The Forrest for the Trees

Posted on Thu Sep 12th, 2024 @ 6:39pm by Curtis Vaan & Teresa Forrest

Mission: Shackles
Location: SS Mary Rose - Computer Control
Timeline: Shortly before "The Disaster"
1069 words - 2.1 OF Standard Post Measure

Curtis had spent most of the day shut away in the computer control room. As the automation hub of the ship and his usual workspace, that wasn't unusual. But the fact that the comms system had broadcast the entire library of personal logs to everyone on board, he was keen to remain sequestered. Particularly from a pair of likely unimpressed Romulan women.

Hearing the door open, he instinctively used a console to keep his body protected and peeked out of the side. "Whoever that is, I'm not here."

"Oh great, now I'm hearing voices, from people who claim they're not here," Teresa answered, followed by a quiet "What was in that drink I just had?"

"Okay, well, at least you're not here to kill me. So you can stay." His face screwed up slightly. "You any good with computers?"

"A bit, yes? Waddya need?" She emerged from around the bulkhead now, offering a hand in greet, along with what she believed was a winning smile,or perhaps a charming one. "Teresa Forrest, engineer. My friends call me Tree. Because of the pun."

"Tree...Oh! Because of Forrest! And a tree is in a forest...that's clever." Curtis nodded, thinking way too hard about that for a moment. "Wow, your parents must have been interesting folks." The off-hand comment was quickly dismissed in his own mind as he held a PADD up in the air vertically from behind the console. "Well, Tree Lady, as I'm sure you are aware, each and everyone on board is having their personal secrets broadcast all over the ship. Some of us would rather those secrets didn't see the light of day. So I'm trying to recompile the backups before I accidentally wipe the entire ship's log archive. Don't worry - it's a last resort." Another very long pause. Curtis poked his head out, up to about his nose. "Oh - me. Curtis. Computer guy. Hello."

"Ah, yes, I'd noticed something had gone - amiss, shall we say," Teresa had watched the man's antics with a sense of amusement. Fortunately she hadn't been affected by the logs being broadcast through the entire ship. Well, she had, but not in an embarrassing way, as she'd been too lazy to record anything embarrassing anyways. All her logs had been just little snippets about her work, mostly. One time her own laziness and procrastination benefited her. "Anything I can do to help? Though I'm more of a hardware kind of gal, software isn't my specialty."

Curtis scratched at his unkempt hair. "Oh, you're that sort of computer person. Well, aside from percussive persuasion, if you have a way to shut the comms system up without rendering us totally without a way of talking to each other or anyone else..." He glanced up hopefully. "I'm all ears."

"Well, typically if rolling back an earlier system restore point isn't feasible I'd close the subsystem a virtual machine and air-gap it, so I can try and figure out what the problem is without affecting the - erm, affected subsystem, but I don't think that's viable," Teresa furrowed her brows, rubbing her chin as she considered. "Way I figure is, there's a fault in the comms system. If we have an old restore point of the comms system without the fault we could try and upload that to a redundant system and channel that in before air-gapping the affected comms system. We'd only have minimal interruption in comms functionality while giving us ample time to figure out what the hell's going on with the faulty system."

"Yes." Curtis responded. He'd understood about 60-70% of what she was saying. "I totally agree. On all points." He tossed the PADD in his hand over one shoulder, ignoring where it clattered to as he sat cross-legged next to the console. "Thing is, this ship's software automation is all strung together like a, well, a Christmas tree. No pun intended..."

"Yeah, that's what I'm getting," Teresa answered, folding her arms over each other and leaning against a bulkhead. "Everything I said depends on finding a workable backup from before things got so screwed up. But the way everythingis strung together, I'm not sure I can fix this without taking everything down, at least for a while," She shrugged. "Unless you have a better idea?"

"I don't think the boss man will be happy if we lose comms. And I think Rivek will feel worse than anyone." Curtis frowned again, deep in thought. "The backups are in a manually separate unit...somewhere." He waved his hand behind him. "I don't know the exact details of where everything is physically kept. I just poke at things on the screen, you know."

"Sounds to me like we need to find those backups. I figure if we can keep basic comms functionality available, even if at reduced capacity, that should keep the boss happy?" Tree furrowed her brows, running her chin. "And if not, well, ask him what we he thinks should've done instead. I mean, if he thinks he knows how to fix this rats nest of a system better than us."

"If...if...if..." Curtis sighed, throwing up a vaguely frustrated flap of his arms. "I'd rather trust what I think. Not in vague hopes and desires." His nose wrinkled faintly. "Can you work out where those backup units are? I don't want any more dirty laundry flung in the face of everyone I live and work with..."

"But the dirty laundry is so funny," Tree could joke. She was fortunate that she was exceedingly lazy in recording her own private logs, as she tended not to, and what logs she had recorded were just musings about work. Complaints about people not leaving things where they should, mostly. "I kid, I kid. It's all very embarrassing and needs to be solved," she added in a more serious tone of voice as she moved towards a functional console. "Lemme go see if I can find something that'd work. Now if I were a backup comm suite, where would I hide ... "

Curtis watched her wander off with a mix of befuddlement and relief. As much as she might be able to help him figure the hardware out, he was far too flustrated to try to make friends with new people. Even ones with funny names.