Reprogramming

Posted on Tue Dec 8th, 2020 @ 10:44am by Lieutenant Bonnie "Bon-Bon" Durnell & Lieutenant Anna S. Thesia M.D.

Mission: Healing of Minds
Location: Sickbay

"Computer, activate EMH", Anna ordered.

"Please state the nature of the..." the hologram started as it shimmered into existence.

"Mute EMH", Anna said, and it stopped. "Enter customisation mode."

"Warning, level five access required. Please enter authorization code."

Anna sighed. She figured the computer already knew who was talking to it and giving her orders, but apparently not. "Quack-42-green."

"Authorisation accepted. You may proceed."

"Display behavioural subroutines on my console", Anna ordered and took a look at what behaviours the EMH would display. She started changing them around to more agreeable responses, which was the easy bit.

About twenty minutes into the process, however, she hit a wall. She wanted to make sure the EMH would always suggest treatment options to the rest of the medical staff, but would be less domineering over the nurses. She didn't want the patients to feel like they had treatments thrust upon them, and she trusted the nurses to mediate between patients and the interactive computer programme.

Whatever she tried to change around, the computer proved uncooperative. Or rather, an additional permission in one place broke programme security in another, and that just wouldn't do.

Anna paused the process and looked up engineering personnel on the computer. She tapped her combadge and said, "Anna S. Thesia to Bonnie Durnell. Hi. I've run into a computer problem here in sickbay. I'd love some help, if you've got a moment to come to sickbay? I'll make us some nice tea, too."

Her computer senses were tingling. Barely five minutes after returning to her duties, uniform clean and mind focused on the task at hand, she could tell something was off. She tapped her combadge, “This is Lt. Durnell, I will be there shortly Doctor.” She then picked up her computer kit, slung it over her shoulder and marched her way to sickbay.

As she entered she spotted a frozen EMH standing mid sentence just shy of a woman with slight green skin who appeared perplexed at a computer terminal. Bonnie took out her tricorder and scanned the EMH, then looked at the doctor with a smile on her face, “Hi, I’m Bonnie. Did someone call for a computer technician?”

Anna smiled at the slightly shorter woman, nodding. “Yes. I’ve been trying to adapt its behavioural subroutines to be more user friendly. But I keep hitting a wall, the computer says my alterations might cause critical errors under some circumstances. I haven’t got a clue how to resolve them.”

To Anna, all of this might as well be in Linear A. So she offered Bonnie a mug of tea, which had the word ‘Luminosi-tea’ on the side, while her own cup read ‘Stupidi-tea’, in accordance with how she felt about this problem. She hoped Bonnie would prove as bright as her mug suggested. “What I’m trying to achieve is the EMH should give expert advice whenever it thinks some procedure could be improved, but at the same time it should cooperate with staff if they decide the current procedure is best. I’m thinking we can always benefit from its capacity to quickly analyse millions of databank entries, and an option to improve after a given emergency is over. But I don’t want the programme to be as obstinate as it was designed to be. It needs to follow orders, and not thrust a seemingly perfect medical procedure on a patient who is unwilling to go through with it, for example.” She paused briefly, then asked, “Can you do that?”

Bonnie blinked. As the mug of tea was handed to her ever so nicely, all she could think about was this nice doctor had been messing with the computer system. A system designed and developed by a team of scientists and engineers over the course of several years wasn’t good enough, no she had to go and mess with it. And now it was up to Bonnie to ‘fix’ what was broken and do so in a way that made everyone happy. She was already feeling sorry for the EMH.

Without sipping the tea she nodded, “Of course.” and then she grew unsure and admitted the truth, “Maybe. It depends really on the extent of the parameters and how much change you expect. This could take a moment. Can I use your terminal?” She indicated the terminal at which the doctor was using when Bonnie entered the room. As she approached she sat the cup down on an adjacent terminal so she could focus on her work, her eyes never leaving her target.

“I just need the EMH to be a little more... user friendly, if you will”, Anna said as she made room for Bonnie to use her console. She hadn’t saved any changes yet, as she was worried about possibly breaking the programme. “Have you been aboard long?”

As Bonnie focused on the personality matrix and the history of what had been changed she allowed her mind to be partially divided long enough to give a response. "From the beginning. Well not the beginning beginning you know what I mean? I missed the launch due to a transportation mishap. But then between Cody, Remal and myself we managed to arrive just in time to help stop some Orion pirates." She realized she was babbling and quickly corrected herself. "Um… about a month or so."

She thought momentarily about that situation, Cody and a pair of assless chaps flashed through her mind quickly before she pushed them out and refocused on the holo matrix. "Computer, run diagnostic on personality matrix and report any conflicts."

"Working." The computer replied efficiently. Even without the results she was already seeing a conflict but to be thorough she had to verify the results.

Anna sighed. “Those pirates are weird. Hide-bound traditionalists, despite piracy being neither necessary nor profitable anymore. I don’t understand why they’re still going for it. There’s so much more to Orion culture, lots of good aspects that don’t hurt anyone either.” She paused briefly, then added, “I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

Even as the computer chimed and presented a readout of results, Bonnie turned her attention and her body around. She had noticed Anna's green tint and had thought nothing of the potential profiling when the words left her mouth and now she was immediately sorry for reasons that went deeper into her own history and the history of her people. She apologized the only way she knew how.

"I… I didn't mean anything by that. I am sorry. You are part Orion aren't you?" And then she began speaking in rapid succession. "They are sort of typecast into their own stereotype aren't they, pirates I mean. Not just Orion pirates, but all pirates. Humans used to have pirate groups that traveled our oceans living like vultures, preying on the weak. But then we also had the Maquis, who were pirates but also not pirates. They were more like rebels fighting for the right to live in peace. And I'm babbling again aren't I?" Her hands had become animated as she spoke, but now that she was finished she folded them in tight with a solemn look on her face.

“I don’t mind, you know?” Anna smiled.

"I'm sorry. I tend to get passionate about certain things and I ramble. I have been trying to reign in that particular side so that I don't offend anyone."

“I’m not offended. I’ve looked into some of the pirate stories in the past. People who were marginalised in society, who saw how things weren’t going their way because powerful elites kept common folk down. I can understand why they turned to piracy. But these days, with replicators and fusion reactors? It’s just unnecessary.” Anna shrugged. “I’ve got my own hypothesis as to why they still do it. I think it’s to win mates, and they believe this is the best way to compete against one another, and show off their reproductive fitness.”

"Reproductive fitness?" Binnie blushed, then added quickly, "not that we care about such things." An immediate shot of Cody's rear end in chaps flashed into her mind then faded ever so slowly. She cleared her throat and reached for the mug of tea, took a sip and almost coughed it up.

“Subconsciously, we all do”, Anna said. “That’s the thing. It’s only with intelligence that some of us are able to overcome instincts and make smart choices.” She smirked. “Maybe we’re too smart to have turned to piracy in this day and age?” Not that this was a serious theory she was defending here.

Bonnie turned back to the terminal, setting aside her mug of tea once more. "Speaking of intelligence." She motioned to the computer results. "It appears there is a conflict in the personality matrix. The EMH was designed as a replacement for you or whomever is in charge as an emergency backup. Ergo his personality was designed to be domineering. By asking him to be nicer and take a nurse’s opinion into account the conflict comes about when a nurse may have to be his patient, do you see?"

Anna frowned. “No, that just won’t do. No doctor should be domineering, or disregard the opinions of their patients on their critical care. Doctors might know better, but it’s the patients who have the greatest interest in the treatment going their way. As appealing as the thought of not having to get up in the middle of the night to do surgery might be, I’d rather use the EMH as a more universal tool in the medical arsenal. And no, I don’t mean for cleaning duty.”

The young Lt. couldn't help but chuckle at the thought of an EMH cleaning a toilet. "I fully understand and I agree. The personality matrix is a large and robust, if not dynamic, collection of synthesized programming. Perhaps if we can isolate and separate his original design for use only in an emergency, we can then construct a new series for when he is a more useful tool. As you put it." She smiled again.

“Can you do that?” Anna asked. “That would be excellent.” This would solve all kinds of problems. “Can you do that?” she repeated, showing how excited and at the same time ignorant she was concerning what computer coding could achieve in this day and age.

Hesitant, “I mean we can certainly try. It may take a bit of time and processing power, and a backup or two, but it’s just a computer program afterall.” She picked up the tea absentmindedly and took a sip, immediately wishing it was a hot cocoa instead. But not willing to upset her host or the offer of the tea, she took another sip and fought the urge to grimace at the bitterness.

“I’d very much like you to try”, Anna said. She grabbed a tricorder and started scanning Bonnie. “I’ll even save you some time and get your readings while we’re at it.” She figured she might as well grab the chance. “You’re not feeling unwell, are you?”

Bonnie immediately grew tense. "No. No, I don't think so, why do I look sick?" She felt her own forehead. Her hand was cold and clammy, like usual.

“No, I’m just asking, it’s a routine question. Like a level five diagnostic for the computer”, Anna explained. She knew about those, as she was shown their results in case something went wrong.

"Oh. I thought maybe you could see something that I couldn't." Bonnie blushed as she always tended to be nervous around doctors, always poking and prodding and asking so many questions. Sometimes the same questions over and over again. She trusted her tricorder and the computer to give her the answers she needed. They were almost always right the first time, accurate to a fault.

“I can see you’re uncomfortable, and that’s not my intention”, Anna said. “I don’t bite, unless I’m asked to, okay?”

"Okay. I'll work, you scan. And I'll try to um, sit still? Right. I'll be fine." She was reassuring herself more than Anna even as she turned and set to work on the EMH personality matrix. "Computer, verify backup of original EMH personality."

The computer chirped its affirmation.

"Computer, redefine original matrix code to EMH doctor on duty."

The computer chirped its affirmation again.

"Computer redefine changes Doctor Thesia has made as," she looked to Anna for a good answer for a file name. She was thinking 'personality disorder' but that felt off-putting.

“Hm, Doctor Using Certain Know-how”, Anna suggested. “Or ‘DUCK’ for short.” She gave Bonnie a lop-sided grin. “I know, I’m reaching here, but the acronym is catchy.”

She blinked, astonished at the weird idea. "Okay, DUCK it is." She confirmed the setting with the computer which in turn beeped its affirmation.

"Alright the matrices are seperate, now all we have to do is reboot him. Um. Unless you want a her?" Bonnie knew there was a female model in the system for the rare situation a patient desired candor. And ultimately this was the CMOs choice to make.

“No, I’m not worried about the visual model, just stick with the default, so everyone will know at a glance they’re dealing with the EMH”, Anna decided. “Besides, we’ve already got two real female doctors in the department.” She figured that had to be enough, unless someone wanted to set up an all-female crew.

"Okay. Computer, reset EMH using personality matrix DUCK and allow change permissions for Dr. Thesia, authorization Durnell-001001100." The computer chimed a response and the EMH disappeared only to moments later reappear. Bonnie turned to face him.

"Please let me know how I can assist you in any way." He said politely.

"He should be good to take commands and corrections audibly from now on, but any changes will have to be authorised by you or I suppose anyone with clearance." She smiled and gestured towards the EMH. "Go ahead, test him out."

Anna smiled. “There’s no emergency, we’re doing a test run of your programme. Show me how you’d do the physical of Bonnie Durnell here.” She grinned at Bonnie. “If he doesn’t take any of your limbs, I’ll consider this a success.”

Bonnie instantly grew sheepish, “Um, okay.” She didn’t come here to be a guinea pig, but if the doctor needed a physical, now was as good a time as any. “Where… where do you want me?” She was addressing Doctor Thesia and not the EMH, who under those circumstances would normally get annoyed.

“Up on the biobed would be perfect”, Anna said. She had already taken her tricorder readings earlier, but she wanted to see how the new programme held up with tasks not considered emergencies. “Just follow its instructions.”

Uneasy, and instantly shy around a new person who was inspecting and criticizing her person, even if it was for medical practice, Bonnie stiffened. She moved to the biobed and sat down, keeping her shoulders slumped for childish effect. She was strangely okay with the EMH, afterall a hologram is a hologram. But Anna was not. “Um, okay. Do what you must. Just warn me before you take blood, okay?”

As the EMH moved to the bed he carried a tray of tools over and sat them on a side station. Bonnie, in her infinite luck, crossed her legs at that moment, kicking the tray and sending the instruments flying across the room. She immediately uncrossed her legs and profusely apologized to Anna, with her sad eyes. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean… I didn’t know... “

Anna laughed at the comical display of medical instruments flying in all directions. As the EMH promptly started to pick them up, Anna put her hand on Bonnie’s shoulder. “At least you kicked a tray, not the bucket”, she teased.

Bonnie could only give a half chuckle. She wanted to help the EMH pick up her mess, but in the back of her mind she knew this was the new programming the holo-doc was going to be functioning as, an assistant. She had to let it play out. She eyed Anna, “Well at least it hasn’t gotten upset over my mess. Usually, by now, I’d at least have gotten on its irritation subroutine.”

“I don’t understand why the programmers even put that in there”, Anna said. “If I could design a programme, I’d make sure to limit it to positive, wholesome emotions. Like, don’t you wish you could just override all the negative stuff in your life, but keep the good times?”

Her mother instantly popped into her brain and she tried hard to push the image back out again. “I do, yes. The EMH however was designed based on several of its creators, most of them doctors. And they felt at the time, in order to appear less robotic it had to include a gamut of emotion. That includes what we perceive as negative unfortunately.“

“Well, I’m glad you could remove those parts from its programming”, Anna said. “My sarcasm and weird sense of humour is grating on people’s nerves enough as it is, we don’t need any more of that in this sickbay, I believe.” Not that she was trying to annoy anyone, it had just developed into her coping mechanism over the years, for whenever she was stressed out.

"I don't have a problem with your humor. In fact I find it refreshing." She bashfully smiled. "I just met you but already I think I admire you for being yourself. And if you want any other changes, to your EMH that is, don't hesitate to call." She patiently waited for her physical results.

“Hm, I’m not all that special, except for some of my physiology”, Anna shrugged. “But that’s a topic for a dinner conversation, I think.” She double-ckecked the EMH’s results and nodded approvingly. “Oh, and you’re reasonably healthy, in case there was any doubt. You seem to do a lot of climbing, is this correct?”

"If you count Jefferies tubes, yes. In reality I'm not into a lot of physical activity, instead preferring my window and a good technology manual. Why do you ask?"

“Muscle tone, you can tell what activities people do a lot from how their muscles have developed”, Anna said. “But yes. As an engineer, I should have figured you’d be spending a lot of time on all fours, and going up and down the ladders.” Anna grinned. “I’m surprised there are no poles in the vertical shafts, to slide down on more quickly. Or even up, if you reverse gravity.”

Bonnie mused at the idea of sliding 15 decks down a pole with nothing to slow you or any way to brake. She also grimaced at being referred to as an engineer, as she had always disassociated herself from the engineering field. True she could craft, build and think constructively like an engineer, but she had always felt more creative than any engineer she had ever met. “Yes. Ladders mainly. Is there anything else you see that I should worry about or am I fit to resume my duties?” She momentarily eyed the EMH who was still standing idly by.

“No, all good, I can’t keep you here any longer, I’m afraid”, Anna grinned. “Thank you again for your help. If there’s a way I can return the favour, just let me know and I’ll do what I can.”

Hopping down off the biobed, Bonnie thought carefully before responding, “Just, keep me alive should something bad happen, I suppose.” Then inspiration struck, “Oh and, maybe consider hot chocolate instead of tea next time we meet. Helps me concentrate. Anyway, enjoy your EMH.” She turned on her heels and walked out of the door, pausing to consider her next direction before turning left and heading back to the computer core.