The Most Horrific Plans

Posted on Mon Nov 4th, 2024 @ 3:59pm by Laurier Cami & Teresa Forrest & Jeassaho Kea (*)

Mission: Shackles
Location: Holo Room
1103 words - 2.2 OF Standard Post Measure

Jeassaho was bored of waiting for the senior crew members to decide who was going down to find the stash and who was staying which was why she was doing her second favourite Engineering activity other than fixing things which was going through plans for ships. She let out a cry of horror and laughter as she saw something that Teresa had left her labelled and she nearly propelled herself out of her seat to go into the main engineering carrying the offending item.

“Tree!” She bellowed laughing as she finally found Teresa with Cami. She stopped dead and held out the plans that had left her in horror and laughter at the same time. “What is this that you sent me?”

Teresa glanced over, then burst out in a snort giggle. "Oh, that thing? The USS Moar? Just a silly something I sketched up, figured you'd get a laugh out of it," Beat. "Though part of me does want to build something like that sometime, just to see what would happen. From a safe distance."

“Holodeck?” Jeassaho suggested raising an eyebrow in a challenging way at her as she passed the offending item to Cami so she could fully appreciate it. If Jeassaho was having to see it so was the younger engineer.

Cami gazed at the plans with squinted eyes, which then sharply widened. "Are you crazy? I mean...where would we even find that many nacelles!?"

"We can use the holodeck to create it." Jeassaho laughed looping her arm through the younger woman to pull her along as she started to confirm that the holo deck was free but with most people either in bed or working they were in luck. "Come on we can use the salvage engineering program I have to play with it."

"You're mad," Tree smirked, putting down what she had been doing and moving to follow along. "But then, I'm the one who came up with it, so I guess I shouldn't talk," she added with a grin. "Yeah we should be able to see if the design can achieve some semblance of functionality, in the holodeck."

Jeassaho grinned as she led the way to the holodeck. It was an old holo unit but it would work. Within moments she had created something that simulated a vast space dock orbiting a distant planet, surrounded by various spaceships and shuttles in pieces. The dock featured an expansive, zero-gravity construction bay with multiple robotic arms and drones for assembling. "Well, this is a little more in-depth than I needed," Jeassaho commented changing the scene to just an observation deck.

"In depth toys are the most fun to play with," Tree answered, cracking her knuckles and setting to work. She summoned a simulation Constitution class, before removing all the nacelles. She hummed a quiet tune to herself, bobbing along as she worked. Geometric readouts, angles, divided by the number of nacelles, removing the original warp core and gutting engineering, replacing it with a much beefier unit, as she hummed the theme to MacGyver.

The Betazoid looked confused at the humming as she watched the scene. "You could have chosen any ship." She pointed out glancing to Cami winking. She could not believe the chaos that she was seeing in front of her. Her Academy Instructors would be horrified.

"Well, the Constitution spaceframe is remarkably adaptable and sturdy, even among newer classes of ships. Plenty of space to fit a more powerful core. Structural integrity for days, these old girls are built to last. Plus, it's the technology I'm most used to," Tree offered with a shrug.

"I know that but it is hard seeing the old girl so...." Jeasaho did not really know how to describe seeing the ship she had called home for the last 6 years looking so different. "If only newer ships were built so sturdy." Jeassaho had been reading some news articles about the newer ships recently and she was glad she was not serving on them right now.

"Mutilated?" Tree completed the unfinished comment. She worked bobbing along to music only she could hear, whistling parts of its melody as she did, beefing up the holographic ship's structural supports, adding pylons in a staggered formation along the engineering hull, laying simulated conduits ...

"That's one word. But Rosie is how many years old now? We've already seen what can happen when the automation systems go haywire!" Cami sighed, trying not to laugh.

"150." Jeassaho said and touched what she hoped was a wall to offer some hushed words to the ship. "Don't listen to them Rosie. They are just jealous they won't be as beautiful at 150 years old." She said smiling at the pair giving up any pretense that she was sensible.

"Speak for yourself," Cami winked at her best friend. "So come on then, Tree. Convince me this isn't the most insane Ferengi-style sales pitch I've ever heard."

Jeassaho laughed as she returned to the console and looked at the chaos that was being created in front of her. She would need to send a picture of it all to Reuben when they were finished to make sure she was not the only one haunted.

When Tree was done with the veryjury-rigged looking modifications it was evidently clear that this experiment was just that; an experiment. Many an engineering truthism and safety regulation were bent and broken to create the absolute monstrosity before them. "As you know, power used goes up exponentially with every increase in speed. At some point, a regular warp nacelle just can't output a warp field strong enough to keep up with the increased requirements just to attain a certain velocity increase, even an incremental one. So the solution is more nacelles and a much more powerful warp core, right?" she ventured, stepping back to admire the grotesque atrocity she had created. "By my estimation, this should make the ship go twice as fast." That said, she activated the simulation, and -

"Simulation ended, catastrophic failure. Warp core exploded." the computer intoned as the trio found themselves standing in the familiar grid array of the holodeck again.

"Well," Teresa rubbed the back of her neck, looking sheepish. "In fairness, the theory is sound. We exploded twice as fast."

"That was... well... that was horrific but very quick," Jeassaho commented finally as she took it all in and shook her head. "I need a drink." She added already heading out the door to get rid of the memory of watching her favourite ship class end in explosion.