Checking Things Out

Posted on Saturday 2 March 2019 @ 21:48 by Commander Cale Llewellyn DSci & Captain Melody Jones & Lieutenant Marbim Rejal

Mission: The New Collective
Location: Research Station
Timeline: Current
2560 words - 5.1 OF Standard Post Measure

Cale spoke with the Officer of the Watch and left the bridge. In doing so, he tapped his commbadge and said, "Commander Jones, Lieutenant Rejal report to Transporter Room 3 to join an away team. I have a feeling that we're going to have need of your services." And with that he cut the connection. He didn't like the idea of sending an away team of junior officers into a situation blindly without appropriate supervision. And with him being First Officer, he was required to go on all away missions for said supervision (or at least he wanted to go along if only to be nosey).

Tapping his combadge, Marbim's grin says it all, "I found Commander Jones, do I win a prize? I also believe that she and I can meet you at the transporter pad shortly." Looking at Melody, "Mam, I purged my puppy, and saved my algorithms on an isolinear chip, just in case I need it for later. I guess I can leave my spear here, as I have everything else I'll need already on me. Were you successful in getting rid of your puppy?"

"Yes, all the watchdog programs have been eliminated." Melody replied. She was still not one hundred percent certain how she had managed to get rid of her watchdog program, but she kept those concerns to herself. "I wonder what the XO has need of us for? Let's cover all the bases. She picked up an engineering kit and placed a phaser on her belt. She looked up at Rejal "Shall we?"

Leaving his spear tucked in Main Engineering, Marbim grabs a few more empty isolinear chips, and an engineering tricorder. Nodding to Commander Jones, he follows her, not really paying attention, as the gears in his head are racing. Anyone getting close to him, and probably Melody can hear him muttering to himself in a mish-mash of Cardassian and Klingon - most of it is engineering and ops stuff, one thing that may peak Melody's interest is when he says, "Sigh, that date I owe Sav is going to be postponed even longer," then he breaks off cursing in Klingon. Once he realizes they are in Transporter Room 3, his face changes to a happier version, "Commander, you never mentioned whether or not I won a prize for finding Commander Jones..." He is teasing, but both of them can tell he is worried about whatever they are heading off to fix.

"What do you want, Rejal?" Cale asked with a smile on his face.

Turning serious the reply rushes out, "Some extra time off to take someone on a date, sir." Then his grin reappears, "Thought I was going to pass out there for a moment."

"Done, it's yours. I can't have my operations officer passing out on me, now can I?" Cale said with a giggle.

Entering the transporter room, Melody stepped over to Cale. "Commander. Whats up?"

"The research base is having some issues with the power core and I promised an engineering team to take a look at it. Giving the Puppet Master's last shot here, I was just playing it safe. What do you think, Mel?"

"Sounds like a wise precaution Commander. The virus we removed from the main computer was a nasty piece of work and definitely not straightforward. Caution is advised."

"That's why I asked the two of you to come along what with the success you had with the one here," Cale said. "I always assume an air of caution on every away team I go on, Melody. You should know that."

"Unless anyone else is joining us, I'd say we are ready to go then." Going to stand on a transport spot, Marbim makes sure all his gear is snug. He also turns his disruptor down to its lowest setting before resettling it in its holster.

"I have asked for an engineering team to accompany us so let's give them time to join us, please," and as Commander Llewellyn said that, the engineering group joined them in the transporter room.

"We are sorry for taking so long, Commander, " said Chief Warrant Officer Sandro Neri. "We had to wait for replacements to relieve us in Main Engineering and with Lieutenant O'Hara being out, we're running on our own down there."

"That's alright, Chief, at least you're here now. Everyone on the transporter pad. Chief, energize as soon as everyone is ready," Cale said.

Melody took her place on the transporter pad. "So who's the lucky lady?" She asked Rejal.

As they are dematerializing he says, "True gentlemen don't kiss and tell milday."

Cale was getting annoyed. "Let's get professional, people. We've beamed down and I've got to find Dr. Delaney. Now, we're here to do a job and let's get on with it with a minimum of fuss and muss," Cale said rather tersely.

Turning all serious, "Sorry Commander, just blowing off some steam. Do we know anything about this issue they are having, other than they need our help?"

"I was told by Dr. Delaney that their power core is experiencing some fluctuations but I don't know anything more than that," Llewellyn said just as Dr. Delaney walked up and began to speak.

"Thank you for coming so quickly. The issue has begun to escalate. Our computer core is beginning to shut down periodically. We have no idea why nor can we track down the cause of the issue. Our best computer people are having a horrible time of finding whatever is causing this. We need your help in finding this 'bug'," Delaney said. "I'll introduce you to both our computer and engineering personnel. If you'll come with me, please?"

"Lead on," Llewellyn replied. And the officers followed the head of the research station. As Delaney led them into the computer core, he stopped just inside the door and gestured to the person at the main console and said, "Commanders, Lieutenant and team, this is Shane Weth, our resident computer 'nerd' I guess you could say. Shane, this is, I'm sorry I didn't get your names."

"I am Commander Cale Llewellyn, DSci Executive Officer of the USS Merlin," Cale said.

"I'm Commander Jones, Chief of Security" Melody smiled and extended a hand.

"Lieutenant Rejal, Chief of Operations, and a bit of a code-head myself." Looking around at their core he will whistle, "Nice set up you got here Mr. Weth, when did all your issues begin, before or after we faced the Borg attack?"

"We just managed to remove a particularly nasty virus from the computer on the Merlin." Melody added. "We might be dealing with something similar here."

"I was thinking the same thing, Commander. Have you done any kind of forensic analysis, Mr. Weth?" Llewellyn asked.

"It was the first thing I did, Commander. It came up with nothing. It was the oddest thing. My team went through the system with a fine-toothed comb," Weth said completely at a loss.

"Well, maybe we can come up with something on our end not being from the station. Lieutenant Rejal, could you take a look at the computer setup and Commander Jones, could you make a sweep of the power core? I'll talk to the administration and see if anyone else has been here recently. Dr. Delaney, is there a private place we could talk?" Llewellyn asked.

"Sure thing Commander." Sitting himself down next to Mr. Weth, Marbim will start with, "Can you show me what your computer is currently working on or processing, that's kind of how we found out about our bug, and its three watchdog programs."

Melody sat down at the computer terminal and began working. When she looked up she froze. She caught a glimpse of a face reflected in the monitor. It was an alien she didn't recognize, yet seemed vaguely familiar. The face was distorted, like it was being viewed though a thick green liquid. Melody span around in her chair. No one was there. When she turned back, the face was gone.

"Right this was, Commander Llewellyn, and as for your rather pertinent question, there has been someone else here. He came for only a short time on a passing Altoran freighter. He was sent here by Starfleet Commander, or so he said," Dr. Delaney said.

"Through a freighter? An Altoran freighter, at that. What else did he say?"

He had a Starfleet uniform, one of command red. He also told us that he was sent here to upgrade several of our systems but he didn't go near our computer or power core. At least not that I remember. He didn't have access to those systems according to his orders which I didn't get the chance to read, might I add," the doctor said.

Most interesting, Cale thought to himself. "Why didn't you see his orders?" he asked.

"He said I didn't have clearance to see them."

"And you didn't question why the director of the facility didn't have clearance to see the orders to upgrade systems at his facility?" Cale asked quite agitated.

"I assumed it was for my own good. Who knows what Starfleet wants these days?"

"OK thank you, Dr Delaney. I've got to go check in on my team," Cale said as he got up to leave. "Cale to Mel, we've got a problem."

Cale's voice snapped Melody out of the weird feeling she was being watched. “Jones here Commander. The power core computer looks clean. If there is another virus in there it’s better hidden than the one on the Merlin. What’s up?”

"Well, that's he kicker. Apparently, there was a Starfleet officer of unknown rank and name here recently to do some upgrades to unknown systems. Dr, Delaney says he wasn't given clearance to see the work order so he's not sure what happened while the officer was here and I can't even find any record of him having been here since he showed up out the blue on an Altoran freighter. I'm on hold with Command about it now.

"I find all of this a little fishy and what's more that Delaney didn't even question this 'officer' if he was an officer about who he was and what he was doing here. Especially, since Delaney isn't a Starfleet officer and this base is under civilian control. Delaney's emotional state was all over the place too. Have you found anything that was strange and I mean anything?"

Melody re-examined the console. “There is an entry here of a new power regulation subroutine and....” she paused “That’s unusual. There’s another program here but it has no name. No indication of what it dose. The log says it was added at the same time but then the monitoring subroutine has been altered to overlook the program. My God!” Melody suddenly exclaimed. “It’s completely bypassed all safety protocols and command codes. I’m coming to you now. We have a real problem here!”

"I thought so. Get Rejal there now. I'm on my way and get someone from the ship down here to help with the computer issues. I'll inform the captain as soon as I get back on board," Cale said rather frustrated at this whole thing.

Meldoy called over her shoulder “Hey Lieutenant Rejal. Can you join me over here. Looks like we’ve got a problem.”

"I just received word from Starfleet confirming what I already suspected," Cale began. "They sent no officer to the research base so I'm thinking that this 'officer' was in all likelihood our 'Puppet Master' bent on causing as much damage to us as possible. I'll have to let Captain Barstow know all of this as soon as possible. I was afraid of this from the beginning. We may have many more problems than we're aware of, Mel."

"Be right there Commander." Looking at Shane, "Look, keep looking for out of the ordinary stuff that is taking large amounts of processing power. The programs we encountered were tying up large portions of our processors, but they were also hidden well. Also, look for any changes to the stations' programming itself since these issues arose. Once we can single out the programs we can help you purge them from the system. I'll be back, or you can report to me over the comm." Frowning, Marbim wanders over to Commander Jones, "This is worse than we thought. Someone has seriously messed with their systems, what'd you find out?"

"They were visited by a 'Starfleet officer' who said he had orders to upgrade several of their systems but didn't allow them access to the orders. I found out from Command they didn't send anyone to upgrade anything because the systems here are state-of-the-art. Dr. Delaney either didn't know or allowed him access to the systems anyway. I'm thinking it was the latter.

"I'm also thinking our anonymous officer was the Puppet Master in the guise of another Starfleet officer who came here to do more damage. Now what exactly he came here to do is beyond me. But we need to find out what he did and stop it. What have you turned up in your investigations, Lieutenant?" Commander Llewellyn asked the young Operations officer.

"So far we haven't found anything. Mr. Weth was surprised when I asked him what programs were currently working or being preocessed, and he is looking through them for anything "new" since the visistor arrived. With what we found on the Merlin, i'm betting something just as insidious shows up here. Do we know where the mystery starfleet officer went once he finished messing with the computers here. If he is still on the station we might be able to figure out what he is up to. If not, then how did he leave?"

"I've found an unnamed program that seemed to have bypassed all safety systems and security programs in the main computer. I'd say that was cause for alarm" Melody commented. "Unfortunately there is also no indication of what it does." She added.

"Unnamed programs are a great way to slip Trojans and worms into computer systems. Even small ones can turn into monsters if you dont stop them fast enough. We may need to split this thing up into smaller pieces to take down like we did with the watchdog programs..." Even with his pale skin, Commander Jones can tell that Marbim has thought of something as his skin color gets paler, "On the Merlin, the Puppet Master was trying to get the warp core to go critical and explode, thus vaporizing the ship. What if here its something along the same lines. Taking out this station would set us back some on research in the region, and with the Borg being active out here, it would be a terrible loss as a place for ships to converge to meet and share information."

"I agree, Commander Jones. I suggest you and I go back to the ship and discuss our findings with Apo...Captain Barstow. Miles can stay here and perform some of the magic he so carefully worked on the Merlin. We can also send some security and more engineering/operations officers down here to assist him," Llewellyn said.

OFF:

Commander Cale Llewellyn, DSci
Executive Officer
USS Merlin
&
LTjg Marbim Rejal
Chief of Operations
USS Merlin
&
Commander Melody Jones
CTSO / Second Officer
USS Merlin