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"Personnel Problems Are Nothing To Get Personal About"
(Previous Post: "Captain's Responsibilities")
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Setting: USS ANUBIS, Deck 1, Bridge
Stardate: 30147.1710

Captain Morningstar had left the Shillian Scientist in charge while he took care of a few things, at least that had been what the Commanding Officer had stated upon leaving his office and stepping into the turbolift.  Silently, the acting Executive Officer wished him good luck on his journey as she hoped that he had been heading to see the Intelligence Liaison Officer.  It was true that matters concerning personnel had been her responsibility, but given that she had yet to see the Intel Officer had made the situation awkward and difficult.

As a Scientist, the Shillian possessed a great deal of experience dealing with a wide range of unknowns, but Shar'El had been an exception to this.  Members of the Senior Staff were by default expected to communicate with the First Officer, relaying information, providing updates on current situations and generally keeping the lines of communication open.  The Intel Officer had seemingly gone out of her way to avoid all of this, staying isolated as much as possible and allowing only a select few to actually see her. Since the acting Executive Officer had not been deemed worthy of being amongst these elite few, she had thought it best to involve Captain Morningstar into this matter.  After all, he actually knew the woman having spent some time in her company.  The only other officer who had been granted this apparent honour had been the Counsellor of the ANUBIS, Lieutenant Eve Dalziel.

As if she had heard the thoughts of the Shillian Scientist, the newly promoted Lieutenant stepped onto the command deck of the USS ANUBIS with purpose and seemed pleased to see the acting Executive Officer standing on the bridge.

"What brings you here Counsellor? I hope that it is not another turbolift malfunction, although it would be nice to have someone else go through this, if only to make me feel as if I had not been singled out by some unknown galactic force," the Shillian said as she forced a grin.

"Actually I am here to see you," the Counsellor replied with a wink.  "I have a mystery for you to solve."

Instantly the Chief Science Officer perked up and moved closer to the Counsellor, this was what the Shillian loved the most and she was not about to delay digging into the mystery that was being handed to her.  "There is a lot of data here," the acting Executive Officer said as her smile grew wider.

"I was hoping that you could analyse all of the data gathered on this one particular research that several members of the crew have been involved in," Eve explained without actually stating the goal of this research.

"Wait, I recognize this. Its the power flow analysis of the ANUBIS that Ensign Stark performed to see it there had been some way to explain the turbolift malfunction.  This is my own spectral analysis of the warp field dynamic that I hoped could have given me a clue as to what had happened," the Chief Science Officer said before she continued to scan through the data contained on the PADD that she had been handed.

"The rest of the research data is mostly from Lieutenant Paquette who added in the Engineering aspect to the malfunction as well as a few personnel notes that I took the liberty to add in," Dalziel said.  "I was hoping that you could confirm an hypothesis of mine as to the possible cause of this malfunction."

Thrilled with the prospect of finally discovering what had happened, the Shillian Scientist turned on her heels and proceeded to the nearest science station at he back of the bridge.  Within seconds the data had been downloaded to the work station and Maya had begun cataloguing and indexing it by reference, type and time to help in her analysis.

"Wow," the Shillian exclaimed. "Our Chief Engineering Officer has looked at everything.  I mean she even went as far as to check the magnetic coils on every single turbolift pod to see if there was any discrepancies between them, noting the age and usage parameters of each.  I even have the interlink data record from the computer and all of the back-ups including those of ANI showing that no signal was ever transmitted or received from that p[articular pod to indicate that something was not working according to the established parameters."

"I need you to look at this and tell me, given that we are suspecting that this was not a malfunction but rather a deliberate effort from someone within the ANUBIS, who could have done this," the Counsellor said, trying to insure that the Shillian Scientist stayed on task.

"Well, there are any number of people who could have diverted that turbolift pod, including the computer itself if it had perceived some sort of danger along the track, but the key here is the lack of any record of that change having been made.  I mean even the computer records show that no such event occurred, which I can say first hand is not the case.  So if we are going under the assumption that this was not a computer oversight and that someone tampered with the system to hide this fact, we are left with only a very few possibilities," the Shillian paused for a very brief moment leaving Dalziel to wonder if Maya was thinking of something or simply drawing in a breath before continuing.

The Counsellor of the ANUBIS took that opportunity to watch the Chief Science Officer in her element, scanning and cross referring lists of seemingly incoherent data and finding the pattern in them.

"The only people who have the access to erase computer records on board the ANUBIS are Captain Morningstar, our Chief of Operations Ensign Stark, our Chief Engineering Officer Lieutenant Paquette, and myself as acting Executive Office.  It is a waste of time to include ANI into this list as there would be no logical reason for her to hide something from herself as she is for all intent and purposes the ANUBIS.  We can also eliminate me as a potential source as there was no reason for me to order a change of destination and to have that order hidden from the records only to have me report it as a malfunction later.  Well, unless I suffered from some sort of neurological problem that made me act this way and forget all about it, but according to Doctor Doyanne I am fit for duty which makes that probability rather unlikely. This brings us to Captain 
Morningstar who could have done this but according to all of the computer records, no interface was executed at the time of the malfunction from his location.  Of course the Captain could have erased those records as well, but that would have been a great deal of work for something that seems to be such a inconsequential matter.  Using that same thinking, we can remove Ensign Stark from this list, not taking into account that he lacks the full clearance to erase from the computer his own ability to affect computer records.  If he had done this, there would have been a computer record of him doing so, and according to everything we have seen there is no such evidence."

Dalziel watched slightly amused and dazed as the Chief Science Officer took another breath in preparation for the next analytic round.

"Lieutenant Paquette could have physically removed the memory components from the computer to hide the order to the turbolift pod, but again there would have been a trace of open panels either in main engineering or in the computer core.  These records show no such access, plus it would be hard to imagine our Chief Engineering Officer going through such much trouble to find the cause when it was her all along.  Given her access to the mechanical side of the ship, she could have found a few hundred other and simpler ways to divert that pod while I was inside.  With all of the people on that list now removed we are left with only one other possibility, that is of course while we are still going on the assumption that this malfunction was initiated by a member of the crew.  The key here is the lack of evidence, which leaves us with only one other possibility, but there is no record to confirm this as she would have likely erased those as well," the Shillian said while her fingers flew over the console.

"Who are you referring to?" The Counsellor asked, wanted to see if the Shillian had been thinking along the same lines as she had, namely that this had all originated from Ensign Shar'El.

"Erasing computer records is one thing, hiding your own access to the computer to erase these records is another, but some sections of the ANUBIS are equipped with special independent co-processors to avoid the system going down should a ship wide cascading failure occur.  This is a safety measure that is not present on every ship in the fleet, but one that is very much here on the ANUBIS. The records could have been erased as well as the records of the access, but the sub-processor would still show a record of these systems having been affected.  In this particular case we are not looking for data, but the absence of said data.  Just like this!"

Dalziel followed the finger of the Shillian which now pointed to an area on the screen where nothing was being displayed.  This had been as close to a proof as they would likely get, but Eve needed one last thing to be confirmed beyond any doubts.  "Who did this?"

"There is only one person with that kind of access to the computer and who would have been able to make the system believe that someone else was giving the clearance while all at the same time keeping all of the records of this clear.  Again the key here is the absence of evidence, and this fit perfectly into what her *modus operandi* should be: anonymity," the Shillian said as she looked over her shoulder at the tall woman standing there.  "Ensign Shar'El."

"Thank you Commander," Dalziel grinned. "I owe you one."

As the Counsellor left the Bridge, the Shillian acting Executive Officer looked back at the data still being displayed on the screen of the science station, glad that she had found what Lieutenant Dalziel had been looking for while at the same time being a little troubled by the fact that this possibility had not crossed her mind earlier.  Had her duties as First Officer of the ANUBIS dulled her research instincts?  Beyond that, the discovery of the missing data in the sub-processor of the IGC computer left one question still very much unanswered: why?  Why would the Intelligence Liaison Officer want to divert the First Officer and delay her greeting Ensign Seska Mizore to the ANUBIS?

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Jessica Solarik

Lieutenant Commander Maya
Chief Science Officer
USS ANUBIS

"To see the world in a grain of sand,
and a heaven in a wild flower.
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
and eternity in an hour."
- William Blake (British, 1757-1827)