Meeting the Brass

Posted on Monday November 11th, 2019 @ 1:36pm by Lieutenant Gypsy Sage & Captain Cayne Morrigan

Mission: Oh Where, Oh Where, Has My Everything Gone?
Location: Captain's Office

ON:

Gypsy straightened her uniform and headed to the Captain's office. She hadn't met him yet but was looking forward to it. After a day of rest from the havoc of the shuttle ride and her brush with the flu she was glad to be doing something normal. She rang the chime and waited to be let in.

"Come in!" Cayne yelled, standing in front of his synthesizer and trying to get a cup of coffee. He wasn't sure if the rodents had chewed the wires or if his unit was just not working, but it kept giving him drinks other than coffee. Of course, now he had an interesting array of drinks on his desk, but he still had no coffee.

Gypsy walked in and gave a salute and then noticed the drinks. "New Kidney work out I have not heard about, Sir?" She couldn't help it. There was enough drinks to keep the entire station hydrated.

Cayne stared at her over his shoulder and then looked at the massive array of drinks covering his desk. He frowned. "Stupid synthesizer won't make a simple cup of coffee anymore. I've told Operations... but I just keep hoping." His shoulders sagged and he sighed. "You're not from Operations are you?" he asked, realizing that he wasn't really sure who she was.

"I am the new chief counselor. Do I detect a coffee addiction?"

Cayne sort of snorted and nodded. "If you do, then you would be correct," he replied, sitting down behind his desk and picking a drink from the pile, seemingly at random. He sipped at it. "Please have a seat, new Chief Counselor." He gestured to the chair opposite his desk.

Gypsy sat down. She handed him her orders. "I am Lieutenant Gypsy Sage."

Cayne took the tablet from her and looked it over. "I am Captain Cayne Morrigan. Nice to meet you and nice to have you on board." He smiled a little at her over the top of the tablet. At least she looked like she was a little more "professional" than their current counselor, although her name was no less "hippy" sounding. He nodded and set the tablet down. "Tell me what you specialize in, Lieutenant Sage..."

She smiled, "My specialty is helping people. I am currently completing the Fleet's PHD program long distance and specializing in Zeno-Psychiatry and have my clinical psychology licence. I specialize also in Ship and Station based counseling and Space psychosis as per my thesis. I take my job very seriously and my only goal is to help those who need me." She smiled, looking around. "I can also treat coffee addiction."

Cayne narrowed his eyes and looked down at the cup of whatever that he was currently holding. "I like my coffee addiction just where it is, thank you. So, why did they send you all the way out here?" He was looking through her records, but they were rather unlike the other crew members he'd received so far. Most of his crew came from the bottom of the Union barrel. They had black marks on their records or were on the verge of being kicked to the curb, but he didn't see any of that on the doctor's files. Immediately, he wondered if she had been sent from the Union to keep an eye on him.

She shrugged. "I need a new start," she said honestly. "I wanted to be where I was needed. I requested this posting."

Cayne stared at her, unbelieving. "You... you requested this posting?" he repeated, unsure as to why anyone would request this posting. "This is a long way to go for a new start. Must have been serious."

She smiled. "My previous captain described me as having a roaming soul. I reviewed a bunch of ships and stations this one... felt different. To be honest, I was drawn here. I think I can be of help here. Let me ask you. The people here... they are misfits, they feel as if they don't belong, right?"

Cayne laughed. "You could say that they're misfits. You could also say that they're bad people. Most of my staff, have some serious black marks on their records. Let's just say that this station is the last resort for many of them. They've been placed out here so that the Union doesn't have to hear about them."

"Well then, this is where I belong. I've never belonged, so I will probably belong amongst those that don't belong because when you belong to the non belonging you truly belong."

Cayne squinted at her, not exactly certain what she had just said to him, but he was sure that it was a lot of non belonging. Not knowing what else to comment he smiled a little uncomfortably and nodded. "Alright, well we don't say no to help out here, so have at it. It should prove to be an interesting posting for you. There are a lot of issues to work through. Have you found your quarters or your offices?"

"Quarters yes, office not yet." She smiled.

Cayne chuckled. "So you've been to Issi... and come over here to Vorl and now you'll have to go back to Issi. That's a lot of space walking. Most people don't like those things. Your offices are on the same asteroid as your quarters... Deck two on Issi. Same place as all the exciting shopping. Do you want me to walk you over there?"

"That would be very much appreciated, Sir."

Cayne stood from behind his desk and rubbed his hands on his uniform with a little bit of a smile. "So... have you ever been stationed on a space station before?" He prepared to head out of the room and show her her office. He needed to check on the shopping district anyway.

"No. The last time I was on a station was when I left my home world." It was a sore spot that she didn't talk about much.

Cayne nodded, leading the way out of the office and towards the space walk, as they liked to refer to it. It was a long open walkway between the asteroids that the station was constructed around. Open, in the sense that the field that protected the people on the space walk was completely invisible, giving one the sense of being in open space. "Stations can be interesting and a lot different from ships. The people are more... stationary, for the lack of a better term. Here, you will have several kinds of people to deal with. The Union members... people that actually work and live on the station, as well as the miners, from the planet below. We just made a deal with the miners for several things... some of them might come to you for counselling. Are you alright with that?"

She gave a nod. "Absolutely." She looked around the stars. "This is my favourite part of the station," she blurted out.

Cayne stopped on the walkway and stared at her. He was obviously surprised, his eyes wide and his mouth slightly open. "You... like this? Most people find it unsettling... at best. One of the Engineers vomits every time he has to go out on one of these." He continued to stare without moving forward.

She smiled. "Ever since I was a little girl I dreamed of walking amongst the stars. On my home world the night is black and when the stars are out it looks like thousands of flickering diamonds. I would always reach up to try and touch them. Here... I feel as if I am finally walking amongst them," she said in a rare candid moment.

Cayne started to move again, more casually. "I won't lie, it was pretty hard for me for awhile, when I first got here. I kept trying to hold my breath the whole way across." He chuckled softly. "I've actually come to enjoy it quite a bit. I also enjoy people's reactions. One crew member was so freaked out by it he wore an environmental suit for weeks to walk it. It's been a minute since I had an counseling session. Perhaps we can do my eval?"

She smiled happy to have work to focus on. "Absolutely! Let's get to the office and we can have a tea or coffee and talk."

Cayne nodded and rubbed the back of his head with one hand, something he did when he was nervous and trying not to show it. He led the way to her office, through the busy shopping district. "We've added a lot of new shops recently, it's really drawn a lot of attention from the planet..."

When they reached the office Cayne tapped in the code for the door and watched it slide open and the lights come on. "So you can put in your own code when you've settled..." The space beyond was open, with several long windows showing a view of the sky. There wasn't much in the room aside from a desk and a computer station. "We can get someone to help you get some furniture up here."

She smiled. "Oh don't worry. I will make it my own. It's not a problem. It's a lovely space." She looked at the food dispenser. "Shall we try for coffee here?"

"Oh... yes please and I'm not afraid to sit on the floor... but I think we could borrow some chairs from another office." He chuckled and made a beeline for her replicator. "Coffee first... then chairs." He ordered his coffee, black, strong, with no sugar and once it was in hand he seemed satisfied. He took several sips and looked around again. "So... chairs?"

She smiled and headed out to get chairs. She returned quickly. "This will do." She set them up and motioned to a chair. "Have a seat!"

Cayne chuckled at her enthusiasm. He wasn't all too keen on actually doing the evaluation part, but better now then never and the brass had been breathing down his neck about the eval for a month. He sat in the chair and continued to sip his coffee, trying like hell to get himself to relax. "So, where should we begin? Hopefully, not at the beginning, because we might be here for awhile..." he stated awkwardly.

She smiled. "We can start anywhere you like but how about what brought you to the station."

Cayne about spit his coffee. When he had recovered he leveled a look at her. "Are you sure? I suppose you probably are sure that you want to hear it... even if afterwards you decide you don't." He wasn't quite sure where to start in that story so he just took a stab at it. "So... jail. Jail brought me to this station. Meaning, I was in jail. I used to be a respectable person... even a damn good Captain, but..." He shrugged a little. "I had a small bout of uncharacteristic behavior."

She smiled. "We've all had those. What did yours consist of?"

"Murder..." he said over the edge of coffee cup. He sort of tipped the cup out a little in an expressive gesture. "Mass murder... I believe. To be completely honest, there's a lot I don't remember. The Krill attacked the colony that my wife and son lived in." It was almost funny that he could say it out loud now and not feel anything, although he wasn't sure that was a good thing.

"You went after revenge?"

Cayne sort of shook his head and nodded at the same time. "I guess you could call it that. It was more like a blind rage. To be honest... I don't remember much of what happened after they told me. I remember the Court Martial... but there's this big, blank, empty space in between. Apparently, I destroyed several Krill colonies before someone could reel me in..."

She made notes on his file. "Tell me about your wife and son."

Cayne sort of shrugged, he had stopped making eye contact and was sort of talking in a tone that suggested he had responded to these questions in this manner before. "They were... my life. For a long time. I don't know what to say other than my memories of them seem perfect. My wife was a free spirit... she liked to help people." He put one hand up over his eyes for a moment and rubbed his face before lowering it again. "They took everything from me in prison. I... I don't even remember what she looked like." He tipped his head to the side and sipped at his coffee, silent for a moment. "My son... my son was an overachiever. Like his old man. He wanted to be the best... at everything."

She smiled. "They sound wonderful. How did you and your wife meet?"

Cayne smiled fondly for just a moment. "Well... I had this time, before I attended Union Point, that I sort of drifted around. It was a rather... bohemian existence." He waved a hand dismissively. "You know how young people have go find themselves... I was on Antares 2 and I had spent a night finding myself at a local bar. I was very drunk and it was very early in the morning. I was staggering along the pier, they have the most amazing water there, and I fell off... rather hard... and tore my leg open from here..." He pointed to a place right below his knee and indicated a line almost the entire length of his shin. "I sort of peeled myself. Anyway, I met Lucia at the hospital where she was working. She was amazing. Truly amazing. Everything about her was beautiful. We were married about six weeks after we met." He sighed softly and rubbed his face again, smiled faintly and shrugged. "My perfect Luci."

She smiled. "She sounds wonderful! Tell me about your baby. What was it like when you held him in your arms."

Cayne shook his head. "Amazing. It felt amazing," he said simply.

She smiled, "I won't lie to you sir. The pain... never goes away, but I am here to help. I promise you that."

Cayne turned his gaze to the new counselor. “I know...” he said softly. “I’m not sure anyone can help me, but I will try. It’s been a long time since I even had the time to think or talk about them. I’m pretty sure that’s not healthy, but it is what it is. I would appreciate your help. I’m not sure how much I can handle.”

"We'll take things slow." She picked up a data tablet and entered some information. She handed it to him. "Your clearance for duty. Why don't you take the rest of the day and we can meet again in a few days."

Cayne took the data tablet from her and chuckled. "Thank you, Doctor. I'm not sure taking the rest of the day off is an option. There are a few too many things going on around here, but I'm not opposed to meeting again in a few days. You can send the appointment information to my comscanner." He smiled and finished his coffee.

"Sounds like a plan." She watched him go feeling great to be back in counseling mode. So far the days were good...although she hadn't been there long. She looked forward to the future.

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