Science Leads

Posted on Sun Jun 21st, 2020 @ 3:58am by Lieutenant Kalin Brennan-Griffin PhD & Captain Nycolas Temple & Lieutenant Katniss Wakefield & Lieutenant Van Kolbeck & Lieutenant Machwen Adaestron
Edited on on Wed Jun 24th, 2020 @ 7:20am

Mission: New Moon Rising
Location: Science Deck
Timeline: During our travel to the Talarian border

The science deck of the USS Pandora was a clean, brightly lit corridor with white and glass walls, shiny black floor, and three large laboratories on either side. In older ships there may have been several seperate single-purpose labs, often no bigger than a junior officer's quarters each, but as ship function and technology progressed, larger, multipurpose spaces were designed. For the Pandora in particular, this meant including all of the top of the line equipment and a Science department that consisted of the whole deck.

In view of the Pandora's scientific focus and investigative purpose, the heads of Science and Medical, along with their Research Officer, were coming together to discuss the ship's upcoming service in the Inconnu Expanse. This was their time to discuss theories, define parameters, and coordinate their efforts.

Never willing to miss a good discussion, captain Nyx arrived unannounced to Lieutenant Brennan's meeting room, an expectant smile on his face.

"Greetings," He said, "Mind if I sit in on this meeting?"

"Oh, of course Captain, you're always welcome to sit in," Shae replied, peaking over her thin-rimmed reading glasses to look at Nyx. She was currently sitting at the head of the table going over what little information Starfleet possessed on the unique stellar phenomenon that surrounded the Inconnu Expanse. She set down her PaDD, then removed her glasses with a curious tilt of her head. "So, were you a scientist before going into Command, or are you simply here to get a better understanding for the dangers we may face?" she asked.

Nyx found a place at the table and relaxed into his chair. It would feel nice not to lead a meeting for a change, he realised. "Goodness no, I don't have the patience to be a scientist. Or the focus. But I like knowing how things work and as you say, I'd especially like to know the dangers we're facing."

Katniss slowly walked into the meeting, she was wearing her long white lab coat and her black rimmed glasses which were halfway down her nose. She held a mug of coffee in one hand and a padd in the other. As the doors closed behind her, she looked up. "Ma'am, Sir." she said looking at Shae and the Captain "What a lovely day." she said as she approached the two of them.

Temple was pleased to see the Chief Research officer in such a fine mood, and smiled warmly at her her, "Welcome, Lieutenant. How are you settling in? Have you been playing with all your fun new equipment?"

"I've settled in quite nicley, thank you." she replied before taking a sip of coffee "I can't wait to try some of the new equipment out."

Lt. Kolbeck walked to Deck 07 Science Labs via the ship's computer. Van had created Jane a female persona as the Pandoras personal interface to him.

Arriving outside of the Science Lab doors, Van tugged at his uniform ensuring he was suited well. He took a drink from his silver mug of hot morning coffee. “Takk Jane.”

“Du er velkommen til Van.” Jane replied.

Entering the Science Labs Van spotted the crew that was presently seated around the conference table. He saluted the Captain in attendance. Van then gestured the crew that was present using his coffee mug “Captain, løytnanter’s.” Setting down his PADD of Medical data he took a seat. He always enjoyed group work sessions as it was an invaluable means of sharing data and collaborating.

Nyx smiled at the Doctor's arrival, but couldn't help but scold the man, "Du må kanskje snakke engelsk til den andre, Doctor."

Ensign Machwen Adaestron walked in quickly, "Sorry for my lateness," he apologised, sitting next to Lt. Kolbeck.

The Captain leaned back in his chair, determined not to become too involved in the discussion today. "Don't mind me, everybody. I just wanted to observe and stay up to date with everything the Science and Medical departments are talking about."

"I don't mind, it saves us all the trouble of you chasing us down to ask us to clarify something you may not otherwise understand in our reports," Shae said, then immediately blushed. "That's not to say that you,- I mean... l-let's get started," she stammered, then using the controls on the table, pulled up an image of the Inconnu Expanse on the room's main monitor.

"The Inconnu Expanse," Shae started, then zoomed the image in to get a close up of the storm-like phenomenon churning dust and stellar gases about in an swirling, undulating mass, "and the 'gravity storms', or at least that is what Starfleet Command has incorrectly labeled this phenomenon. We don't have much information on what this is, only that ships entering this area are often pulled off course by tides similar to those experienced with the plasma storms in the Badlands. There are reports of gravitational effect, which is why these have erroneously been labeled as gravity storms, but such a thing is not actually possible. I would surmise that the gravitational effects I have researched are consistent with graviton fields independent of the storm-like effect we see. If this is the case, progress through the storms will be slow as the only reliable method of detecting these graviton fields is with tachyon bursts, a method which is slow and has limited range. I'm working with Ops to try to boost the efficacy of tachyon dispersion to give faster results. Thankfully, the Pandora isn't any bigger than it is otherwise we would need to have a shuttle flying before us as a guide to help us make the necessary course corrections."

"Fascinating," Nyx found himself saying, "We can try to venture into the storms, as they are called, with the tachyon bursts, but only if safe to do so. What effect do you think a probe would have in penetrating into the gravitational fields?"

"As long as we proceed slowly and with caution, the risk is minimal," Shae assured him. "As for probes, while they may extend our range somewhat, I would hesitate to use them; they have limited maneuverability, so if they get caught up in one of the tides and swept into a graviton feild, they'll most likely be destroyed, and that would be a wasted resource. If we could tether a probe to the Pandora somehow, that might prove to be an interesting means of extending our sensor range, but the risk of the probe getting destroyed is still present."

Waiting for a pause, Van seated his self upward pressing his medical PADD of data onto the same viewing screen.

The data showed three large interstellar masses. Van cleared his throat adding, “nearby the expanse there are two Class IV and one Class III Interstellar giants, capable of producing gamma wave radiation bursts. For the most part, gamma radiation is common.” He mused. “What be an upmost concern to me, Ja. However, is these three gas giants can pull gamma radiation into the graviton fields as Shae stated and can saturate them.” He circled the three classes of Gas Giants outside of the corridor.

“The Pandora gets pulled off course by any graviton field for too long, the high-frequency radiation or fast moving particles plow into living cells.” He then raised the shields on the Pandora showing a computed simulation, “without enough shield energy, the gamma particles knock electrons free from molecules that make up the cell. In the presence of these ions disrupts the normal functioning of the cell.”

“We cannot get caught up in one of these graviton waves for too long before the crew begins experiencing severe radiation burns, and long-term deformities.” He clasped his hands together hoping that some of the medical messages had communicated effectively.

"I cannot send this crew back to Earth with deformities." Nyx answered with a casual shrug. "At least not on our maiden journey. Maybe on the second tour if people start to annoy me, but let's try to avoid that scenario for now."

He continued with a little more concern, "We will need to rely on the USS Merrimack's data for avoiding these spacial death traps, as well as any friendly information we can gain from local inhabitants."

Katniss was making notes on a padd, she didn't have alot to contribute at the moment, but this is why she was aboard, research. She had several ideas but she wasnt ready to voice them, she wanted to head back to her lab and start working on the problems right away, she sat, thinking how much long this meeting was going to go on for. She was never that good at this side of the job.

"The Merrimack's data is limited and there's no guarantee that it will prove to be useful to us as we try to find our way through," Shae cautioned. "However, this data does give us a place to start, and it's how I formulated my theory on the graviton fields, but we won't know anything for certain until we get in there. I'm still curious to see just what is causing the storm-like anomoly; that could prove to be even more dangerous than the graviton fields."

Nyx nodded along, "The investigative direction of the Pandora is at your lead, Lieutenant. Given what this meeting has discussed, what we know, and may face in the Expanse, what would you like to investigate first?"

"I want to know what is causing this storm phenomenon," Shae stated. "Even if my theory on the graviton fields doesn't pan out, there's only a few other options that could be causing the gravitational effects, and thankfully the means of dealing with them are not too dissimilar from dealing with gravitons, so even though it's still a mystery, we know how to handle it. But this storm is a complete mystery in every aspect and that makes it all the more dangerous. I could easily spend months, even years, studying this phenomenon from the safety of the corridor, but since that is not possible, if I can get a day, even more if we can spare it, to collect some data and analyze it before we enter then that would be ideal."

"I'm sure we can swing that," Nyx replied. He turned to Lieutenant Wakefield, "Can you assist Brennan on this task?"

"Of course, I'll help where I can." she said with a smile

The Captain then turned to the Medical crew, "Let's make sure we have proper response proceedures in place for dealing with these storms and any possible radiation exposure."

"I can prepare some hyposprays for any side effects, and have supplies ready for any damage that's more serious, if that's okay with Lieutenant Kolbeck," Adaestron said, looking to his superior

Kolbeck nodded at his colleague. "Prudent, yes."

Giving a nod, Nycolas stood with a sigh, his PADD flashing with reminders for meetings and other duties. "I'll leave you all to it. This was a very insightful meeting, I hope we can continue to collaborate and discuss like this throughout our mission."

He paused, a smile growing on his face, "As I think I told you once, Lt Brennan, my late grandfather's favorite saying was 'Science leads when words and weapons fail us.' And I want to carry that motto with us at all times."

"No, Captain, it is your place to lead, I am content to simply show you the way," Shae replied humbly.

OFF