Secure in the Face of Adversity

[NDak 0]

The call had not been unexpected; that it had taken this long for the call to come had itself been rather surprising. Destorie had been in this position before. He’d been questioned, interrogated, poked, prodded and given the nth degree over his every decision. At some level, he almost enjoyed the process. It had almost become … routine.

 

Glancing to the blinking light on his hand-held ISD, he acknowledged the summons and stood from his resting position, placing aside crew evaluations to finish later after the grueling work of justifying himself. Running his hands through his regrown, crew-cut brown hair, Destorie walked to the small sink outside the sonic shower to wash his face. Looking in the mirror as he cupped water in his hands and splashed it, he considered for a moment the man he now saw looking back at him and how different he was from the previous times he’d faced such an inquiry into his actions.

 

The first time, he’d been a young man still green from the Retor who’d been drug unwittingly into a galactic game of chess being played at the highest levels as the Alpha Quadrant teetered on the dangerously on the precipice of defeat in the war against the Dominion and her allies. In truth, he’d been so emotionally numb during the entire tribunal that he remembered very little, other than officially he was found not to be at fault, as he was only following orders.

 

When he faced the tribunal a second time, however, the experience had been far more visceral. Sighing, Destorie turned the water off and toweled his face dry. He’d been reckless then. His ambition, his lust for power had betrayed his honor and left him scarred, physically and emotionally; and even though his body was now being repaired, the damage to his honor and his career would follow him the rest of his life.

 

Shrugging on a clean tunic before sliding his feet into freshly polished black boots, he recalled his most recent trip before the tribunal. The Talon had returned from disastrous trade mission with dangerous knowledge about the activities of the Tal’Shiar, and for him, knowledge that his father had been extorted into supporting their nefarious activities, activities he worried could push the Empire to the brink of civil war. Those ties, even though now severed, had complicated the situation and his loyalty had been put on trial.

 

In many ways, he considered, the journey he was about to make was merely an extension of those previous inquires. His loyalty and his judgment would be questioned based on the perceived notions that had came from those inquiries and his actions in the past. The man he’d seen in the mirror was not the same man who’d been before these boards, even though he’d be judged as such. He’d learned to control his ambitions, his temper, his lust for power.

 

As he headed out of his quarters and towards the airlock that would lead him to yet another tribunal, he exhaled. The younger Destorie would have been sullen, pouting or resentful that his loyality was about to be questioned, that his every decision would be scrutinized, and in all likelihood, that he’d be accused of being a traitor to the Empire by someone. Now though, as he cleared the airlock and planted his foot on the station, he felt … secure.

[KhreRiovtRex 0]

Great log!!

 

Hann'yyo for sharing.