The Engineer and the Time Lady - Story Prose v2

The Engineer and the Time Lady

1. Alpha

Unknown Planet

The small starship was in trouble. It had defeated the other ship, but it was out of control, entering the atmosphere of an M-Class planet at a rather steep angle. The crash landing was going to be terrible.

Some time later.

The ship was still, especially in the main computer room. The red-alert was still flashing there. “Warning! Estimated time to total system failure: 1 day 18 hours.” An alert tone sounded. Twice.

“Initiating starship preservation protocol.”

Then there was a hum. “Activating Emergency Engineering Hologram Alpha.”

The hologram of a female engineer appeared. “Please state the nature of the Engineering Emergency.”

“Approximately 10 standard years ago; USS Ionia NCC 84401 crash-landed on an unknown M-Class planet. The Starship Preservation Protocol has been initiated,” the computer reported.

“Understood,” the engineering hologram stated. A screen activated on the side of the computer core.

Emergency fuel cells for the computer core are very low. Reinitialise the Warp Core.

That was only the first of a long list of tasks that needed to be performed.

“Computer, run a level 5 diagnostic on the holoprojectors between the Computer Core and Engineering.”

“Affirmative,” the computer said.

A minute later, the diagnostic was complete. “... Holoprojectors are functional.”

The hologram nodded and then moved to leave the computer core.

She stopped outside of Engineering. “Computer, run a level 5 diagnostic on the holoprojectors in Engineering.”

The holoprojectors were functional, so she entered.

The emergency lighting was on, giving the room a sombre appearance. The hologram briefly wondered why Starfleet would program their holograms with such recognition subroutines. She shook her head and went to the powerless core.

She checked the fuel (the antimatter and deuterium) levels. Both fuels would last for a very long time. She was ready to restart the core. “Computer; activate Emergency Engineering Hologram Beta.”

The Core re-start required two officers.

“Affirmative.”

There was another hum. “Please state the nature of the Engineering Emergency.”

Emergency Hologram Beta was based on a male engineer. “The Starship Preservation Protocol has been initiated,” Alpha said.

“Confirmed,” Beta said. He went to the dilithium chamber. “We need to check the crystals.”

Alpha nodded and they went to work.

The dilithium crystal in the chamber had fractured in the crash, so they had to replace it with one of the spares. There were still many of those left.

“Crystal is aligned,” Alpha reported.

“Confirmed,” Beta said. “Closing chamber.”

The chamber closed. “Checking matter injectors.”

“Checking antimatter injectors.”

“Matter injectors ready.”

“Antimatter injectors ready.”

“We're ready,” Alpha stated.

“Starting cold-restart sequence.”

The deuterium and anti-deuterium began to flow from the storage pods to the reaction chamber and the core powered up. “Reaction is stable,” Beta stated. “Holding at 0.05% reaction rate,” Beta said.

“Good,” Alpha said. “Monitor the core, while I check the bridge systems.” That was next on the Starship Preservation Protocol check list.

A minute later, Alpha entered the bridge, and saw that only the operations console was operating. None of the lighting was on. “Computer, emergency lights.” The lights came on. She then saw a skeleton sitting in the Command Chair. She suspected that it was Commander Emerson, who was listed as Commander of the Ionia. 'I need to check the systems first,” she thought. “Computer run level five diagnostic on bridge systems.”

“Affirmative. Results in five minutes.”

“Diagnostic complete. Command systems are functional. Operations and Engineering consoles are functional. Helm is offline.”

“Understood.”