Tryouts

Posted on Tue Sep 20th, 2022 @ 9:50am by Cadet First Class Pallas

Mission: The Goddess
Location: Earth
Timeline: Flashback — Three Years Ago
867 words - 1.7 OF Standard Post Measure

Cadet Fourth Class Pallas had no idea what she was doing.

She could be talking about the current situation she was in—for some reason, with no boxing experience whatsoever or even a full understanding of the rules of the sport, she was standing in a ring, about to start sparring for the first time, and having the feeling in her gut that she might be about to die—but the sentiment extended to pretty much every single part of her experience in San Francisco so far.

She had no idea what she was doing when she went to a restaurant with her assigned group of first years during orientation; she didn’t understand ordering in the Earth fashion or that she wasn’t supposed to go get her own food but rather that someone was voluntarily going to bring it to her. Why, she had asked, are there servants here when the Federation has made everything and everyone free? Her question had been met by unanimous laughter of all the other first years, as well as the pair of third and fourth years who were playing babysitters to the group. She had blushed a crimson so deep that she could see it in her water glass, and refused to speak another word the rest of the meal.

She had no idea what she was doing when her PT instructor decided that instead of their regular run through the obstacle course, they were going to play a game called Parrises Squares. This, apparently, is a game that all Federation children know about and watch and so completely understand the rules. Pallas, however, did not know the rules. She was an absolute liability, and once her teammates realized that, spent the rest of the PT session on the bench.

It was there that Pallas met the first of the other cadets who would form the ‘Outties’ with Pallas. Glom, a cadet from a non-Federation world, sitting bashfully next to an angry Pallas, had ventured to say something reassuring to her, and the friendship has blossomed quickly. Having a group of friends, what Aarfa might call a ‘pack,’ made all the difference, and was maybe the only reason Pallas survived her first month at the Academy.

It was another Outtie, T’shel, who first pitched that the Ardanan should try out for the Academy boxing team. The idea, quickly endorsed by the rest of the Outties so that they had their collective intelligence and powers of persuasion to ensure that Pallas could come up with neither a logical nor an emotional argument for getting out of it, had appeared to T’shel in yet another incident of Pallas having no idea what she was doing. That came in the mess hall, when, experiencing tamales for the first time, the cadet cut into and began eating a bite that included the leaf wrapper, quickly spitting it out to the raucous laughter of the table next to the one occupied by the Outties. Fed up with being continuously mocked, and seeing that one of her peanut gallery was a repeat offender who had also been part of both the failed Parrises Squares exhibition and her orientation dinner in historic Chinatown, Pallas stood up with force and marched over the the much larger, taller fellow first year, a muscular human named something like John or George or something like that. Seeing her approach, John/George also stood quickly, a cocky smile spread over his face, perhaps expecting that seeing his size and height advantage would be sufficient to deter Pallas. His overconfidence was his undoing; before he could process what was happening, Pallas, without stopping, decked him straight across the chin. John/George collapsed like an empty sack, his limbs flying all over the place and his friends just looking on in stunned silence as he hit the deck.

Cadet Fourth Class got a few demerits for that incident, as well as mandatory regular counseling. She also realized that she had gotten completely lucky; there was no way she landed that punch, having had no formal martial arts training, without having caught the human off-guard. But the lucky victory was still a victory in the eyes of the Outties, and they basically dragged Pallas to sign ups and then to her tryouts.

Her first sparring experience, not surprisingly, went the way one would expect such a trial would go for someone who had no idea what they were doing. She got the crap beat out of her. She swung wildly and missed, leaving herself all the way open for a series of brutal counterpunches.

The one thing she did have a very good idea of how to do, it turned out, was to not give up. Despite the flurry of blows coming her way, she didn’t back down. She held her ground, stayed aggressive, and didn’t get knocked down. Coach called her “a natural bruiser” and she earned a provisional spot on the junior team. It was the first time since she had gotten to the Academy that she felt like there was something she knew how to do already, something that made her Starfleet material.

It was a start.