"Winking Out"

[LeftEar JoNs 0]

Note: this log is set during the one hour TBS.

 

10.04.08

USS Excalibur NCC-2004 C

“Winking Out”

 

Commander Left Ear JoNs had just discharged a couple of her minor XO duties; updating the Ziers on the situation with their daughter, and then updating the Captain on the Ziers. She had been focused on her tasks, yes she had, but they had been easy enough to accomplish on her mental co-pilot so to speak. Now, the feline had brusquely but politely excused herself from the Ziers as they still waited to see their daughter, and then quickly made herself scarce for the next one hour to take care of some personal concerns: a sonic shower, locating a fresh uniform, food, and beating the hell out of something that wouldn’t get her court-martialed for assault and battery.

 

In no particular order.

 

Twenty Minutes

 

Left Kick. Right Kick. Paw Swipe. Battle Yowl. Round House Kick. Battle Yowl. Right Punch. Left Kick. Paw Swipe.

 

“Can I shoot her again GranMom? Please?”

 

The words spoken by the yellowish green Boganary kid that had been one of the guard escorts to Auntie Wort kept replaying over and over in Left Ears mind. Shoot her again, as if it was a common every day thing to shoot someone full of shrapnel. Then again, the Wort Clan was a family of pirate raiders, so perhaps it really was an everyday thing.

 

That didn’t mean that JoNs had to like it.

 

Yeah, she wanted someone’s rear end in a sling, but it was unfair to take it out on the first crewmember that ticked her off or something. She could be a hard case at the best of times, but the problem here was that her inner predator was on full prowl mode. You really couldn’t explain what this meant to someone who came from a non predator gene pool so it really was best to completely avoid the non-predators, at least for the next little while.

 

So, JoNs had opted for the most logical inanimate object to put a serious beat down on: one of the sparring bags down in the gym. The impromptu pick up workout served two purposes – Left Ear would get an idea of how much recovery time she’d need to get back up to her fighting form prior to her injury, and she’d be able to work through some of the frustration that she felt.

 

She really couldn’t pin down exactly why she was frustrated … if anything she should be happy that she was still alive after being shot point blank in the neck shoulder and arm by a shrapnel shotgun, right?

 

Left Kick. Battle Yowl. Right Punch. Yelp.

 

Whoops. She had stretched out that sore shoulder a little too much. Eh, time would heal all wounds, both the mental and physical ones. Right? … and she’d get rid of this scared feeling that caused her to keep looking over her shoulder soon. Sure she would.

The five foot five inch muscular panther cat had ended up down on one knee, with her paw clamped to the crease in between her neck and shoulder waiting for the soreness to pass. JoNs was winded, panting, and had violated at least some (if not all) of her standing light duty and physical therapy orders from Wydown by engaging in the workout so soon after her medical discharge. She was weak from the low impact twenty minute beginners workout, but she had needed the physical outlet. The workout had taken the edge off of her more predatory leanings and mindset, and that was important. She still wanted that vekken Boganary kids butt in a sling though. It had taken all of her control not to pounce on him during the exchange in the shuttle bay and take some retribution out of his green scaly hide.

 

The little b*stard totally had it coming.

 

“Uh … sir?”

 

Left Ears brown furred head came snapping up, and her deep green eyes latched onto the young dark skinned crewmember that had approached her. About three of the gym goers had approached the Caitian after the yelp of pain, but the dark skinned one had obviously been elected the speaker for the little group.

 

“I’m fine. At ease and continue your own workout crewman, thanks.”

 

The dismissal hadn’t been rude, but it also hadn’t left any room for a protest from the human woman or her companions. The dark haired security ensign merely shrugged and nodded at the executive officer and went about her own business, motioning to her two buddies from the sciences department to back off from the feline senior officer.

 

Within two minutes, Left Ear had recovered enough to end the exercise jaunt with some basic cool down stretches, and then she left the gym in a whirl of tail and brown fur.

 

Fifteen Minutes

 

JoNs entered her quarters, stripping off the dark gray sweat outfit that she had worn since being discharged from the medical bay as she walked over towards the sonic shower. When the lean brown furred cat moved her sleek and muscular frame into the small shower alcove, a trail of discarded clothing had been left in her wake.

 

The sonics felt like heaven as the invisible waves battered against her sore and still healing body.

 

The cat emerged from the shower and barked a command for the computer to read out the latest text mails that had graced her inbox. As she dressed in a crisp and clean duty uniform, the feminine monotone voice of the ships computer verbally read out the inter ship text mails according to Left Ears personal settings: high priority to low priority, with special tags on any request that required her personal attention.

 

Satisfied that none of the updates required an immediate answer or in some cases were already being taken care off thanks to Commander Teykier, JoNs verbally ordered the computer to stop the playback and store the outstanding updates and clearances that she needed to look into herself on the personal Padd set nearby the desk terminal. The download took all of one minute, and then the data Padd obediently pinged when the wireless data transfer had been completed.

 

She swiped the data Padd off the desktop with a wide and powerful paw, and started moving towards the doorway to the quarters, stopping only long enough at the long mirror set on the wall in her sleeping area to get one last look at herself. She wore the standard black duty uniform with charcoal gray shoulders and red collared under tunic denoting her command branch of service. Her rank pips were affixed to her collar and the Starfleet communicator symbol was affixed to the outer left chest area of the outer tunic. The two pieces were, as usual, spotlessly clean and gleamed in the dim lighting of the quarters. Half of her panther-like face was shadowed, while the other half was visually clear and showed in the reflection.

 

It was an accurate visual description of how the feline currently felt about herself and her current state of health. Shadowed, scared, and fighting to recover her former sense of personal safety and security.

 

JoNs quickly exited her quarters, for fear that being idle for too long would cause her to think way too much.

 

Ten Minutes

 

Left Ear’s stomach was still a bit sensitive due to her recovery, and the medications weren’t helping, so she opted to grab an energy bar at the mess hall and kept on going. Actually, she really didn’t have an appetite if she was honest with herself. The energy bar would do for now until she could snork down some real food.

 

Five Minutes

 

The executive officer made a beeline for the medical bay; the feline wanted to be there when the Ziers were permitted to see their daughter, and Left Ear also wanted to see her godchild.

 

JoNs passed two maintenance techs who were working about halfway down the corridor on a blown out console panel. She assumed that the panel had been one of the casualties when the Boganary cloaking device sent several system surges throughout the big warship. The feline and the two human technicians exchanged polite nods with one another as the XO sauntered past them.

 

Just as Left Ear passed, one of the engineers dropped an air gun that had been in use to cool down some fried circuits. The “gun” was usually employed to cool down any gel packs that were running a bit hot so an engineering team could get a proper data reading on any sort of gel packs or fluid based control wires that were acting up or overheating.

 

The air gun impacted with the decking and went off, released a highly concentrated stream of air; since the stream had nothing to stop it, such as the interior of a hot panel, the retort was loud within the corridor and sounded almost like the contained retort of a projectile weapon.

 

The commander unfortunately reacted to the sound, whirling around and going into a defensive crouch while simultaneously slamming her good shoulder into the bulkhead, getting something solid against her back so she could meet the oncoming threat. Her paw flew to her side to grab at a non existent phaser, and the personal Padd clattered to the decking and skittered a few steps away, and her claws flared out. Her ears flattened and she growled.

 

The engineering repair team froze, and both of the men stared in confusion at the brown furred executive officer. Neither man was inclined to approach her as they exchanged a fast multi directional look between the two of them.

 

The taller of the two techs, a middle aged man just beginning to gray at his temples, cleared his throat. “Sorry ‘bout that Ma’am; I seem to have the drops today.”

 

As quickly as Left Ear had “winked out” and had the post traumatic reaction to the loud retort of the repair tool, she came back into reality so to speak and offered a terse “carry on” to the two technicians before scooping up the data Padd in a mildly trembling paw and then retreating into the confines of the medical bay.

 

Scared, and running.