Hurry up and wait
Posted on Sat Feb 16th, 2019 @ 3:48pm by Major Cornelius Tremble
Edited on on Thu Feb 28th, 2019 @ 4:21am
685 words; about a 3 minute read
Mission:
Episode 6 - Old Habits Die Hard
Location: Marine CO's Office
Timeline: MD003 1400 hrs
Neal sat in his office.
Brooding.
They’d been briefed by the Captain and XO half an hour ago on yet another Cardassian problem and felt slightly frustrated.
There just wasn’t a lot for him to do. No-loan-zones had already been manned and the Marines gear was almost always ready. The Hawkeye was good to go and all he really had to do was brief his troops.
When he had something to brief them on. As a matter of course, since he’d taken over the Cure, there had been monthly readiness training specifically geared toward the New Marquee.
And the Cardassians.
He just didn’t trust them. He had too many memories from the Dominan War. Technical, social, and cultural familiarization training (broad strokes) had been a part of that.
What he needed, didn’t have and likely wouldn’t get was details as to what would be expected of the Cure when they got to Cardassia Prime.
What he guessed was that the Cure wouldn’t be given a mission in itself. He suspected they would dispersed to accomplish missions including, if not lead by, fleet personnel.
Feet up on his desk and slumped into his desk chair, Neil sipped at the coffee in his heavy mug and looked at the 3D render or Cardassia Prime spinning above the work surface as a wall screen scrolled through pictures of various landmarks.
Neil considered things and wondered what he should be doing that he wasn’t. He’d been through the officer’s manual, the field manual for shipboard detachment (small unit) service, and the StarFleet guide for officers dealing with marines to make sure he had things covered.
Gunny Wilson had the day’s training well in hand, and they didn’t need him sticking his nose in on that. Not for the first time, he rather regretted taking the butter bar: as a gunny, he’d at least had the unending training to fall back on.
That thought stuck in his mind and he stopped the program, clearing the air over his desk and brought up the training roster he and Gunny Wilson had recently revised. Then he brought up the quarterly (un-revised) copy and began pulling up some of the exercises the corp and Captain Malbrooke had provided them with that (supposedly) covered operational expectations or wild hairs that they wanted his marines trained on.
The new roster (obviously) had Maquis and Cardassian heavy material. History was a good instructor and he began pulling up Klingon and Breen intel. Both races were known to be opportunistic and if they caught wind of what was going on, Neil theorized, he and his could experience plenty of close quarters battle.
He revised the recently revised training lists and began generating scenarios to add to the mix. Classroom time would also be required and he went through the roster, picking several marines to function as trainers.
Everyone needed to be pushed, so he’d work with them prepping material and encouraging them to become better teachers. Promotions required certain skill sets, and he wanted to make sure his marines all had the opportunity to achieve as much as they wanted.
That ate up the day and he was surprised when a forget-me-not went off, reminding him that he had another arse kicking by Makeba in an hour. He finished what he was doing, cleaned up his desk and stood, stretching.
Neil stretched, then began changing into workout gear as his mind drifted back to the day’s work. It hadn’t been that bad, really.
Then a thought struck him: was he starting to enjoy this officer drahk?
He decided to not dwell too much on that line of thought and returned to his work. Another thing came to mind and he returned to the Klingon Larta's file and began trying to see if she might throw a clog into the works.
He had been wrong. There was plenty to do.
Second Lieutenant Cornelius Tremble
Marine Commanding Officer, USS Pioneer
RSS Feed