Subject: Grail: 'Unexplores Spaces' - Various Thoughts of an Unwilling Exec (Brinn)

Athalya Anne strode into her quarters, still not quite believing what the

hell it was she was dealing with. *Five days. Five frigging days.* Or was

it? It could have been six, for all she knew or cared. It felt like

years. Or months. *In recap, I've: 1)met God, or fate, or whatever, 2)

become XO of a starship, 3) lead said starship into battle 4) had two

people, 5) met two people in hand to hand.* All the sudden, Athalya Anne

felt very exhausted.

*Oh, wow. Executive Officer of a frigging starship.* Somehow, when Athalya

Anne joined the Marines, she hadn't expected that she'd be execing a

frigging starship, of all things. *Truth be told, I hadn't even expected to

lead a squad for at least a decade or two.* It was why she had become an

e-man when she could have easily been an officer. In maybe three months,

she'd gone from watching her own back, to watching the backs of a squad to

watching the backs of an entire company, and finaly, to watching the backs

of an entire crew of a starship. *Oh, Jesus.* Athalya Anne thought as she

ambled over to the replicator. *Don't think of that now.*

"Root beer float, vanilla ice cream." Her celebration drink. It

materialized almost instantly.

Celebration. *Over what?* Athalya Anne scardonicly wondered. Over the

fact that she had just beaten down a little kid? *He needed it. Like

something bad.* There were three things she couldn't stand for: 1) Being

riped away from a

steak, 2) Being called Athalya or Anne with out her permission, 3) Being

weak. Epic had tired to do the first on the first day of her arrival and

had tried to make her feel weak just now, by offering her that sickening

'compassion'. *I don't need no one's compassion.* She thought vehemtly,

also reiterating to herself to be the best frigging exec she could.

And then there was this foisting of the exec's job on her. There were two

reasons she had enlisted in the Corps, the first being that she didn't need

to be in a command situation and the second being that she didn't want to

wind up on a starship. *Command.* Athalya Anne thought distastefuly. It

was a crock of shit. Bossing people around may have been her style, but

command also took her out of the trenches, away from the job she loved.

Her job. Athalya Anne groaned softly as she sat down. *You're getting

weak.* She reprimanded herself as she turned off her holographic leg and

detached it. Being weak ment being dead. Being dead usualy meant being a

failure. Being a failure meant being a dishonor to the family. The family

was all.

*Family.* She scoffed a laugh. The closest thing she had to family were

the Lowells, and she had lost touch with them long ago. Still, the word,

for some odd reason, brought to mind Kyp Firespray and Alison Donucci.

Athalya Anne shook her head at the subconcious connection. Grabing her

terminal, she debated whether or not to contact them. *Unless you're a

coward....* It was a challenge now, to see whether or not she could get

close to them without developing any real emotions for them. Sub

conciously, she knew that she had no chance of that ever happening: to get

involved with them would surely lead to a real commitment. But she didn't

know that now, and she used the fact that she didn't to challenge herself to

the impossible. Quickly, she typed out a message to Alison:

"Hi. Hope you're well. Call me."

*So much for wordiness.* Athalya Anne thought as she sent that message and

then typed out something for Kyp:

"Hello, Kyp. How are you? Have you resloved it? Keep in touch."

*Well, wordiness is NOT my forte today.*

And then it dawned on her: in all the things she had done in her stay here,

on thing she had not done was had a good, hearty laugh. Drawing her

eyebrows together, she tired to think of the easiest way to remidy this

situation without physicaly having to do anything. An idea hit her.

Tapping on her monitor, she brought up an old Terran film, "Texas Chainsaw

Massacre" and settled in for the blood, guts and stupidity that would

follow.

LMaj Athalya Anne Brinn