Removing the Core

Posted on Thu Oct 28th, 2021 @ 8:28am by Ensign Wendy Marvell & Lieutenant James Henderson & Lieutenant Commander Peter Carter Jr & Lieutenant Jamie Dougherty

1,017 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: Cleaning Up
Location: USS Enterprise Computer Core

Ensign Wendy Marvell wasn't expecting her first assignment on a Starship to be a salvage operation, especially of the famous USS Enterprise. Regardless, here she was, the young ensign standing with a tricorder looking up at the large computer core of the Galaxy Class Starship. They had spent the last few days carving a hole through the top of the saucer section's hull and decks in order to remove the core in one go.

=A= Marvell to Carter. We're ready here sir .. =A= she reported tapping her comm badge as she checked the last few explosive charges that had to be detonated to release the core.

=A= Thank you. Stand by ... =A= Pete said putting her on hold. He'd been physically dreading this moment for the past week or so. The computer core of any starship was the largest single piece of equipment aboard, and a Galaxy-class core stood some forty feet tall and sixty-foot square. Compounding the problem it sat at nearly the center of the saucer section. =A= All hands ... all hands listen up and listen good. We are about to move something the size of a four-story building weighing in excess of ten thousand tons. If there is a hitch anywhere, and I mean even the smallest, call for a halt. We do this slowly, and carefully, do I make myself clear. Team leaders, I want one final go-around in 10 minutes. If everything is good, we begin in one hour. Carter out. =A=

=A= Marvell here =A= Wendy replied. As an Ensign, she was leading the small engineering team on one of the sides. =A= West Side is ready. We're clearing to the safe distance =A=

=A=Dougherty here,=A= said the young redhead. She took another pass with her tricorder and took the readings with her mini-drones. =A=All hull connection points disconnected, and the core is physically disconnected from all interconnections. Ready to remove at your command.=A=

=A= All good here Chief." McMasters checked in.

=A= Donaldson here. The rigging team is all set, Pete. =A=

One by one every one of 20 odd team leaders checked in with him and Pete struck a line through their name in his notebook. 'Okay, that's everybody.' =A= Carter to Henderson, you and your flyboys ready Jim? =A=

=A= My Boys and I are always ready. Just let me know where you want us and we'll be there.=A=

At that point, 2 Danube class runabouts slowly moved into position waiting for the final command for them to hook up to the core.

=A= Roger that. =A= Pete said. "Okay Chelia, here's where you take over," Peter said looking at his counterpart. He held up a hand with two crossed fingers.

Chelia grinned as she tapped her comm badge. "On the count of three, start your ascent," she said simply. She checked her Tricorder one last time. "One. Two. Three. Engage"

The runabouts with their tractor beams and support chains attached to lifting points on the computer core began to rise up gently. The large hole in the hull cut out by the engineers slowly began to grow darker as the computer core was lifted out in one piece.

The computer itself was six decks high, it was a huge piece of equipment; one which was replicated on the Ermiana in orbit. At the time of construction, the Enterprise's computer was the most advanced computer system in the fleet, seven years later it had been surpassed by the computers founded on newer designs such as the Intrepid and Sovereign Class Starships. The Ermiana also had an upgrade using the new Bio-Neural Gel packs over older Isolinear Circuitry.

"Nice and easy, nice and easy..." Chelia said over the comms as she monitored the ascent with her tricorder. "Carter, I hope your guys have the touch-down area clear so we can put this puppy into one of those big cargo ships," she said. Over the far side of the site sat several large cargo vessels with huge rear hangars where they could squeeze the core in with only centimeters to spare to get it back to Starfleet in one piece.

Once the core was clear past the hull Pete finally exhaled. "I think my heart just started again." He muttered to himself. "You're forgetting we set that up weeks ago. I'm just glad we decided not to finalize those welds until we're sure that monstrosity fits."

Chelia looked at him like he was nuts. "You can take all the measurements you want and still have things get screwed up," Pete said.

=A= Carter to Henderson. How's it going up there? =A= From where Pete and Chelia were standing things it looked like Jim and his guys had done this sort of thing all their lives.

Meanwhile, in the lead runabout, James had his fingers dancing over two consoles. One that was controlling his runabouts slow ascent, the other one was keeping an eye on the uplink with the other runabout so the tractor beams were staying within tolerances of the Computer Core and of each other.

=A= Henderson here, it's going ok, just having to keep a phase variance between the 2 tractor beams within a certain frequency band manually, so they don't repel each other. Once we get high enough. Could you point us in the direction you want us to go? =A=

"East by South East about twelve degrees left should do it, and then about 200 meters to the loader" Chelia responded over comms.

=A= Look for three massive orange horseshoe looking things as soon as get over that ridge ahead of you. If my guess is right they should be off to your left hand side and coming into view any second now. =A= Pete said looking through a pair of field glasses.

The core set down gently, finally it was removed and now the engineers could rest easier.

Posting by

Lieutenant James Henderson
Chief Flight Control Officer

Lieutenant Peter Carter Jr
Chief Engineer

Lieutenant Zon th'Tetz
Chief Operations Officer

Lieutenant JG Jamie Dougherty
Assistant Chief Engineer

Ensign Wendy Marvell
Engineering Officer

Chelia
Civilian Contractors

RSS Feed