Personal Log 002

Posted on 30 Apr 2012 @ 9:11pm by Lieutenant Lilou Zaren

1,313 words; about a 7 minute read

I suppose I really should record another one of these even though I'm not at all sure what to say. I'm... alive. Well. Healthy - thanks to the medical staff. Who knew that having a fractured skull would be so subtle? I didn't even feel- well, okay, I felt maybe not quite myself, but not bad. Not bad at all.

Is that a bad thing? Should I have felt strange, not feeling like me? But it was a relief. Spirits, such a relief. For a few hours, I didn't think, I just was. Just... walked and talked like a normal human. Normal. My head was... quiet. Maybe a little achy, a little... buzzed, but quiet.

And since then...

Well. Anyway. I was promoted. That's exciting news. I sent a message to my parents from the starbase, but haven't received a response. I guess they probably shut down extraneous communications while we're in the Neutral Zone. Either that or maybe the message didn't go through. I can't imagine they'd have read that I was Assistant Chief and not said anything. Not that I need them to say anything. I'm proud of myself.

Though... I wonder why Quinn boosted me. I mean... Slak's got higher rank and Quinn's been working with Willis for six or eight years. Something like that. A long time. And me? He doesn't know me, not really. I can do the job, but I believe both of them could too. And it's extra responsibility - I like that, being able to make decisions about how to deal with things without running to someone for approval every five minutes. That's nice. And I deserve it. I think I do. I make good calls. I'm just not clear on why he thinks that I deserve it. Sometimes...

::sounds of pacing::

Sometimes I think he sees me. You know? Of course you don't, you wouldn't care what people see. You're a machine. But I do. I'm... Sometimes I think he sees who I am. The good parts, anyway. Maybe. That I can do the job, that maybe I have some kind of... potential in his eyes? He acts that way sometimes. But... others, it's like I'm just out of Academy as far as he's concerned. Which... I mean, how can he trust me to make decisions as Assistant Chief if he doesn't understand how-

Anyway. I don't know why I keep expecting people to-

I shouldn't. It's stupid. The whole thing... and this playacting at humanity. I feel like a child. Like a little girl. Overthinking everything. And then that overthinking makes me think things that maybe I wouldn't have thought otherwise. Or something. Like... I asked Remington... out. To dinner. Well, I asked him out. He asked me to dinner. Which was... nice. I mean, it was nice to not be in uniform for a meal. To sit and talk to someone. With someone. Not because I have to, but just because.

I like Will. He makes sense to me, at least so far. I feel like maybe both of us are a lot more comfortable working than we are... not working. Maybe. At least more comfortable talking about work. He thinks a lot. He's smart. And he reads, which is... nice. I haven't had a good talk about books with anyone since... ha, since the Academy in universal literature lecture series B. I'm not sure... I'm not sure whether I - ugh, I hate that I'm saying this - like-like him. ::sigh:: But I don't feel like I need to know. And I don't know whether he's... interested in me in that way. But i don't feel like I need to know that either. This, just this - talking and listening. It's enough. It's good. Training in being human.

What else? Kestra's on board, which is... perplexing. Not that I wasn't glad to see her. I'm glad she's here. I am. She's... solid in a way that most people in my life aren't. Maybe because I've known her so long. Except I haven't; not really. I mean, a few months together as children and then holo-messages... how much do I really know about her? Except I do. Over the years, she's told me... spirits, more than I've ever told anyone about me. About her family, her friends, her training, her work... Kestra can and will talk about anything. She once sent me a letter about- well. Detailed instructions on what to do with... anyway. It took me about fifteen minutes to read, it was so long. She's shameless. Maybe that's part of what I like about her. How she's so... uninhibited.

Because I am. Inhibited. I know that. Knowing it doesn't change it, but I do know it.

I was supposed to... I guess I was supposed to work on that with McCarthy. She wanted me to. I think. Actually, I don't know what she wanted. I don't know why I went and told her about The Thing either. I just suddenly was. Like I couldn't help myself. I guess some part of me needed to say it again, just to get kicked all over again. But she didn't kick me. Just... I don't know. Said it wasn't my fault. Which I knew. It wasn't. But it not being my fault doesn't change the fact that it happened, that it could happen again easily, because this cog isn't an important enough part of the machine.

Not- that's not what I meant. What I meant was that... there's other people who come first. They have to. Because they serve a greater purpose to the mission than I do. So... of course, I mean, a) if anything happened to me, it wouldn't really be that big of a deal. Someone else would come along and be able to do what I do, maybe not better but at least just as well. Maybe better. Who knows? And b) well, the problem is I understand why my COs made the decisions they did with me. I get it. They couldn't afford the scandal or the loss of manpower. So... I mean, what else were they supposed to do? And c) well. There's not really... I mean there isn't a huge marine contingency on this ship. Just the one I've run up against so far and he's...

He has kind eyes. And he's not as... hard, I guess, as the others I've met. He... there's a quality - I don't know - an easiness to him. Not a lack of expectation, I don't mean that, just a... acceptance?

::silence for a while::

Still, he's a marine.

::silence::

At least he used to be. Maybe the change in position- the... I mean, maybe they're only that bad in groups. Mob mentality. Maybe any of the men who- tried to- maybe they wouldn't have, on their own.

::silence::

McCarthy's in a coma. She had some kind of brain bleed - or something. The nurse I asked was kind of vague about it. It sucks. I mean it sucks that she was sick and no one caught it and it sucks that she's laying there unconscious in the sickbay only a few days into the mission, but too many days in for her to get transported back to a station medical wing. Just stuck, flying around with us until the mission is over. Who knows what we're missing - what we can't tell because of the equipment the doctors have or don't have. And it just sucks that it had to happen. Period. Because... well, she was nice. Maybe she didn't like me much - who the hell does - but she tried. More than anyone has in a long time, she tried. And it got her laid up on a slab.

::sighs::

I guess I had stuff to say after all.

-End Log-

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