It's a shame the computer can't have chicken soup

Posted on Friday 1 March 2019 @ 18:03 by Captain John "Apollo" Barstow, M.D. & Captain Melody Jones & Lieutenant Marbim Rejal

Mission: The New Collective
Location: Main Engineering
Timeline: Current
2827 words - 5.7 OF Standard Post Measure

ON:

Melody noticed on the readout that all the watchdog programs had been eliminated. Good she thought to herself, now lets get rid of this virus once and for all.

Liz walked into the engineering bay with purpose. She strode straight up to Melody and dropped a fistful of isolinear chips on the console in front of her. "Your pup. Caged and ready for transport. Does this mean I can officially add 'Dog Catcher' to my resume?"

Melody nodded "You can indeed." She placed the chips into a secure container "We'll just have to keep that contained for now."

Shortly after this exchange, Stephanie came striding through the door to Engineering. She was most notably out of uniform, wearing a pair of cutoff denim shorts, a black tank top and black canvas sneakers with a star on them. Her hair was pulled up into a high ponytail. The Commbadge almost looked out of place.

Liz looked up at her. "Should you be here?"

Stephanie smiled at Liz. There was never any question about where you stood with her. "Na," Stephanie responded flatly. "But I'm gonna be here anayway, so it'd behoove ya lot t' use what I know. I am th' Federation's leadin' expert in data security."

Liz shrugged. "At least I know it's you. You're too honest to lie and too dumb to fudge the truth."

"I love ya too, bitch." Stephanie blew her a kiss and winked.

Marbim wanders in about now with his spear in hand. "That software was tough to beat, but I prevailed. Had to use some interesting programming on it." Looking over at Steph, "Chief O'Hara, glad to see you back on your feet and not trying to kill anyone. I've had crews working round the clock on repairs. That cutter beam did some serious damage to us, but we are prevailing on repairs. We will need to pick up some more resources for the replicators, as we've had to replicate several integral parts that we wouldn't normally worry about replacing, but we aren't anywhere near a shipyard or spacedock."

Stephanie smiled at Miles. "Good t' see ya too, Spoonhead." She listened to the damage report silently. She opened her mouth like she had something to say, then closed it again. Iinstead she just said "Thank you f'r lookin' after her. Use whatever personnel ya need... An' if yer hard up for raw materials, then pull th' most recent inventory logs o' th' cargo an' storage bays. Find out what's there an' feed as much o' it as ya can t' waste reclamation.

Melody noticed when O'Hara walked in and raised an eyebrow "I take it this is not an official visit Lieutenant, by the way I'm sorry about what happened earlier. I'm not going to have to shoot you again, am I?"

Stephanie regarded Melody for a few moments. This was after all the first time they had actually really met. She sized the Security Chief up, eyes stopping at the pips on the collar. She locked eyes with Melody and gave her a smile that was equal parts amicable and mischievous. "That depends, Commanda....Are ya gonna ask me t' leave?"

"Oh, I don't think we need a red alert just yet." Melody replied with a wry smile. "As far as I know, the Doctor has removed all trace of what was controlling you. Do you remember anything of what it did? We could use some help removing this virus from the main computer. I suppose you could assist in an unofficial capacity."

"Good t' hear!" Stephanie said, not pressing her luck any further. "Now anaone care t' bring me up t' speed?"

Liz looked at Stephanie, then to Melody. "Care to do the honors, Commander?"

Stephanie grimaced at Liz. "Yer never tha' polite t' me."

Liz grinned devilishly. "I like her. Besides, how would you respond if I was?"

Stephanie inhaled sharply. She then opened her mouth and put her index finger up as if she was going to give Liz a stern talking to; but abruptly she stopped. The visual effect was as if someone hit her pause button as she martialed her arguments. After a few moments of this, she visibly deflated as she exhaled through her nose and dropped her arm to her side. "I see yer point. Do carry on." She said.

Liz looked expectantly back to Melody.

Melody indicated the to the display readout "There's currently a rather insidious virus in the main computer. It's dormant at the moment but if activated it has the potential to cripple every system on this ship including the antimatter containment system." She paused "And we all know what that means. The virus had several watchdog programs guarding it but those have been eliminated so we're left with the main virus program but it keeps mutating and adapting. We also don't know what the activation code is."

Melody took a breath. "We're sitting on a bomb that could potentially go off any second, or never. Needless to say we need to get rid off it, and now. So" she looked at O'Hara. "Any insight into what this thing is and, how we deal with it?"

Stephanie studied the readout for a few moments. "Self-replicatin'... That's evident by th' infection rate." She screwed up her face as she stared at the screen. "Liz, Did ya run th' broad spectrum anti-virals?"

"Failed across the board, Chief." Liz responded.

Stephanie was afraid of that. "An' it's embedded itself in every bloody system on th' ship." She looked back over at Liz "Did ya do an overwrite from the PBU's?"

"Nope. They told me purging was off the table."

Stephanie frowned and thought. "Well, feck!" She mumbled seemingly incoherently to herself as she traced pathways back from the computer core in her mind's eye as she read through them on the screen. "It's a systematic attack. It's almost beautiful if ya look at it. Each iteration is learnin' from th' previous generation an' improvin'. Each bit's focusin' on breachin' a small part o' th' security protocols. We're bein' DDoSed back ta th' feckin' stone age. Looks like... At th' current rate, it'ill have broken every encryption algorythm we have in..." She stopped and thought for a moment, muttering some numbers. "...jus' unda 20 hours. Conceptually, It could give someone complete control o' th' Merlin. They could make th' ship do anathin' they wanted. Fly us into a sun, Destabilize th' antimatter chamber, use us t' incite a war." She shuddered. "Any manor o' ill-conceived shenanigans and there'd na be a blessed thing we can do t' stop it... Unless... " The wheels were turning in the Engineer's mind. Her thoughts gained speed. "We can control their population. Viruses are just code. When they replicate, they run a command that merges their data with the source data. What if we corrupt their source data? We set their output parameter to a null pointer an' they output t' nothing. No new generation. That should arrest their replication process while they find a way t' adapt... But eventually they will start replicatin' again. We've no way o' tellin' how long they'll be down f'r an' what their replication rate'll be after." She looked at the numbers again. "What I do know is tha' th' longer we wait, th' harder it'll be t' implement."

Melody clasped her hands together "Well, we better make a start then!"

When the two ladies realize neither can access the warp core command structure, Marbim will step up to a close terminal and type in some commands. With his back to everone, more to cover what he's typing he says, "I grew concerned that whatever was controlling Steph would force her to detonate the warp core, so I locked everyone out of it. Once I realized we had a virus, I then locked everyone out of being able to make any changes to the software controlling," looking over his shoulder at O'Hara he says, "was it susan or sallie, I can't remember what you named your girlfriend here..(nods at the warp core)."

O'Hara rolled her eyes. "Sarah," she said, narrowing her eyes and frowning at the Cardassian. "But good lookin' out none the less. Leave it like that. An extra layer o' encryption'll slow it down. Okay, Miles... I'll need ya t' wipe a section o' the'computer core tha' we can use a null pointer. Write zeroes t' th' entire cluster, then write lock it so th' li'l bastards can' use it as a spawnin' ground. Somethin' non-essentia,l please." She then looked over to Liz. "Liz, Find me th' chink in th' armor. We need a weak spot in th' security protocols where we can insert our code." She then looked over at Melody thoughtfully. "Ya know, It's occurred t' me tha' I've no idea who ya are We've na officially met." She shook her head. "But time f'r that when we're na all about t' die. I need ya t' lock out th' command codes. scramble personal security access, keep throwin' it random problems it has t' solve. It don' know how long it'll slow 'em down, but at this point every bit helps. I'll be in m' office writin' th' code."

“I’ll come with you.” Melody said “The rest of you make a start.” She looked at O’Hara “I admire you dedication to duty and value your input but strictly speaking you’re been relived of duty. Also after the..... incident your personal access has been temporarily suspended so you’re going to need me to access the engineering computer. Also I can keep an eye on you.” Melody softened slightly “Look, I know you want to help and you want things back to normal.”

Stephanie brought a hand up to her mouth to stifle a laugh. "It's adorable tha' ya think I need yer help t' bypass a security lockout." She looked around the room and realized she was the only person present who saw this as a source of mirth. She rolled her eyes, and resigned herself to the new paradigm that she had been presented.. "If it please ya..."

Snickering, Miles turns back to the computer terminal and enters commands for several minutes. Once done he turns back to the ladies, "Ok. You've got your null point. I also added a trap of my own. If it tries to break through or break out, it'll trigger a worm that will begin unravelling its code. I figured payback can be a bitch sometimes."

"Don' get fancy, Spoonhead! Just write an' data lock it. Th' first thin' ya come t' understand as an engineer is th' more movin' parts it has, the more that can go wrong." Stephanie saw Melody wasn't going to be dissuaded from following her. She made a gesture. "After ya. commanda."

The Captain had come down from the bridge to get a report and walked in just in time to catch the tail end of the conversation, "it's adorable you think after what happened you think measures against you hacking Merlins systems wouldn't have been started, Lieutenant," he commented with an all to sweet smile and stepped behind Melody and Stephanie, "give me a report while you work," he said.

"Ya underestimate how good I am," Stephanie shot back. After everything, she didn't even have the good grace too sound sheepish about it. "Yer na th' first." She let a beat fall and continued on before Barstow had the time to be mad at her for being flippant. "So inna nutshell, we've less than 20 hours before th' virus breaks every encryption code th' Merlin has. When it does, we lose control o' th' ship. We're implementin' a plan t' temporarily arrest it's replication while we regroup an' come up with another plan to get rid o' it completely. "

“Captain”. Melody acknowledged. “Lieutenant O’Hara is here in an unofficial capacity. She has a knowledge of the of the virus, not to mention the engineering systems which make her input valuable. It will help speed up the process of removing this damn virus.”

Stephanie shrugged. "No need t' thank me. M' benevolence stems from unenlightened self interest. All m' shite's here." She affected a half grin, then went back to work.

Melody watched O’Hara work. “I’ve no doubt you could have hacked your way back into the system, but the new safety protocols would have alerted security instantly I’m afraid.... There! That’s it!” Melody interrupted herself. “You’ve managed to isolate the virus program. Very nice work I’m must say.” Melody studied the readout “This looks far too complicated to try and decompile. I think we should risk a complete shutdown, wipe of all affected memory and reboot from the protected archives. Do you agree?”

Stephanie crooked an eyebrow at Melody. "I thought Liz said that a purge was off th' table...?"

Melody sighed. “It’s a measure of last resort. This virus looks so complex by the time we’ve unraveled it could have killed us already. It’s a bad hand we’ve been dealt, so put on your best poker face.” She turned to Barstow “Captain, we’re going to try a complete shutdown, memory wipe and reboot.” Meldoy pressed the intercom to address the engineering room. “Ok! Look alive people. We’re going for a full shutdown right now. And I mean everything!” She turned back to O’Hara. “I’m going to need your flare with this. Ready?”

Stephanie cracked her knuckles theatrically and grinned menacingly. "Born that way," Stephanie retorted. "I came t' drink whiskey an' kick ass... An' I'm fresh outta whiskey." She bent to her console and began configuring the batch sequence initializer that would blank the core and copy the files over one at a time from the PBUs.

Melody now activated a ship wide comm broadcast. "All hands, this is Commander Jones. We will be performing a full shutdown, wipe and reboot in thirty seconds. Please standby." She nodded at O'Hara "Lets do this. And Mark!"

"THROW TH' THIRD SWITCH!" O'Hara yelled as she slammed her hand down on the console. "GIVE M' CREATION... LIIIIIFE!" She laughed in what one would be hard pressed to call anything else than a maniacal fashion. It subsided as quickly as it came on.

All the ships systems shut down and all rooms were plunged into darkness. Melody released the breath she had been subconsciously holding. "Let's pray this works..... Restart Now!"

The great ship hummed back into life.

Melody smiled as she studied the readout. "Well, we're still here and it looks to have worked. Very nice work Lieutenant. Good work all of you. " she addressed the rest of the team.

Melody looked back at O'Hara. "Now you have done your job Lieutenant, I'm afraid I must do mine and escort you back to your quarters."

Stephanie adopted a defeated expression. "Na need t' trouble yerself," She began, pausing for a moment to compose herself. . "I know th' way." She said and exited Engineering without another word.

Meldoy Tapped her comm badge. “Jones to Security. O’Hara just left engineering. Would you monitor her position and make sure she goes directly to her quarters.”

A voice came back “Aye Sir.”

Melody look at Hale. “Would you check in on her in the morning. I’m going off duty now but if you need me, don’t hesitate to contact me.”

"That depends," Hale replied. "Will you have Sickbay standing by for me?" She grinned stupidly. "I guarantee you she' ll be none too happy to see me." Before Melody could say anything else Liz said simply, "I'll see to it, Commander. Don't tell her I told you, but I'm worried about her, too... But probably not for the same reasons you are."

Melody thought for a moment. "I've only just met her but I can tell she's a skilled engineer and a valued officer. A credit to her ship."

"I'll check on her, Master Chief," Barstow said, having been quietly watching the scene, "and this is her last time here without a direct order from me. If she argues tell her I said ná déan meastachán ormsa," he said, referring to O'Hara saying he underestimated her being able to get around lockouts, "and Commander, Master Chief, way too many people have all out access to ships systems, I want any deadman codes, backdoors, do us doggy access purged and removed, no-one but three command officer are to have full systems access, and bring Rijal in on that. Understood?" he asked.

Melody nodded “Aye Sir.”

Hale Nodded and echoed Melody and added "O'Hara will love that."

Off:

Commander Melody Jones
CSTO/ Second Officer
USS Merlin

LTjg Stephanie O'Hara
Chief Engineer
USS Merlin

MCPO Elizabeth Hale
Ranking Engineering NCO
USS Merlin

Captain John "Apollo" Barstow
Commanding Officer
USS Merlin
Task Group Commanding Officer
Task Group 47-A