Now I KNOW what I've done...

[Atragon9 0]

::Sitting up in a biobed in Sickbay, wearing his spare exoskeleton support suit, with his two broken arms mended::

 

Suit Recorder On, Personal Log - Atragon-9, Commanding Officer, USS Manticore, NCC-5852, password *********

 

[whirr, click]

 

(Very subdued tone) The mission was a success.  How did they used to say it... We won the war, but lost every battle!!

 

The renegade Romulan ships with the stolen technology have been destroyed, there is no record of any battle with the Federation since it was just the obsession of a delusional Admiral with a "quest" to kill his evil nemesis, who was already DEAD!  Yes, the cover story worked perfectly - so perfectly that my crew is having a hard time believing it.  I know they think I really was after Melville, that he is alive and selling our tech and that I endangered everyone's lives by acting foolishly.  Well, I sure as hell WAS endangering their lives, and we were after the stolen tech, but that's where the story and reality split.  After all, if Melville was really feeding them his knowledge, they could have bypassed our computer core completely and come in from behind - no, he wasn't there, but will they believe it, deeply and truly in their hearts?  I'm not sure how much that matters though, when you get right down to it.

 

Sure, they all know that we are a deep cover, black ops ship.  We tread dangerously on the line between what's "right" and what needs to be done to protect those who decide what's "right."  Hell, sometimes we blow right by that line and don't even slow down.  Sure, they all know that they risk their lives every day out here in the line of duty.  Still, when push comes to shove, when they are being imprisoned, deprived, Tortured - especially for what they believe, at the time, to be their Commanding officer's folly??  That's a hard one to get past.  Maybe that's why I'm still in Sickbay and not back on the Bridge, even though Doctor Mele has cleared me for duty.  Can I face them?  I must, I must regain their trust.

 

What of the ship?  Will they trust the ship now - now that it's been compromised by the Romulans?  Sure, we destroyed the six Romulans with the stolen tech, but are there none others in the Empire who know how they cracked our cloak?  I'm sure there are a few, at least.  Well, that's why the doppleganger Manticore was sent off, soon we will hear the reports of our demise.  Then we get a full reprogramming - all of our systems, our frequencies, our deepest core settings - they'll all get a unique new twist and each one different.  It will be time for us all to go back to school and relearn our jobs.  Yes, it will be time for a "new" Manticore to be commissioned in the place of the old.  Also time for the Babylon to come out of the shadows of the shadow.  After all, they really DID save us out there and the story will show that they also rescued the crew before the faithful 5852 succumbed to the superior might of the enemy - and before the Babylon finished them off.

 

I guess we'll be in port for some time while they pretty us up enough to look like new and while the real rebuild takes place internally.  So, we sit here once again, licking our wounds after another near death.  But this time, it's different, this time the crew needs more than just physical succor.  This time they have to learn not only to walk without pain, but to trust the ship again.  To trust... Me again.  

 

That's where it hurts me the most - in their eyes, in their reactions to me.  Maybe that's why I'm still sitting here.  Can I lead them again, truly lead them?  Will they trust my decisions or wonder if it's another game?  I could only tell Sovak of my true intent - oh how I wished I could have trusted them all.  But the Consul General was right, we were captured and "questioned."  It was better that way, but now it's not better that way.

 

And can I trust myself?  I'm now aboard a ship with Jami Farrington and Megan Cummings.  Megan Cummings, how can she be alive??  But here she is, altered to be Margaux Roget, but yet, in the back of my mind, did I always know?  There was always... something about Margaux that didn't fit, that didn't work.  Now that I know who she is, it all seems to fit.  But there are too many pieces for this puzzle to work.  She can't be a part of my life now, but she *IS* a part of my life and always will be.

 

Yes, I don't feel at all well, I think the doctors were too quick to release me for duty, yes... yes