| Brassed Part Two - Up the Down Money Shot |
| Summary: | Tisiphone has her rank of LTJG restored. Can't say you weren't warned. |
| Date: | 02 Oct 2041 AE |
| Related Logs: | Brassed Part One - Frak!; Brassed Part Three - Sisters In Arms; Various others, but That Which We Earn and Not Finished Yet are most heavily referenced |
| Players: |
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| Ready Room - Deck 7 - Battlestar Cerberus |
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| With the hatches at the rear of the room, the walkways on both sides slope down towards the dais at the front of the room. The stadium seating forms a partial semi-circle around the speaking podium and provides enough seats for all three hundred members of the Air Wing. The walls are adorned with the patches of each squadron aboard and their mottos stenciled in white lettering above each one. Behind the podium is a set of large LCD screens that can display any matter of material from reconnaissance to maps to gun camera footage. |
| Post-Holocaust Day: #218 |
Ensign Apostolos was summoned to the Ready Room for a meeting with the CAG. ASAP. Why? The details were not given. Given Tisiphone's general antics, it could be just about anything, really. Though Cidra generally does not chew pilots over in the Ready Room. She avoids conducting business here if she can help it, actually, beyond briefings that actually require the stadium seating. She stands at the podium now. Posture straight and manner still. In her duty blues. Waiting.
'The CAG's looking for you.' Never a phrase one wants to be startled from a few moments' sleep with. Tisiphone's still buttoning her jacket as she backs in through the hatch, giving the bottom of the blue fabric a sharp tug before she turns around. A quick, sweeping glance locates Cidra, and narrow shoulders straighten on cue. Down the steps she heads, booted feet dragging a little as she approaches. "Sir?" comes the query as she nears, voice scratchy from too many cigarettes and disuse. "You were looking for me."
"At ease," Cidra says as she steps down from the podium. Not 'As you were,' so Tisiphone can continue standing for inspection in that rather uncomfortable 'ease' position of the military's. The CAG looks more generally pulled together than when she and Tisiphone had their previous little chat sessions, but the lines at the corners of her eyes and mouth still look deeper than they did a few weeks ago. It seems to be permanent. "I was, yes." No details about why are immediately forthcoming. "How are you bearing up these days?"
At Ease — named so only because it's /easier/ than standing at attention. Slightly. Tisiphone settles into it without protest, her flat-eyed and sleety stare fixed at some remote point across the room from her. Her ash-blonde hair, bleached out nearly to bone-white by Sagittaron's sun and finally long enough to seem more like hair than overgrown dandelion fuzz, has been shorn back to a bare scalp. The olive tan is dwindling away, dark circles more prominent under her eyes as it does, and the lines of her fine-boned face are sharper than they ought to be. "Just fine, Sir," she replies, dutiful as can be. It would need a flashing marquee sign spelling L-I-A-R to be more obviously the case.
"I very much doubt that," Cidra replies, as to Tisiphone answer to her question. Regarding the younger pilot with those cloudy blue eyes. There's a somberness to them. Though, otherwise, she's inscrutable. "But you are keeping to your duties. That is good. Duty is a blessing, Money Shot. Gives one focus." A pause. "I have two questions for you. I shall take the easier one first. How do you deem your skills as a Viper pilot?"
She /is/ attending to her duties. There's that, if nothing else. Hasn't been talking to much of anyone, on CAP or off, but the work that's hers to do is getting done. Nothing flashy, but nothing shoddy enough to warrant censure, either. "Compared to what, Sir? I'm a good wingman. I stay with my lead. I'm good support. Better in the black than atmo." Beat. "Shiv said I had a good eye for spotting details in other pilots' flying. Said I was better than him at his age, so not to get cocky." A faint twitch of her shoulders, eyes not wavering from their distant stare; as close to a shrug as she'll give in her current position.
"You are an excellent pilot," Cidra says. It is said flatly. Praise is rare from her, except in the form of 'You did met expectations when doing that.' And it always has less the sound of flattery than of stating cold fact. "A better one than I shall ever be. A better one than most of the lieutenants you serve under were at your age. Well. You have forged in a hotter fire than they were. You have spot-on combat instincts, Money Shot, but you do not hotdog and you do not leave your wing undefended. Out in the black you follow orders, you keep your head, you protect your ship and your flight mates. There few I would pick to fly with over you on a given day." A pause. "Now. How would you describe your quality as an officer?"
Tisiphone's breath leaves her in a sharp, nearly inaudible huff. Her brows twitch, furrow toward eachother, and her lips prim into a narrower line; the sort of subtle maneuvers of someone arguing with themself over whether or not they're allowed to cry. After a few sharp blinks, her face settles out smoothly again. "Not much of one at all, Sir. We both know that."
Cidra just watches Tisiphone in that mild way of hers. "You are a difficult one for me, Money Shot. We both know this. We spoke once of the difference between trust and respect. On a CAP, against a waterfall of Raiders, I trust you more than near any other pilot in this Wing. In other matters…well. We both know that. You lack impulse control in your personal dealings. That is why I had you demoted after your attempt to shoot the abomination. That was no decision of the JAG. I had put my trust in you and I felt it had been broken. Tell me, Apostolos. Do you trust me?"
The sleety eyes flick back from their remote point at Cidra's question and slant over to the other woman for a beat, somewhere between wary and confused. "Yessir," she replies. "Of- course, Sir." She struggles with the words a bit, as if they're suddenly difficult to get out in the order she wants. "I- why wouldn't I?"
"The manner in which you and Ibrahim conducted yourselves suggests otherwise," Cidra replies mildly. "But. That matter is done now. Though it does bring me 'round to my point of this. I relied upon Shiv more than I think he understood. It has been difficult for me to…well. I am endeavoring to sort matters out in these coming days. I need to strengthen my hands, Money Shot. Particularly with many of our Nuggets readying to actually join us as proper pilots. I need officers I can rely upon to set an example for them. Both in the black and in other matters. I ask you now if I can trust you to be that."
Tisiphone's puzzled frown sharpens with a sudden stab of laid-bare emotion. Just as abruptly, her pale eyes are yanked away, back to their spot on the wall, like an unruly beast bodily dragged away on a leash. "You would have told us to end it," she says, flat and still. "For the good of the Wing. There was no other way." Her nostrils flare with sharp, silent breaths as she takes a long while to consider the last of Cidra's words. "I don't know what you want me to say, Sir," she finally says. "Object example of what not to do's all I've been. You're putting a bunch of half-baked pilots out there. All I can promise is to try to finish making them worth having on someone's wing before they kill us all."
"I would have asked you to cut it out, yes," Cidra replies. "If that was not…doable, I would have likely placed you in Broadside's squadron to avoid…complications. I know how to pick my battles, Money Shot. But there are things a commander needs to do at times that are…" She pauses, taking a breath. "…Anyone who says they can send their lover to their death is lying. I could not. Not and live myself." She clears her throat, reaching one hand into her pocket and plucking something out. Which she keeps in a closed fist. "I need to be able to trust you, Apostolos. I ask you now if I can do that."
There's no response at all for a long while from Tisiphone, other than the determinedly flat and remote stare and the rise and fall of her shoulders. "Sure," she finally says. Her mouth twitches, as if the listless affirmation is too tepid even for her current mood, and she tries again: "Yeah." Not much better. She clears her throat, and tries a third time. "Yessir. I'll- do my best. For all our sakes."
Cidra stares right back at Tisiphone. For a long, long beat. To the point where one might think she'd just asked her in here for a staring contest. But, finally, her hand opens. To reveal LTJG pins in her palm. "Good. I need to strengthen my arms, Apostolos. And you will need these back, I do think."
A bit like a cat, the movement of Cidra's hand snags Tisiphone's attention over and down. She blinks at the pins, then again, her eyes shinier than they were a moment before. "Those-" she starts to say, then reconsiders her phrasing. "Damned pins," she finishes, very carefully, as if determined to keep her words smooth. "I'll." She blows out a slow breath. "Make a better Junior Lieutenant this time around, Sir." After clearing her throat, she pulls herself up into a salute.
"Yes. You will." It has the sound of an order. Cidra leans forward to pin the younger pilot's collar. "I need you, Apostolos. We are stronger with you. And we shall remain, you and I." A refrain she often falls back on, though Tisiphone might be the only one in the Wing who really knows what her meaning by it. "To dance with furies, and protect this ship. In this we are sisters. As duties go, it is no small thing." And, as Tisiphone would remember from her last promotion to JG, Cidra now leans down to kiss the younger pilot on the lips. Mouth closed, more ceremony than anything else. Albeit none that is in the Colonial Military handbook.
"Remain, and be something that would not shame those that love us best." A slight variation of a theme brought up by the CAG, once upon a Sickbay bedside chat ago. Plural, now, instead of singular. "Yessir." Tisiphone's jaw tightens for a second when the new insignia's pinned on, and a flurry of blinks keep her eyes dry. Such a thoughtful (ex-)Ensign — Cidra doesn't have to contend with a runny nose when it's time for the ceremonial kiss.
Cidra steps back. "So say we all," the first part of that gets. Simply but firmly. She clears her throat. "You are dismissed, Lieutenant." She sounds glad, perhaps in spite of herself, to be able to say it to Tisiphone again. "Good hunting."
"Sir," Tisiphone replies, simply, somehow managing to find a fraction of an inch further to straighten as she holds the salute a second longer before relaxing. She runs a hand across her scalp as she glances down at herself, then nods faintly to Cidra before striding briskly to the door.