Window Shopping

Posted on Sun Jan 16, 2022 @ 5:45am by Lieutenant Commander Elli-Navine

Mission: S1 M6 Shore Leave - Obsidian Command
Location: Obsidian Command, Promenade
Timeline: TBR#008 (Mid Session) -- MD 06 1430HRS
Tags: TBR#008, Tobias Hirsh

After days of debriefing about things so wildly out of her own control that even Starfleet didn’t know what to do with it all besides seal it and classify it for now, being out on a public starbase promenade surrounded by the leisurely flow of people was just…. weird.

The first time she had come to the promenade with Captain Pax, she’d still been so wound up and had the distraction of talking with him, so she hadn’t really absorbed the scenery. But now that Elli had caught up on some sleep, and followed up with the reports on the Potemkin repairs, she was looking around with a fresh view.

How did everyone walk around like that? Like there was nothing at all in the galaxy to worry about? Not that she was worried. Well, she was, but she felt like it was a bottomless worry that she was constantly in denial of or looking for an excuse not to think about, some distraction to keep her from panicking at the very idea that the future of entire galaxies might come down to her and her crew mates being ready for some test no one was publishing a practice drill for ahead of time. How would she possibly know what was going to be on it?

What was the point?

“Why, Elli?” She asked herself out loud. “Why worry about something you can’t even do anything to prepare for?” She smirked at her own reflection in a shop window, trying to let the worry untangle itself from her furrowed brow. “Pride will worry enough for the whole crew, anyway.”

Top Secret thoughts about the Protectorate and the Tenzim evaporated at the luscious scent of roses. Literal roses, in the next shop. Elli drifted towards the smell and inhaled deeply as she watched a half Cardassian woman direct a short Bolian shopkeeper what flowers to build a decadent bouquet out of. Curious, Elli tilted her head at the cascading floral art that was amassing. The chief flower in it was a vine-like sort of transparent petaled thing that made it hard to pin down a color. It was like paper thin rainbow opals subtly shifting in the light.

“That will be sufficient beside the guest book.” The Cardassian said with a flourishing gesture in her fingers. There was more class in that woman’s pinky finger than Elli felt she’d ever have. Her make up was incredible, her perfect skin, her tailor fit dress. The lady’s voice seemed to drip with latinum and distaste. Elli was impressed and repelled both at once. In a way it reminded her of her sister… “I’ll require wall pieces for the gallery corners,” the Cardassian continued, “with similar compositions. Thirty of them should do.”

“I’ll make the arrangements,” The Bolian agreed brightly as she marked it in her order book, “and have them delivered the morning of the opening so they’re fresh for the whole week.” Elli felt more familiar with the bubbly can-do tone of the florist.

As she eavesdropped, Elli marveled. She couldn’t imagine what that sort of display might cost. She’d only bought flowers for her grandmother on a few occasions and sent a few bouquets to ailing friends, but she’d just picked the common sorts of things, like the ones out in the sale carts that she was standing next to. Everything about those fancy custom arrangements on the cutting table said Latium. The Cadassian woman didn’t flinch as she signed for the charges. Incredible.

Concerned she might be caught staring, Elli moved along, looking at the next shop. It was walled off with some logos painted on the frontage, and “Coming soon” written in stylized lettering in a dozen languages. Bajoran and Vulcan scripts were always so beautiful. With her eyes, Elli traced the elegant lines and wished she could read them, but she’d never found the time or had the knack to become multilingual, so she’d have to settle for the graphical awe of the mysterious strokes and alignments. “Silly Elli,” She scolded herself. “They probably just say ‘Coming Soon’, too. No special education needed to deduce that.”

No, she had other things to learn now. That introduction to Commander Quinn had gone off far better than she could have imagined! Most of what she had imagined were clumsy disasters and cruel rejections. He wasn’t exactly warm and fuzzy or a roll-out-the-welcome-mat kind of guy, but Elli had actually felt herself rise to his verbal parries. Maybe not with finesse, but with enough conviction anyway that Commander Quinn had allowed her to present all of her key data in the lab. She’d expected dubiousness or rejection, but his reactions were all something more like problem restatements. Instead of shutting the whole idea down with questions, his criticisms were more as if he were unpacking the problem and setting it up in his mind.

…All while Scott had looked bored out of his gourd. She wasn’t sure Scott would forgive her soon for taking him along. “Wonder if there’s some way I can make it up to him.”

She paused at the window of a yoga studio, a slightly digitally frosted window which allowed only impressions of people to be visible to the passers by. Elli could understand that. Who wanted to do yoga publicly, really? The unidentifiable figures were moving more or less simultaneously through some poses with arched backs and necks. mimicking them slightly, Elli felt herself standing straighter and arching until her shoulder blades gave a satisfying pop. “Maybe a few sessions would be a good idea…” She mused, noting the schedule on the display placard and the location of the studio so she could tack back to it again soon. “It would probably be a good way to break up all of that Quantum Theory study.” The tomes Commander Quinn had given her were not layman worded, and Elli was more of a technician than a theorist. It was going to be a stretch, she knew. But something told her Quantum Theory would probably be on that pop quiz the universe was going to be proctoring the Potemkin crew. Boning up was one thing she could do, at least.

Besides ‘saving the universe’, there was the exciting possibility she could contribute to the creation of new technology. Quinn was already calling the nascent idea the Quinn-Navine Drive. She wondered if maybe it was too presumptive of her. Would he be offended if she asked him to replace her name with the Xec engineer on whom she’d based all of her research? Quinn-Sen Drive? Oh. But that would just shorten to QSD and there was already one of those. It might be too confusing. And she had to admit she was still raw about Sen not being forthright about the shortcomings of his project and the whole matter of the Quantum Foam Navigation being unresolved and the limitations of Exotic Energy over Exotic Matter. More upset at herself for not picking it out ahead of time. She’d learned her lesson about trusting eccentric theorists… Commander Quinn was clearly going to be far more thorough, forthright, and discerning than Sen had been.

There was some music up ahead. A bass line on some sort of electrified string instrument. She couldn’t help but feel her hips and shoulders sway and counter sway as she went along thinking. There was a little free standing sign board out in the path ahead. It read: Buy/ Sell New & Used Instruments, All Kinds. Repairs. Lessons Starting 15 cr/ Half-Hour. Hiring Instructors. Inquire within.

Elli’s head turned curiously and honed in on the source of the bass.

He was a customer in the shop, testing out instruments for sale. Coincidentally for Elli he was another Grazerite. With his massive upper body, he barely fit between the tightly packed displays of stringed instruments hanging in two rows overhead and lining the floor on either side, but he didn’t seem concerned about knocking anything over. His eyes were focused on the neck of the instrument as he slid his heavy finger pads up and down the strings; he seemed completely absorbed in his own little jam session.

He had thoughtful eyes deep set in those heavy brows, Elli observed. It implied a kind of calm presence of mind that the bulk of his form wouldn’t have suggested alone. She felt a little bit of sympathy for a snap in his right horn. He’d chipped the end off and for some reason hadn’t had it cosmetically fixed. But what was even more curious to her than it being broken, was that he’d go around with his horns completely uncovered. Even she tied a kerchief around her head in a pale deference to the planetary tradition of Peace. She couldn’t remember ever seeing a man with his horns completely uncovered, not one that wasn’t shamed or outright rebellious.

And then he looked up from his playing. The music stopped when their eyes met through the shop glass, in the gap of the words “Music” and “Box”.

Time seemed suspended between heartbeats.

Elli froze, a stupefied look on her face, realizing she’d been caught staring. Non-nonchalantly, He broke a mild grin and turned to replace the instrument on its hook. As soon as he looked away from her, Elli felt momentarily free of some bizarre enchantment, panicked, and took that opportunity to dash behind a sale banner.

She waited briefly, but realized she couldn’t be sure he’d not be there if she left her cover. Elli reached to her over-sized pocket and brought out her tricorder, plotting a very indirect course around the nearest Grazerite life signature. Behind a planter, around a holographic map kiosk…

“Hello Lieutenant Elli-Navine—” Elli yelped and backpedaled as an automatically triggered holographic assistant in the form of a cartoon robot projected itself. “I am the promenade map assistant, at your service! Please state your search query for directions!”

“Shhhhhhhh-ut up! shut up!” Elli hissed at it as she continued forging her way, dodging into the middle of a convenient rack of coats, parting them with a diving motion of her hands to keep her horns from catching. She peeked over the top to double check that the coast was clear and could just barely see him outside of the music shop, looking around curiously. She bit her lip and stood perfectly still again. What a regal figure he cut as he looked back and forth a couple of times. When he went back inside, Elli breathed a sigh of relief.

“Pardon me,” a blue haired lady said. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to either buy something or else quit mishandling the merchandise. Those are genuine sheep skin coats, you know.”

“Sheep skin?” Elli gulped, trying to find words as she backed out and four of the coats came away in her arms. She fumbled with them until she knocked three others down and finally in a ridiculous ballet scooped them all into the indignant shop-keepers arms. “Sorry, I… I don’t want any of these.”

She practically tripped over herself looking for an air-lock she could launch her embarrassed self into the vacuum of space from, but settled on a turbo-lift. Pressing her back against the side wall, she attempted to will herself to become invisible as the doors closed.

“Officers’ Quarters.” Elli whispered at the computer. She couldn’t wait to get back to Quantum Theory. “Please.”

 

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