Incident Report- July 22, 2376

Posted on Fri Dec 6th, 2024 @ 10:11pm by Commander Mashiro Munetani "Shiro"

"Captain's Log, Stardate 53303.49- Commander Munetani reporting:

"Following an attempted mutiny orchestrated by the Jem'Hadar Second, Galag'Rin, Captain Misaki remains in sickbay in critical condition. Doctor Johnson reports that her vital signs have stabilized and she no longer requires the assistance of life support, but she will need at least a couple more days to fully recover from her injuries.

"Commander McKenzie has recently finished tallying up the casualties, and it looks like we were relatively fortunate to have emerged from this whole ordeal with just 8 fatalities and less than 30 injuries, Captain Misaki included amongst the latter. I have no doubt that such a low casualty rate is attributable to wartime instincts and fastidious pro-activity on the part of this crew, and for that, I must applaud everyone for taking the incentive and ensuring that this incident wasn't as bad as it could've been.

"At the same time, however, the responsibility now falls on me to deliver death notifications to the families of the eight people whose lives were lost in this ordeal. I must admit, I have been procrastinating on this- I've spent the last hour articulating my concerns with Lieutenant Suruga, and time and again, I keep coming back to the same question- what do I tell them? That their loved ones have come off of the single-bloodiest conflict in their history, only to lose their lives fighting a meaningless battle? While certainly no fault of their own, I just can't shake this feeling that the news would come off as a hollow insult- to have things finally start to look up, only to have the people that mattered most to them snatched away, just like that, in a conflict that will ultimately be meaningless in the anals of history?

"I dunno... maybe it's just my experiences; maybe I keep circling back to that time when I found Lieutenant Sullivan dead in his quarters, and I find myself forced to reckon with the greater ramifications of losing someone who gave your life meaning, purpose, fulfillment, for that matter. And I, of all people, shouldn't be bothered by this notion; Starfleet has been in my blood for as long as I can remember, and I've always known that it came with its fair share of risks; all those stories my mother told me of her time commanding the Arizona, and all the friends she had lost under her command, should've prepared me for this, and yet... here I am, still questioning if I have it in myself to break the news to someone that they'll never see their loved one's smile, or hear their laughter ever again.

"A part of me still wonders how Captain Misaki manages to deal with all of this, especially considering she's allegedly had things worse off than I have- her parents were declared as MIA when she was 9, and she lost her grandparents in the Attack on San Francisco last year. Were that me, that'd be a heck of a lot of baggage to carry, and yet here she is hosting karaoke nights en route to a mass war grave, as if this war is little more than a holiday to her. How does she do it? It seems the more I learn about Captain Misaki, the less I understand...

"Perhaps I'm not as ready for the center chair as I previously thought... it may behoove me to stick it out with this crew for just a while longer. Perhaps they may be able to offer me some insight into things that I don't fully grasp.

-End log."