Lhandon Nilsen/Mission: The Sandbox of Man (Alpha Brenkelvi II)

Overview

Nilsen egar to get back into Etan's good books, threw himself into this mission. The mission, initially focused on exploration, evolved into the discovery of an ancient Bajoran civilization and an orb linked to the Prophets. Ensign Lhandon Nilsen experienced a neural disruption after his consciousness was transferred into his commodore's mindscape. Nilsen played a key role in scanning the planet and responding to an attack from a moon, alongside Ensign Elijah Kovacs, whom Nilsen later became romantically involved with. Tensions with Lt. Sherlock escalated before they eventually found mutual respect. Nilsen joined an away team and encountered non-corporeal beings resembling his father, engaging in telepathic communication with them. His consciousness was later transferred to the mindscape of Commodore V'Airu as he helped bridge communication between the Federation and the ancient Bajoran entities. After facing personal trauma in a recreated memory, Nilsen was ultimately returned to his body, and began a long recovery in sickbay

In Act 1: Nilsen expected to provide operational support during the Alpha Brenkelvi II mission but was unexpectedly called to the bridge with Ensign Kovacs to reroute power to sensors. After launching a probe and attempting to maintain communication with the away teams, the Oumuamua was attacked by the moon of Alpha Brenkelvi II. Nilsen executed evasive maneuvers and directed damage control teams but faced criticism for overstepping his bounds. He performed a successful in-system warp jump, making Nilsen only the third helms officer in Starfleet history to successfully pull off an in-system warp, after Commander Dax, Colonel Kira Nerys, and Captain Picard. making history, but his actions led to clashes with superiors over the chain of command. Despite this, Nilsen identified chroniton radiation on the planet and advocated for communication with "ghost" beings, leading to a successful attempt to establish contact.

In Act 2: Lhandon Nilsen confronts Sherlock over her perceived treatment of him, leading to a surprising moment of mutual respect. Nilsen joins an away mission with Rouiancet and Brzezinski, transported into a vision of his family home. There, he encounters entities taking the form of his father, learns to communicate telepathically, and discovers they are ancient Bajorans. These beings reveal the events of Alpha Brenkelvi II's final night and Nilsen's past crash. Nilsen agrees to act as a communication bridge, sending his consciousness to V'Airu's mindscape while his body becomes brain dead, awaiting the Bajorans' return.

In Act 3, Nilsen's consciousness remains safe in Commodore V'Airu's mindscape as he acts as a bridge between the Federation and the Bajorans, who reveal their history and the threat of the "Eye of the Night" facility on Alpha Brenkelvi II's moon. V'Airu prioritizes disarming the weapon, bringing justice for the Bajorans. Nilsen grapples with fear and anxiety, but remains hopeful for his return. However, he finds himself confronting past trauma from the Echo Squad crash in a recreated memory. After a period of emotional struggle, Nilsen's consciousness returns to his body in sickbay, facilitated by V'Airu's physical contact, and he begins a slow recovery.

Act 1 - Arrival at Alpha Brenkelvi II

Nilsen was expecting to spend the Alpha Brenkelvi II mission in the Operations Centre of the USS Oumuamua, providing operational and logistical support to the away teams. Ensign Kovacs joined him. He was not expecting to take part in the anthropological discovery of the year.

Shortly after the mission began, Nilsen was summoned to the bridge by Lt. Sherlock and was advised to bring an engineer with him. Upon arrival, Nilsen and Kovacs were tasked with rerouting power to the sensors. After this action, the bridge was able to get clearer readings from the surface of the planet. Nilsen was concerned by some of the scans he saw and had a sense that trouble was about to happen. Nilsen launched a class three probe and then worked with Lt. Arlill, who was on one of the two away teams, to direct a structural integrity field at the device mounted on the shuttle Nichols.

Moments later, Nilsen reported a "massive power build-up" and attempted to maintain communication with the away team. This was unsuccessful. After this, Kovacs stuttered, but Nilsen stood by him as he got his words out and found his voice. Kovacs's suggestion of checking the comms of the other away team was solid; unfortunately, this too was unsuccessful.

The Oumuamua was then attacked by the moon of Alpha Brenkelvi II, and Nilsen took to the helm and began evasive manoeuvres. These had some success, but Nilsen incorrectly identified the shots as coming from the planet surface rather than the moon. When he was able to correct his mistake, his manoeuvres were more effective; however, the barrage from the moon was relentless.

While evading, he was also trying to do damage control and direct the damage control teams. He knew that "they can go over via Deck 3 and drop down. The tubes are in a loop" to reach Commodore V'Airu, who had been trapped and injured in the attack. While this was a good suggestion on his part, he would later be admonished by Winters for not staying in his lane.

As he was evading, he suggested a course of action that would be unwise: an in-system warp jump, with the destination being a short distance away. After giving the option to Sherlock, she gave permission for him to pull the manoeuvre, making Nilsen only the third helms officer in Starfleet history to successfully pull off an in-system warp, after Commander Dax, Colonel Kira Nerys, and Captain Picard.

When they were a safe distance away and no longer in danger, Sherlock summoned Nilsen and Winters into the conference room to discuss the next steps. It was here that Winters admonished Nilsen for not respecting the chain of command, even if he was in the right. He then clashed with Winters again in the same meeting over the distribution of power reserves for the shields and weapons. This concluded with Winters telling him to stay in his lane, and Nilsen's lack of respect for Winters and Sherlock grew.

Nilsen was then instructed to return to the bridge. There, he established an uplink with the probe and soon had the scanners working and picking up data from the planet. After this, he identified that there were four distinct collections of chroniton radiation.

While he was working on this, he saw an image on the bridge that was his father. This image appeared to be helpful as he was able to make a successful connection to the ground team. At this moment, Nilsen was the only person to see an image, but soon, each member of the bridge crew had their own vision. Soon, Winters surmised that these hallucinations were real and caused by the chroniton particles at his station.

Soon after, Nilsen was able to give the bridge crew a clear view of the moon and a scan of the structures on the surface and make brief contact with Etan's away team. Further details were discovered, and the other members of the bridge crew started to see their own images. Lhandon then came to the conclusion that these beings were trying to communicate with them and advocated for an attempt at returning communication with the "ghosts." After discussion with the rest of the bridge crew, the solution was found: to use all the chronitons they had collected and pour them into one big attempt at communication.

Act 2 - Confrontations

The bridge crew retired to the conference room and Lhandon could not shake that there was a reason these beings choose the appear as his father and made a mental plan to go over. He argued for the beings, saying that he thinks they want to show his crew something, but what he didn't know. . A plan was made to used the transporter, add in the chronitions and use that to go to their space. He then chose to speak up for himself and asked to be asgined to the away mission. This would be his first meeting with Commander Rouiancet who would later become his commanding officer on the USS Octavia E Butler in 2401.

However, his distrust and anger with Sherlock was coming to a head. After the rest of the crew left the conference room, Nilsen confronts Sherlock for constantly belttling him, thinking that he is up to something, creeping around his OC and he confronts her for his perceved treament of ensigns from Sherlock. The two of them has a frank discussion. Nilsen's temper threatens to surface but he keeps a lid on it. To Nilsen's suprise, Sherlock appuaded him for this, said that she did trust him even more shockingly, was proud of him. As the disucssion drew to a close, she left him with a threat, "If you ever speak to me like that again, I WILL make you number sixteen! DO YOU GET ME!?" which was then followed by "Cross me again, and I WILL eat your heart!" A threat that was also a joke...mostly. Nilsen is pretty sure Sherlock would eat his heart if she wanted to.

Nilsen is yet to understand what she meant by calling him number sixteen, he thinks it's the number of ensigns she has eaten for breakfast that week.

After the plan was made, Lhandon collected communications systems from the OC with the aim of cataloguing everything that happened as well as acting as a form of universal translator. As he was transported over with the rest of the away team made up of Commander Lia Rouiancet and Lt Rivka Brzezinski he found that he had been beam on to a couch, as he came to his senses he realised that he was in living room of his family home in Gault. Nilsen was naturally happy to be home and enjoy the few moments of tranquillity. Soon he heard voices outside and found that they were the voices of Rouiancet and Brzezinski. When he met up with them he found that the could not see what he could see. All they could see was a liminal white space

Brzezinski performed some brain scans as Nilsen tried to show that they were in his farm. He set up the communications array that he brought with him and at that pointed noticed that there was someone else with them who appeared to take the form of his father. He soon realised that he could communicate with this entity and it took the form of his father to help facilitie this. This was his first experience with telepathic communication A second entity reveal it's self to be the son of the entity and revealed himself to be Torka Mikal. He soon found that their form of communication was though the sharing of images and vocal communication was possible but different, so keeping an open mind he was successful in communicating with them and embrace this method of communication. However he needed to extend that to the other two members of his away team, and he asked if that was possible. It was and soon they were being shown the events of the final night of Alpha Brenkelvi II

After this, Nilsen was able to show and explain to Torka and his father that the farm was his home. They then saw his crash from Echo Squad and told him that he was there. He didn't understand at that moment but would later go on to realize the lesson they were about to give. They also saw the USS Oumuamua before they found the bridge of a galaxy-class starship. Unknown to Nilsen at the time, Commodore V'Airu was in a mindscape after she was injured in the battle with the moon. To further facilitate conversation, the people he had just met asked to use his body to directly talk, where he would act as a bridge. At the same time, his consciousness would be sent to Commodore V'Airu's mindscape to be safe. He agreed to this, and seconds later appeared at the helm of the USS Crow Dog in V'Airu's mindscape.

After proving who he was to V'Airu, that process was more for his comfort than for his commanding officers'. He also met Fer’at at this time. He explained why he was there and acted as a sort of ambassador to the people of Alpha Brenkelvi II. He explained that they were Bajorans from around 50,000 years ago and also clarified that these people were not the ones who attacked them; rather, they were wiped out by what was on the moon. He then explained that this mindscape would have to stay open until his consciousness could be returned to his body. If the mindscape should fail, his consciousness may be lost. Unknown but reveal to Nilsen later, the Bajroans who were talking to Rouiancet and Brzezinski needed to depart quickly but promised to return him as soon as possible. The act ends with Nilsen's consciousness in the mindscape of the commodore but his body effectively brain dead.

Act 3 - Bridges And The Eye Of The Night

With the stakes set, Nilsen's Consciousness is for now, safe in the mindscape of Commodore V'Airu, topics turn to the purpose of the away mission, making contact with the beings of Alpha Brenkelvi II. Nilsen was happy to be a bridge between the federation and the Bajroans, and the Bajroans were more then happy to come to the table, explain who they are, tell their story and help Nilsen return home.

When they arrive, the Bajorans explain that they are cousins of the Bajoran people, but their people were wiped out when the "Eye of the Night" attacked. Through some translation on Nilsen's part, it is figured out that the Eye of the Night is the facility on the moon of Alpha Brenkelvi II which attacked and damaged the Oumuamua. With the Mindscape active and that information given, V'airu instructs Nirid and Fer'at to take orders to Lt. Sherlock: "Disarming, destroying, or otherwise disabling these weapons is our new first priority." This order eventually leads to a sense of justice for the Bajorans as their non-corporeal forms can now find some peace knowing the weapon is dealt with.

V'airu, Horque, and Almor, brainstorm ways to locate and reunite Nilsen with his body, while Nilsen grapples with the fear and anxiety of his situation. The Bajorans, represented by Torka, offer their guidance and the chance to stay with them should it all go wrong, but Nilsen remains eager to ensure his survival and share the Bajorans' stories with Bajor. Ultimately, Nilsen expresses his desire to return home, hopeful that the crew's efforts will succeed. V'airu takes his hand helps him step forward and out of the mindscape.

But, he does not return to his body, As the conference room dissolves into darkness, Nilsen finds himself in a recreated memory of a past shuttle crash, and his connection to Echo Squad. He unwillingly spends a period of time in this space.

This space soon starts to resemble the wreckage of Shuttle FH-421, confronts the trauma of his past. Despite being physically uninjured, he relives the crash that almost killed him and led to his expulsion from Echo Squad. Haunted by guilt and feelings of inadequacy, he struggles with the belief that he is a bad person. Surrounded by smoke and fire, Nilsen is paralyzed and helpless, reflecting on his failures and the judgments he feels he deserves.

He was unsure where this took place, but theories suggest that he did not return to his own body. Those theories are proven when he doesn't wake up untill V'airu makes physical contact with him in the normal plane on existence in sick bay.

Nilsen returned to his own body after this and recovered in sickbay.