Help!

Posted on Sun Oct 11th, 2020 @ 8:54pm by Lieutenant Bonnie "Bon-Bon" Durnell & Commander Savar cha'Salik hei-Surak Talek-sen-deen
Edited on on Sun Oct 11th, 2020 @ 8:55pm

Mission: Diplomatic Masquerade
Location: USS Liberty
Timeline: Current

She had never felt the need for therapy before. Nothing had disturbed her more than the events of the past few days and she understood if she was to move forward she would have to deal with the trauma of her broken trust, and maybe the fact that she had shot a fellow crewman by accident. Those sorts of things had to change if she ever expected to better herself, which was the driving goal of most Starfleet officers.

Bonnie stood outside the closed office doors, hand over the chime button, debating with herself the need and effects of seeing a counselor. Punctual, she had given herself an extra few minutes just to talk herself out of the season, that's how unsure of herself she was feeling. Finally she told herself just do it, you'll feel better when it's over. And so she pressed the chime as her heartbeat took a skip.

From inside the office a voice answered, calm. cool and collected. “Enter” the voice called out with a professional tone.

The doors parted to reveal an office with a rather bland setting, a couch, a chair and a Vulcan male, her XO. She did not expect to be talking over her problems with the man who essentially gave her orders. This meant he would know her faults on a personal level which threw up so many red flags, one for each fault. She entered, and waited to be offered a seat as she was unsure of what capacity this meeting would reside.

Savar stood as Bonnie entered. Making a mental note about her. Young Earth female. An engineer or in the engineering department. He could feel her uncertainness. Best to get that out of the way quickly.“Lieutenant, please have a seat. Would you like something from the replicator before we begin?” He asked politely, ready to get Bonnie whatever she wanted from the replicator...within reason.

It was warm, warmer than her quarters at least, but for some reason she still felt a cold chill on her skin. As she sat she thought of the one drink her papa always offered to calm her nerves. She couldn't possibly ask for that now though, could she? "Can I have a hot chocolate with whipped cream?" Her mouth was already watering, "oh and a dash of cinnamon?" She added briskly.

“Certainly.” Savar replied as he walked to the replicator to get her specified beverage. An instant later he was back, standing in front of her, his eyes on her, cool and unreadable, mentally sizing her up. “Your drink Lieutenant.”

She took the cup with an outstretched hand and immediately pulled into a double clutched grasp close to her chest. She would have taken a sip but she could already feel the temperature from the outside of the mug. Just like papa used to make. She eyed her superior officer and could only muster the nerve to ask "So how do we… um… begin?"

“The preferred way is by you telling me why you came here. Why do you feel you need my services Lieutenant? How do you think I can help you?”

Why did she seek his services? She asked herself, more as an effort to narrow the problem into words. She took a sip of hot cocoa, the whipped cream easing her tension despite leaving a visible while dot on the tip of her nose. She started, and as she spoke she rambled off faster, "I guess I'm having some trouble sleeping. I cant get him out of my head, I mean at first it was just the idea of him but the more I thought about the idea the more I thought about him, and then those chaps sitting on the corner of my room just taunting me with their message and then I shot that poor crewman who was only trying to help, and I just don't know why I'm such a screw up all the time. It's like the harder I try sometimes the worse things get which brings me back to the message of luck and those damn chaps, you know." At some point she had stood and was pacing, her hands flailing about as she talked, growing ever more exasperated.

He listened to her ramble, as she paced in front of him. His eyes tracked her as she spoke. Finally she stopped and stood in front of him. Only her hands flailed away at her sides. “Lieutenant, relax..” He suggested firmly. “Next, it might be useful for me to know ,just who we are talking about and sit down.”

Right, of course, she thought as she sat down. “Right, sorry. I.. you don’t know.. Of course you don’t, I mean you could but anyway.” She took a breath and another sip, the cream soothing her soul. She took another deeper breath and began again. “His name is Cody Devilrall and he recently came into my life, invaded it practically. He infuriates me. He was constantly trying to tell me that what I perceive as luck, was all a matter of perception. Which, maybe he’s right but that would mean his escape was just another face rub of how unlucky I am.” She looked at him in his deadpan face and asked, “Does that make any sense?”

Savar sat and listened as Lt. Durnell rambled and explained 11why she was here, sitting in front of him and telling him of a Cody Devilrall who seemed to occupy a large part of the Lieutenant’s waking hours. “Lieutenant. You speak of being infuriated at this Cody Devifall could it be you are in fact infatuated with him?” Savar asked as he looked across his desk at her.

He said this just as she took a sip of her cocoa and she almost choked on the hot liquid. She coughed and then huffed out, “No, I can’t possibly, at first maybe, but no. I’m furious with him. I want to hurt him for what he did, for how he made me feel.” She was shaking her head no constantly as she spoke and attempting to wrap her head around the concept of if she was infatuated with Cody. Deep down she knew there were moments where he made her feel, something, but only moments.

“I trusted him and he… he broke that. He made me feel sorry for him and then…. Then he just… he just USED me.” She forced out her words in frustration. A single tear rolled down her cheek where it hung for a second unperturbed before she quickly wiped it away.

“I see you are quite adamant in your denial of being infatuated with this Mr. Devilrall. Are you trying to convince me or yourself of this?” Savar questioned, unruffled by Bonnie’s bout of choking. He moved on, “You said he used you. I have found people cannot be used unless they wish to be.” Savar pointed out . “Tell me Lieutenant, you say you are furious with Mr. Devilrall but I suspect other emotions are all at play and I believe it would be prudent on your part to address those emotions.”

Denial, no? Want to be used, hell no? She almost rolled her eyes so hard her future children could feel it. "Of course there are other emotions at play. Isn't that what I'm doing here, trying to understand how to understand why I feel this way and what to do about it?" She was laying on a thick paste of sarcasm, but mostly she just wanted to put Cody in her past, where he belonged. "Am I not addressing my emotions?"

Savar arched an eyebrow at Bonnie’s outburst. “No. You are not. You are, I believe the Human term is, dancing all around them. You have been quite vocal in telling me how you feel about this Mr. Cody Devilrall but you have been less than forward in stating why you feel like you do. By your own admission, he is a person you hardly know. Correct? So by that logic, why are you obsessed with him?”

Why? She didn't know why. She couldn't wrap her head around how or why he had dug so deep into her subconscious in such a short amount of time. At least not enough to articulate into words. Was she dancing around the emotions, probably but she had always been a bit of a 'rubber band ball of emotion' according to her papa.

She looked around for a clock, showing how uncomfortable she was getting. "I… yes… I mean right, I barely know him so why am I bothered by him? I was hoping… maybe…" she glanced at the blank wall for a moment then quickly sipped the last bit of her cocoa. "Is our time up yet? I think our time is up." She abruptly changed the subject.

Savar cast cool eyes in her direction, oblivious to Bonnie's discomfort. “Lieutenant, if we are or more importantly if you are going to make any progress in facing your current dilemma, then you must examine and face your feelings.” He nodded even as he arched an eyebrow. “Yes, our time is up. However I am going to set another appointment for you so we may delve deeper into your emotions concerning one Mr. Cody Devilrall. Then depending on how that appointment goes we will discuss follow up appointments. As I am frankly dismayed by your
behavior in this incident.”

She stood and partially saluted, then turned and walked out. Not until she reached the bend in the corridor did she allow herself to breath out. 'What have I gotten myself into?' She asked herself. He was dismayed in her behavior, that's two syllables from all out disappointment. She was feeling a weight of dismay in herself. All she wanted to do was move on from a man who should have meant nothing to her.

She took her time returning to her quarters as she felt the need to walk it off. During her walk she thought about where she went wrong which brought her thoughts back to her papa and the decision to take the assignment aboard the Liberty. He had pushed her to follow her dreams even though they may lead down the same path her mother traveled. And now here she stood already unraveling at the seams because of The Cody.

The doors to her room parted and there sat those mocking pieces of leather in the corner. They spoke volumes about luck and perspective, trust and deception. They deserved to be incinerated but like her papa always told her, lessons can be learned from the most unlikely of sources. This pair of chaps was not one but a multitude of lessons wrapped up in an assless package. She could continue to cry about it or she could do something about it. Either way she was determined to learn from it.

TBC

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