13
Problems with Commanding officers
AN: A quick one-shot of male Trooper and Aric Jorgan, told from Jorgan's perspective. Male/Male: may stray away from canon a tad. As in, I am taking liberty on Aric's backstory and how the legacy characters intermingle. Also a warning for those who don't like it…there is fourth wall leaning.
Aric Jorgan walked to his tiny room on the Thunderclap. His posture was ridged, his expression void of emotion. Or at least Aric hoped so. He didn't enjoy the idea that someone could read him easily, especially at times like these. Nothing awful or dire accrued—well that not yet at least. Aric could easily loose his rank as lieutenant of Havoc Squad and be dishonorable discharged from the army. The Captain will have every right to.
Aric sat down on his cot and sighed.
I need to clear my head…A preposterous thought sprung to Aric's mind. And just like last night he was going to go for it. Aric got up and walked a short distance to a little cabinet and grabbed a hologram, and a headset. He sat back down and started to recording his thoughts.
I decided to make a personal log over what has transpired over the past day.
I was once told putting conflicting thoughts in a recording can sort them out. So here's hoping that this doesn't feel ridiculous as it sounds.
Silence filled the room.
Oh yeah…this is completely ridiculous.
This is just moronic and a waste of time. I need to inform my sister that when I see her next. Estrid is where all the story-telling talent in the family went to and was one who told me this Rancor crap about speaking how speaking out loud and then playing back will sort through personal thoughts. Yes I will definitely need to tell her that this is a waste of time.
But then again…if someone was to come across this in a thousand years or next week, if I stopped here and not delete the file it would be torturous for anyone who pushed play…
Where to start? I suppose background would be helpful. I am Aric Jorgan and currently the lieutenant of Havoc Squad. I say currently simply because what accrued last night between my Captain and me was against protocol. And assume what you want that to mean, because you most likely to be correct.
Anyway, Havoc Squad was given some down time before jumping to Hoth for our next mission. We had a week for 'leisure'. As such I stayed on board the BT-7 Thunderclap and make sure everything is in order: Clean and expect firearms, checked if all the maps have been updated, watch for any space missions or distress calls in the surrounding areas, take inventory—despite knowing that we are running low, and check for any new upgrades are needed. Not because the Captain has ordered me to do any of this, I want the Squad at its best…
…And to keep busy if I have to be honest with myself. I was the only member of Havoc that wasn't needed somewhere else; so much for leisure time for the squad.
The Captain was attending meetings with the higher ups and the politicians on how Havoc can be more efficient. Just thinking about what the bureaucrats had to say, makes my eyes sore, so I am going to spare the details.
Sargent Elara Dorne, a former Imperial soldier and Havoc's main medic, had to be at the Republic's Personnel Division office for the next four days. I find it idiotic. She has proven herself that she I loyal to the Republic since being on the squad.
Our demolitions expert, Tanno Vic, is also going to be gone for the next few days. We needed supplies, and supposedly he can get them better and cheaper. Basically he is getting us stolen goods. The Captain, only hearing the word cheaper, didn't question him.
And finally M1-4X and that C2-N2 unit were getting maintenance done. That were will take about three days…hopefully we can leave the N2 unit behind.
So all in all, I had a few hours of work before boredom set in. Searching for the rest of the Deadeyes was futile at this time, due to the lack of any new tips.
But, I am just side stepping around my current problem that alluded to earlier.
My captain. He's my problem…So my captain, Candis Aleanym. Captain Aleanym is a young Mirialan with dark green skin, sharp red eyes, is completely bald and has a few nasty scars covering half his face. He has a nice muscular build too.
Did I mention that he's my problem—an attractive problem, which makes the problem bigger.
Aric paused after making that comment and pinched the bridge of his nose. An attractive problem, which makes the problem bigger? Well, don't I just sound like a pervert.
While my obvious attraction has always been issue, why I am making this damn thing started when he came back from his conferences.
The meetings he had didn't last at all, not as long I thought they would be. That doesn't mean anything though. These types of meetings are never pleasant and if one goes to these conferences then that person will resemble pile of rancor matter. When he left this morning he was his happy-go-lucky self. He was energetic, optimistic even, about the meetings. Poor bastard. He will learn that these kinds of meetings are never proactive.
When he stumbled back on the ship, he didn't notice me. His head was down, his shoulders were slumped, he barely picked up his feet, and I remember hearing mumbles under his breath about pompous jedi. To sum it up, basically the look of someone who spent an entire night drinking with a jedi.
I decided to clear my throat, partly because I wanted the unavoidable of hearing the Hutt Slime that the Captain had to endure, and to let him unload.
And again, avoid this being a rant about the bureaucrats, the Jedi, and certain aspects of the Republic politics I don't entirely agree with, I am just going to skip over that conversation.
I will put down everything else that allows.
After discussing what transpired at his meetings and what the future is for Havoc, Candis shifted from aggravated and upset to being happy and easy-going, much like he was yesterday morning.
He even gave me one of his smiles. Being the type of man that he is, a smile is always on his face isn't shocking, but there are just moments when Candis smiles, his face lights up. And every one of those smiles never fails to shoot a shiver down my spine. It hadn't on Old Mantell, and it didn't fail there either.
This is the part where I acknowledge my ridiculousness.
I will look back at this and most likely roll my eyes at how describe Candis, but given what just accrued last night…well I won't be too hard on myself. Maybe.
After we had a few moments of comfortable silence, Candis gave off another big smile and commented on how with just the two of us by ourselves, it reminds him of the days when we were just starting out.
"Only better now that N2 unit is off the ship."
He chuckled at my comment. "Now, Aric, give the droid a break; he isn't too bad. He keeps the ship clean and functioning while we are off doing what needs to be done." As much as I enjoy seeing him smile, hearing my first name in his voice is far better; even if it is too personal for my taste.
I simply gave him a smirk and raised my eyebrows. When I finally came to grips that I found Candis attractive, I started to unintentionally flirt with him. While I have stopped myself from doing so when I caught myself, I seem to have compensated by smirking at him
But I am getting ahead of myself. If I want to truly want to look back on this moment of my life and figure it out, I need to fallow the events as it happened.
I am not sure what I called him after that. It was either a variant of 'yes, captain' or 'right, sir'. It had to be one of those two because I do remember him asking, "Come on, Arc, we are on shore leave. You can call me Candis for the time being," and him winking afterwards.
And I remember being stunned into silence and for two reasons. I have been referring to him as Candis in my head for months now. I never once said it out loud due the fact it was unprofessional and I knew I would betray my personal feelings. The second reason is that Candis never flirts. He never acknowledged flirting that was directed his way. Since I have started travail with the Captain there have been a few female, and fewer male, officers and civilians that we accounted that tried to flirt with him, and all of them at the end of the conversation offended or confused as he didn't even register what they were doing. We weren't even on duty on most of those times. The only person I have seen him flirt with was with an officer, Ave Jaxo.
"Ave, we are done working together. Candis would do just fine." Wink.
It was the same tone, nearly the same words and the same expression. I still remember the details of that moment even if it was so long ago. It was the first time I ever felt jealous and that jealousy is what made me realized I liked my captain too much.
But despite the slight shock, I recovered quickly and answered that it was doable.
We continued our conversion on more mundane, un-related to duty topics. So naturally they quickly became personal.
Candis, "We talk about the Deadeyes quite a bit and other work related stuff, but we never talked about anything personal. How was your family like? Did you grow up on Cathar?"
I don't know why I told him the details of my childhood, but the second I started speaking everything came out.
My mother was taken to be sex slave for the Huts when I was fairly young and my sister, Estrid, was a newborn. My father took off right after to bring her back home, but somewhere down the line ended up becoming pirate selling spice. Candis didn't want to
When he didn't come back we were sent to Coruscant to live with an uncle, a jedi knight. Caxton was eccentric and caring man, but he and his apprentice Yionna, couldn't take care of two small kids.
Estrid, still young and cute enough, was adopted by a senator and her husband. I, on the other hand, was old enough live by myself. While he couldn't raise me, Caxton did make an effort to make sure I was well off and didn't end up working with any gangs that populated Coruscant's underworld. I opted to not tell Candis what I am about to record. I did end up in one of the gangs, but at thirteen, I had little options. I am not proud of that I got dragged into that life so easily.
But I was able to leave that life however. I am one of the few lucky ones I suppose. A good friend of mine wasn't however…
Aric paused for a moment ran a hand over his face. He didn't need to go into detail about his years running with gangsters and extortionists. Nor did he need to talk about him at the moment. That would worsen his mood. He sighed and picked up where he left off.
Aric continued skipping a few details he rather not focus on.
I joined the Republic army after my friend's death soon after. The skills I learned Coruscant's underworld transferred well. I became commander of the Deadeyes with them, so my years as some punk ere not wasted.
It took many years for me to be reunited with Estrid and it was after Caxton's funeral. He died in the Sacking of Coruscant along with Yionna. It wasn't the way I wanted us to be together after all those years, but it was mixed blessing. The blessing leaned more on the negative side, because it became apparent those missing years did a lot of damage to our relationship; we are not close.
"I didn't grow up with my parents either," he mumbled. It wasn't if he was upset, though I sure he was, he sounded as if he wanted to avoid talking about what happened to his parents. I suppose my curiosity got the better me, and persisted that he could tell me.
His parents were killed by pirates. I winced. I know the chance of my father being the one of the parents that directly or indirectly is highly unlikely, but I get this way when I hear about any pirate attack.
We were sitting in the main hall of the ship and reached across the small table and grabbed my hand. My first reaction was to pull away; I might like Candis, but that form of affection is something my species doesn't engage in. That is another reason as to why we cannot be together, besides the fact he is my commanding officer. Mirialan are generally sensitive, calm, rational, and understanding. They, as whole, are affectionate race. While I like to say I am rational being, it takes a lot of strained on my part to fight my natural traits as Cathars.
But despite that I didn't move my hand. The contact didn't last lost anyway.
"So your sister is Senator Estrid?" He asked, thankfully changing the subject—sort of, "I met her at the final meeting I had to go too. Your relation wasn't even brought up."
"Not surprised about that. That hers and mine sibling status wasn't talked about, I mean. But why was she there?"
"Apparently," He cocked his head to the side in confusing, a habit of his. "To represent Cathar interest—it was not fully explained what that meant."
I shrugged. I don't even know what that means either.
We continued to talk more after that. We spent a good chuck of late afternoon just talking and the rest of the conversation was more light-hearted.
Another one of his smiles spread across his face by the time but I could see a mischievous glint in his red eyes
"Let's go to the Dealer's Den and have a few," He gave me wink. If the aforementioned flirting was a warning blast that Candis has a more intimate interest in me, then that was a thermal detonator to the face. And while put off by the flirting from earlier
I agreed to go with Candis. At the time, I was mildly suspicious, but I mostly felt I read into a lot of his behavior yesterday.
We didn't wear our normal armor nor did we bring our assault canons, we opted out for light armor and blaster pistols. Thinking of what Candis wore. I feel bad that his black jacket was ruined last night.
The Dealer's Den serves decent drinks, but the crowd is seedier than Hutt's ass, I don't find the appeal. We could have gotten drunk on the ship and have the same result of last night, but apparently the lack of wookie liquor on board was enough for the Captain to leave the ship.
I will spare the details of what we encountered on our way to the Cantina; let me just say it's Coruscant and I am glad we didn't leave our blasters. The planet is has beautiful buildings sure, but those buildings don't mask the underbelly of the planet.
We arrived, the cantina was packed. But Candis had enough sense to pack an I.D. to get us a personal booth. Granted, it also completely stupid seeing how word got around that the commanding officer of Havoc Squad was in the general area. Our prices were cut down by half, a clear sign of bribery in case anything illegal. Candis didn't mind, considering Yaargwaar, the wookie liquer, is priced. And because our prices were cut in half, he ordered a Manahan Blue Drop; a highly unorthodox acholah mixture. I just stuck with Mandalorian Black.
Nothing happened of note for a good hour after we settled I back booth of the Cantina. We continued having similar conversations like what he had on the ship, the difference in the Cantina is that those conversations became incoherent.
But like I just stated, it took an hour for something to happen, which a surprise is given where we were at. Unfortunately, what happened was not positive—again Dealer's Den.
Candis and I didn't acknowledge right away that the noise level was dying down. When we finally did, we looked around the cantina and spotted a rare sight on Coruscant—a pureblooded Sith.
The Sith was not alone. He was led by dark-skinned, female Miraluka. She made it obvious that she was Jedi, with two lightsabers attached to her belt. They walked to the very back off the room to a table that was full of smugglers. It was also within earshot.
Before any discussion started up with the clearly irate jedi and the band of smugglers, the Miraluka turned her head towards the rest of the patrons. No one could tell if she was glaring, but the message was clear: no interruptions and no one will get hurt. Disgraceful. I am not a jedi, but I just imagine how Caxton would feel towards such obvious disregard of the code he died to protect. That was enough for me to hate the Miraluka.
The music struck up and everyone went back to what they were doing before she and the Sith walked in. A common practice in Coruscant cantinas
It had a sobering effect on the two of us; I motioned toward a waitress to bring us water and a few stims. I knew that the relaxed environment was gone between the two of us. And if anything happened, we needed to be at east halfway on our toes.
Like any good jedi, the Miraluka started off her conversation with the group of smugglers by loudly telling the ring leader, a male Zabrak, that she will throw him a across the room and shove one of her lightsaber down his throat. The Zabrak laughed the threat off. They quickly start to argue in hush tones, but it was clearly a heated argument. The rest of the smugglers grew tenser the longer they went at it.
I tried not to focus on the conversation behind us, but Candis looked over his left shoulder and by every minute they continued to talk, he grew more tensed.
"We can leave you know," I told him.
He shook his head, "Remember the jedi I was complaining about when I came back?" Here's a clue, it wasn't the Miraluka. He went on to say, "She was the one I was talking about. Jedi Master Adalia, and that Zabrak, Galen Phloros were at the second meeting I had to attend. They are both reckless and a risk. Everyone was told upfront in the room that Havoc needed to watch them both."
I must of shown my anger of having information withheld about what is expected of the Squad, given we were just talking about what was going on in those meetings, and that was never brought up. Because he quickly threw his hands up in defense and continued, "I was ordered not to inform you and the rest of the crew until everyone was back on board the ship."
He then cut short what was clearly our first—and mostly likely our last—date to intervene the growing argument between the smuggler and the jedi. And as a side note, we both recognized what we had was a date only after it was over. Makes the whole situation even more infuriating to me, because that bastard Zabrak said something stupid to me to make me realize it was a date.
At any rate, I did find something useful about my Captain, or at least reforced something I already knew. Candis is a tall man. Very tall. And has incredibly long legs and does pretty well on his feet while drunk. Me? Not so much. So when Candis arrived to the two, I was still a few meters short to hear what he said. But I did see the reactions of Phloros, Adalia and her Sith companion. The Sith automatically went to his side, threating to grab his lightsaber, Adalia, or at least the bottom half of it, twisted with anger even moreso. She did have enough since to hold out her hand to hold off her Sith from making a dumb move. Phloros fall back into a more relax composure and smirked at Candis. His fellow smugglers at the table started to slowly relax a bit more too. And I have to admit I feel slightly idiotic that I didn't notice the wookie when Candis and I first arrived, nor didn't I spot a familiar face Ord Mantell, Carso Riggs.
When I finally got there, I got there just in time to here Candis trying to persuade the two idiots to compromise and not break into a fight.
"…there are plenty of ways of solving this disagreement."
"Disagreement? There is no disagreement. This waste of space sold me bad equipment and I am going to kick his ass for it."
"Is that really a good reason to come in here and start a fight?"
"…Yes!"
Candis and the irate jedi would have gone back forth if Riggs getting up and swinging his arms over Phloros, and Adalia. "Look, why don't we just all sit down and have a few. We all friends here, right?" The wookie hollered in agreement while the female human continued to take sips of her drink. "Right! We can discuss this-
He was cut off by Adalia pushing him off of her and taking a step back. Apparently, the Jedi Code is just a nice poem to this lady, because she pulled her lightsaber out. I don't fault Phloros pulling out his blasters, because I also gripped the blaster that was hanging off my belt; I just didn't point it at her face. The wookie and human sat up and pulled out their weapons too, while Riggs stood back reaching for his weapon slowly.
Candis, who was the only one not going for a blaster, tried to defuse the situation, "We all need to calm down. Wait a few days and we all can just sit down and find a way to work this out."
Phloros decided that insulting Adalia was a great idea, "Why don't you tell the Schuttahere turn off her light show and calm down?"
So, I decided to point out that insulting Adalia wasn't needed, naturally, I did so with the tact…
Aric rubbed his chin trying to remember what he said to the smuggler.
"Look, dumbass, if you continue to piss her off no one's going to give a damn if she decided to cut your head off."
Well, the Zabrak did piss Aric off and he was slightly drunk…He was completely justified. Sort of.
…of a rampaging rancor…
So I insulted the man, only slightly, and I realize it wasn't exactly a smart move on my part. But like I said, the fool and his argument with the dark jedi disturbed my date, even if I didn't realize it was a date at the time, I still felt angry that their petty crap ruined my good mood. I was also drunk off of Mandoalain liquer.
And I wasn't about to take my anger out on the jedi. I was not that stupid drunk.
But my comment did have a pacifying effect on Adalia, because she pulled the yellow blade back into its hilt and smirked.
Candis wasn't happy about what I said, but at least I diffused a fight…at least between Phloros and Adalia.
The smuggler lowered his blasters and turned to me. He gave me look over and shirked, and turned back to Candis, "Well, Captain, I didn't know that you were that type of man. Bold, I mean, to go and buy such an aggressive slave on Republic's dime."
Here's some advice, if you are going to insult someone, tell it to that person's face. Only so you can dodge their fist.
I broke Phloros's jaw and send him crashing into his table. I would like to say that I had some control over myself and I left it at that, but that comment left me a tad bit sore. And my judgment wasn't at its best. As a result I ended up on top of the Zabrak proceeded to beat the living crap out of him. Not that I didn't get out of the brawl unscathed; my hand was broken after the first punch and I got a few nasty bruises.
The fight between us didn't last long, however, the smuggler's Wookie pal lifted me off of him and held us at arm's length from each other. Once we stopped struggling to continue, I was tossed to Candis.
While outside, I called for a taxi speeder, when he went back inside to make sure a fight didn't break out. When he was in there was able to convenience the two parties to meet peacefully in two days before heading off Coruscant; I am not sure how he managed to do that, he didn't tell me.
The ride back to the space port was silent. Other than informing me that he dissolved the argument, and will take a look at my hand when we get back to the ship, Candis was silent. He went into a trance like state for most of the ride. Normally this Mirialan trick would be soothing for anyone who was near it, but the light that glowed off him was giving me a headache.
When we got back, Candis grabbed one of his kolto sprays and treated my hand in the infirmary. I decided to speak up and apologize for my behavior and the only response I got back was a simple shrug. Silence was uncomfortable for me, and maybe it was for him too. Awkwardness of the moment just grew by every second as we sat on one of the cots in the infirmary. It allowed me to mull over what Phrolos said. For whatever reason what he said made me think back when Candis blatantly flirted with me earlier in the day and that bizarre connection made me come to the conclusion that we were on a date.
I was still a touch drunk when I came up with that assumption, obviously. If there was any logic to my thought process the previous night, I don't recall any of it.
I do remember, however, how he responded when I bluntly through it out there we were on a date. Candis's reaction was humorous and, I hate to say it, adorable. It took him a moment what I was saying, despite how frank I stated my opinion, and once he caught he just started laughing nervously.
"What? No...It was just two friends having a few, right?" Candis flashed me a large grin, but between the flirting from earlier in that day and going to the cantina, my drunken mind wasn't going to let him drop it. I lifted my eye brow up, questioning him. He became fairly fidgety, turning his head to face me then back looking forward. He repeated this several times over, while I just scooted myself closer to him. We were shoulder to shoulder by the time he stopped fidgeting and looked me in the eyes.
"Is the attraction mutual?" Candis asked. How he asked such a simple question threw me off. It was almost technical; I blame his armstech training.
I asked him to clarify, "Between us, you mean?"
He nodded…
Aric paused the holo recorder.
How am I supposed to go over what came after that? With that thought leaving his brain, memories of last night hit him hard.
Aric wrapping his arms around Candis,s neck, lowing his voice, whispering in his ear, "Yes."
Candis's response is to shove Aric into the cot and removing his jacket, but not fast enough. Aric muttering that he will buy Candis a new one.
Armor and clothes are removed at a quicker paste, disregarded with the torn jacket.
The entire encounter was aggressive, fast passed, heated, frantic, and over as rapidly it started.
Not that meant anything, they both wanted more. They stumbled out the infirmary into the captain's private room.
And I am not going into details about my sex life.
The important thing is I had sex with my commanding officer; right in the infirmary—and then in his private courters.
When we both woke up both of us realized that we did was a mistake, which is what leads me to when I started this recording.
And it helped. Not that I am going to inform my sister that.
Aric stopped the hologram. He took off the headset and plugged in a password and put it back in the cabinet. He took a deep sigh. He was going to turning around, walk into Candis's room and demand to speak about this.
Unfortunately, things don't work the way. In his path was the Captain sitting in his door frame. He held out his hand for support to get up and Aric could feel his face heating up as bent down to help.
"How much did you hear?"
"You were a Coruscant Gangster, you are jealous of Ave, and you kicked Galen Phrolous's ass because ruined our first date."
Aric glared at the Mirialan, "I hate you."
He smiled, "No you don't," Oh, yes, I do. Aric's glare narrowed, Candis's smile grew bigger.
"Why didn't you say anything?" Aric dropped the glare, rolled his eyes, and sighed. Aric sat back down on his bed.
"Well I was going to, but I remember something about smiles lighting up a room and…I'm a narcissist?" Candis paused for a moment, "You think I'm adorable?" He gave a half-assed shrug, and sat next to Aric.
Aric, despite anger, laughed. Candis chuckled a tad. The laughter didn't last one, "Aric, I am not going to throw you off Havoc or strip you of your ranked. You earned both." The mood became very somber.
Quick to the point.
Aric open to speak, but Candis held up his hand, "Aric, I really like you…I don't want last night to be a onetime thing."
Honestly, Aric didn't want last night to be one time deal—there as just a few issues…
"You're my CO. It's against regulations, people will talk." And if Aric was still being honest, he didn't care about those issues. He just needed to state out loud, before Candis and Aric lose their judgment once again.
"I need to know right now, Aric, would you be bothered of a relationship between us? If you do, then I will drop it and it never happened."
I need to say yes. This will only end badly if I don't. Aric shook his and smirked, "Not bothered by it at all." He's right I don't hate him, I hate myself. Falling for my younger CO. Where's the hard acholah when you need to blame something?
"Are you sure?" Candis asked, his voice filled with hope. His smile was tentative. Round red eyes filled with both caution, and optimism. Candis was utterly to endearing Aric's own good.
Aric smiled and repeated his actions from last night. He wrapped both his arms around Candis's neck and muttered yes.