1stLt Samuel Woolheater – Buffering
Radamio
1stLt Samuel Woolheater – Buffering
(( Holodeck 4, Deck 7, USS Octavia E. Butler ))
Working
the transporter buffers was a hell of a lot harder than the transporter folks
made it look.
Until a few minutes ago, Sam’s entire understanding of the job had been step on
a pad, sound confident, and poof, you are somewhere else. He would have been
happy to keep believing that myth.
Now he stood at a simulated console inside a holodeck OPS room, watching
pattern integrity and buffer harmonics in amber, knowing a thousand things
could go wrong and every single one of them would matter.
He was not operating the transporter itself. He was guarding the margins.
Calling windows. Keeping the signal alive long enough for the people who did
this for a living to pull the trigger.
Battlefield is battlefield. Hold the line. Do your job.
Sam wiped sweat from his brow and stayed with the readouts while the room around him ran hot with tension. While all around him, everyone was basically trying to do the same. Navigate a new situation as best as they could with the tools they had and keep everybody coming home. Even, as it would seem, Mama Cee, the Continuance.
Continuance: =/\= Directive: Captain Rouiancet, maintain core installation. Do not attempt removal. Core presence restores limited command channel required for delay attempt. Execute immediate evacuation toward hull-adjacent compartments. I am initiating transfer to Sphere infrastructure to attempt redistribution of stellar energy flow and cascade dampening. Probability of full abort remains low. Delay remains possible. =/\=
Arlill: =/\= Commander Arlill, Kevara Continuance is preparing to transfer over, we’re prepared to go to warp upon the safe return of all crew members. =/\=
Samuel watched as the waveforms and pattern locks focused and moved toward alignment. As people moved towards or away from the sources of interference, their patterns would lock and glow green.
Rouiancet: =/\= Response =/\=
Woolheater: Stability. Forty-seconds!
Forty seconds was enough time for a miracle.
Continuance: Final instruction: Initiate warp no later than T-minus 12.6 seconds regardless of remaining away team status. Refusal to depart within threshold will result in projected 87% probability of total vessel loss. Clarification: I will signal optimal departure moment. Transfer sequence commencing.
It was still all math to the Continuance, so it seemed to Sam. From where he stood, this was a game of poker. Three patterns began to resolve.
Nilsen: Noted.
Arlill: Just get the back! Whether Continuance is successful or not, we’re out of time.
Continuance: Notification: Transfer complete. All Starfleet system access terminated. Departure timer synchronization transmitted. Awaiting evacuation confirmation…
And then it was gone. As quickly as the Continuance had arrived, it had now left.
Continuance/Rouiancet: =/\= Response =/\=
Arlill: =/\= I’m sorry sir, we’re not leaving yet, there’s still time. =/\=
Nilsen: Tox.
Samuel looked up from his console for a second to see what the XO was talking about. There wasn’t anything there other than determination for Sam to read. This would be cutting it close.
Nilsen: What are you doing?
Woolheater didn’t react to the tension between the brothers. That wasn’t his lane. Sam knew that the XO’s had the local picture. The Captain had the broader one. There wasn’t time to reconcile both. His focus stayed on the transporter readouts.
Woolheater: Stability is holding. The window is still there. Small, but usable. Pattern coherence is improving.
Arlill: Response
Rouiancet: =/\= Response =/\=
Sam listened but he did not take his eyes off the buffer telemetry.
Nilsen: He’s being stubborn ::to Woolheater:: keep working on the transporters, don’t stop. I’m stealing power from everything else for us.
He adjusted his stance slightly, tracking the fluctuations as power from other systems was reallocated.
Woolheater: Aye! If you’re robbing grid priority, give me five seconds warning before any heavy draw. I’ll brace for signal loss.
Five seconds was also asking someone to be virtually clairvoyant. No pressure though. No challenge. Just coordination.
Arlill: Response
00:30
As the clock ticked down to the dreaded 12.8-second red line, one which the Continuance and Stella were working on, the smallest hint of a signal was detected.
Nilsen: I’ve got a weak lock on Rouiancet’s team. ::to Woolheater:: That window of yours helped a lot. See what you can do about Greaves team. ::calling out to his broroomy:: Tox. We gotta get moving soon.
The buffer telemetry spiked, then dropped. A transporter cycle completed. Rouiancet’s away team was aboard.
Woolheater: Transport cycle completed. Pattern load dropped. They made it.
He stayed with the edges of the signal guarding the margins and focused on the next away team.
Woolheater: Interference is different. Different frequency. The power transfer is helping.
Transporter buffer telemetry is tightening.
He leaned closer to the display, monitoring the lock attempt Nilsen was driving. Woolheater was watching for the moment things slipped. He heard Varik’s call for emergency beamout over the COMM.
Woolheater: I have Greaves’ team in the margins. Weak, but present. If Transporter Room 3 is seeing what I am seeing, they can grab it.::He glanced once toward Arlill:: Signal is there. It will not last.
Arlill: Response?
They weren’t out of the woods yet. But, Sam saw Greave’s away team patterns fully resolve in the transporter buffer telemetry.
Arlill/Greaves/Nilsen/Rouiancet: Response?
The patterns stabilized. The buffer load dropped and Sam heard over the COMM that the transport was complete.
Arlill/Greaves/Nilsen/Rouiancet: Response?
Sam was not a transporter tech. He was an extra set of trained eyes on buffer stability while the clock tried to murder them.
Arlill/Greaves/Nilsen/Rouiancet: Response?
Tags
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Scout Sniper / Infantry Officer
MARDET, Starfleet Marine Corps
USS Octavia E. Butler NCC-82850