"That's a lot of line," Ronnie said to Mak. "I think a probe is a godo first step. If that doesn't work, we can try somthing else. Maybe send out some sort of tractored scanner?"
Sam nodded, then responded to Jerry. "If we send down a ship, I'd like to either have a fighter or a Naga. They're better equipped for emergency landings than a shuttle. But it's something we should consider if the probes don't work."
"Aye," Mak said to both the Captain and Ronnie.
"All right," Ronnie said. "Let's get three probes set up and launched as soon as possible." She glanced at Sam, who nodded. "If those fail, we go to fighters. If fighters fail, we'll talk about tethers. Is there anything else?"
Talri decided that her approval of their course of action was such that it needed no further comment from her. The idea of cables struck her as impractical, given the distances involved, but that concern she would voice only if there was immediate need. She folded her arms, glancing at the others to see if they intended to contribute anything further.
Jerry shrugged lightly. "Shuttle, fighter. Whatever. I'd suggest a shuttle because they have better scanning ability, but hey. Your choice, I guess. As far as the probes go, do we go the bioneural route, or what?"
Kyt looked at Jerry. "I thought all of our probes had bioneural components." Kyt said, pondering the statement.
Jerry shook his head, fairly thoroughly. Despite his demotion, he still had the knowledge that had been given to him as Chief Science Officer, and he still had the genius that had netted him the job. "No, not all, though whether that's a good thing or not is up to interpretation. This is a Galaxy-class starship, a lot of our loadout still uses the more stable components. Lucky us, right? Plus, speaking in terms of the majority, the gelpacks aren't being utilized for their capacity to learn and adapt, but for their processing speed. I don't think it'd take very long, seeing as the same way they process is what we need - to allow it to create neural connections such that it finds a frequency that works. So... grab someone with the right know-how and the proper toolkit, and it should work. Most likely. Probably."
Kyt nodded. "Sounds like a plan." Kyt said. Not for the first time, she pondered if the only reason she was in this meeting was to uppercut Jerry if he said anything stupid again.
"Why not use both? One of each? Or two bioneural and one older? that way we cover all our bases?" Ronnie suggested. "Jerry, can you work with Mak on the probes? Kyt and Talri, can you work on the ship's communications? See if you can get anything from the planet? I'll see if there's any way to use a tether with a shuttle." She looked at the Captain. "Do you want to talk to the wing commander or shall I?"
"You do it. Maybe he has an idea about tethering," Sam said.
Ronnie nodded. "Okay then, if there's nothing else, we're done for now."
Mak approached the chief science officer. "Shall we?" The engineer asked.
Jerry nodded at Mak with a smile, standing up. He hadn't been reaching out with his powers during the meeting, as he found it entirely rude to do so. While he could have probably connected with the Captain's mind to try and explain to her more completely what he was thinking, but chose not to. Instead, he merely tried to gauge Mak's general mood, to see if there was anything he needed to watch out for there. "Uh, yeah, sure."
Talri glanced over at Kyt. Given the circumstances, she would have preferred to work alone, but she didn't suppose that was an option just now. 'Ensign Tramira? Let us go to discuss this,' she decided.
Kyt quirked an eyebrow, in an almost Vulcan fashion, pondering why the Vulcan woman wanted, of all people, her input, but she shrugged. "Didn't have anything better planned anyways."
"Good luck," Sam told them all. She hoped one of the ideas would work and they could find their missing people.
OFF
Captain Samantha York
Commanding Officer
USS Calypso
Lieutenant JG Ronnie Lancaster (PNPC)
Chief Science Officer
USS Calypso
Lieutenant JG Jerreck O'Connor
Assistant Chief Science Officer
USS Calypso
Lieutenant JG Talri
Stellar Cartographer
Ensign Tramira Kyt
Chief Security/Tactical Officer
USS Calypso
Ensign Mak Free (PNPC)
Engineer
USS Calypso
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