On Applying Oneself (t'Tamarak)

[Jaiysa t'Tamarak 0]

Attn: Starfleet Personnel Department

Re: Commission

 

I have now attempted this communique under the auspices of two universes not actually my own. It is therefore with some frustration that I make the attempt again, but I am given to understand that the situation of the USS Manticore has now been ascertained with relative certainty...

 

Jaiysa paused, setting the PADD down on the desk and leaning her head on one hand, her dark eyes scrutinizing the bulkhead of her quarters with interest before resuming her writing. The last month had been slow, introspective; she had found a certain amount of distraction to be found on Mahasin but no particular relaxation.

 

She had been debating her position with the lloann’na Fleet since long before her recent work on Erei’Riov Faldek; she did not fool herself enough to think that her situation had ever been one of particular clarity. But the discomfort which she had suffered during the surgery had been both surprising and worrisome. She could not legitimately offer her services if she could not trust herself to perform them with equanimity.

 

But she could do nothing else, either. She was not a soldier; she could do nothing with an engine. She commanded neither intelligence authority nor political sway (factors which could raise an otherwise useless officer to positions of prominance, at least in the Empire). She was, and always had been, a student of the mind and body, and she had no home.

 

She had to admit, however, that she was no longer a surgeon. She hadn’t been one for some time, not since long before the Echo facility and the lloann’na. She was, in fact, perhaps lucky that Vilanne had been injured, at the time, under such conditions of uncertainty; there had been no time to think, consider, or remember, and therefore she had done her work properly and made enough of an impact to gain a certain amount of trust. Since then she had treated, commented on, and been injured with these people, but she had done no further invasive surgery and the question had been allowed to lie quiet.

 

It was before her now, and as she again pondered the possibility of throwing her lot in with the Manticore permanently, she wondered with an honesty that she would have admitted only to herself whether she was in fact equal to the task. She could not judge herself by any light other than that of her ability to understand the processes of the body, but she could not risk leaving to chance the potential influences of her memory over her present.

 

She pondered the question for some time in silence, and then leaned forward and readdressed herself to the PADD.

 

...and it is with great respect that I forward my qualifications and references to you with the request of a formal commission and posting to the USS Manticore to offer my assistance in the field of biological science.

 

I hope the attached information will offer suitable credentials and I will submit to any necessary verification of my identity, honesty, and thorough (and, in fact, enforced) disconnect from the Empire which saw my birth. I anticipate hearing from you shortly. Until then I shall remain with the crew of the Manticore and maintain the state of consultancy which I have occupied to this point.

 

Hann’yyo.

Maenek Jaiysa ir-Apnex t’Tamarak