Cryosuspension

Captain’s Log, USS Hustler, Stardate 23859.11.15 1500hrs, exited warp space and reanimated crew. Doctor MacHinery reports a system malfunction occurred in Ensign Flannery’s pod when cryogenic suspension was initiated three years ago, see his report in annexe.

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Report of Doctor William MacHinery, cyborg medical officer.

At 1820hrs Stardate 23829.3.24, Ensign Bridget Flannery entered her cryosuspension pod 1285/16 in readiness for warp jump ordered by the Captain to occur at 1830hrs, and initiated the suspension procedure.

The pod in question was part of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation Model 15-001 series, and a similar pod was installed on Level 4.

As is normal in the pods, to prevent oxidation of the subject’s corporal tissues while in stasis, once the subject is sealed between the pod membranes, the atmosphere is repeatedly evacuated and flushed with nitrogen until the oxygen content is eliminated. A quick-acting anaesthetic gas is used to render the subject unconscious before being flash-frozen into cryogenic stasis, and the final vacuum elimination is not released until reanimation.

On resuscitation, Ensign Flannery’s behaviour was remarked as abnormal, insofar as she seems to have bonded psychologically with the pod membrane material and was otherwise completely catatonic.

A close examination of her pod stores indicates she may have been fed automatically during the stasis period in a closed environmental cycle, which in its turn suggested the cryogenic suspension may not have occurred.

Further testing and an examination of the log shows that SCC appear to have assigned the same serial to all pods of the series: the Corporation explain that a batch of that serial was produced for installation in escape pods, and cost-saving meant identical serials were assigned to all, it was never envisaged that these would be installed in multi-pod configurations.

As a consequence, only pod 1346/45 was actively managed by the ship’s computer, pod 1285/16’s “ready” signal, sent when Ensign Flannery triggered the first vacuum sealing stage, having been ignored by the computer which took it to be a ghost echo of pod 1346/45’s earlier “ready”, bounced around the ship’s circuitry.

As a result, it is to be supposed the Ensign remained saliently conscious between the vacuum-sealed membranes for the three-year duration of the Jump, fed through her mask’s feeding tube.

Thankfully, Ensign Flannery has fully recovered after her personality backup was reloaded, but a waiting list has been formed for her pod.

28.07.09