Moving Out?!

Posted on 05 Jan 2015 @ 10:27am by Lieutenant Tuula Voutilainen M.D. & Lieutenant Olsam Mott & Ensign Jaana Voutilainen

2,115 words; about a 11 minute read

Mission: Episode 07 - Sojourn
Location: USS Galileo - Deck 3, Tuula and Jaana's quarters
Timeline: MD9, 11:00

[ON]

The plan was as simple as it was devious. While the Motts were distracted, Tuula and Olsam would "borrow" a hover-pallet from the cargo bay and quickly move as much of Tuula's clothes and other personal effects to Mott's quarters as possible, in order to "keep up appearances." Their little ruse wouldn't last very long if mama Mott opened up Olsam's closet and found nothing but men's clothing, so it was of the utmost importance that they got everything in order to look the part of a married couple.

To give themselves time to make the move, they had arranged for a feast of a brunch to be prepared on the station for the Mott family, which Olsam would make a discrete exit from as soon as his dozens of relatives began to chow down. It was the perfect distraction. No Bolian could turn down food , and given Bolian appetites, Tuula and Olsam figured they had at least an hour before anyone would notice that Mott was gone.

Of course, the execution was not quite perfect. It was complicated by the fact that Mott kept insisting on riding on the hoverpallet rather than pulling it thought the corridors, clearly disregarding the numerous warning stickers, and dented a not insignificant number of pieces of wall plating on the way to Tuula's quarters. Mott seemed sure that no one would notice, however, and the operation continued.

"All right," said Tuula as she rolled through the door to her quarters. "We're going to need to take my clothes; mine are the black ones on the left side of the closet. And my boots. I'm going to need those. And of course, my harp and my bone--"

It was at that moment that she saw Jaana peek her head out of the bedroom. "Jaana, what are you doing here!" exclaimed Tuula, surprised to see her sister home. This was a complication that she didn't plan for; she hoped that the Bolians were very hungry.

"Well, last time I checked I lived here." Jaana said, annoyed by the obvious question. "And what are you doing here?" she continued after seeing the other medical officer standing next to her sister with a hoverboard.

"I'm moving in with Dr. Mott," replied Tuula. "Don't worry, it's just for a few days, while his family is in town. I'm..." Tuula trailed off. It was at that moment that the craziness of the plan hit her. This was the most insane thing she's ever done. She smiled nervously up at her sister, struggling for the right words to describe the situation.

"We're married now," Olsam said confidently, having finally decided to fully commit himself to the rouse. The Bolian kept packing things away into a small cargo crate as if he'd just announced the time or something mundane like that. "You can come visit Tuula whenever you like, Jaana. Our door is always open to you."

Jaana was dumbstruck at that announcement. And was looking from her sister to her new brother in law and back with her mouth open. "You're what?"

"Our door," Olsam repeated, completely misunderstanding her. "Doo-ooor. Our door will always be open to you. You know, that thing." He paused in the packing and motioned toward the door leading to the corridor. "Of course it won't be literally open all the time - that would be silly - but I mean to say you can come over whenever you like for some sibling bonding. Why are you looking at me like that?" Olsam stood up straight and turned to Tuula, concerned. "Is she okay?"

"You married that?" Jaana said to her sister almost screaming.

"It's just a fake marriage," shouted Tuula in an attempt to explain the situation to Jaana with the goal of calming her down. "Just for a few days while his family is visiting. Besides," she added in a slightly feeble tone, "even if we were actually married, I could do a lot worse than Dr. Mott."

Jaana, slowly becoming from the shock of her sisters fake marriage. tried to process what was going on. "So you are going to pretend to be living together, so your pretend marriage makes more sense. Right." Jaana said. "He does bring some more colour in your life."

"Yes, that's the plan," replied Tuula, pleasantly surprised at how Jaana was taking it. "Do you mind helping me load some of my clothes onto the pallet? Olsam, can you get my harp and bone saw?"

Removing the black clothing from their closet and placing it on the pallet Jaana said to Mott jokingly. "So my dear brother in law. When is the pre wedding party? Or did my invite get lost in subspace?" Her sister had done many stupid and impulsive things in her life, so she didn't needed that long of a time to adjust to the whole idea.

"The what?" Olsam asked, carelessly whirling around with the bone saw in his hand and nearly taking off Jaana's nose. "Pre-wedding party? Uh. I hadn't really thought of that... We, uh... I kinda told my family we were already married. Otherwise they'd want to throw a Bolian wedding immediately and trust me when I say Starbase 84 doesn't have the capacity or resources to handle that. My extended family would show up and that's really something that needs to be accommodated on a planetary scale." He turned to pack the bone saw away in a cargo container, but, having a thought, turned back with a wild swing of the antique metal instrument. "Say, does Tuula have any weird quirks I should know about? She isn't going to try to kill me in my sleep, is she? I've honestly had enough of that for a lifetime."

"Weird quirks?" Jaana said raising an eyebrow and looking at her sisters face. She wasn't looking happy, like she knew what Jaana was going to say. "Well, she does have a think for torture equipment, but as long as you keep that locked up, you don't have a thing to worry." she said with a highly sarcastic tone. She was actually starting to like this whole masquerade. She would love to see how her sister dealt with the blue invasion now called her family-in-law. "Oh, and apparently she has a thing for blue"

Olsam was no stranger to torture equipment, but this hardly seemed like the time or place to discuss it. Instead, he took up wondering about this "Blue" for whom Tuula seemed to have a "thing." Who was Blue? Some crewman he didn't know about? A pet name for someone already on the ship? And what sort of thing did she have for him? Was she holding his property for him, or was this one of those human sayings that alluded to romantic intentions? The last thing he needed was his fake wife getting involved in a fake affair on the first day of their fake marriage so whoever Blue was, he was just going to have to take a backseat.

"I see," Olsam muttered, turning over in his mind just how he could discover the identity of this Blue. He turned back to the cargo container, carefully packed away the bone saw, and then reached for some other antique-looking device that could likely remove limbs, too. "Well, I hope she likes to eat because that's pretty much all my family does. Eat and argue. We're a simple people. And they're going to be asking her a thousand questions. If I were you, Jaana, I'd lay low until they're gone. If they find out Tuula has a sister then they'll come after you, too. The Mott family has a tendency to absorb all of a person's relatives upon marriage, sort of like a deadly pathogen that can't be stopped. You know, like a plague. A big blue plague."

The first thing that came to mind was how she could make her sister's fake marriage a small hell. She still had to get back at her for ruining her date. "Come on, how bad can it be." Well, the food part didn't sound that good to her. "Won't most of the attention be with Tuula?"

"She can't capture and hold the attention of all 47 of them forever," Olsam grumbled. "I'm sure at least one of them will track you down. They're very coordinated that way, even if they look chaotic together. Besides, they'll want to check our back story. One of my cousins is a detective, a very annoying detective. They'll probably send him around to make sure we're not lying. I wouldn't be surprised if some of them hid in the closet waiting for us to consummate the marriage - they did it to my cousin Norbo seven years ago, so I wouldn't be surprised if they tried something like that again."

"We'll just have to check the closets before we go to bed then," replied Tuula. "Just... don't get any funny ideas, okay?" she warned. This little fake marriage was already starting to spiral out of control.

"About checking the closet. What are you going to wear when you meet his whole family?" Jaana asked. "You really should wear something colourful for a change."

"Black is a colour," shot back Tuula in a playful and affectionate tone. Jaana was always trying to get her to tone down her style. Of course, Tuula was no better, with her attempts to get Jaana to wear something a little more exciting than a frumpy sweater. "I was thinking that sleeveless formal dress I have. The one with the chains around the skirt," she added. "You know, to show off my ink."

"Jeh, good idea!" Jaana replied, knowing very well she just said that because she knew her opinion on that dress. "It's a fake marriage anyway, so why try to leave a good impression." she teased back.

"Hey, I look good in that dress!" protested Tuula. "It matches my hair. And this chair." Seeing it lying on top of the pallet containing her clothes, she pulled it off and held it in front of her, draping it over her body. "Don't you agree, doctor, I'd look just smashing in this?"

Olsam had bumped up against the bulkhead, having been slowly easing backward away from the arguing pair. He'd miscalculated his exit trajectory and was now pinned against the wall next to the door, rather than disappearing through it. What was it his mother had told him? Never tell a woman she looks fat in a dress? Or always tell a woman she looks fat in a dress? He couldn't remember... He enjoyed the curves afforded by a little "extra" padding here and there, so he figured it must be the latter.

"Yes, you look very fat in it," he said, giving a wide smile to indicate both his approval and the genius of his answer.

Tuula gasped in shock at the doctor's response. She briefly considered angrily throwing it in his face, but then remembered the doctor's social cluelessness. "Well, I think I look good in this dress, and that's what matters," she said, tossing it back onto her pile of clothes.

"I think you look good in it, too," Olsam said, confused and looking around the room for someone who'd suggested otherwise. Was this what marriage was like, you compliment your spouse and they appear insulted? "I don't think it really matters what you wear when you meet them, though. You can't possibly please 47 individual opinions, especially not 47 individual Bolian opinions. My cousin Eese is the worst. She thinks she's some kind of big shot fashion designer, and no matter what you put on she'll have some derisive to say about it. It's either too conformist or too edgy, out-dated or trying too hard. And she's got a lot of nerve being a critic, too, because I think she always looks like she got lathered up in glue and fell into a pile of discarded clothes."

Tuula cringed at the mention again of the forty-seven Bolians. She was already regretting agreeing to help Mott -- not that she could have said no to him and give the EMH the satisfaction. "How long did you say they were staying again?" she asked in an exasperated voice.

"Not long, just a couple of months," Olsam shrugged, hiding a sly smile that suggested he might not necessarily be telling the truth.

Tuula signed deeply. So much for shore leave.

[OFF]

Lieutenant (J.G.) Tuula Voutilainen, M.D.
Medical Officer
USS Galileo

Ensign Jaana Voutilainen
Stellar Cartographer
USS Galileo

AND

Lieutenant Olsam Mott, M.D.
Assistant Chief Medical Officer
USS Galileo

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