“A what?”

Posted on Wed Jun 27th, 2018 @ 7:07am by Lieutenant JG Zork & Ferrofax & Rear Admiral Aerilyn Nyel

3,685 words; about a 18 minute read

Mission: S1E1: Bynars Be Bygones
Location: Memory Theta Overwatch
Timeline: MD 9

For the past four days, Zork had expressed no interest in anything that wasn’t the inside of a starship. The labyrinthine corridors, the machine shops and fabrication facilities, the science labs, the medical research units, the hydroponic bays and arboretums, and - in the utmost of ascending importance - the main hangar bays, the holodecks, and the bridges. Zork had been ferried to Deep Space Nine aboard the USS New Jersey, a Galaxy-class refit, and he’d nearly ran himself ragged going from one end of the ship to another whether on duty or off. He’d been assigned as a Logistics Integration Officer, which basically meant he was picking and packing tools, rations, weapons components, and the like from Cargo Bay Two, then preparing them to be transferred to their appropriate destination within the ship. At its heart it was the same as one of the many roles he’d filled for his father before Starfleet, just with less dirt, rocks, and risk of life-threatening injury due to workplace negligence. Because of his assignment and his familiarity with the tasks, he’d managed to talk his way into a full two and a half minutes on the bridge twice by overhearing the COO complain about delta-shift bridge duty during an inspection of the cargo bay Zork had been working in. By waiting for everyone else to punch their off-duty code in, Zork managed to technically become the “ranking officer” of Beta-shift; as the “ranking officer,” Zork was responsible for delivering his cargo bay’s final report to the ACOO. Funny thing about that: if the ACOO’s whereabouts were unknown, the Chief was to be sought. And the funny thing about that: Zork didn’t know any of their names, and therefore couldn’t be expected to ask the computer.

Zork had lights in his eyes, his mouth agape, and an awestruck expression when he walked onto the bridge to deliver the report that first night. Lieutenant Commander Rehlok, when presented with the course of events as Zork presented them on the bridge, not only found the categorically Ferengi-like approach to Starfleet protocol amusing, but Zork’s dumbfounded excitement at where he was standing to be endearing. The SO was a good sport and opted to humor the junior officer. For both days Zork was on the New Jersey, he managed to deliver the shift report to the bridge. The remainder of his spare time was spent buzzing about the rest of the ship. It was much the same once Zork transferred to the USS Ableton, though over the next two days he found the Intrepid-class to be slightly less appealing due to its compact design, and the XO was much less jovial than Rehlok had been. Zork welcomed his disembarkment from the Ableton at the edge of the Badlands, where he boarded a Runabout that was dispatched from Starfleet Intelligence, and subsequently ferried through the hellish space-scape to an equally as hellish looking ball of rock that was nearly dwarfed when compared to the Starbase above it.

And thus the Junior Lieutenant had shouldered his pack of personal belongings and gear bag, donned the Mark II hand phaser and tricorder on his utility belt, and walked off the Runabout onto the decking of Memory Theta. He’d been inside such installations before, however there was something that felt different about this one. Wide eyed and all but at a loss for where to go and who exactly to ask for, the young Ferengi stood idly by and kept an eye out for his expected escort or guide. Shuffling back and forth between his feet, occasionally switching shoulders with his gear bag (until he finally placed it on the floor), and otherwise fidgeting, he waited as patiently as he could for word to come down as to what he was to do with himself.

From the other side of the docking bay, a pressure hatch sighed open, and an antigrav trolly scooted inside. It was the automated sort that wove through halls of large installations running the menial deliveries that were either to time-consuming or transporter intensive. It hummed quietly above the deck plates until it came to a rest right before Zork.

"Lieutenant Junior Grade Zork," a voice boomed from the docking bay's speaker system. Unlike other computer auto voices, this was carried just a hint of disdain, a hint of a less than benign intellect pulling its strings. "Place your personal affect bag on the lower compartment of the trolley, and put all personal electronics on top of the cart. I can highlight how poorly things will go for you if you do not follow these instructions precisely."

As if to highlight this point, the large space tight doors behind him began to grind open, stretching a fizzing blue atmosphere forcefield between them.

Zork nearly jumped out of his skin at the abrupt thundering of his name from above, behind, and all around. He frantically turned this way and that in confusion, unsure of why the computer was giving him instructions and not an officer as was prescribed by regulation and procedure. Without someone in front of him, Zork slowly spun in place, yelling to nobody, “My personal bag? What? Why?” The vague but ominous ultimatum struck him as odd, as did the sass behind it, and his question reflected this with its note of suspicion.

What skepticism was present at one moment was washed away the next, just as soon as Zork caught sight of the slowly growing gap between the cargo doors. While it could have been argued that the atmospheric forcefield was almost more effective at protecting humanoids from the lethal conditions of open space, having only the occasional blue flicker between him and the inferno of the Badlands was enough to send ice water through Zork’s veins. Eyes wide and quietly cursing to himself, “Sell my ears! Right to the damn treasury, sell my ears!” Zork fumbled for the strap of his bag. He dropped it just short of the conveyer belt with a fear induced tremor, picked it up quickly only to drop it again in the same place, “There it is! That’s all of it!” Heavy with his breaths and wild eyed, he turned to look at the still parting doors. He kicked the bag squarely onto the conveyer belt before looking up and around again, trying to find some sign that his compliance had been accepted.

The large space doors groaned to a halt but remained partly open. From the other side of the trolley a holographic projection of a human burned into existence, arising from a pillar of flame with CGi wizardry. Dressed oddly in a fashion oft seen in really old paintings it matched the voice. He smiled a razor thing grin at Zork, and looked down at the collection of personal electrical devices. His fingers walked along the edge of the tray and plucked a data padd from, holding it up to the light as though it were a rare gem.

"Disgusting," he said after a moment, and blue smoke began to arise from the casing of the data padd as the chips and power cell within began to thermally overload. As the padd smoked, he turned startling blue eyes on the Ferengi helmsman. "I keep a very tidy operating system here Mister Zork. My name is Ferrofax, superintendant AI for this facility and final arbiter for when all things go wrong. It is my job to make sure that away teams, and new hires like yourself, are given the proper sort of welcome. You were sanitised by the airlocks when you enter, but what a UV bath and sterilisation flasher can't get at is the diseases of machines."

He put the padd back onto the tray, and ushered Zork closer as something began to wriggle out of the plastic casing. It was an electric blue centipede, its hundred legs scrabbling as it tried to get away, pulses of light running up and down its wriggling body.

"Look at what you brought with you to my station, a simple bit of malware," Ferrofax tutted, and imperiously placed a single fingertip on the wriggling holographic insect. With an azure flash, the bug was gone, along with the padd. What was left was a small melted circle of bubbling plastic. "There, much better. I'll be honest I wasn't designed as anti-virus software, being an AI designed to run a squadron of starships at full combat load. Still, it keeps my point defence subroutine's calibrated. Now, you've seen what I did the PADD that was carrying your transfer orders. If I scan these items, will I find some sort of key counter program or a trojan virus carrier from the Ferengi data net? Because if I do..."

Ferrofax...smiled, big, and wide, and with a worrying amount of sharp teeth.

"You'll be using pen and paper for the duration of your stay here. Data security is not a joking matter for me," his eyes flickered to a bloody red. "It's rather life and death actually."

In the span of the seconds between Ferrofax’s fiery entrance and his very first grin, Zork had gone nearly as stiff as a board. His eyes remained transfixed upon the form the AI took, widening as the PADD was reduced to little more than electronic cinder, only to widen again as the hologram sought to touch and guide him closer to the tray. Zork complied after an initial retreat from Ferrofax’s hand, though moved clumsily and was obviously hesitant to do so. When what appeared to be a centipede wriggled free of the PADD the young Ferengi let out a small gasp and backed away; his eyes never left the critter, to his credit, though whether out of academic curiosity or just a fight/flight response was tough to gauge just by the look of him. There was clearly a bit of fear in Zork’s amber eyes, however, once the creature was melted into a hyperrealistic pool of blue goo.

The implication that Zork may have brought similarly malignant software onto the station on purpose elicited a silent attempt to mouth a response. He quickly realized that he was making a fool of himself, though, and clenched his jaw shut before shaking his head vehemently enough to almost cause a breeze due to the surface area of his ears, “N-n .... No.” Zork did his best to hold a stern gaze with the hologram, but faltered when its eyes became angry and threatening, “There’s nothing else in there, no way.”

A very long handful of seconds passed, during which Zork pulled his shoulders back defiantly and managed to pick up his fresh but momentarily fumbled Academy-entrenched stature as an officer of Starfleet, “And scanning electronics is what you’re here for if you’re here doing it.” His jaw twitched a bit and he visibly gulped despite how dry his mouth was, though he’d managed to steel himself enough to ask the obvious question, “How’d you do that - with the bug?”

"Holograms. Its how I am able to manifest this shell to interact with the flesh and blood crew in a manner they find less intimidating than a disembodied voice," Ferrofax stated, slowly sliding one hand over each of the devices in turn. "As for how I turned the PADD to slag, most public areas of the station, and especially those deemed high security, come fitted with a modified point defence turret mounted in the ceiling. Easy enough to power up its shield generator to the point it's able to generate an arc of electrical discharge."

He eyed the last device, and then with a little shooing gesture, the trolley whisked the bag and items away.

"That will be waiting for you in your quarters in the habitation module. Have you received a crew briefing on what we do here? A hazard briefing?"

“Not entirely, sir, no,” the Academy-ingrained formality jumped back into Zork’s young voice without him even realizing it, “I’ve been vetted by Starfleet Intelligence if that’s what you mean.” His eyes wandered around the bay skeptically, ostensibly searching for the mentioned turret, “I was told I’d be getting a lot of flight time, details on arrival. ”

"Huum," Ferrofax mused. With a fraction of his processing power he shifted the course of the luggage trolley from 'Crew Quarters' to 'Transient Accommodation'. They both looked the same, but the AI doubted the pilot would survive long enough to warrant warming and putting power into the room. Best not to get too attached, after all his job was to keep his people alive. And even then it was more a case of 'most of his people'.

Maybe he could get away with just 'person'?

"I am sure you will be briefed fully on what it is we do here. Sufficed to say Starfleet Intelligence might have vetted you, but we tend to run things a little...differently here," Ferrofax said and then vanished. The floor was now marked with a series of blinking chevrons. "Follow the floor tiles and do not deviate. I keep sections of the stations infrastructure in vacuum to save on power generation. I'd hate for you to open the wrong door and experience an explosive decompression event."

“A vacuum?!” the young man cried, “How much power could you possibly....” Zork trailed off as it dawned on him that this hologram had been programmed to do exactly what it was doing. There was no emotion behind the AI’s decision, just a series of conditions and variables that it reacted to as specified. The fact it was willing to so cavalierly jeopardize life implied that, somewhere along the way, somebody had failed to program a proper ethical subroutine into it’s operating system. The fact that it preferred to gain compliance by way of terror could also be explained away by the same logic, but Zork couldn’t help but assign a certain chosen malevolence to Ferrofax. As such, the young lieutenant took a few steps back from the hologram before seamlessly turning into a brisk walk that brought him directly down the center of the golden arrows illuminated on the floor.

“Oh man. Oh no,” Zork attempted to soothe himself, “Okay. Just follow the arrows. He can’t decompre- IT WON’T decompress me. Why would he?” He turned as indicated by the chevron pointed to the right, “Why would IT ... IT do that? Just gotta do what it says.” Thinking he’d heard something suspicious, Zork whipped his head around to look behind him. He simultaneously picked up his pace, subconsciously hoping to affirm that he was putting distance between himself and the devilish projection that had vaguely threatened his well-being twice in the span of five minutes. *Satisfied he was getting away, he turned his attention to the fore and continued along the route indicated by the chevrons on the floor. It wasn’t too much longer until Zork reached a door marked “Station Administrator,” at which point he pressed the button that would request entry. He again looked over his shoulder, though had enough sense to have his attention squarely ahead by the time the doors opened.

"Enter," came a calm, feminine voice from within.

Zork stepped into the office sharply, came to a halt approximately five feet from the desk, and snapped to his freshly-pressed, best Academy-creased attention, “Lieutenant Zork reporting, sir.”

The woman behind the desk slowly looked up, pulling her glasses off her face, "Excuse me?" she said, almost to herself. "Last time I checked, Lieutenant, I was still a woman."

The pallor that came over the junior officer was immediate, as was his urge to find one of the vacuum-state corridors Ferrofax had mentioned and hurl himself into it. He gaped momentarily, though eventually stammered out, “I apologize, sir - MA’AM!” He clenched his teeth but started again, “Just using the formality, ma’am.” Zork now caught the rank insignia and visibly deflated a centimeter, “Admiral.”

Aerilyn sat back, the corner of her mouth barely twitching into a slight smile. "At ease, Lieutenant. Feel free to relax." She set the glasses down on the desk and held out her hand, palm turned up.

The gesture and instructions served to pick him back up a small measure, and Zork anxiously assumed a more relaxed-appearing posture and stance. He caught himself midway through a deep breath, managed to stifle a heavy exhale, and covered it by replying, “Thank you, ma’am. Ferrofax asked me,” there was a hiccup in his cadence, but he continued nonetheless, “told me to report to this office for crew and hazard briefings, ma’am.” Zork shifted uneasily between the balls of his feet and his heels as he glanced intermittently at the expectant hand and the flag officer’s gaze, trying to find the appropriate words, “My orders were, well ....”. He fumbled for a moment and then cleared his throat, “They were incinerated upon my arrival, Admiral.”

The woman looked displeased at this news. She lowered her hand and leaned back in the chair. "Ferrofax has the tendency to do things that...he knows I dislike. And yet, he continues to do them. I assume your other belongings have been taken?"

The pallor returned as his expression fell once more, “They were.”

The woman reached for her glasses, sliding them back on her face with grace. "Hopefully you didn't have anything too valuable or personal in there. Or sentimental." She tapped at the computer console embedded into the desktop and a screen slowly slid up from the polished surface. "What was your name again?

Point of fact: just about everything Zork had to his name, not the least of which was a handful of bars of gold-pressed-latinum, had been in those bags. He knew better than to expect recompense for his losses, and instead allowed himself a deep sigh, “Nothing irreplaceable, ma’am.

“Zork, Admiral,” he replied, “Lieutenant Zork.”

"Ah, yes," she said, giving no indication that she planned to apologize for either the potentially lost possessions or the mix-up with his name. "Here you are. Looks like your orders are correct and I have signed them." She looked back up at the Ferengi, this time, a look of surprise flashed, as if this was the first time she had seen him. "You're quite young, Lieutenant. It usually takes officers much longer before they get condemned here."

A cloud passed over the young man’s face, the phrasing of the last observation clearly bewildering him, “Condemned, ma’am?” His browridge had bowed downward at the center, ”I don’t feel condemned, Admiral.” One person might have called it naïveté, another might have called it assertion, and another still might have heard it as simply a genuine estimation of his place in the universe, but whatever there was in his voice in that moment was a fleeting departure from the understandably-anxious junior officer archetype; Zork had made a deliberate declaration.

Aerilyn quietly scoffed as she looked back down at her computer screen. "Unless there's anything you need, you're dismissed. Ferrofax will take care of you until the team returns. You will report to Mrazak upon their arrival."

"Oh, I am sure we can find some work to fall on him," the disembodied voice from the ceiling said. "Janeway's heavy-duty manipulators have been sticking a little after the incident with MT-3876. She could use a good cleaning, and MrZork does have a high dexterity score. You're not afraid of a little preventive maintenance on a tame Borg drone are you?"

It took a moment for the entirety of the statements to register as a cohesive abstract, but Zork’s eyes fluttered in bewilderment and disbelief when they did, “A what?”

The Admiral smiled to herself. She'd never admit it, but she found some sick satisfaction in Ferrofax's treatment of new officers. "Please don't get any blood on the carpet, Ferrofax," she said. "Again."

“‘Again?!’” Zork turned as heard the whoosh of the doors behind him, however he quickly turned back to the Admiral, “The Borg are here?!” A second and half passed before Zork asked a third question with ever increasing anxiety, “What’s MT-3876?”

Aerilyn waved her hand, shooing the young Ferengi away. "You're dismissed," she said, her tone sounding utterly bored as she turned her attention to what she was doing before the young man interrupted her.

Lieutenant Junior Grade Zork was visibly aghast at his immediate assignment, though whether that was due to being instructed to deal directly with a Borg drone or at having Ferrofax as his steward was not quite as clear. Unable to protest further, Zork accepted, “Aye, sir - MA’am!” and quickly sought to retreat from the room before the Admiral could cast further ire upon him. As the doors closed behind him, however, he found no asylum from his duties in the corridor. “Ferrofax,” Zork sighed as he began walking the reverse path he’d taken to the Admiral’s office. He quickly stopped dead in his tracks upon remembering “explosive decompression event” as a prior warning, “direct me to the drone’s current location.” He thought for another second, “And describe MT-3876.”

"MT-3876, or Buddy, is a polyplastic life form that feeds off of replicator matter stock. It was discovered at Utopia Planitia a year ago during construction of the USS Challenger. On the Chitiri Intelligence Index, it scores as either an Omega or Eplison level sapient, comparable to a clever dog or parrot," Ferrofax instructed as the floor panel's lit up again, illuminating a path. "I've taken the liberty of replicating an apron, face guard and catchers mitt in case 'Buddy' is still hanging around. He likes to meet new people, and given its sensory pits don't detect light waves well it's a bit touchy."

A turbolift door opened before them, revealing a neatly stacked pile of clothing including the catcher mitt, from which a baseball rolled.

"Buddy likes to play fetch."

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