Post 36: Sleeping Giants and Weird Science
Posted on Mon Apr 26th, 2021 @ 6:38pm by Ensign Noah Balsam
Edited on on Mon Apr 26th, 2021 @ 6:39pm
Mission:
The Waiting Game
Location: Computer Core Control Room; USS Sojourner
Timeline: MD 87: 2330 hours
The warp core was overrated. At least, that's what Noah Balsam would attest when Engineers on campus would get snarky over a pint- Propulsion and Systems Engineers, it seemed, could have massive rival egos: a megascale version of a cock-measuring contest always seemed to ensue. One side always hoping to upstage the other was the goal, in a circular argument that at best left them with an "agree to disagree" detente, or possibly a few bruised egos from ad hominem.
Sometimes it was a chicken or the egg argument. Or what was one without the other? If the warp core was the heart, feeding vital energy and the power to sustain and move a ship, then the computer core was the brain. Something had to tell that heart how to function, to give it the vital signals to begin, sustain and end its skillset. One was much more pervasive around the ship, diffused into every console panel, backup system or pack-chip interface point.
Noah stepped inside the dark, multideck tower that was the core. The dim light of the corridor closed with a swish behind him. He had spent almost the entire time from Antares Shipyards in Main Engineering, where no real lead officer existed- just a gaggle of junior specialists, shakedown observers, and the odd shipyard technician who were helping stock, prep and debug the Sojourner. Those tasks were beyond the mien of a mere handful of crew. That work would continue well on their way to the next stage.
Noah felt respect for the warbling thrum, like a heart in a way, of the warp core and Main Engineering. But it did not give him the tingle, that rude and delighted tension of muscles somewhere in the guts, possibly behind the prostate, in some nebulous nerve center that seemed to understand: This is
His nearly Betazoid-dark eyes flitted to the panels that flashed white at him. With the Sojourner in low-power mode, just the blink, fade, glow and fade again of the Gray Condition icon seemed to light the room from each panel. It wasn't for Noah to change the alert status- that belonged to the Captain and the Captain alone. But the itch of just wanting a taste of this giant brain, like a great turquoise silo of literally millions of bio-neural isolinear interfaces, with its programmable, alterable, hot-swappable matter all dormant and waiting to burst.
It was red button syndrome- push the consoles. Activate their holographic interfaces. Nope. Do not. Not on duty. The ship is on standby for a reason. Noah's fingers flexed at the desire. To control them he folded his lanky arms across his chest, covering up the words "SOJO" on a navy-colored short-sleeve. He chewed his lip and bounced on his heels. "Index" he stated with an almost adolescent waver, one eye wincing. That would go on record- obscure, minimal, but still. It would be there.
A hologram of a plain-looking woman in white clothes, no hair, and bright eyes appeared. "This is Index. How may I help?" The voice stated in the iconic voice of most Starfleet computers.
"Index..." Noah chewed his lip again, "What is the total storage capacity of the Starship Sojourner?"
The Index, which blinked, looked at the youth, "Starship Sojourner has an active memory capacity of 32,256 petabytes, or 31.5 exabytes," the Index stated while Noah guffawed, "... With a conditional reserve memory capacity of an additional 3.95 exabytes that can be brought online by order of the Chief Operations Manager, Chief Engineer or Commanding Officer. The estimated time of deployment of additional resources would be 30.23 standard minutes. Do you wish to engage additional resources now?"
Noah's mouth rounded and he raised his hands to brace, "No, no I was.. um... just-just curious." He fidgeted long fingers in front of his lip a few seconds later. He bounced on his heels. Enough indulging. "Uh, close Index." The image of the white-clas woman faded, "Th-thanks, by the way," Noah said to the vanishing apparition. It wasn't lost on Noah that this relatively small ship had almost ten times the memory and computing power of a Galaxy-class starship thirty years ago. He smiled his too-wide smile. Bio-neurals and quantum-rotation isolinear interfaces really had changed everything.
Noah pushed further into the darkness, passing large panels of translucent blue glass that, when activated, were holographic interface projectors and data monitoring stations. He ventured past the main control banks to the slate blue silo, made to look cool black by the light. Touching it, the wall was markedly colder than the surrounding air- enough that he left dissipating, foggy fingerprints. All of that brain-power had to be kept cool, and when on it generated a massive amount of heat. Computer core control rooms could get pretty warm during high-resource mission profiles and there was an informal agreement among systems engineers that no one was going to lose face if they needed to ditch a uniform jacket in here. A lot of t-shirts, much like the one Noah wore now, tended to flit around these spaces.
He eyed the door into the Holy of Holies- into the core itself. It was much like a silo, a cylinder with levels within for diagnostic work. And while Noah felt the urge to key in his access code, going so far as to lift fingers, he held off. But he did want in. It was a Christmas morning moment. And he was the little kid who'd toddled downstairs before his parents. He could rip open the presents, or he could head back to bed for a few more fitful hours of waiting.
Reverently Noah turned on his heel and slipped back into the dim light of the corridor, not looking at for some fear that it would entice him again. The doors closed behind him.
Down below on the planet the crew was wrapping up its revelries but, not knowing anyone and being too shy to engage the strangers who seemed to know one another quite well, Noah had chosen to come back up to the ship. Risa was... nice. It was like Earth. Or Deneva. But those were alien worlds to a kid who had grown up in the deep, dark outer system of Sol.
Normal to him was a deep black expanse of methanated water and ice, the occasional pass of a spotlight sweeping through the abyss to illuminate the blue and black of the deep ice of Enceladus. Invariably it was to ping a submersible from one of the agrarian bathyscaphes, bringing one shift of workers home for a while, while the next shift would board. Or occasionally, it would be a surface delivery from 50 kilometers above at Eilat Port Station.
Normal was the tawny gold and rusty bronze of the great Ringed Giant- strapping on a vacuum suit with a thruster pack and coursing through the chunks of fresh, white ices that made up its rings. The Gods loved it so much, they put a ring on it. Normal was the recreation centers on Titan, and the massive archives and collected technicals of Titan University.
Planets like Risa were the alien worlds- very pleasant yes but... not home.
Noah yawned at that and rubbed the corner of his eye. He passed through the empty, dark corridors that housed some of the junior officers and found his own bunk in the communal setting. His was up a short ladder and he still hadn't figured out exactly how to get in without tapping his head. He was too tall. The mattress was soft under him. He sighed and put an arm behind his head, scratching idly at his armpit. Then, circling fingers In the air, he decided to download and play some music from his compressed files. He pushed into his ears his personal buds and tapped them on.
With the small holographic he swiped through different music choices until he settled on one with a small smirk of amusement. He flicked and sent it to his earbuds. His eyes closed.
Post By:
Midshipman Noah Hyman Balsam
Systems Engineer
