"I'm a hospitality man, Mr. Scotty, I live to serve. To auxiliary damage control! Normally you have to book the behind-the-scenes tour WEEKS in advance to see this kind of thing. You're lucky we have a spot open today due to a last minute cancellation."
Seabourne hung a left going down what would have been a rather lovely two story promenade but was currently just a state of flux. A plaza like area full of stacked couches looked out through windows that spanned the two decks. A clear change in tint about halfway down revealed how far the window washers got before the alarms went off. Shops catering to every need imaginable flanked the inner walls of the ship. Some were still stocked, some where just signage, others were bare bulkheads, full of possibility.
"Orlando's undergoing a 5 year refit to freshen things up. As tastes change, we swap out passenger amenities as needed. If you do go making modifications, note that these bulkheads ARE structural and can't be moved. The staterooms are rated only to hold a little more than 1 atmosphere, but these dividers double as the ribs of the core of the ship. You can see where the emergency doors can slam down across their fronts. Those are radiation shielded and rated to take much higher than a single atm. They can essentially create a ship within the ship to serve as a safe haven. In practice, I only ever tested them against unruly passengers who started to riot. I did a booze cruise for a world cup match between Bretonia and Rheinland that got WAY too rowdy once. We sealed the shops and adjusted the oxygen mixture until they got sleepy. We pulled that stunt from the bridge, but you can also do it from here!"
The unassuming door had no label, just a small scanner for crew to wave their credentials off to one side. It was recessed, but not exactly hidden. It just was surrounded by so many other potential delights for the senses that no passenger would think to look at it.
"We've found that slapping "DANGER - CREW ONLY" on doors tends to invite the wrong kind of people, especially when your boat's packed to the gills with drunk socialites who seem to have "Do you know who my father is?" as their middle name. All of the crew-only areas are so disguised from the passenger areas. Past these doors you might find a broom closet or you might find a full armory. The trick is to keep the passengers NOT guessing."
Seabourne waved his hand at the pad. To both gentelmen's surprise, it turned green and opened.
"Huh, usually those are only keyed to officers since technically speaking you could murder everyone aboard the boat from here. The bridge can override anything in this room, of course, but here you have access to every system from one place except for propulsion and navigation."
The door opened to reveal a cramped room lined with monitors, half of which were off or simply read "OFFLINE" in front of an OS&C logo. The lights were dim save for the blue glow from the monitors. A large white board on the back wall had a large schematic of the ship, both from the side and each deck from above. Emergency gear such as first aid kits, magnetic boots, and oxygen tanks were on the inside of the wall on either side of the door. In the middle of the room was a long thin table with a meter long model of the Orlando done in white plastic. Seabourne flicked a switch and the lights came up. Projectors in the ceiling started displaying information on the table and on the model itself.
"We found that 3D projectors are too finicky when various bodily fluids are hitting the fan, so we opt for a more tried and true display option for a 3D model. Likewise, the whiteboard is a backup to the smart table. You can use your fingers to navigate it if you're comfortable with touch interfaces, or you can use the keyboards on any of the wall monitors and hit the large red "display" button to bring it up on the table. Hitting the button again reverts the table to it's neutral state, which just displays general information about the ship's life support, power supply, water circulation..."
A three tone alarm sounded along with a large orange dot on the front of the model. Its twin showed up on the smart table.
"...and collision alarms."
Both men instinctively looked at the three bar graphs projected on the table. Universal to every ship in Sirius, they were a quick display of shields (blue), hull integrity (red), and available energy (yellow). Gallia had, coincidentally, evolved the same convention from whatever the Alliance used back on Earth before the fleets went their separate ways. Seabourne had wondered at times if Nomads had something similar in their otherwise completely alien craft. Both gentlemen breathed a small sigh of relief to see the blue bar barely took a hit before instantly rebounding. And both of them had their eyes drawn to the yellow.
"That's odd. I know the only red bar that really matters is the last one, but I'm pretty sure that even while being refitted, an Enteprise's power core should be running at more than 10%."
He turned from the table to face Scotty in dramatic fashion.
"Unless there's something on this ship that shouldn't be!"
After a pause.
"Aside from us I mean."
A different set of tones chimed and a green circle was projected on the ship model.
