Unwelcome visits

Posted on Tue May 17th, 2022 @ 12:25pm by Lieutenant Commander P’rel M.D & Lieutenant Commander Savin

Mission: Character Development
Location: CIO's office
Timeline: En route to Rondac
2394 words - 4.8 OF Standard Post Measure

Of course, word had reached him that the CIO had yet again managed to alienate an XO. What was it with the Vulcan woman, and women in power, Savin wondered as he made his way to the CIO's office. He had pondered on trying to meet her in a casual and perhaps looser setting but he had realized that formal might just work better with the Vulcan.

Unannounced, and without appointment, the Romulan counselor now stepped inside the office, staring directly at the woman who was supposed to be off-duty. "Why are you in your office?" he challenged, quite directly.

Grimacing internally slightly, and realising she should have locked the door, P'rel recognised the voice of the ship's counsellor. In truth she hadn't had much time avoid him since their last encounter, she had been so busy, although given the opportunity she would very much have given him a wide berth. Not looking up from her console, she curtly responded with "the logical conclusion would be that I am working, counsellor...".

"The logical conclusion should be that you are relieved of your duties, and as such should not be working," he answered, after reading her -unseen- answer from his PADD, which he always seemed to carry as a 'just in case' measure. "That however begs the question, why have you been relieved of duty? What did you do this time?"

“Me?” P’rel questioned, her calmer voice somewhat the incredulity she felt. Turning around to face Savin, she remembered the deafness of her colleague, and chastised herself for having forgotten. “You might want to consider what she’s done. Mr Tolbar doesn’t understand the human cultural reference of coming in here and cocking one’s leg, but I presume you do? Honestly, first officers on this ship…..” she finished with a mutter.

"I do not know a mister Tolbar," Savin clarified, "and please, do enlighten me in reference to his leg because I do not understand." He moved in further and sat down across from her desk. "What about he first officers?" he challenged, "because so far, I have had no issue with either of them."

"Not HIS le- never mind..." she replied, sounding exasperated even for P'rel. The Vulcan realised she wasn't getting out of this one by escalating the interaction into a conflict and then leaving, and so gestured to a seat for Savin to sit. There was a relatively comfortable desk chair nearby, though P'rel opted to gesture to the far less so terminal stool. "You're a man" she answered, hoping to deflect the Counsellor with some nonsense or other about the clashing of gender roles in seniority.

"Last time I checked, yes," the counselor deadpanned, ignoring the gesture to sit somewhere further away as he had already seated himself, quite close to her, it seemed. Fortunately for her he couldn't hear her exasperation, so he seemed oblivious to it. "A very astute observation lieutenant, but what is your point?"

Savin wasn’t biting, and P’rel decided to step it up a gear. Logically the only conclusions would favour her, either Savin would run with it and P’rel didn’t need to waste any headspace on the Counsellor’s nonsense, or he would understand she was deflecting him, realise he was wasting his own time and leave. “Female officers don’t seem to like me…” she said with as much sincerity as she could muster. “Also I had a difficult birth, which I believe is something to do with intrafemale conflict….or something…” she finished, audibly less interested in maintaining the pretence and spinning around to continue her work. She inwardly grimaced again briefly, and wheeled back around to face her deaf colleague.

"You had a difficult birth... you have a child?" Savin arched a single eyebrow at her, watching her indecision to turn her back to him - and thus be intentionally rude - and then turn back to face him. "Do female officers require to like you, to be able to work with them without turning to mischief?"

The Vulcan looked at her colleague deadpan; she couldn’t entirely decide if the counsellor was being deliberately provocative or not. “Define Mischief…” she replied, curious to see what Savin knew.

"Pulling pranks," Savin answered dryly, "word travels on a ship lieutenant, and I know what you did to the first officer, after she removed you from duty. The question now is..did she rightfully do so. Because as it is now, you should not even be in your office and technically, I should call for security."

“I’m not restricted to quarters, Counsellor…” began the Vulcan, slowly becoming more visibly irritated despite her efforts to keep it under control. “…but by all means call security…”

"...but you are restricted from your duties, and by extension your workspace," the counselor supplied calmly. "That is what restricted from duty means, you are to refrain from entering your workspace and are refrained from tending to your duties. Which begs the question, what are you thinking you are doing here?"

By now a lesser man would have given up and walked away, and it irked the Vulcan that the counsellor wasn’t doing so. “Undergoing a counselling session, Counsellor…” she replied obtusely and obstructively. Purposely making a show of directing her attention to a PADD she picked up, pretending to concentrate on some data block.

"Are you?" The counselor crossed his arms over his chest and smirked at her. "I was not under the impression that we were having a formal session, and I am under the impression you are working..." He reached to snatch the PADD from her grasp. "Should I inform the XO that you are disobeying orders?"

“Perhaps you are right Counsellor…” P’rel replied with a twinge of challenge and daring to her voice. “I should not be here, and am clearly not required to stay for a formal session….” She rose, intending to walk out the door but curious as to the response of her sparring partner.

For obvious reasons, the tone in her voice was completely lost. Yet, he stood and blocked her path. "We could make this a formal session," Savin challenged in return, "and since I do tend to go where people are comfortable, and we are already here... if you are not working, then we could indeed talk. About your motivations, perhaps, and why you do not seem to fit in."

P'rel made a mental note of where the nearest phaser was in the room and only half joked to herself that it was probably the only way she was leaving any time soon. Standing almost nose to nose with Savin, she got the uncomfortable impression that she had met her match. "Why is it important to you that I fit in?" she challenged.

"To improve working relations with your co-workers. That does work better, if you are part of the team instead of wanting to row it alone." He didn't back down or away as she was in his personal space, standing his ground and staring right back at her. "If you work with people instead of doing your own thing you may find things to go easier, for yourself and the people you are expected to work with."

Taking a single step back to deescalate what had almost turned into a physical confrontation between the pair, P'rel clasped her hands behind her back. "I work alone." she flatly replied. It wasn't strictly false, the nature of her role did necessitate a certain level of isolation from others. Short of the somewhat accidental addition of her old mentee, and the occasional irritation of Petty Officer Saghir, she generally only worked with Captain Kane.

"There is no I in team," Savin pointed out, "you work on a starfleet vessel and as such are part of this crew, and part of a team. This means, that you do need to work with others, and not against them."

P'rel pondered for a moment and wondered if there was in fact a language with a similarly denoted singular pronoun anywhere, which was included the equivalent word for "team". Chastising herself for not having an example to come back at the Counsellor with she instead settled for a withering look of pity at the man. If he only knew a fraction of what she knew, about the team working against the rest of the team. Starfleet, the Federation....a corrupt moralism, a failed experiment doomed to collapse. "My job sometimes requires me to work against the team, Counsellor. I wish it didn't. But it just does...".

Though he noticed the glare, he chose to ignore it and see how she'd deal with it. "Does that include exhibiting childish behaviour?"

It was unfortunate that her personal LCARS access trick didn't include transporter operations, or P'rel would have beamed herself out of the room; or the Counsellor into waste reclamation. "Define childish..." she challenged.

"Changing the parameters of someone's logged appearance so equipment will respond differently and become unusable by said person. That is, in fact, conduct unbecoming, and can be seen as bullying." He returned a challenging gaze of his own. "What were you trying to prove...that you can still do your own thing, despite restrictions?"

A brief flicker of amusement crossed the Vulcan's mind as she imagined Commander Zora being beamed through doorways and having control interfaces suddenly shift their buttons around in front of her. "Well if I was, I did, didn't I?".

"But why do you feel you need to prove that rules and regulations do not apply to you? You are a Starfleet officer, yet you do not act like one." Savin frowned. "You are acting like a recalcitrant child who is not getting her way."

Ignoring the derisory remark, P'rel mildly scoffed internally at the sheer ignorance of her colleague. She was embarrassed for him. Her mind briefly flashed over her Starfleet career and all that she had seen of Starfleet Officers; corruption, treachery, oppression, violating sovereign territories at will, and her own project which had turned out to be a barely hidden front for the genocide of the Jem'Hadar. Not to mention the current crisis. "And just how does a Starfleet Officer act, exactly, Counsellor?"

"A Starfleet officer works as part of a team, and respects fellow officers and does not stoop to childish behaviour when he or she is berated for actions that do not become officer behaviour. Perhaps you have been working on your own for too long, but as long as you serve on this vessel I recommend you learn to operate as part of a team, as we all have to." It seemed to Savin that he just wasn't getting through to the stubborn intelligence officer.

P'rel looked at the Counsellor for a few silent moments, thanking at least her traditional early years for granting her the patience not to lamp the ignorant officer in the jaw. Instead, the briefest flash of a smug smile flickered across the Vulcan's face before she shook her head pitifully at Savin. "Counsellor...if you knew the barest fraction of what I know, you wouldn't be so audacious in your claims of some kind of virtue amongst Starfleet officers." She took a step again towards the door, hoping he wouldn't block her this time. "Starfleet, the team" she emphasised mockingly, "are as corrupt as Ferengi, as violent as a Klingon, conniving as a Cardassian and as ruthless as a Rom -... you catch my point," she finished, catching the somewhat racial slur before she finished in front of her colleague. "I simply don't care to live in the pretence of a virtuous happy fleet of honourable do-gooders, I know better".

"Then what are you doing here?" Savin challenged, before giving her a curt nod. "Yes, Romulans can be ruthless. But I am, fortunately, not all Romulans. As, I am certain, you are well aware. And no I probably do not know all you know, but I consider those on this vessel to he honourable."

Savin had her there. For all her experiences of corruption, megalomania and even genocidal command leaders in Starfleet; she couldn't really argue that the people on this particular ship seemed honourable, decent people - if still somewhat naive to the imperialism of the Federation and Starfleet as a whole. "I am here because I was told to be here, Counsellor. I shall remain here for as long as Captain Kane deems it to be necessary".

"Then I would recommend that at least for the duration of your service here, you at least attempt to be a team player." He cast her an almost wicked smile. "You could consider that both a challenge, and an exercise."

Stepping past the Counsellor and closer to the door than she'd been during this ridiculous tedium, she noncommittally responded with "is that an order, Commander?"

"I believe I said that I would recommend it," Savin answered as he moved to be able to see her speak. "But I could make it one, if you prefer."

"I'm too recalcitrant to follow it, even you did...sir" P'rel replied, raising a brow and least trying to defuse the combative exchange with a small degree of humour, though still emphasising 'sir' with some derision.

"That you are doctor," Savin smirked back at her, "it is with reason they say doctors make the worst patients, is it not?"

"Doctors serve the ranks of the living, we're not meant to swell the ranks of the dead, Counsellor" P'rel responded, with far darker a tone than she had intended, whilst thinking back to her last time on Rondac. The memories were unpleasant, at the very least. Snapping out of her momentary trance, she offered the briefest of smiles to Savin, hoping to reassure him.

The tone lost on him, he did sense a shift in her mood for a moment. "As you say," he agreed. "Even so... consider the challenge? Or exercise? You may find your working relations on this vessel to go...smoother."

"I shall" P'rel responded, committing only to considering the options rather than undertaking them. Nodding politely, she made the final few steps to the door unchallenged and crossed the threshold, finding it most agreeable to away from the interrogative Counsellor and his suggestions...