If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them....maybe you can hire The B-Team.

Posted on Wed Feb 8, 2023 @ 9:58am by Lieutenant Penelope Naroot & Lieutenant Commander Miguel Torres & Lieutenant Commander Zachary Addams & Lieutenant JG Ardal King & Lieutenant JG Sydney Friedman Jr & Fleet Captain Rhea Kennit

1,656 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: We Will Take Care of You
Location: Briefing Room

Penny sat at the conference table, eyes glued to the mirrored tabletop. She heard the doors open and looked up as people started filing in.

Zach and Sydney walked in together. Zach didn't look at Penny but sat down across from her so she was in his line of sight. Sydney went to the other side of the table and sat across from Zach, next to Penny.

Torres walked in and saw the others. He nodded in greeting as he took his seat and waited for the others to enter. His face was clearly one of frustration.

King came in after the rest, taking a position towards the other end of the table.

The Captain entered a few minutes later, silent and tense. She was the very definition of controlled rage as she walked to her seat at the table and sat. "Status on restoration of control to ship's systems?" she asked.

Penny licked her lips nervously. "Ineffective," she said. "Whatever they've done, it's been spread out and buried so deep I'm not sure we'll find all of it, and what little I've found I can't access. I haven't given up though."

Kennit's expression didn't shift. "In other words, we are effectively hamstrung. All right. Mr. Torres!" she said as she turned her gaze toward the Engineer. "Our Valkyrie craft are not connected to the Victory's computer systems. I have already taken the initiative to verify that no hostile forces were able to gain access to any of the Valkyrie as they are maintained in a separate, high security hanger for safety purposes. This means, none of the Valkyrie have been compromised by enemy activity. I need you to get together with whichever Engineers you need, and swap out the torpedoes currently loaded on five of our Valkyrie fighters and replace the standard weapons load of four photon torpedoes per ship to two quantum and 2 tri-cobalt torpedoes. The other three, load them with quantum torpedoes so that they can be launched and take up defensive positions around the Victory. The five which will carry tri-cobalt torpedoes will be prepped for launch as well. As soon as they are ready, we will utilize a Borg transwarp conduit to get ahead of the enemy ship and then drop out and engage them. They may have gotten a look into my head, but that won't help them with the control algorithms which operate and direct the conduits. The transport system is not part of what is implanted into my skull, and without Borg technology, the system won't respond to any command. Once we engage them, they can stand down and return to their planet, or if necessary I'll fly one Valkyrie personally straight into their warp nacelle and drag them to hell with me. We cannot allow them to reach Earth. I want those Valkyrie ready for launch yesterday."

"We may not have time," Penny said. "If the other androids in Alpha Quadrant are making similar overtures to other Federation ships, stopping this one may not be enough."

"What do you suggest Penny? We can't just float here and do nothing." Miguel asked. He had thought of every possible way to undo the damage that was done. He had totally wiped the core, but that didn't work. He shut off the main core and transferred the controls to the secondary core, but all that seemed to do was give them minimal systems.

"Well, that's why you're all here," Penny said. "They've been using my letters home as intelligence on the crew. They've made their projections and anticipations based on that. Everyone in this room, with the exception of the Captain, are the people I know the least on board. So...we need your ideas, because that's going to be what the androids can anticipate the least."

"Well," Sydney said, "from what I hear, they've been anticipating how we'd try to stop them. What if we surrendered? Throw them off and make them second-guess their next moves? Then we can try moving against them once we've bought some time."

"Or we could take one of them, open up her circuits and hit them from the inside," Zach said, now looking at Penny. "You know...assuming we can get ahold of one."

“We are running out of time.” the Captain said. “There is an old adage which applies here I believe. We must act and right now I believe cutting the head off the snake is likely our best course of action.”

"But...who's the head of the snake?" Sydney said. "The representative we were meeting with?"

“Right now the snake is that ship and the androids aboard.” Kennit said. “They pose an immediate threat to the Federation. We swore an oath to defend the Federation, and that is what we must do.”

"So....that's exactly what we shouldn't do," Zach said.

“We can not sit back and watch as they do this.” Kennit snapped.

"Lieutenant Naroot says the androids are prepared for anything you think of," Zach said. "So if you say our best bet is to attack their ship, that's the last thing we should do. Maybe instead of the head of the snake, we restrain the body. Only question is how..." He looked at Penny. "Who built these things anyway?"

That question intrigued Torres as he looked over at Penny and waited for her answer.

Penny gave a half shrug. "The Makers were a highly evolved species from the Andromeda Galaxy. They were wiped out centuries ago by an all-consuming force called The Totality. The androids are all that's left of their culture, and at this point, even that's faded."

"So...presumably they have an 'off' button?" Sydney asked.

Penny squirmed in her seat a bit. "I mean...I don't know if it's a literal 'off' button..."

"Well, if I was creating a race of androids for servitude, I'd make sure to install an emergency shutoff in case something goes wrong," Sydney said.

Penny squirmed a bit more as if her seat had become uncomfortable. "The original androids were equipped with an emergency shutoff, yes."

"Well, if they're left over from all those centuries ago, they would repair themselves, but may not think to remove the feature...or may not be able to. And, if all they had were their Makers' original blueprints, then second generations might be stopped the same way."

"That's...possible," Penny said, ignoring Zach's stare. "But even if we could get to their 'off buttons', the moment we deactivated one, the others would know." She thought it over. "Still, it probably wouldn't be something they'd expect us to try."

"From what I gather, we've tussled with these androids before?" Zach said, looking around for confirmation. "How did we beat them last time?"

"We didn't. The issue was solved by the rapid unplanned disassembly of the rogue vessel and it's crew, which resulted in the remaining rogue ship retreating back to their planet." Kennit said in a dry but, pointed tone of voice.

"Originally, when Captain Kirk first encountered them, they used illogic and a sense of humor," Penny said. "Since then, the androids have made an adaptive subroutine that files all that under, well, basically 'dumb human stuff.'"

King gave a snort of laughter. "Must be a big file."

Sydney's large, hazel eyes twinkled with mirth and she giggled as well. "I can just imagine their confusion, seeing someone like Captain Kirk rutsching around like that. It must have confused them no end." She suddenly sat up. "Stupid human stuff....I know what we can do..." She looked towards Penny. "How long would it take you to adjust the environmental controls on deck ten to these specifications?" She began typing rapidly into her seat's terminal.

Penny looked at the screen by her seat and took a nanosecond to think it over. "Approximately forty-seven minutes."

Sydney nodded. "Okay. Commander?" she looked at Torres. "Can you adjust our engine efficiency down to 84%?"

(Tag Torres)

"Yes, down. Trust me." Sydney turned to King. "How fast can you reconfigure the sensor array to pick up transwarp conduits within the sector?"

Answering, King spoke, "If I readjust the one in the system, I would have to go through every line of code, that could take hours, possibly days. I could write a makeshift program in about an hour, hour and a half. The test to see if it would work would be us doing whatever your plan."

Sydney nodded. "All right..." she looked at Zach. "How much delactovine can you get replicated in the next hour?"

Zach's brow couldn't have gotten more furrowed, but he thought it over. "Several dozen liters..."

"Good we'll need all of it. Finally, Captain: does the Borg interface technology in this ship work with any Borg drone or only you?"

Eyes narrowing, Kennit answered cautiously “There are security measures designed with my assistance to make it considerably difficult for Borg to interface and take control..”

"All right. Are you able to assimilate an interface on a Valkyrie ship?"

“I am.” The Captain replied.

"Good...trust me...if we can get all this done in ninety minutes, the androids do not stand a chance." Sydney said, looking excited.

“Get what done..exactly..” the Captain questioned.

"The plan," Sydney said, as if it were obvious.

As everyone stood, Zach shook his head. Penny walked out quickly, heading to Environmental Control.

Just before the Chief Engineer exited at the end of the group the Captain spoke. "Mr. Torres. Get those Valkryie ready for launch armed as I specified earlier. I want them ready to launch yesterday."

Penny stepped into the turbolift. As the doors closed in front of her, her eyes lost focus. Unit synchronization subroutine initiated the back of her mind said, as the androids downloaded all the fresh information she'd just received. By the turbolift doors opened, she stepped out, unaware that they now knew everything she did.

 

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