PHD 236: One Locked Drawer
One Locked Drawer
Summary: Salazar heads down to the Sec Hub to remove the marine flag from Ezra's desk, and searches the locked drawer.
Date: PH236 (11 Dec 2009)
Related Logs: Silent Night.
Players:
Epi..Dell..Cinder..Salazar..NPCs..

CEC Kharon, Deck 2, Security Hub
IC Time: Post Holocaust Day #236
OOC Time: Thu Dec 10 23:33:54 2009


A pair of staggered desks flank the entrance, one occupied during most hours by a desk sergeant, and the other rotates between other personnel. In the back is a bank of monitors on the port wall in a 180 degree view. The arc of stacked flatscreens is under the watchful eye of an MP or three during most hours of the day, and recorded for review otherwise. These monitors are visible from the S2's desk (directly across on the starboard wall) and the station set just in front of them. One of the feeds always on display is a feed of the Brig. Other secure areas have been wired in since warday. A Colonial Marine Corps flag hangs proudly in the corner, accompanied by pictures of Marines in action and paintings depicting famous battles of the Cylon War and other actions. An armored door at the far end of the room displays in bright white lettering 'Primary Small Arms,' and holds the main locker for storing the rifles and explosives aboard. A hatch midway through the room leads into the Small Arms Range.



The SecHub is…well, it's the SecHub. There's not much more to be said about it. Ezra'a desk is still draped with the flag and there's coffee still percolating (bubbling?) in the pot. Epi's now cleaned up and set for a shift in here, sitting the desk while the Sergeant goes to take a break.

The hatch opens, and a nameless enlisted from the support department drops off an empty storage crate, leaving it just on the desk sergeant's desk. "Delivery for the S2." The crate is clearly empty, the top open and tipped into the body of the box. It's about two by two feet, and would be familiar to anyone who'd put items in storage before, or had parts of their belongings called out from storage within the ship. "Just give us a memo when it's ready to go back." The young man nods, then steps out without another word. Drive by delivery.

Dell is in the Sec Hub having been assigned to sit in here and watch how things work so he can learn first hand how things work in the SecHub and to his luck he has been set to follow Epi tonight. He stands near Epi as he looks up at the flag and then to the coffee. "So, we just stand here and watch people?" He grunts out as his right about twists up, "What are our other duties?" He then looks over at the crate.

It's about a minute later that Salazar steps into the Sec Hub. She wears standard issue sweats, but has her sidearm strapped to her thigh as usual. It looks a little odd, wearing the black holster over grey sweats, but say that to her face. She pulls the hatch behind her and glances briefly around. "Marines." Then she heads back toward the CO's desk.

Cinder's in the SecHub as well…off patrol from another part of the ship. "Well, typically, low-man on the totem pole is responsible for making sure this…" she says, tapping the coffee machine. "You have to make sure there's always something brewing, so that when you come off patrol, you don't fall asleep at your desk…or at least that's what I've found." When the S2 walks in, Cinder's pouring herself a cup, planning to pop into the SAR and reload mags to pass the time. "Evening, Sir," Cinder nods to Salazar as she enters. "Package for you, it looks like."

The woman who's supposed to be providing the answers to Dell pauses as Cinder answers, lips parted slightly, then she closes her mouth and pulls to attention. "CO on deck," she announces quietly, back stiff. No familiarity, odd.

Dell looks over at Cinder and he listens as he says gruffly, "I make coffee." Eyes fall on the coffeemaker and he nods his head to Cinder. Then when the S2 comes in Dell does what Epi does since he is shadowing her.

Sal brushes a hand over the flag that covers the desk, then glances over. "Brand." Her greeting is somewhat flat. She picks up the corners of the flag over one side. "As you were." The response to the call is almost absent minded. She tugs, and the flag slides from the surface of the desk. "Trip, you're the tallest marine in the room. Hang this flag back up on the wall." She holds it up, keeping the corners off of the deck.

Epi goes to a parade rest next to the desk, just watching the flag. No, she's not watching Sal or Cinder or Dell - she's watching the flag, and likely what it represents. She's still for a time, utterly so, then moves over to get the storage container, carrying it over to where the S2 is standing with all due care.

"Need any help with that, Sir?" Cinder asks the S2, as she watches the flag being slid off the desk. She's not entirely sure if it should be allowed to touch the floor, but she doesn't seem to want that to happen anyway. She can't say she was especially close to the Major, but she's not totally immune to the effects that his loss is having on everyone, herself included.

Dell picks up the flag and he walks over to first pick the flag up as he walks over to put it in position. He stands on his tiptoes and he stretches his arms up and he after a few moments of struggling and the phrase, "Son of a bitch!", is muttered three times the flag before the goes up since the farmer is good with physical labor. Dell steps back to make sure the flag is hanging correctly and indeed it is not, he moves to grab a chair which he climbs up on to straighten the flag. After climbing down from the chair he looks over at his handywork, "Done and done, sir."

"Looks like Trip's got it under control, Brand." Salazar reaches down her shirt and slides out a slim, flexible leather case out. She moves around behind the desk, and kneels down behind it. There's the soft sound of metal on metal. "Thanks, Jarot." It's about thirty two seconds before the drawer opens. "Rusty," mutters the tattooed woman. She reaches in, and pulls out a stack of things. "Good work, Trip." She doesn't even look up. She must sense the flag is hanging straight. A bottle of whiskey is set on the desk first, followed by some papers, a book, and a small leather bag that rattles as it's tossed to the surface of the desk. Salazar pulls out a revolver last, kicks the drawer closed, and moves to sit in the CO's chair. "Brand, check the bag if you have a minute. Jarot, the papers." Salazar turns the revolver over in her hands.

Epi's not really up to saying much for reasons which are obvious to some, not so much to others. "Yes, Sir," she tells Sal, glancing over at the S2 briefly. Around to the other side of the desk she goes. The process of separating out the papers begins. Personal, professional, none of the above. There are three very neat piles placed out. They're almost obsessively neat.

Cinder grabs a chair and takes the bag. Untying the leather strap at the top she reaches in, and begins to pull out dogtags. For a moment, she reads each one as she pulls them out, looking at the names; they're not names she's familiar with at all from Kharon, nobody living or dead in this ship's Marine contingent that she can recall.

Dell moves to stand at position as he watches all of this happen. Eyes look over everything that is pulled out. He then walks over to the coffee maker and he pours a cup of coffee as he huffs noticing that the S2 didn't look, "Thanks, sir." Does he care, not really, though the straight flag does look nice and patriotic.

Salazar checks the ammo load. "Two rounds." She empties the weapon, then sets it on the desk. The bullets are set on the desk standing up. She reaches for the book. It's a thick scripture. Translation of the cover lists it as a book of the Cult of Demeter. She pages through, but nothing strikes her interest, so she flips the book closed. Demeter. Creepy. "Anything interesting or porn related?"

If it's possible, Epi goes even more still as she discovers something in the pile of papers. She simply stares for a moment at a crayon drawing, then reaches out to brush her fingers lightly over the surface, barely skimming it. Nope, Marines don't cry. But those present can practically see the little one break. "Sir," she says softly to Salazar, carefully putting a crayon sketch over and one under a small sheaf of papers. "I think you'll need these. They're from an ongoing investigation." Her voice remains steady.

"Nothing remotely related here, Sir. A bunch of tags from Marines I've never heard of…presumably, likely deceased, seeing as how they're being kept in a little bag like this. Not Kharon marines, at least." Though she can't see the drawing, Cinder can see how Epi responds to whatever it she found, and so she subsequently tries to take a peek, wondering what investigation it might pertain to…there being one or two of unsolved nature.

Dell who is standing near Epi with his coffee gets a puzzled look on his face as she becomes emotional and he spots the drawing as he looks a little more puzzled but he remains quiet. Eyes shift to the book and then over to Cinder as she mentions the tags and he takes a sip of his coffee.

Salazar rises, and moves around the desk to stand beside Epi, rather than have the paper passed over. "Jarot." She says the name softly, and moves up to stand beside the shorter marine. She holds her hand out for the paper only when she's well within Epi's personal bubble. "Cass lost a lot of marines. Could be Bellerophon personnel. We have a couple of marines aboard from the Elpis. Brand, if you could investigate further."

Strange, isn't it, that Epi doesn't seem to mind Salazar in her bubble. In fact, she closes some of the distance and hands the papers over, looking up at the other woman for a long moment. She's silent, as a good Marine should be, but some communication passes between them. The nod is faint. The papers that got passed over? Well, oddly enough, they're crayon drawings. It's not like she's trying to hide them, she's just being cautious. Then she goes about separating the rest of the papers. A fourth stack gets created - for the crayon drawings.

Salazar's eyes go to Jarot's, and she sorts through what she was handed, eyes skimming down. She pages through them briefly, pausing longest on the second one. That's only about two seconds, before she flips to the third page, and nods. "I hadn't seen these before. It looks like the Major was keeping his own notes on the Ozymandias case. Thank you." Her hand touches to Epi's shoulder briefly before the taller marine steps back. She slides the papers neatly into her other hand, then goes back to the S2's station to pull an empty folder from a stack in an unlocked drawer.

Dell would speak since there are a whole lot of names that are dropped that he is unfamiliar with but he is watching everything play out and he is keeping watch over the room, yup, another marine keeping quiet as he takes mental notes on what the procedure is when a CO dies, which is sort of creepy.

"Will do, Sir," Cinder says with a nod. She's at least familiar with one Marine that she knows was present on Elpis, the ship she was on. She'll have to make it a point to find him and ask him some questions related to the tags…but for the moment, it's going to be a little creepy carrying them around. "Think I might leave there here until I can get around to asking…uh…Torres?"

Epi continues with the sorting and separating until everything is done. Once she's finished, she turns to Salazar, hands on the crayon sketches. "I've got four piles, Sir," she says quietly. "Personal, professional, not sure, and Ca…" Yep, there she goes. Her voice stutters. "And Cass' drawings that he gave his grandfather."

"You could write down a few names and take him a list. We can add the tags to our collection." Salazar pauses before sliding the papers, in a folder, under her arm. she nods to Cinder. Yep, they have a collection of dogtags pulles from deceased marines. You never know when there will be a family to return them to. She pulls a few more folders, and passes them over to Epi when she steps close to the CO's desk again. "If you'd like to look after the drawings? I'll keep the rest locked up in my desk." She glances over to Dell then. "Trip, any questions?"

"Right now, I've gotta ton of 'em, sir, but the only one I'm going to ask is do we do this for everyone that dies and if so who is normally assigned to this kind of duty?" He takes a sip of coffee and his body shifts a bit and his head cocks to the side to show that he is listening and paying attention to what is going on around him.

For the moment, Cinder nods and settles herself at one of the desks in the SecHub, tags in one hand, coffee in the other. From one of the pockets of her duty gear, she withdraws a small pad of paper, and flips through to a clean sheet. On said clean sheet, she begins to write down the names on the tags, so she can ask Torres about them later. On the pages prior to that, there are notes about Ashe's case. Time to write a memo, since the S2 doesn't seem to be in a mood to discuss that.

"Not all marines practice the flag draping. The duration of the period or mourning varies by location, space, ability, and desire. My family is full of marines, and we're traditionalists." Salazar touches the desk, and then glances over toward the flag. "Traditionally, the CO's desk is draped with the Corps flag when he is lost. In wartime, this is often a period of a few hours rather than days. I prefer three days, but went four since there is no pressing need to swap our desks." In other words, no other officers are coming up to take her desk, so she waited. "It's simply a show of respect and reminder to every marine, as they come in for a duty rotation, to remember what we fight for."

Epi offers Salazar a little smile and takes the folders offered. The crayon sketches are treated like gold - of course. The rest of the pages are tucked into their proper folders and neatly labeled. Yes, she even takes a folder for the sketches. "If it's alright, Sir," she asks Salazar, glancing at the other woman. Yep, she's asking to be dismissed. "Trip can stay to shadow Brand."

Salazar nods to Epi. "Dismissed, Jarot."

Dell listens and he nods his head softly as he takes all of the information in and he suddenly understands why he put the flag up was important and he simply says, "Thank you, sir." He steps over to Cinder since he has been reassigned. He is quiet in reverence for the dead though his eyes flick over to Epi since he figures out she must have known a child who died. It took him a second but the lightbulb went off.

Salazar glances over to the flag once more, then steps over to her old desk to lock up the other files. She'll need to see about getting a key for the CO's desk so she doesn't have to pick it every time. That could get tendious. "Brand, you have the Sec Hub until Brandy finds his way back from the Head." She indicates the empty Sarge's desk. Sal scoops up the bottle of whiskey from the desk, and tucks the book into a top drawer before she also grabs the revolver. That's going with her. It's practically a relic. "Trip, the range is yours. Inspection in the morning. Thank you for the assistance." That's said to the three marines present, then she turns to follow Jarot out.

"Very good Sir," Cinder nods at the S2. For the moment, she's got quite a bit of writing to do, what with the list of names, and the memo and all. She takes a look around, making sure things look to be in order, at least on the surface. "You should make sure all the mags are loaded with range ammo, clean up all the trashed target sheets, and make sure the place is tidy. That's my advice," she says to Dell.

Dell watches Epi leave and his eyes shift to the S2 as she mentions the firing range, "Score." Then the word inspection rings in his ears and his brows furrow a little, "That range is gonna look great." Yup, he looks over at Cinder, "Thanks. Getting up all those rubber bullets up is gonna be a pain in the ass."

"The real trick is making sure nobody wants to shoot while you're trying to clean," Cinder jokes. "For the moment though, I'll leave you to it. We've all gotta start somewhere. I did…and most people on duty here take time stocking up in the range and all to pass the time." She continues to write on the memo and all, leaving Dell to his duties.

Dell grunts, "Someone shoots me and I will shoot that bastard back." He then says, "See ya back in the berthings."



CEC Kharon, Deck 2, Hallway, Fore
IC Time: Post Holocaust Day #236
OOC Time: Fri Dec 11 01:53:34 2009


The hallways of the CEC Kharon are a nondescript battleship grey, functional and plain. Dull white lighting is inset into each archway and runs along the ceiling in recessed holds, illuminating the steel painted interior, and the occasional oxygen scrubber along the walls. Storage crates, in a matching dark grey scheme, are located here and there along these corridors, containing items of use for various nearby departments.



Salazar steps out of the Sec Hub rubbing a hand over her face. She grunts briefly to the MPs stationed outside of it, then turns to head for the stairwell, tucking something down the hip of her sweats.

Epi's just to one side of the door, quiet, but then she falls into step behind Salazar. "Sir," she calls, voice low. Those MPs better mind their own damned business.

Salazar blinks once, then drops her hand and glances over. "Jarot." She steps away from the MPs, so that she and Epi can talk briefly across the corridor, outside of polite listening range.

The littlest Marine, once they're out of easy sight and hearing, reaches out to touch the other woman's arm. "You're doing a great job, Sir," she says softly. "Thank you, for that and for everything."

Salazar's smile is brief, but genuine. She nods and then drops a hand on the little marine's shoulder, and gives a squeeze. The contact lingers before she finally says. "Thank you, Corporal. I know… things have been tough. And I know that it can be hard to move forward with all that we've lost. I appreciate your professionalism, and your candor." She glances down at the folder, and her lips part again, but she doesn't say anything about Cass.

The folder is head close to Epi's heart. Who's surprised? "Death is a bitch," she says softly. "Senseless accidents make it worse. But we'll keep moving on." Yeah, they will, though Epi looks like utter shit. She's been trying to hide it, but the woman looks like hell. "Get some rest, Sir. I'll try to keep the kids in the corral. If not, I've got duct tape."

"Get some rest yourself, Jarot. We have a busy couple of weeks ahead of us, and it's going to take a lot to adjust. We will overcome. But you're one of the most reliable marines I've got." Salazar's hand retreats after another soft squeeze. "Take care of you."

Epi pulls off a salute, then turns to head toward the berthings, moving slowly, holding the folder a bit more tightly.

Salazar watches Epi go for but a moment, then turns to head into the stairwell. Destination: Unknown.

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