Studying the engine scans

Posted on Mon Sep 28th, 2026 @ 11:22pm by Lieutenant Varkl Brukh

901 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: Lines in the Vacuum
Location: USS Frontier Engineering
Timeline: Shortly after the planet away team's return

Once back on board the Frontier, Brukh made his way to Main Engineering to check on things...

"All right everyone I'm back, and I pleasantly note that in my absence you haven't managed to cause any overloads or core breaches. Well done I applaud you for keeping the ship intact." He turned to the Engineer's Mate, "did anything noteworthy happen?"

Petty Officer Xidcem, a Jelna Rigelian manning the main engineering console noted the Chief's arrival with a smirk before answering his supervisor. "Since you already noted everything was fine, I'm surprised you need to ask that question. Did your powers of observation fade while on the freighter?"

"Being able to argue is precisely why I put you in the Mate's position!" Brukh exclaimed, "I hope that everyone else takes note of it. Have we heard when Marcus is due back?"

"The last report they had left the surface and were en-route, I expect the away team should be back within the next quarter hour." Xidcem answered.

"Very well. I shall catch up on some reports in the mean time." Brukh muttered while entering his office.

He had scarcely gone through the 2nd padd when the main engineering doors once again opened to admit the Asst. Chief Engineer, looking a bit weary from wearing the environmental suit for an extended period. As everyone greeted his arrival, Brukh called out "Did you managed to get heat stroke down on that inferno? I expected a report hours ago!"

Marcus grinned back "and how was I supposed to do that with all the interference, telepathy?"

"Transmit the data once you got off that barren rock of course!" Brukh retorted. "So what did you find down there?"

"We don't know for certain if the ship made a hard landing or not, but they started to make a mining settlement before they were attacked by an unknown party. It appears they were after the Trellium since there is an excavation above a deposit, the Duritanium may have been planned for later." Marcus reported. "When the ship was attacked, presumably from orbit, it caused a chemical reaction from their cargo creating a massive chloromethane leak."

"A logical conclusion..." Brukh nodded, "anything else interesting about the wreck?"

"Funny you should ask..." Marcus hinted while passing over the scan results.

Brukh transferred the information to the computer terminal which lit up with the images and schematics. Others from the team crowded around the door to observe and listen in. Page after page of data scrolled by causing many perplexed faces and murmurs from those looking. "There's no warp core," someone uttered "how could they get way out here?" followed by "what are all those conduits? I've never seen anything like that before!"

Brukh ignored the miscellaneous chatter from his team and concentrated on what the schematics were revealing, his brain worked overtime... something about this was familiar but what... He brought his three-fingered meaty hand up to stroke his beard, and tap his temple before the notion clicked in place. "It could be a CID." he remarked.

"I've never heard of a Sid, what kind of engine is that?" Marcus inquired.

"C-I-D" Brukh spelled, "Cascading Ion Drive. Multiple cultures have worked on it at one time or another, even Terrans had a project some 10 years before the Warp 5 project, but I don't suppose any of you took advanced warp theory. Mathematically it could potentially reach Warp 7, but applying it is far more difficult than it is on paper."

"Humans used Ion drives back in the early years of space exploration before Impulse reactions..." Marcus confirmed, "but cascading ions?"

Brukh traced the varying conduits on the schematic while contemplating a reply. "One stream of positively charged ions" indicating one line, "and one stream of negatively charged ions," he traced another line, "both are accelerated in a magnetic chamber similar to our own warp core," he pointed to a large cylindrical chamber "which is heated to create a plasma. That is then released through a series of nested chambers in alternating layers to create thrust."

The group nodded following the educational description their Chief was giving.

"The main difficulty is that each nested layer must be added at specific mathematical intervals to build on the prior level, it needs slow acceleration to allow the cascade reaction to build. Failure to do so would result in catastrophic failure where different parts of the ship are accelerated at different rates - that's how the Terran's engine failed, and the test ship destroyed they pushed the reaction too fast. It was decided that the warp 5 project would take priority rather than trying to make the CID math work."

"The Skagarans figured it out over a century before Earth, and were using it to kidnap what they deemed 'undeveloped' races as slave labor." someone remarked.

"Terrans advanced very quickly in a short time" Brukh cautioned, "many other cultures were warp-capable for centuries, but didn't have the desire or need to expand their territory. Slavery isn't condemned by everyone - even in your own history before you grew out of needing it. The Orions are still guilty of being slave traders, and from reports they do a brisk business."

With that the crew slowly returned to their stations to mull over the discussion, leaving Brukh and Marcus to prepare notes for the mission briefing that would eventually ensue.

Lt. Varkl Brukh
Chief Engineer
Sentinel Station/USS Frontier

 

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