[sb118-butler] Lieutenant. J.G. Alex Forsyth - Contingency Planning

[Robert Forsyth]

(( Operations Centre, Deck 6, USS Octavia E. Butler. ))

Forsyth: You don't think the Continuance is behind our slow system, sir?

Lahl: I'm going to be honest, I think our friend has put too many fish in our river.

That was a better metaphor to use than food, and Alex could focus on her work without having to think about food, although her stomach was still grumbling.

oO Just waited a few hours…. Oo

Arlill: That seems likely. We need to find a workaround.

O'Reilly: Um, sirs?

Alex looked over to Lieutenant O’Reilly, who seemed a bit annoyed that the First officer was not listening to him. She felt bad for him and wanted to give him a chance to get an idea out.

Lahl: Alright, so…if there's a blockage in a river, what can we do if we can't get fish out of the river?

Arlill: Create a new path for the water to flow?

Forsyth: Um, sir…

O'Reilly: ::sighing deeply:: That’s what I was trying to get at sirs. I think… ::cut off again::

The chief engineer snapped her fingers, which cut off O’Reilly again.

Lahl: Precisely! We make another stream.

Arlill: Excellent thinking. How do we implement that?

O'Reilly: ::under his breath:: I honestly give up. ::turning back to his console to assist with finding another stream

Forsyth: I wanted to help, sorry.

Again, she felt bad for him. He really wanted to help, but felt like he was being sidelined. Alex had similar situations during her school days, where her friends would talk over or just straight up ignore her. It was also something Lindsay did as well, thinking back to their relationships.

oO Maybe I should invite him to JOPA after this… Oo

Lahl: Ok, that is a good question, how do we create a new stream…we don't have another computer core hiding somewhere do we?

Arlill: Not that I'm aware of. What about using auxiliary systems?

O'Reilly: ::sighing again and then speaking a bit louder:: SIRs! ::beat:: My apologies. Sirs ::lower this time:: we could use the vehicles not currently in use, right? They have much smaller cores, but we should have enough of them for it to work.

Finally, the Lieutenant got to voice his idea, and knew what he was implying. He was suggesting they use the shuttle's computer to run their plan on, as it was separate from the Ship's main data core, which was something they had done before.  

Arlill: Yes! That could work. We could even set it up from here. ::he began looking around the large room::

The First Officer went over to an ops ensign, which raised an eyebrow from Alex as she wondered if he was getting more people to help them. She would not mind the extra help, as it would speed up things.

Arlill: ::softly:: Ensign, I need to you to do something, but don’t say a word, and don’t make it obviously what you’re doing. ::beat:: I need you to go to SB-One and bring the auxillary propulsion systems on in every ::beat:: vehicle, we have. Keep the power levels low enough to only power the computer cores. ::beat:: report back when you’re done.

The ensign nodded and exited quickly, followed by the Commander coming back to the centre.  

Forsyth: Do you think they managed, sir?

Lahl: Response

Arlill: Well, the ensign shouldn’t get caught, but we should have a backup plan.

Alex nodded in agreement, as it was always good to have a backup plan for these kinds of things. She should maybe have some in case the captain goes rogue, or Lhandon talks about Rugby.

Forsyth:  Right, what should that backup plan be?

She was not sure herself, but she assumed it would need to be something if they got caught. So Alex would have to think about ways to cover up their attempts if that did happen, but that might take a while.

Lahl: Response

Arlill: I don’t know, I just don’t ::shaking his head::

O’Reilly: Then we should make the best of this plan. Anticipate the ensign’s success and prepare what we can from here.

Alex nodded and sighed, resting her head in her hand.

Forsyth: Hopefully it’s soon, we're going at snail's pace here….

Lahl: Response

Arlill: Agreed. ::to Lahl:: keep the lines running, it should speed up once the other resources are online.

She drummed her fingers as she glanced back at the slow progress the computer was making, not sure what to do while they waited for the Ensign to do their part.

Forsyth:  Guess, while we wait, we should come up with a backup plan.

Lahl: Response

Arlill / Lahl / O’Reilly: Response

Forsyth: If my fake virus sweep does not pan out as planned, then we should try another route to avoid detection.

But their options would be limited, and no doubt the Probe would be watching after the first attempt. Alex did not feel so confident about her idea, but she needed to stop thinking that everything would fail and be more of a half-glass-full kind of officer.  

Arlill / Lahl / O’Reilly: Response

Nilsen: =/\= All hands, this Lieutenant Commander Lhandon Nilsen; the Kevara Continuance is cooperating with us. Report any latency in our systems. =/\=

The voice of Commander Nilsen came over the ship's comms, giving some good news. Alex wondered if that meant the Continuance was going to give back control of their ship, which means they might not need to find ways to bypass it.

Forsyth: Well, I guess that's a start, huh.

Arlill / Lahl / O’Reilly: Response

TAG/TBC

_________________________________________________

Lieutenant. J.G. Alex Forsyth

Tactical

USS Octavia E. Butler

D239910AF1