Dividing by Zero

Posted on Tue Dec 10th, 2024 @ 6:37am by Lieutenant Commander Rin & Lieutenant Commander S'hib & Lieutenant Nicholas Reece [Reece]

Mission: Season 6: Episode 5: A church beyond heaven
Location: Elysium
Timeline: Immediately after "Gathering Intel"
2139 words - 4.3 OF Standard Post Measure

Rin stormed through the docking umbilical, interfacing with Elysium's computer system the moment she was onboard.

How many passengers were on board when we departed Starbase 1?
How many died in the quantum filament accident?
How many have died since then?
What is the current crew and passenger complement?
How many berths were assigned at departure?

The numbers that ran through her data interface kept adding up correctly, but they were....odd. They were almost one hundred people short of maximum capacity when they departed. That was suspiciously low. Not that she expected the ship to be filled to maximum, but the number was...odd. And there were odd pauses in the flow of data, places where the computer should have been able to easily relay data. She couldn't quantify the problem, however. It was more of a... gut feeling, for lack of a better term.

Who was chief of engineering at our time of departure?
Who was chief of operations?
Who was chief of intel?

Yes, she did, in fact, query her own existence. Just in case.

She went through all the senior staff. Thankfully, the computer believed only the role of chief of flight control had been vacant.

If the records could be trusted.

Why shouldn't they be? It all added up.

Except that the captain they had just spoken to on the station believed at least 25 people had gone missing from his ship.

"Something's wrong with the numbers," Rin said out loud to Nicholas Reece as they headed toward the senior staff quarters. "I mean, there isn't, on the surface, but.... it's like I'm not asking the right questions. But I am asking the right questions. I think."

She looked a little sheepishly at Nicholas. "Sorry, you aren't hearing the conversation inside my head at the moment."

Nicholas gave Rin a friendly grin. "No worries, Ma'am. I talk things out in my head all the time." He paused a beat then asked, "Anything you'd like to share? Two heads are better than one, afterall." The reached the nearest turbolift as he finished speaking. He waited for Rin to enter first, then he followed her inside, moving to her left side, as they both turned back towards the now-closed car doors.

"I mean I'm interfacing with the computer system. Waaay faster than reading it on a screen," Rin clarified. "Everything adds up right. The crew we started with, minus those who died in the accident, or on the ice world, or elsewhere, plus the few people we've picked up, it all adds up. But, according to records, we didn't start with a full complement, although there's margin for error. But... I'm looking at the empty positions. There's a handful of highly questionable absences... like the lack of a chief of flight control. There's a couple fairly critical positions in engineering which were open as well. We've lost lots of people, critical people, since the accident. But these positions, according to the computer data, were never filled in the first place. Why would we have done that?"

Nicholas considered what Rin had said for a few seconds, then replied, shaking his head as he did so. "While I don't know her personally, I doubt the Commodore would have done so. Nor do I think that Fleet Personnel allowed it to happen either. It's not like there is a personnel shortage currently, or that we're on the losing end of a galactic war." He paused a few beats, then continued. "This issue of forgetting seemed to begin shortly after we docked with this station. Logic therefore dictates that the issue is located on that station."

"Or we just started noticing it then, although the fact that at least one other ship is having the same problem supports your conclusion," Rin acknowledged.

There was a long pause as the turbolift whisked them toward their destination.

"We're missing two people from Intel," Rin said plainly.

Another pause.

"Records indicate we were two people short when we departed from Starbase One, and I have no idea if that's true, or if we've just forgotten them."

Rin subtly bit her lip, a tell she had developed over the last few months as her emotional inhibitor chip was breaking down. She was trying to put on a brave face, trying not to show the emotion that was creeping through her brain.

Nicholas was silent for a rew beats, then asked, "Maybe we are looking at this the wrong way....what if we compare the missing, who should be here, with the list of those lost during the crossing, and those we lost on the ice planet?"

"I'm not following. We don't know who's missing. The empty spaces were not filled by people who have recently died, if that's what you're asking."

Nicolas paused, realizing that Rin was right. He grimaced slightly. "Sorry, Ma'am. I forgot for a moment the fact that our database seems to have been changed without our doing, along with our own memories." He shook his head again. "I've never experienced something like this before. It's a bit....disconcerting, to say the least." He paused to take a breath, as he tried to clear his head. He then looked at his department head. "I think, your original idea of checking the currently unassigned cabins, will be the only way to start figuring this out. At the very least, it could eliminate another option in figuring out this mystery."

Rin turned to look at Nicholas, a bit perplexed. "Did I?" She paused, trying to remember. "What would we gain from that?"

Nicholas paused, a frown creasing his features. "You did Ma'am, before we came back aboard the ship. It was your idea to check the unassigned quarters of the senior staff, to try and figure out why we couldn't remember who the chief flight officer was, before Maxine had been elevated to the position recently."

"Oh, that is clever. Sure it wasn't your idea?"

The turbolift paused and the doors opened, allowing the pair access to the senior officer quarters. Rin quietly repeated the name of each officer as she passed their doors until she came up short for one of the quarters. "Computer, who is assigned to these quarters?"

"Indicated quarters are unassigned."

"Open doors on my authority."

The door obediently slid open.

The first room was, indeed empty. Its previous occupant had either consciously moved out, or someone had removed an entire room's worth of possessions, which seemed far less likely.

Same with the second room.

The third door, however, slid aside to reveal furnished quarters. Rin checked with the computer again to verify the room was unassigned, which it acknowledged. No sign of a struggle. It looked as if its owner had simply gone to work one day and never came back.

She tapped her badge. "Rin to security. I need a forensics team at my location."

S’hibs voice came booming through the comms almost immediately, =/\= “A forensic team?” =/\= He snorted, already rising from his desk and stomping out into the main security office. =/\= “I’m on my way…” =/\= he added, barking orders to his team just as the comms cut


----- Ten minutes later -----


“Commander?” S’hib asked, his loud voice carrying down the corridor as he hurried towards the pair, the forensic team tailing somewhat behind his stride.

“Whats going on?” He asked again, feeling an odd sense of familiarity with this specific corridor for reasons he didn’t fully understand.

"We think we're missing crew, and we think nobody's noticing because we've all forgotten about them," Rin explained. "Computer's forgotten about them too. So, we started searching quarters the computer believes are unassigned. This is one of those rooms. Our theory is that our former chief of flight control, the one before the recently promoted Maxine McKull, occupied these quarters. These are the belongings of someone we've all somehow forgotten. We need to know who they were and what happened to them, and so far this room provides the only evidence of their existence."

S'hib stared at Rin as she spoke, it seemed far-fetched but he trusted her judgement; plus it wasn't like her to pull a theory out of thin air without good cause, which concerned him greatly.

"The church is a big place, with a lot of ships docked... I could understand people going missing, what I can't understand is the memory loss." He frowned, his eyes flicking over to the open door and the quarters beyond.

A wave of familiarity washed over him, warm and happy, tugging at memories that should have been there... and then his heart went cold, filling with a deep unknowing sadness.

"Wait I know these quarters..." He stuttered out, a soft frown creased into his brow, showing an air of confusion across his normally staunch features.

"I've been here many times," S'hib added before stepping hurriedly inside, heading for the open room.

"You... have?"

There was a moment of pause for Rin. She wasn't sure what would come of finding this room, but that certainly was not on her list of possibilities. She hurried after S'hib, although his long strides easily out-distanced her short legs. "What..."

She came up short at the sight of S'hib sitting on the edge of a bed, holding, of all things, a teddy bear. Suddenly, she felt like she was intruding. However, they really didn't have time to be sentimental.

"You... remember who was assigned to these quarters?" she asked.

Nicholas entered the quarters after both Rin and S'hib. His eyes moved around the cabin with interest. While he didn't remember who the cabin belonged to, he also was not feeling any familiarity with anything that he was seeing. Until, that is, when his eyes landed on a small holo imagery. The image it was displaying was of a pair of young Boslics, possibly siblings. The young woman did spark a feeling of vague familiarity, with her big grin and bright pink pigtails.

He picked up the imager, and carried it over to Rin, who was facing the Security Chief, who was currently sitting on a bed, clutching a teddy bear. In a quiet voice, he spoke to his department head. "While I still can't remember a name....I feel very strongly, that this cabin belonged to this woman."

Rin examined the image. It didn't ring any bells with her. She couldn't remember a conversation with her, or looking at a file with her image on it, or sitting opposite her in a meeting. With that grin, the pigtails, and general demeanor, Rin was willing to guess this was a woman who stood out one way or another. This was not a wallflower. Yet, she could not remember a damn thing about her even existing.

"I'll take your word for it." Rin replied quietly to Nicholas. "S'hib clearly has deep feelings for this person. You have strong feelings this is the correct answer. I... do not. But feelings have never been my strong suit. Whatever is causing this clearly affects memory and computer records, but emotions, apparently, don't work quite the same way. Unfortunately, there are very few people on board to whom I have a strong emotional attachment. So I'm going to trust your gut."

Nicholas nodded slowly, giving Rin a soft, saddened smile. He knew that she had been on the Elysium longer than he had, and she hadn't formed any close friendships yet? He made a decision, then and there, to change that. Once they got past the current crisis, that is. He then looked over at Commander S'hib. "Sir?" He stepped forward, gently placing his right hand on the other's left shoulder. He lifted the image so the Sequus officer could see it better. "Do you recognize either individual in this holoimage, Sir?"

S'hib took the photo, holding it as gently as his cloven fingers would allow. The first thing he noticed was her hair, it was the same colour as what was braided into his own, and mostly was the very same hair.

"No..." S'hib said softly, the very word feeling like a betrayal.

"But I should because we are mane bonded..." He added as he turned his head towards Nicholas and Rin, showing the braided length dangling to one side.

"The importance of such an act for my people is... I should remember."

He blinked, looking back at the photo he held against the bear on his lap. Whoever this was, it felt sacrilegious that he couldn't remember them

"I'd like a moment alone please, this is quite upsetting for me."

Rin nodded. "We'll be outside. We're going to need to start searching more quarters."

Nicholas followed Rin out, giving Commander S'hib the time he requested to think and try to figure out why the cabin seemed familiar to him.