[Vimyridge] 950808.21 Department Head Meeting Redoux pt 2 (Blake, Blake, Lox, Reed, Nix)

[Tana Ragsdale]

"You said that you don't dare use transporters... what's the speculated
dangers?" Nick asked, if needed he'd volunteer to test out the dangers, and
if it worked, then they could try to immediately beam him back. If THAT
worked, then there could be no reason they couldn't beam over the rest of
the crew. Sending more... food... for it sounded bad. Nix, herself, had
mentioned two disasterous outcomes. Still, at least his idea would only
endanger one person, not an entire ship, or two.

"Transporters convert matter to energy. That thing eats energy. You
wouldn't come out of transport with all your parts intact, at best." Justin
said.

The mere thought of that caused Cait to shudder. "What are the chances we
could get dragged into that pocket using the tractor beam?"

"If we keep the energy fluctuating, we may be able to avoid being pulled in.
If we also give it enough temporary energy to keep it occupied, then that
will add to the chances we avoid being pulled in. I really don't want to
test those chances with the ship," she stated. "It would be best to give the
ship its own chance to escape."

"We might also be able to sour the flavor of the energy if we keep changing
the frequency and amplitude." Justin suggested.

Toby shook his head, "No, no transporters. No shuttles either, the Captain
told me, that if anything went in after the Patagonia, it would be the Vimy
Ridge."

Justin though this over a bit "If we powered every reactor we have to full,
and the warp core to full power... we might give this thing something like
heartburn, which could cause it to spit everything out. I wouldn't count on
it though."

"You keep talking about it as if it were a living being of some kind, have
you any proof to this or are you just anthropomorphizing?" Toby sipped his
coffee, "Let's not get caught in that trap. Are we talking about a being of
some kind, or are we talking about a wormhole that is acting out of the
ordinary for wormholes?"

"I do not believe it is a living being. I am suggesting that it is acting
in a way that is easily describable using terms related to living beings. As
far as our sensors can tell, it is a subspace pocket of some sort. Similar
to a worm-hole, but so far as we can find, only one opening." Justin said.
"If we over power the subspace field, it should dump it's
contents into normal space."

Toby looked around the table at everyone present then back at Justin, "And
just what is the risk to us, powering everything to full like that?"

"There would be almost no room for error on any system. Everything would be
charged to full, that includes all weapons, shields, deflectors, light, life
support, and everything else. It would create a great risk of shock to
anyone repairing systems, and in the case of combat, any damaged system
would be at a risk for exploding in a person's face. For normal
operations it would mean 'heavy handedness' on any control would result in
twice or more of whatever reaction they were trying to do. Simple thrusters
would act more like impulse drive. Phasers would punch holes in planets.
Torpedo launchers would fling torpedoes twice as far.. and... if the worst
case happens... we could blow the ship up inside that subspace
area." Justin said. "The odds of that happening are quite low, though. It
would also be possible for us to burn out the warp core and possibly some of
the fusion reactors. If everything goes right, we go in, fire up the
tractor beam, and pulse a few phaser bursts at multiple frequencies, and we
all get dumped out as the subspace field collapses. I am open to other
ideas though. This is only the most likely workable solution I can think
of."

"Is there any way to keep life support and sickbay out of that ramping
equation? If things happen, I have to be able to count on our medical
equipment working correctly. We burn out life support and that's an even
bigger problem." Cait chewed her lip, brow furrowed in thought. "Could we
take them off line during the proceedure? Would there be enough time to get
in, do what needs doing and get out again before life support reaches
critical?"

"If we're going to boost systems to make the wormhole spit out the other
ship, would it not be best to just focus that energy in to the deflector and
feed it in massive bursts of energy? That way, we don't risk the chance of
getting ourselves stuck within," she states, her brow furrowing. "We need to
figure out the pull of the wormhole, to know what we are dealing with."

"Sorry Doctor, it would be an all or nothing process." Justin turned to
Kylee "To generate that level of energy... would require full power from all
systems. To protect the deflector from burnout, all systems would have to
take the full load. Phasers, Tractor beam, and deflectors would emit the
energy, but it would still be flowing outward from all generation points on
the ship, and into every system. It would also counter the possible side
effects of that worm-hole collecting and absorbing the power needed for our
other systems." He stopped as an idea occurred to him. "There was, once, an
encounter that the USS Enterprise
had that might give us an alternative though. According to the records,
they were caught in a trap that fed off their ship's energy and turned that
energy into radiation. They had to do the reverse of what I am proposing.
Their solution was to power down everything then navigate out using
thrusters only. That might be an alternate idea. I do not know the odds on
that one, yet."

Nick frowned a bit as he thought of the ideas going around the table. He
didn't like the idea of having the Ridge be the only thing going after the
Patagonia if it came to that. Losing a shuttle was one thing, losing the
Ridge was non negotiable to him. He merely listened for now, figuring if
they wouldn't be going over, then his people were where they needed to be at
the moment, to help medical recieve wounded once they got the Patagonia to
safety and stand guard in case any of the casualties isn't of sound mind.

"Would it be feasable to evacuate our civilians to the shuttles while we try
this?" Cait asked. "If everything goes as planned, they'd be able to rejoin
us quickly and free up the shuttles for rescue work."

There was no denying the amusement in Toby's crystal blue eyes, thought his
expression was serious and his tone almost grave, "Justin, forgive me, but
unless we have a breach while passing through a planet I don't think we can
punch a hole through a planet. Though I do know phasers can be tuned to dig
into a planet, without boosting things like you're talking about. And from
what you've described, I'm not really sure thrusters only would work." He
thought a moment, "Someone mentioned souring the energy earlier, that
wouldn't necessarily put everything at risk of blowing up from systems
overloading, and would leave sickbay and lifesupport out of things. Frankly,
mucking with lifesupport and risking the loss of it is not an option.
However if we can find a frequency that doesn't agree with the wormhole,
that would be the safer direction to go in, wouldn't it?" "That may work as
well. Just have to remember this thing absorbs energy. It may take a while
to find one that it doesn't like." Justin said.

"You do realize we are talking about risking the ship, and the lives of
others, by going in to the wormhole, and not even sure we can get out?" she
asked, her brow furrowing. "There are way too many problems with sending the
ship in to that anomaly. What about devising some kind of tow rope we can
launch in to pull the ship out?"

"Yes I realize the risk I also know that inside the wormhole, the Vimy has
the best chance of getting back out again. The Captain and I discussed it
already." Toby spoke up again, then he looked at Justin, "I think, Justin,
that I have found a flaw in your idea that you're so crazily fond of. If it
eats energy, overloading our systems would only drain them faster would it
not? In that case, let's look at an idea that hasn't so many risks to it.
You and science have the readings from the probe, which... since the
readings would have been sent back out of the hole with energy and weren't
interfered with means it doesn't eat all kinds of energy, find the energy
types that go against what it does seem to like. I will take any suggestion
except those that are obviously too crazy for publication, such as
overloading everything."


Kylee blinked, her brow arching at that logic. "We're dealing with something
that is an anomaly. How exactly would you know that the Vimy has the best
chance of getting out? We already have one ship in there that is unable to
escape," she said. "Adding a second may just fuel the wormhole and cause it
to grow larger, or snap shut." She closed her mouth, leaning back in her
chair. She was all for saving this ship, and in a normal battle, she would
be willing to rush in. But, this was something entirely different.

"I believe what the Commander is saying is that we have a better chance
than, say, a shuttle," Nick said, "There's still no garauntee, hell, there's
no garauntee that any of these options'll work," he said, pinching the
bridge of his nose for a moment. "We risk losing the Ridge in just about
any mission we go on, part of the risk we understand when we signed up to
Starfleet, that's something we can fight to avoid, but ultimately accept,
but there must be another way to get the Patagonia out of the worm....
pocket... without needlessly risking the ship," he said. His mind was on
security at the moment, and keeping both ship and crew as safe as possible.

Toby nodded his head to Nick, then looked at the others, "It may not be
needless, the risk to the ship. I do not believe Lox's idea is the right
one. Nix once mentioned souring the energy. Look into that."

Justin nodded.  He didn't like that his idea had been shot down, but he was 
Glad that the alternate was there. "Let get this thing dealt with."

"I take it that its not feasable to get the civilians off ship while we do 
this?" Cait asked again. 

"It would be suicide for them, if you ask me."  Justin said. "If the 'Ridge
gets
stuck... they won't have enough supplies to get them anywhere.  They stand a
better chance of survival on the ship, instead of in shuttles."

"We could set up a time delayed distress beacon, so if we don't make it,
it'll
activate, and they could get picked up, it's less of a risk as opposed to 
getting trapped in there too," Nick said. "And make sure that the beacon has
a warning
about the pocket to keep them away," he added.

"It's a matter of distances, the civilians will stay, in case we need the
shuttles to help us should we go in. Let's work on the grapple idea of Nix's
and on the idea of souring the energy which was also Nix's." Toby looked
around at each face, "We will also want to look at moving all unnecessary
personnel to the interior of the ship so that we can husband resources
better. Doctor, emergency medical kits should be prepared for those interior
locations where people will be gathering, make sure there's medical
personnel available on each deck, to cut down on travel between decks and
again, conserve energy." He stood up and looked at everyone, "Let's get
moving people, the Patagonia doesn't have that much longer I don't believe."
He turned and headed off to inform the captain of the situation and the
findings.

<Fin>

___________________________

Cmdr Tobias "Toby" Blake
XO

Cmdr Caitlin Blake
CMO

Lt Cmdr Justin Lox
CEO

Lt. Nicholas Reed
CSec

Lt. Kylee Nix
CSci