More Than a Distraction

Posted on Sun Jun 8th, 2025 @ 9:08pm by Lieutenant Commander Finnley Keating VII & Ensign Kateyo Fenn

Mission: Character Development
Location: USS Athena, Main Engineering
Timeline: MD06
2701 words - 5.4 OF Standard Post Measure

Teyo paused and took in the almost silent ambience of the engineering room. He was working at one of the stations that overlooked the warp core; its blue pulsing light which usually reverbed around the multi-story room, was nothing more than a quiet hum. The engines of the Athena were powered down as the ship sat in a lazy lull, orbiting a moon that no one would care about if it weren't for what lay on the surface. It was ironic, the ship felt so calm and peaceful while a few thousand kilometres below them was one of the most deadly creations in the known galaxy.

Teyo sighed. The Planet Killer hadn't directly killed Ensign Iska but it was the reason the young Bajoran had died. If it hadn't been for it and the pirates who thought they could profit from its resources, then maybe Iska would still be alive and the young Trill wouldn't be feeling so...sad. These feelings confused him, not because he was a sociopath as some people believed him to be. He had feelings, too many feelings at times, and he had dealt with death before, unfortunately it was part of the life they had chosen. But he had never talked to the security officer, not once. He had no personal connection to Iska, so why was he feeling like this?

"Analysis complete. Structural integrity has been weakened beyond recommended parameters."

The tiresome voice of the computer broke Teyo's reverie and forced him to focus on the screen in front of him. It was early evening and his shift had ended a few hours ago but he found himself here, not because someone had forced him to be, but because he wanted to be. This was a new feeling for the Trill and he wasn't quite sure how he felt about it. He groaned as he entered another set of calculations into the terminal. "Let's go again," he said with determination in his voice. "You will not beat me!"

"Trouble sleeping?" Finn casually strolled in, still working herself. She had watched him from a different console earlier while running tests of her own, but had finally decided that perhaps she should step in. Then again, knowing Teyo there was a high chance that he'd push her away or try to get entirely too close. Either option wasn't a good one, but she felt it her duty as the Chief to at least make an attempt at getting through to the engineer when he was clearly struggling with something.

"Something like that," Teyo replied as he turned to face the head of the engineering department. The room had to be manned 24 hours a day, but he hadn't expected the Commander to be one of the people on duty right now, though he shouldn't have been surprised; no one loved more work that Commander Keating. He didn't think it would be proper to ask what she had been doing here, they weren't exactly on the best of terms. Instead, he thought it best to explain what he was doing here after his shift. "I have an idea that I can't shake from my head so I'm trying to math it out... if the computer would play ball, that is."

"Tell me what you're trying to accomplish. Maybe I can help?" Finn offered, unsure if the Trill would take her up on it or not. Teyo was usually more predictable, but working late didn't really fall into his status quo so this, was new territory.

"I'll show you instead," Teyo replied, clearly grateful for the assist. He turned around and led Keating to one of the bigger wall displays. "I'm trying to solve the problem with hull breaches. Not the breaches themself, but I'm trying to save lives should one ever occur." He pressed a few buttons on the console and the display above it turned into a computer graphic of the Athena. He zoomed in to focus on the angular "saucer" section. "Right now, if the hull is breached, emergency forcefields will seal the hole, and if it's bad enough, emergency bulkheads will also seal the section. The problem is..."

"Analysis complete. Structural integrity has been weakened beyond recommended parameters," the computer interrupted.

Teyo rolled his eyes. " The problem is," he continued a bit louder, as though hoping the computer would hear him and let him speak. "If anyone is in that section, they're expelled into the vacuum of space and...die. I think there's a way to avoid that or at least save them."

"Interesting..." It was something Finn had never spent too much time consciously thinking about it. Partly because it was simply a part of ship life, just as it had been in the old days on Earth's naval vessels. If a bulkhead had to seal, every effort would be made to evacuate it first, but ultimately, those that didn't make it to the hatch in time would lose their life. It was one of the nastier parts of a Starfleet career. One of the things that no one really talks about, but everyone hopes to avoid. "What all have you tried so far in your simulation?"

"I have thought of two possible solutions, but both of them have their issues. First, we could program the shields to extend around the fallen crew member. This will act as a protective bubble and stop them from floating off into space." Teyo tapped a few buttons and the simulated Athena started to move. A blue line appeared around the ship, representing the shield grid. A tiny flash of light appeared on the hull and a tiny red dot floated away from the inside of the ship. The blue line morphed to keep the red dot within proximity to the ship.

"Now, this has problems," Teyo continued as the simulation played on a loop. "One being lack of oxygen, we won't be able to pressurise the hole, so we'd have to get them out of there pretty quickly. But the main issue is this will create a massive strain on the structural integrity field and the shields, which I think is safe to say will already be under strain cause there's a hole in the ship."

"Interesting," Finn nodded approvingly, her mind already spinning on possible alternatives. "It definitely has potential. Whats your other solution? You said you had two." She asked, curious to learn more before interjecting with ideas.

"The second one is more promising," Teyo said as he pressed more buttons on the console. The Athena, white flash, and red dot all appeared again, however this time, the red dot just disappeared after a few seconds before the simulation looped. "Emergency site-to-site transport," he said proudly as he turned back to face Finn. "The computer will lock onto anyone pulled into space and transport them directly to sickbay. Our problems this time are oxygen and speed. We'll need to get them out of there fast but trying to get a precise lock, considering the velocity they will be travelling at and the ship's speed, is tricky under normal circumstances."

Finn nodded in silence as her brain churned. "Both ideas are good ones. I can see how the second would be more promising, but the first has merit too...there was some research a while back on personal shield devices. Do you remember that? I wonder if any of that info might be helpful here?" She asked, purposefully trying to provide help without overstepping even though internally she just wanted to dive in and get her hands dirty. Stepping into someone else's project too far and too fast was often not taken well and the last thing she wanted to do in this scenario was upset Teyo any more than he seemed to be already.

"Only vaguely," Teyo replied honestly. "Fill me in." He was inviting the engineering chief to help him out of this conundrum he had found himself in.

"Well, it's pretty simple really. Imagine a ship's shield but on a personal basis. To be honest, it hasn't been very successful yet. Research shows that it's possible, but the power requirements are just too high to make it portable enough for use, but..." Finn looked at the data Fenn had proposed with a momentary pause. "In your scenario we don't really need it to be portable. We just need it to activate and block a certain section of bulkhead when it blows. Think like the ship's shields, but an independent redundancy emergency shield instead. You following what I'm saying?"

"I think so," Teyo replied, though there was a level of uncertainty in his voice. He picked up a nearby PADD and started inputting a series of calculations, double then triple-checking his working out. He had to admit he was a little out of his depth, he was a propulsion specialist, power distributions and emergency procedures fell more in the realm of operations. "How would the personal shield be applied and it's gotta get its power from somewhere, right?"

"Right..." Finn put her hand to her chin. She hadn't really thought that part out yet. "What if we tied an emergency shield into some sort of backup power source? Though to be honest I don't know entirely if thats possible. Feels like one of those things that operations would tell us is impossible, but really there's a chance it would work but they have to tell us it's impossible so they look like the heroes when they figure it out, you know what i mean?" Finn chuckled.

Teyo side-eyed Keating with the biggest smirk on his face. "Commander," he said. His tone was a mix of shock and admiration. She had always spoken highly of the operations department, probably because of her closeness to Xav. However, it was a well known fleet tradition that the engineering department thought of themselves as better than operations. It never had to be voiced, but the tension was always there, underfoot for all to see. Kind of like the tension between a joined Trill and an unjoined one, a class system. The thought made Teyo's heart pang, but he ignored it, distracting himself with work.

"I think the problem would be distributing the power sources around the ship so that wherever the damage occurs, they will still activate," he said, returning to a more serious tone.

"True. There's really no way to guarantee that they wouldn't be damaged, unless the shielding was put on the person themselves and even that's not a guarantee....what if we're thinking about this all the wrong way? What if shielding isn't the problem?"

"What are you thinking?" Teyo asked, turning to give her his full attention.

"You mentioned site to site transport, right?" She said, her words already increasing in pace as her mind clicked through possibilities. "Just that calculating it is hard under even normal circumstances..."what if we can load the database with all of the data we have con structural failure and data from all previous damages and also incorporate other ship's disaster data. Things like exactly what happened that led up to compartments decompressing in past firefights. It wouldn't be perfect, but maybe with all of that we could create an algorithm that exacts the most likely scenario in which a compartment is about to blow. Like an earlier warning system. Sort of like what we have now, but more detailed. THEN, if that works, we could have the algorithm already detect each life sign within that area and start calculating an emergency beam out. That way we stay one step ahead of the game...I don't know if it's even possible but..."

Teyo's eyes widened. "That's... genius," he exclaimed, with a mixture of surprise and excitement. "Like you said, it wouldn't be an exact science; there are a million variables, but it would give us a higher success rate." He was talking faster than before, running calculations in his head as he struggled to make his sentences coherent. "The targeting sensors would need to be upgraded, maybe the transporter buffer too, but that's the easy part." His eyes widened again as he realised something. "The more data we collect, the more accurate this will be, so why restrict it to the Athena? Why not gather data from the entire squad? Or fleet?"

"Definitely. You keep working on the calculations and I'll start digging for data from other ships," Finn slipped Teyo a sideways smile and continued work. She let the silence fall for a while, until it seemed like Fenn might have hit a good spot for a break in his task. "So..." she tread carefully, not wanting to push Fenn, but just lightly dig for answers. "What is this really about? I mean, don't get me wrong. Noble pursuit. It just doesn't strike me as a problem someone decides to solve on a whim..."

Teyo stopped mid-calculation. He hadn't expected the question and he guessed that was the point. He debated how honest he should be as he mentally scrolled through his Rolodex of lies. They had always worked for him in the past and saw no reason why they wouldn't do the same for him now. He had finally settled on one and was about to open his mouth when he changed his mind. That was the old Teyo. "I needed a distraction," he said truthfully.

"Ok...well why this? Why not be distracted on the holodeck or the bar?" She asked.

Teyo smiled. "I don't think Conrad wants me showing up at her quarters drunk again," he replied, referring to the last time he had drunk. "Nothing happened," he hastened to add. He didn't need more rumours circulating the ship about him and he knew that Viv would kill him if she thought he was boasting about their none-night together. "I'll correct myself. I needed a healthy distraction."

"Rum is a healthy distraction," she muttered under her breath before clearing her throat. "Still a pretty specific problem to want to work on. You could've just realigned the plasma injectors if you really wanted something to do."

Teyo grinned at the rum comment but said nothing of it. Of course this was the way Keating processed her feelings. It worked for her; she was a total badass, but he knew that drinking more wasn't going to break his funk. "I guess I wanted to challenge myself," he explained, focusing on the PADD in front of him so he didn't have to make eye contact. "I'm ready for more responsibility, but I know I need to prove myself." He shrugged nonchalantly. "I can realign the plasma injectors in my sleep. This project is taxing, and I like it like that."

Finn tilted her head towards him. "You? Want more responsibility? And you want to prove yourself instead of just getting into mischief and trouble?" She wanted to add 'when did you become an emotionally balanced engineer with responsibility desires' but thought better of it. She had to keep some level of professional control over her dialogue as CEO. Instead she just nodded and added, "Well, you're certainly off to a good start."

Teyo's head snapped up at her comment, but he decided to keep his emotions in check. The comment had hurt him but it had come as no surprise. He knew this was how the crew viewed him, but the change had to start with him. "Thank you, Sir," he said sincerely.

"I’ll go track down your data. We’ll figure this out." Finn turned to leave, then paused, glancing back with a mix of pride and concern. "Just… let me know if there’s anything else I can do, alright?" Her gaze lingered for a beat, as if silently asking if he was truly ok.

"Thank you, Commander," Teyo said with a smile. "I appreciate that." He gave a slight nod of his head and watched as she walked away. Today had turned out better than it had started, making him think he was finally on the correct path.