Chapter 3
First Draft
'Because if you don’t, you’ll be kicked off the team', Relle said by way of reply. She understood why Nis had lashed out at Ferra. Half the time she wanted to do it herself. But Ferra was just the type to make a big deal of it. And the council didn’t like Nis as it was. They were looking for an excuse to drop her from the team. This looked like just the thing.
‘But all I did was point out to her that she was making everything for more complicated than it needed to be!’
Relle thought about pointing out that the problem was more with the way she had said it than with the fact that she had said it. She restrained herself, though, for the simple fact that it wasn’t the truth. Or, at the very least, it wasn’t the whole truth. Not by a long shot…
Relle had held a fair number of different jobs in several different industries. One thing she had learned was that there was always a Ferra. She worked with them in every job she’d ever held. She saw them in restaurants where she ate, at the bank, at the doctor’s office… There was always one employee — usually a middle-aged woman, not very high up the corporate ladder — who drove everybody else up the wall. She was always a hard worker, never one to shirk her responsibilities. That was the problem, though. She didn’t just do her job, she did it in triplicate. She wouldn’t just write a report; she would write a report, complete with table of contents, footnotes, introduction page and a statement about the report-writing process. She couldn’t just file paperwork, she had to complete the same forms three times over and then file each one individually. She never used down time to relax or take a break; she used it to imagine new make-work projects for herself; things that didn’t need to be done, but would undoubtedly take huge amounts of her time and effort. And, inevitably, she convinced her co-workers that if she ever once failed to complete these tasks within her self-appointed time-frame, the universe would come to a crashing halt.
For the most part, people were content to let her plod along, griping about how nobody else ever filled out form T3-7A correctly or about the fact that she was the only person around here who ever used the publication log book. People generally assumed that her work was vital and were grateful for her dedication. Occasionally, somebody would attempt to assist her with one of her tasks. When they discovered just how complex they really were, they gave up.
Nis, on the other hand, took things far too literally. She was Ferra’s polar opposite. While Ferra wanted everything done and done right and would spend ridiculous amounts of time focused on making the end result exactly what she wanted it to be, Nis wanted everything done as efficiently as possible. She was prepared to spend vast amounts of time investing in a system that would make the process as simple and painless as possible. Ferra balked at change of any sort. Nis was constantly on the lookout for things she could change. She took one look at Ferra’s system and saw potential for improvement. She began to make suggestions as to how Ferra could improve the process.
It was a match made in hell.
They were in the final days of the training programme. In just two weeks, they would board the Questor and head out on their 29-year mission. They had all been chosen for their skills and their experience, but also for their lack of ties. Those few of them who had spouses were bringing them. They had a father-daughter team in Nis and Parik. They had three pairs of siblings. There were life-long friends and people who probably would never have met if not for the mission. As they got to know one another, new friendships began to form as well. There had been a few relationships that looked like they were going to prove to be trouble. Strangely (or maybe not), Nis was at the centre of several of those. Only time would tell how things would work out. And there would be plenty of time…
Tension between Nis and Ferra had built quickly. Both women were mature enough to attempt civility. They each understood what was at stake. To make an enemy now was to make life miserable for oneself for years to come. Ferra firmly but politely stood her ground and insisted that her way was the only way. Nis had tried to play nice, but yesterday afternoon had proved too much.
All team members were required to learn to perform all of the tasks to at least a basic level. The day had started off with a geology exam; they’d been tested on their ability to recognise minerals, igneous rocks, and different rock formations. That had been followed by a particularly harrowing session in the anti-grav simluator. By the time they made it to the Communication Procedures lecture, nobody was in a particularly good mood. Ferra had droned on and on about the importance of following the steps precisely. Nis had questioned her on several points, asking why each one was so vitally important. Ferra had responded to each question, but never quite answered any of them. Nis finally snapped. She declared that they’d all been communicating successfully their entire lives and didn’t need her to tell them how to dot their ‘i’s and cross their ‘t’s.
Ferra had, of course, issued a formal complaint to the council. The council pushed to have Nis ejected from the programme immediately. Taren had managed to persuade them to drop the matter, on the condition that Ferra withdraw her complaint. He even managed to get Ferra to agree to it — if Nis apologised, formally and in front of the same group who had been present at the original outburst.
Taren walked away from his meeting with Ferra with some very unoptomistic feelings. He told Relle what had happened. She offered to speak to Nis. He wasn’t convinced that it would work, but he agreed.
In the end, Nis issued a polite (if somewhat terse) apology to Ferra in front of all 18 of the others that had been present. She followed it up by not speaking to Ferra for the remaining two weeks leading up to the launch.
'Because if you don’t, you’ll be kicked off the team', Relle said by way of reply. She understood why Nis had lashed out at Ferra. Half the time she wanted to do it herself. But Ferra was just the type to make a big deal of it. And the council didn’t like Nis as it was. They were looking for an excuse to drop her from the team. This looked like just the thing.
‘But all I did was point out to her that she was making everything for more complicated than it needed to be!’
Relle thought about pointing out that the problem was more with the way she had said it than with the fact that she had said it. She restrained herself, though, for the simple fact that it wasn’t the truth. Or, at the very least, it wasn’t the whole truth. Not by a long shot…
Relle had held a fair number of different jobs in several different industries. One thing she had learned was that there was always a Ferra. She worked with them in every job she’d ever held. She saw them in restaurants where she ate, at the bank, at the doctor’s office… There was always one employee — usually a middle-aged woman, not very high up the corporate ladder — who drove everybody else up the wall. She was always a hard worker, never one to shirk her responsibilities. That was the problem, though. She didn’t just do her job, she did it in triplicate. She wouldn’t just write a report; she would write a report, complete with table of contents, footnotes, introduction page and a statement about the report-writing process. She couldn’t just file paperwork, she had to complete the same forms three times over and then file each one individually. She never used down time to relax or take a break; she used it to imagine new make-work projects for herself; things that didn’t need to be done, but would undoubtedly take huge amounts of her time and effort. And, inevitably, she convinced her co-workers that if she ever once failed to complete these tasks within her self-appointed time-frame, the universe would come to a crashing halt.
For the most part, people were content to let her plod along, griping about how nobody else ever filled out form T3-7A correctly or about the fact that she was the only person around here who ever used the publication log book. People generally assumed that her work was vital and were grateful for her dedication. Occasionally, somebody would attempt to assist her with one of her tasks. When they discovered just how complex they really were, they gave up.
Nis, on the other hand, took things far too literally. She was Ferra’s polar opposite. While Ferra wanted everything done and done right and would spend ridiculous amounts of time focused on making the end result exactly what she wanted it to be, Nis wanted everything done as efficiently as possible. She was prepared to spend vast amounts of time investing in a system that would make the process as simple and painless as possible. Ferra balked at change of any sort. Nis was constantly on the lookout for things she could change. She took one look at Ferra’s system and saw potential for improvement. She began to make suggestions as to how Ferra could improve the process.
It was a match made in hell.
They were in the final days of the training programme. In just two weeks, they would board the Questor and head out on their 29-year mission. They had all been chosen for their skills and their experience, but also for their lack of ties. Those few of them who had spouses were bringing them. They had a father-daughter team in Nis and Parik. They had three pairs of siblings. There were life-long friends and people who probably would never have met if not for the mission. As they got to know one another, new friendships began to form as well. There had been a few relationships that looked like they were going to prove to be trouble. Strangely (or maybe not), Nis was at the centre of several of those. Only time would tell how things would work out. And there would be plenty of time…
Tension between Nis and Ferra had built quickly. Both women were mature enough to attempt civility. They each understood what was at stake. To make an enemy now was to make life miserable for oneself for years to come. Ferra firmly but politely stood her ground and insisted that her way was the only way. Nis had tried to play nice, but yesterday afternoon had proved too much.
All team members were required to learn to perform all of the tasks to at least a basic level. The day had started off with a geology exam; they’d been tested on their ability to recognise minerals, igneous rocks, and different rock formations. That had been followed by a particularly harrowing session in the anti-grav simluator. By the time they made it to the Communication Procedures lecture, nobody was in a particularly good mood. Ferra had droned on and on about the importance of following the steps precisely. Nis had questioned her on several points, asking why each one was so vitally important. Ferra had responded to each question, but never quite answered any of them. Nis finally snapped. She declared that they’d all been communicating successfully their entire lives and didn’t need her to tell them how to dot their ‘i’s and cross their ‘t’s.
Ferra had, of course, issued a formal complaint to the council. The council pushed to have Nis ejected from the programme immediately. Taren had managed to persuade them to drop the matter, on the condition that Ferra withdraw her complaint. He even managed to get Ferra to agree to it — if Nis apologised, formally and in front of the same group who had been present at the original outburst.
Taren walked away from his meeting with Ferra with some very unoptomistic feelings. He told Relle what had happened. She offered to speak to Nis. He wasn’t convinced that it would work, but he agreed.
In the end, Nis issued a polite (if somewhat terse) apology to Ferra in front of all 18 of the others that had been present. She followed it up by not speaking to Ferra for the remaining two weeks leading up to the launch.
posted by sic at 13:32
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