Another indecent proposal

Posted on Wed Jan 12th, 2022 @ 7:25am by Lieutenant JG Miraj Derani & Lieutenant Myne Redal

Mission: Season 5: Episode 3: CAPETOWN
Location: Flight Control Department
Timeline: MD14 1400
1469 words - 2.9 OF Standard Post Measure

//ON//

*Alright kid, we got this far. Now we have walls without a foundation so... this will suck if we don't land this mark!* Myne mused to herself to help ease her nerves. A lot of new things happened today. Lots of new things, so many new things, all the new things? Or people, lots of those. Myne met and talked with so many new people and got way out past the safety of her comfort bubble for this. But the idea, the principle of it, the promised rewards of such an endeavor, not to mention the excitement, made it all worth it.

Oh yes, lots of excitement. She could feel goosebumps on her skin just thinking about it. Myne licked her lips unconsciously and hugged her custom, ancient PaDD tightly to her stomach. Federation AI tech, and she will be able to dismantle, reassemble, modify, learn, adapt, create, her brain already furiously working in overdrive mode just imagining countless hours spent each day working herself to exhaustion to unravel such precious new knowledge.

Shaking herself awake, quite a bit aware of how she might have looked sitting still and daydreaming in front of the door, she pressed the button finally. A chime announcing her intent of entering into the Chief Flight Control Officer's, well, office.

The chime died away after a moment, leaving nothing but silence behind. The moments ticked on stretching the silence. And just as it was starting to get oo long, there was the sound of running feet, and Miraj burst around the corner, out or breath. For a moment, she leant on her knees, trying to catch her breath. "Sorry, ma'am. I was down in the flight simulator."

Myne actually waited patiently, even as the minutes ticked by. If anything she was humming a Super Garrett song she wrote and was really getting into the chorus by the time Miraj arrived suddenly, scaring Myne a bit and making her yelp!

"What?! You came totally out of nowhere!! I thought you were inside!! Wait. Erm, do I know you? Do you have a meeting with Ensign Derani? Are you by chance Ensign Derani?" Myne's flurry of words served to help calm herself down after the quick scare.

"Yes!" Miraj said, breathing a bit easier. "Yhat's me, ma'am. Avalon said you were here. I wasn't expecting anyone, I don't usually get visitors, and i never use this place anyway, so I had to run from the other end of the ship, sorry to keep you waiting." She managed to get in a full lungful of air, and straightened up.

"Wait? Avalon told you I was here? Damn nosy snitch she is!" Myne said and made a very theatrical gesture with her hand. "Anyway, nosy AI's aside. I wish to discuss a very important subject with you. The Lethe shuttle, the medical one. I need your approval to tinker with its computer systems. Long story short, I want to build a EMH from the ground up more or less and I would like to install it on the Lethe. Provided you sign off on it." She explained smiling a bit nervously as she looked at the winded Miraj. "It will certainly help you recover faster when you run back here from the other end of the ship!"

Miraj looked at Myne. There was no reason she could fathom to build an EMH from scratch when they could just download one. Then again, people said that about flying manually when the computer could do it. "Will it want to try and pilot the ship?"

Myne shook her head. "Nope. It will be an adaptive EMH in the mind of a first responder. Hopefully one able to adapt on the fly to newly encountered species much more easily. And only limited to medical operations, nothing more. I don't plan on giving it much of a personality or autonomy beyond that."

Tension she didn't know she was carrying, slipped out of Miraj, and shescrunche her bare feet into the carpet, seeking out sensations of the ship. "Well, in that case, I've no objections, but as its technically a medical ship, I guess Dr Sthilg would need to sign off as well?"

"Thank you Ensign. Of course the doctor will be notified when the time comes. For now, I got approval from the XO to do it without informing Dr. Sthilg. This is meant as a surprise. Provided he will accept it when its done. If not, at least I will have a strange new type of EMH ready to be used whenever it is needed!" Myne replied smiling excitedly.

Miraj nodded, though privately she wasn't reassured. If someone wrote an autopilot for one of her ships and installed it without asking, she'd not be very happy. But the lieutenant seemed excited. "Is it going to be nicer than the usual one. He's very grumpy."

Myne nodded eagerly. "Well kinda. It's not really gonna have a personality really, not in the sense of the old EMH model. It will be adaptable to the situation and the crew, as well as new contacts it will have to engage with. Which means less conflictual and more focused on the medicine and efficiency."

Miraj nodded along. "Sounds like you've got it all figured out, ma'am."

"Me? Naaah, just flying by the end of my breeches? Is that a saying you fliers use? I am just making stuff up as I go. Can you show me the shuttle? Where it is parked? Might as well go say hello to it if I am going to be poking inside of it!"

"Her," Miraj corrected with a smile, beckoning for Myne to follow with a smile, "Lethe's a girl. Don't let her hear you calling her an it. She'll get huffy." Miraj's office wasn't far from the main flight deck.

"Right, her. Sorry, I was not aware the shuttle already had an onboard AI." Myne apologized as she followed after Miraj. "Do not worry, I will not offend her. Can I tweak her personality matrix a bit to make her less prone to be offended? Since such emotions in an AI or EMH can cause disruptions with normal operations!"

"Oh Lethe doesn't have an AI," Miraj explained. "I mean the ship herself."

Myne stopped to look at Miraj with a obviously scared and concerned expression. "Wait, are you telling me, that the ship is alive?"

"All ships are alive," Miraj said as the door the the main shuttle bay opened. "You just have to get the feel of them. Most people don't bother. She's over there." Miraj pointed to the runabout, a danube class in the traditional white of starfleet, a grey cadeuceus picked out towards the rear over her registry.

That statement, all ships are alive, froze Myne's blood in her veins. And it took a tremendous force of will to not run away in a panic and struggle to keep the panic from showing on her face. Trembling slightly she willed one foot in front of the other. "Alive you say, all of them?" She swallowed hard and meekly, deflated, timid and afraid followed after Miraj. "T-thank you. I guess I'll go talk to her." Myne was already tapping on her PaDD holding an unsteady smile on her lips as she furiously was preparing a program to set up an emergency transporter retrieval of her in case Lethe, the shuttle, decided to kill her.

Miraj lead the way over and opened Lethe's door, not picking up on the trill's discomfort. "So here we are. Main computer terminal is there. Everything over that line and that line," she pointed to two maroon lines in the carpet, fore and aft, "is part of the main craft, everything inside the lines is part of the interchangeable section. Not that it gets changed on this ship, so its okay to crosswire. Isn't she lovely?"

"Uh huh. She yes." Myne said and swallowed hard, afraid to say anything else as not to anger the sentient, alive shuttle. "I think I got it from here. Thank you Ensign. Erm, I will scream... call if I need anymore help." She did her best to remember everything Miraj told her, it might save her life if she angered the sentient spacecraft.

"Okay. If I'm not back on the bridge, I'll be in the simulators." Miraj patted the bulkhead. "Be good," she told Lethe, and skipped out.

"T-thank you. Be seeing you." The Trill replied in almost a whimper as she saw Miraj tell the shuttle to be good. She could feel a chill down her spine as she looked at the shuttle with renewed terror that she was doing her best to mask. If someone had told her that ships and shuttles were alive, maybe she would have not started this project.

//OFF//