[[This happened a few weeks ago on October 15th. enjoy]]
“Listen, the sign of a good leader is someone who can take command and is willing to take responsibility. The sign of a great leader is someone who can do all of that, and knows when to let go and move on. And right now that’s what keeps Foos from being a great leader. He has no problem getting the respect from the men, but he doesn’t know when to let go. Look what happened with Richards. Foos had know way of knowing, that kid padded his qualifications, he had know way of knowing the kid had never docked a fighter to a ship in space before. If anything it was my fault, I was the one that hired him; I was the one that should have checked him out. But he died on Foos watch, so now in his mind it’s his fault and it will always be his fault and nothing anyone can say will ever change that.
I had hoped at someday Foos would take over the ship and keep the business going, but he can’t he’s just not that good of a leader to do, at least now he isn’t. Maybe if he learns to let go, to understand not everything is his responsibility.
But it really doesn’t matter; Foos is looking to leave soon. He hasn’t told me, and I know he won’t tell me until he’s ready. But his days as a star-runner are coming to an end he’ll be a planet-walker soon enough.
I just hope he finds what he’s looking for.”
The words of his father echo through the canyon of his unconscious, and he laid there restless replaying the conversation that he wasn’t meant to hear.
The image of his younger self working in one of the many maintenance tunnels and over hearing his father’s conversation quickly shifted to a small fighter craft crashing into the ships hanger, as Foos watched helpless watching the event take place on the control monitor.
Foos awoke with a jolt making him sit upright. He was sweating and disoriented. How long was I asleep? He thought to himself as he looked around to get his bearings. He was sitting in his Borealis apartment he could barely remember walking there. He spoke aloud to himself, “Sometimes I hate coming back from the Shadowlands they take so much out of me”… His thought was cut short by an incoming transmission. Since his com was off he knew before looking at the call sign it was Cylie, she was the only one who could contact him as long as he was wearing the com unit, it would automatically be turned on by either her signal or voice. Still in a haze he answered the incoming call.
“Foos are you there?” her voice sounded tired and stressed.
“Yes Love. I’m here is everything ok?” he asked in a reassuring voice.
“Yes. Well no, everything is so crazy because of all that has happened. We’re short handed and to make matter worse I have three ships here that need to loaded and out in two and a half hours and I can’t get these guys to work, they’ve been screwing off all day. If you’re not too busy do you think you could come down and give me a hand on the docks?” her voice sounding frustrated and worried as she asked him.
“Sure, I’m at your disposal anything you need I’ll do. I’m not sure how much help I’ll be, but I’ll do my best” he replied to her, having no clue what he was getting him self into. It didn’t matter she needed help and he swore an oath to stand by her no matter what.
“I’m sure you’ll do fine, I’ll see you when you get here” she said to him, her voice sound a little more reassured as she shut her com off.
He left his apartment shortly after their conversation and made his way to Trade and the Omni-Trans building. As he approached the OT building and stopped dead in his tracks for a moment as the memory of the evil machine that came and took Cylie away all thanks to that blond headed twit, Sotto. Foos could never prove Sotto was behind Cylie’s questioning, but in someway or another he knew he had something to do with it. “Sotto you bastard!” he thought to himself “why did you have to pick now to loose your mind?” He pictured an unflattering image of Sotto standing there in the meeting spouting out “She’s an omega, here’s some crappy photos and a trinket I found to prove it.” Foos shakes his head trying not to laugh. He knew he shouldn’t laugh about it, this was a serious matter. He knew Cylie believed Sotto as well as Tom, but he was still unsure himself. “Sotto why couldn’t you be a good little Omni and just do your damn job. Maybe I could be home with Cylie instead of coming here to help her do your job, you twit.” Foos thought to himself trying not to get angry at the situation, the last thing he wanted was to give Cylie more stress, his job is to help out not to make things worse. “Maybe he worked too much, the man barely had any kind of social life, maybe that put him over the edge and started him chasing shadows.” He shook his head one more time trying to clear his mind so he could focus on his next task, helping his wife. Part of him couldn’t help but feel bad for Sotto, even thought he is a pompous bureaucrat and his latest stunt has made Foos’ life needless complicated, nobody deserved be going where he is going to be going.
Foos entered the Omni-Trans building and was met by a mass of commotion, people scurrying about carrying papers and files, repair crews patching up the walls and cleaning up the blood left by Tom’s group. He had been to the Omni-Trans many times in the past to see Cylie and had never once experienced the dismay currently being played out before him. He weaved his way through the chaos making his way to the front desk. He waited there for a few seconds letting the receptionist catch her breath. She saw him there waiting patiently. She took a moment to trying to neaten up her messy hair. She looked at Foos and an in a pleasant tone she said, “Thank you for coming to Omni-Trans. Please excuse our mess as we are currently going through some changes. How may I help you today?”
Foos looked at her for a moment, surprised and impressed with ability to regain composure so quickly and said, “Hello, I’m Mr. Cross I am here to help out, Mrs. Cross should be expecting me.”
“Oh yes Mr. Cross, if you could please place your thumb on the scanner here for verification.”
Foos takes his thumb as asked and places it on the scanner, almost immediately his ID is verified.
She smiles at him and says, “I have everything you need right here.” She starts digging through the mess of papers and boxes on her desk. “Just one moment please, it was just right here” she smiles and continues to look. “Here it is”, she hands Foos an electronic pad and ID badge. “Use this pad, it will give you directions to the docking hangers and this ID will give you temporary command access and authority”.
“Command authority?” he asked her with a puzzled look on his face.
“Yes Mr. Cross, you have full command authority over the docks. As of right now you are the acting dock supervisor. Now please make sure you follow the directions on the pad, due to a recent mishap some of the passages ways have been closed down for repairs. Have a nice day, and remember Omni is your friend.” After speaking she returned to her previous work, and didn’t pay attention to Foos’ blank stair.
Foos takes the direction pad in hand and follows the path giving too him. Along the way he sees repair bots and workers patching up holes in the walls. He thinks to him self, “More of Tom and his men’s handy work. And what about Tom, now that he’s off Sotto’s leash, could Cylie be in danger. Judging by the damage done here he doesn’t seem to think much about the Omni-Trans employees that decided not to follow him. Besides I know he hates Cylie, I’m sure he would love nothing more then to put a bullet in her head, especially now she has Sotto’s job. I’m going to have to keep my eyes open, even though he did tell me last night he had not plans to go after Cylie. Still I would be the last person he would tell if he did. I need to keep a close watch on things and listen to what he says on the node. I’m not even sure if I can take him in a fight. No! I can’t allow that kind of thinking, if he means any harm to Cylie then I have to stop him at all costs. But I also can’t go running off the handle, track him down in the Shadowlands and strike him first, that could make matters much worse. I’ll just have to wait a bit and see what happens next.”