Lieutenant JG Amelia Semara - Lightning Rod

[Max]

((Bridge, Deck 1, USS Khitomer, the Lagoon Nebula))

Twelve hours up to the neck in blurry esoteric sensor readings was enough to make most people regret some of their life decisions.  Not so Amelia.

Though she was beginning to wonder how much of Hobart's grumpy glares and empathic fuming she could sense from the next room over was something she could have handled better.  Admittedly, he had a comfy little room to retreat to and eat in (and nap in!  If her senses weren't completely fried by Sencha radiation) where she'd been on the bridge this whole time.  That was where she ate, and where she didn't sleep.  That made it somewhat harder to carefully choose the right response to another's feelings.

Those things were the Captain's privilege - she understood - but did it have to come with unnecessary judgement of her eating, too?

Semara: Yeah, yeah, I know.  I wasn't promoted yesterday you know... :: A cheeky grin. :: That's why I'm keepin' it away from the consoles.

Right.  In the time apart, she'd almost forgotten how much he disliked her attempts at humor.  She almost started to think on some way to repair whatever bridge there was between them hanging by a single rope when the science console called her attention.

Food down, back to work.

Semara: Dang...  We lost Rapunzel again.  :: Beat :: Sorry, that's Sencha strand Kappa-seven-three.

Ceylan pulled up the section of space where "Rapunzel" should have been.

Although the anomaly wasn't literally glittering, the graviton-bound isotopes deployed by a type-7 probe had worked marvellously to illuminate the Sencha strands to Khitomer's half-working sensors.  Now if only they'd stop squirming around like spiced Gagh on a humid day.

Graves: Pathway sta-stability at junction theta-six is c-collapsing. Temporal refraction increasing b- ::he froze and took a moment then tried again:: by point two-three percent per-per cycle.

Zerva: Response

Hobart: Problem with the scanner, or the strand?

Semara:  :: Working at the consoles :: We were doin' great chartin' the anomaly for a bit after we got our gel packs replaced, but we keep loosin' strands after a while.  We find one, scan the path of the knot til we get a plot we can use for navigation, and move on.  But they keep collapsin' after a while, then re-appearin' as isomorphs of the original strand.  They usually keep their average orbital distance, but that's about it.  I still think somethin' about the probe's destruction destabilized things.  The only thing that's stayin' fairly fixed is center hole, so far.  But scannin' that's been a devil...

Hobart: Then wrap up your work. Record as much data as you can on the center, you can analyze it on the way home.

Home sounded good.  Then again, she was pretty sure she could fall asleep if she just laid down on the decking.

Semara: You got it, Cap'n.  Just as soon as we're confident we can get out safely.

Zerva: Response

Hobart: And then start thinking up ways to seal it.

Amelia carefully considered for a moment both what the man was asking, and how he was asking it.  A few hours of separation had given her a bit of perspective: his big mission in the center seat, and he was struggling to keep a grip on a ship full of officers with big ideas and big personalities as a man who apparently enjoyed neither.  In part, his insistence on his timetable had gotten them here.  In a way he had almost the opposite syndrome she had demonstrated in the simulation during prior shore leave.  Perhaps he should be allowed some grace - same as he offered her, after all.

But he'd set forth a highwire for her to walk.  Answer quickly, answer smartly, answer obediently.  She decided to answer truthfully and as kindly as she could.

Semara: We'll work on it, but this thing is volatile and our sensors are still a mess.  If we can safely leave, couldn't a proper science ship workin' at full power come back and close it with less risk?

Zerva: Response
 
Graves remained quiet.  Smart man.

Hobart's eyebrow, meanwhile, raised up high.

Hobart: “Aye, Captain, understood” is what I just heard, I think.

So that's how it was going to be.  She did what she could, but there had only been one correct answer, and she imagined there was still only one.

Semara: Aye, Cap'n, understood.

Zerva: Response

An uncomfortable moment passed.  She almost envied the absurdly tall Graves' genetic gift to seemingly disappear into the background - even in an environment as foreign to his genes as the bridge of a starship.  Then again, she wouldn't have traded her species' telepathic gifts for anything.

With Hobart's eyes off of her, she rolled out her shoulders, breathing in time with the stretching motion.  Any amount of blood flow and calm to her overtired brain would help right now.

Graves: If-if Sencha is disrupting the singu- larity’s reach, why don’t we-we do the sssame?

Hobart / Zerva: Response

Amelia chewed her lip for a moment.  "Disrupt" could mean so many things in the context, but she decided to let the theory run its course.  She leaned back comfortably to give the man some space and spoke in a soft tone, hoping to keep the man from any sudden scares that might burst the bubble of thought.

Semara: How?

Graves met her eyes.  She smiled softly, hoping to encourage him.  Instead, he cowered back down, as if he was trying to erase the nearly thirty centimeter height difference between them, and then some.

Graves: We c-can’t use Sencha bec-cause we don’t have the capability b-but we can use the warp- the warp drive’s signature to emulate it. A s-sort of feedback loop that entices the fila-ments to ::mouthing the words silently then outloud:: move around the ship.

Amelia closed her eyes and furrowed her brows a moment, trying to picture the solution on the back of her eyelids.

Semara: Hmm.  The calculation's gotta be real precise.  Warp bubbles push a lot deeper into subspace than Sencha waves.  And Sencha waves exhibit much higher quantum state turbulence.

Hobart / Zerva: Response

Graves: ::still working without looking up:: N-No.

Amelia opened her eyes again and caught Zerva's questioning gaze.  She smiled a little.  He was better at the science than he gave himself credit for.  He knew the right questions to ask.

Semara: So, we're thinkin' the probe's power source was anchorin' the anomaly, right?  We don't wanna be the new anchor, or we'll be stuck here - or worse we punch a hole in subspace and take ourselves into it.  So no.  We run the numbers and thread the needle on our warp power, or we don't try it.

Hobart / Zerva: Response

Graves: No.

Semara: :: Shaking her head :: Normally, warp bubbles are egg-shaped.  But scientists with too much time on their hands have made all kinds a' weirdly shaped warp geometry.  I think we'll wanna form a two-sheet hyperboloid warp field, to collapse the Sencha waves where we want them to.  But our nacelles ain't exactly designed to do that, so it takes a bit a' math to get 'em to misbehave just the right way.  Probably need help from Engineerin'.

Her lips quirked a little upwards and to one side, but only just a little.  The idea of equipment misbehaving the right way struck her as amusing, but she tried to keep a grip on it for Hobart's sake.

Hobart / Zerva: Response

A veritable gale of wind blew from the Kelpian.  He must have been holding it in reserve.

Graves: No. N-No. Like a recurs-sive subspace imprint of itself in f-front and b-behind us, creating a corridor-a corridor of temporal in-inevitability. Epistrophic Cascade.

Semara: :: A smile smile :: Poetic.  But right.

She knew Graves was the man for the job.  She enjoyed actually getting to speak the native science language.

Hobart / Zerva: Response

Graves: The K-Khitomer appears to have already passed s-safely, and so the quant-um entangled strands do not consider the o-occupied space to be a rational space for t-them to exist.

Hobart / Zerva: Response

Amelia watched as the poor Kelpian was quickly discovering the same kind of headache she'd found hours ago trying to explain these things.  She offered an encouraging smile to try one more time.

Graves: Like tri- ::pausing:: tricking a predator by thr-throwing your scent ahead of y-you and beh-behind you simultaneously.

Semara: :: Nodding :: Or a lightning rod.

Hobart / Zerva: Response

Amelia smiled.  If there was something she enjoyed feeling in another person as much as happiness, it was that floodgate opening of understanding when a concept finally landed home.

Graves: There is the danger, we imp-implode in th-three dimensions in an inst-ant.

Her smile broadened into a grin, delighted to feel the glimmer of a newly discovered star of enjoyment in the Kelpian next to her.

Semara: There is that...  :: A little shrug ::  But it ain't a bigger risk than any other we've taken today.

Hobart / Zerva: Response

Graves: Shall I s-start the calculations?

Hobart / Zerva: Response

Amelia took in a slow chestful of air in consideration of the last, unanswered order Hobart had given.

Semara: If we make it out... I think we could also use this idea to collapse the anomaly.  Well, more like discharge it.

Hobart / Zerva / Graves: Response

Semara: If we make a strong enough warp bubble around the singularity, pull all the energy inside the horizon...  :: She trailed off. :: Let's just say everyone'll know we were here.  Past tense.  But the anomaly oughta be closed after that!

Hopefully that warning was clear enough, despite the slightly over-eager little smile on her face.  People didn't get to see subspace eat itself alive very often, let alone in the spectacular fashion she just proposed.  If they went with the suggestion, it would be one hell of a show.  One to watch from a long, long way away.  One that might give away some of the secret of their mission, too.

Anyway, that was all assuming they could figure out a way to make a warp bubble around the central singularity without anyone actually being anywhere near the singularity.  Not a straightforward feat.

Hobart / Zerva / Graves: Response

Tag / TBC...

Lieutenant Junior Grade Amelia Magnolia Semara

Science Officer

USS Khitomer - NCC-62400

A239710MA0