[Fiction] Know Thyself

[Rowena 'Synergy' Bainbridge]

Taken from the private journal of Rowena 'Synergy' Bainbridge:

Bic Runga's 'Sway' is playing at the moment. It's an old song and performed by a baseline artist, but it sums up my current emotions best.

In my life as a nova, I have sought to live by two things - the ancient maxim 'Know thyself' and the Team Tomorrow Code. I have been a creature of intellect over emotion since eruption, despite my primary abilities being telempathic, maintaining a perfect harmony within myself.

In Tarot terms, I am the High Priestess. Celibate, perfectly calm and unruffled, the impersonation of self-knowledge and intellect. The reverse side is sterility and coldness... Have I perhaps distanced myself too far from my emotions?

It comes back to the Tarot and Tarot himself. My work with Internal Affairs has distanced me from my colleagues, except for Athena, who is as aloof in her way as I am in mine - but I am told that I have a warmer demeanour, whatever that means. People know that they can trust me and I project that.

I digress. Tarot. He's got to be ten years younger than me at least and as an artist, he is not the sort of person I would associate with. He is a hedonist of the worst sort and one who has mocked one of the two pillars of my life.

But he calls me Ro'. He is quite literally the first man or woman to give me a nickname. He is amusing on occasions and seems genuinely interested in having me model for him.

I am not a dreaded IA/T2M agent or an insight into human nature with him, I am a unique nova. That gratifies my ego more than I should admit.

I have discovered within myself a need for recognition and respect. This is not healthy by the code that I follow. Team Tomorrow members are supposed to be confident, but not to the point where we wish adulation for doing our jobs.

I should meditate more and visit the team psychologist, because I am not supposed to act like this. I am an example for humanity, not a gloryhound!

If I were less inclined to blame myself for my own faults, I would blame Tarot. He started this.

But no, his words merely awakened a dormant fault within my own nature. Blaming him would be like blaming the storm that washes away the dirt and reveals a crack in the building's foundations.

Perhaps I should work more. That would certainly keep my mind where it should belong.