Altogether Ooky

Posted on Thu 20th Oct, 2016 @ 10:34pm by
Edited on on Thu 20th Oct, 2016 @ 10:36pm

1,450 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: Cloak & Dagger
Location: Deck 1554, Queen Anne Villas
Timeline: Backpost -- shortly after Addams' arrival on station
Tags: addams, thing

She was dressed in black. Her sheer blouse was black, as was the camisole beneath it. Her knee-length bell skirt was black, and the spiderweb-patterned lace stockings. Her kitten heeled shoes, which added another four centimeters to her already formidable height, were black. The hair which fell unbound and straight down her back to her waist was black. Even her eyes were so black that it was difficult to discern iris from pupil. Her skin, however, was white... not the pinkish color Humans tended to call white, but an ivory white; a porcelain white. Her lips were encarmined with a deep tint -- deeper than crimson, deeper than maroon, the color of blood.

As if her all-but monochrome appearance were not odd enough, on her left shoulder was a hand. It appeared to be a man's right hand, and it held her shoulder fondly, as a lover might do, occasionally stroking her collarbone with its index finger, or shifting the grip of its thumb to a more comfortable angle. But there was no body attached to the hand... it was just a hand, riding her shoulder.

She had taken the tram down from the stardock's inner harbor. Turbolifts were not efficent enough for a journey of over a thousand decks. The express tram only stopped every two hundred decks; the local, every fifty. The turbolift from deck 1500 to deck 1554 was oversized, large enough for a horse or two, and its rider, to make the trip. Unsurprisingly, the other passengers used that space to stay more than arm's reach away from the monochrome apparition.

When the lift doors slid open, she was the first to disembark. She walked around the transport station to the north doors, and approached a middle-aged Bajoran man with a sign reading "Addams." "Good afternoon. Mister Oto? I am Chlamydia Addams, and this," she indicated the hand on her shoulder, "is my Thing."

"Ah," the man said, smiling. "Doctor Addams. A pleasure to meet you." He held out his hand for the Human ritual of shaking hands.

Addams regarded the hand. "Do you know how many pathogenic organisms live on skin, Mr. Oto? I fear that we are not yet well enough acquainted for the intimacy of exchanging biota."

"Oh," the man said, glancing at his hand and then pulling it back, awkwardly. "Er, I understand you're interested in the Queen Anne Villas?"

"Yes," Addams said. "I am searching for a certain... je ne sais quoi. I shall know it when I see it."

"The villas are not very far... you don't mind walking?"

"I do not," Addams said. "Lay on, MacDuff, and damn'd be him that first cries, 'Hold, enough!'"

Oto looked puzzled. "I thought it was 'lead on,'" he said, setting out along the cobblestoned street toward a bridge.

"Alas," Addams commented, "far too many people do." She switched subjects before the Bajoran could inquire further, "tell me a little about this area?"

"When the station was first constructed," Oto said, walking toward a bridge, "this area was created as a bit of planetary surface analogue, a recreation, conservation, and relaxation area. The area as a whole is called 'Tivoli Gardens', and expands over several levels, each of which is somewhat taller than a standard starship deck. Sponsored by Disney Interstellar Parks, the imagineers created multiple landscapes and climate areas, all linked together by a river system."

Oto paused in the middle of the bridge, and stepped to the railing, Addams trailing him. "This is the largest portion of the river; Central River. If you look down there, you can see one of two paddlewheel steamboats which make entertainment cruises along the river. That's the Walt, and it's putting in at the Village... well, we call it the American Village, though. The imagineers designed it to resemble a late nineteenth or early twentieth century North American town."

"Ships' names, Mister Oto, are proper nouns. They do not receive definite articles." She paused, looking beyond the rooftops of the Village. "Is that a bamboo forest?"

"Mixed bamboo, yes," Oto answered, resuming the walk. "It turns out a fair number of Japanese and Japanese-descended people moved into the northwest quadrant, so about five years ago, we redeveloped the area behind the village into a more Asian-themed setting. There are a Shinto shrine and a Buddhist temple back there, if you're inclined to visit."

"But the Villas are in the north-east quadrant?" Addams asked, turning her dark gaze in the indicated direction.

"Yes," Oto said. "And at the moment, about half of them are empty. The population of the base has been in steady decline ever since the CDA took over." They walked along the street, through a lightly wooded area, and then the villas appeared. True to the area's name, they were constructed in the Queen Anne style of architecture, each house set on a plot of land, and many having fences around them. "We do have weather events," Oto said, as the pair strolled along. "Programmed in advance, of course, and you can submit a request for a sunny day for any special event you're holding."

Addams shuddered at the thought of inflicting a sunny day on her guests, but passed the thought over without remark. She could tell which of the houses was occupied, and which vacant, by the upkeep of the yards. The homes where people resided had individual touches, plants special to them, even reflecting balls or birdbaths in the yard. Those which were vacant were rather uniform, maintained by automated systems, any individuality long erased.

"Our residents are quite proud of their gardens," Oto said, correctly interpreting Addams' gaze. "We of course allow individual householders to plant species native to their homelands."

"This is a rather good emulation of my homeland," Addams commented. "I am of the New York Addamses." She omitted the name of the town where she'd grown up; few non-Terrans had ever heard of Sleepy Hollow.

"Then you should feel right at home," Oto said, as they reached the end of the street. He turned right, onto another street. "There's another block over here."

Addams, however, had paused, staring at the house on the end of the street. It had been built on a double-size lot, and faced the woods across the road. Unlike the other houses, it appeared to be in a state of disrepair. Scaffolding sat on the roof of the porch, but even it appeared to be in disrepair, the steel cross-members flaking paint and rusting. Paint was likewise flaking from the dark-green shingle wall behind the scaffolding. To the right of the house's round turret, on the grounds, stood a tree which appeared to be dead. Crows gathered in its bare branches. On her shoulder, Thing squeezed excitedly. "Oh!" exclaimed Addams.

Oto winced. "The old Pylman place," he said, sounding apologetic. "It's been vacant for a while... we've been trying to get repairs made, but between budget issues and that bunch of crows..." he shrugged, uncomfortably.

"A murder, Mr. Oto," Addams said, absently. "A gathering of crows is a 'murder.'" She approached the black, wrought iron fence in wonder. "It's perfect. I'll take it."

"You don't really want this house, Doctor," the Bajoran protested.

"I will thank you not to tell me my own mind, Mr. Oto," Addams answered, opening the gate. Thing hopped from her shoulder, and scurried along the top of the fence. "Just look at that moon gate on the porch, Thing," Addams said breathlessly. "And the stonework!"

Thing didn't seem to answer, scuttling further along the fence to the wrought-iron mailbox. Carefully, it opened the box and crawled inside.

"Yes, Mr. Oto," Addams said. "If I am to be exiled to this base, I will have this house!"

Oto sighed, and pulled a PADD from his pocket. "Alright," he said, pulling up a lease agreement form. "But you understand that you're taking the house as-is, right?"

"I do understand that, yes," Addams said dryly. She accepted the PADD, glanced through the contract, and thumbprinted it. "Thank you, Mr. Oto," she said, handing the PADD back.

"I'll be your point of contact when you're ready to schedule repairs," He answered. He looked at the house again, shook his head, and said, "Good afternoon, Doctor. I wish you joy in your new home."

"Oh," Addams said, sounding enraptured, "I'm sure it will be absolute, utter misery!" Where, she wondered, would she be able to find a climbing species of toxicodendron radicans to plant along the fence? And a Toxicodendron vernix would look so lovely near the porch!

 

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