Probing the Depths

Posted on Sun Oct 25th, 2015 @ 6:31am by Lieutenant David Windsor & Ensign Wesley Scott & Lieutenant Rianna DiMarco

Mission: The Belle of Bellatrix
Location: Science Lab

"Have you been able to increase the range of the probes output? These readings... I can't tell if they're scrambled, or if they really are this sporadic. It doesn't seem right," David was saying as he poured over the readouts on the Farragut's science computer.

"I think... I honestly think they're coming in clear, boss," Wesley replied.

"I do too, but I want to be sure... Ri?" David asked, looking up to the engineer who had been working to enhance the broadcast signals.

"Everything's pinging back just fine," DiMarco declared around a mouthful of hot coffee. She sank back into the chair that Wesley had formerly stolen from him with a sigh. "Either your sensor kit's borked on a whole new level or it's weird as hell out there."

"Hmm..." David considered what he was considering something. "Very well then," David replied, tapping in data on his Padd.

"What's WAH noise frequencies?" Wesley asked, looking at the data that David had just entered.

"Weird as Hell," David replied with a giant grin.

"Oh, lord..." Wesley said, rolling his eyes.

Ri chuckled. "Very scientific, Mister Brain. You've got a way with words for sure."

"Poets have yearned for my lyrical word choices," David said, grinning broadly. "Let's start seeing if we can..." David sat up bolt straight and furrowed his brow, "Who's that?" He called over Wesley's shoulder to the darkened science lab behind him. "If you're in the lab, turn on the bloody lights before you break something."

Wesley turned and looked over his shoulder to see who David was talking to, but so no one, "Lab's empty, boss." He said.

David harumphed, "I would have sworn I saw someone moving in there..." He said, still trying to peer through the dark for a moment before shrugging his shoulders and going back to his data analysis.

With a sideways glance at David, Ri casually walked over and turned off the probe's garbled audio feedback at the console by wall. She patted Windsor on the shoulder on the way back to the console that she was babysitting. "See if that doesn't help. It was beginning to grate on my nerves, maybe it was making you twitchy, too. I think instinctively we try to hear things in white noise the way we look for faces and shapes in patterns."

David smiled, "Thank you, Lieutenant. That is much better," He said with a nod.

"What do the two of you make of all the rumors from this sector of space?" David asked, "Supernatural aside, of course. We're all men and women of science here."

"'Cept for Wesley. He's an experiment," teased DiMarco with a cheeky grin. "I dunno, David. It's a pretty big pill to swallow that there's a magic corner of space where weird crud happens. I'm a sucker for superstition just in case and this- is still a little out of my belief range. Why would such phenomena exist and why would it be isolated?"

Wesley shot her a look, but didn't say anything in retort to the experiment comment, "Cosmic resonance, particle fields, undiscovered phenomenon," Wesley replied simply. "It could be some odd sort of radiation or frequency put out by the sun in the system... there's lots of ways it could be isolated. As far as the truth of the effects... I have my doubts there."

"There is recorded evidence that exposure to certain frequencies and radiations have resulted in madness and hallucinations, Wesley. Never rule something as impossible or foolish until you weigh all options," David replied.

"Not to mention all the three billion half guesses and weird parallel dimension quasi scientific mumblings. Maybe Santa, too. There's an infinite number of possibilities, though. Where do you finally draw the line? Somewhere between mass hysteria, a bad batch of illegal stims floating around ship, and weird radiation: where's the cut off point that says 'this is too jacked up: let's call it a haunted space triangle' and write it off?" Ri asked with a frustrated shrug. This was why she stuck to engineering in a nutshell.

"Someplace long before you start calling space haunted," David replied with a chuckle. "We've been able to finally trace the ghost stories of earth back to unstable dimensional rifts allowing visage into another dimension just briefly. It's all be scientifically proven. There's no... mysticism here. I'm not looking for some supernatural answer to these questions. The science is much more interesting to me," David said, grinning broadly.

"That's funny.. 'cause I'm just lookin' to fill the time between now and lunch." Ri quipped back quickly.

"Are you ever not hungry?" Wesley asked, snarkily.

"You do have a rather fascinating appetite at all times," David said, chuckling.

"I like food, the engineer quipped back easily. The rest of her words weren't quite as light. "Besides, if you ever had to go without, you'd look forward to it every single time, too."

"Ah... yes, I suppose that is true," David replied, feeling low for forgetting her challenged past.

"We've got a strange readout here," Wesley said, seeming to have missed the rest of the conversation. "There's a sub-frequency to all of this noise." He said.

DiMarco waited for a few minutes before nudging Wesley with her elbow. "Okay.. so.. what kind?"

"I'm trying to isolate it, but the snakes in the aquarium are eating the frogs," He said, simply.

Windsor looked at DiMarco for a moment, then back at Wesley, "Say that again?" He asked.

Wesley looked up, and gave them a disapproving look, "If you'd listen the first time, I wouldn't have to repeat myself, you know? I said, I'm trying to isolate the frequency, but it's buried under a lot of distortion."

Ri glanced at David, who had just as curious an expression on his face. He had to have heard it, too. "What was that about snakes and frogs?"

"What are you people on about? You'd think the lions in the woods were roaring at the bulkheads! Seriously," Wesley replied, simply.

DiMarco straightened in her seat and looked directly at Windsor. "David.."

"No... I hear it as well... Wesley, you're saying things that don't seem to be what you mean... a sort of speech paraphasia if I'm not mistaken," David said, calmly.

Wesley jerked the headphones that he'd been using to isolate the frequency out of his ears and sighed, "I am not. I'm speaking perfectly clearly. What are you two on about?"

David cocked his head to the side, "Are you capable of speaking normally still?"

Wesley sighed, "What are you talking about, David? I'm speaking perfectly normally. I have been the entire evening. Are you two going off your nut?" He asked.

David looked over to Ri, "You heard it as well, yes?"

The engineer nodded warily. "Maybe it's the subfrequency influencing the change in speech? Would it alter the cognitive state though?"

"Could, very well could," David said, stroking his chin. "Put the head phones back in," David offered, tapping in a command on a console, "I've got the computer recording our conversation now," He said, grinning slightly. The thrill of the hunt in an experiment.

Wesley complied and shrugged, "Is this the bag of raisins that you threw into the lake?" He asked, sounding very perplexed.

"What room are we in, Wesley," Wells asked.

Wesley sighed, "We're oblong to the shark aquatic basket," He replied, matter of factly.

"Are we now?" Wells replied, grinning broadly. "And the name of our ship?"

Wesley grumbled some, "This is antelope. We're aboard the IQX Frankfurter," He replied, starting to sound exasperated.

Wells motioned for Welsey to pull the earplugs out of his ears, and he did so.

"Now... listen closely, Wesley, and you'll see what we're on about," David said, grinning broadly still.

Wesley's face fell as he listened. When it ended he was shaking his head, "That's... that's not what I said at all. That's not what I heard either," He insisted.

"No, I'd wager it wasn't. We need to put in a warning on this frequency," He said. He looked over to Ri, "I think it'd also be wise to start trying to find some sort of... counter frequency or scrambling frequency to prevent it from effecting the rest of the crew, don't you agree?" He asked.

DiMarco nodded. As much as she wanted to say that there was nothing to the triangle, this was certainly indicative of something in the least. "You'll want to talk to Daisy about that. I lay you money she'd know exactly what to do."

"Yes... Daisy... would you... could you say... could you perhaps uhm... speak with her on the matter for me?" David asked, smiling sheepishly.

"She's female. She flirted with him. He blew it. She's now in the no fly zone," Wesley quipped, sarcastically.

"Shuddup, Wesley! AND WHO THE DEVIL IS IN THAT ROOM?!" David barked, suddenly rushing into the lab behind Wesley and slapping on the lights. It was vacant. "Bugger all! I know I saw some one in here! Show yourself!"

"I was there-" Ri started to say when David started yelling. She whipped around to try and catch a glimpse at whomever he was yelling at, but she didn't see a thing. She looked from David to Wesley, then back to David again and her eyes narrowed. "Oh," she said in a dry, cold tone. "I see. This is because I opened my mouth in the staff meeting, isn't it? I said I didn't believe in this triangle crap and you guys are playing games with me. Thought it'd be funny, huh?" She stood, still scowling. "Well it's not."

David turned back and looked at her, confusion on his face, "What the bloody hell are you on about?" He asked. "Wesley, did you see the person in here just now?"

"No one is down here but us, boss," Wesley insisted.

Exasperated, the engineer stalked over to the lab in question- activated all of the lights- then stalked back out. "See? Nobody there. Are you serious, or are you playing with me?"

David looked at her oddly for a moment, then abruptly walked over to the various engineering access panels and checked to see if they were ajar, or if anyone was crawling away, "Absurd... I know I saw someone in here," He said, earnestly.

"If there's a game going on, I'm not a part of it," Wesley said, stepping up behind her. "Bossman, no one was in here... honest."

David stood up from behind the console he was crouched behind and looked around, "No... No, I suppose not. I... dammit, do you think the frequency could be causing hallucinations?" He asked, seriously.

Still not fully convinced that this wasn't some sort of joke, DiMarco continued to be pensive. "As soon as Wesley turned off the feed, he no longer had issues. If that was the case, you should be fine now, too."

"Not necessarily. He's actually been exposed to less of the frequency than we have because of the headphones and the fact that he's been working on multiple different frequencies. The notable change in speech patters didn't happen until he listened to a full feed of it for a moment. It may be effecting us more slowly, but more permanently than it did him," David speculated.

"David, that would be umbrella. I mean, really. I can't even begin to explain the various astroturf why that wouldn't work," Wesley replied.

"... It would be 'umbrella', Wesley?" David replied, arching an eyebrow.

Wesley's eyes went wide as he looked over at Ri, "My god... he's doing the word substitution," He said, sounding alarmed.

The engineering chief sighed loudly. If they were both losing their minds, then why wasn't she? It had to be a ruse. Had to be. It was the only thing that made sense. "Seriously. If you're not joking, you need to head to sickbay now and let one of the nurses do some tests. If you are, we're gonna go round once this mission is over. Am I clear?"

"She's right! We need to be looked over, Wesley. This frequency could be doing irreparable damage to our minds right now!" David insisted.

"I'll go shortly," Wesley replied, plainly. "I need to keep trying to figure out the properties of the frequency. I'll work with Daisy to get that done... uhm... Ri, can you stay with me and translate in case I can't talk," He asked, sheepishly.

DiMarco's expression shifted from frustrated to concerned. "Yeah, sure I can.. Then shed have to split and check in on her own folks if.. if this was really happening. "I'm sorry that I doubted you guys. I should have known better."

"Nonsense!" David said, excitedly. "Skepticism is one of the foundations of science, and we're currently dealing with--" David cut off and he looked behind her for a moment, "Interesting..." He muttered to himself. "There's no one there, David. No one." He blinked hard, and looked back at Ri, "We're currently dealing with phenomenon far being the norm. Keep doing what you're doing! It's exactly as it should be!"

"Are you sure that you're okay to head to sickbay on your own? I'm going to call ahead and let them know that you're coming. " If Wesley hadn't asked her to stay, she would have escorted him there herself.

"I'm certain," David said, snatching up a nearby tricorder. "I'll keep myself on point with this. You can't argue hard data, right?" He said, smiling broadly. "You take care of Wesley, I'll handle getting myself to sickbay."

"Okay.." The expression on the engineer's face no bones about the fact that she was growing more and more worried about Windsor the more that this went on. "Be careful."

"I'm a scientist! I don't know any other way to be!" David assured her, laughing happily as he left the lab. Most people would have been scared, but not David Windsor. This was his favorite pastime: The unknown!