Log:When Majors Hover
When Majors Hover
OOC Date: May 25, 2016
Location: Training Grounds, D'Qar
Participants: Ambrosia Greystorm, Tess Ul'Datha, A Megaphone
After her escape from the medbay there was little excuse to keep Tess caged once she proved she was wholly incapable of staying under lock and key, but more over, the tests showed that her heart was sustaining... even during exercise. The cybernetic implant never once hiccupped and she hasn't shown any signs of rejection, so the doctors are letting her do more exercise for the purpose of running tests. That's why she's out on the training field alone.
Monitored, but Tess Ul'Datha is pushing herself. Sweat pours down her scarred face as she stops the endless loop on the obstacle course to take a long drink of water from a cantin hanging from her hip. She's in full kit, armor, pack, and a pair of rifles... which includes Addell (her sniper rifle. It has a name tag stickered on the side).
There's another dead woman walking (riding) on the training grounds tonight, but she's stubbornly making her natural heart do all the work. A little scorching wasn't enough to warrant a new one, evidently. The telltale sign she's up about begins very softly. A gentle hum crests a hill, descending along a path towards the obstacle course. The form of the Major in her throne grows into a more identifiable size in time, the hum growing louder as she nears.
Ambrosia unclips something from her chair's 'hip' and raises it to her mouth. It's a megaphone. "PRIVATE UL'DATHA" The Major's voice booms rather flatly. Almost seems more of a statement than a holler, but carries nicely!
Tess straightens to stretch her back and gazes up in the direction of the looming shadow approaching the field over yander hill. She does not realize the situation she's to soon find herself in and is about to start running the obstacle again whent he booming voice of the Major shatters any idea that she might be doing anything that doesn't involve pushups for the next eternity.
The private is quick to start across the short divide between them and stands stark straight with her arms down at her side and face precisely straight. "Sir, yes Sir!" At a stiff attention before the Major.
Ambrosia's mouth opens...then closes. She thumbs the amplifier off to the tune of a loud screech and hooks it back to her chair. "Our new Lt Colonel told me something interesting yesterday. He's concerned. As the natural order of things around here go...the problem's now mine." Glancing past the at-attention solider to the field behind her, she sighs inwardly. Oh, sweet freedom...
Her hands fold neatly in her lap and chin uplifts to look at Tess. "You wanna tell me what that's about, or shall I begin?"
"Sir, I get antsy, sir." Tess isn't going to make excuses for her actions, nor is she going to argue that she didn't do them. She doesn't even look upset that the Lt. Colonel told the Major, she expected it, or at least should have if she doesn't. Either way, she's wearing a blank expression that's probably borderline sociopathic, if she didn't have all the markings of the perfect grunt soldier.
"I tried to reason with the medical staff. I spent my time in the bacta tank, sir. I..." She looks to Amber in her chair, eyes cutting a ltitle, then snap straight back to stare across the field... Lips pressed tight together. Whatever she has to say will, without a doubt, sound suicidal. She has no business being out of the med bay. "I was not really running away, sir."
"Of course not. You leave us, you lose the best opportunity you'll ever have to put blaster bolts through some skulls in the name of something justifiable." Ambrosia's expression, or lack thereof, mirrors Tess quite well. "I know." Glancing over her shoulder and around, she motions for the young woman's canteen. "Gimme a drink. Watching you sweat is making ME thirsty." Her head jerks towards the westward path, into the trees that separate here from base. "Walk with me." Her right hand opens out, to take the water.
Tess' eyes cut towards the Major when she doesn't tear into her like a pack of freeze dried fruit.. but they go straight back to staring ahead seconds later. "Yes, sir." She agrees, it is well documented how much Tess likes shooting people, so well played major! Well played indeed. The canteen is retrieved and held out and she relaxes a little, not completely, but goes into a parade rest until she's ordered to walk with Amber. "Sorry, sir. I'm trying to stay in fighting shape." And probably going to ruin a million credit heart, but them's the stix.
The Major takes the canteen wordlessly and tosses back a swig. Guess she wasn't kidding. Or maybe she didn't actually ride all the way here afterall. Her legs /are/ trembling a bit. "Here," she gives it back and wipes her mouth on her sleeve as they hoof/hover along. "A few weeks rest aren't gonna take you out of it. Hell, I was back to slapping around the training bag one week after Jax was born, and lemme tell you, those muscles were very much out of literal shape."
"If you're on this team, you're an asset. We need to preserve all our assets and can't risk wasting them via self-destructive behavior. You don't just bounce back from death kid, and zip into the field without using every precaution the medics order you to. Without being cleared. Officially." Furrowing her brows together, she eyes Tess sideways. "So be patient. FO ain't going away overnight. You've got time to heal."
Tess walks along beside the Major, hands down at her side, wearing about a hundred pounds of gear and looking like it bothers her exactly zero... even in the blistering afternoon sun. She was never very good at smart stuff or being not stupid, but she's got this whole soldiering thing down to a science.
"Yes, Sir." She says quietly, but there's obviously more. Despite her lackadaisical attitude with the other grunts, Tess -was- raised by a Bothan spy. She knows better than to speak her mind to a superior officer and, therefore, does not do that.
Ambrosia never liked looking into the mirror. So she quits looking at Tess. "I want you to get back to the medical lab. Now. And I want a full diagnostic test administered. They'll be sending me the results and a signature if you're cleared for active duty. They'll also notify me if you're to remain under hospitalized observation. If there's any indicator that you're not at a hundred percent, you won't be among those departing for this next round of survival school. Understood? We can't risk damaging your new bits quite yet."
"Sir, yes sir." Tess assures with a brisk nod. "Sir..?" She manages with a voice that's a little quieter, never losing step with the major on their little trek across the training fields. "Permission to speak freely?" It's not timid so much as respectful. She's well aware that it can be denied and is ready and willing to take that at face value.
"Granted." Stars know Ambrosia does it alllll the time.
"They're not actually testing the heart, sir." Tess says flatly. "They kept me hooked up to a monitor while I'm laying on a medical bed flashing images on the screen thinking they'll get a response from me... As if it would be that easy to work me up." Seriously, she can run a mile without raising her heart rate, what's a few images going to do? "If anything, I did more testing than they did in a week, in a few hours running from them..."
"Dammit," Ambrosia grumbles with a head shake and casts her a hard look. "Well they sure as shit are going to stress test it now - I'm going back there with you. Fuck." A little eye roll and she lifts a hand to absently feel her own pulse. "Kept me chained to the damn bed for two weeks...least they can do is stick you on the damn machine for a few hours. Then strap a pulseOx to your wrist and kick you back out here."
She ain't a doctor. Nowhere near smart enough for that. But she's pretty much experienced it all, from a patient's view!
"Yes sir." Tess nods briskly. She's not medical in the slightest, her expertise are in the ending of lives not saving them, but she knows they've not done much to 'stress' her. Which isn't as easy as one might think. Running isn't a problem... at least the amount they want. Not with the amount of PT Tess does on her free time... let alone as a Private. And, let's face it, an idiot. She's in trouble more often than she's not.
"I just can't lay there... it will drive me insane before they ever clear me for duty, sir."
Ambrosia smirks and can't help but to shoot Tess a secretive smile. "Maybe that's my excuse." In all seriousness though...she sobers. "You're going. Maybe laying there IS your stress test, much as you hate it. Still, I'll make a suggestion that they put you through a more productive test. Sob stories and horrible images don't faze everyone as much as they'd like to think. Not in our line of work."
Soldiering. Killing. Take your pick, it's all the same. "If it means it'll get me back out of their midst sooner rather than later I'm sure they'll oblige. But I need to know...the powers that be need to know...that you're genuinely fit, inside as much as out. And hiding out in a cave with friends doesn't get us closer to that deduction."
Tess offers the briefest and quite secretive, smile, she's not a machine... though she's only kind of human. It's her raisin', Bothan's are like that, but she's not beyond actually smiling when she's not addressing a superior officer in a professional manner. "Sir, yes sir." She assures the Major with a brisk nod. So long as they stop flashing all those images at her and put her through the paces to really test this new ticker... "I'll suffer through it to make the lab coats happy, sir." Again, promising, as they trot along at the pace with the hoverchair. "I... yes. I understand, sir. It was stupid." Par for the damn course.
"Good. Then hop to it." Ambrosia arches a brow. "I'll follow along behind and pick up your corpse for delivery if you keel over. No worries." Seems she's not as in doubt of the heart's capability as her order implies.
Or...maybe she really is just a bitch.
In either case, off they go: Tess jogging along with her self-punishment strapped to her back and the chair-bound Major hovering along after.
