Serving Kusari

[Teta]

Ordered to appear in front of her superior officer, Teta Nakamura entered his office, wondering what this would be about, since no topic was given beforehand.

She saluted to the captain in front of her, who had also stood up from the chair behind his desk to return the salute: "Commander Teta Nakamura at your service, Captain." The captain offered the seat in front of his desk to her with a gesture of his arm, before slowly taking place himself again. So she sat down, waiting what the Captain would have to say.

"Commander...", he started, pronouncing her rank like in disgust, "Nakamura, right." He took a pause to inspect her more closely for a while, seeing her rising confusion with satisfaction.

"Let us be frank, Nakamura-san: I... am sure you are a valuable asset for the Naval Forces, and we are honored to have you with us." Despite his words, he sounded, not without intention, completely indifferent while saying this. "But", as his voice took a very sharp tone, "your performance as of late seems to be severly lacking, and you are not showing the skill we would expect of someone with your rank, and your responsibility."

His words shocked Nakamura, as she would have not believed it to be like this. Surely, with the overwhelming amount of threats to Kusari as of late, there was no battle to be clearly won. And about the subordinates of her who preferred not following her orders, she always assumed that they would only be a result of the generally low morale, resulting in this unruly behavior. But as the Captain blamed her, she started to believe it must partially be her fault.

Since the Captain again took a dramatic pause, she decided to speak: "But we are currently understaffed and..." The Captain interrupted her sentence: "This is not the time for making excuses, Nakamura! Exactly because of this, the Naval Forces are in need of competent officers right now, capable of taking command." He took another moment to watch the desperation showing from her expression. "And, you see, Nakamura-san, this is why I say: a woman, like you, should not have become Commander right now, and I urge you to fill in a request to be transfer to a different position, and to resign from your current rank."

The Captain looked at her insistently with a serious expression on his face, waiting for an answer. Intimidated by him, Nakamura did not know what to say at first, but decided to not give in this quickly, taking heart from the fact that Jiro was there to support her. "Ca-Captain, I just recently started in this new assignment. And, I am certain that soon..."

Seeing that Nakamura was still talking back, he interrupted her again: "Nakamura-san... Nakamura-san.", he repeated in a presumptuous tone while shaking his head, before folding his hands in front of his face, "You see... there is more: a very aspiring officer from your wing reported me, in detail, about you... and Taiyouji san. I am sure you understand that a person with the rank of yours is far more likely to have... private matters made public. Do I need to continue?"

His approach left her entirely downhearted, as she began to understand his motivations more clearly. While forming a 'But...' with her mouth, she could not give any voice to it. Realizing that the Captain had her cornered, she looked down in defeat.

Seeing her like this, the Captain asked her in a satisfied tone: "I hope to have your request on my desk soon. And please keep in mind that this conversation was confidential."

With that, the Captain stood up again, raising his arm towards the door: "So, have a good day, Nakamura-san.", while smiling at her confidently. Teta was still sitting in her chair vacantly, as she realized the Captain was already about to throw her out again. She slowly raised while stuttering "Ha-Hai...", before weakly saluting at the Captain to keep up appearances, what he returned, still smiling.

Teta then turned to leave the room. Once outside, she had to lean against the wall, because her body felt all numb, as much as she herself felt helpless at this moment. Turning her face towards the wall to hide her miserable expression, and her tears, she had to rest for a while. Thrown between anger and sadness, she did not know what to do anymore. She could not even talk to Jiro about it, not because of the confidentiality, but because he might feel guilty for it, given the circumstances.

Returning to her room, she quietly started to write her note of resignation and the request to be transferred, at least hoping to not meet the Captain again.