she's ship captain (open-ish)

[alsohawkeye]

CHARACTERS ▶ Kate Bishop + others
LOCATION ▶ Mostly in and around the Atalanta
SUMMARY ▶ A catch-all post for logs for the month
WARNINGS ▶ n/a
NOTES ▶ I'll be tossing up starters in here for people I've already planned things with; if you'd like something too feel free to ping me to discuss or drop in a starter of your own!

Zion's docks are busy at all hours, and among their many visitors one has recently become even more of a fixture than usual. It only makes sense a newly minted captain would want to spend time getting acquainted with her ship, and the Atalanta's is no different. Maybe a little more zealous than some given the amount of time she spends overseeing every detail of repair work and outfitting, in and out a dozen times a day to discuss this or learn more about that.

When she isn't charming the mechanics into showing her how they fix a gimbal or sketching out alterations to the weapon targeting systems or meeting with her new crew there's paperwork to be done, ZDG rosters and releases and briefings, personnel files and mission packets. She's often to be found perched somewhere, in sight of the ship or in a restaurant nearby, reading and typing away.

She hasn't entirely abandoned the rest of her life for the ship-- almost, but not totally. There are still appointments to be kept, regular training partners and 'students' to check up on while she's still in town, sim sessions and real world sparring, runs that wind her way through the city. Every once in a while she even goes home long enough to run into her neighbors.

Comments

for deucalion

[alsohawkeye]

[ Kate's meeting with her new First Officer is the only one of the bunch of appointments on her busy schedule she's at all anxious about. Maybe anxious isn't quite the right word, but it's the one she's most uncertain about: how it will go, how she's going to handle it. It niggles at the back of her mind, has her drumming her fingers in a relentless, restless tattoo on the back of the chair as she leans over watching the programmer running through the set-up of various on-board systems, tweaking things to her specifications. She's had years to build up opinions about how she'd arrange things if she had a ship of her own.

This is what she's doing when Deucalion arrives, leaning over with an arm stretched out to tap at the little console screen, some setting she wants raised, some display she wants shifted over to the right. It's a little micromanagey, and from the technician's resigned expression it's not the first thing she's felt the need to dictate in detail today.

She's engrossed in it, but not so much that she misses his arrival, and she turns quickly, holds up a finger, and then finishes her instructions before pushing away from the station. She greets her First Officer with a polite nod and a tilt of her head that indicates the way down the corridor. She begins to walk, assumes he'll follow. ]

So. Here we are. I admit I was surprised, I hadn't heard you were gunning to move up the ranks.

[scission]

[For not the first time since the assignments were sent out, Deucalion has to wonder if the council did this deliberately, or if it's simply fate. Between the two options, he can't decide which he prefers, though he wouldn't argue with either. Kate and the rest of the team which extracted him have more knowledge of what he can be than anyone else in the city. There's likely no one better for monitoring how well he takes to a new role in command.

It doesn't lessen the doubts and worry that coil in his gut as he boards the ship, works his way slowly along the walkways up to the cockpit, fingers trailing on railings and the edges of doorframes. The Atalanta. The huntress. And home, perhaps, for all the irony in that.]

I can't say that I am.

[He answers honestly, turning to follow Kate back down the corridor. She's already navigating the space as though she commands it, issuing instructions, confident. He wonders how much of that is settled in, and how much of it is forced. He wonders if she's thinking of betas and alphas, when she says about moving up the ranks.]

There was a need, and I had the skills to meet it.

[alsohawkeye]

[ She is thinking of precisely that, and it's clear in the keenness of the gaze she turns on him over her shoulder as she walks, already navigating the ship by instinct and habit. It's a look as cool and piercing as the arrows she's so fond of she basically named a ship after them, and she fixes him with it for a long moment, assessing those indications of honesty. ]

Good.

[ It's clear she doesn't entirely trust them, that she isn't ready to let go of her wariness altogether. But also that she doesn't find the red flags she was looking for. They take another few yards of corridor in silence, and then she turns in the doorway to the cockpit. He isn't as much taller than her as he sometimes seems, but one gets the sense Kate wouldn't care if he towered. ]

If captain is what you want, then you do good work with us here and I won't stand in your way. Do good enough, show me you're really taking this second chance seriously, and I might even help you. But if I see any sign that you're aiming to step on our heads to get back on top-- any sign at all that this crew is disposable to you?-- and I will make sure that you never work again. Not on my ship, not on any ship. Got it?

[scission]

Loud and clear, captain.

[Genuine in tone, rather than anything that could be mistaken as condescending. He hadn't asked for the role of captain and he hadn't been given it - he knew his place. And he knew why she wouldn't trust that yet.]

I had many year's experience of being a leader before I was a monster. It's that I'm hoping to offer you and this crew. Not the rest.

[Level, meeting her gaze. She knew what he'd been. There was no hiding from that, but the parts of him that wanted to were fuelled by shame, not secrecy and ambition. She didn't yet trust him, but he could meet that quite easily in how he didn't yet trust himself.]