Mid January 2015

Lisa Hayes had come to a crossroads. The weeks following Christmas had been difficult to say the least. She tried to do what she had done in the past when she was upset, which was to throw herself into her job to distract herself. But unlike the past, she found little solace in her work. She instead found herself in the throes of physical and emotional chaos.

She had heard the rumors going around the bridge crew that she had been drinking a lot. While she did occasionally have a few drinks to try and numb her heartbreak, the truth was that her tolerance was very low, and too much made her sick. In reality, she was eating very little, sleeping a lot, and not returning her friends concerned phone calls. Rick had even called a few times, but she could not bring herself to talk to him. What would they have to talk about?

Lisa began to doubt herself not only personally, but also professionally. As far as her job was concerned, she was afraid that her distracted mental state could be a danger to the safety of herself and others. After all, look what happened to Rick because of her inability to focus.

Facing her coworkers every day became increasing difficult. Admiral Gloval, Kim, Sammy and Vanessa knew something was going terribly wrong between Lisa and Rick, but she wasn't sure how much they knew.

She found herself missing Rick terribly. They were after all, friends first. She just happened to fall in love with him. She regretted never telling him, fully how she felt. There were some signs that he had feelings for her, but she didn't know what to do with them. Just a few weeks ago, at his place she missed the best opportunity of all. She found herself replaying the evening over and over again in her head, berating herself for what she could have, and should have said. She also wondered if it would have mattered at all. He was with the woman of his dreams, the beautiful, talented, famous, Minmei. Didn't every man want her? How could she compete with her? Rick had wanted to be with Minmei for the past five years and had told Lisa that on many occasions.

She knew it would just be a matter of time before the two of them "came out" in public and would probably be all over TV and tabloids. They couldn't hide forever, and she heard rumors that some of the news people were on to them. She especially couldn't stand to think of seeing the two of them together, knowing they were now intimate. She was drawn to Rick physically more than any other man she had ever known. And based on his rather obvious and somewhat embarrassing physical response to their last kiss on Breetai's ship, he felt at least something toward her, too.

She began to consider to options outside the RDF. She heard that Monument City was undergoing a huge economic boom and she was sure she could find a new career, and hopefully, a new life, there. Monument was close enough where she could still see her friends occasionally, but just far enough away from Rick and Minmei.

Saturday, January 17th

After a few more days of thinking and a preliminary job and apartment search in Monument City, Lisa decided to tell Claudia about her decision. After all, Claudia was her closest and most trusted friend, and she felt that she should hear it first, directly from her. She left Claudia a message to meet her that afternoon.

Claudia could tell from the tone of Lisa's voice on her message that something was up, and she was genuinely concerned for her friend's well being. When she approached Lisa, she was staring out over the railing over one of the SDF1's many open balconies with tears streaming down her face.

"Lisa, I came as soon as I got your message. What's wrong?"

"I wanted to tell you first. I've decided to resign, Claudia. I can't do this anymore. Coming in every day seeing him, or reminders of him. Knowing he's going home to her. I just can't. You were right. I waited too long and Rick's lost to me forever." After a long pause Lisa continued. "There are plenty of good jobs in Monument City, in the private sector. I need to get on with my life, and I can't do that here."

"Lisa! I'm surprised at you. If you're willing to throw your career away because of a broken heart than you're not the person I thought you were."

Claudia could see that remark both hurt and surprised Lisa, but she continued on.

"Listen, Lisa. I understand how you feel, but running away from this, is not going to make it go away. You're incredibly important to the RDF. We all need you here. People depend on you. Please think about this some more. If you need to talk it out, I'm here for you. You know that, okay?"

Lisa shook her head. "Claudia, I don't know. I've though about this a lot over the past few weeks. When I lost Carl, I threw myself into my job to the point that I forgot who I was. I lost myself in all this. I wasn't healthy. I'm not healthy now. I don't want to do this to myself again. I want a life, and unfortunately I was stupid enough to convince myself that that was something Rick and I could have together. Don't you see Claudia?"

"You have friends, Lisa. Listen, Rick Hunter was a fool. And there are other men out there, believe it or not. Somehow you miss it, but I hear it all the time from men around here how attractive you are. You just need to loosen up, and not let yourself get consumed by your job. Give yourself some more time to get over this."

Claudia gave her friend a quick hug.

"Like I said, I'm here for you. Anytime. And so is Jean. And Kim, and Sammy and Vanessa and Miriya, although I'm not too sure how much help they'd be, but we all care about you." Claudia's watch alarm sounded.

"Listen, I've got a briefing to run to. By the way, Admiral Gloval wants to see you right away about a new assignment. From I understand it involves quite a lot of travel. You might want to consider it. I'll call you later."

Lisa watched as her friend walked off, and decided to tell go Admiral Gloval why she would not accept a new assignment.