The Cabin in the Woods

Posted on Thu Feb 20, 2020 @ 11:53am by Lieutenant Alanna Wells & Commander Caleb Ryan

1,788 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Et In Arcadia Ego
Location: Pangaea
Timeline: BACKPOST

ON

Alanna had taken to flying her shuttle down to Pangaea to see if any new sites had appeared on the planet, and to spend time alone. She was slowly dong better, but she still missed Jason terribly. Spending time alone on the planet or neck-deep in work helped her cope.

It was on one of her trips that she noticed a cabin about five miles from the colony. An unauthorized and unexpected cabin. She landed the shuttle and went to investigate.

As Alanna landed, she saw a small, single person commuter shuttle.parked discreetly under cover of the trees. It was the cheap kind that could be rented from civilian commercial businesses from the docks, meant for quick trips to nearby systems, or planetside.

As she approached the cabin itself, she could see it was still unfinished. The walls were about the height of Allana’s head, so she couldn’t see over them yet, but construction the the roof hadn’t yet begun. Several logs had been pulled into the clearing and were settled in a work area covered with wood chips, near a small shed that had been built for storing tools. There were tools lying about the area, hand tools, no power tools: axes, saws, lathes, planes, and wooden mallets.

There was no door hung in the opening, so Alanna could look inside. The floor had been set in flagstones, fitted together with a bit of crude mortar where necessary. A fireplace and stone chimney had been built up into where the roof would eventually be. Inside the fireplace was the remains of a cooking fire, and a bedroll was laid out on the floor.

There didn’t appear to be anyone around the cabin, but a careful look revealed the beginnings of a well-used trail heading into a copse of trees on the opposite side of the clearing.

She grew more angry as she walked around, looking over the cabin. How had someone gotten this far without being noticed? Did he or she even know how much trouble they were causing with this? She followed the path, all the while thinking about what she could do to fix this, to not have a hundred other people demanding to have a cabin, too, out in the middle of nowhere.

The path led to a small pool at the base of an escarpment. A waterfall, about a dozen or so feet high, came over the escarpment into the pool. Allana found a pile of simple, sturdy work clothes on the grassy bank, and out under the waterfall, the figure of a tall, dark-haired man in the pool, running his hands through his hair under the fall of cold, clean water, seemingly bathing.

She had no intention of embarrassing the man under the water, so she reached out and gently touched his surface thoughts. Commander Ryan. Her surprise at finding the commander here tempered some of her anger. And sparked her humor. She couldn't blame him for wanting a cabin out here, or for taking advantage of the natural waterfall. However, she was not going to go away without having a talk with him first.

Perhaps, this time, it would be more prudent to let him know she was there before he swam to shore. She clapped her hands three times in an age-old announcement of her presence, using her telepathy to add a mental amplification to the sound. She paused and clapped again.

Caleb started under the waterfall for a moment. He pushed back his hair and peered out. “Lieutenant?” he called. “Um...just a moment.” He assessed his situation. Well, there was no way around it. His clothes were over on the bank by the science officer, and here he was in only what God gave him. With a shrug, he dove into the pool and swam toward shore.

Alanna turned her back as he approached the shore so as not to embarrass him further. She tried very hard not to laugh at the situation. Served him right to be caught out like this. She waited until he was out of the water before speaking. "I'm half Betazoid, Commander. However, I'll keep my back turned to preserve your modesty." She didn't even try to hide the touch of laughter in her voice.

“Mah thanks, Lieutenant,” Caleb said. Well, damn. He’d intended to air dry, so hadn’t brought a towel. Wet clothes it was, then. He started to pull them on. “So what brings ya’ll the way out heah?” he asked, pushing his dripping hair back.

"Checking for new ruins or other anomalies," she said. "We've had several new old sites. And I was heading farther out for a bit of camping." When she decided he was dressed, she turned around. "While I understand why you're building a cabin, you know it's against the rules. You have to be within the colony boundaries. As soon as this site becomes public, we're going to have a hundred people demanding they get the same privilege you do. So, why not mark the site, tell Captain Soran and me about it, and wait for it to open up officially?"

“Cause it wasn’t gonna become public,” Caleb said. “It’s only about five clicks outside the approval zone. It’s been thoroughly surveyed and certified safe. Ah checked,” he pointed out. Ya know how long it takes ta build a cabin by hand? If Ah’d waited, someone woulda plotted a prefab down heah already before Ah could blink. Ah guess Ah just wanted someplace quiet Ah could crawl off ta, mebbe get me some real horses again. Sorry Ah didn’t go through all the red tape, Lieutenant.”

"Captain Soran and I could have reserved it for you," Alanna said. "The problem is we have a colony full of people who would love to claim property on Pangaea. If they find out about this -- and they will -- they'll demand equal rights, and then we wouldn't be able to preserve Pangaea for the future. There's a lot more temporal activity around here than people know, and I don't know what affect the larger colony will have on that, or on the fey shadows. We have to be very careful of who lives where." She ran a hand through her hair. "I can't let you keep the cabin here. You'll have to move it to the colony. But I can mark this as yours for when more land opens up. You're welcome to camp here, but not to build a permanent home. I can't even do that, and I'd love to have my own place to come to when I needed to get away." She might be able to find a loophole, but right now, she didn't think there would be one that would be acceptable to the others.

Caleb sighed. “Let me pack up mah tools,” he said. “The point was ta be away from people,” he said as he headed back up the trail toward the cabin. He came into the clearing and stared at all the hard work he’d put into it. “Need me ta burn it down or somethin’?” He headed for the shed.

"No, but I think we can transport it closer to the colony where you're technically part of it, but still have some privacy. Would that be acceptable? If not, we'll have to find something else." She wondered if it would be possible to have a small area set aside for those who are working in the more remote areas of the planet. "Either way, I can talk to Captain Soran about marking off this area for you for a future cabin." She stopped beside him. "Commander, I understand how you feel. If it were just up to me, I'd let you have it, but I have to be aware of what the Cardassians, Romulans, Ferengi, and Klingons will say if they find out."

She paused for a moment. "You know, let's ask Captain Soran. Maybe she'll want to open up more space around the colony and you can keep the cabin."

Caleb sighed. “Why’d we even let them get their fingers in this place?” he wondered, looking over the beauty of the clearing and the half-finished cabin and all the work he’d put into it. “Mah own fault, Ah guess,” he said, putting the tools away in the shed. It wasn’t like he would need them again. “Guess Ah’ll stick ta holodeck holidays. Like ya said, Captain Soran’s gotta think of the others. Ah don’t wanna be causin’ her more headaches than Ah already do.”

Alanna hated to have him lose this place. He'd put so much work into it, and it really was nice. "Let's talk to her and see if we can come up with something. I won't let anyone else have your cabin and the waterfall, Commander. Maybe, with some creative thinking, we can come up with a reason for you to stay here." Because maybe, if she could find a reason for him to keep this cabin, she could use the same reason to build a place of her own.

“Thank you, Lieutenant,” Caleb said. “Let me just retrieve mah bag an’ Ah’ll be ready ta head back to the station.”

Caleb headed into the cabin and rolled up his bedroll, packing his kit. He paused at the door, resting a hand on a plaque hanging on the door. It was a woodcut of Miqa he had made back when he was trying to win her again after her Joining. He took it down and slipped it into his bag as he came out again, giving Alanna a shy smile.

“Mika always wanted a place like this,” he said. “She loved the ranch, but she hated livin’ with mah parents,” he said with a chuckle.

He'd done an excellent job building the cabin. "A place like this has a way of restoring the soul." She smiled. "Let's see if we can let you keep it and keep the wolves at bay."

Caleb smiled and closed the door. It didn’t have a lock. “Well, you’d be most welcome ta use it occasionally,” he offered Alanna with a smile as they walked back to the shuttles. “Ah cain’t spend all mah time down heah.”

"Thank you. There's a definite appeal about this place. If we can get you approval, I might want one in the forest. I would use it as an observation post--officially, anyway."

She walked with him to his shuttle. "I'll meet you on the station."

____
OFF

Cdr. Caleb Ryan
Executive Officer

Lieutenant Alanna Wells
Chief Science Officer
Deep Space Five

 

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