Game Film Part I
Posted on Mon Mar 2nd, 2026 @ 8:10am by Lieutenant Colonel Cornelius Tremble & Major Edmund Merrick & Staff Warrant Officer Rommie
Edited on on Thu Mar 5th, 2026 @ 2:38am
1,635 words; about a 8 minute read
Mission:
Episode 17 - Going Home
Location: Office of the Executive Officer - Deck 2 - USS Pioneer
Timeline: MD008 1700 hrs.
Arms crossed, Neil stood in the center of his office, watching a holo-vid of the battle of Wren IX play through. Rommie had pieced it all together and was playing it out on a time lapse for him, each teams drama rolling out on a three dimensional map that rotated around him so that he didn’t have to move. He was back in the black and tans he favored for office work, though he knew Taylor wasn't fond of them.
Rommie saw the fatigue he was feeling and even had inhabited his artificial leg more than once to help him fine tune it, even though Neil was pretty sure medical would have kittens when they found out about that.
Turf wars.
Sighing, he rubbed his eyes and said, “Rommie. It’s time. Get Ed up here.”
“Yes sir,” the AI’s voice sounded in his ear as he stepped through the holo projection and took a glass of water from the side board replicator. He switched the side wall to a view of Sol system. A near up view of Earth with Mars off in the horizon. It was a real time feed and he watched traffic within the system move about resembling bugs in comparison to the planets. He hadn’t been back to Earth for several years and it was going to be busy.
And that was before this new mission that was thundering about in the wings.
It was a quiet bit of thundering, but it was there and the whole thing was likely to rattle the rafters.
A scent caught his nose as he reached out and shifted the view to that of Jupiter and he said, “Rommie…is that gun oil and liniment I smell? Are you trying to say I’m old, though I am feeling old. But still, that’s …”
“It is, Colonel,” the AI confirmed, humor in her voice. “Sergeant Shy suggested it might make you feel more comfortable.”
The AI felt comfortable enough in cutting him off, but Neil shook his head as he waited for Merrick and finished his sentence anyway.
“Rude.”
Over the comm, Rommie's voice found him. “Major Merrick, the Colonel asks that you to join him in his office.
Edmund gave a start when he heard Rommie's voice. He had set up a small table which had a diorama which was part hologram and also physical pieces.
"On my way." Edmund responded glancing at the table, giving a frown.
In a short time he arrived at Tremble's office stepping inside, "Colonel?" the door opening right as he approached. A quick glance revealed the images being played on the wall.
It was only a fleeting glance, of what there was, his eyes going towards Neil. His nose caught the scent of something, liniment and gun oil?
Turning, Neil nodded to the Cure's commander and said, "Come on in, Ed. How goes the war?"
Rommie materialized from a data stream, her long-sleeved uniform skant in charcoal and marine green, the piping red for command twisting with gold and silver marking her duties as aide.
The side board hummed, lights twisting and a coffee service appeared, the scent adding to the room.
"It proceeds forward as usual, Neil." Edmund stepping in further. "How about for you? The leg functioning well enough?"
Edmund watched as the coffee appeared, even noting Rommie's change of appearance. She was quite the Aide for Neil.
Edmund was still working out in his mind as to Wren IX, and how it all went down.
"It's a.." Neil had to think about how to best put it, then shrugged. "Work in progress. Seems slightly insane to learn to walk with this," he thumped the artificial leg, "When they'll reattach my real leg and I'll have to learn to walk all over again. But I can't sit around for three months while it rehabs in medical either."
Then he grinned and asked innocently, "How did your night out with Andrew go?"
"It went well enough, then when I woke up, I found that I had gotten married. I have no clue how that happened. It wasn't my intention, so now I find that I have two kids on the way, car payments. And a mortgage for a big house." Edmund deadpanned.
Neil snickered then asked, "What's a car? Or a mortgage for that matter? Must be a talented girl if she's going to get you a brace of privates after the first couple go-rounds." He smirked and said, "I'm glad you let your hair down some...it was needed after Wren IX."
"It was way overdue, Neil" Edmund admitted with a tint of regret. "You had to practically order me through Shy to go and let my hair down." He shook his head at that thought. "Wound up so tight or my head stuck in the dark, that I snap at the worst possible moment."
He looked at the images on the wall. "Wren IX that was messy."
Neil weighed things for a moment, then said. Operations usually get that way. Give me your overall command assessment, broken down as you like of strengths weaknesses. What worked and what didn't. I'd like your take, even though I've reviewed all the after-action break downs and reports that will be redacted or lost."
"Overall, most of those involved, I felt did well under the uncertain circumstances, if you want to speak of marines. Except for Jeksyne he didn't perform well, I wanted to put him into the photon torpedo and send him out into space."
"If it weren't for you and Jayna going in and keeping his team moving forward, it would have been even more disasterous. Though--" he gave out a huff focusing on Neil. "We came too close to losing you."
Neil made a dismissive gesture, "Jeksyne wasn't ready and least said the better. I recommended him for a one man listening post on the Romulan Neutral Zone for six months." He moved the holo between them and moved it forward toward just before the entity revealed itself and tried its mind games." Neil zeroed in slightly on Ed's position and said, "From my review, it looks a lot like something fell apart and Lachlan had to jump in, directing the fight. He might have been in place, but when you arrived I would have expected you to direct the fight. Am I reading things wrong?"
"No, you are not reading things wrong there, and truth be told I did fall apart. We were dealing with a plethora of images, doppelgangers of our own fears, the Borg. It took Lachlan to realize they were mere fakes which pulled us out of our living nightmares. We hadn't run into anything like that before. We were fortunate. Oh also can't forget your words that came through to us all." Ed not turning his gaze from Neil.
Neil weighed for a few beats, but right now he couldn't be a friend. "Everything but that first sentence is an excuse, Major. Fear is our constant companion and should be an old friend by now." He kept his tone even and rubbed at his eyes. From a Battalion point of view...hell from a Brigade point of view, while it was a successful mission and everyone came back alive, the officers flunked out. I got myself incapacitated. Jeksyne tried by jerks and starts but came off ineffective and our Marines followed his commands only because they're good Marines and got the job done anyway."
Running fingers through his hair, Neil sighed. "It's why we have redundancy and Lachlan is a damned good Sergeant Major and an even better Marine. We had a problem with the switch over when the Portal was reached and Science took over while the Cure moved to Static Defense with Security backing us up. That's my screw up...I should have put Alyssa in direct charge of things when I bugged out and not assumed it would happen. I didn't think I'd get hurt, so you're not the only one that had a hiccup on Wren."
After a few more beats of keeping his own eyes level, Neil asked, "Anything there I'm off base on, from your perspective?"
"You trained an excellent team, Neil." Ed commented. "Hence the reason why they were successful. As for Jeksyne, I wanted to give him a chance, thought he'd actually step up. Instead, he floundered."
Frustrated Ed grunted out.
"For the coordinating things where taking down the portal, yes she should have been in charge of getting that done. She's got a good head on her shoulders" Edmund looked at the images that were there.
"And what you said is true, and you are not off base at all. Those mistakes are not going to be made again" Ed firmly stated.
Neil let the silence hang for a long minute then said, "No they can't. The Corp; the Cure and the Pioneer need to see you out front, leading by example. Even when people are getting their moments in and everything seems handled, don't think you can't judiciously add to things or tell them to keep doing what they're doing...but then add more to it. Be seen. Be heard. Be effective."
A joint post by:
Lieutenant Colonel Cornelius Tremble
Executive Officer, USS Pioneer
Battalion Commander, The Cure
Major Edmund Merrick
Company Commanding Officer Officer, The Cure
USS Pioneer
Staff Warrant Officer Rommie
Artificial Intelligence, The Cure
USS Pioneer
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