ON: USS Potemkin; Deck One Lavatory
[Mission Day 2; 1502 hours]

When the red alert sounded, he peed on his left boot.

"Oh hell," Kellin Nertlinge muttered, defeated.

The lack of sleep had been catching up with Kellin, as the afternoon
wore on. After lunch, he had updated the design of a bio-scanning
communicator, replicated a mass of said commbadges, mediated a minor
cargo dispute, held an Operations staff meeting, and then had returned
to his post on the Bridge. He had only longed for eight minutes
without anyone wanting anything from him, and he only expected to find
those minutes in the lavatory. Apparently he'd been wrong.

By the second cry of the red alert klaxon, Kellin smashed his cast into
the touchpad over the toilet. While the toilet flushed, he kicked his
left foot up to waist level, setting his boot directly under the sink's
sonic steriliser. After another cry of the klaxon, Kellin swiped his
hands under the steriliser, and broke into a run out into the short
corridor. Stumbling his way onto the Bridge as the deck shook,
Nertlinge took notice of how desperately damaged the inertial dampers
had become in so short a period of time. It was nigh impossible, while
she shields were still raised.

"Where the hell are the shields?" Tupalov barked from the Captain's
chair. "Fire at will! Helm get us behind them. Ops, simulate
incendiary dewice transported at weakest shield point."

Sliding into the chair at Mission Ops, Nertlinge watched the delicate
fingerwork of Annikafiore Szerda at his standard console. She expanded
the area of weakness in the shield, and sent false radiological alerts
to the decks nearest to the explosion of the theoretical torpedos.

Having to hope that he was better than his Quartermaster, Lieutenant
Nertlinge got into controlling the theoretical damage she was causing.
He began reinforcing the weakened shields with energy from the
replicators, shutting them all down, save for a few in Sickbay. He
then activated the internal bulkhead shields nearest to the weak points
in the shield bubble -- it wouldn't protect the bulkheads, but it would
protect the people inside. Protect them from what, Kellin didn't know.
From Romulans, from Klingons, from Tupalov? Take your pick.


OFF:

Lieutenant Junior Grade Kellin Nertlinge
Chief Operations Officer
USS Potemkin