Company (part 7)

Posted on Fri Mar 16th, 2018 @ 8:50am by Captain T'mpest Michaels & Commander Rylie Cattmor & Lieutenant Commander Orin ch’Valri

1,090 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: Ripples
Location: Ra & Ranger

[CONTINUED]

[OLD]

"I don't go out there looking for a body count!!" Orin screamed, narrowing his eyes behind his goggles. "Those men out there are trained to avoid dropping people, but it doesn't always work out that way. Sometimes we have no other choice because we run out of options." Orin gestured to the monitors again. "This.... all of this is to let you know that this is what we do. We may not do it the way you want, but we do it just the same. That ship out there approached us as a hostile and threatened us to surrender. If they were trained by the same masters that you speak so much, then you would know that a Starfleet Officer wouldn't do that especially to another who is flying under the same banner. We showed no intent to attack them. I would consider it suspicious, but you would label it as an innocent accident. If things go south, we need to be prepared to do something about it and not be caught surprise. You may not like our methods, but in a situation like this, they may come in handy."

[NEW]
Orin let out a frustrated grunt as he turned away, closing his eyes. "Monitors off." The monitors around the office all went dark, coating the room in darkness again. Slowly, Orin pulled off his goggles and kept his eyes closed, trying to put himself in a state of calm. When he reached it, he opened his eyes and turned back around, looking at Cattmor with his delicate pink colored eyes. "We should remain at the ready should things not work out. They still have the advantage over us, and until we receive the clear from the Captain, we should remain in the dark because its the only advantage we have against them right now should this turn hostile. If our people need us, we should be ready." He paused for a moment, letting out a deep breath before adding. "Should you make it an order I will obey, but because I don't think the way you want me to doesn't mean I can't see things from a different point of view. I have experience and my experience is telling me, until we get the call from our people inside that the situation is clear, we should remain where we are. Watching carefully and cautiously."

If Rylie didn't know better, she'd have said that Orin was nervous, maybe even a little scared as she stood there facing him in his darkened ready room for lack of a better term, his googles off still. There was a long pause while she contemplated his words, and fought beyond belief not to probe her mind outward for more of a concrete answer. So much of most X-O's jobs came from the gut, to trust in their crew, and their experiences, despite her having her own extra sensory gut/mind feel. Her jaw clenched slightly, "Your unorthodox thinking," she said with a slight sigh, "may come in handy, yes, but not now. Your methods may have a time and place, again this is not now. What was on the table was risking everything for little guarantee. That is a position in my view, not worth taking."

She took a breath before going on in her calm, softer tone, "I'll let you in a little secret, commander. For the longest time, even once I'd been given the chance to join Starfleet, I've never been afraid of dying...in actual fact I welcomed it. But especially since joining the Ranger, I've come to accept that dying would be the cheating way of release of the obligations of this life. So, until we get word from the captain..."

"I'm not afraid to die, Commander." Orin interjected, "I'm afraid of failing to protect the people I swore to protect because of someone else's stupidity and need to turn everything into a pissing contest." Orin said firmly before his console beeped. He walked away to look at the message.

[Ranger]

T'mpest sent an encrypted message to Orin. "Stay out of sight. I may need you to get us out of this. To save the crew, I am forced to go with these people, but I do not trust them."

She turned to T'kaarch and Morgana. "Find something we can use in our favor."

Finally, she opened a comm channel again. "We will follow you."

"Thank you," came the short and frank sounded reply over the comms, "We look forward to meeting you face to face aboard the station. Please adjust heading to two-nine-seven mark zero-one-one; a docking berth has already been assigned and awaits your arrival."

[Ra]

Orin looked up to Cattmor and tapped his console, putting it on the screen so the XO could read. "You've been overruled. We're staying put." He took his goggles in his hands. "You can take this time to start filling out the request for a new Chief of Security." He slipped his goggles back on and sat back down in his chair.

Rylie's temper began to flare for the first time during this little meeting, her hereditary markings showing themselves slightly in the low light levels of the room, and she fought her natural and ingrained instincts on what to do. "Now who's not trusting who? If you think this is a pissing contest, you against me, unit against fleet, rank versus rank situation, commander, then you are sorely mistaken, and when push comes to shove, I'm going to be there to remind you of that. We're done." and at that, Cattmor walked out of the room.

"You're welcomed to it, as long as you don't get anyone killed in the process." Orin leaned back in his chair and tapped on the console on the table, locking the door as she left. The lights around him turned off, leaving him in the relaxing darkness.

Cattmor was already out of the room, but the lock of the door did little to shield Orin's final reactions. She paused slightly as the doors closed, I'll take it under advisement, she thought, before heading out to the main compartment aft of the cockpit, flares still evident around her eyes, them resisting every effort of hers to quell them making them and her retinas faintly glow.

____
OFF

Lieutenant Commander Orin ch'Valri
Chief Security/Tactical Officer

Commander Rylie Cattmor
Executive Officer

Captain T'mpest Michaels
Commanding OFficer

Unknown Captain
NPCd by Rylie Cattmor

 

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