2011-02-22: Breaking Command
Breaking Command
| Author: EM Drosselmeyer | Published: February 22, 2011 |
(This is back story involving Captain Irina ’s past, just before she was assigned to Papua.)
Gwendolyn Irina sat stoically in the office of her commanding officer’s superior, who was scowling ever the worse at her between reading the message she’d been sent with. It didn’t help that she was bleeding onto both her uniform and his chair. After rereading the letter for the second time, the officer steepled his fingers together and waited in silence for her to say something. After several minutes the officer finally spoke.
“Do you want to explain yourself on this? Maybe claim some sort of temporary insanity? Because this isn’t going to end well for you without some reasonable justification. I’ve got here…” He said as he picked up the parchment and gestured towards it, “A signed and sworn statement by the two junior guards who saw the altercation stating that your commander spoke with you about something, and you took a swing at him for it, pulping his face pretty well before you were restrained and subdued yourself. You’ve already been demoted once for insubordination, but this time you might be looking at worse.”
Gwen reached up with one hand and wiped some of the blood from her face, though her lip was still bleeding fairly profusely. “Sir, you have my own statement. Is it not clear, sir?” Her voice was strong and sure despite her own injuries.
The officer picked up the paper and looked over it with a sigh. “Irina, it’s your statement against his. He’s been with the guard for seven years now in Minoc, and there’ve never been any issues. You got transferred to Minoc three months after your demotion. You claim that he ordered you to collect money from some locals he was blackmailing. You also claim he didn’t give you specifics on who before you hauled off and hit him. He says that he told you to join a routine patrol with the two junior guards, and that you refused, first verbally and then physically. Right now it’s your word against his, and the junior guards are backing him up on it. Are you sure you don’t want to change your story?”
Gwen grimaced darkly at hearing that. She should’ve thought over the fact that the junior guards were probably in on it with him. She’d been raised in Trinsic from a young age to always follow the virtue of Honor, and she’d not hesitated to take a swing at the man when he told her what he planned. She’d seen red and acted on her first instinct. She still didn’t have to think over the officer’s offer for long though. “Sir, No Sir. My statement is a sworn document and I have told the truth in it.”
The officer stood from his desk and sighed, pacing back and forth a minute while rubbing his forehead with a thumb and forefinger. “Irina, you’re a good soldier, an excellent combatant, a knowledgeable tactician, and I personally wouldn’t think twice about you guarding my back in any situation. But you’ve got a temper, and you need to control it. Regardless of whether or not I believe you here, all the evidence is against you. And it’s especially bad when your commanding officer, the one whose nose you broke, is pushing for you to just be transferred instead of being brought up on charges. That’s a lot more lenient than most officers would be.”
Gwen scowled deeper at that notion. Her commanding officer was apparently smart enough to even come up with a valid reason for not having an in depth investigation and disguise it as leniency. “That’d be your decision to make, Sir. I don’t mind there being a trial.”
The officer sighed once more as he looked out his window, before turning to her. “No, I think we’ll go with his suggestion. Despite how sure you seem of yourself, without any real evidence I doubt you’ll convince anyone else, and I’d rather you be with the guard than kicked out. It’ll make us all look bad either way, and you’re not someone we want to lose. As you know, Papua hasn’t had anyone in a rank stationed above sergeant in some time. You’ll be in charge of the few guards who are stationed there, and your task will be to watch the Ophidians for anything suspicious or out of the ordinary. Is there any problem with that, First Lieutenant Irina?”
Gwen stood up briskly to attention and snapped up her hand in a crisp salute, despite the throbbing in her knuckles from where she’d punched the man. She held the salute until the officer returned it, and was dismissed from his office.
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