Lieutenant Morro Caras - Hurt
Morro Caras
((Chief Engineer’s Office, Deck 20, USS Thor))
Lieutenant Morro Caras was currently exploring an uncomfortable topic. He had many thoughts surrounding his Transfer to the Thor and his current duty post. He had vacated the role of one of the Chief Engineers on the Butler because of a breakdown he had during a mission where he had caused a cascading failure in an enemy ship holding prisoners. He had gone back to save all that he could, but in the end he was only able to save some, and was rescued himself. He had resigned as chief then, and now he was here, only months later standing as sole chief of a different ship.
Caras: I think we have a problem… Starfleet has a problem with abdication of responsibility. I think it just doesn’t work well with the flow of ships, people and other resources. Individual mistakes are sometimes brushed under the rug when the ends have justified the means, or when people just get lucky. Even after my admission, I got awards. It doesn’t matter how many pirates and slavers I destroyed, Innocents died because of my actions. Now they’re dead, and I'm chief. Hardly seems fair right?
This meeting was not going in a direction Morro liked. He figured he better start shoring it up. He didn’t want to lash out at his first officer. He wondered if this is what Josh had come here for.
Herrick: Before all the consequences, before the guilt. What were you trying to do when you initiated that cascade?
Morro’s countenance darkened, like it always did when he tried to think back to the moment.
Caras: Hurt “it”.
Caras spat the “it” out like a swear.
Caras: I was trying to destroy the machine that was endless slavery and suffering of versions of my friends, that I had to witness. Including an alternate version of you. While we still hadn’t found out where the rest of the command team was. I was just trying to cripple the operations and I ended up…
Herrick: ::cutting him off:: How could you have even known that it would run away on you? I read the report, Lieutenant, reviewed everyone’s account of what had transpired on the vessel. You say an abdication of responsibility, I don’t see that here. What I see you doing is dismantling an elaborate ring and working towards a great good. What were you going to do, dust your hands of it all and leave those captives to continue to suffer and be auctioned off?
Caras: No, I couldn’t. That’s why I couldn’t, I couldn't let them get away with it.
Herrick knew this about him. Were people wondering why he wasn’t still over this? Why did he feel like he was the only one who thought he had been reckless.
Herrick: Let me reframe this for you. ::motioning in the direction of the warp core:: We’re in the middle of the breach, and the only option to avert it is sending two officers in there. The component affected is going to flood them with toxic radiation that there’s no coming back from. ::beat:: What are you going to do?
Morro saw Josh’s eyes on him. He had been asked similar things before, but mainly as a philosophical exercise, but Morro knew this was more, he was trying to make a point.
Caras: And I can’t do it myself. I’d pick the best officers I know that could save the most lives. You know, the needs of the many.
Herrick: But they’re innocents, no?
Caras wasn’t exactly sure where this was going, but he humored him. The tone had cooled for a moment.
Caras: They are also starfleet officers. They know what they signed up for, and that doesn’t make it any easier, but it does make it more clear.
Caras didn’t like it, but one of the cores of Starfleet was sacrificing yourself for the greater good if it was in your power; so of course most Starfleet ships were filled with people that would die at the drop of a hat for you. He felt like it was almost like taking advantage of that
Herrick: Response
Damn, Josh had him there. A large majority of GGS Trillian prisoners HAD been former Starfleet Officers in their own Universes. Morro couldn’t even debate with him that it was different. He had met Officers from those other Universes, like Freddie Greene and Velaan Saa. Velaan’s training and experiences were so in line with their current timeline’s Starfleet, that this universe Starfleet command had commissioned Velaan Saa and let him keep his rank.
Caras was one to usually back down when he was wrong, but he still wanted to be mad about it. It also didn’t settle well with him.
Caras: Honestly, in a way that almost seems worse. Like we’re the fodder that gets churned between the universes. We stand in the way so much that now we’re a hilarious collectible commodity to unscrupulous psychopaths. I never want to be the one that makes Starfleet a death sentence, and that day I did.
The first thing that Morro could remember from that day was the clarity that hit after realizing he couldn’t stop the cascade. It still haunted his nightmares. He had never lost control like that before. It had scared him, he was scared for everyone involved.
Herrick: Response
Once again Herrick proved that he was First officer for a reason. He had known Morro as a fresh faced ensign. He had seen his record out of the academy, how he had struggled through the first two and a half years, only to come around with academy distinctions. There had never been a time where Josh hadn’t had some kind of insight into him. A First officer of the ship was usually the one that was responsible for checking the duty rosters, and paying close attention to the personnel aboard, that also included the Chiefs of each department and knowing how they interacted with others on the ship.
Caras: Then maybe you don’t know everything about me, Josh. Maybe I am just a dirty Orion to the core. A Pirate and a sabatour. Someone who wanted the blood of the ones that hurt his friends and took it too far. I lost control, and now I'm in a position where I control half of the engineering systems of a ship, but all of them. The Captain relies on me, you rely on me to make sure that control is in check. That the crewmen working under me are safe.
Now Morro was digging a little deeper. He still felt that way, even after making Lieutenant. He still did things that only a syndicate Orion would do. It was something he kept under wraps, but it was also something that had saved other’s lives. Morro did it because despite the break in protocol, the rules, and the SFUCJ, It helped people. But because he kept that part of him alive, there might be other consequences. Morro assumed that his loss of control was one of them.
Herrick: Response
Duty, duty was important. Morro maintained it because it was all he had. His position, his job, his place in Starfleet was the only thing he had. He owed the officers that had saved him and his sister, and he knew the only way to repay that was to do what the intelligence officer had told him.
“I have everything I need. What I want is for you to live a good life. Make work out here mean something. That’s what anyone in Starfleet wants. Take what we’ve given you, and show others what you’ve made of it.”
The older intelligence officer had changed their lives. He was far from what Morro would consider an idealist. If anything he reminded Morro of a sheriff from those old earth Western movies he’d watch with his Roommate in the academy. Grizzled, Worn, and didn’t take guff (Whatever that was).It changed him by giving him direction.
Caras: I feel like Starfleet really got me. They really got me to believe in everything they stand for and make it a part of myself. Make me a part of them.All of my best friends are Starfleet officers, my romantic partner is in Starfleet. It’s everything I was missing from my life that I didn’t know that I needed. It lives because of its people, and I helped destroy some of that on that day. If I hadn't lost control they might still have their lives, but maybe more collectors would be free. Maybe we’d all be dead or being sold by them right now. I lost control, I never felt like I earned a position like this.
Morro didn’t feel like he was tricked, he just never thought he’d get here. They wanted to keep giving it to him, but he had never felt like he had earned it.
Herrick: Response
[Tags! TBC]
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Lieutenant Morro Caras
Chief of Engineering
USS Thor
O240106MC1
he/him/his (player/character)