PEEK... PRINT...

Posted on Tue Dec 12th, 2023 @ 9:29pm by Cadet Junior Grade Maxwell Hofmann & Lieutenant Commander Darrod Hanous

0 words; about a 1 minute read

Mission: Mission 5: The Price of Paradise
Location: Deck 19 - Deflector Communications Control
Timeline: M5 MD02 (2268.07.25) 2230

Dar stood up again from the console, "But let's back up a step and make sure we don't glitch all this to hell and back. We want to make sure that this is actually data for the Midway. When I was on the New Jersey - that's 1795 - we once got accidentally got sent the update data for the Exeter - 1672. Because the production runs aren't totally identical, especially not in terms of the comms setups and definitely not that many generations apart while both were on border duty, we had glitches running to hell and back for a week until we put into dock. Couldn't even communicate outside the ship except through the shuttles - and the shuttles couldn't communicate with the ship, either! So, that's this step here - we PEEK the buffer data at the specified address and compare registrations. So type in a PEEK command for that location, comma, plus, three, then PRINT - so it actually tells us, That'll give us the data in that spot, and the three following. You should see our registry number on the screen there."

He looked at Maxwell and with a tired, but now slightly amused expression, raised an eyebrow. "You do remember the registry number of the Midway, right, Cadet? Type in that command I just told you and check the registration."

The midshipman nodded. He keyed in the command... PEEK... Then comma, + 3 then PRINT. The number printed on the small screen as... 1709... "Registry number for the Lexington, sir," Max said, looking up from the screen, feeling a tad vindicated but still not out of hot water. His pitiful wide brown eyes stared up at the Orion Engineer, waiting on his response.

Darrod finished the coffee, looking at the surprised expressions on the faces of the two crewmen accompanying him. They weren't used to Starfleet making mistakes; he was - and it seemed they always came from Starbase 10. He wondered if there was a saboteur there; or a security tester. He nodded at the Cadet sagely. "Well, there's your whole issue right there, Cadet. That's not cause for a damage report, that's a data error report that you need to file. We're four generations ahead of the Lex, I can't even recode that to our registry safely. No wonder everything went down. Every ship has unique coding, and every run has tweaks and improvements. We'll have to reach out in the morning for to record a new update tape; that's well above your pay grade." He waved at the two Crewmen holding coffee cups. "Davis, Ulster - dismissed. Check in your tools and get to bed." With that done, he looked at Max. "Damage reports get filed when something is really broken. You just had an improper shutdown. What we expected when you signaled was that something was terribly wrong with the deflector dish, like you'd knocked it off-axis or thrown the mooring clamps and we'd have to tractor it back on - or you'd blown up a panel. Reports like the one you filed are for life-threatening issues, Cadet. Not just a terminal that shut down in a bad way to protect itself but didn't break anything else. Priority's there for a reason, please respect it. I'm not going to mark this on your record, because I respect that you were panicked - I'll manually downgrade the report. You were given some bad data, the computer reacted badly. So next time, remember to error-check. If you don't know or don't remember how to do something, ask. Engineering's always a call away, we respect people who ask for help when they need it. Going forward, when Lieutenant Vox gives you a command and a deadline, you really do have until then to do it. We'd all prefer things be done correctly at the last minute rather than be rushed and done wrong. If there's instructions like these, you have to read them through before you touch anything. If you don't understand something, either call us, or query the library computer for the information - there's even training simulations in there for most processes. And no, it's not coincidental that I'm not teaching you the process beyond when we identified the error state. Once you hit a critical error like that, you don't get clever and try to make it work. You stop, make your report, and move on, because you did your job to the best of your ability. Now, file that incorrect data report, then get back to whatever else you were doing tonight. If it'd been a ship in our group like the Mandalay; or our sister hull the Sirius, I might have been able to recode it. As is, we just log the error and Lieutenant Vox will request a new update packet in the morning. Understood?"

"Understood sir," Max responded simply in a defeated tone. He wanted to rebuke some of the facts such as rushing, he followed the procedure taught to him and they were very understaffed, but what else was new. He also wasn't experienced enough to know the difference between a data error and a matter of life and death. If anything it looked to him as though the entire communication grid or maybe even the ship's power systems were effective. Everything went dark and the displays went red.

 

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