Chapter Text
Getting settled into a new home was by far the least settling thing he had ever done, even if it were under the protection of a petite uniformed officer named Abigail Mills. He found her likeable enough to not mind her silence too terribly, in fact, he rather liked her silence considering Sheriff Corbin had been irritatingly talkative.
You see, dear friends, one Ichabod Crane travelled from his native home in which he was a renowned genealogist and historian. It had been his pursuit of knowledge which led him to take his current sabbatical to America, where he had traced his roots to a family sire that bore his own name. Just as his predecessor bore his name, he was also an Oxford scholar, which made the former Ichabod Crane a sort of inspiration to the current one.
He had grown up hearing tales of how a headless horseman pursued any Crane heir that dared to venture to the small town of Sleepy Hollow, New York. Population: 144,001 as of his arrival. Of course he believed it to simply be a metaphorical pursuit as the headless man defied the very laws of nature and were nothing more than a quirk of his family history. He was certain that if he dug deep enough, he would find his namesake suffered from delusions or had been affected by some sort of food borne illness which had hallucinogenic properties.
Despite his protests, his family had insisted upon making arrangements with the local police to make sure he retained his head for the duration of his scheduled seven years of research. After all, there was much more history to his family in the colonies that he desired to learn and the initial two years he had planned would simply not be enough. It may be enough for the basic foray into learning about the legend of the horseman, but nowhere near enough to research his family.
"Do you know anything of the legends of the headless horseman, Lieutenant Mills?" Ichabod asked as he carefully placed unboxed items in a predetermined place on his desk. He wanted to make sure his set up was precisely that which he had back home to inhibit homesickness.
The tiny woman pushed herself away from the wall she had been leaning again. She blinked as though he had awakened her from a nap. "Excuse me?" she asked.
"The headless horseman," he repeated. "Do you know anything of the legends? I intend to do my dissertation on the mythos which surrounds it."
The woman hid a yawn as she shifted her body to work out the strains she had been putting on her body during her rest. "Are you kidding?" she said with a grin. "There's an entire museum dedicated to the legend. That would probably be the best place to start. We also have yearly events at Halloween that play it up, so you arrived at a good time." She eased herself into a chair across from him. "And the sheriff wanted me to make sure you had access to anything you might need in our archives."
Ichabod felt himself smile. "Whilst I do intend to peruse the archives and museum records... my query was to what you knew of the legends."
Lieutenant Mills leaned forward to rest her elbows on her thighs. "Well, Professor Crane, I once did a little research into the legend myself. It's sort of a big deal around here after all, so almost everyone has at least a small connection to it. My family had a major connection to the legend. One of my ancestors served as a protector for the Crane family. Legends say she was a witch with incredible powers and that fate had ordained her and your ancestor with protecting mankind from the apocalypse."
"And here our families are, once again, working together," Ichabod said. "Although, I fear, for a much more mundane task."
"You'll learn that Sleepy Hollow is far from mundane, Professor," she said.
Ichabod chucked lightly. "I hardly foresee any sort of true excitement taking place in such a quaint place."
A knock sounded on the door. "Shift change, Mills," a muffled voice said from the other side.
Lieutenant Mills looked over her shoulder. "Oh well. Our time is done, Professor. If you need anything just let Morales know, Brooks should be relieving him around midnight," she said as she stood up.
"Perhaps you could start me on my journey in the morning, Lieutenant," Ichabod offered. "That is, of course, if you will be the one on duty at that time."
"I'm scheduled to watch over you for the next three days, eight to four," the woman provided and she pulled herself from the chair. "It was nice talking with you and... standing around watching you unpack all day."
"And I enjoyed your company, Lieutenant," Ichabod said with a humbled bow of his head.
"We're going to be seeing a lot of each other in the times to come," she said. "May as well get ourselves on a first name basis. Feel free to call me Abbie."
"Only if you refer to me as Ichabod," he replied with a gentle smile.
"Consider it done, Ichabod," Abbie said with a teasing grin. She turned and strode purposely to the door. She put her hand on her gun as she peered out of the spyhole. "Confirm your identity."
"Seriously Abbie?" Luke's annoyed voice said from the other side of the door.
"Use the code or I will shoot you through the door, Morales," Abbie replied.
Ichabod shook his head, amused by the banter between the two officers. The man on the other side of the door groaned with annoyance but gave the code, nonetheless. Abbie yanked the door open and let her relieving officer in. They swapped trivial details of what was to be done while on the shift. Abbie gave him a quick smile and wave before she disappeared out of the door.
"She's a likeable lady," Morales said, walking over to claim the seat Abbie had been in.
"Indeed she is," Ichabod said, concentrating on the positioning a cup of pens on his desk. "I was especially fond of her habit of not trying to engage me in idle chit chat." He gave the cup a 1/4 of a turn, bringing the handle even with a stack of triangle coasters. Perfect. "I have research to get started."
He pulled a pen from the cup and clicked it. He gave Morales a forced smile and the other man nodded in understanding. "I'll just keep watch at the door."