| Helping or Hurting |
| Summary: | Coll tracks down Tisiphone for some clarifications. |
| Date: | 2041.06.25 |
| Related Logs: | Get Angry and Homework Detail. |
| Players: |
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| Athletics Area — Deck 12 — Battlestar Cerberus |
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| Post-Holocaust Day: #119 |
| A large pair of mats dominates the center of this room, their centers taped-out for a small area to practice boxing or other martial arts. Around the outside are treadmills, bikes, weights, and an impressive variety of gym equipment to help tone and shape the bodies of the crew. To one side of the room is the locker room while at the rear is a hatch that leads back to the oversized swimming pool. Off to the side is a rack that holds boxing gloves, pugil sticks, and the associated pads for the sticks. |
| Condition Level: 3 — All Clear |
Paff. PaffPAFF. Paff. An irregular litany of canvas abuse drifts through the Athletics Area from over yonder, where Tisiphone metes out punishment to one of the man-height punching bags. She's been at it for quite some time, by the looks of it — she's dripping with sweat, her skin flushed, her bob-and-weaving closer to stagger-and-swaying.
Coll wanders in wearing her duty greens, looking fairly stoic-faced. Apparently someone pointed her down her. Scanning the room briefly, she fixes her eyes on Tisiphone and makes her way over slowly, hands lifting to equipment for support as she moves. A weight bench is found near the bag and she stares a Tisiphone for a long moment. "You got a minute to hash some shit out?" No 'sir' or rank. No attempt at a name.
Paff. PaffPAFF. Pa- Tisiphone hops back a step as if the punching-bag just shouted, 'BREAK!' and sways with exhaustion. Another step back, and her gloved hands drop to her sides as if they were filled with lead. "There's- a problem?" she pants, sun-bleached brows lifting on her sweaty forehead. Her expression isn't so much unreadable as it's empty.
"Godsdamned right there's a problem. What the hell is your damage with Sophronia?" Coll just stares at Tisiphone, eyes fixed on her. The woman isn't tense so much as heavily focused on the pilot.
"You- want the- long version or the- short version?" Tisiphone asks, looking up from where she's sagged forward, gloved hands against knees. A carpet of long, overlapping scars shine fishbelly white against her exposed lower back and bare shoulderblades. "Long version, I'm- getting a drink first."
"Take your time. I ain't leaving you alone until I get some damned answers." Coll really doesn't seem interested in polite conversation. She almost looks like she'd as soon spit on the pilot than talk to her, judging by the look in her eye. That's pure animosity there.
"Whatever." Tisiphone's too tired to roll her eyes — or maybe it's hidden beneath her brows before she pushes herself upright. She turns her back to the deckie and staggers over to the bench, fumbling off her gloves as she goes. There's a plastic squeeze-bottle and a short towel waiting for her. After three thirsty gulps, she sets the water down and picks up the towel, scrubbing it across her face and head. "She's a flight hazard," she says, as she looks up. "She puts herself before the squad. She's already nearly killed one of her wingmen, and now she's supposed to be responsible for the entire squad."
The Crewman doesn't seem to care, hunched forward as she rubs at the bandages on her chest. If the news of her being a hazard was even heard, there's no reaction. "Says the opinion of..you? Or are you the lone ranger in this? Seems to me that an officer worth their wings would step up and help out rather than undermine authority and command."
"She had the thigh-sweats for our old squadleader. You could smell it at thirty paces." Tisiphone's lip curls back slightly. It's the closest to scorn she can manage, at the moment. "She tried to impress him while we were over Virgon. Frakked off on her own for the sake of her kill-count. I spent seven weeks getting my arm put back together for it. I don't expect you to understand-" Being, you know, a deckie. "-but what she did is something they're supposed to train out of you before your first year in flight school is done. You're not supposed to be able to /get/ your wings in the first place, without knowing you don't ditch your wingman. That she's still doing it, as a full L-T? She's worse than useless. She's dangerous."
"I'm aware that she believes she loved Captain Laskaris," Coll deadpans. "I'm also completely aware of what is taught in flight school. I was in the Academy before you hit puberty. I was crewing airframes before you were old enough to legally sign your paperwork." The Deckie doesn't look one bit impressed. "So rather than trying to help your squad leader and support the squadron and your wing, you decide that being a flippant bitch is the way to go? That somehow HELPS rather than hurts things?"
"Right," says Tisiphone to the Crewman's claims of previous duties, adrenaline-bright eyes skittering down Coll and up again. It's the complete antithesis to the sentiment actually conveyed. "She's useless to us if she can't step up. Which she can't. You saw it yourself. She's mewling and pathetic when she's not in a cockpit, and she's dangerous when she is. You don't have to like how I react to poor command calls. It's none of your business." She pushes up to her feet, scrubbing her face and hair with her towel again. "Anything else?" she asks, half-muffled by the cloth.
"It is my business when you set piss-poor examples to the rest of the frakking wing. You want to treat people like that, you have those damned conversations in private. You don't undermine the rest of the officer corps in front of junior enlisted. Weren't you the one talking about learning things in training?" Coll stares at the pilot. But her face slowly curves into something between a sneer and a smile. "I used to be cocky and think I had all the answers. Flaunt my shit. Get critical. Think my ass was the hottest thing ever. Now I'm the lowest of the low on the food chain. Enjoy your shit while it lasts, Lieutenant, because I can godsdamn guarantee it won't. I'll be seeing you in the air." Coll slowly rises from the bench with the help of a nearby wall hangar and turns on a hobble to go.
"Whatever, man. You're the one who was sticking your nose where it's not wanted in the first place. You don't see me stinking up /your/ berths." Tisiphone shakes her head and turns away, grabbing her squeeze-bottle again to squirt another long gulp of water into her mouth. "Keep my bird flying, I'll keep your groundbound ass safe." She heads in the opposite direction, toward the showers.