trans_9 | Exhaustion!

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Exhaustion!

After fighting in a massive planetary battle -- well, less 'fighting' and more 'healing people, occasionally from literal death' -- the Akashic was, in a word, exhausted.

Not necessarily physically; regardless of how grueling shifts in Medbay might be at the moment, he made a point to stick to his schedule, sleep plenty, eat (ugh) enough gruel, and keep his body in shape. Not necessarily mentally either; good health and self-care, along with meditation and discipline, helped in that matter as well.

There was just a certain level of core, deep, ground-in exhaustion that couldn't be banished that easily, though. So that left only one thing to do for the best relaxation:

Snowboard in the sensorium.

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"I've been doing it for years. It comes from growing up on a mountain with a bunch of other physical exercise maniacs," he said, grinning. "It's about as fun as it gets, if you don't mind cold and the occasional fall."

"I see. It did seem entertaining, not something I'd do however. Though I'm not against a bit of relaxation after an exhausting battle." She was thinking of heading to the bathhouse herself once she was sure there wouldn't be too many in the area.

"You're missing out." He winked, though that was as far as he'd take the issue. Everyone had different standards of fun, after all. "Relaxation, definitely. I don't know if it was more frustrating to deal with all the healing, or just to not be fighting myself, directly."

"Everyone has their strengths. I'm sure those who you helped would tell you how much they appreciated your healing." Her? She was more of a fighter, always had been ever since she vowed to never lose to anyone.

"Oh, I know, but I just have all this martial arts training and I feel like it's a shame not to use it," he said. "I went where I was needed and could do the most good, but it wasn't my personal preference, you know?"

"We don't always get what we prefer in life. Sometimes we just have to deal with it."

"Or find a way to change it," he responded.

How often did that refrain come up? 'Life sucks, deal with it' or some variant. And yet so often, people used it as an excuse to accept, to settle into passivity and apathy, rather than step up and make a change...

"Not everyone has that luxury. What would have happened should you have decided to fight instead of heal? There very well could have been someone who picked up your healing and kept everyone safe, but there could have also been more deaths than previously."

She was one to do as she pleased, regardless of orders at times, but she understood that you sometimes didn't have a choice in the things set before you...

"I said changing it, not denying reality," he said. "If I wanted to change things, I'd train in some discipline or weapon that would allow me to take the fight to the Ohm, right?"

"Well considering there's not much known about the Ohm in the first place, I'd gather you'd have to do the research first to find out the most effective way to eliminate them and then concentrate on such." She wouldn't mind being part of said research, anything to get her stronger than her enemy.

"Well, we do have an Armory full of weapons. One of them HAS to be useful against them," he said, just tossing out an example.

"Not necessarily. Without the proper research, we won't know what's the most effective way of disposing of them." Having experienced quite a failure in her world when the armies of every nation unleashed all their weapons against the Novas only to fail...

"The way I hear it, there's so many different types, some of them have to be weak to pretty much anything we could do." Besides, they wouldn't load the ship up with assault weaponry that was ineffective in its entirely.

"True, but I heard that this last battle also carried with it advanced forms never seen before. That means they're adapting, and unless we do the same, we're going to lose." It was cold hard facts, ingrained into her during her own world's war against the Novas.

"Of course. That's warfare. They learn, we learn. They adapt, we adapt. We came out it better than they did, that's for sure." A loss of one, versus all they were facing? As tragic as it was, no one could argue that they'd been very lucky.

"Oh no, I agree wholeheartedly with that statement. We had an overwhelming victory compared to them, even if we add the losses the GIA had. I'm just concerned about the direction the crew will take from now on."

"Any reason why?" He hadn't seen a colossal reason to be worried, yet, but quite admittedly he'd been in Medbay, or trying to relax, not out and about getting opinions and information.

"People have a tendency to overlook things like that, specially after a victory. They get comfortable in the fact that they won and don't bother questioning things or moving forward."

"We lost someone, and everyone is taking it pretty hard, I feel," he said, somber. "I don't think that's too much to worry about."

"I suppose. Though it was one loss, maybe I just don't understand the connection the person had with the crew, but as far as out team goes, the loss doesn't override the fact that we need to be making preparations for the future and such."

She pauses for a moment and looks up for a few, "I guess it's fine to have grieving time. It's just not important to me."

"The connection? They were a crew member, here, the same as all of us. I don't know that too much more is needed." He shook his head. Having not put much effort into grieving himself, he nevertheless understood the connection. And the feeling that it could have been any of them.

She shrugged, that wasn't enough, not to someone who had been practically bred for war. A loss is a loss yes, but to simply think of it as a moment to grieve for everyone just wasn't for her. Maybe if she had grown close to them.

"I understand, it must have been painful for his loved ones." that, she could understand.

"For everyone, more or less. The attitude that it could have been any one of us, easily," he said. "Moreover, the fact that it was a sacrifice..."

She frowned, "There's no such thing as sacrifice in war. Only duty. It's the duty of the soldiers to give their all for the success of the mission. Had the crew member not carried through with it, another would have surely done so. And if not? Then we had already lost the war before it started."

Sacrifice, she disliked that word, specially when it came to organizations like hers. That word didn't exist, it was do or don't, there were no martyrs, there were no heroes, only the good and the bad Pandoras.

"That's not such an easy question to answer, though," Morgan said. "It's easy to decide a suicide run is the answer, and maybe it solves the short-term problem, but what about the long? Sure, the Firewyrm fell, but not without some emotional damage to the crew that was left behind, and who knows what will happen in the future that might have been prevented or ameliorated if the sacrifice hadn't been made? Was there another way that it could have gone, some other method that wouldn't have cost a life?

"We'll never know the answers to those questions, only what ended up happening," he said quietly. "That can be rough."

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