On The Holodeck

Chief engineer's log, stardate 64328.4. While performing routine maintenance on the holodeck subprocessors, I noticed something was amiss: someone had tampered with the security protocols. Although, strictly speaking, this is the responsibility of the security department, the nature of the modifications that were made makes me suspect that Lieutenant Poulson, my deputy, is involved. He's a good engineer and a good man, but a bit shy when it comes to women. Before I bring this to the attention of ship's head of security, I think I'll give Poulson a little lesson about the whys of Starfleet Protocol...

Chapter 1

Burton

"...so I'm afraid it looks like Jenny made a mistake when she was calibrating the Heisenberg compensators yesterday. We'll probably have to do it all over again."

"Jenny? "

"Eh, sorry—Ensign Doyle," Poulson said, blushing.

It was a little dance the two of us had been going through for a while already. I knew he was smitten with her; but he refused to acknowledge it to anyone. I used to believe he wouldn't even acknowledge it to himself; but if my suspicions are correct, I may have to revise that belief.

"Oh, right," I said, suppressing a grin.

I had to give it to him; Jennifer Doyle is a very nice girl. Blond, shoulder-length hair that she prefers to wear in a ponytail; a figure consisting of just that right amount of body fat; and breasts to die for. She's bit short, but it actually looked good on her; and she didn't seem to be bothered by it at all. If I hadn't been happily married for the past 15 years, who knows?

"Also, I think I should have a word with her. I don't think we should let this kind of error go unnoticed, because..."

"That's okay, Barry, I'll take care of that..."

"No, don't worry sir, It's not..."

"I said I'll take care of it, Lieutenant Poulson," I said somewhat sternly, and sighed inwardly. This is exactly why officers shouldn't get involved with their subordinates. To his credit, he was trying to avoid it; but anyone who knew him a little could tell what was going on.

The predictable result was that he was now trying to compensate for his feelings—whether consciously or subconsciously, I don't know—by being very strict for her, giving her a pretty hard time. The little girl deserved better, and she had, rightly, been complaining to me about it.

"Yes sir. Sorry sir."

"That's okay. Anything else? "

"No sir, I believe that's it."

"Okay, thanks then," I said, as we both stood up and left my office. "So, Barry. Any plans for tonight? "

"Not really, no," he said, thoughtfully. "Why, you have any suggestions? "

"Well, you could go to the mess, talk to the girl behind the bar. I heard she really likes you."

"You heard that, did you? " he said, the sarcasm drooping from his voice. We both knew she hated his guts.

"Yeah. Especially after what happened last night. What happened last night? "

"You don't want to know that, Leo."

"Actually I do, Barry."

He looked at me from the side, as we were nearing the turbolift.

"If you say so. I was having a conversation," he fired off, "with some of the usual flailing of my arms, and she..."

"Right, I've seen that before."

"You want to hear this story or not? "

"Sorry. Go on."

"So she passed behind my back, and I hadn't noticed her. Just as she turned left to go to the table by our right, my right arm hit her plate. It contained two coffees, a raktajino, and a tea. She got them all catapulted squarely into her face."

"Awtch."

"So I think I'll pass on the bar tonight."

"Yeah. Doc told me she had second-degree burns."

"Second...She's going to be fine, right? "

"She is fine. But yeah, you might want to stay out of her way."

"See? Besides, I actually have a holodeck booked in about an hour. I was thinking of going to Venice tonight."

"Venice? Sounds nice. You have a good time, Barry"

"Thanks. You have a good shift, Leo."

The turbolift doors closed, and he was gone.

"Venice, my ass." I muttered. "Computer, run program Burton-47"

"Authentication required."

"Burton alpha 3 9"

"Voice recognition positive. Authentication accepted. Program started."

"There," I thought, as I entered main engineering. "Now let's see where Ensign Doyle is."

I didn't have to look very far. She was right there, working on one of the consoles.

"Ensign Doyle, do you have a minute? "

"Right away, sir! "

She finished up whatever it was she was doing, and darted towards me.

"Sir? "

"Ensign. Lieutenant Poulson just told me something went wrong with your calibrations on the Heisenberg compensators last night. What's that about? "

"I was actually just working on that, sir. It looks like your pre-calibration measurements were a bit off."

Well, duh. "Oh? "

"Yes, sir. But I think I found the error: it looks like you made a mistake when copying the data from the sensor into the databanks. I'm correcting it now, sir."

"I see. Well, if that's the case, then I'm sorry about that. But I'd like you to run a simulation in the holodeck before you do it on the actual system, just to be sure. We can't afford another awry calibration; the ship needs its transporters."

"I don't think that'll be necessary, sir, I mean..."

"I insist, ensign." Gee, that was the whole point. Chapter 2

Poulson

"...so I'm afraid it looks like Jenny made a mistake when she was calibrating the Heisenberg compensators yesterday. We'll probably have to do it all over again."

"Jenny? "

Damn! "Eh, sorry—Ensign Doyle," I blurted. I might even have been blushing. Damn!

I really, really like the girl, but Starfleet protocol is very strict on what is and isn't allowed. I couldn't give Commander Burton the impression that I was favoring her.

"Oh, right," he said. But there was that little something in his voice...I had to act, quickly.

"Also, I think I should have a word with her. I don't think we should let this kind of error go unnoticed, because..."

"That's okay, Barry, I'll take care of that..."

"No, don't worry sir, It's not..."

"I said I'll take care of it, Lieutenant Poulson," he said, and sounded a bit agitated. Well, I didn't want to tick him off.

"Yes sir. Sorry sir."

But now I'd sent the Commander on Jenny's back. Damn. I didn't mean for that to happen.

"That's okay. Anything else? "

"No sir, I believe that's it."

"Okay, thanks then," he said, as we both stood up and left his office. I could almost guess his next question. "So, Barry. Any plans for tonight? "

Bingo. Leo Burton is a nice guy and a good commanding officer, but he can be so predictable sometimes.

"Not really, no," I said, lowering my voice somewhat. "Why, you have any suggestions? "

"Well, you could go to the mess, talk to the girl behind the bar. I heard she really likes you." Oh man, did he really have to bring that up?

"You heard that, did you? " I said, sarcastically. I'm sure he knew better than that.

"Yeah. Especially after what happened last night. What happened last night? "

Oh God, please no. I didn't want to talk about that incident.

"You don't want to know that, Leo."

"Actually I do, Barry."

I leered at him, and decided that pretending disinterest was probably going to be the best way to get him off my back.

"If you say so," I said, trying to sound as blandly as possible. "I was having a conversation, with some of the usual flailing of my arms, and she..."

"Right, I've seen that before."

I gave him the look. "You want to hear this story or not? "

"Sorry. Go on."

"So she passed behind my back, and I hadn't noticed her. Just as she turned left to go to the table by our right, my right arm hit her plate. It contained two coffees, a raktajino, and a tea. She got them all catapulted squarely into her face."

"Awtch."

Good, he bought it. Looks like I'm a better liar than I thought. Truth is, the bitch had had one of her fits again. Against Jenny, of all people. I first wanted to berate her for that, but then realized that I couldn't seem to be favorable to Jenny. It was a bit evil of me to do what I did, but I'd had my vengeance.

"So I think I'll pass on the bar tonight."

"Yeah. Doc told me she had second-degree burns."

"Second...She's going to be fine, right? " Oh my, it didn't have to be that bad.

"She is fine. But yeah, you might want to stay out of her way."

That's a relief. "See? Besides, I actually have a holodeck booked in about an hour. I was thinking of going to Venice tonight."

"Venice? Sounds nice. You have a good time, Barry"

"Thanks. You have a good shift, Leo."

As the turbolift's doors closed, I found myself relaxing from a stress that I hadn't realized I was feeling, and I made my way towards my quarters. Yes, I had a holodeck booked, but I had no intention of going to Venice. I had a different fantasy to play out. Strictly speaking, what I was about to do wasn't allowed, but it was better than the alternative. And as long as nobody ever needed to do maintenance on the holodeck subprocessors, it would remain unnoticed. I'd just have to make sure to take care of those myself for the foreseeable future.

After dinner, I entered holodeck 2, and made sure the doors were sealed behind me.

"Computer, start Holodeck program Poulson Gamma-4"

"Program uses personnel physical and psychological templates. Department head's authentication required to continue."

"Computer, engage program Poulson Pi-Delta."

I waited, as the holodeck subprocessors kicked in, and my little security override went into action. I'd discovered a while back, quite by accident, that if you drop the voltage going from the subprocessors to the holodeck emitters at just the right moment, the security subroutines in the main controller could be fooled into thinking whatever you wanted them to believe. In my case, I wanted them to believe that I was, in fact, authorized to do what I was about to do.

There was just one minor complication: the timing was very delicate, and any extraneous information being fed to the holodeck sensors could throw it off. I therefore had to stand very, very still. But then, I'd long mastered this now, after doing it so many times.

"Authentication received. Program Poulson Gamma-4 starting"

Before me, the main engineering level materialized, as did some of the staff. Strictly speaking, the deck was understaffed, but I didn't want to push my luck by using too many personnel templates; eventually this might get noticed. And the only person that really mattered was right there, anyway.

"Hi, Jenny"

"Hi, Barry"

"Are you ready? "

"Sorry, I have to finish this Heisenberg recalibration first."

Right.

Originally, I had tried to do "interesting" things with Jenny on the holodeck, such as visiting nice cities on various planets, or going out to some interesting resort with her; but I found it wasn't very satisfying. Eventually I realized that this was because holo-Jenny didn't experience anything, and therefore didn't have anything to talk about, apart from fawning over me. While having her fawn over me was the whole point of this exercise, having her talk about other things as well would be more fulfilling. So then I changed the program so that she'd be performing some task related to what the real Jenny was doing during her last shift, when I started up the program. It involved another minor protocol violation, but at least this time I didn't have to violate security protocols to do it—as her superior officer, I was supposed to know what she was doing during her shifts.

This plan worked marvellously most of the time, though sometimes it meant she would insist on spending most of my booked holodeck time on finishing up some task well into the next shift. It looked like today was going to be one of those days. True to form, the real Jenny was a very dedicated officer, but it meant less quality time with holo-Jenny.

The first few times when this happened, I decided to end the program, and call up one of my earlier sightseeing programs. But eventually I found that even working with this holo-Jenny on the holodeck was more satisfying than spending time at some resort with the holo-Jenny of those earlier programs.

"Want me to help you out? "

"Sure! " Chapter 3

Doyle

"Ensign Doyle, do you have a minute? " the voice of Commander Burton sounded from the other end of Engineering.

"Right away, sir."

This week, I was working Delta shift, and happily so; it meant I would be working under Commander Burton, not Lieutenant Poulson. For whatever reason, Poulson seemed to hate me. Every time I do something, he'll always find something to berate me about. And does he like berating me! Preferably in public. I can't stand it anymore. It's just not fair.

Such a difference with his initial reaction when I reported on this ship a few months ago. He was actually checking me out! And the look in his eyes, I thought he was going to soil his pants right there. But no, he turned around and left. And then during my first shift he found this little error in my work, and made a huge fuss about it. Things have been going downhill from there.

Thing is, apart from his professional attitude towards me, he's actually a fairly nice guy. And good-looking, too. If he wasn't being such an ass to me, I might actually like him.

I finished entering the data, and went over to the commander.

"Sir? "

"Ensign. Lieutenant Poulson just told me something went wrong with your calibrations on the Heisenberg compensators last night. What's that about? "

Oh, that. This wasn't going to be pretty. I braced myself, and said: "I was actually just working on that, sir. It looks like your pre-calibration measurements were a bit off."

I prepared myself mentally for my defense; Commander Burton was a man who's very proud of his work. I'd have to come up with some very good arguments to convince him. But, to my surprise, he seemed to believe me immediately.

"Oh? "

"What? " I thought, "This can't be right. He believes me, just like that? Or maybe he's just testing me? Let's see about that."

"Yes, sir. But I think I found the error: it looks like you made a mistake when copying the data from the sensor into the databanks. I'm correcting it now, sir."

"I see. Well, if that's the case, then I'm sorry about that. But I'd like you to run a simulation in the holodeck before you do it on the actual system, just to be sure. We can't afford another awry calibration; the ship needs its transporters."

Well, duh. Couldn't be that easy. Now he wants me to run a simulation. I don't have time for this, I know I'm right.

"I don't think that'll be necessary, sir, I mean..."

"I insist, ensign," he said, firmly. Well, I'd just have to bite the bullet then.

"Yes, sir, of course. I'm sorry, sir. I won't let you down again."

"I'm counting on it. Now, carry on."

"Yes, sir."

I went back to my calculations, and lost track of time. They weren't too hard, but there was a lot of stuff that I had to double- and even triple-check, so it did take up quite some time. Then, suddenly, the commander came out of his office and walked up to me.

"Ensign Doyle. Are you ready yet with those calculations? "

"Just about, sir."

"Okay. I just found out that holodeck three will be available in a few minutes for an hour or so. After that, it'll be not before tomorrow until you could run that simulation, and I wouldn't like to see that. Think you can make it? "

"Certainly, sir. I'll be there in five minutes."

"Perfect. Carry on."

I finished up my calculations, transferred the data to the holodeck, and then went there myself. But as I fired up the simulation, I was in for a little surprise.

"Ah, Ensign Doyle, there you are. I think we should start this calibration by..."

"Computer, freeze program." Lieutenant Poulson stopped mid-sentence, as I suspected he would; he was off-duty, and so he wouldn't have been in the holodeck for this simulation. Besides, his voice was just too friendly to me. This couldn't be him for real.

"Computer, remove Lieutenant Poulson"

"Unable to comply"

"Explain"

That took a while, but then the computer replied with:

"No explanation is available."

What? This couldn't be right. I touched my combadge.

"Doyle to Commander Burton"

"Go ahead"

"Sir, there's a simulated Lieutenant Poulson here with me. I don't know where he came from, and the computer can't remove him—and can't seem to figure out why. Any ideas? "

"Stand by"

"Yes, sir." Great. This was just great. Not only did I have to run this stupid simulation now I'd have to do it with Poulson himself. Well, not himself, but close enough.

"Burton to Ensign Doyle"

"Doyle here."

"I found the problem; there's a glitch in one of the holodeck subprocessors."

"I'm on it, sir."

"No, Doyle, we don't have time for that. The problem is in subprocessor alpha-3. Are you using that one for your simulation? "

"No."

"Good, then it shouldn't affect your simulation. Proceed with that; I'll have a team look after the subprocessor later on."

"As you wish, sir. Doyle out."

This didn't make sense. First he wants me to run this stupid simulation, because he wants to be sure that my calculations were correct. And then he is willing to compromise the correctness of this simulation by allowing such a blatant problem to stand uncorrected? What the hell was he thinking?

Well, his choice. I just knew my calculations were correct, this time around; so if the simulation failed, I'd just have to make sure I could prove that this glitch in that subprocessor caused it. But he still wasn't making any sense.

Unless...

Unless he was trying to set me up here. I'd talked to him last week about how unfair Lieutenant Poulson was treating me. Perhaps he thought that if he could force me to work with "Lieutenant Poulson" in this manner, I would give him another chance?

Fat chance at that. But hey, I'm game.

"Computer, resume program."

"...checking the oxygen levels in the Heisenberg compensators," holo-Poulson continued. "Otherwise we risk the chance of them being contaminated."

"My thoughts exactly, sir." Chapter 4

Burton

After my little exchange with Ensign Doyle at the beginning of our shift, I went back into my office.

"Computer, status of program Burton-47? "

"Target event has not yet been reached."

"Good. Notify me when it does."

"Affirmative."

From now on, I couldn't leave my office; I didn't want to risk other people hearing that notification. So I started doing some paperwork that had been piling up; personnel reviews, acquisition requests, the works. About an hour into this, the notification came.

"Target event on program Burton-47 has been reached."

Perfect. "Computer, locate Lieutenant Poulson"

"Lieutenant Poulson is in holodeck 2"

"Computer, update program Burton-47: alpha is Holodeck 2."

"Update complete."

"Which program is running in holodeck 2? "

"Program Poulson Gamma-4 is just starting."

"Good, good." That was that. Now I had to connect Doyle's simulation to the program.

"Computer, locate Ensign Doyle"

"Ensign Doyle is in Main Engineering."

"What? Oh, shit, she's not ready yet. I have to get her out there soon."

"Please rephrase the question."

"... Nothing, computer. Disregard." This could all fall apart quickly if I didn't get Doyle to a holodeck now. I didn't have many options, so I just had to think on my feet, and rushed back to main engineering.

"Ensign Doyle. Are you ready yet with those calculations? "