Posted by Lieutenant Commander Faye Calloway (Chief Intelligence Officer) in CIO’s Office- Building Trust

Posted by Lieutenant Shock (Chief of Security) in CIO’s Office- Building Trust

Posted by Lieutenant Commander Faye Calloway (Chief Intelligence Officer) in CIO’s Office- Building Trust
Posted by… suppressed (1) by the Post Ghost! 👻

(snip)

So there had been a security system set in place by Calloway and the engineering and operations departments. Shock was the chief of security – he was responsible for the security of the ship. Anything security-related was his responsibility, he took that seriously. This system that Calloway and her colleagues had set up had been done without his input.

He needed to be clear with her.

“I need to know anything security-related, because I am ultimately responsible for the security of the ship and its crew. I require regular updates on all aspects of this system, its implementation and any and all threats identified under the system and for the system, as well as the screening process, as well as the decisions on who is taken on. I regard all this to fall under my jurisdiction, shared, naturally, between our and the engineering departments” he said, adding for good measure (knowing humans, though Calloway wasn’t the archetypical human): “I appreciate your courtesy in providing me all this information. I look forward to our continued collaboration.”

–Lt Shock (COS)

Faye tilted her head as she considered him and simply nodded. “As I tried to explain in the briefing, this was approved at levels above both our heads. In the case of the Manhattan, well… that was complicated and very different from the situation here. I had no say in whether I could or could not share information and it was discouraged at every turn. that wasn’t how it was supposed to be, but it was. And it put me in a very difficult position with my captain and the rest of the crew. I don’t want that here and this is why we are having this conversation now.”

She gestured to the technical layout on the screen. “To be clear, nothing has been installed yet. I have all the equipment on board and I was waiting till we were set to get going before I started this process. Then we had time complications,” she said with a lift of her brows. “Now that I can focus on Project Bastion again, we’re going through these initial steps.” Calloway turned to face him fully. “I see us at a fully collaborative team. At first, I read your resistance to the whole things as being a barrier to us working together. Now I think we can both agree that we are going to have to work a bit harder to make sure we are being understood as we go along. But I am the foremost data security expert not just on this ship, but possibly in Starfleet. I am really good at what I do. and there is a team at Intelligence R&D that I liaise with in terms of the equipment. Yes, you are responsible for shipboard security, and the systems fall under that. But they also fall under my purview, and Ops, and Engineering, as you already expressed. We are going to have to figure out how best to proceed, because this will take far too long to implement if we have to run every tiny decision past you, Lieutenant. I asked you, and everyone, for a bit of trust and benefit of the doubt. But I don’t know how much you are able to offer me here.” Did it bother her that that he seemed to have to reinforce his role in everything? Maybe just a little. But she didn’t want to have circular conversations with him every time and though she had explained about her BPD, in reality few people understood what that looked like in every day life for her.

~Faye Calloway, CIO

Shock had tried to be direct and clear with Calloway, in an effort to avoid misunderstanding. Yet, she misunderstood him again. He sensed exasperation from her, annoyance. She now had a negative view of him, yet seemed to try to keep her calm and reach out to him. That was a step forward, a token of her good will to him. He

“It is not about resistance or a lack of trust, commander,” Shock said, understanding that she was reinforcing her higher rank by calling him out by his officer’s rank. “I trust you.”

But his empahsis didn’t not convey that trust and it felt like a wall going up. Faye frowned.

“I have obligations based on my position, rank and oath to Starfleet. Security threats are part of that. That is my purview, my responsibility. If security is compromised, it will be my fault, not yours, not engineering’s, not the captain’s. My fault. If there is a security threat that I have not acted upon, that will be my dishonour, and my discharge. Not yours. Logically, Starfleet would never do away with you. Your are too important. I, however, am not.”

He paused.

“However, as a token of my trust, I will offer you this compromise: I will need reports on identified security threats, how the threats were identified and what actions, if any, were taken. Do you consent?”

Things had gone well, yet she had grossly misunderstood him again. He sensed in his gut feelings of heat and nausea. What was this sensation? He didn’t have the time or mental focus to analyse it, so he purged them away, regulated his system once again, and waited for Calloway to reply.

– Lt Shock (COS)

For a moment Faye’s mind slipped elsewhere, remembering. All those long lessons with T’Lora, honing her mind and wielding it in ways she had never imagined before. Some days she longed for the beautiful innocence of that time, the time before everything she had ever known was destroyed and her memories sullied. She had spent so much time in recent years pulling the root threads of those memories out and bringing them into the present where she could touch them again without fear. People sometimes forgot that beautiful memories could cut just as deeply as the painful ones.

“Yes, as I said earlier, I absolutely intend to keep you in the loop. But I disagree that anything related to this particular system would be your responsibility and that you would be blamed for anything going wrong. It falls to me, and the Captain as commanding officer.” Her expression softened. “Shock, I… admire your dedication and your persistence towards making sure the Athena is looked after, but your team doesn’t code the computer systems of the ship. Those are a part of the defence systems, no? This is no different, expect that it requires us to install things after the fact and not during the starship construction phase. It’s a system of redundancy for a reason, because what we have already does in fact work for most things. But given the Athena’s penchant for getting into trouble, it’s logical to give us every advantage and protection, no?”

Lt. Cmdr. Faye Calloway, Chief Intelligence Officer

Shock interpreted Calloway’s reply as further steps of finding rapprochement, yet she still appeared not to understand what he was trying to convey. Why was this so difficult for him to communicate with her? Why did she have to persist in habitually misinterpreting him? He had tried to be as clear as possible, perhaps he was speaking to clearly in this case, as she seemed to interpret his words as barriers and resistance.

“That is indeed logical,” he said, resigning himself to this. There was no way he could convince Calloway. And he would not be able to get a bigger insight to the system right now. He decided not to say anything more, at the risk of her misinterpreting him further, but rather, giving Calloway a chance to move on in the conversation. He wanted to see what she would say next.

This was difficult for Shock. He began doubting his role as chief security officer. He needed to speak to someone about this. And that someone would certainly not be Calloway.

– Lt Shock (COS)