| If You Build It |
| Summary: | Thanos needs some things built to help find more ancient sites and visions. Or maybe to keep ancient sites and visions away. |
| Date: | 31 May 2016 |
| Related Logs: | TBA |
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| ChEng Office |
| A small nine foot by nine foot office. Most of the floorspace is taken up by a desk and filing cabinets. |
| AWD #344 |
The Chief Engineer's office, or the Chief Stoker's office depending on who you ask, is small and utilitarian. A desk, one metal chair in front of it, one behind it, and file cabinets bolted to the wall. Schematics for the core engine, schematics for the ship, and other similar 'artwork' has been posted on the walls, along with a list of rules for behavior in the engine rooms. No jewlery, shoes, things of this nature. Halena is sitting behind her desk in her normal jumpsuite, scribbling away on a file. Her red hair is pulel back in her normal ponytail, otherwise she is clean and pale as is the usual too. The room, the woman, all are … clean. Almost spartan, one might say.
There's a sharp rap at the door, open or closed as the case may be-after two sets of footsteps walking up to and then stopping outside it. After waiting for an answer-or not, in the case of an open door, that doggone scientest will poke her curious head through the doorway. "Captain Tremaine?" she calls out, almost cheerfully. In addition to an ever so slight dulling of dust across the tops of her boots, the blonde archeologist seems to be sporting a fresh crop of freckles and a slightly red nose and cheeks, as if she's spent a great deal of sudden time outside. "Do you have a moment, sir?"
Halena has the door open almost always, so Thanos will have no difficulty in making her presence known. The redhead lifts her face toward her guests, eyes flitting up immediately to the face. Recognition is there instantaneously. "Doctor," Halena says, leaning back in her seat a bit and folding her file closed in front of her without a second glance. "Please, come in. Have a seat. I apologize I don't have any coffee in here - it's on my aquisition list, eventually. But please, make yourself comfortable. How many I be of service?" She speaks easily and clearly, with a touch of class. This is a girl who has had allocution lessons at some point in life.
"Oh, that's quite all right!" Is the friendly response to the lack of coffee. "I'm certain you've a great deal upon your plate anyway, Captain, but I am hoping that you might be able to add a few more morsels-or at least, point me in the right direction to find someone who might be able to help. Thanos tucks a stray strand of hair behind one ear, looking thoughtful. "There are two things, primarily. One-is it feasible do you think, to set up some sort of advanced warning radioactive contamination sensors at the archeological dig? I've been made aware that there was another site that was found that was too dangerous to be examined-and while it may be simply that this one was not attacked in that manner while the other one was, well. It would be so very dreadful to go digging and then discover that we were wrong once a chamber or somesuch was opened, don't you agree?" The blue eyes look up very gravely at Halena, from where Thanos sits.
"And the second-if we were to isolate a specific radiological compound that is at both sites, assuming it's unique-might you be able to figure out some way to develop a sensor that one of the raptors or…damn it all. What are the other things called? The smaller ships. Some sort of sensor that they could have that would allow detection of other sites of ruins from the air rather than chance crash landing?" There's a hopeful smile, on Thanos' part, and absolute faith in the poor Engineer.
Both questions have Halena pursing her lips. She leans back a bit further in her chair, her fingers forming a thoughtful pyramid befor her. Some might see it as a pyramid of evil, but it - like academia, or any other weapon - is merely a tool of thought, and is evil only in evil hands. "Both should be rather simple, I would say," the redhead finally admits, her hazel eyes flitting calmly back to the woman before her. The ChEng tilts her head slightly to the side as she regards the woman. "The first is hardly a problem at all - I'll get a team of techs down there in short order to set some things up, and leave some mobile isotope readers as well for exploration purposes. The second … have you spoken to anyone yet about developing these particular sensors? Is there a certain reading required to pinpoint one of these locations, or will it simply be a large radioactive reading? Whereas your one site sounds like it meets that criteria, I doubt the site you and I visited together would if we were able to visit safely."
"I have not, though it was a question asked by one of the Air wing people," the scientist says. "If it was possible. I used an isotope found both at our site, and one in the records previously for the dating of the ruins. Perhaps that could be used? I shall have air sampling as we go further in to see if there's any other molecules that could be used-same with taking samples of the building materials and the like. Though it may be a good idea to have something to detect massive radiation from the air anyway—it may help us map other attack areas, even if we can't visit them." Thanos scratches at the back of her head. "I'm afraid I'm a little out of my element here. I can extract and detect molecules from small samples, for the purposes of dating, or to discover effects and perhaps old flora and fauna, but it will need to be a different mind than mine to discover how to extrapolate that to some sort of long range sensor." She seems quite pleased with the help offered to the site. "I am in your debt, Captain, especially for the mobile readers. I'd not thought of that, but as we explore it will be very handy indeed."
"Readers are no problem," Halena explains, with a slight uptilt on one side of her mouth that may be a smile. "But it sounds to me like you may well be quite within your element here. I'm no chemist, or any other type of scientist really. I can't extrapolate anything from soil or air samples. But if you have an isotope within those samples that you want me to find a way to detect? Well, that's far more my speed. My team and I would be more than able to assist. Do any of our medical doctors have any ideas to extrapolate any markers from your samples?"
"Yes-though not for ruins detection per se. I'll send a copy of the isotope that I was able to use to date the site, that had been isolated elsewhere-we're looking for it at that specific concentration as well; there are probably other ruins, but the ones most relevant to the most recent exploration are from about 2500 years ago." Thanos explains. "Very well then! I'll continue to compare samples and send you any promising looking agents." Her smile brightens. "And please-if there's anything that you can think of that you'd like me to keep an eye out for, please let me know. I've not yet found anything that seems like it could be a power source for the structure we started to investigate-though I don't know that I'd know what to look for. If you don't mind, I thought I'd be sure you had copies of the maps that we make of the interior, and any strange objects, so that if there's anything you can make sense of…it's just good to have fresh eyes to look at these things too." She hmmms a moment. "Speaking of that, have you had a chance to speak with Petty Officer Alexios? There's to be a raider dissection of a sort soon. We thought perhaps you might like to have a look at things too-flight systems and biology shall be covered, but your expertise and observance would be very welcome as well, I think."
Halena smiles a bit more. "Therein lies the difference in us. You say isotope, and you speak of ancient half-lives. I hear isotope, and I think of residual nuclear signatures." She seems rather amused by that. Sitting up a bit straighter, the woman nods. "I'm happy to take another look if you like, although I cannot express how terribly far from my element I would be, there. The maps themselves might be helpful, however. If there is a power-source, I can likely denote several locations most likely for it to be housed, based on the design." She gives an apologetic look a moment - indeed, not much help there. "I've been to visit the raider on a few accounts. I'll be on-hand when they take it apart, though if the power source and other components are biological, I doubt I'll be able to assist very much."
"You'd be surprised," Thanos assures Halena. "I know there are some sciences where being out of one's element can be-catastrophic, when it comes to calculations and hypotheses," she says, with a slight shake of her head. "But in mine-sometimes it is all in the baseline and calculations, and those are very important. But when we are dealing with unfamiliar cultures and even species, separated so by biology or time…intuition plays a role sometimes, or an unexpected spark of brilliance from outside the box as it were. You have a very trained mind, sir. It's that that I value; you bring things to the table that no one else does. So if you look through the ruin sites and maps, and there's something that niggles at you-it is something that I'd very much like to hear, so we can investigate it more."
"I'm sure my parents would be most grateful to hear such praise for a trained mind. Such things are costly, so they'd be pleased to know it did not go to waste." It's difficult to tell if Halena is teasing. She probably is, but really that's maybe a 60-70 percent chance. There's still a possibility that she's not. The redead shifts her chair a bit, allowing her bad leg to stretch out in front of her once she's scooted back. "As I said, I'm most happy to be of whatever service I can. I just wish to make sure that you understand it's most likely I'll see nothing at all of use."
"Well, my friend, I'm quite used to hearing that myself! Especially from overly influenced by treasure stories investors and patrons," Thanos says, making a little face, as if to share with the Engineer just what she thinks of /that/. "Always a risk, I understand. Perhaps between all of us, we'll come up with something splendid. And at least we'll be able to admit it rather than pressure to make up some bulldrek report!" She waves a hand. "Though I do rather hope you've not had to do that in the /military/ regardless!" She winks at the redhead.
"Hmm. I know the military, and perhaps it's my years dedicated to it, but I cannot even quite call it bulldrek, myself. It's as natural an addition as punctuation to a sentance. Necessary, sometimes poorly used, but vital all the same. Now in academia, I would have thought such people beyond the reproach of such nonsense." She seems more comfortable now, smiling and speaking easily with a warm politeness. She nods once. "Send down your maps, and we'll see what we can do with that. Thank you for coming by, Doctor."