Posted by Lieutenant Junior Grade Sovrk (Chief Science Officer) in Main Sim - City

Posted by Fleet Captain Alexander Cochrane (Commanding Officer) in Main Sim - City

Posted by Gamemaster Wookius Furrius (Senior Gamemaster) in Main Sim - City
Posted by… suppressed (6) by the Post Ghost! 👻

Snip

In essence the Machine was on the surface simple. It was powered by an extremely deep and interlaced series of geothermal conductors that drew energy from the planetary core in a web not unlike the root system of a tree. That powered a temporal subspace tunnel with adjoining cities wherein their energy strands were interwoven, and that all in a chain. In a way, with the link, each city in some way looked to power or reinforce others.

Temporal theory was not anywhere close to Shedda’s area of expertise. The closest she came was marking things on a timeline. She looked at Kaia and Sovrk. “Theorize, the machine creates subspace folds. What would happen if we disconnected each of the linked power sources, leaving each city with their own power but no longer connected to the chain? Would the cities safely survive in their own universe? If we shut the machine down in sequence that it was started would they all return here or be cut loose?” Any solution that might put any of the cities at risk wasn’t a solution. Not unless things became desperate. Shedda would rather not consider that, yet.

She looked at Zoon, “You said that your city was trying to become an anchor point because you thought everyone here was dead. What made you think that, other than the sun was supposed to have gone nova?”

Mal’athar, XO

“The home world was supposed to be dead. Long ago. We had no reason to think otherwise until recently when the Eternal Emperor sought to rejoin the city with the homeworld. It was then that what was discovered was that it was not dead but a separate universe altogether that the Builders had caused to be formed.”
- Zoon and Reauna

Sovrk let out his breath in a small huff before drawing it in again. “Each one is a distinct possibility.... between the three, I would believe that it would be more likely that in shutting them down it would cause the sepperation of each city in the fold. Depending on how dependent structure is to the fold… seperating them off would most likely cause their destruction in my opinion. Without analytical data and being able to run the possibilities on simulations we can not say for certain however which event is the most likely to happen and my aswer is purely speculation. I would think… that…” Sovrk pauses a moment. “Given the right amount of time.... and technology… and the realities compatibility with one another we may be able to bring them into a singular phaze.”

Zoon frowned. Reauna gazed at the display narrowing the data as she went. “Time may be something we don’t have,” she said at last. “Look here.” She pointed to the energy streams between the cities which had been tight but now tendrils were emanating from the city sources. The intertwined blue threads had twinges of green and purple. “This began according to the system not an hour ago. When you came.” Her smooth gesture that may have been seen as a general movement that they did as a people and which the team had grown more used to looked more accusatory now even though there was little discernable difference in it. “There is a power disruption in the streams. Multidimensional in nature. Whatever it was you did to come here is causing instabilities from one end to the other.”

The Vulcan rubed at his temple for a moment as he continued to think. “I believe that for this to be possible each city would have to have existed in this reality before they brcame their own.. if so it should be relatively simple to bring them back into this reality.. if not, then it still may be possible, though it would take alot more thought, theory, and calculation.”
Lt. J.G Sovrk, CSO

“Perhaps, but easy is not assured,” Reauna said.

The emotions around everyone rose no hackles on the Security Chief. She listened to everyone then chimed in as the voices lulled while everyone was pondering. “I’m no scientist, but is there a way to travel to each city and see what their situation is? I mean, you all speak that everyone is attached to the machine. But what if not everyone is? I mean, perhaps their ‘energy’ is still tied in, but what if they found ways to function separately? Then the machine wouldn’t be an issue to them. Sure, no more energy would come from them. But if they aren’t relying on it, then it wouldn’t hurt them and would take them from the equation.”

Zoon frowned. “We believed that our trip here was one way only, that there was no return. Thus we are the Dead.”
Reauna glanced over to him with a glare that was the epitome of ‘if looks could kill’. “According to this it may be possible to return. But that travel is a strain on the power. Like he said. It is possible to go. Maybe not to return. We may have a chance of one trip.” She seemed to ponder what Juliet said. “Perhaps,” was her reply.

She wasn’t sure it made sense. But everyone was speaking like the umbilical cord, effectively, being cut would mean death for those not still tied in.

Juliet
CoS

Reauna turned and said, “We may have to travel to the end. This disruption has generated a phased energy feedback disruption that is cycling from the end city to this one, oscillating back and forth. If this is not halted everything could be destroyed. Right now it is drawing energy from other sources in each city as some form of automatic defense to attempt to stabilize itself. Even here.”
- Wookiee

Defenses

That was something Juliet understood. “So, it’s like everyone is on a web bridge. And everyone is making it wobble, threatening to topple the whole show. So, my guess would be that, chances are, one place is having issues. Ripples usually start from an origin and wave out from there. Since there isn’t an ‘out’, per se, it’s merely rippling up and down the line like water caught in a tipped over tube. So how do we go to each place to see if it’s the one causing the ripple?” She glanced around. “Or is that the crux of this? We don’t know how or can’t?”

She had been trying to follow along, but till Reauna had placed it in terms that made sense, she had been lost on trying to figure the science out.

Juliet
“Jewels”
CoS

“One location appears to be the .. problem. But which one?” Reauna mused.

“It’s like a pond. If you drop multiple pebbles in at different spots, the center will ripple more, in an attempt to stop the others.” Zakene said, nodding. “Stop the outside, the inside eventually stabilizes as well.”

Sozi Zakene, Diplomatic Attache

Shedda listened to the back and forth. “Zoon, can you tell us what your world did to try and jump forward on the line? If we can add that information to what we know, we might understand better what to do.” She looked back at the temple building and then the screen again. “Reauna you said that people have gone through the portal but can not return. You didn’t say their movement caused any disruption before, so why has the arrival of Zoon’s group done so?” They may not know now but it was an important point to consider. Or maybe Shedda had misunderstood when they said that people had traveled to the other cities.

Mal’athar, XO

Zoon frowned in thought. “What we did was a brute force attempt in gathering sufficient energy to bend the power stream,” he said, pointing to the linked power cable between the cities. “We thought that if we had enough energy applied into our Machine we could bend the stream to bring us ahead of this one. Would it work? We didn’t know. It failed. The power link to our sun was strained and caused an instability resulting in many solar flares. What happened was that instead of bending over and leap over this it moved the city along the line of the power. What we didn’t know was that there was a temporal aspect to this and we were moving along the stream and, at one point, intersected with this city. It overloaded our power.”

Iliana had so far remained quiet, taking stock of their options but a question occurred to her. “What exactly did your readings indicate had changed? As Commander Mal’athar has suggested, this doesn’t seem to have been a problem before but if we are to try and fix it now, we need to know exactly what has changed this time?”

Lt Kara (CE)

Reauna answered. “From my understanding the energy should simply be flowing from each city source to the ones closest to maintain the link like a conduit. I am working on what I have been told. I’ve never had need to look closer. But now the stone that has been dropped into the water as you said is causing a feedback ripple oscillating from one end to the other and back and drawing more power from wherever it can. If it continues it could simply .. erupt.”

Sovrk had remained quiet for a moment as he continued to think. “That is the question… what is the difference? The only thing that I can think of right now is the rapid succession of pings… one group traveling through so close to the other… it is possible that it could have set off a rapid chain of events… one ripple causing the other to cascade.” He turned to look between Zoon and Reauna. “With your permission I would also like to take scans of the both of you, maybe if time permitted a blood draw as well to see if there is a different composition between your bloods… as you both come from two different realities right?” Sovrk for once looked troubled, some worry leaked through that very carefully put together mask of emotionlessness.
Lt.J.G Sovrk, CSO

Zoon thought the last request odd, but shrugged. With the existence of reality at stake a sample was of little matter. Reauna, too, wordlessly assented.
- Reauna and Zoon

Cochrane thought for a long moment and then said “So we have a few options, it seems. We can either one: try and move Zoon’s city back to it’s original location in space-time. Two, we move the other cities away from the moved one to reestablish the balance. Or three… we cut the link between all the cities and allow them to exist in their own timelines free from the others. Does that sound about right?” he asked the assembled individuals.

Cochrane, CO

Juliet wasn’t sure how whole cities could be moved, but she understood severing power. Without thinking, a thought slipped from her lips loud enough for those closest to hear. “If you draw power from your sun and the overdraw possibly harmed it, is there a way to boost that power? Perhaps something on our ship could hitch up the power a notch or two to put things back to right. You all keep speaking of stones thrown in water, now rippling back and forth. How about, instead a stone, we toss an entire bolder? One large shunt of power that ceases the ripples and maybe stabilizes it?”

She wasn’t sure what made her think of it. As she stopped talking a small part of her brain finished the thought. Or it could just blow everything up down the whole line and destroy it all. But if they were considering severing them all, wouldn’t it be the same thing?

Juliet
CoS
(Obviously not a scientist)
OOC: Like most of us are? <G>
IC:
The two blanched at the suggestions, each one seemingly fearing that at least one of the three would destroy it all. “This is an anchor city,” Zoon said at last. “This is the other end here. Power cycles to the end and then reflects back. What if it would be possible to do that? The energy would cycle nowhere and the feedback loop would end. That would be like that,” he glanced at Juliet, “big rock. With no end what are the chances of these energy streams fading?”

“We would have to try to travel there,” Reauna said in a tone that suggested she was dubious of that.
“I did it. It is possible.”
“I can access the machine, but I do not know how to change it.”
“I may know that, but I cannot do it alone.”
“Our city has not the power to do it,” Reauna said. “To open such a bridge we would need more power .. ” she glanced at Cochrane.
- reauna and Zoon

Iliana nodded as she pulled up a quick schematic. “If we use a focussed energy beam from the deflector array I think we can provide enough power to reestablish the link with a few tweaks to the system. That said, we would need some further scans to calculate the exact power required, I wouldn’t want to overdo it and leave you in a worse position. “ she added.

Lt Kara (CE)

Sovrk had set about getting scans of the each of them while he digested the information he had recieved. He had managed to scan one of the two.

Cochrane looked at Sovrk. “Get us a detailed scan of the system’s sun. Let’s see if we can use it to supplement the power to the machine.” He looked at Zoon and said “You said something about your link to your sun being unstable. What if we were able to stabilize that link and reset you to your correct temporal position? That would balance out the draw… correct?” He looked at Anders and Sovrk. “That’s what we are talking about, right?”

Cochrane, CO

“Yes Captain.” The Vulcan put away the tricoder and stood. He looked thoughtful. “If we were able to reconnect them as they should be it should help to fix the situation. The other thing I could think of to help do so would be to be to sever the connections and then reestablish them… I will get into contact with the ship.” The man then walked around teying to get a com link estabilshed with the ship.
Lt.J.G Sovrk, CSO

OOC: If I remember right, it is hard to make com contact right?
D Inman