Mapping out the Athegan Rift
Posted on 04/19/2020 @ 1:09pm by Lieutenant JG Jasmine Langtree & Captain Cian D'Anvers & Lieutenant JG Salynn Oram
Mission:
S1E2: The Plomeek Soup Conundrum
Location: Stellar Cartography/USS Crazy Horse
Timeline: Day 1 at 0730
[ON]
[Turbolift]
This was a section of the ship that Salynn rarely had occasion to visit, either on the Crazy Horse or any of the other vessels she had served on before. Deep within the purview of the Science department, Stellar Cartography was definitely a lab that could interest her, if only because of how it impacted her navigation duties. Commander Ysayne had asked her to liaise with Lieutenant Langtree to ensure that whatever their impromptu mission had in store for them, the Athegan Rift would not be one of the factors that precluded their success. Sal was eager to get to know her counterpart in Science, and working with Jasmine would be the perfect opportunity. She tapped her toes impatiently as she willed the turbolift to hurry up.
[Stellar Cartography]
Jasmine had received instructions that the USS Crazy Horse was going into the Athegan Rift a very dangerous place between Ferengi and Tzenkethi space that had a bevy of navigational hazards such of strange gravimetric storms and plasma storms. The UFP and Starfleet in particular was very interested in mapping the region. Multiple probes had been sent into the region but very little data had been received. though the rift spanned some 15 light years width in some area and up to 25 light years wide in others no one knew precisely how long it was. It acted as a natural border between Tzenkethi and Ferengi space. Both sides tended to avoid the area as they had taken heavy losses trying to navigate it.
A Trill stuck her head tentatively through the door, and looked around the relatively small space. She saw a brunette officer that she recognized from the bridge during their quick departure from starbase, replete in teal uniform denoting her status in the Sciences, and entered the room proper. With a smile she rose a hand in greeting. "Lieutenant Langtree, right? Sal Oram. The captain suggested that we might be able to put our heads together on the rift?"
"That's right. Nice to meet you, Sal. So you're our new driver huh? Thanks for coming down . The captain thought we should get together and discuss this region of space. Its quite unexplored. Both the Ferengi and the Tzenkethi have tried unsuccessfully to map it. There are lots of gravimetric storms and other strange phenomenon.Its a scientists playground and a helmsman's nightmare. I've had word that there is a planet about four light months into the rift from our side. There has been no further penetration form any Federation star ships." Jasmine said.
Salynn looked at the large curved display that dominated the back wall of Stellar Cartography and took a second to place the star chart she was looking at. She quickly was able to determine the bordering regions of space belonging to the Ferengi and the Tzenkethi, with the Federation making up the third side of the rough triangle of dead space. And a data-sparse region of space it was. What little Salynn had read on the Athegan Rift was info gleaned from the Ferengi who claimed the threshold between it and their space was completely impenetrable. It was assumed the Tzenkethi border was as well. If the Federation side of the Rift proved to be the same, then no amount of lifetimes would help Sal get the Crazy Horse near it. She hoped Jasmine had better insight into what they were up against. "I'd rather not beach the Crazy Horse on any gravimetric shoals on her first deep space mission. Are we in range for more in-depth scans yet?" asked the helmsman.
"Negative. Most scans are being reflected back at us. There seems to be a boundary layer on our side of the pass as well but it is quite thin compared to the border of the north and south side (Galactic relative). Make no mistake it is a rift of sorts and our orders are to explore as much of it as we can. The effect is similar to the phenomenon that was encountered in the Delphic expanse, however that was ultimately proven to be artificially created. The problem with our probes is that once inside there telemetry is being reflected back inside. We wont be able to get good telemetry until we actually go in there and start exploring." Lt. Langtree explained.
Sal chuckled, hiding an undercurrent of apprehension. "Well, there's nothing for it then than to just poke our noses in it. I'll run through some simulations to see how the ship will react to what little we do know, and hope for the best when it comes to the rest. Do we need to talk to Engineering to get any sensor modifications done?"
"That's not the half of it, the probes we have sent in never made it out of the rift, so we may encounter malfunctions in the ships systems. Malfunctions or even down right failures. But I am confident that if we go slowly we will be able to adjust, if not we will perish." Jasmine said.
We wont know until we enter the barrier and take a look." Jasmine added.
It was then that stellar cartography failed, or at least the holographic processors.
=/\=Stellar cartography to engineering, looks like we have a processor failure, Can you send someone down to take a look at it.=/\=
At that moment, Archer walked through the door with tool kit in hand. The feedback loop through his combadge made it sound like a ghost voice. =/\=Can you send someone down to--"=/\= Archer tapped his combadge to cut off the echo.
"Good timing, yeah?" he beamed. "These professors are being ornery lil' buggers and I figured they were due for another breakdown. Guess I was right." He slid an antigrav harness around his waist, cinched it tight to his shoulders, and pointed its mooring pylon at the ceiling near the emitters. "I've got a theory that the processors are wonky because the holomatrix that governs the emitters are crossfiring, which would do a feedback glitch kinda' like you might'a noticed with the comms a second ago."
With that said, he glided into the air as if drawn upward on an invisible string. In a way, from the perspective of quantum mechanics, maybe he was. He arrived at the nearest holoemitter and popped it loose with his hyperspanner. "If I'm right, then these holoemitters will need manual recalibration, which just might stop the whole system from crashing."
Pointing down from his place on the ceiling to the toolbox left on the floor, Archer added, "I brought a spare harness or two if anybody wants to calibrate any of the other holoemitters. We could troubleshoot a might faster..."
"Good I'll help out, Holo-emitters are pretty tricky but I've had a lot of experience with them. Tell me what is the cause of all these system errors? There has to be a reason why so many systems are failing all at once." Jasmine asked.
Archer let out a chuckle in between his grunts elicited by torquing the holomatrix governors. "A lot. There. Now this one should be ready. How's it looking over there?"
"Well its back online, but it still looks out of phase". Jasmine replied.
"That's because we haven't recalibrated it yet," Archer chided with a grin. "Set to diagnostic mode, manually calibrate, and then resume processing, but only on my mark." He tethered himself to the first processor and careened through the air toward another, and then another. In short order, he'd done three himself to Jasmine's one. "Alright, I think we're ready. Ima' count down from three, and after one we're going to recalibrate the processors before bringing them back online. Ready? 3, 2, 1..."
"Alright setting to diagnostic mode now..." Jasmines hands flew over the console.
"Okay setting for manual re-calibration."
Jasmine got down on her knees and removed the access panel, then used the micro calibration spanner to re-calibrate the sensor grid then the holographic projector. After she was done she replaced the panel. She went a lot slower than archer but manual re-calibration was much more delicate and precise work. It was a good thing she had small delicate hands.
The science officer got back to her feet.
"Resuming processing in 3, 2, 1, System back online. "Computer re-establish 3 dimensional image of the sector 21-Alpha, Authorization Langtree 6-2-5 Gamma".
The computer responded. "Processing. . ."
The image compiled and restored in under 20 seconds.
"This looks right Mr. Archer, I owe you!!" Jasmine said.
Archer heaved a sigh of relief. "Thank Fusion! I hope I won't have to do that again anytime soon." He came back down to the deck and began packing up his anti-grav harness and assorted tools. "If you have any other problems, just let us know." Once he was finished, he spared a look at the holographic imaging. "Whoa. That's one gnarly sector of space!"
"Yeah a real piece of work too. Not only do I have to map it, but I have to make sure we don't get lost in there too." Jasmine said.
"Well, I wish you the best of luck with that," Archer said with a nervous chuckle. "For all our sake."
"Good luck to all of us". Jasmine stated.
[OFF]
A Post By:
Commander Cian D'Anvers
Commanding Officer
USS Crazy Horse
Lieutenant JG Jasmine Langtree
Chief Science Officer
USS Crazy Horse
Lieutenant JG Salynn Oram
Chief Helmsman
USS Crazy Horse
Lieutenant JG Archer Lohan
Chief Engineer
USS Crazy Horse
