Aftermaths of a Past Long Lost

Posted on Tue Feb 25th, 2020 @ 4:19pm by Jillian "Phoenix" Sullivan

Mission: Mission 15: Old Ghosts
Location: Various Locations - USS Roanoke
Timeline: 1400Hrs, December 6th, 2390

The mini bar was a good idea. Phoenix had downed four shots of some Andorian brand of rum. Did her assault on the spoonhead make her feel terrible? Not really. And maybe that was a very big red flag that something was not right in her head.

All Phoenix understood, however, was the fact the Cardassian gave her an entrance into memories long forgotten. And she hated that woman even more for forcing Phoenix to live through that again.

After she finished her fifth shot of rum, Phoenix poured herself a sifter of Saurian brandy.

Had security stopped by while Phoenix drank? Possibly. The pilot believed that was more likely her imagination, since none hovered over her in the office.

Varkon remained quiet while Phoenix downed her shots, not saying much. He had seen the situation before with people under his command, and Anastasiya seemed understanding as well, as she provided the alcohol. Both her and Hakaya knew right away, Hakaya saw the whole thing from the tower, as soon as Phoenix started arguing with the Cardassian. She was the one whom asked Varkon to go check it out, and good thing too. Hakaya could see Phoenix's point of view, having fought against them herself, and seeing her own comrades die to their hands. Really none of them knew what to say at this point, so no one said anything.

Jacen had been nothing but surprisingly professional with the initial investigation into the Lieutenant Colonel's assault against her Cardassian antagonist. He had seen incidents like this before, old wounds being opened up by the wrong word and then the flood gates just open up. It was easier than most people thought for this kind of thing to happen, especially with the veterans of the Dominion War as they lost so much in that bloody conflict and with much of the physical damage mended the majority of people figured that all the wounds had been healed.

He nodded to his men as one turned to open the door for him as he strode through and stared at the woman who was three sheets to the wind. He looked to the Brikar who was sitting with the woman, obviously there to keep her from doing something else stupid.

"Chief, mind if I talk with you for a second while we let the Colonel have a moment?" he asked while producing a PaDD in order to take the alien man's statement about the incident.

Varkon didn't waste much time," Well, both me and Hakaya noticed from the tower, that Phoenix, and the Cardassian lieutenant where getting into a heated argument, so Hakaya asked me to go down there and check it out. since the hangar was pretty quiet with most people off to lunch , Hakaya, with those feline ears of hears could actually hear what was being said, though not all that clearly. As far as I know both where trading insults."

Jacen gave a nod as he listened to the man, then looked up at him "And you are sure that the Colonel was antagonized into striking Lieutenant Kurzkai?"

"They where more or less antagonizing each other, from what it looked like, but you will have to ask Hakaya about what was said, though I did see Phoenix throw the first blow, though I was to far away to stop her. She managed to hit the lieutenant once with her prosthetic arm, before I got close enough to stop her from hitting again." Varkon gave a brief pause, "Though something else I would like to make mention, Phoenix very much had that look like she was having a PTSD flashback, probably form the moment she saw the cardassian. Given her past, I am not overly surprised, and whomever sent the cardassian officer was a complete moron."

Jacen nodded as he shut off the PaDD and turned his attention to the feline officer who seemed to be handling her regular duties despite the disruption that had been caused by her CAGs assault of a fellow officer. "Commander mind if I drag you away from your duties to ask you about the Colonel's assault of Lieutenant Kurzkai?"

"Yeah it was colorful, I would say," Hakaya explained, " I know that they where insulting each other pretty good, and it sounded like they where trying to goad each other into a fight, though the comment that set Phoenix off, was when the cardassian insulted Phoenix's mother, and she called all maquis criminals that needed to be cleansed or something like that. It was pretty nasty. Though I'm surprised the cardassian was even brave enough to come up here. Normally its some annoying Tellarite guy at around this time of day.

Jacen paused as he pondered this and made note in his PaDD to look into the duty roster for Operations to see who the duty officer was and who was supposed to be the Ops liaison officer to the Flight Deck. He then turned his attention to the woman who had been quiet and rather absorbed into her alcohol as he walked over to her. "Colonel, would you mind if we take a walk? You can bring the booze if you like."

"Thanks for the drinks, guys." Phoenix pointed that to her bar hosts and deck gang before she picked up her rather full sifter and walked with Jacen. It had been refilled only once while the investigation went on.

Jacen walked beside the woman, she was quiet and her face was rather placid as it betrayed none of the anger and rage that had left Lieutenant Kurzkai bloodied and beaten with at least a shattered arm. The few deck crew that were around now made brief eye contact with their CAG but as soon as Jacen noticed them, they were quick to get about to their other duties. He took her out of the hangar by the farther exit as he recognized enough symptoms of a PTSD episode withdrawal.

"So I am just going to go ahead and get this out of the way, I have orders to escort you to your quarters where you will placed under house arrest for twenty four hours," he said once they came to a turbolift and pressed the call button and looked over at her as she sipped her drink, his mouth watering at the strong scent of the alcohol.

"I think you are familiar enough with this song and dance that I don't need to elaborate as to what will happen if you break your restriction."

Phoenix gave an indifferent nod. She was confused, to say the least for she normally got sent to the brig for something this major.

"Fair enough," Phoenix finally spoke, and continued to sip on her alcohol.

The lift finally arrived and Jacen waited for Phoenix to board before he did, waving off a couple of crew who had rushed down the corridor to catch the lift. "Security business, catch the next one." he said a moment before the doors closed, since the last thing the woman needed was more bodies crowding around her.

He gave her space and leaned back against the wall, shifting his gaze between watching her and the deck numbers climbing after he had manually entered the deck for her quarters. "Loyal deck crew you have, I hope I can get the same kind of loyalty from my own security teams."

"Pilots and deck gangs generally have to get along," Phoenix spoke quietly and worked on her drink some more. "Deck gang knows pilots have the highest death rate so making our crafts as safe as possible is imperative."

"Hmmm," he said as his gaze settled onto the blond woman, standing up as he smirked a little. "I didn't know that extended to making sure that their boss wasn't completely at fault in assaulting someone."

"I don' get along with most of them. So I doubt it," Phoenix spoke rather harshly, then went back to her drink. "An' I don' claim innocence either. I hit her. Cause she fucked with me an' my folks with her nasty cheek."

"Oh their statements confirm that you struck the Lieutenant, but they also made sure that I knew that they felt it was something the woman said that triggered a PTSD episode...which after examining some of the statements taken, I would agree that her comments served as a trigger." Jacen replied with a slight shrug of his shoulders, he wasn't going to put on kid gloves to deal with Phoenix and Kurzkai, that wasn't his way of doing things, but it also didn't mean that he had to be unduly cruel to her in the whole process.

"That shows some loyalty and appreciation of you Colonel cause they could have easily thrown you under the bus."

"It's Phoenix. I hate using my rank," the pilot pointed out, then sipped on her booze again. "Not rightly sure I know what ta say at this point. Seems all the facts are there for ya in a bow."

"You still have a right to make a statement Phoenix, make sure that your side is heard...and I'm not going to railroad you just because you are or were a Maquis and what most folks would consider to be a fuck up...you'll get a fair shake with me." he said while moving over closer to her.

"And since we aren't using rank, you can call me Jacen. Or Saint like most people prefer."

"The moment she entered my hangar, my skin crawled," Phoenix shivered. "Pisses me off ta see her kind in the Federation. An' I wanted ta make it clear I would not back down to her ilk."

He listened silently to her as she spoke, but he didn't try to reach out and take her hand or touch her shoulder. He had to remain objective so that he was getting all the facts down for Zara and the review board so that they didn't try to railroad Phoenix. He did move a step closer to her so that their shoulders touched a little. "I think she got that message loud and clear sweetheart." he said with the hint of a southern drawl coming through as he spoke.

"An' now my girlfriend will have somethin' else ta jab at me," Phoenix said in a very depressed sigh. "She don' like it when I punch folks. An' she always likes ta remind me of some of tha more darker moments."

She did not know why she told him that. But anyone who knew stress could see she was under an enormous amount of stress.

"I love that gal, but she makes me debate why I aint gone and run out an airlock sometimes," Phoenix shook her head and leaned against the bulkhead a moment. Then she licked her lips as she looked at him. What she wanted was a man inside her and a whole lot of liquor. "You fancy a drink?"

"Sure, I could handle a shot or two." Jacen replied, seeing that hungry look in her eyes as she looked him up and down. He could take a couple of shots easily and then shuffle Phoenix off to bed after getting the rest of the story from her.