One Step Closer, But More Time To Go...

Posted on 03 Aug 2021 @ 1:09am by Lieutenant JG Kemm & Lieutenant Commander Arjin Djinx & Lieutenant Zayna Ryler

1,940 words; about a 10 minute read

Mission: Extinction
Location: Science Lab
Timeline: Mission Day 17 at 0900

Zayna had been frustrated. It'd been too long, and engineering had been dealing with too many rusty repairs for her liking. Not as many as there could have been, which she was glad about, but still too many. She'd been trying to find the source or some way to stop this from happening. However, no luck.

But, her research seemed to finally be going somewhere. There was no way to be 100% sure, but she hoped she had a lead. Now, she just had to wait for those she'd contacted to get back to her.

Voss walked over. "Lieutenant." handing over a padd. "When we finish with one repair, another one crops up. I have some of my people trying to analyze this....rust...but so far, nothing to report."

Taking the PADD, Zayna shook her head slightly, "I wish we didn't have to deal with this. But once the others get here, I might have an explanation. Well...part of one."

Kemm arrived in the science lab just a few moments later, carrying a padd of his own. "I've prepared a complete list of locations that have been affected by this anomaly," he stated, approaching the other lieutenants. "There are twelve in all, and all within the secondary hull."

"Matches the rest of the counts, and locations." Ryler looked to the other two. "Looks like we're just waiting on Djinx."

Voss looked at Kemm. "If you found 12, there's probably twice that many we haven't found." He looked at the data. "If we can't solve this quickly....the ship will rust completely, forcing us to abandon ship."

Arjin had woken up with a headache, but had not taken the time to pass by Medical. It felt like his head was going to explode when he entered the lab. “Good morning Lieutenants. An update please.”, he asked before sitting down.

Zayna raised an eyebrow at Voss right before Djinx came in. "Morning, Commander. You look...exhausted. But Voss? It isn't that bad. Most of the parts have been able to be replaced is my understanding."

She switched on a holographic monitor, and lowered the brightness down except the areas impacted by the rust. "Kemm is right though. All of the areas are within the secondary hull. Our ongoing scans tell us when one crops up. Now..." She moved the images around a little.

"I've been trying to find a center for this thing, and I think I'm getting close. The problem is, there isn't a full circle for me to get an exact center. I've got a general idea, but, its hard to pinpoint. Tweaking internal sensors hasn't helped either. There isn't even a regular time between each occurrence."

"What about a set of conditions?" Kemm asked. "We know what the end result is, but is there a way to create some sort of early warning system?"

"The hull of this ship," Voss brought up, "was designed to be rust proof. Rust requires moisture and a metallic surface to happen....the hull is a composite material so that rust can't occur."

“As we have seen in the science lab, when the incident commences, the decay is almost instantaneous. Did we look into the conditions and are there similarities?”, he asked to Kemm. Then turning towards the Engineer, he added:”Explain your thoughts Lieutenant. How does this help us?”

"Let's start with the basics. The body of this ship consists of an inner hull and an outer hull or skin." Voss started to explain. "The outer skin is composed of a mixture of 13 components, from duranium, electroceramic to victurium. What we have to do is determine what part of that mixture is attracting this rust."

“I’m sorry for interrupting,” Kemm said cautiously. “But I think everyone is forgetting that rust is only one of the side affects. Twelve different occurrences have been detected, but only eight are rust related. We’ve also encountered a decomposed gel pack, dried up plasma, and two rubber seals that became brittle. In each case, the affected items have been aged decades during their brief exposure to… whatever that is happening. And all instances have been located in internal compartments, which due to the relative humidity in the air, are expected to begin rusting after their first decade of service. Our focus needs to be on how this hyper aging is remotely possible, not focusing on one particular aspect.”

"No, Kemm, you're just fine. You have all the correct points." Zayna found a seat so she could see them all. "We all know what the ship is composed of. All of this has to do with the science end of things. Is the entire ship in danger? Perhaps, but not enough to raise alarms right now."

The alert went off for another location being found within the search parameters that had been set.

"Oh boy," Ryler stated as she switched the holographic image to where had been impacted. However, she raised an eyebrow and split the image to another section. "Commander...if I'm not mistaken...is that a quantum filament?"

Arjin focused on the image, trying to ignore his worsening headache. The filament was extremely small, but the analysis undisputed. It was a quantum filament. “I believe it is Lieutenant. Well spotted.”

Zayna nodded, "That's what I thought. This might explain a few things. Actually...a lot of things..." She adjusted the scanners to scan for quantum filaments and waited. "One of these? Not a bad thing honestly. Many? Technically not so bad either. But if the many meet up? We get what we've been getting: random things jumping through time faster than they should, such as rusting."

Voss looked at the data. "I'd like to suggest we get a sample of the "rust" and examine it. What if it's a life form of some kind?"

Rubbing her forehead, Zayna sighed softly. "Lieutenant, I appreciate you wanting to help. However, that has already been done. It is literally just rust. These quantum filaments could be the explanation to all of this. We get rid of them, we should stop seeing rust, and we'd just have to track down any remaining things the sensors haven't picked up." She walked closer to the holographic image to look at it better. "However, the when and how we picked them up...that's a mystery."

"I'll help my people with these additionals areas of the rust." Voss turned and headed to the turbolift.

Sitting back down, Zayna turned off the holographic image, but kept the lights lowered for the Commander's sake. "Tracking down quantum filaments across the ship, not the adventure I planned on having." She looked to Kemm. "Hopefully we get them all before more rust starts showing up."

"Or rotten gel packs," Kemm remarked. "I must admit, I've never tracked a filament before. I'm not sure when we would have picked them up, but the point is, they're here. Is there any way to detect where they are anchored? That might help in getting free from them."

"I can work on that. Now that I know what it is we're dealing with, I can set the sensors to find them, and then find the connection. It won't take long but, still tedious. Hopefully by the end of the day if I'm not distracted." Zayna picked up a PADD. "Once that's done, the anchor should light up brighter than any other filaments."

"We've been encountering at least one anomaly per day," Kemm stated. "Let's just hope that when these filaments reappear, they don't try to take down a member of the crew."

Once he was in engineering, he ordered the damage control teams to start checking the ship's gel packs, and to replace any that show any abnormalities.

“I will make sure you are not distracted.”, Arjin replied. “If you give me 15, I’ll help you with the sensors.”

"Bring along some coffee, and I'll hold you to that, Commander." Ryler gave a smirk and looked to Kemm. "Hopefully we can finally finish this whole rust thing you found a few weeks ago." She started in on working on the sensor tweaks, all while also formulating in her head how they'd clear this all up once the sensors could detect the filaments.


===[Several Hours Later...]===

Finishing the last bit of her 3rd cup of coffee, Zayna put the last bit of code into the sensors and kicked on the scans for the filaments. Her eyes moved over to Djinx. "Really hoping that they're in few enough spots that we don't have to worry about running all over the ship."

She slid a PADD over to him, "Hopefully this containment field works too, else we're going to have a hell of a time containing them."

"What was that?" a voice behind Ryler asked. Lieutenant Kemm had arrived in the lab just moments before, but he could tell no one had entered. He was about to make himself known when the Assistant Science Chief made her remark to the Commander.

Looking over her shoulder, Zayna smiled, "Containment field that should hold these things, assuming we can gather them into one area." She slid a PADD over to him as well, "Setup so that the filaments should be attracted to it. Sensors would tell us if there are any stragglers."

"Fascinating," the lanky Kelpien engineer replied. "In other words, a magnet to find the needle within a haystack."

“Trouble with magnets is that you are never sure you find all the needles. And if the magnet is strong enough to do so, it usually interferes with other equipments. Let’s hope it is not the case with what we have set up.”, Arjin added.

"If we are able to detect anything," Kemm suggested, "then it is at least a step in the right direction. I hate to think what more could happen if this filaments continue to run amok. It is only a matter of time before one of these manifests in a member of the crew."

Zay looked at Kemm, "That is what I'm hoping to avoid. We might have to set up a few of these, but at least they aren't a major drain on ship power. Well, not based on the initial tests. But, we better work on it sooner rather than later."

"How long do you think it would take one of these to draw a filament?" Kemm asked, looking over the data. "And, we should probably start small, and far away from populated and sensitive areas of the ship."

"Hopefully not too long. And it should only attract the filaments, at least, based on the simulation. If it attracts anything else, well, hopefully it doesn't cause ship issued."

"When do you think we could activate these?" Kemm asked. He was personally hoping for sooner, rather than later.

Zayna nodded to the PADD she'd given Kemm. "You double-check the setup I put on there, since I'm no engineer, and then we can set them up."

Kemm accepted the padd gratefully and began to study the information there. He doubled checked each of the equations, and found that the math was more than adequate. Then he reviewed the other settings and didn't find anything that needed to be updated there. "Looks like we're good to go," he confirmed.

“Let’s get this show on the road then.”, the Lieutenant Commander said.

Nodding again, Zay looked over the information one last time. "Well then, guess we have nothing else to lose. Lieutenant Kemm, join me in setting this up?"

"With pleasure, Lieutenant." Kemm gave both science officers a nod before following Lieutenant Ryler to a nearby station.

~To Be Continued~

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