Poundin' on Heaven's Doors

Posted on Sat 11th Aug, 2018 @ 9:45pm by Purulence Addams

1,162 words; about a 6 minute read

Mission: Oblivion
Location: Addams Home, Deck 1554

Previously, on Star Trek: SB109:

The hag smiled sadly. "Lilith was my mother; I was the first child of the Sky Gods and the mud-men. The first of the Nephilim."

And now... the continuation!

Their many-times Great-Grandmother sighed. "So many things I'm leaving out, or getting out of order. Mother's laboratory garden came first, in a fertile valley of the Himalayas. She experimented, and walked among the results, trying to improve them, to make them the best they could be. Is it any wonder the garden is remembered as paradise on Earth? And when she had succeeded as well as she could, she sent the virus to the valley of the Tigris and Euphrates, and there she was remembered as the serpent who tempted Men into servitude."

Purulence glanced wide-eyed at Ischemia over the top of her tea cup and covered her uncertainty by taking a long sniff and a swallow to allow herself to think. Entities like Lilith and the Nephilim were things of legend and myth to her, not direct ancestors. Oh, by the way, Dear, our children will be descended from angels! she imagined telling Ignatius. She couldn't imagine his reaction--though, given the vagaries of his own family, perhaps he wouldn't find the notion quite so far-fetched.

"That explains a lot about you," Purulence said after savoring her tea for a moment. "Your abilities, your age. You've been Great-Grandmama for many generations."

Ischemia kept still, neither drinking her tea nor saying anything about the old woman's so-called revelations. She was skeptical. She was born skeptical, and nothing in her life had ever made her less so. She gazed at the woman she'd always called Great-Grandmother or Great-Grandmama, and thought back to many things she'd heard over the years.

Finally, after an almost interminable silence she said, "Really, Great Grandmama? You came all this way on the pretext of telling us something about Purulence's boyfriend, and this is the story you concoct? You seriously want us to believe that you were born even before the dawn of time, and maybe not even born, just created, and that you are still here, guiding the Addams family members who, by the way, are descended from god-like beings? If Chlamy were here, she'd laugh her head off. Your story is medically unsound, and mentally insane."

Her words didn't seem to phase Great-Grandmama. "Come on. What's the real story, and why are you truly here?" Ischemia asked, not quite scoffing, since that would be bordering on rudeness her father would not have countenanced.

"Computer," the hag said, "Vicipaedia Foederatio. Who are the Elioud, and how shall they be recognized?"

In its dulcet voice, the computer read from the encyclopedia article, "The children of the Nephilim and the daughters of men are known as the Elioud. According to the apocryphal Judaic and Christian text The Book of Enoch, the Elioud may be identified by their six fingers and toes on each hand and foot."

"Thank you, computer," the old, old woman said, turning her dim eyes to Ischemia. "Take off your shoes, dear."

"What?" Ischemia protested, without removing her shoes. "Because I have six toes, that proves I'm one of these Elioud? Chlamy could probably provide a dozen reasons why that is, and I don't have six fingers on either hand."

Turning to Purulence, she saw that she had removed her shoes, and angrily jerked off her own. "Are you really buying into this?" she asked, as she displayed both elegant feet, beautifully shaped and manicured, but with four toes between the large one on one side and the tiny one on the other. "It's just a genetic aberration of we Addams sisters. Chlamydia only has the extra digit on one foot!"

"Of course it's a genetic aberration," Great Grandmama said, just a hint of exasperation sneaking into her voice. "But where did that aberration come from? Purulence, love, how do you know exactly what to paint to bring out a person's true character in a way no photograph can? Ischemia, how do you know, when you sit down at the negotiating table, what a person's true intentions are? How many languages do you speak? Even your eldest sister, whose shadow you've been fleeing since you could stand upright, only speaks a tiny fraction of the number you do. Where does that knack, that aptitude come from?"

Great-Grandmama held her cane pointing in the direction of the stained-glass door, not visible from where they sat. "How did Wendelin walk out of the flames, not once, but seven times?"

"I was not necessarily believing," Purulence said to Ischemia. "I was attempting to draw her out with a very neutral, factual statement and gather further information. It is true that Great-Grandmama is extremely old." She looked at her great-grandmother. "I never really gave the reasons behind my artistic skill any thought. To me, I do what any good portrait artist does. And I'm not like a chieri; I only have five fingers on each hand. But I do have the six toes."

Ignoring what the old woman said about her relationship with Chlamydia, and the mythological ancestor Wendelin, the middle Addams sister said, "Alright, then. Let's suppose what you say is true. What's the point of telling us now?" Ischemia knew that there would be a point. No one would come up with this outlandish a story without a reason behind the telling. "What is it you want of us?"

Ischemia had her own rules of negotiation that included number 2: Everyone wants something from you. Find out what it is, and see what you can get in return. For once, she couldn't anticipate what it was that her opponent, for that was how she was now viewing Great-Grandmother, wanted. She didn't know why this crazy origin story, but there was nothing of it that she accepted at this point. Rule number 1: Keep an open mind. She was struggling to do that this time, and she realized she didn't want it to be true because it made her feel diminished in some way. She set that aside for the time being.

"I probably should have started with this," Great-Grandmama Addams said. "But I needed you to hear what I said, and you wouldn't have." She stood easily, without the aid of her cane, and straightened, years dropping away from her. She was even taller than Chlamydia when she stood straight, and beautiful in a middle-eastern mold. But her change did not stop there. She continued to grow, and a radiance which was not light poured from her, beautiful and terrible, inspiring love and loathing in equal measure. Wings of fire which burned but consumed nothing unfurled behind her, stretching out and up beyond the confines of the room.

And then, she was naught but an old, old woman, sitting in her chair, reaching for her teacup and taking a sip.

 

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