Bypass, bypass, bypass

Posted on Mon Apr 16th, 2018 @ 11:28pm by Lieutenant Jaton Alyl & Lieutenant Hel Samedi

Mission: Of Machines and Men
Location: USS Victory, Main Engineering, Coder’s Cave

Eoin felt his eyes crossing. He’d honestly lost track of how long he’d been sitting cross-legged beneath his usual console to one side of main engineering, lovingly dubbed the Coder’s Cave by the crew because of its traditional association with the computer and AI specialists like himself. And the cave moniker was even more apt than usual, he thought, as the only illumination was currently coming from the panel open in front of him.

Eoin scanned the gel packs behind the panel to assess their status and see if they could take the extra power he was going to shunt through them to try and jumpstart main power. On the engineering deck at least. The scans looked good and the gel packs looked okay. He tapped his commbadge.

“Ensign Mac Liam to Lt Samedi,” he said.

"Samedi here, go ahead Mac Liam." came the reply.

“The relays at junction Alpha 7 Sigma look good. With your permission I’d like to reroute power through them to help restore main power.”

"Sounds good, Ensign, give it a try." Hel replied. "I'm almost done here, I'll come give you a hand in a minute."

“Understood.” Eoin closed the channel.

He took out a calibrator from his tool kit and made one last adjustment.

“Computer, bypass and shunt main power through junction Alpha 7 Sigma.”

The computer chirped. Nothing happened. Eoin exasperatedly ran a hand through his disheveled hair. “That should’ve worked,” he said to himself. “Diabhal!”

"I have no idea what that means but judging from the context I can venture a guess or two." offered Hel as she approached, flopping down on the floor next to Eoin. Even in the dim light she looked smudged, her hair haggard and a weary, almost exhausted expression on pale features. "No luck then?"

Eoin sighed. “No ma’am. Unless you noticed the lights come on as you were on the way over. I can’t imagine what went wrong. What’s going on in the rest of the ship?”

"Same struggles as you're having here." Hel rolled her shoulders. "I managed to get the sensors working, life support is going strong, my team is working on propulsion. Shields are next. Then weapons." She sighed, closing her eyes for a moment. "The lights and consoles over here are lower on the priority list than sensors and life support, considering what's going on."

She opened her eyes again and glanced over at Eoin's work. "I have an idea what might've gone wrong here. The pulse that disabled the ship fried many of our distributor nodes and smaller junctions and relays, sometimes the damage isn't visible and doesn't trip diags. I brought you some spare relays from the industrial replicator. Give 'em a try." she spoke, grunting a bit as she handed him the heavy pieces of equipment.

“Understood.” Eoin stood and took a short moment to stretch his legs. “I suppose the only thing to do is go through and check them manually.” He took the spare relays and put them in a bag that he had slung over his usual chair. He smiled, but didn’t know if Samedi could see his face. “But at least gets me out of the cave for a while. I honestly can’t tell you how long I had been sitting there.”

"Too long. Entirely too long." Hel put a hand on his shoulder for a moment before rising to her feet again with a wince. "We all have. This whole thing is FUBAR. I'll be happy to hit my bed come the night."

“You and me both, ma’am. Though I was hoping to contact my older brother in Paris tonight. He just opened a new art show.”

"That'll have to wait until everything else is working. We're not out of this yet. Far from." Hel mused. "You're a good man, Mac Liam. Get those lights working for me, ok?"

“Consider it done, ma’am,” Eoin said as he opened the Jeffries tube access panel behind his station. “Can you monitor me from here?”

A moment's pause, then a nod. "Sure, I can spare the time. Valeria should have the rest under control for now."

“Thank you, ma’am. I’m sure we can do this together.” And with that, he disappeared into the Jeffries Tubes, the relays on his back.