Making Two Into One

Posted on Sat Dec 31st, 2016 @ 9:51pm by Captain Tim Williams & Lieutenant Griffen Tanol & Lieutenant Commander Horatio Hawke

Episode: Lost Property
Location: USS Highlander - Rear Bridge Station
Timeline: MD05

Hawke furrowed his brow and nodded like he was following everything the chief engineer was saying. For some of the time, he did understand what she was saying, but the rest of the time was spent wishing he'd taken those advanced quantum physics courses back at the Academy.

Too late for that now, though. He stood up straight and held out a hand, palm facing the chief. "Stop, stop, stop. Chief, stop," he said, trying to keep his exasperation out of his voice. "You're talking to a pilot here, not a physicist. Can you say all that again, but this time pretend you're talking to a jumped-up shuttle jockey."

"Right. So a bomb went off as the ship went into warp. Combined with the radiation infused in the hull from the region among other things, it created a duplicate in another level of phase." Grif said pointing at the wall panel showing the two different ships, well same ship, just on different levels of phase. "So we need to duplicate the effects in some way. The only thing we have on board that could tear a hole in subspace is a tricobalt. So I'm saying we take one of those, put it next to the ship on our phase, run up her warp engines as we flood the area with radiation. We blow the warhead as we focus the warp field on the ship, with the radiation it SHOULD tear a hole in subspace and break the bond between the two ships. This would cause them to merge... I think."

Hawke grimaced and shook his head. "This is where you lose me," he said. "If we detonate a warhead - tricobalt or otherwise - isn't there a risk that we lose both ships?"

"Yes and no. A tricobalt inherently rips a hole in the layers between subspace that's why they're so powerful and why we can only fire them with a captains authorization or higher. Now a warp engine creates a subspace bubble around the ship, distorting the space time continuum allowing us to move at faster than light speeds. If we focus the warp bubble around the ship right next to the tricobalt device as well as flooding the area with the same radiation, it will rip a hole in subspace whilst recreating the effects that caused the ships to split in the first place. Best hope it will merge the two ships back together in a similar manner in how they were split, but a more likely answer is it will destroy the De Salle on one of the planes of existence, but it should leave the other ship intact. I don't know which one will be left, but even if it is the one that is out of phase, without its partner in our phase we should be able to bring it through the new rift we'll create." Grif explained as she tried to make it a bit more... well less engineery speak and more normal speak and explaining her idea a bit better.

"Okay..." Hawke said, processing the explanation and trying to see if he could identify any holes in it. "It definitely sounds like it could work, though it goes without saying that we'll have to hope that Jean and Ryan can come up with a way of beaming the crew of the DeSalle over here before we try this. Let's set up some simulations - I want to see if the computer agrees with you that it's workable before we present the plan to the captain."

"It will work. No matter what happens, merge or breaking of the bond, there will be one ship left when the fallout clears. Shiny and new or old and rundown that remains to be seen." Grif said with a shrug, "But you're right. The Captain wont go for it off of my word alone." The dark hair trill played at the console in front of her, hands playing across its smooth surface. "Okay... Tricobalt... warp field... we'll have to estimate the radiation density so a few simulations will probably help us get that down to a science." She muttered to herself as she input the different parts of their little experiment into the computer. "Anddd running." She said as she hit the final button to run the simulations.

"You're not all that optimistic they'll merge are you?"

"Not really," Hawke admitted. "I mean, aside from the fact that we're using a high-yield explosive device, which tends to do more destruction than correction, the two ships have had two hundred years to diverge. Wouldn't that cause issues in a merging? An old, battered hull trying to merge with a nearly-new hull? I just don't see how the two could be reconciled."

"Well Commander, you know what the great Montgomery Scott once said? Starfleet captains are like children. They want everything right now and they want it their way. But the secret is to give them only what they need, not what they want. Either way this works, we'll give the Captain what he wants and that's a single DeSalle." Grif shrugged as she watched the simulations run out, "Truthfully I'm hoping for a merge because it'd make a great paper on phase shifting but... realistically I think your viewpoint is the more practical one."

"And Engineers are just like Doctors; always eager to write up a paper for every mishap," Hawke responded with a grin. "Let's see how the simulations play out. I may just be being pessimistic for nothing."

"Either way makes for a good story. 'Remember that time we blew up a ship in two different levels of phase?! Yeah me too that was cool.'" Grif laughed.