Data, Data, Analysis, Analysis

Posted on Tue Jun 1st, 2021 @ 3:23pm by Captain Abigail Laurens & Commander Ichiko Gail & Lieutenant Alexis Aenera

Mission: Pathstone to History
Location: Science Lab 1

They came through. The Dalacari were definitely back on the good side of Alexis as she all but rubbed her hands together as she made her way to her lab. Five hundred years of history or what would have BEEN history of the system they were in. Very few people would have been as excited as she was about this, even as they dreaded the situation at hand. But Alexis wasn't normal. Hell, anyone who saw her knew THAT right away.

The first thing she did as she entered wasn't turning on the lights, that happened automatically, but she placed the PADD and the datacard on her lab table and immediately turned to the mirror and blanched in disgust. She'd not messed with her hair in the staff meeting and it was... Bad. Bad was a soft word for it and she went to work to rapidly repair the damage, at least to a semi-acceptable level, by using her fingers to comb through it initially, then sighing and pulling a brush out of a drawer and turning back towards the table.

The datacard went into the table's data slot and she punched up the timeline data and set it to run at a rate of five seconds per year and sat back to watch what would be over forty minutes of just planets going around the star. To pass the time, she idly began to brush her hair. By the time the first run-through had ended, she'd straightened everything out and her hair was was silky smooth. She sighed in relief as she patted it down and then reached out to input the new planet.

This time, she set the program to take the new input, which she input a 'standard' Class M mass setting for what they'd observed the size to be. A gravity sink and how it could affect the rest of the star system, as well as simulating the rest of the gravity wells by the information she'd been given for the local planets and planetoids. She reset the simulation to twenty years prior to the appearance, then let it run at ten second per year and settled back again to watch intently, a PADD in her hands now to take notes in shorthand.

These next forty-five minutes passed in silence as she took her notes and saw the same alteration of the last planet's orbit that the Dalacari had noted, regaining a stable orbit slightly closer to the star. Further out, she noted a cluster of comets changing their course about a hundred and twenty years down the line and setting themselves up to be swept in-system another forty years later. She made a list of various things that should be brought to the Dalacari's attention, the comets being the only thing that really could be a danger.

"So, not much bad going on..." She muttered to herself, then set herself to the process of isolating the 'new planet' and reset the simulation to a year before its arrival and started running it on a one month-one second then zoomed in. It wasn't more than a handful of seconds that she blanched, then dialed it down to an hour per second and re-ran for about a minute.

Shaking, she reached out to the comm, "Bridge Science Station, this is Alexis.. We've got sensors, right? I need a max zoom on the planetary subject. Get me visuals on atmospherics as best you can, try for a gas analysis, see if we can get a map of the continental masses, oceans, lakes, the like."

=/\= Scans are on in progress and will be routed to you =/\=

Alexis leaned back in her chair and took a deep breath. When she'd commented to the doctor that a humanitarian crisis was most likely, she'd not anticipated the destruction she'd seen on her simulation. If it were right, within a few months, the system might have the beginning of a new asteroid belt that would take several centuries or millennia to form.

A light in front of her began to flash for her attention and she tapped it to expand it and saw a static image of the part of the planet visible to them, caught wonderfully in a full hemisphere. The image wasn't the best and she knew she couldn't zoom in far enough to really see any damage caused by earthquakes, yet. Instead, she traced along major landmasses and potentially unique landmarks, then brought up the database for Federation planets, including typically uninhabited planets, just to be thorough and began to run it through it.

As the computer began to slowly spit out potential matches, Alexis ran her fingers through and around her hair, putting it up into a bun to contain it, then as she compared the potentials began removing them from the queue, seeing differences such as a lake that was missing, a mountain range that was gone, forests that shouldn't be present or other features. At the end of the fifteen minutes, none of the 'matches' remained and she sighed. "Dead end..." She reviewed her criteria and pursed her lips, then added in another category.

Under a minute later, her leg was jittering under her as she reviewed the single potential match, then reached out slowly and hit the comm on her table as she enlarged the image of the whole planet in her file as a holo, "Captain Laurens, Commander Gail? Can I have you two down to Science Lab One, please? This might just be kindof urgent." She duplicated the planet and began to input gravitational data from the current 'situation' the planet was in and began to run that simulation to get a feel for what could be happening, IF this was indeed what she thought it was.

It was a minute or so before Ichiko arrived, a mug of tea in her grasp as the science station doors opened. The resident rabbitess cast her glance around the section, noting the various machines, computation engines, and various holograms. "Hmmm, your team seems to be absent. Call my memory what you will, but I distinctly recall you being assigned to work on this task with a group.."

"Yes, well, umm.." Alexis waved towards her table, "I haven't gotten this to them yet, but for this particular aspect of the research, here was the best place to simulate orbital mechanics and system-wide gravitational effects." She kept most of the panic out of her voice, "And then I had the idea to get what we could visually from the planet and compared it to our database of planets in the Federation and I found which one it was." She offered as a counterpoint, "Well, it matches to within three percent from the visible landmasses and oceans, which is close enough."

Ichiko shook her head, "Yes, here. As opposed to the holodeck? Or Astrometrics?" the rabbitess turned towards Abigail. "Apologies, but it's a little too overwhelming here. A little too busy for the comfort of my disability." she offered with a slightly lowered glance. "I'll tend to the rest of the team, bring them up to speed, check on their progress. We'll be in Astrometrics."

"It is better than Astrometrics, yes, or the holodeck. It has a mirror." Alexis interjected quietly.

Abigail walked into the Science lab, first noting Ichiko's expression, one she had never quite seen before. Something of a cross between anger and pain. The second thing she noted was the absence of the others. "Lieutenant?" she queried softly, tilting her head slightly to one side as she turned toward Alexis.

“Yes, Captain?” Alexis said brightly, turning a bright smile and presentable hair towards Abigail, trying to put Ichiko’s semi-interrogation behind her, “Guess what? I think I know which planet this is, or was, or would have been if it weren’t going to most likely get torn apart by the seismic activity that’s rippling through it.”

Abigail glanced around the lab again. "You seem to be missing a few members of your team," she said quietly, her voice remaining perfectly calm and steady. "I assume they've gone to the bathroom or to refresh their drinks, shall we wait for them to return before we proceed?"

Alexis had opened her mouth to reply before something in the back of her head told her that she was in extreme danger and she closed it again before anything came out. She shook her head slowly, “Nnno, ma’am, I umm…” She had a brilliant though that if she told the Captain she had planned on using herself as a control group to see if the others would come up with the same result, but no. That would backfire spectacularly. “No, ma’am.” She repeated, “I’m here, by myself..” The volume of her voice was very low.

"I see." Two simple words portrayed a multitude of unspoken words. Abigail clasped her hands behind her back, her eyes never leaving Alexis' face. "So, please, explain to me which part of my order to work with Commander Meyers, Commander Gunnison and Commander Rozia was interpreted as leave them in the dark while you hide here in your lab on some kind of solo crusade?" Again, Abigail's voice remained calm, yet every word reverberated with disappointment.

Panic. Hairs raised on the backs of Lexi's arms and a chill ran down her spine as she frantically tried to come up with an answer other than what (to her) was the outright truth. One that the Captain wouldn't see as sheer, unadulterated ego, even though.. No, truth. 'Tell her what you were thinking, that'll make it less bad.' She reminded herself.

Alexis took a deep breath, then met the Captain's eyes, "Because they would get in my way." She said solemnly, paused only half a heartbeat because she HAD to get the whole explanation out before the Captain blew up, shot her and threw her out an airlock, "I know it sounds bad, but you're talking about an engineer, a security officer and an operations officer. What this is," She gestured briefly towards the simulation, the map, the other several images cluttering up the workspace in front of her, "Is astrophysics. It's science on a planetary and system level that none of them can make proper sense of. I know you and they all think that the important thing is to identify who they are and where they came from, and yes, that's important, but that affects a SINGLE world. I see what happened and I see an entire planetary system potentially getting thrown out of order and several worlds affected or destroyed."

Lexi sat straighter in the chair, "Yes, the Dalacari said that they checked it out and it would only affect a single planet and yes, for the existing worlds, this was a very fortunate situation, even looking at a century and a half in the future, the biggest other effect will be a comet cluster altering course to bring it in-system, but if I had the three Commanders in here with me, they'd be pointing to other things that have absolutely nothing to do with what is happening to that planet. It's not their fault, they're just not scientists." Her eyes turned pleading, "Without me there, they've got brains and can work on identifying the planet faster, finding potentially other more technical ways that a planet could be moved here from the Federation, or finding how an alien world could even be from OUTside the Federation if it was pure coincidence. Aside from being a science officer, I'm just a Lieutenant. And I know everyone here thinks I'm a joke, you don't have to say it, I'm not that much of an airhead. I love science, Captain."

"I don't want to hear another word Lieutenant," the same tone of disappointment was evident in Abigail's voice. "Come with me." Without saying another word, Abigail turned on her heel and started walking out of the science lab.

Alexis reached out and swiped the data from her table over to the PADD she'd put in the data port and grabbed it, then immediately followed the Captain, mouth shut.