Administration Error

Posted on 05 Apr 2026 @ 11:22pm by Lieutenant Ryan Collingway & Lieutenant Kristin Emerson PhD, Counselor
Edited on on 06 Apr 2026 @ 12:07am

2,135 words; about a 11 minute read

Mission: Arawyn’s Itchy Trigger Finger

// USS Arawyn //

For first time, Ryan postponed his scheduled appointment with Emerson.

Then he did it again a few days later. And again.

His intentions were good. There were probably dozens, if not more crew members who were dealing with trauma. Of loss. His mandated therapy could wait. Her scheduled had to be pretty full right now. At least, so he told himself.

Dr Emerson to Lieutenant Collingway. Lieutenant, I’m missing you from my schedule again. Please contact me at your easiest convenience, perhaps immediately.

Emerson sent the message with great respect for the work Ryan Collingway had done for to save the ship, so it was a texted message as opposed to an immediate verbal interruption to his day. However, she was quite concerned that he had missed three sessions. Three sessions too many, for after two missed mandatory sessions, she was required to include that in her report which would end up on Starfleet Medical’s "reading list". That would not be any kind of benefit to his overall records. They would not take into account the troubles of a starship in a challenging situation. They went by the book. So she was already fudging to say she had personally excused the second one after notification that he was detained and had been rescheduled for today.

She had been very busy. Lots of sleeplessness and nightmares on the ship, everyone from the senior officers to the kitchen staff who had dropped a carton of 24 uncooked eggs on the mess hall floor when the deck lurched beneath her feet. But she would have made space for Ryan Collingway regardless. He had been making good progress in understanding how counseling and therapy actually worked and she could see a glimmer of recognition and surprise to learn things about himself that helped him do his job better. In fact, she would venture to say that the Ryan Collingway who walked into her office the first session would not have been the one to take the initiative in that critical moment. She returned to making notes in his file to that effect.

Her com chimed as requested. "Sorry doctor, I've been busy with repairs," Ryan said quickly, then added after a beat. "I'm sure you've been busy as well.”

“I am. Aren’t we all? I assumed it was work related. I’m just checking to be sure you can come in for today’s session.”

Ryan had definitely been poised to reschedule a fourth time, and hesitated. Despite all his perceived progress, he was still stuck in mandated therapy. And he knew Emerson wasn't the type to let him play around with that for long. She could easily pull rank, or pull him off duty among other things. Yet so far she hadn't done so. He released a hint of a sigh. "I'll be there," he agreed.


//Dr. Emerson's Office///

Ryan arrived at the agreed upon time. "Apologies for rescheduling," he said simply. "It's not been a good time.”

“Well, you know, in an ordinary world, where warp cores are unlikely to blow and no strangers are shooting at you, a therapist would require the client to abide by her hours of availability. But we are clearly not in that ordinary world, are we? So, you let me know when you are available, and I’ll adjust my schedule. And just in case you think I’m doing this special for you, I am not. I have done it for others as well. So, if you need to be late, let me know, we will work with that. Understood?"

"Yes, I can manage that," Ryan said, though part of him knew it had more than just himself being busy. This particular incident was hard to talk about.

“So, how effectively do you feel you have been handling the mental stress and emotional repercussions of this whole adventure in no-man’s-land? As on a scale of 1 to 10, ten being just sailing through without a single hitch,” asked Kris. “Try to be honest with yourself. You know you can’t bullshit me.”

"It has been stressful," Ryan admitted. "But maybe a bit easier for me when compared to others. It hasn't been my first time seeing a ship under attack. At the same time, I had other people who helped me get through it. So maybe a 5 or 6."

"I think what I still struggle with is just...how quickly we lost our sense of security. It was just supposed to be a simple weapons test. And then, a second later, people were dead. The CEO was dying. And only a force field around the warp core prevented most of us from being instantly killed in Engineering.”

Kris nodded in both agreement, and with respect for his analysis of not only the 5 to 6 on a scale of ten, but with the insight into the real issue, fear and the instantaneous shift from a place of power and apparent sovereignty to a position of disaster. “Kind of like having the rug pulled out from under you and you are suddenly on the floor with broken bones. And for you, this is the 2nd catastrophic, ship-wide disaster you’ve lived through. Other people on this ship have been in battles before, but this has been a very costly and traumatic event, wherein our perceived safety and control was doused in, as you say, a mere second of time. How can you ever trust that rug again, that floor? I’m interested to know your thoughts on how you process that?

Ryan blinked at the question, and looked away. "There isn't a process," he said simply. "I just never trust the rug ever again. Engineering is critical to a ship being run. It's always going to be a target when under attack. At least, if our opponents are intelligent enough. I can't change that.”

“That is a true statement and valuable knowledge. You have to continue to live with that truth. If another crewman were having trouble dealing with that mistrust to the point their job efficiency was compromised, and they came to you for support or advice, what might you tell them? And that’s not a trick question, though I know it sounds a bit like it might be. I honestly want to know what you would tell someone who could not quite get their legs under them after this mess.”

"That's already kind of happened," Ryan said. "Lieutenant Quinn has been talking about transferring back to the Starbase, after what happened to Commander Sorvak. I tried to do what I could do to convince her otherwise, but..." He sighed. "She always felt like it was too dangerous to be out here even before all of this."

"I'm not in charge of Engineering," Ryan said firmly after a moment. "If someone from my own department came to me with that question, I would tell them to talk to the Chief about it. I'm sure he could come up with a speech. He's good at that kind of thing.”

“And that person replies I’m not asking the Chief. I’m asking one of my peers. I want to hear from someone in a similar position to myself. Not some high and mighty Chief. And it doesn’t have to be good. It just has to be true.” replied Kris, firmly.

"Because lying about things hasn't worked too well for me on this ship so far," Ryan said bitterly. He was getting annoyed by this question. "Ugh, fine. I would say that the odds of us being caught completely unawares again are statistically very low. The chances of us being attacked by some randomized, piece of junk defense grid in the middle of nowhere which decided to try and kill us because our shields were down are also staggeringly low. And if we ever do a field test on our weapons systems again, I'm sure the command team will kindly do it in a place where our sensors won't be jammed up at the same time. And believe me I will be very close to the 'raise shields button' the next time they do."

Kris’s expression remained neutral. “Good answer. Now feel into that anger. Are you angry at me, or at Command? It’s okay either way, but examine that anger and see where it really originates.”

Ryan thought about it, then sighed. "I'm angry about the senselessness of it all. An old defense system that decide to fire on us for no reason at all, just because our shields were down. No warning. No intelligence behind it. Nothing. I can't even say that it was an enemy that had a grudge against Starfleet. It just decided we were different, and killed three people on the ship for no reason and injured several others. I'm sure it made sense for someone to make it years ago, but whoever it was just decided to leave it as a hazard to everyone else. That's why I'm angry."

Internally, Kris was elated. He was starting to actually feel his feelings and to own his feelings. But she kept her countenance neutral. “That anger can be channeled as motivation, as power to change things. I’m curious, how do you feel about being in charge of Engineering at the moment?”

"It's...interesting. Terrifying during the emergency, but I had a great deal of help to get me through it," he said, and started to fidget a little. "A while ago Lelina...Lieutenant Evans wanted to train me in the role of assistant chief engineering officer. She gave me the initial codes to start. But ultimately she transferred off before she could talk about it with the Captain."

Ryan looked away briefly. "Then Commander Harlan came on board and our first real interaction was in the drunk tank. Between him and Lieutenant Caldwell it was very clear I was not being considered for that position any longer. I thought he deleted the codes from my file. But he told me during one of our meetings that he hadn't bothered to go through the personnel files yet."

"So...." he concluded. "The only reason I was able to jump-start the warp core and potentially save the ship was due to...administration error. But I'm sure it's a conversation the Commander will have with me when he's out of sickbay. And once he and Caldwell are out of sickbay, I will probably not be in that position again for a while. Since the correct people are back, I mean."

Kris cocked her head to the right, brows raised in acknowledgment. “I would expect Cmdr Harlan to take your leadership role into very serious consideration when he returns. Administrative error be damned. You recognized what you needed to do, and had the means to do, and took responsibility for that. You acted. That’s not something to scoff at, Ryan. That’s level headed in a crisis and it took incredible courage, whether you thought about that at the time or not. It was not an act of mindless desperation, though again, at the time, might have seemed so. It was calculated in a split second. It was quite amazing and it saved the ship so we are here to discuss it. That’s at least as qualifying as leadership as Cmdr Harlan taking the brunt of that explosion upon himself instead of backing off and letting someone less able to deal with it take the hit. Take a deep breath of that truth. Suck it into your heart center, into your gut.”

"I'll try," Ryan promised. "Commander Harlan is a hard man to please." He smiled a little. "Guess that's the self-doubt in me talking as well. Like I said, I had plenty of help as well in Engineering. We were a good team. Alura also stopped in as well, to give me a moment to breathe. It was appreciated. I couldn't have done any of it without them."

“And Cmdr Harlan clearly can’t do it on his own either. He depends upon you and the rest of engineering. We’re not independent cowboys out here. Those who think they are, or think they have to be, don’t last long. If we don’t have each other, we are quite literally dead in space.” Kris smiled.

"True enough," Ryan agreed.

Emerson gave a sigh. “Hard work in here today, Ryan, but you slogged through it and are better for it. Thanks for making the time to come in.”

"No problem. And...thanks as well," Ryan said. Talking about things wasn't quite as difficult as he had pictured.
~~~
Lieutenant (JG) Ryan Collingway
Engineering Officer
USS Arawyn

&
LtCmdr Kris Emerson, PhD
Lead Counseling Officer
USS Arawyn
Apb Kate

 

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