Chapter Text
Goddammit she was infuriating. The training session had ended three hours ago, and Tom still found himself fuming, completely unable to let go of his anger. It should have been a straightforward exercise, the squad clearing the area and establishing a perimeter in the way he’d taught, and then waiting out the all-clear once he and his co-lead, Sanders, confirmed they’d achieved the objectives. But no. Rather than executing as instructed, she’d convinced Smith and Reyes to join her on a little unsanctioned excursion that ended with him and Sanders ambushed and held at gunpoint, at which point she’d cocked her head and smirked. “That a creative enough solution for you, Lieutenant?”
He splashed water on his face and faced the mirror in his assigned housing, his left hand reaching to massage his forehead while his right worked the muscles of his quad. She was a damn second-class midshipman. Frankly, he’d be less frustrated if she were just dull. Instead, he’d been trying for weeks to get her to show some of the brilliance in the field that she’d demonstrated in her written work, and this is how she responded? By spitting in the face of the exercise and then rubbing her victory in his own? And she had to do it in front of her whole squad. Guess that’s what he got for trying to encourage her.
He hadn’t been totally surprised at her reticence early in the term, given the intel he’d gathered when he’d received the roster for his tactical seminar back in August. It was a competitive program, so it made sense to hear that he had a group of thirty-five overachievers, plus, apparently, Reznik. When he’d asked Commander Palmer, all he’d gotten was that “she’s top of her class in both academic and military merit, but, somehow, nobody knows her except the faculty in the Languages department and her specific instructors. Zero company or brigade leadership.” So definitely an outlier amongst the hypercompetitive mids. But once the assignments started rolling in, he’d made it his mission to draw her out both in the classroom and the field. Her written work was well above her training level, and he wanted the entire group to hear from her. The fact that he'd overheard two of the men bitching that she and four other women had been accepted over their buddy was only part of his reasoning. More than sticking it to the chauvinists he knew well still existed within the brigade, he wanted her to take a leadership position because she was obviously the top of the class. Apparently, her demonstration of “leadership” with Smith and Reyes was his payback for chasing that particular goal.
And that quip about creativity too. Brat. Her most recent essay had excoriated Japanese Admiral Yamamoto for his failures at Midway, arguing, among other blunders, that his failure to imagine the US code breaking was at its core a failure to consider all the possibilities. Tom hadn’t even marked her down for the comment, just scribbled back that she might be being excessively harsh on the man who’d masterminded the Pearl Harbor attacks, and that he hoped she would be able to outstrip Yamamoto creatively one day. Which, it appeared, she had taken rather personally. And he had to admit, despite his fury, that it was a creative solution. More creative than the ideas of many of the junior lieutenants he’d worked with in special forces. Whatever. He made a mental note to discuss things with Commander Palmer and then talk to Sanders about putting together a plan to regain the upper hand next weekend.
Since they were a third of the way through the term, Monday morning’s meeting with Palmer to discuss the program had been planned for weeks, but the incident with Reznik wound up taking up far more of the agenda than Tom imagined the commander had intended. In his defense, everything else seemed to be going well, and even the lowest performers in the group were meeting the standards they’d set. Sure, Coleman had broken his ankle they day they’d gone rappelling, but that was well within the expected bounds for a course like this, and the kid was on the mend. Hardly worth talking about given the incident report he’d filed. Which left the Reznik issue.
Palmer wasn’t thrilled that Tom had let her sass go unaddressed in front of the squad. Felt it was counter to good order and discipline to have her demonstrate insubordination toward an officer and an instructor. And when he asked why Tom let her get away with it, he didn’t have a good answer. There wasn’t exactly a good way to tell your superior that you were so emotionally out of control that you weren’t sure you could reprimand her without flying off the handle. Certainly sounded like a failure of leadership. But that was all he’d be able to come up with in the 48 hours since the encounter, and it wasn’t for lack of trying. Given the blank he’d drawn, all that was left was to ask Palmer about his recommendations for handling things moving forward. The classroom portion of the seminar met on Thursday nights, so Tom had suggested calling her into his Tuesday office hours, a strategy the commander greenlit as Tom headed out. Privately, he also committed to figuring out what it was that had gotten under his skin so bad that he couldn’t control himself in the moment. However he handled things with Reznik, that was going to have to be addressed. He still planned to make it back to the teams following this little rehab stint in Maryland, and it wouldn’t do to be emotionally volatile in combat.
Walking into the officers' workroom, he set his backpack down by the seat Sanders indicated and grabbed a Gatorade out of the fridge. By virtue of his subordinate status, Sanders had been spared the monthly meeting with Palmer.
“How’d it go? Any thoughts from our dear commander?”
“He wasn’t exactly happy with the reports about our ambush Saturday, but I think he might have crossed the line into actual irritation when I mentioned the smartass comment.”
“Ah shit. What are we gonna do about it?”
“I’m planning to call her in to meet with me Tuesday. See if I can’t just get her back on the right track. You cool to wait outside the office just for regs’ sake?” It was always better to have backup when meeting one on one with a student. Tom had a spotless disciplinary record, and he planned to keep it that way.
“Always. Can’t have hot Lieutenant Chandler getting into trouble now, can we?” Sanders joked with a smile.
“That’s not what I meant and you know it. I don’t want to make her uncomfortable either.”
“Fine, fine, touchy touchy. What is our plan for getting those three back next weekend then? Last day we’re slated to have the RHIBs, so could be a chance to have some fun.”
Tom was glad none of the other instructors were around to hear this particular conversation. Hazing of midshipmen by officers was strictly forbidden, and a revenge mission like the one Sanders was suggesting came mighty close to the line. But he’d been mulling the prospect of handing it right back to the mids who’d gotten the drop on them all weekend, and it still seemed like the best way to handle things with the whole group going forward. Give them a little taste of their own medicine and it would be clear that, while the insubordination would not be tolerated, there were no hard feelings. It had been a demonstration of excellent strategy, which was, ostensibly, the point of the course.
“Oh we’re definitely going to give it right back to ‘em. I’ve got plans for that,” he chuckled. “They might even look back on it fondly…once they’ve had a chance to dry out.”
“I know that look,” replied Sanders. “Remind me of it if I’m ever inspired to test you myself.”
Laughing, Tom checked his watch, grabbed his bag, and stood up. “Shit, I’m gonna be pushing it for physical therapy. I’ll see you tomorrow for office hours and planning for Thursday.”
A quick “sounds good!” came through the closing door. Allowing himself to feel the levity that always came from spending time with teammates, he began the trek towards the medical department with renewed energy. He’d only met Sanders at the start of this assignment, but the man was becoming something close to a friend in the way that he was used to with SEALs. A pang went through him at the thought. The shared mission helped bring people together on a faster timeline than normal friendships, but Tom wasn’t sure he was ready for that again.
Once he finished PT, he’d have to make sure to send a message to Reznik’s company to make sure she showed up to his office tomorrow. While other students had come by in past weeks, it had mostly been in attempts to shoot the shit and hopefully suck up to the new instructor, and she never had. And since he’d told Commander Palmer he’d be speaking with her one on one, he needed to make sure she showed up before Palmer had a chance to check in again.
“Fuck me. Fuck me. Fuuuccckk me.”
“Well that sounds interesting. Who exactly are we hoping will fuck you?”
Jesus Christ. Sasha normally loved being roommates with Lauren. They had similar interests, and she made an excellent ally in the often-hostile world of the naval academy. But right now, there were definite downsides to having roughly zero boundaries with one’s roommate, and Sasha was feeling them. She looked back at the note that had been delivered by company leadership. “I’ve apparently been called into Chandler’s office hours tomorrow.”
“Oh shit. Two full years of saving your snarky comments for me with our door closed, and the one time you slip you’re getting called in for a meeting about it? Brutal.”
Lauren wasn’t wrong. Like many of their classmates, Sasha had managed to channel her intensity into high levels of academic and military success while in high school and college, and she’d largely been able to put a damper on the sharp tongue that had occasionally gotten her in trouble with various authority figures as a much younger teen. These days, she expertly maintained military bearing even during the most grueling tasks, and she’d kept well under the academy’s finely tuned disciplinary radar. Saturday’s slip had surprised no one more than Sasha herself. Which is why she’d told Lauren about it as soon as she’d returned to the dorm that evening.
“No kidding. I still can’t figure out what happened. I mean he wrote that comment on my Yamamoto essay, but it really wasn’t anything worse than I’ve gotten from some of my Russian instructors. You’d think the fact that I grew up speaking the damn language would make it easy, but of course not. Humorless Russians. I’m almost disappointed in the cliché.
“But seriously. It wasn’t like he was being a dick. Henderson said worse things to me all through plebe year, and I never even felt any of it. But somehow one critical word from this guy and I’m losing it. I don’t get it.”
Lauren huffed at the mention of the first class mid who’d tormented their company for the entirety of first year. Sasha was the only member of their class who’d never seemed phased after getting ripped by Henderson, to the point that Lauren had actually wondered if she experienced emotions at all. Over the course of the year, it had become obvious that Sasha did care deeply, but she had such tight control on her emotions that it was exceedingly rare to see them outside of the confines of their dorm room. That she’d successfully subverted Chandler’s exercise was not surprising. Sasha was brilliant, and she’d been known to turn an assignment on its head if she found it uninteresting. The fact that she’d lost her composure during the exercise and flirted with insubordination though, that was unusual to say the least. “Must be something about Lieutenant Chandler then,” Lauren mused.
Sasha paused, unsure how to respond. Chandler was the only variable unaccounted for in the situation. She’d been through much worse treatment during her time at the academy, and everything else in her life was pretty much great. Her friends were good, school was good, family, such as it was, was good. Chandler pretty much was all that was left. But what about him would have made her completely lose her head like that? She, Smith, and Reyes had obviously crushed the exercise, and normally that would have been more than enough. It was like when she’d taken penalty kicks in high school. Better to walk away stone cold than undermine your success with too many fist pumps. But the boast had slipped out before she even realized what she’d said. “I don’t even know. I guess my strategic creativity might just be a raw nerve.”
Lauren laughed at that. “I’m sure that’s it. You don’t like having your strategic creativity questioned. That’s what we’ll call it. Nothing to do with the lieutenant who I have on good authority is smoking hot. It definitely couldn’t be about him –”
“Exactly,” Sasha cut Lauren off before she could get on a roll about Chandler. Some things were best left alone, especially when she had to gear up to get chewed out by that very same lieutenant tomorrow. There was going to be nothing hot about Chandler raking her over the coals for insubordination in the middle of a September afternoon.