Sensory Activation

Posted on Sat Aug 6th, 2022 @ 6:48pm by Lieutenant Etan tar-Lexros & Commander Antonia 'Tony" Stoffels & Lieutenant Commander Rutherford (RJ) Milton

Mission: The Lost Brother
Location: Sensor Control
Timeline: After "Change of Plans"

Etan was aware that Commander Stoffels was upset with being left out of the planning for the mission, but two things stood in the way of him trying to help. First, she was on Leave by the Captain's order; and second, it would be highly improper at the best of times for a junior officer to summon a senior unless there was provable need. He wondered if the Doctor could provide that provable need, since he'd asked the man to join him in the Sensor Control section, along with the new (civilian) Chief Science Officer - he wondered how she would be accounted for in the chain of command. For the moment, he decided to relate to Bryant as he would a Warrant Officer - she was a subject matter expert, and highly capable in her field. Her command position was based on a recognition of that expertise. Still, he wondered why she hadn't been granted a Warrant or a Brevet by the Captain; it would make dealing with her simpler in terms of seniority and rank, two of the things which helped Etan determine how he should best approach a social situation.

He hadn't changed his uniform, or even had a chance to wash his hair, following the briefing. His entire physical appearance right now was more like a mechanic than a skilled Operations officer - and the few times he caught his reflection, he wondered to himself which of those he really was. Still, there was something they could do proactively to help find the Commander's brother and the other two missing persons. Looking at the other two Department heads when they joined him, he tried to smile but didn't find the inspiration.

"Uh, hello. Doctor, Chief Bryant - I was hoping we might be able to get a biosign for Commander Stoffels' brother and program it into the life-sign sensors of the ship. Since the Captain has made a standing order that I am allowed to do 'anything' which will benefit the ship, the crew, or the mission, I was sort of hoping that we could work together to help with this mission, and try to ensure the safe return of all the missing individuals. I didn't see the man's biosigns in the transport logs - if he has ever come aboard by transport, it was before the last time the Ops Officer at the time compressed and uploaded ship's logs, and it wasn't mission-critical. Do you happen to have anything in your data, Dr. Milton?"

He turned to Bryant, failing to make eye contact with her. "Chief Bryant, I asked you here so that you can oversee any modifications we make to the scanning algorithm. Are you familiar with Starfleet sensor protocols, ma'am?"

"Some of them, yes. I admit that I had been intending to assign a Starfleet trained officer to that bridge station until I got myself up to speed." Paige answered smiling a little, her tone slightly embarrassed.

"I have transferred Medical records of all the listed personnel." Milton spoke. "Standard for my having a baseline after location and retrieval so I can check them medically. " He explained. "using those preset readings might hone in the search patterns and help highlight matches during the scans a bit?"

"I am sure if we make a request for their last transporter log of wherever they were last we could get it sent to us. Do you think Commander Stoffels could contact the Admiral referenced in the meeting to arrange it? I'm guessing from the look on her face that she knows him quite well, and he might do it for her." Greenish eyes raised from the PADD to the assembled officers.

" I know that medical sensors are set to scan to the .0003 Micron-particle, yet for this if we could go another decimal smaller in case there is something the standard parameters miss might help?" Milton suggested. "It should not slow the sweeps more than a minuscule bit and yield us something important to know what level of danger we are in and if there are foreign contaminants involved?"

"Thats impossible to know at this stage Doctor." Paige answered.

Etan nodded at Paige with a slight smile, acknowledging her civilian status. "I was less concerned with the Bridge setup than the actual sensor protocols, ma'am. I would like to adjust the biosensors to point out the specific biosigns that we're seeking, rather than doing it in software post-processing."

He nodded at Dr. Milton with the same pleased expression. "We can route the medical routine into the full sensor array, and by doing that, we'll be able to find Commander Stoffels' brother at a much greater range, which may help Commander Doctrine and her team better align their insertion, either for an actual ground action, or to act as a transport relay. But to push it out that extra decimal, we'd need something very close to the exact biosign we're looking for. If we don't have a current scan of Commander Stoffels' brother, it might be best to scan her - and then, get the data on the others, of course."

"As I am just a doctor I will leave the complexities of a Bioscan to you." He turned to exit. Transporters are just Bio-scan road maps to reassembly. In lieu of ready access a medical bioscan has been used to enhace transporter signal upon many occasions. " Milton noted. "Since you wish to use sibling DNA to cross reference a hybrid scan parameter, the extra decimal would make a loose scan of sibling as basis easier to narrow since you are adding factors. " He headed for the door. "Sick Bay is at your service." Milton gave his advice, he would now get things prepared for worst case senario."Good hunting."

"Thanks Doctor, I'll be in touch to get the bioscans." Paige said with a wave of farewell.

Etan looked at the doctor as he was leaving. Looking over what he had available, he wasn't sure of the accuracy of the data from Commander Stoffels. "Doctor, if you could, I'd like to see if we can read it in in real-time. Engineering and I may be able to rig a transport pattern emulator to do that once we get closer, but before I do that, I'd prefer if we can try it with the Commander's real biosigns. I know aboard the Cannonball, there was a legacy mode from the Miranda and Soyuz external sensors that allowed for scanning in comparison to transport data; apparently there was a concern about transport duplication. It's not used, and it's barely documented, but I think if we can get a live datastream from the Commander, it will make the test more feasible."

Milton nodded his agreement.

"Well if we can get a connection to the Medical Database to mix with the Filtration Scan that could also filter out any 'residual data that is in the Transporter Buffer as a 'Stand-by'. "Milton began. ' The Buffer is a Double Edged Sword, it can be a help in boosting a weak signal but the other side is it is a copy of the original. " He began with opening his tricorder and typing. "That is a danger in using the Buffer as a basis for the scan, if the original is somehow outside the normal parameters you could get a false return as the Buffer compares probability of that pattern being a match to the sensory data..." Glancing up he realized he was rambling. "Using the Medical data will give accurate 'Baseline of data and cancel out any 'Duplicated information." He added.

His fingers dancing over the data logging parameters.

"Captain Scott used a buffer as a type of suspended animation..." Narrowing the parameters of the filter. "Doctor Palaski of the Enterprise was subject to a DNA sample from a hair brush being used to fine tune a pattern in the buffer to restore her to her healthy state when a dieses had caused her to change due to an experimental 'Proactive Immune system that saw humans as ..." He shook his head. "And the Thomas Rinker duplicate is by far the most prominent of the Transporter duplication and a very fine example to support your concerns of course. " He looked up. "The data you need is being transferred, you all can begin putting it into your sensory sweep, I transferred the files to the computer panel and such for your use."