Looking For Hidden Things

Posted on 21 May 2015 @ 3:58am by Commodore Harvey Geisler
Edited on on 06 Nov 2016 @ 5:24pm

1,149 words; about a 6 minute read

Mission: Repairs
Location: Engineering.

Dicon had been going through the dilapidated remains of his office, and had been looking for his hidden storage devices but had yet to find anything. However he had found something very very interesting

=/\=" Dicon to Geisler, found something really interesting in Engineering; you might want to see this." =/\=

Harvey had just left the Jeffries Tube on the Engineering deck when he heard Dicon's squawk over the radio, which was instantly followed by chatter from a security detail. He brought the radio up to his mouth and waited a break in the conversation before replying "On my way."

A few moments later, Harvey crossed the threshold into Engineering, nodding at the armed guard posted at the door. Until the computer was up and running, there would be no other way to defend the ship's critical areas. In fact, Harvey was considering leaving them in place until the ship was out of Golden Stars' space. He walked over to Dicon's office and nodded at the man already inside. "What is it, Lieutenant?"

Dicon pointed to the wall across from them. "See that section of paneling there sir? The one that is completely plain in every way?" He was holding a fairly thick coil of cabling.

"I do." Harvey frowned, anticipating the worst.

Dicon tugged the bundle hard. The patch of wall flickered, revealing a console bolted to the wall, its metal greened with rust. The consoles display showed characters that had a oddly angular look to them. "Tada" Said Dicon flatly.

"What..." Harvey asked, staring blankly at what just appeared, "...is that?"

"That, Captain; is a Dominion computer decryption and analysis portable terminal. Responsible for more lost Starfleet equipment and shuttles in the war then any attack group. You need not worry, though these things were normally booby trapped this model is one of the early ones. Seems like a gift given. I've gone over it three times. Chemical, mechanical and biological; its safe."

"I've seen them before," Harvey said, thinking of his incarceration by the Dominion so long ago. "What's it doing here?" he asked, knowing that Dominion technology itself was hard to come by, especially out this far in the Gamma Quadrant. "What's it doing here in your office of all places?"

"Ahha, that Captain is the Latinum plated question. This isn't the main console though. I was wondering how they managed to roll our systems so quickly. This little beauty. It rolled over our main computer in fifty seconds. Fifty seconds! Even the fastest decryption software that Starfleet has access takes over half an hour to roll over our systems."

"I know my former Yeoman had a lot to do with it," Harvey added. "She'd worked our systems for months, writing the code that almost led to our downfall." Taking a closer look at the console, Harvey said, "I bet the Syndicate installed this as a measure to keep Carter from taking direct control of this ship. Maybe they didn't trust her as much as we did."

"Of course Captain this is a boon to us, them not trusting her. Can you take a guess as to what this particular console is connected to?" Dicon grinned; a duplicitous glassy grin.

"Make coffee?" Harvey said, his tone completely deadpan. He was a medical researcher, not an engineer.

"Close Sir, close." Dicon input a few commands, and with a low ' Boooop the low hum of all the consoles in Engineering whirred into life. "Tadaa!"

Harvey looked out the window to see what the device had done. He nodded his head, thinking about the implications. "That's some good coffee," Harvey muttered. "So, we're looking at an attempt to clone the computer here? How much did they get?"

"About twenty percent, give or take. What is strange is their choice in what to remove first. No weapons tech, shielding or advanced replications. Mostly hydroponics work and medical procedures. What also surprises me is that I can scan for the others across ship. But some of the readings are very strange." Dicon frowned, the first time the Captain had seen him do so.

Harvey looked back over to his Chief Engineer. The data removed was indeed interesting, giving him more insight into both the Golden Stars and the Syndicate. He'd have to put together a think tank soon to try and figure out what this meant. "Strange in what way?" he asked Dicon. "Are we talking about obscure locations or something else entirely?"

Dicon looked miffed as he explained " Obscure Captain, some of them in places where I would be surprised even an Engineer would normally be. For example, five are inside Jeffery's tubes maintenance panels. You know the ones Sir? The ones in the ceiling? Also a few in crawl ways under the bridge, and one in a place I've never seen before." Dicon threw up a diagram of the Black Hawk and pointed. "Here thirty meters below the bridge. "

"That's pretty deep in the ship," Harvey said, studying the schematic. "Deck Ten... Just above the flight deck..." He looked at the schematic for a moment more. "That's the Observation Tower for the Flight Deck," he said tapping the screen. "We know they wanted to take the ship for keeps." He looked at Dicon. "Looks like this proves that."

"I had what teams I could find going over them with damage control. Six devices out of the twenty six I found are ours. We now have control of the warp core, eps conduits, partial internal environment control and bulk head shields in a few sections. Also; I can't be sure, but we appear to have an unconfirmed life form somewhere on board." Dicon shifted through deck layouts at vision blurring speeds. He found what he was looking for. "Here, Deck eight. Internal sensors are really poor in that direction, and as far as I understand it, the only way into that deck is Jeffries tube 421, and I am going up there once I have finished flipping as many of these consoles as I can."

"Don't go alone," Harvey warned. "Get security involved on this. I can't afford to have my Chief Engineer out of commission while we're trying to get this ship back sailing."

Dicon nodded, attaching his disrutor pistol holster to his belt. "Understood Sir. Once damage control teams have reported back I will take Doctor Kij and I will dig up any security officers found on the way there. Sir what should I do with said life form if I find it?"

"If you find anyone," Harvey said, "let Security handle it. That's what Lieutenant Reza is here for."

"Aye aye Sir, be seeing you an a few hours. I'm off for duct crawling. Oh what a joy". Dicon rose and deactivated the projector. " I just hope the life form is not armed. I have had enough of fire fights for today."

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