Scientifically Speaking

Posted on Sat Jul 30th, 2022 @ 11:26am by Lieutenant Commander Amaya Capac & Lieutenant JG Cara Ross

1,231 words; about a 6 minute read

Mission: Mission 8 - A Blast from the Past
Location: Science

ON

Amaya was curious about the race they'd encountered and hoped the Chief Science Officer could give her more information. She also wanted to meet the other woman. And so, when she had the time, she headed for main science.

What she could tell remained to be seen, but Cara was certainly keeping herself busy, buried down in the main science's lab. She had many of her subordinates running all the various scans they could possibly manage, and cross comparing them alongside a plethora of species the Federation had already encountered. Similarities and differences were collated and tabulated, and slowly, but surely, a picture was forming.

That said, it wasn't a crystal-clear image by any means. This was still the early stage, and Cara kept trying to tell herself that as she stood at the master display board, looking at a biological scan of one of their 'guests from earlier. Meanwhile an image of their home planet rotated off on an ancillary monitor with a scroll of various atmospheric data running off to the side.

Maya stopped to look over the displays and scan the data. "That's their home world?" she asked.

To her credit, Cara did not jump. She was getting better at having people sneak up on her while she was in the labs. She stiffened slightly, but she most certainly did not jump. Nope, not at even a little. Remaining composed, the red head turned to dark eyed woman, who was of a height with her and offered a nod.

"Lt. Commander. Didn't hear you come in. Yes ma'am," she readily gestured toward the orb floating on the screen. "That would be our guests home world."

"What do we know of them so far, if you don't mind my asking" the other woman said. "I'm Amaya Capac, by the way. Hi."

"A pleasure," whether that was really the case would wait to be seen. But getting off on a good foot seemed like a smart mood, and Cara was fairly gregarious when not sleep deprived. "Cara Siobhan Ross."

Her accent grew a bit thicker as she said her name, and continued on to answering the XO's question. "What we have here appears to be a tropical planet. Very humid, precipitation is quite common. Honestly not sure where the dry season is.: She started point out a few of the readings.

"What's important to note - and I'll bring this up in the general briefing later - is that there's
just something about the atmosphere, the thickness or its makeup will cause transporting to be difficult. Nae impossible, but nae easy either. I cannae discern the cause of the interference yet, but gimmie a wee bit o'time to put together a model. A day or three maybe?" She pounced 'three' as if she were saying 'tree'.

"Interesting. That will be important when we go visit them," Maya said. "Any indication of their dwellings, or any signs of older civilizations? I guess what I want to know is if they evolved here or came here at some point and if there was anyone here before them. I'm an archaeologist, so I tend to wonder about the layers of civilization."

"The same atmospheric distortions that are gonna play a bit o'havoc with our transporters are making that a tad difficult. Best I can tell they come from here, but we haven't had time to do quite that in depth a scan." She gave a shrug. "We'll call it 'inconclusive' for now. I dinnae think they were transplanted though, for what it’s worth. If that had happened at any point recently, we'd see obvious signs of it."

"Makes sense," Maya said. "I hope the Captain will send a team down to the planet. I admit I'm curious to learn more about them and how they got into space."

Reflecting on her tenure aboard the America so far, Cara gave a nod of agreement. "Based on what I know of the Captain I'm sure she's just as eager to send someone down and establish some sort of relations. Get a better feeling for these folk. I'd be right curious to see how they've set themselves up.

"Assuming, of course, that we dinnae bring the Romulans down on our heads in the process. We are a wee bit close their front lawn, geographically speaking."

"True, but I'd rather not leave them to the tender mercies of the Romulans," Maya said. "What little I've seen of their culture is fascinating. Like you, I would love to see how they live."

"Hard to argue with that," the redhead nodded in agreement. "I haven't really had much experience with uh...client species of the Romulans and how they might fare. Hopefully that isn't the case here with our potential new friends."

"Neither have I," Maya admitted. "Do you have a specialty in science?"

"Climatology is my bread and butter, along with all things terraforming," Cara replied with that eager sort of enthusiasm scientists got when they began to speak of that which they knew best. She practically rubbed her hands together. "I come by it honestly. My folks are on the lead terraforming team out on Caldos. Turned the whole planet into Scotland, or near enough. Fascinating stuff, and the weather pattern control systems are some of the most impressive in the whole Federation."

The first officer smiled. "That sounds amazing. So is the ability to terraform a planet. I've read about it, and still find it incredible what scientists can achieve in such a short time."

"Aye, we had some basic building blocks to work with on Caldos mind ye, not as bad as Mars. But we don't have to fling asteroids at the planet like humanity did back in the late twenty-first and early twenty-second centuries to terraform the Red Planet. it’s...down right fascinating, it is."

Amaya nodded. "Indeed. Another reason I came here was to see if there is anything you would like to update, or anything I can help you with."

Pursing her lips, Cara moved away from the console she'd been standing at, and moved over to a side unit, pulling up a small, ongoing list. "Well, the department here has a wish list as it were. It was nice to get a direct update of the database during our last lay over, mind you, but there's those new Isolinear based storage units that they've rolled out on the Excelsior class ships, and even if the America is an older vessel, she can absolutely manage the power supply to run that..."

Amaya made a note of that on her PADD. "I will see what I can do--although it may not happen immediately." Sometimes requisitions took a bit longer if Starfleet didn't see a need, but it was always worth asking.

"Aye, don't I know that," Cara mused, chuckling softly. "I've noticed that the quartermasters back at command move about as fast as an Antarian Slug."

Alyssa chuckled and nodded. "That they do. Well, I'll do what I can and we can hope for the best. If there's nothing else, I'll leave you to your work. Do let me know if I can help with anything." She smiled at the science officer and left her to her work.

____
OFF

Lieutenant Commander Amaya Capaac
Executive Officer
USS America

Lieutenant JG Cara Ross
Chief Science Officer
USS America

 

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