New Dawn (Wandering Engineer) (51 page)

Molly looked down at her pad.
"3a, 3b...oh here it is, 3c." She touched the door controls but they
wouldn't open. "Crud." She played with the door panel.

"So what's wrong with this
one?" the guard asked. Molly didn't get a response as she started
unscrewing the panel.

"The tank was holed one deck
up. We want to pull it, but I want to run a diagnostic to make sure it's worth
fixing before we go through all that headache of yanking the old tank and
putting in a new one," Irons replied.

Molly didn't look up, focusing on
the job.  The guard looked startled. "Hand me that screwdriver." The
guard reached for one. "No the other one," Molly said. Molly didn't
look up. In a moment the guard handed her the handle.

"How did she...?" she
asked.

She looked over to the other
guard who shrugged and smiled. "Darn! What the heck is wrong here...?”
Molly demanded. The Admiral stood back and watched. Trisha started to offer his
services but he waved her off.

"Let the lady do her
job," he said. He turned and studied the corridor. He spotted a broken
fixture. "I'll be over here if you need me," he said. He went over to
the fixture and started pulling it down.

A tech arrived. "Hey! That’s
my job," she growled at him. He stopped and looked the woman over. She was
wearing a coverall and squirmed a bit.

He nodded politely then stepped
back. "Have at it," he chuckled shaking his head as he came back to
the girls.

"Got chased off I see,"
Molly commented, not even looking up.

He chuckled. "Everyone's a
critic."

She smiled. "Okay, that just
about... Okay... I'm in!" The door sparkled.

`"Hey what the?" The
guard said.

Molly touched the door. Sparks
flew and her hand was thrown back. "OWE! That really hurt!" she said,
clutching her hand. The tech down the corridor looked over to them craning her
body to get a better view.

The Admiral grimaced. "Force
field. The computer sensed an intruder when you tried to hot wire the door and
activated it." He studied the controls. "The controls are dead. One
moment." He closed his eyes. "Sprite?" he sub vocalized. The HUD
came up.

 "Already on it
Admiral," Sprite said as she scrolled data. "Hmm... Hardwired
security access node, you'll need to go to the next junction, take the port
corridor down twenty meters, pull the panel on your starboard side and then
jack in," she said.

He nodded and opened his eyes.
"Hardwired security system, I'll have to jack in to bypass."

They followed down the corridor,
and to the access port. "Here it is." He pulled the panel off then
set it aside. "Just be a moment." He extended his right hand, letting
it morph into a jack. "I'm in. Okay..." He fed the security node his
ID. It flashed back at him.

"Damn stubborn paranoid son
of a dishwasher...” Sprite said grumpily. Her colloquialism made him smile.
"Okay, got it. Try again," she growled finally. He did. The node
cleared.

"All right, I reset the
node. No problem." He unjacked and they went back to work.

"I heard you were talking
about implants. What's this I hear about an identity chip?" a familiar
voice said behind him. He turned to the Chief sitting next to the Captain.

"Yes, civilians and military
personnel had them in my time to identify themselves and act as keys," he
explained.

She looked amused.
"Keys?" He nodded.

"To electronic records in
networks, and electronic locks."

She gave the Captain a look, and
then shifted her attention back to the Admiral. "Can we do something like
that?" she finally asked. He noted a curious sound of...anticipation in
her voice.

He nodded warily. "Yes,
there's a stock of them in sickbay according to the records, and the doctor can
replicate more. Why?"

She didn't answer, just typed
something into her tablet. "Why?" the Captain echoed, looking at her.
"Oh huh?" she looked up. "Um, well, I would like to lock off
access to some areas of the ship," she said.

The Admiral nodded. "You
mean restrict them. Good idea," he said. Her eyes became a little hooded.

"What areas?" the
purser asked.

"Well, like the weapon
rooms, armory, and areas of the ship that could cause damage if someone broke
something inside," the chief replied. She nodded to Jennie.

She nodded back. "I see
where you’re going with this," she said. She turned to the Captain.
"Captain, it's a good idea. We've had a few problems with people getting
into compartments they aren't supposed too or damaging systems," she said
with a grimace.

"Remember when Dorah and
Mindy decided to make necklaces?" Jenny asked when the captain didn't look
totally convinced.

The purser, Chief, Captain, and
Shandra winced. "Good point. I'm still not sold however," she gave
the Chief a look. "What else?" she demanded, knowing there was more.

The Chief squirmed a little.
"Well, we could also track their movements," she admitted.

The Captain's eyes glittered.
"I'm not sure I'm at all happy about that." She turned to the
Admiral. "So you have one of these?"she asked. 

He nodded. "Two. One is my
civilian implant when I was a child; the other is my military IFF," he
replied. She nodded.

"I want the access
codes," the Chief said suddenly. He knew she wanted them to limit his
access and monitor his movements.

"That won’t be
necessary," the Captain said hands flat on the table.

He thought for a moment.
"Captain, if the crew is going through with this, I don't mind giving her
the civilian IFF code," he said.

She studied him for a moment, and
then nodded. "All right, if you’re okay with it."

He shrugged. "It's best to
lead by example ma'am." She smiled.

"Can it get into your
head?" the purser asked, sounding concerned.

He turned to the purser. She
blushed. "No ma'am. Well, there's a tendril that's inserted, but only to
your optic nerve. It projects a signal onto your optic nerve when you palm
something. More complex systems allow you to view data through them. If you get
to military grade level one implants, then you can send information to and from
the basic link."

The doctor looked up. "I
noticed a lot of the equipment requires that," he observed.

He nodded. "Yes doc, to use
some of the more advanced equipment, you have to have medical implant
technology," Irons replied.

The purser shuddered. "But
what about those virus things?" she asked. He smiled.

"Well, I stamped them out,
and any that are still lurking in hardware not connected to the net will get hammered
by antivirus software and stopped by the firewall if they're ever plugged back
in," he said. He shrugged at her uncertain expression. "Also, the
basic implant has a primitive antivirus and firewall." She nodded slowly.
"How's it powered?" she asked. He held up his right hand.

"Well, my implants
are...more advanced, so require an external power source from time to time. But
basic implants rely on your electrical field and thermal profile your body
generates." She looked confused.

The doctor smiled. "I just
finished reading about that!"

"All right, make it so
doctor, starting with the senior staff," the Captain said quietly. A few
of the faces weren't happy.

"It won’t hurt, you just
swallow a pill. When you go to bed it makes the connections," the Admiral
explained. A few looked relieved.

"Can we make
replicators?" Jennie asked him later that day.

He turned to Jennie. He had been
expecting the question for some time. They hadn't noticed he'd been making
replicators or replicator parts. "Not exactly. You see, you can make a lot
of things, but with only civilian implants, the hardware will limit the gear
you can make to civilian grade," he explained. She looked confused.
"Replicators have nanites in them. So do a few other things, so are
restricted tech. As is weapons," he further explained.

She nodded. "But what about
parts?" she asked.

He sighed. "Any attempt to
make parts for them will lock up the replicator. That's what happened with the
replicator on deck two," he said. She nodded.

"In my time we had to
restrict that tech to prevent terrorists from using the tech to make
weapons," he explained.

She looked confused so did Molly.
"Why would anyone do that?" Molly asked.

He nodded to the Chief as she
approached. "Well, some people didn't agree with the current government.
Some for religious reasons, some for other reasons. They would use any tool to
get their point across. Terror was their biggest weapon. I was hurt in two
terrorist attacks.”

 He looked away for a moment.
"That's why we put a lock on tech. You saw what happened with nanite
weapons," he said. All the women shivered at that. Seeing a planet crumple
into dust was...terrifying. "Well, we had to make sure it didn't happen by
our own people. So lockouts were hardwired into every replicator," he
finished.

Molly nodded. "I think I for
one am glad," she finally said. He nodded.

"So you want us to teach a
class on first aide to the entire crew? Why? Didn't we already do that?"
Mindy asked him as he showed the doctor how to use the organ cloning machine.
She was still acting a little sullen around him.

"Oh, it's so the crew can do
basic first aid in case of an accident," he responded absently as he
touched the controls and rotated the view. "Nice, very nice."

Mindy yanked on his sleeve.
"But why? I mean, that's our job right?" she asked plaintively. He
turned to gaze at her. She was biting her lip, hands behind her back.

The doctor looked up.
"Sometimes accidents happen. If the first people on scene can do something
to help the injured, it increases their chances to survive," the doctor
explained patiently.

The Admiral nodded. "You
can't be everywhere Mindy, what happens if Dorah or someone else is hurt while
you’re on the other side of the ship? Or with another patient? Or asleep?"
he asked.

She bit her lip. "Like
mom," she murmured. She paled, then murmured as she turned, hiding her
face.

Doc nodded. "Yes, like your
mom. A mandatory class could help a lot of people. If we can help, we
should," he said.

She nodded. "Okay doc."
She bounced off. "This is going to be so much fun teaching a class!"

The Admiral froze. "What
have I done!" he groaned, drooping his head into his hands.

The doctor laughed and patted his
shoulder. "It’s for a good cause."

"Remind me to suggest
satellites to the purser as trade goods," he ordered Sprite as he pulled
the bolt out of its hole.

 "Okay. I will," a tentative
voice said. He started. That wasn't Sprite's voice.

He looked over and noticed a girl
standing there.”Good. You could also suggest the idea to her yourself," he
said, covering.

She looked confused then nodded.
"Okay, if you say so," she said wrinkling her nose. He snorted at her
expression..

He looked over the computer
motherboard and nodded. "Bad ram?" he asked.

Sammy had her multi tool out
probing. "Looks like it. A terabyte stick right here." He looked over
and nodded. Sprite had already confirmed it with a memory test earlier on.

"What bothers me...?” She
cleared her throat and blushed. "Um," she said uncertain.

He nodded. "Go on," he
encouraged her.

"Well, um, what bothers me
is, with the replicators and nanites, why build things like this?"she
asked.

He handed her a new stick of ram
as she gingerly pulled the old out. "Well, that's why," he said. She
looked confused.

He nodded his head to the ram. "With
different parts, if one goes bad, we can swap it out. If it was all one
homogeneous piece we would have to send in nanites to fix the problem," he
explained.

She glanced at the memory in her
hands then back up as she handed it to him. "Oh," she said. Her face
cleared.

 "Besides, it would regulate
people like you and I obsolete," he chuckled. She giggled after a moment.

"How come you don't need a
haircut?" a woman asked as he passed her with his usual entourage. he
paused. "Excuse me?" he asked politely.

She smiled. She was a portly
woman of moderate age, most likely in her early forties. "Yes, I do the
girls hair and I was wondering why we haven't seen you in the hair salon,"
she said.

He looked her over. "Well, I
have nanites that take care of that at night while I sleep," he replied
without thinking.

She looked at his scalp.
"Nanites?" She moved back turning ashen. "Rrrooobots?" She
wrung her hands then hid them. "Never mind never you mind!" She
turned and jogged away taking periodic looks over her shoulder.

He shrugged to the others.
"Takes all kinds..."

"Wiring, electronics,
plumbing, and plasma conduits, is that all we do?" one of the techs asked
exasperated.

Molly snorted. "You’re
forgetting replacing parts, rebuilding things, recalibrating them, patching the
hull, and replacing spars. Not to mention motors, gravity plates, and the
like," She glanced over her controls then shrugged.  She was getting a lot
more grumbling now that everything was working better. People were getting
bored.

"A day in the life of an
engineer," the Admiral replied. "Once the repairs are done, we can
move onto bigger things," he said. He wrote a patch program and uploaded
it through his jack.

"Like what?" the woman
asked, glancing over.

"Oh, like making satellites,
parts for colonies for trade goods, vehicles, shuttle craft, all sorts of
things," He suggested absently.

She looked awed. "We can do
that?" she asked. He nodded.