Joint Duty Log - Capt Ivanova & LtCmdr Waterhouse - BACKLOG "Like a Led Zeppelin"

Posted on Wed Oct 29th, 2014 @ 9:40am by Commander Amelia Waterhouse & Admiral Rochelle Ivanova

1,111 words; about a 6 minute read

Mission: All Hallows’

Amelia was seeing red. It was all she could do to report for duty like expected, with the intention of checking on Rochelle either on her lunch or after her duty shift. It was probably for the best for her career that the asshole was already laid up in sickbay — Rochelle had certainly done a good job defending herself, not that she should have been put in that position in the first place. If Amelia had only just pushed him out the airlock like had been her instinct upon the end of that first meeting over the coronation in the ready room... No point lingering on it, like there was no point lingering on the fact that no one had felt need to call her last night when it happened, leaving her to find out over breakfast via the avalanche of reports it had caused overnight.

So when she walked out of the turbolift to find Rochelle already on the bridge, Amelia literally stopped and gaped just clear of the turbolift door's sensors. She'd expected her friend to be relieved of duty, if not for the investigation, then at least just to make sure she was going to be okay emotionally and mentally. Instead the stubborn woman was on duty, acting like nothing had happened. When Amelia finally picked her jaw up off the floor, she walked over to Rochelle, and lowered her voice.

"Can we speak in your ready room?"

"Certainly." Rochelle replied, looking over her shoulder at the Lieutenant at Ops, "You have the bridge." She nodded, accepting the silent response the young woman gave her in return. Leaving the bridge was done wordlessly, easy as the redhead tucked herself away in the privacy of the room and gestured for Amelia to follow suit as per her request.

Resting against the edge of her desk, she watched as the doors closed behind the taller woman, "What can I do for you?" She asked, her voice level and easy with no hint of the trauma of the emotional onslaught that had happened the night before. Regenerators and showers were truly amazing things. The only thing she'd missed was sleep. Almar had guarded her until she'd demanded she go on duty, there had been no sleep. Instead there had been conversation and reading, crying and resting while the big Cardassian cradled and rocked her in his arms.

Amelia silently looked her friend over in the privacy of the ready room. She certainly held up a solid front, but Amelia had seen that before. It took a lot for Rochelle to be willing to drop the facade. Amelia frowned and crossed her arms.

"Shouldn't you be in your quarters, resting?" she finally elected to ask. There were a million questions she could ask: clarify the details in the reports, ask if she was allowed to push Mikkal out the airlock now, or even just the big question — why did no one call her. She decided to start small.

The Captain shrugged and brushed an errant strand of copper away from her eyes. "Why should I be?" She asked, folding her arms over her chest as she spoke, "I'm fine, a little tired, but fine. You and I both know I've been through worse."

Amelia wanted to protest, argue that they both knew that wasn't true, that this was different. In the end it didn't matter, if Rochelle wouldn't admit this was more than just a physical assault then Amelia couldn't force her to face it any differently. All she could do is be there for her as Rochelle wanted her to be.

"Why didn't anyone tell me what happened? I had a mess of reports this morning, and not one person thought it important to inform the XO that the Captain had been assaulted?" Fine, if she felt there was nothing wrong, Amelia would focus on something that could be quantified. She should have been informed before she read the reports.

"Because it was a private matter." Rochelle replied ever so matter-of-factly, her eyes darkening as she sensed the rising tide of challenge that began to seep so heavily into the room. It was thick, palpable and the Captain couldn't decide what it was that made her mood come crashing down so quickly. She was raw, walking a razor's edge, and now she'd come face to face with round one of fight one. "The ship isn't at war, it happened off duty and it was taken care of. I wanted my privacy, so I took it for a few hours knowing that you'd find out either way and I wasn't about to tuck my tail and have someone wake you up just to hear 'oh poor baby' or deal with bullshit posturing right at that moment." She hissed, feeling her hands begin to shake as the familiar cold sensation of adrenaline began to steal territory in her circulatory system.

"Stepping back from where you assumed that I, your friend, would patronize you after you were assaulted," Amelia returned, trying to keep herself calm, "the fact of the matter is, you are the Captain of the ship, even when you're off duty. And sometimes the emotional trauma can take time to surface. I needed to know about it, even if it was followed directly by a request to just give you space."

Rochelle, the friend and woman, was gone. Instead the cold and highly calculated Captain stood there in front of that cherry wood desk. "If you have an issue with how things filtered down to you, I suggest you take it up with Security. It's presently their investigation." She replied coolly.

Amelia knew that look, and on some level she had expected to encounter it with Rochelle at some point after becoming XO, but something about her own anger about the whole situation had blinded her to the possibility of it coming up now. She sighed softly.

"You're right, I shouldn't have even bothered you with it," Amelia finally said, after letting the silence fill the room for a long moment. "Sorry to have disturbed you. Please let me know if you need anything." Then she stood and waited to be dismissed.

"Good." The little phoenix replied, "Then you're dismissed, Commander."

Amelia wasted no time on beating her retreat, and as she paced back to her seat on the bridge she practically had steam coming out of her ears. Just as soon as she could find the coordinating gap in their schedules, she would discuss this with Commander PontBrillant.

=/\= End Log =/\=

Captain Rochelle Ivanova
Commanding Officer
USS Vindicator, NCC 78213-E

Lt Commander Amelia Waterhouse
Executive Officer
USS Vindicator NCC-78213-E

 

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