"Deliver de letter, de sooner de better."

[Drae Shelton 0]

“"Deliver de letter, de sooner de better.”

T’Prise & Drae

 

“Admiral, we are estimating 10 minutes to complete the programming and a method of transmitting them,” the chief medical officer announced over the comm, looking around at the team gathered in sickbay.

She turned to Drae. “You need to find a safe way to introduce these into their swarm, without them thinking its an attack, as if they were already there.”

Wait... what? “I need to find a safe way to introduce these?”

No response. She’d already moved on.

A delivery system. She wants a delivery system. One that will deliver our modified nanites into a swarm of nomming zombie nanites. And she wants it in ten minutes?

“There was discussion on the bridge to use a torp,” she continued, “but they cannot think that it's an attack”

“Yeah, I get that, Doc. But....” Adrenaline flow, his mouth hung open, mind spinning.

The nanites’ basic programming wasn’t basic anymore. It’d been modified. By us... or Daventry... or Kumquat... or all three. We tried to destroy it with a torpedo so now it’s saying, “Torpedo bad. Torpedo threat. Kill. Eat. Nom_nom_nom....”

“These nanites appear to be fixated on consuming fuel. They do not appear to be easily diverted, or open to suggestion,” the science officer stated quietly, in a flat emotionless tone.

Drae’s attention jerked to T’Prise and flashbacks of a pamphlet that circulated through the Academy and almost cost him his career. (Yeah, most Vulcans don’t have a sense of humor.)

 

“Surviving Dr. Sivuk’s Trans-warp Theory”

brought to you by

DMShelton Productions™

 

1. Grab enough engineering stuff to make you look really impressive. Extra credit for anything Vulcan.

2. Walk straight and tall, eyes confident. (Practice in the lift.)

3. Jerk your tunic down now and then. (Practice in the lift. Don’t drop your stuff.)

4. Look like you know exactly what you're doing. Extra credit for “The Sivuk Look.”

5. Enter the room at precisely 0859.00.

6. Modify your blank stare to look like Vulcan concentration.

7. Do a lot of sage nodding but don’t fall asleep. (Practice in the lift.)

8. Say “interesting” and “fascinating” every so often (at least twice per hour, especially during a pause).

9. Make casual eye-contact with someone who actually knows what’s going on - or can fake it better than you can.

10. Single out and listen to one person who has it all together. Follow that lead.

 

Today that lead just happened to be the Vulcan science officer, T’Prise. Talk about irony. Drae’s adrenaline spiked, pumping like electro-plasma through a warp core.

“TPrise, did they have any magnetic attributes, something that would let us release these gently and have them be naturally attracted to become part of the swarm when it passes by?” the doctor broke in.

“Not as far as we have observed.”

“The nanites we have here do not need to be convinced of anything, they will just accept our programming. The concern will be making sure they get accepted into the swarm as part of their own,” the chief medical officer continued.

“It is quite illogical to assume that the nanites will accept foreign programming. We should therefore make a simple suggestion, instead of a complex set of instructions.”

“Uh... how about, ‘Follow me?’” Heads turned to Drae. There was an awkward silence.

The Vulcan nodded to acknowledge the engineer. “Such a suggestion may work, however, it does not differ greatly from the Manticore leading them in the direction we wish them to move.”

He blew out a breath. “Which brings us back to the delivery system. What would they follow? What do most things follow? I mean, like, basic things, like... animals and kids.”

She pondered for a moment before responding. “They appear to be following the Manticore, perhaps they would follow a shuttle?”

“Yeah, maybe. But it’s a heck of a lot like a starship and it’s probably a good idea to stay away from that kind of design just so they don’t get the idea that anything that looks like a starship, flies like a starship, and sounds like a starship is prime rib. I was thinking really basic.”

He leaned forward to stare at the conference table a moment. “We want basic commands, simple things. They’re following Manticore for food. What else supplies food? Ah...” a hand-wave got his brain working, “...fruit trees, honey bees, hot dog stands, pizza parlors…” Yeah, he forgot to eat lunch.

T'Prise leveled Drae with a steely loom. “The nebulae, as we have been leading them towards it in the first place.”

He stopped short. “Okay,” said Drae, straightening up. “the... nebu-lae... is the food source, but how are we going to get them there? What’s going to make them pay attention....” He stopped again, cogs turned. “Oh. Yeah. We’re leading. They’re following. They’re behind us!”

His eyes sparkled as a broad, playful grin lit his face. “Exhaust manifold! You ever heard of a backfire?”

“I believe that is when a vehicle with a propulsion system emits some kind of waste product," she responded promptly.

“Yeah. When incomplete combustion causes fuel to back up in the exhaust. And when you downshift too fast the backup causes a huge explosion, like a Jake brake. Talk about a wakeup call.

“My uncle had this old car back on earth. Awesome 1970s Dodge Charger R/T, four twenty-six eight-cylinder Hemi with a compression ratio of 10.25 to one. It ran 425 horses at 5000 rips and 480 FP at 4000 rips, zero to sixty in 5.5 and a quarter-mile in 13.9 at 105 miles per.” He became more animated, ignoring the stares.

“We’d take it into town and right about the middle of town square we’d make it backfire... ka-boom... rattle the floorboards for a mile just to hassle the rich kids, then haul ass back to the ranch. ‘Course Uncle Bud got all bent out of shape so we lost privileges for a month, but it was a hell of a ride.”

Another long pause. He shrugged.

“Your anecdote is colorful...however, I question its appropriateness in this situation. Time is of the essence and we ought not to be discussing the hoodlum antics of your past. Are you proposing that we use the Manticore’s propulsion system as your delivery method?” Pausing to think for a moment. “This suggestion has merit. We could release the nanites into the swarm with a simple set of instructions that they have located a food source.”

Drae gave a snort, the grin still pretty broad. “Yeah, through the ship’s exhaust manifold It’d be pretty much like an up yours!”

The look returned. "As I stated before, we have no the time for juvenile trespasses. Please create a detailed plan for a release mechanism, while I program the nanites.” The science officer being tapping on a console, dismissing the engineer.