Fire & Rain (Part 2/4)

Posted on 08 Jun 2013 @ 10:36am by Rear Admiral Lirha Saalm & Petty Officer 1st Class Siren Hex Saalm

1,907 words; about a 10 minute read

Mission: Episode 03 - Frontier
Location: USS Galileo: Deck 2 - Holodeck 2
Timeline: MD 11 - 1950

Previously, on Fire and Rain (part 1)...

"Can I ask you something?" Lirha wondered, not sure if Siren was in the mood for serious discussion or simply play.

"Whatever you want," Siren assured, smiling gently as she searched her eyes. She gently rolled off of her, lying on her back next to her as she reached to hold her hand, turning her head on to its side so she could watch her and to let Lirha talk properly.

And now, the continuation...

ON:

Breathing with mild exhaustion from the brief half-round of sparring, Lirha rolled over on her side and looked Siren deeply in her eyes. They were beautiful, a deep blue color which was rarely seen in Orions yet also held a mystic quality to them which she had come to admire over the years. "I have a former lover here on Galileo...and she has been troublesome to deal with, both as her friend and as her commanding officer..." she began to explain as her voice trailed off.

Siren squeezed her hand, to give her confidence to continue. "Why?"

Lirha thought long and hard about the reasons why. They had been a source of frustration for her over the past mission days and she had still not yet figured it out herself, but she had her assumptions. "I am not sure...but I believe that the person, a fellow officer on Galileo, is simply not fond of me for one reason or another. I do not know why. And it troubles me because I have tried to do everything in my power to make her feel welcome and loved...and now, I feel as if I am somehow at fault." she tried to explain.

Siren lifted her hand, touching her cheek gently, to put her at ease. "Start from the beginning, beauty. Who is it? What happened?"

With a frustrated sigh, Lirha realized that she needed to tell Siren the details of her problems. At least, as well as she could explain them. "I was in a brief relationship with our CSO, Lieutenant Panne, when she first came aboard the ship during the beginning of our mission." she confessed. "It began well enough, but after a few days it quickly devolved into a troubled dynamic...and now, as I have heard from various rumors across the ship, she is not fond of me and is dissentful. And most recently, when I questioned her about her performance on an away team mission, she became overly defensive and began to...cry while I was conducting our interview."

Siren blinked with something close to disbelief for a moment, her breath stuck in her throat. An officer? Crying in front of the Captain during questioning? "She cried?" she echoed, the surprise all too clear on her features. There was a time and place to relieve emotions - while answering questions from your Captain in a meeting wasn't it. "Why?"

The captain shook her head, the uncertainty obvious in her eyes. "I do not know." she answered simply enough, then let out a deep sigh to try and relax herself. "I believe she has psychological issues, and am tempted to refer her to long-term counseling. Her behavior was similar to that of a teenage girl, not a professional Starfleet officer who has supposedly attended four years at the academy with multiple postings in her resume. It simply does not make sense to me."

Siren mused on it for a moment, pressing her lips together in thought. "Was the questioning - difficult?"

Lirha grazed her hands over Siren's hair and neck, stroking them both gently and affectionately while she explained the complicated situation. "Yes. It was." she answered in a short manner, then rolled her head to the side to stare out at the holodeck walls which were still projections of the sparring field. "Her name is Maenad Panne, our CSO. And she became overly-defensive about my questioning, even though I never implied that she had done anything wrong. She seems to have some type of issues which I have yet to identify, and I am tempted to send her to counseling for further review. She has a disdain for authority and at times cannot accept her role on our ship as a subordinate to other officers. She feels that her opinion is the most valid, and in that process, undermines those around her."

"She should try having to put up with being enlisted, then she'd really know what being subordinate means," Siren gave a gentle laugh, touching her arm, trying to cheer her a little. She settled to a reassuring smile instead, stroking her arm. She thought over what she said about the meeting, wondering if she should speak her mind or not. She finally sat up, looking down at the stretched out woman, deciding that if she'd brought it up to talk about it to her, the least she owed Lirha was her honest thoughts on the matter. Lirha could always dismiss her view if she didn't agree. "You know, back on Nyx, I learnt a lot about people. Fighting wasn't the only weapon for surviving and advancing in a gang. Manipulation was just as important - knowing how to understand people, how to read people and push their buttons to get what I needed. So here goes, Lirha, but I warn you, I don't sugar coat my words. There's not enough sugar on Nyx to waste on words. You know what I learnt back there?

I learnt there's usually only three reasons a woman cries. One - because she's genuinely upset or emotionally unstable - if that was the case, then Panne clearly wasn't able to keep things professional, and if she was so emotionally overwhelmed that she couldn't stop from crying in the middle of a professional meeting, then shouldn't she be seeing a counsellor? What if it happened in the middle of a battle? It's unsafe to have an officer that is unable to control their emotions to that extent.

Two - they're tired or in pain - now, if that was the problem, as an officer, she is responsible for making sure that she's fit for duty. If she decides to work while she is so tired or so in pain that she can't stop herself from bursting into tears, then, personally? It would make me seriously consider how sound her judgement is as an officer and how safe those judgement calls are. If she was so on the edge due to tiredness or pain, she should have requested to see you at a time she was fit enough to answer your questions. What if she decides to push herself like that again and gets something wrong in the middle of an emergency because she's so tired or in pain and it puts the ship at risk? If you can't function properly, you shouldn't be at work. Simple. If she doesn't understand that, maybe some retraining to help her understand that would help? Or counselling?

Three - manipulation. I'm sorry, it sounds harsh, but a lot of people learn from childhood that crying gets you what you want. I did it often enough back in the gangs when I needed to so badly I didn't have a choice. You cry to make the other person give you sympathy, so they'll stop what it is they're doing that you don't like or can't take - or to distract them from the fact you don't have an answer to the question - or because you're losing the argument - or so you don't have to answer something that might get you into trouble. Crying as a way of manipulating people to feel sorry for you, so you can get out of trouble or to make someone go easy on you, is a basic building block of manipulation. Children perfect it at an early age without even realising it, and some people just don't grow out of it - or see it as a pretty useful manipulation tool. And if that's what was happening with your meeting, well, that's pretty serious."

Siren had counted each point off on her fingers, holding Lirha's eyes throughout, unapologetic for her blunt view on life. "Now, I can't tell you which one of those things was happening in your meeting, or if it was a combination of two or all of those things. But I can tell you that in my experience? Those are the reasons a woman cries. Hell, they're the reasons anyone cries. So, the way I see it, it has to be one of them. And whichever one it was, considering the situation, a professional meeting with the Captain, they all have serious connotations. Savvy?"

"Yes." Lirha nodded in understanding. She agreed with everything Siren had mentioned and believed that a grown woman crying was indicative of a larger problem. What exactly that problem was, the captain had no idea, but it would need to be addressed sooner rather than later. Especially for the sake of her ship and crew.

"The last time I cried was when I was in a Klingon interrogation cell being tortured for information. But I think that was more due to the physical pain." the captain added with a nervous chuckle, then paused when she realized that she had not told Siren about that experience.

Siren took a sharp breath, watching her with a frown for a long moment. She searched her eyes with pain at knowing she'd been through something like that. Running her hand softly up her thigh, she leant close, to press a soft, reassuring kiss to her forehead. "But never again."

When she was kissed, Lirha closed her eyes and let out a soft sigh. She wrapped her arms around Siren's back and pulled her even closer, not wanting to let her escape. "I hope not." she said in a soft yet shaky voice, one which subtly betrayed her emotional turmoil from the experience. It had not been her intention to change subjects so quickly or to lament in her past troubles, but somehow that was the way in which the conversation had shifted. "I suppose we all have our struggles, no?" she added to the Nyxan who had obviously come from a much more tumultuous life than Lirha.

Siren gave a small smile, her lips curling with more than just a hint of wryness as she tucked hair away from Lirha's face and behind her delicate green ear. "There's no point to life if you don't fight. You gotta put your head down and keep on striding forward. But you already know that. Let it make you stronger, let it spin you another thread of your tapestry," she motioned to her back, where the tattooed threads were.

"Those are some fine words of wisdom." Lirha replied with a subtle smile, then entwined her fingers in Siren's and give her hand a light squeeze. "Speaking of fighting... would you like another round?" she offered, wanting to continue their sparring if Siren was still up for it. The captain was quite content to lay with her friend for the immediate future but figured it might be best to take care of work before indulging in play.

TO BE CONTINUED:

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CAPT Lirha Saalm
Commanding Officer
USS Galileo

CN Siren Hex
Intelligence
USS Galileo
(PNPC: Lt. JG Scarlet Blake)

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