Star Trek Read Online Free PDF Page B

need?”
    â€œI need to put monitoring taps on Emmett’s program. I’m worried about the load on his system, what with his database being accessed by a thousand different people. The degradation could get bad.”
    â€œYes, I’ve noticed a lag in his performance too. Isn’t there anything that can be done about that?”
    â€œNot yet. The problem is the constant file synching, and Emmett just wasn’t designed for it. In theory, the main computers on the planet are better equipped, but they’re short-handed—”
    â€œYes, yes. Do whatever you have to. Take processing power from all the other systems; we’re the only ones up here and what we’re doing is more important.” She went back to staring at the screen, glancing over at flasks that Fabian could only conjecture about.
    But it wasn’t his concern. His was getting Emmett’s program to scale upward so he could surpass his design specs by a thousandfold. He didn’t want to tell her that he’d already cut back on every drain of excess CPU cycles he could think of. The
da Vinci
was practically running on a hamster on a wheel at this point.
    â€œHow goes the battle?” he asked.
    â€œBadly. This thing is brutal. It’d be tough to design a more perfect pathogen against any humanoid race.”
    â€œThat bad?”
    â€œWorse. This thing attacks any organism that uses a nucleic acid as its genetic basis. Doesn’t matter if it’s DNA, RNA, or some of the more exotic forms, this virus has proteins that integrate into them all. And our vain hope that Pattie, Soloman, and the other nonhumans would be immune is fading. They’re probably all just as vulnerable.”
    Fabian smiled wryly. “Wow. The holy grail of computing.”
    â€œPardon me?”
    â€œSorry. Old computer problem, how to integrate data between nonstandard systems.”
    â€œHow do computer engineers solve the problem?”
    â€œWait two years and upgrade the entire system.”
    â€œWe don’t have two years to wait here.”
    â€œWell, computer viruses don’t give you the option either.”
    â€œWhatever.” Lense went back to her monitor. She started muttering, probably to herself, though Fabian couldn’t help overhear. “The hell of it is, I know that the virus would probably burn itself out in a week if it didn’t have a live host—but that’s every human on the planet.”
    Fabian piped up. “Shouldn’t the transporter biofilters be taking the viruses out?”
    Lense just kept staring at the screen and tapping. Fabian was sure he heard a growl.
    â€œNo, I guess not,” Fabian said, after thinking about it a moment. “We could take out the airborne viruses, I suppose, but we couldn’t do anything for the viruses already in the person’s—wait a minute! Why can’t we use the biofilters to take out the viruses in people’s blood?”
    â€œBecause it’s getting into the DNA of cells, including blood cells. That’s what viruses do. We might be able to reduce the viral load of some patients, but it’s a stopgap measure at best that would have to be applied to the entire population, and that’s tough with three and a half million people.”
    â€œDamn. And it sounded so good.”
    Lense sighed. “Welcome to my life.”
    â€œOkay, we couldn’t do anything for the viruses already in the person’s DNA, and they’d just stay sick. And they’d keep pumping out the virus. And even if we could, the air on the planet is so saturated they just get reinfected. We couldn’t keep them all up here while we clean up the planet, and we couldn’t make an oxygen tent the size of a city.”
    â€œMmm.” Lense had gotten up and was looking at another batch of lab equipment. There’d been little indication that she’d heard a word he said.
    Fabian continued talking out