"What kind of fucking name...?" She rubbed her eyes, hoping that when her vision cleared, there would be something sensible written on the papers in her hands. No such luck. It still said the same idiotic thing: Siren Squad. Christ almighty.
This had to be a joke. Right? The sergeant glanced up, half-expecting that her gaze would fall upon one of the jokers from her old unit, throwing her some shit-eating grin. An elaborate prank, the most elborate in military history, that's what this had to be. Surely, it was only in a practical joke that any unit could have such a fucking moronic name.
Then again, based on some the decisions the brass made... well... anything might be possible.
"Fuck me," she muttered with a heavy sigh. Much as she wanted to just march around to find an exit, head back home and pretend like this shit had never happened, Melissa was at least morbidly curious. Based on the name alone, she hadn't a clue what exactly this squad she'd been lumped into was even supposed to be responsible for. What, did they run around repairing air raid sirens around the world or some shit?
Well, soon enough she'd have an answer to that question, at least. It wasn't much further down the hall that she located their bunk; stepping inside, she found herself greeted with what had to be the most spacious barracks she'd ever seen. Six beds - actual beds, not bunks, but real honest to god beds - occupied the sprawling room, each separated into its own little area with a desk, storage locker, equipment rack, even enough space to work out.
Maybe this assignment wasn't so bad. Hell, she'd seen junior officers on supercarriers who didn't get accomodations this nice. Every single space seemed to be loaded with odds and ends that screamed of personalization, save one rather barren spot. Her new space, it seemed.
She got as far as heading over and tossing her papers and rucksack onto the bed before hearing movement. A door at the opposite end of the room sliding open, and from it emerging a woman who was impossible to miss. Tall, well-built, with a mane of fiery red hair tied back into a neat bun. The freckles dotting her face, they were cute, though Melissa would hardly have ascribed such a term to the intensity in her emerald eyes, nor the roughed-up uniform that denoted her as on officer - Irish Naval Service, lieutenant, if she guessed right.
As soon as the redhead laid eyes on Melissa, she was marching over, an excited look on her face. "Ahah, they told me you were supposed to be showin' up soon!" The thick brouge made her nationality unmistakable as she held out a hand. "Lieutenant Danielle Kerrigan. You're Sergeant... Ramirez, right lass?"
She nodded, quietly at first, shaking her hand before pulling away to rub the back of her neck. "Yes ma'am. Just got assigned to uh..." She winced. "Siren... Squad?"
Almost instantly, there was a loud, bellowing laugh from the lieutenant, one hand coming up to grip her stomach. She grinned as she spoke again, "I know, I know, I thought the same thing when I got assigned here. Still think it's a right stupid name, quite frankly, but you'll see pretty quick why we've got it."
"Riiiight." Self-awareness, and no snapping at her for not reporting to a superior properly. That was a good sign. By now, most stuffed-up, full-of-themselves officers that Melissa had met would've revealed their true, frustrating, pain in the ass colors. That Kerrigan hadn't done so either meant that she was alright, or damn good at hiding it.
Fingers crossed that it was the former. "What, ah.... what exactly is it that we do, ma'am? It's been pretty hush-hush this whole selection process."
The redhead looked at her for a moment before rolling her eyes, though it was immediately evident that her frustration wasn't directed at the sergeant. "Fuck's sake, one of these days they gotta stop making us fill in all the FNGs." She sighed and moved back towards the door she'd emerged from, waving for Melissa to follow. "Come on, lass. Best we demonstrate it visually."
Her curiousity piqued, she silently followed the irishwoman over to the door and through it into some kind of training area. A pretty well-stocked gym, better than some of the bases she'd been stationed at. Past all the exercise equipment, however, her eyes were drawn to the pool - it was absolutely massive, and even from this angle she could tell that it was deep to match.
"Go ahead and get some workout gear on, won't you lass?" She waved Melissa over to a locker, the sergeant heading right over as Kerrigan continued to talk and walk towards the pool. "Read your file before you came here, lass. Force Recon, skilled sniper, underwater operations experience - all pretty impressive, if I do say so myself."
The comments gave Melissa momentary pause, causing her to stop removing her fatigues for a second. "Thank you, ma'am." The past few months in selection had seemed aimed towards breaking her down, making all her accomplishments into absolutely nothing. To hear somebody actually recognize her capabilities... well, it was different. Nice, but quite different.
It didn't take terribly long for her to drop the duty uniform and change into some workout gear - shorts, sports bra, the whole nine yards. She turned back towards the pool, about to ask a few more questions, only to be left with her mouth hanging open at... a very odd sight. Kerrigan was nowhere to be seen, but her clothes were laying right by the pool, seemingly discarded down to even the undergarments.
"...great, I have a skinny-dipping CO." She muttered the exasperated observation under her breath, needing a moment to compose herself before she could take a step towards the water. There were ripples, clearly revealing that something was moving around in there. "Ma'am? Where did you-"
She was cut off by her answer breaching the surface of the water in spectacular fashion. Really, if not for the red mane that rippled and flowed wildly atop her head, Melissa wouldn't have recognized Kerrigan. In the bright lights of the workout area, she could see the woman's fair skin had shifted to a mottled grey color, more like the hull of a warship than the skin of a human being. The muscles that were now so proimently displayed with breathtaking in definition, slender yet so clearly rippling with raw, untamed strength.
Yet those details were quite secondary compared to what was going on down south. What followed Kerrigan out of the water was not a pair of legs and feet as Melissa would have expected. It was a single smooth, tapered mass, narrowing down to a point before spreading wildly into a fin where there ought to have been feet. The limb - the tail, it was a goddamn tail! - kicked strongly as Kerrigan once again went beneath the surface, driving her to the edge of the pool.
When she pushed herself up, the claws at the ends of her fingers now easily visible, she didn't stare back at Melissa with those same green eyes. Instead, a pair of black, murky orbs stared up, predatory yet not hostile. Bemused, was perhaps more accurate. A grin spread wide on her face, revealing rows of razor-sharp teeth as she waited to see exactly how Ramirez was going to respond to... well... all of this.