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DAY 02: Goldeneye's Confession [0700 hrs.]

DAY 02: Goldeneye's Confession [0700 hrs.]

[ Tessa May Lance | SCO Office | Deck 15 ]| USS Theurgy ]  Attn: Miles Renard

Tessa paused outside the door to  the office that Lieutenant Commander Miles Renard shared with Chief Warrant Officer First Class Sten Covington.   She had put this off way too long, but this was the possibly the most difficult confession she ever had to make.   Steeling herself, she went over what she was going to say in her mind before activating the door chime.  She wasn't going to barge in.  The whole point was that Tessa was a terrible officer.  There was no point demonstrating it.

When Commander Renard called her in, Tessa stood at attention before his desk and waited for permission to speak.  Her face betrayed her shame and trepidation but to her credit she followed protocol by the book.  When Renard asked what brought her to his office, she momentarily forgot her rehearsed speech.

"Er um, Commander I regret that I have to report that a pilot under your command is unfit for duty," she stammered.  "Everyone has been covering for her but during the battle with the Calamity I believe that her personal demons affected her flying.  Drastic action needs to be taken before she gets her whole squadron killed."  

Renard's eyes revealed that he understood perfectly.  "Go ahead Lieutenant,"

"Me sir," she admitted in a voice that was nearly too quiet to be heard.  "Lieutenant junior grade Tessa May Lance," she added with a slight increase in volume.

Re: DAY 02: Goldeneye's Confession

Reply #1 –
He looked towards her quite surprised at the statement.  Still he allowed himself to remain calm regarding the news.  "In all due seriousness, before I make any sort of judgements regarding your information can you please elaborate on why you feel this way."  he asked pulling the PADD at the desk over to him and pulling up the recent flight data for her ship in the recent battles.  "It isn't that i don't trust your on feelings regarding your own state, but, according to the flight recorder logs I can hardly find fault in your actions.  I would like to review with you the data I have."

"At the start of the sortie you engaged and destroyed multiple bandits while employing non standard evasive maneuvers.  Given the enemies previous reliability on standard Starfleet procedures in combat the advisable general strategy would be to try and be unpredictable.  In fact before we had been betrayed by the Harbinger crew I had been planning on a squadron meeting to discuss general strategies in the event that we were taken by surprise by the Calamity.  My first recommendation would have been avoid standard tactics when flying against them and try and keep your on tactics unpredictable.  Secondly you held your own very well against the enemy.  Once destroying a few multiple bandits attempted to engage you thereby preventing them from attacking our home base.  Despite being attacked by multiple enemies you evaded fire well enough to stay alive.  Given their ship capabilities and how they had begun to learn to adapt to our own styles of flying.  Just staying alive was an accomplishment for all of us.  If it had not been for Thea's intel the mission would have essentially been fire at them enough to divert them away from the Theurgy and try not to die.   The fact that you didn't die given the assault you were dealing with is an accomplishment in itself."

"Once the Harbinger warped in you made the correct decision in attempting to retreat into the shadow of the Theurgy.  Finally the last engagement with the enemy, it appears that due to the nearby warp core breeches you had lost shields and your scanners were barely online.  You spotted an enemy ship as it began to establish a weapons lock on your ship.  You took evasive action and lined up a shot.  Given the locations of your weapons strikes and its lack of returning fire it appears you likely destroyed the main energy feed to its weapons systems.  After that first shot, it appears that you lined up with the enemy ship and opened fire destroying it but not without suffering a collision with the enemy wreckage.  The result was stabilizer system damage.  Given your level of damage you requested an immediate RTB."

"From the perspective of an analysis of the recorded data you preformed admirably, probably even superbly.  I apologize but I am failing to see any reason why you would feel that someone is covering up for any form of shortcomings during this mission.  May I ask for some specifics on why you would say that you, to paraphrase, are becoming a liability to the squadron?" He asked curiously genuinely hoping to understand her concerns.  He needed to know what it was that had put her in this state.   Was it just her who was shaken or were there others? who unlike her had just not came forward?  Was it a result of his actions in command?  There were many questions he needed the answer too and knew he wouldn't get them by just blindly accepting her statement that she felt like she was a danger to the squadron."

Re: DAY 02: Goldeneye's Confession

Reply #2 –
[ Tessa May Lance | SCO Office | Deck 15 ]| USS Theurgy ]  Attn: Miles Renard

Tessa was taken aback by Renard's reaction.  Did nobody see it but her?  Or was being fugitives from their own fleet so hard on everybody that Tessa didn't stand out?  Tessa had walked into this office assuming that she was a disappointment.  Miles let her know she wasn't, at least until now.   Had Tessa somehow managed to hide it that well?

Ooh boy.  He just asked her a question.  No wait, slow down Tessa, she told herself.  Take a deep breath and explain yourself calmly. 

"Sir, have you ever ran a holonovel where a civilian somehow gets into a fighter and performs at Starfleet level ability?  That's where I've been for the last month or so," she explained while marveling at her own calm.  Now that she had come clean, her nerves were finally steady.  Perhaps confession really was good for the soul.  "Somehow I've completely lost my sense of discipline.  I'm practically as much of a civilian as that folk singer guy we picked up on Theta Eridani IV.  I've completely lost my Starfleet edge.  In the cockpit I'm still Goldeneye but on the ground I'm this close to being a liability."

"But don't worry sir!" she assured him.  "I'm not turning in my resignation or anything!  After the losses we've sustained you need every pilot you can find!  I'm not abandoning you sir!  I just didn't want to say anything until I thought of a solution.  And I think I've got one."

"Simply put, I need some revisional training sir," she continued as some of her old fighting spirit returned.  "I need to go back to boot camp for a while.  I need to prepare for Hell Week.  I need to become an officer again Commander, and I'll bet I'm not the only one.  There must be lots of people aboard this ship who need some spit and polish lately.  Heck, we've got so many civilians aboard that they're just getting in the way.  They could use some training so they'll react appropriately during an emergency situation.   I say we ask Commander Cinn if he can spare a noncommissioned officer with drill instructor experience to get us back in shipshape.  We can't afford to carry any ballast on this trip sir."

Re: DAY 02: Goldeneye's Confession

Reply #3 –
he had a moment of clarity hearing her evaluation, "Oh,  I hadn't thought to consider you were referring to the non piloting aspects of your performance."  pausing he looked at her.  "And I agree but less so about yourself alone and more so about the general population of the ship.  That said i do not think i would have even thought to notice it without you bringing it to my attention.  The fact that you recognize your faults is evidence that you still have a great deal of your officer's wits about you.  If you feel you need to be reforged though I am hardly the person to disagree with such a request."

He looked around and smiled at her, "I want you to know something though Lieutenant.  You should not fell shame for having lost your edge as you called it.  Given the things that have happened on this ship since falling out of Starfleet's good graces it is a wonder that most of us even have such a thing as wills left to be shattered.  Your edge has not been dulled from neglect as you may think.  It has been dulled from the constant slashes  with other blades.  Sometimes even the best soldiers and officers forget that constant battle can dull ones sharpness worse than the neglect that comes from never thinking to look at your saber from lack of it's use."

"Thank you Lieutenant, I will forward your request to the security office and will inform the Captain of your observations immediately.  I imagine I will be joining you; Mother knows I probably need it as badly as you after all that we've all been through."

Re: DAY 02: Goldeneye's Confession

Reply #4 –
[ Tessa May Lance | SCO Office | Deck 15 ]| USS Theurgy ]  Attn: Miles Renard
 
"No, thank you sir," Tessa smiled.  She blushed as she realized how self-absorbed she had been to think that she was the worst officer on the ship.  Ironfox was right.  Everyone on the ship had been branded a traitor and was now a fugitive.  Almost everyone aboard had their mind and body taken over by a lustful plant or had their emotions toyed with by the Ishtar entity.   Everyone had lost a shipmate and been betrayed by some of the few people they still trusted.  There was nothing remarkable about Tessa.   She wasn't even special.  And for some reason that was such a relief.  It was like a great weight had been taken off her shoulders.  

"I guess I'll go talk to Cinn and see if he's got someone to spare," she nodded.  "Permission to be dismissed...  Oh!  Before I forget," she blushed as she once again realized how self-absorbed she was being.  "That new guy, Slayton, he's having some trouble being accepted by the rest of us, big shock there," she added sarcastically as she rolled her eyes.  "While I'm as resentful and paranoid as the next officer, we really need to pull together as one team as soon as we can.  Maybe the whole team should get some boot camp.  It would be an excellent chance to break us down and build us back up again," she shrugged.  "Well, it's an idea anyway.  With your permission Commander, I'll head over to Commander Cinn's office and see what he thinks."

Re: DAY 02: Goldeneye's Confession [0700 hrs.]

Reply #5 –
Now that you mentioned Husker...I think we as a squadron should go to the "boot-camp" as a squadron.  Think of it as a team building exercise as well.  By that I mean whoever the security instructor is while we are there they are the ranking officer and as we are all equally crewman recruits during said exercises.  That said, " he added.  "I believe that in the process we should all be given a full refresher on security procedures.  Given our current mission it wouldn't hurt if we were retrained in ground combat operations so we can dually function as security branch Noncoms if the need should arise again"

He smiled genuinely, "And yes you are excused.  I will be sending CSEC Cinn a message to expect you.  I am putting you in charge of hashing out the details with security on this one, and will be noting to the XO that you pointed out a lapse in general performance that even I had failed to notice."
 

Re: DAY 02: Goldeneye's Confession [0700 hrs.]

Reply #6 –
[ Tessa May Lance | Fighter Bay | Deck 15 ]| USS Theurgy ] 

"Thank you sir," Tessa nodded.  "It will be good to get my game face back on." 

It was time to take her act on the road, she mused as she strolled out of Renard's office and out into the fighter bay.  She didn't relish confessing her shortcomings to Commander Cinn after questioning his identity during the mutiny; personally she was glad that she knew who Miles Renard was and tried not to think about the possibility of the Bajoran chief security officer being a plant by the brain sucking aliens that had taken over Starfleet.  She decided to go to her quarters and make sure that her dress white uniform was ready for the memorial service before mustering the courage to face Commander Back-from-the-dead-and-big-and-scary-looking Cinn and request a chief with drill instructor duty be spared to get her and the Lone Wolves back in fighting trim.  And Renard was right.  Having the whole team trained as security noncoms would ensure they would be ready for the next thing the universe through at them as well as getting the whole team to act as one again.  It was time to think positive:  She wasn't a whiner, she was a problem solver, and hopefully that thought would get her through her meeting with Wenn Cinn.

Fin


OOC:  Time to finish the old threads before starting any new ones!
 
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