Hitting the bags

Posted on Sun Feb 5th, 2023 @ 5:22am by Cadet First Class Pallas & 1st Lieutenant Kyle Walken

Mission: The Goddess
Location: Gym
Timeline: Backpost
4485 words - 9 OF Standard Post Measure

Even though she didn't have an upcoming fight to train for, Cadet Pallas was well aware that the moment she stopped training was the moment she stopped being a boxer. And she had spent too much time these last three years on the sport to give it up so easily. As her Academy coach always said, "Use it or lose it." It was maybe not the deepest of adages, but it carried with it everything else he had taught her about channeling her anxiety and anger into something productive. So much so that, even thousands of lightyears away from her coach, she still found herself here, in the Gladiator's gym, checking her wraps again before pulling on her training gloves.

Walken was spending some of his free time shockingly not drinking, quietly stretching inside his office he was now ready for the light jog to the gym. His mind began to wander back to his argument with the Captain before shaking it off as he reached the gym. Clearing his mind he entered, and a new sight caught his attention. Someone he had never seen on the ship before, he shrugged after thinking about it for a moment wouldn't be the first time he didn't know who some Navy personnel was. The jarhead was quick to start getting ready.

Pallas stood and moved to a speed bag. She saw the tall human enter just as she tapped the bag for the first time, held her glove out to stop its motion and then stood at attention by default, before relaxing and realizing that she was both in the gym and also didn't know yet whether the man was an officer. She walked over; she'd found that when there were a lot of people in a gym, it was fine to just keep her head down and do her own thing. But when there were only a pair, it could get awkward real fast too pretend the other person wasn't there. So she took the momentary awkwardness of introducing herself to avoid the longer term discomfort. "Hello, we haven't met yet. Cadet First Class Pallas." She had pulled off a glove and extended her hand in the human tradition.

Walken grips her hand and shakes it, "First Lieutenant Kyle Walken." He paused for a moment releasing her hand. "So Navy, I'm guessing you are here from the Academy for training of some kind." He sits down on a bench and unzips his bag. He pulls out his athletic tape and begins to tape up his hands. "So what are you specializing in?" He asks trying to stop the awkward silence from returning.

“Nice to meet you, Lieutenant Walken. Honestly, I haven’t have a specialty locked in yet. My education focused on science and engineering, but I was advised to keep an open mind coming into my Training Cruise… and, yes, you’re right, I’m here for training. I’ve finished my coursework at the Academy and it’s time for me to learn what being Starfleet is actually like. And then pick a career that I will have for the rest of my life. Something like that. I’ve started my first rotation in Medical with Doctor Svidi.” She watched as finished taping his hands. “So you’re a Marine?” It wasn’t really a question; it was obvious and he had said as much with his title, but Pallas was equally working to avoid silence.

"You will figure it out, everyone has to," Walken states as he finishes taping up his hands. He laughed knowing that the Doc more than likely bitched about having to instruct a cadet on top of her being stuck in the downgraded medbay, "I'm sure the Doc will take great care of you Cadet. Yes, I am a Marine so I didn't go to the fancy Naval Academy. Did my time in boot, served for a few years, and returned for my specialist training which for me was FORECON training aka scouting and sniping. Of course, it wasn't all sunshine and training." Walken stood up, "But I don't think I should share them yet, would hate to scary a Cadet out of training."

“I might surprise you, sir, in terms of what does and doesn’t scare me. It would probably take more than stories to get me to quit. But we just met, and I don’t want to interrupt your workout, Lieutenant. I just figured it was better to introduce myself than to not, as we are the only ones here.” Pallas pointed at him taping up his hands. “What are you working on today?”

"I'll tell you what, once you finish your time as a Cadet I will tell you my time as a Gorn POW." Walken offers as he looks down at his hands once she mentions the tape. "Figured it was a good day to go over the basics, what about you Cadet?"

"I can't say I look forward to that story, sir. I don't mean that I don't want to hear it, it just sounds like it was likely very unpleasant for you, and I'm not a fan of making others relive any traumatic incidents unnecessarily. Nonetheless, I appreciate your willingness to share your experience, and if it helps to talk about in any way, I'm certain that I can learn from it." She looked around the gym, as if surveying the equipment. "I suppose I was going to go through basics as well, you could say. Was just going to get some frustration out. Happy to lend a pair of hands if you want to hit the heavy bag, or do any drills. I'm sure I could gain something from your expertise, you could give me some pointers."

"It wasn't pleasant at all but it is what it is, can't remember where I heard this but the failures of others can be a great teacher for another," Walken states as he drops his tape back into his duffle bag and zips it up. "Frustration? Something bothering you Cadet?" He asks as he walks over to the heavy bag, grabbing it he turns back. "Step up Sparkplug, punch out that frustration and spit it out."

The Marine didn't have to ask Pallas twice. She slipped her glove back on and swung her arms across her torso, warming them up, as she bounced toward the bag. "I suppose the normal kind of frustration, or at least the kind you can normally expect when you end up on a ship that has had a bunch of its crew murdered in cold blood and is now chasing after a bunch of psychotic cultists." She started out slowly, with some jabs, before mixing it up with some combinations. "Thought I was going to get to explore. See some cool space phenomena. Now I'm helping play detective, running tissue samples from dead bodies."

Walken laughs out loud, "First mistake Sparkplug, never assume about what you are going to be doing. Remember you are a Cadet on their training cruise, thinking it was gonna just be exploring and looking at things in space. Do you want to be up on that bridge seeing all that? In a lab studying it? Well, right now you are going to be doing all the basics." Kyle stops and looks down at the Cadet's eyes. "It sucks, but we all start at the bottom and get the assignments we don't agree with. Being part of Starfleet means being open to it all, taking the good with the bad."

"Fair point, LT," Pallas grunted as she threw hard hooks into the body of the bag, hitting it hard enough that she could feel the air getting knocked out of her imaginary opponent's lungs. "About never assuming. But I have no problem with doing the basics. I knew that was what I was getting into. No problem with running samples, even. My frustration is more being dropped into the middle of a murder scene." Jab, jab, hook, hook, cross. "I'm open to it," she said, pausing for a moment as she looked back into the Marine's eyes, "but I saw a lot of death before Starfleet. It's not shocking, sir. Just... sometimes it feels old."

"Sadly Cadet, that is something that will never go away. No matter how much anyone fights for peace or for any reason. Humans, Klingons, and pretty much all races will break down and try to kill each other. I've watched friends and foes die, I've taken my fair share of life, and I'm the one person who understands that feeling. Seeing and being part of this cycle of death is old." Walken answered honestly. "The best thing I can say is to stay out of Security, they don't see as much action as Marines but being Navy they will be the worse choice if you want to avoid the cycle."

Pallas finished up with a rapid series of combinations, really pushing until she we out of breath, the sweat flying off of her as she laid a final pair of hard uppercuts into the bag. "It's good advice, sir," she said as she put her gloves behind her head and caught her breath. "I'm pretty sure I'm going to take it. I realize the need for Security, and for the Marines. I also realize that I'm not cut out for it. I guess that's why I was complaining at the start about 'playing detective' instead of doing other, less crime-related Medical grunt work. I'm sure I'll learn something from my rotation through Security, but hopefully it doesn't happen in the middle of another galactic-scale terrorist crisis. Your turn, sir," she said, pointing to the bag and then bracing it for Kyle. "Can I ask why you chose to become a Marine? I have to admit, I didn't get a chance to speak to many while I was at the Academy. And that was my first time off of Ardana, so."

Walken raises his arms, throwing two quick jabs followed by a hook. "Tradition Cadet, my family has a long line of military service. I'm a marine, young brother is going to boot, father was a marine, grandfather was navy, etc etc etc. It's just part of being a Walken, we all served in a branch going back to before we even were Walkens." Kyle follows this up with a quick left followed by an uppercut. "It wasn't a question my old man raised us to do this so as soon as I was of age I enlisted."

Pallas studied the marine’s form as he worked the bag. Something about the way he threw himself into his punches spoke of warrior who had thrown punches in a real fight, where severe injury or death was on the line and a bell wasn’t going to save you. She had seen it before, the difference between those who had seen action, if even just a street brawl as a kid, and those who boxed purely for sport. She grinned in recognition. “Enlisted? But now you’re an officer. Sir,” she smiled again. “How did that happen?”

Walken narrows his glare as he rapidly strikes the heavy bag with right after right. "Battlefield promotion, former CO left leaving a gap in the battalion leadership. Hawkins had two options, ask Hayter to take it over or go to the highest SNCO. I'm certain there will be many marines who are unhappy with my jump in rank." Walken finally threw a left no holding back as he did. "Sometimes I wish I refused him, gone through the proper way. Can't turn back now."

Pallas felt that last punch. There was a lot of feeling behind it. "I would think that with some Marines, they would think that a battlefield promotion *was* the proper way," she proposed. "At least the promotion came from Captain Hawkins. The others must have at least respected that it was another Marine who made the decision." She shifted her weight and switched her stance, rolling her shoulders back in the interlude. "If you don't mind me continuing to be a nosy cadet who asks too many questions, sir, why didn't you let... 'Hayter,' you said? I'm still relatively new, I don't know that officer. Why didn't you turn down the Captain's offer and make the other guy take over?"

"Because even if I would have said no there was no guarantee that Hayter would have accepted it," Walken answers as he steps back from the heavy bag. We needed a leader so it would have been wrong for me to turn my back and refuse, even if a little part of me wanted to. Since you wanted to dig so deep with me I guess I can ask another basic question, why did you join Starfleet?"

"Beats mining zenite?" she joked. "You could say that I'm 'paying it forward,' to use a human turn of phrase. Starfleet basically changed the entire history of Ardana, in a good way... even though it took over a century and a lot of suffering. They stepped in and intervened when the Federation itself, which strangely we were a member of before the intervention, couldn't care less about the apartheid that was happening on our planet. And then, when it seemed like we were headed for another disaster, Starfleet stepped in again, even though we weren't members of the Federation at that time. We are, now. Again. Anyway, I had the chance, when I was much younger, to meet Starfleet officers, ones from the Engineering Corps. They came to stop our abandoned floating city from crashing into our current largest city, and then help stabilize things afterwards, address some damage we experienced from a big earthquake. I ended up sort of stalking them around, as you can imagine kids on technologically backwards worlds might do. They eventually gave in, started teaching me some things." She smiled. "Does this sound very corny, sir? Someone helped me, so I wanted to help other people the same way."

"Sounds to me as good of a reason to join as any other, because as long as it's important to you, and you are doing what you feel is right then it's a good reason." The Marine sat down on a bench his attention fully on Pallas. "With the story you've told, it would make sense that you join up with Engineering but who knows maybe you will find something here or in the Academy that may sway you into focusing on another specialization."

"That's what I thought, too, when I first started preparing to apply to the Academy. Starfleet Engineering Corps was what I thought Starfleet *was* you know? So that was my mindset going in; the Engineers are the good guys and the heroes and the angels beaming down from space to save the day, so that's what I should be. I mean, this wasn't their fault at all; I'm not blaming them. In retrospect, they tried to explain all of Starfleet to me, but I didn't have the context to understand it. It wasn't until I was off Ardana and on my way to Earth that I really started to grok... 'Oh, you need all these different kinds of people to make a starship fly and make this whole enterprise work.' So, yeah, I am trying to keep more of an open mind coming into this now. But, like you said, probably not Security." She laughed. "Do you ever feel like you might want to do something different than what you're doing now?"

"No, I don't. This is what I was raised to do I can't see myself doing anything outside of hot dropping into a combat zone." Walken answers honestly. "As I always joked if you want someone to use book smarts you go to my twin sister, if you want something done you come to me." The marine laughed softly to himself quietly. "Doesn't mean I'm dumb and just charge headlong into a fight, you want a bunker of cultists assaulted I will plan out a tactical assault plan and give no room for escape. Just don't ask me to fix a sub-routine in some system."

“No problem, LT, you leave the subroutines to me, and I’ll leave the cultists to you. Seems like more than a fair trade.” Since it appeared that they were done with the heavy bag, she picked up a jump rope, which seemed like a good activity while continuing the conversation. “So, you have a twin sister, sir? What’s that like? I have a bunch of siblings, but we were all adopted at different ages, never had a sibling who was the same age as me.”

Walken lifts a dumbbell and begins to work on his arms as he lifts them. "I will take you up on that trade then." He thinks for a minute before switching arms. "I mean it really is the same, most people wouldn't even think me and Emma are twins unless someone told them. Now when you say adopted are you saying that you and your siblings were all adopted or you have a lot of adopted siblings?" Walken asks.

“Strange. I would have thought that as twins you’d have more in common.” Pallas began jumping rope, slowly at first and steadily gaining speed as she switched from one foot to another. “I have a lot of adopted siblings. I am not related to any of them by blood. But they are my siblings with no caveats. We were raised together, they would do anything for me and I would for them. Sort of like my own personal Starfleet crew,” she smiled.

"Don't get me wrong, Emma and I have some things in common but we are still different people. People tend to get caught up on the twin thing and think we are just copies are each other." Kyle answered as he set down one of the dumbbells. Placing both hands on one he began an overhead lift. "Blood or not family is family, at least that is how I've always seen it. It does seem we share that, I would do anything for my family and they for me."

"Agreed. I take it from your description, then, that Emma is not a marine like you are? What path did she take that is so different from your own? Is she a nerd like I am?" Pallas laughed.

"You are right, Emma is no marine." Kyle answered as he set down the dumbbell. She kept on learning, she is a biologist. She specializes in floral biology." He took a moment and laughed. "You don't strike me as a nerd, at least not how they are referred to on Earth."

"Flowers? Interesting. Just ones on Earth, or on other planets as well... is she Starfleet?" She sped up the rope, becoming a blur. "Nerds come in many different forms, I think. Some of us might have a better cross, but an obsession with a particular field of study, bookish-ness, and prioritizing schoolwork over having any sort of social life? Yeah, that is me, 100 percent."

"Now she wouldn't be a good Starfleet biologist if she were just interested in flowers from Earth would she?" Walken laughs quietly as he moved on to the speed bag, starting out slow he began with switching only after three strikes. "Just make sure you give time to those you connect with. You never know when they are going to be gone. Six years, one-hundred and twenty-eight days. That was the day I lost my best friend and not one day goes by where I wouldn't give to be able to sit back and drink with him once more."

Pallas stopped the rope and caught her breath. "I do not count the days since I lost my birth parents, because I do not know the exact day it happened... I was too young. But I understand where you are coming from; not a day goes by that I do not think about them. What was your friend's name, if it is okay for me to ask?"

"It's okay to ask, his name was Akoni Kealoha. Met him in boot camp and we deployed together. He was my brother." Walken began his next round on the speed bags just working his quickness as he hit the bag over and over. After a moment of silence, Kyle stops and looks toward Pallas. "Cadet, tell me something. If I was just dressed in my civis and you saw me without knowing anything about me what would you think? I'm curious as to what people think when they just see me for the first time."

The cadet watched Kyle as he worked methodically and connected eyes with him as he stopped. She took his question seriously, looked him over and studied his face, his posture, his mannerisms, especially. "Your fitness level, and your conspicuous scar," she nodded in his direction without pointing, understanding that he knew what she meant before she even finished the words, "give away that you are no ordinary civilian. At least, not any ordinary Federation civilian. Any Federation medical center could deal with the scar, and even in heavier industries, mechanized assistive tools forestall the need for heavy lifting. So you are someone outside of the normal stream of Federation civilian life. That could mean a few things: Marines or Starfleet Security, given your brawn; a civilian working a more physically grueling career outside of or at the edge of Federation space; or a non-Starfleet spacefarer." She paused thoughtfully. "... or a professional athlete. But, in any case, I think if you're asking about first impressions from a superficial glance alone, you present as an adventurer. I would say 'potentially dangerous' as well, except, well, you have a friendly face, to be honest."

"That was rather detailed but it makes sense since you might be joining engineering. Most of them are extremely detail oriented." The marine smiled once more at her comments. "Remind me that if I trick you into joining the Corps, assign you to a recon squad. That detail is something I look for when it comes to people I send on recce patrols when we are planet side."

Pallas laughed. "I would be a terrible Marine. It is good to know our own limits, right? I think I have had a lifetime enough of moving through muck and ruin that I might just give up mid-mission to find myself a sonic shower. To be honest, though, that is probably more from the Xenoanthropology side than the Engineering, though you are right about Engineers. Studying people, though, figuring out what everything about them, their expressions, their speech, their attire, might signal about the way that they live, its now a part of my brain that is hard to shut off." She looked him over again. "Anyway, why did you ask me what I would think of you? Feeling self-conscious?"

"And that is where it pays to have a couple of jarheads at your back. We don't let others give up because we don't give up." Walken turns his focus back to the speed bag as he began his routine again, starting with the rights and following up with his left. "Self-conscious? No, as I said before I'm curious about new folks when they first meet me. I like to see if they are perceptive when inspecting someone. More than a few times snap judgments have to be made and sometimes you have to make a choice between people you know little about."

The cadet nodded in agreement. "That makes sense to me. Perhaps I should be asking others the same. I think, maybe, I was projecting: I actually *am* self-conscious, pretty much all the time. And I usually do not ask what you asked because... well, I assume I know what others see when they see me. But maybe I am wrong. So, LT, what do you see when you see me? Or would you see, if you saw me dressed like this, in training gear without any nerdy engineering implements in sight?"

"I've learned it is never wise to assume anything, just because someone is fit and looks like they can hold themselves in a fight doesn't mean they can't build a warp core." The marine answers honestly as to his mindset. "I would see a young woman who obviously cares about taking care of herself. I know now that not only can she throw a punch but she can outthink me on a lot of matters. But I can also see that based on how you fight you haven't been forced to take another's life. I honestly hope you never need to experience that."

Pallas looked long at Walken, thinking over his evaluation. "I have not thought about it, if I am to be completely honest. Even through all the basic training at the Academy, the ethics courses of when such action that may result in loss of life is authorized, I somehow removed myself from that possibility. Even now, confronted by the thought of it directly, something about it feels--I do not know how to describe it--too far away. So, even though I know that in many cultures, the appropriate response from me would be something along the lines of, 'I also hope I never experience that," I cannot say that honestly." She breaks the awkward response with a smile. "I see why they made you an officer. Must be useful being able to read your Marines that way."

Walken stepped forward and placed his hands on her shoulders, "The first time it happens is always the worse, unlike Navy that is what we as Marines are trained for. I will give you advice for when it does happen, it's okay to feel guilt but in the end, you have to remember that it was them or you it may seem cruel or even evil. But never let it be you." He released the Cadet and sat down on a bench before answering further. "I was made an officer out of convenience, if you were here not all that long ago I would have still been an NCO."

She gave a tight smile, but nodded with thanks at the pep talk. "Commission or not, you give good enough advice. Your insight is appreciated; I know just from being there that not everyone who goes through the Academy can cut through philosophizing quickly enough when matters of life and death are on the line. Thank you, Lieutenant."

Walken gives a nod to Pallas as he gathers up his things and heads for the exit. "If you run into anything you can't handle, just call." With that the Marine left the gym and began his journey back to the Marine HQ.

END