The Other Side of the Coin

Posted on Tue Jan 15th, 2013 @ 5:47pm by Commodore Samantha York & Lieutenant Eamon Lynx & Lieutenant Commander Damion Wolfe
Edited on on Tue Jan 15th, 2013 @ 5:58pm

1,480 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: The Enemy Within: Lying in Wait
Location: Brig

ON

Samantha walked into the brig to have a chat with Damion. She spoke to the officer on duty before proceeding to the cell to talk to Damion.

The Brig officer approached the Commodore. "He's all yours ma'am," he smiled.

"That good, huh?" Sam asked, wondering what sort of mood Damion was in.

The officer nodded.

"Thanks for the warning." Preparing for the worst, she headed for his cell.

"Hello, Lieutenant," she said, standing just outside his cell.

Damion sat at the bench looking down at the floor. The moment she had walked in he picked up on the sound of her voice and was expecting a good chewing out, but he had already anticipated something like this. Slowly, he stood up and cleared his throat as he now felt calmer and relaxed now that the Doctor had given him his regular dose of medication. "Hello Captain. I wasn't aware it was time for my scheduled yelling. I thought it was tomorrow." He said softly and then turned around. He hated being this way, but he knew he had no other choice.

Sam folded her arms and watched him, saying nothing. That comment didn't warrant an answer.

"Alright." Damion paused for a moment and then let out a slight laugh as he turned around. "Would it help if I said I was sorry?"

"It would help if you told me what you were thinking when you decided to react like that to a Colonel."

"Captain. In all fairness allow me to explain to you using the most advanced and scientific reasoning that I have come to know." Damion paused for a moment and then slammed his hands against the forcefield. "He was being a complete dick!"

"And you weren't?" she asked. She pushed a button on the console next to him and his argument with Colonel von Hackleberg began to play on the viewscreen in the cell.

When it was over, she turned to face him. "Explain to me how that excuses your behavior?"

"I can't tell you." Damion said softly and then looked quickly up to her. "How much it pains me that your taking his side over mine!" He yelled again. He had almost forced his hand but quickly recovered as he crossed his arms over his chest and looked at her sternly. "We had a mission down there. Our crew had its own agenda and here comes a bunch of ration eating, trigger happy grunts barking out orders like they run the place." Damion took in a deep breath and acted like he was trying to calm himself down. If Leo could hear him talk about a bunch of Marines like that he would certainly have lost his respect. "They came down there looking for a pissing contest, Sam and I put my foot down because I wasn't going to risk our people because they wanted to get into a firefight. I was still the senior officer on that mission and I was trying to keep our crew's agenda in check. I am not about to bend over and take it from a bunch of Marines because they're there to blow stuff up!"

"Trigger-happy grunts?" Sam asked quietly. "You realize I married a Marine, right? And your mission was first to rescue the crew of the Columbia and then, when we learned of the xenomorphs it became a mission to destroy the Borg facility on Tiberius IV. You were supposed to work TOGETHER, Lieutenant. This was never a competition and you were not THE senior officer, you were A senior officer."

That thought hadn't escaped him. He knew pushing her buttons about Marines would make things go south, but he had to keep pushing. "Are you sure about that? Cause the moment that Colonel stepped into those caves he figured we would be bending over for him and his team. He identified himself AS the ranking officer, Sam. Not as A senior officer. So if we were supposed to work together, how come he already walked into those caves thinking he ran the show? And since your married to a Marine you can explain to me when does a Marine have the authority to relieve a Federation Officer? Last I checked, we don't run in the same circles with Marines and there was no threat in those caves for them to assume command." Damion raised his brow and tilted his head slightly. "You setting me up to fail? Are you siding with a Marine because you have an obligation to your husband or because you see this as a perfect moment to get rid of a loose cannon officer like me?" Damion looked at her and gave her a hard look, but inside he was crushing. He didn't want to be away from Ronnie, but he was under orders to do this and it lead him with no choice. He could feel his heart breaking as he turned away from her and tried to stop himself from continuing.

"When it comes right down to it, when the mission turned from exploration to destroying the Borg facility, the Marines were the ones in charge of that task. You're out of line, Lieutenant. Just like you were on Tiberius IV. THAT is why you're in trouble. You were rude, arrogant and insubordinate."

He took a step back and crossed his arms over his chest. "But that never made someone a liar, did it?" Damion looked at her with a tilted head and a blank expression. As he walked away and knew he needed to salvage this situation some how and still maintain his cover. "You have no idea what its like to be in my shoes, York. How hard it is for me to keep control over myself when every time I feel it slipping away from under me." He stopped walking and looked over to Sam with a sigh. "You seen my file. My condition does get the better of me, from time to time, and often gets me in this situation by people who don't know about it."

He started to walk back towards the force field and he continued. "I'm not saying you should take me out of here. If our roles were reversed I would have reacted the same way, but you have to take that into account knowing what you know." Damion let out a frustrated sigh. "I am stressed. Medication isn't working as good as it used to. I am over a flaming barrel with my relationship with Ronnie, which scares me because I really love her." He ran his hand slowly through his hair and closed his eyes. "I'll do whatever you need me to in order to make this go away, York. But you can agree, I am no good to you in here. No one else can do what I can do and as well as I can do it."

"If the medication isn't working as it should, you need to get it adjusted before you're allowed back on duty. Many more outbursts like that and you're likely to end up in a psych ward," she said, none too pleased with him or his behavior. "As for Ronnie, how can you expect things to go well when you treat her like you don't trust her?"

Sam paused for a moment. "Damon teases me about going into caves. And to be honest, if I had a choice, I would have been down on Tiberius IV myself. The first away mission Damon and I went on, I went into a cave looking for an alien device that transported crew off ships. My team and I got sealed in by pirates and nearly died. The second cave had poisonous rodents. The third was here and I broke my arm. I'm not accident-prone, but because of those three events, he tends to either keep me from going into caves or insists on going with me. He doesn't yell at me or make me feel incompetent or foolish, but he gets his point across. Maybe you should take a page from Damon's book and give her a little more credit for knowing her job."

She looked over at the guard and then back to Damion. "I'll let you think on that for a while. I'll have Doctor Bowen and Lieutenant Hoffman come see you. When they both clear you for duty, I"ll let you out of here. Until then, I suggest you try meditation." With a nod of farewell, Sam turned and walked away. What she didn't add was that, in spite of what Admiral Burke told her -- or was that because of what the Admiral told her? -- what charges he faced depended on what the two had to report.

OFF

Commodore Samantha York
Commanding Officer

Lieutenant Damion Wolfe
Chief Intelligence Officer

Brig Officer

 

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