1152: A Shiny Vulcan Dress

by Rada Dengar
110409.2330
After The Detective

-=Deck Three, USS Serendipity=-

Arriving back at the quarters he shared with Wren and Tam, Rada found them to be unexpectedly quiet. There was no conversation, no sounds of music, nor even the tapping of fingers on a PADD.

He began to slowly walk from room to room, looking for where they could be. Each one after the other though he found them empty. Only upon finally returning to the entrance did he notice the note taped to the inside of the door.

Taking it down in his hand, he read it in silence.

Hi Rada,

We decided to spend a couple of hours in the arboretum. Should be back by sixteen hundred hours.

Love you.

~Wren and Tam

Rada smiled, slightly sadly. He’d been very near the arboretum just before and may even have passed them. Had he known, he’d have joined them. He knew Tam liked the place and that Wren knew it too. More than likely, she decided to take him there for that reason, and as a distraction from all that had happened with Arie recently. As of yet, of course, he had no way of knowing that she had already left the ship.

Had Rada known that, he wouldn’t have been so focused on his own introspection as he was in this moment.

Rada didn’t place the note down, instead carrying it with him as he moved over to the couch. At first he eased his weight down into the cushions. Then he shifted to the side, then back again, before finally letting himself fall slightly forward. It was not a comfortable position, but he was never particularly comfortable with those.

Repeatedly he recalled the detective’s words about how he should ‘ask the victim’ to uncover the sender of the book that rested upon the table before him.

He only wished it were that simple, and smiled a little at the concept.

“So, Rada,” he asked himself, “who was it that sent this book to you?”

“I really couldn’t tell you,” he answered. “Unfortunately I’m just as in the dark as you are.”

“My, that really is a pity. I was hoping at least one of us would know.”

He exhaled briefly in quiet amusement, as he accepted that things would never be so easy.

Realising he needed to think, he put the note down and stood up again, and began to walk the length of the room.

Unfortunately, sudden flashes of inspiration were no more forthcoming than they’d been on the entire way back here. Still, he concentrated all his attention and energy, on trying to force just one useful thought to arrive.

*It really is quiet here today.*

It wasn’t a particularly useful one, but it was a start.

“Computer. Play music.”

^Please specify selection.^

“Whatever was the most recently used file.”

The computer beeped in acknowledgement, before beginning to play the song at the most unnecessarily high volume.

“Computer. End Music.”

Thankfully, the computer complied. Rada wasn’t entirely certain whom on board would have been listening to that particular song, but he was certain it didn’t quite fit the mood.

He sighed. This wasn’t working.

“Come on Rada, you can do this. Why would someone want you to have the book?”

Once more, he answered himself.

“Well, it’s an Angosian book. Maybe someone there wants me to think of home.” He quickly shook his head. “No, then why this book? If it were family, they could have sent one I’d read as a child. So it’d have to be someone who didn’t know me then. But why would they want me to be homesick? It doesn’t make sense.”

He sighed again.

“Maybe they just wanted to make me insane. I mean I am talking to myself.”

Again he shook his head. “No, I’m pretty sure I was crazy enough already…”

He stopped walking again and huffed.

*This is ridiculous. Think…*

He took a few steps again.

*Think…think… think of words other than ‘think’.*

Unfortunately, he found he really couldn’t.

“Alright, let’s think of this logically. If it’s not family and presumably it’s not someone on board, who does that leave? I’m not exactly Mr. Social Life.”

His mind immediately went to the place it always did. “It must be an enemy. But why a book? How’s that going to kill me? Death by a thousand paper cuts?”

Even Rada considered that unlikely.

Of course the transporters would have detected any sort of deadly poison in the pages, and if not then his violent death would have been a giveaway. It was possible, he supposed, that he would have to be someone who'd lick his fingers when he was turning the pages to cause that. He’d never been such a person though, and he didn’t know why anyone would think he was. He certainly couldn’t make sense of the behaviour. He wondered if when their hands were dirty they licked the pages instead.

“Maybe you’re looking at this the wrong way.” He suggested to himself.

“Oh, and I suppose you have a better one?”

“No, but you do,” he replied, before growling slightly at himself that now it really was absurd.

Still, he did have a good point, though he would forgo the formality of both admitting it and stating it aloud:

A lot of other people had enemies.

There was the Captain; Salvek had surely made a few in the Romulan Empire, and it could even have been some indirect attack by an old female acquaintance of occasional visitor William Lindsay.

Thinking about it now, he was sure someone at least would more than simply want to kill Jamie Halliday.

Rada’s eyes suddenly opened wider as he considered that they could be trying to distract him, so he’d make a mistake and accidentally press the wrong button and destroy the ship.

His heart rate slowed though as he dismissed that as a possibility. It’d take him at least three buttons to do that. The probability of it happening within the next month was only something like 12.5%. On average he’d only kill them all one and a half times this year. The intricate genius behind this, who apparently felt they’d mastered his psychology, wouldn’t leave it to that much of a chance.

Unless that was what they wanted him to think.

“Okay, under characteristics of the victim, we can put ‘paranoid’.”

Unless that was what they wanted him to think…

He spun around and continued walking.

Perhaps he was overanalysing this. Then again, not overanalysing this meant taking it at face value and accepting that no one was trying to kill him. Obviously that was ridiculous. So in fact analysing it normally was underanalysing it and so he had to doubly overanalyse in order to do so correctly.

In all probability, therefore, he was in fact still underanalysing it considerably. Yet if considering a potential alien plot to destroy the ship as an act of final spiteful retribution against Jamie Halliday for over exposure of teeth was still just looking at the obvious, then the reality must be more wild and horrifying than he could possibly imagine.

It would have to be some sort of massive interstellar conspiracy; a thousand seemingly unrelated components all working as one; like gears in a clock so absurdly complicated that by the time you read its face, you're neither still interested in the time nor in fact still alive.

Perhaps it was about more than books. Maybe someone had sent Dwan Tubman a shiny bottle of Vulcan wine, or Sue Tenney a trendy new dress. Then maybe it was something less predictable.

If he discovered Dwan in a shiny Vulcan dress then he’d really know he was onto something, not to mention having a question or two to ask.

Getting a brief mental flash of the image he actually smiled, before scolding himself at being amused when the entire Federation could be at risk.

Still, based upon all the evidence he’d seen so far, he couldn’t believe Vulcan garments for friendly giants were likely. That he was sent something Angosian couldn’t be a coincidence. Maybe therefore, all players would be receiving something to remind them of their homeworld.

Salvek would be getting the Vulcan dress, Dabin Reece would be getting some extra spots, and perhaps Lair Kellyn would be receiving some sort of portable argument.

The only plausible reason for all of this that Rada could see though would be to inspire waves of patriotism about people’s homeworlds. That could get people arguing about which was best, much like with competing sporting teams. At first it’s a friendly rivalry, then it’s a traditional grudge match, and then it’s an all out war that tears the Federation to pieces.

No, he shook his head, obviously that reasoning was unreasonable. In that case, they wouldn’t have put Wren’s name on the book too…

He immediately began to consider the potential involvement of the Betazoid government, possibly in cooperation with a particularly shifty looking Ferengi who’d once held him at phaser point, when suddenly he stopped…and thought about what he was thinking.

Even he had to admit, it was slightly excessive…

He made himself turn around and settle back onto the couch again. Smiling again to himself as he thought of how easily he got carried away, he realised that he was never much good at seeing things the way they really were. The smile slowly disappeared though as he reached another realisation.

“You know what Rada?” he asked himself, sighing. “Frankly I don’t trust your opinion of me to be completely accurate.”

This time, he offered himself no reply. He knew he needed an outside perspective.

“Computer,” he said, “locate Lair Kellyn.”

Lt. Commander Rada Dengar
Chief Engineering Officer
USS Serendipity NCC-2012