JC's Guide to the Final Frontier: Volume II

JC's Guide to the Final Frontier
Volume II 

More glib, blunt and possibly politically incorrect musings on the final frontier:

Unluckiest in Love

Possibly the unluckily man in the Galaxy when it comes to women is a certain eternally mono-piped ops officer on the intrepid starship Voyager.  Out of politeness I won't say his name, but it rhymes with "Harry Kim".  Among his failed exploits: a holodeck character puppeted by an alien, an ex-Borg, the wrong Delaney twin, a women from a xenophobic species (including sex without medical clearance, he got reprimanded for that one) a resurrected dead crewmember, and a group of life-sucking Taresian bridezillas.  This guy has even less luck with the opposite sex than Geordi LaForge. 

Stranger Things

Sir Arthur Eddington (no relation to Maquis leader Michael-we hope) once said: "Not only is the Universe stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine".  True.  Look at the time women from Sigma Draconis boarded Kirk's Enterprise from their very suggestive looking ship and stole Spock's brain.  Or when Dr. Crusher had sex with her late grandmothers energy ghost lover.  Or when NX-01's Trip Tucker got pregnant by sticking his hand in an alien box...

What Happens on the Holodeck...

Much like Earth's Las Vegas, what happens on the holodeck should stay on the holodeck.  Otherwise you end up with sentient hologram Moriarty trying to take over the Enterprise, the faux-Irish characters in Voyagers "Fair Haven" program becoming aware of the holodeck, Sam Rutherford's walking talking Starfleet Delta training hologram going rogue and trying to kill everyone and Riker's holorecreation of NX-01's last mission being the true story.

Wesley, Wesley, Wesley

Wesley Crusher, the prodigal firstborn son of Dr. Beverly.  First he got the Psi 2000/SS Tsiolkovsky "drunk and horny" virus and nearly got the Enterprise destroyed (only to then help save the Enterprise).  Then he got appointed acting Ensign by Captain Picard after the incident with the Traveller.  Then he failed the Starfleet Academy entrance exam the first time and had to stay on the Enterprise.  Two years later his quick thinking saved Will Riker and Deanna Troi from a Ferengi sex-freak and caused him to miss his ride to the Academy (although he did earn an ensigns pip and pretty red uniform for that one).  6 months later he decided to play around with a warp bubble and trapped his mother in a pocket universe.  He finally did move out of his mother's quarters and go to the academy, only to end up in hot water a year in for helping his flight team cover up a banned maneuver that killed of of their own, and got reprimanded and held back a year as a result.  2 years after that he visited the Enterprise, only to insult LaForge, mouth off at his mother about his failing grades, sabotage fraught negotiations with colonists on a Cardassian border colony and resign his academy appointment to join the cult of the Traveller.  Feeling regret much Jean-Luc?  And the less said about the time paradox mess with those Prodigy kids, the better.  At least Sisko's son knew how to cuddle up with a good book.

The Galaxy's Greatest Grudge

First Michael Eddington betrayed Ben Sisko by stealing a shipment of replicators, defecting to the Maquis and becoming one of their top leaders.  After catching up with him Sisko tried to capture him, only to result in Sisko getting-what do the 21st century Earth kids call it-"pwnd" by Eddington planting a computer virus on the Defiant.  After hastily repairing the "tough little ship" Sisko resumed his Eddington hunt after the former Starfleet officer turned resistance leader poisoned a Cardassian planet in the Demilitarized Zone (an ill-advised treaty border if ever there was one).  This game of chase the traitor only ended after Sisko poisoned the atmosphere of a Maquis colony, rendering it uninhabitable (something I'm positive he didn't clear with Starfleet Command first...)  Begs the question: who's the bigger ass here: Valjean or Javert?

Fail Forward

In the category of "Galactic fails with long term effects": In 2257 during the USS Discovery's diversion to the Mirror Universe (that Mirror Universe) Michael Burnham forcibly brought one Terran Emperor Phillipa Georgiou (the mirror universe counterpart of the late captain Georgiou of the USS Shenzhou), full name "Her Most Imperial Majesty, Mother of the Fatherland, Overlord of Vulcan, Dominus of Qo'noS, Regina Andor, Philippa Georgiou Augustus Iaponius Centarius" into the prime universe (this one).  Then Emperor "Space Hitler" took the USS pizza wheel-I mean Discovery-to Qo'nos and tried to go Hiroshima on the Klingon homeworld.  After the USS Discovery was destroyed the following year the former despot, now a member of the clandestine Section 31 organization disappeared.  66 years later a surprisingly un-aged Emperor Georgiou reappeared on Baraam station, working as the floating nightclubs proprietor under the alias "Madame Veronique du Franc".  She would then be recruited by Section 31 again to help the organizations motley Alpha Team capture a superweapon created by her in the mirror universe and stolen by her former rival (try not to think about it too much).  Oh, and by motley I mean: a meat head in a mech suit, a Deltan sex-pot, a Chameloid, an augment, a future Enterprise captain, and a jovial not-Vulcan piloted by a microscopic lifeform.  Apparently this is the best Section 31 can send to stop a potentially galaxy spanning threat.  Would that this were just a bad holonovel that could be deleted with a few words to the computer. 

Stop Me if You've Heard This One...

A human, a Klingon and an android and a walk into a bar.  The bartender is an El-Aurian, 400 years old if she's a day.  The Klingon orders prune juice (don't ask), the human synth ale.  The android, having just installed a new emotion chip asks for ale from Frocas III.  He hates it.  It's revolting to him.  He orders more.

Or how about this one: a Klingon, a Human and a Trill walk into a bar.  The Klingon orders bloodwine.  The bartender, a skeevy Ferengi overcharges him and the prune juice glass gets thrown across the room.  The bartender blames it on his brother, the bumbling idiot's falling down on the job of keeping the replicator working right.  To keep him from killing the bartender the Trill starts making out with the Klingon and they head for the holosuite.  The human stays out of it completely and hits up the dart board.

By the way: the Ferengi bartender: his bumbling, idiot, tinkerer brother is now the Grand Nagus.  True story.

Now if a Klingon and a Romulan walked into a bar...that's not going to end well.  Broken furniture, shattered glass and green blood will quickly become the evenings decor.  

Let's Nazi Do That

Why do so many alien species species like to cosplay as WWII Earth Nazis?  In 2268 that old fart historian John Gill had the Ekosians running around in Nazi uniforms trying to use their newfound misguided fascism to wipeout neighboring Zeos.  Over a century later Kathryn Janeways ship, after being overrun by Hirogen hunters was turned into a holographic WWII Marsailles, with Janeway and company as the resistance and the Hirogen as the reich.  It seems that even Jon Archer's crew was not immune to the alienazis: in an alternate 1944 (to which the ship was sent by a certain time travelling temporal agent from the 31st century) NX-01 and its crew were forced to defeat the temporal machinations of a group of Na'Khul from the 29th century who were giving Hitler's forces future weapons to change Earths history, while-you guessed it-dressing up in Nazi garb.  What do these aliens see in Earths failed fascist folly?  Besides, there's a much easier way to see a paranoid, corrupt fascist state: just book a transport to Cardassia.

The Most Dangerous Experiment

In the mid 23rd century, while Captain Pike commanded the Enterprise and the Federation and the Klingon Empire duked it out in a war started by a mutineer and a Klingon zealot, Starfleet in its infinite wisdom decided to tinker with traveling faster than warp by outfitting two Crossfield class science ships with a prototype "Spore Hub Drive" to allow them to instantaneously jump across space using the mycelial network.  The result of this ill-conceived endeavor: the USS Glenn was destroyed after it captured a sentient tardigrade and ran into a Hawking radiation firewall, twisting the crew and splattering their remains all over the bulkheads, and the USS Discovery (don't worry if you've never heard of it) tortured said sentient tardigrade to use it as a navigator, had one of their own crew members genetically modify himself with the tardigrades DNA to navigate the drive, and ended up jumping across the dimensional boundary to the mirror universe and back, and returned nine months late, its absence nearly causing the Federation's defeat.  Who writes this stuff?  After nearly destroying the jahSepp with their continuing Spore Drive jumps and ultimately getting the ship destroyed in a Spore Drive related explosion, it's probably for the best that Starfleet decided to bury the whole affair.

Bad-mirals

Starfleet seems to have a huge opportunity for development when it comes to vetting their officers for the Admiral positions.  Erik Pressman, Will Riker's former C.O. and former captain of the Pegasus led a project to develop a Federation cloaking device, violating a treaty and risking war and losing his ship and 71 members of the crew in the process.  Not to be outdone James Layton, Ben Sisko's former C.O. used changeling fears to attempt a military coup and impose martial law on Earth.  Fortunately Sisko saved the day and even forced Layton to resign, but not before Layton ordered on of his loyalist captains to attack another Starfleet ship.  Matt Dougherty worked with the Dominion allied Son'a to violate the Prime Directive and forcibly relocate the Ba'ku from their home planet.  He also allowed the Son'a leader Ru'afo to order an attack on the USS Enterprise and attempt parricide by using his planet destroying particle collector on the still occupied planet after the Son'a and Ba'ku were revealed to be the same species.  Yikes.  And then there's Les Buenamigo.  Who conducted illegal tests resulting in serios injuries to one Ensign Sam Rutherford (and then wiping Rutherford's memories to cover up said activities) to create an ultimately unstable corrupt AI to control a fleet of automated starships (which later turned on him-who could've guessed-and destroyed him).  Maybe the top brass should be a little more choosy about who they admit into the "four pips in a bar" club.  One more for the road: Norah Satie, who turned the investigation into possible sabotage on the Enterprise into a paranoia fueled witch-hunt a-la 20th century Earth McCarthyism.  Fortunately Jean-Luc pulled out a quote about civil liberties from Satie's own father and the younger Satie was hoist by her own Picard (I'll show myself out).