Summation Summaries

Posted on Thu Feb 10th, 2011 @ 3:12pm by Lieutenant Three of Seven & Captain Nathan Cowell MD

Mission: Hippocratic Hijacking
Location: Bridge - USS Arizona
Timeline: After 'A little girl chat...'

With auditory sensors that picked up on a wide variety of vibrations in the air, it was impossible for Three not to be aware of the conversation that unfolded between the Major and Lieutenant Marion, it merely wasn't something the Borg focused any attention on. Perhaps some individuals would have attributed it to a 'distraction' but it was merely input to the machine, sorted, cataloged, and indexed within the memory library. When Three went to regenerate, it would then be able to decide which parts of its memory were worthy of further storage or could be discarded.

Captain Cowell's order to increase speed was, on the other hand, a stray comment that was immediately relevant for the small cyborg. Shifting priorities, the Borg immediately examined the current load on the ship's EPS grid and calculated the necessary increase to propulsion systems that be required in order to maintain a Warp 9 velocity. As that was above the standard cruise velocity, more power than was typical would have to be dedicated to the nacelles. The deuterium valves and anti-matter injectors would also require additional allocations due to greater volume passing through those processing systems and further safeguards being required for safe operation of the amount of matter and anti-matter now colliding in the core of the ship.

With the ship's finite resources, this meant that Three was now approaching a decision point. The Arizona would attain one hundred percent power consumption in approximately seven minutes at present rate of increase in usage. Life Support, Environmental Systems, Anti-Matter Containment, and Medical Support were four areas immediately locked from the operations officer or engineer diverting any power away from without command authorization, and consent of the Chief Medical Officer in the case of medical systems, so Three immediately diverted additional resourcing from the impulse fusion reactors to those areas so to not restrict their continued function.

Given the ship's current function, approaching an unknown situation, tactical and defensive systems were secondary priorities. As was the navigational deflector, whose power consumption at this velocity was substantial by itself. The various sensor modules dotting the skin of the ship were likewise necessary to maintain awareness in an uncertain region, particularly one with the prospect of a threat existing to the ship. By estimates, Three needed to reduce one of the ship's systems by seven percent in order to balance the demand on the power from the warp core. If it inserted a reasonable margin of error, then Three would reduce ten percent. And the obvious option wasn't apt to be a popular one, even in the short term.

Swiveling it's chair just slightly to the right, the Borg turned its head so that it was looking back at the center chair. "Captain, with your permission I would like to reduce power to the replicators by ten percent," Three stated evenly, pausing to allow the man to process the request before providing further details. "Food replication should be unaffected by this reduction in capabilities, merely the materialization of large or complex items."

Nathan hadn't been paying attention to the forward console, indeed he hadn't even noticed a body in it since Joker had left. He diverted his attention from his book long enough to catch sight of two things. The first was the implants, the second was the youthful face that was behind the implants.

"Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!" Nathan exclaimed, nearly throwing the book in his hand at the Borg in surprise, "Jack, when the hell did you get assimilated, and how'd you manage to get back here after it happened?! What the fuck is going on around here, people?! Who's responsible for this bullshit?!"

Three could only blink as it's mind processed the unexpected response from Cowell. "None of the names mentioned would be my own, Captain," the Borg stated, deciding that perhaps introductions would be an appropriate place to start. "I am Lieutenant Junior Grade Three of Seven. I transferred here from the USS Comanche. As for who would be responsible for the excrement of livestock, I have no reference by which to judge, though I assume that to be a metaphor," the Borg answered neatly.

Nathan settled down... a little, "Listen here, Borg, I don't know what those other people might have taught you back on that Injin ship, but around these parts, we don't have livestock runnin' around. If I'm asking about some bullshit, it means something is out of place and you need to start explain why. You, being Borg, in my Ops manager's seat, spouting garbage about replicators is out of place. When the hell did you even get on the boat? Who the fuck neglected to tell me these things, and why do you sound like someone cut your nuts off?"

Metaphors and more metaphors. For a people that liked to decry that more individuals in the galaxy should 'say what they mean' it seemed very rare that any humanoid Three encountered ever did so with any frequency. "I joined the crew at Deep Space Six, precisely six days, two hours, and seventeen minutes ago. My transfer orders should have been routed through both yourself and the first officer after my arrival so I cannot state with any certainty why you would be unaware of them, other than for the fact that your duties require you to assimilate large amount of details and the ones particular to my arrival may not have held any particular importance in light of operational commitments directing your attention elsewhere," the Borg supplied neatly, it's mind stuck on the final question that had been posed.

"My vocal synthesizer is functioning within normal parameters, though I don't see the relevance between sound and nuts, Captain," Three remarked finally.

"Oh for the love of..." Nathan declared before explaining, "Your nuts, your balls, your dick danglers... Your testicles, boy. Don't you have any? Your voice sounds like you're halfway between a sex change operation."

"The answer to your inquiry is that I do not. My assimilation was different than what you may have encountered previously. All parts of my original anatomy were removed except for the upper portions of my face. As to my original gender, it is unknown whether I was ever a 'boy'," Three responded calmly, though the cognitive processors were somewhat confused at how the request to the captain had gone very far off topic.

"If I may, sir, our power consumption at present is approaching maximum. We must reduce dependency somewhere. The replicators are the most reasonable option," Three remarked, heralding back to his original comment.

"Yeah yeah, whatever..." Nathan waved it off without bothering to really listen. He'd made a discovery and he wasn't about to let it go by useless concerns like power consumption, "So what you're telling me is, you could go either way at this point. Them Borg bastards stripped you of everything but yer brain and your mug. So you don't get that warm and fuzzy feeling when you look at a certain person? No hot and bothered, heavy breathing, heart pumping nervousness when you look at some cute girl or boy? Nothing?"

"That would be impossible as I have no cardio-pulmonary system, Captain," Three commented, as the Borg continued to look back at the captain even as the fingers of it's left hand were inputting the commands to reduce power to the replication system throughout the ship.

Nathan frowned and got up out of his chair. He'd had about enough of looking at this one from a distance, it was time for the exam. He crossed the short distance and seized the Borg by the chin, "Look up for me."

Obediently, Three tilted it's head back. "The lower jaw and below are entirely artificial," the Borg supplied.

"Shush," Nathan ordered as his fingers moved with the grace of a medical practitioner with countless decades of experience. His fingers slid under Three's jaw, along the neck, then along the curvature of the cheeks. His thumbs caressed the bulges of the eyebrows, then moved to the ears, feeling around them and behind them. They then moved to the top of Three's skull, again the fingers were probing and searching, but for what only Nathan knew. The whole affair took only about a minute, but when Nathan pulled his hands away, he looked satisfied.

"Well, they didn't do too bad of a job preserving what they left you. What the hell were you, anyway? You're not human, certainly not Vulcan..." Nathan asked.

"Ocampa, sir," Three supplied, looking unfazed by the impromptu examination and likely very well accustomed to many like it. "A Delta Quadrant race. My function for the Collective was as a probe. I traveled from the Delta Quadrant to the Beta Quadrant where I was picked up by the USS Hawking."

"That would explain the unusual cranial divots and the ears," Nathan nodded to himself, "But not so much your longevity. Must be all them probes pumping through your body keeping you young and fresh. How about yer own personal self-image? Do you see yourself more masculine or more feminine, or somewhere in between?"

"As I have no reproductive function or concept of gender, I see neither trait as being relevant to my function as an individual," Three answered more readily than he had the other questions. That was a common inquiry for it.

"Hardly true," Nathan countered suddenly, "Gender identity shapes an individual in more ways that you think. It gives you a sense of social identity when dealing with others. It gives you avenues of interpersonal relationships that you wouldn't have as a neutral person. I get that love and that shit isn't probably on your priority list but it helps people get more comfortable around you as well. Calling you 'it' all the time makes you sound like an object... or worse still, just a drone. It would go a long way to making you more of a 'person' to people if you identify yourself with a specific gender, or at least build toward it."

The comments were unexpected, more so than the physical examination had been. For a moment, Three's eyes moved back and forth as though uncertain how to respond. "Noted, sir," Three said finally, it's cognitive processors taking a moment to index and catalog all of the various ideas presented regarding gender's relation to individuality. "However, there are many more parallels between my current form and an object than a living person, Captain."

"That's horse shit," Nathan declared forcefully, "You aren't the sum of your parts. You've got plenty enough flesh on you to make you a person. Hell, I knew a guy years ago who had more metal in him than bones. That didn't stop him from being the man he always had been. Even had to shit in a bag the last few years of his life, but he was still damn feisty and a personality to be reckoned with. Granted, this was back before cyborgs and all this modern medicine on Earth, but the story still holds water. You got to let go of the machines and start embracing the warm bodies next to you."

Before he forgot to mention it, "Just don't hug me, I don't like being touched..."

In the back of the compartment, Lieutenant JG Marion could be heard laughing at her station.

"What's so damn funny?!" Nathan said, looking back at his daughter.

"Oh nothing..." Elizabeth smirked, "You big old softy..."

Nathan grumbled something under his breath and stormed back to his chair, but not before retrieving the book he'd tossed earlier, "Quiet your noise over there..."

Marion just continued to smirk as she went back to what she was doing.