#the people playing were a group of ensigns who we also follow as they have cryptic conversations which make sense in retrospect

[bumblingbabooshka]

Voyager B Plot where Neelix finds several notes that say 'Kill Tom Paris' and enlists Tuvok to help find the potential murderer (Tuvok would phrase who's helping who a bit differently) after informing the pilot that someone may be planning an attempt on his life. Episode ends with the reveal that some people were just playing Fuck-Marry-Kill and forgot to properly clean up.

[myenterpriseisparked]

The Voyager Bunch

Or, Rascals: Voyager Edition

-----

Based on this post

This is dedicated to @jellybeansarecool @bizships @emilie786 @joyful-voyager and @subtle-spock for providing ideas, encouragement, and for generally being really awesome people. Also they are the nicest folks ever. Go follow them.

This ain’t my first fanfiction rodeo, but it is my first Star Trek fanfiction rodeo so I beg for your patience. Also, I am perfectly aware that there are some plot holes in here. This is because I am an animal scientist, not a Starfleet physicist/biologist/whateverist. Swiss cheese also has holes and swiss cheese is good so please consider that.

Click here to read on AO3, if you prefer. Thanks for reading!

-----

Despite having only been a captain for a few years, Kathryn Janeway had seen more unusual occurrences, courtesy of the Delta Quadrant, than most Starfleet captains combined. Some days, she felt a little overwhelmed by the summary of the last three years of experiences. Other days, she was grateful for the callouses such challenges had built over her nerves, preparing her to face even the strangest incidents without panicking.

Today was a day to be grateful, because without having seen everything she had seen, the prospect of her Chief Engineer, Chief of Security, Head Helmsman, and most brilliant Ensign being reverted into child-like versions of themselves would have launched her straight into a spiral of panic.

“How-” Janeway paused for a moment to pinch the bridge of her nose, “how exactly did this happen?”

“Well, ya see, ‘Lanna and Harry and I were in that shuttle and then this big black thing showed up and we flew into it and there was a big flash and-”

Janeway held a hand up, cutting off the shockingly fast string of prattle. “I think I understand that part, Tom, thank you.” She spoke as gently and patiently as possible. “What I don’t understand is how Tuvok got into this.... predicament.”

She turned toward the tallest of the four children, who stood with his hands behind his back in a way that would have been exactly like Tuvok, if the pre-teen boy weren’t fidgeting with the hem of his shirt and looking around the bridge, open mouthed and starry-eyed. “Tuvok?”

The Vulcan turned toward her. “The shuttle was stuck in the anomaly and the tractor beam wasn’t working, so I rammed my ship into theirs to dislodge it.” Tuvok nearly smiled, which was jarring to see on his features, no matter how much younger he looked. “It worked, but I got sucked into the anomaly too. When we came out the other side, we looked like this.”

He motioned to Tom and B’Elanna, who were standing next to him, both of which appeared to be around the age of 5 or 6. Harry, who looked to be about a year old, was currently tucked into Chakotay’s arms, playing contentedly with the rank bar at the large man’s throat.

Janeway looked the group over, ignoring the humored smiled playing at her first officer’s lips. With a sigh, she turned to the members of her senior officer team that were not currently under the age of 13. “I’m open to suggestions.”

“I would like to run some experiments first, but I am wondering if I can age their DNA back to the correct age in a process similar to the one I used to turn you and Mr. Paris back into humans after the, ah, Warp 10 incident,” The Doctor said.

“That might put their bodies back at the right age,” Kes said, brow furrowing, “but their minds appear to have reverted to their new biological age as well. Will the DNA reversal process fix that?”

The Doctor tilted his head. “I’m unsure. I need more time to research and run simulations.”

Janeway nodded. “Get started on that right away. In the meantime,” she turned back to the children and her commander, “let’s get you four something to eat.” 

Neelix jumped to his feet, practically lighting up the room with his enthusiasm. “I’ll fix you kiddos up something real nice!” He dashed over to the door with a wild grin. “Give me ten minutes, and I’ll have the best grilled cheese sandwich you’ve ever smelt!” He saluted the whole room and practically bounced out the door.

Janeway glanced over at Chakotay who, for the first time since he had picked up baby Harry, looked nervous. His worried glance met her own and he tilted his head.

“Well,” Chakotay sighed, “hopefully these guys aren’t as picky of eaters as I was.”

-----

As unappealing as Janeway found Neelix’s cooking to be, it was, apparently, perfect for kids, as evidenced by the unrestrained glee with which Tom, B’Elanna, and Tuvok devoured their sandwiches.

The captain couldn’t help but smile as Tom downed the second half of his sandwich in a few bites and think how the older version of Tom would have been appalled to see himself eating Neelix’s cooking with such enjoyment.

As the older children ate, Janeway found herself spooning some kind of mashed vegetable mix into Harry’s waiting mouth. At first, she was a little uncomfortable with the idea of feeding one of her best officers, but, once she was able to get past the strangeness of the entire situation, she found herself enjoying the funny expressions and eager attitude of the baby in front of her.

“Gosh, he’s such a cute baby.” She said with a grin for the fourth time.

Chakotay leaned over, his shoulder brushing hers as he smiled at Harry. “I’d like to agree with you, Captain, but you keep hogging him so I can’t get a good look.” He turned to look her in the eye, raising his eyebrow teasingly.

She shoved him playfully with her elbow. “You got to hold him earlier in the conference room. It’s my turn.”

“I think your turn ended about ten minutes ago,” he grinned.

“I think I can find something else for you to do if you’re going to take Harry away from me, Commander.” She returned his grin.

“Fine,” Chakotay shook his head with a chuckle, “but I get him later.”

-----

Several hours had passed since lunch and, much to Chakotay’s disappointment, baby Harry was still firmly in Janeway’s possession, perched on her hip and looking for all the world like he belonged there.

Chakotay tried not to think too much about how naturally Kathryn had taken to caring for Harry as he watched her pace the bridge, checking on various scanner readings and flight paths, from his position on the floor by their command chairs. Beside him, Tom and B’Elanna rolled a ball back and forth between them, excitedly chattering about... well... everything.

“Do you think the whales were really THAT big?” Tom spread his arms out to the side.

“Yeah they were!” B’Elanna exclaimed loudly enough that the entire ship could probably hear it. Despite Chakotay’s best efforts to get her to lower her voice, the young girl seemed to only have one volume. “I saw a big fake one in a museum once and it was HUGE!”

“Whoa!” Tom’s eyes widened. “Bigger than this ship?”

B’Elanna tilted her head. “I don’t know, but it was definitely bigger than me!”

The two kids laughed, rolling the ball back and forth faster.

“Hey Tom?”

“What?”

“You’re my best friend!” B’Elanna suddenly reached forward and gave Tom a hug.

Chakotay glanced up at Kathryn to exchange a look of awe before he turned back to the kids on the floor. “But B’E, I thought you just said a few minutes ago that I’m your best friend.” He raised an eyebrow, hiding his smile.

The young girl gave him a look that he had seen far too many times on her older counterpart’s face whenever he said something particularly dumb. “I can have two best friends, duh.”

He laughed. “Fair enough.”

Suddenly, he saw Kathryn’s purposeful walk stop out of the corner of his eye. 

“Chakotay,” her voice was even and tense, “where’s Tuvok?”

Eyes widening, Chakotay glanced around the bridge. Tuvok was no where to be seen.

“Chakotay to Tuvok.” He stood as he tapped his commbadge. “Tuvok, please acknowledge.” They waited a moment and, upon receiving no response, moved simultaneously toward the turbolift. 

“It’s possible he hasn’t figured out how to use his comm.” Janeway tucked Harry closer to her side as they stepped into the lift. “Computer: locate Tuvok.”

“Unable to comply.”

Janeway gave the ceiling a glare. “Why?”

The computer did not respond.

“Maybe the de-aging effect has made it difficult for the computer to locate him.” Chakotay rested a hand on her shoulder. “I’m sure he’s alright; he’s probably just exploring the ship; you saw how amazed he was by everything in the conference room earlier.”

She nodded tightly. “Let’s hope so. Where do you think he’s gone?”

“Maybe to the holodeck?”

“Or his quarters.”

“What about the mess hall?”

“He just ate.”

They both paused, mulling it over.

“Alright.” Kathryn straightened. “I’ll check holodeck one and his quarters, you check holodeck two and the mess hall.” She turned back to the lift door. “Holodeck one.”

Chakotay swallowed around the lump in his throat, trying not to think of all the ways a small child could get hurt on a spaceship like Voyager. As the turbolift began to move, Janeway’s badge chirped.

“Kes to the captain.”

Her brow raised as she tapped the emblem. “Go ahead.”

“I think I’ve found something you’re missing.” Kes’s usually lighthearted tone was even lighter, clear amusement seeping through.

Kathryn turned to look Chakotay in the eye, a hopeful smile brightening her face. “I’m on my way.”

-----

Honestly, Janeway was a little ashamed of the fact that she didn’t think to go looking for her best friend among the orchids and other plants in the aeroponics bay, considering his horticulturally-related hobbies. As she and Chakotay stepped into the room, smiles crept onto both of their faces as they watched Tuvok carefully transfer one of Kes’s sprouts to a bigger pot. After patting the soil around the plant firmly, he wiped a hand across his forehead, smearing dirt on his face to match the dirt on his uniform.

Kes smiled up at the command team. “He came down and asked about a hundred questions about our system and then offered to help me with my work while we talked because its ‘more efficient to talk and work than simply talk.’” 

Janeway chuckled at Kes’s approximation of Tuvok’s speech pattern. “Thanks for letting us know, Kes.” She reluctantly handed Harry to Chakotay, who flashed his dimples, and crouched next to Tuvok. “Hello there.”

Tuvok glanced up quickly before resuming his work. “Hello, Captain. Did you know that these Talaxian green beans take only a week and a half to reach maturity?”

“I did not.” Janeway raised a brow and tilted her head. “That’s very impressive.”

“I thought so too when Kes told me.” He patted the soil around another plant and set it aside, retrieving another sprout.

“Tuvok,” the captain reached forward and rested a hand on his shoulder, “I’m glad you’ve found something to do, but you have to tell someone where you’re going before you wander off. We didn’t know what happened to you and Chakotay and I were really worried.”

Behind her, Chakotay’s heart flipped. There was something rather... intimate about the way she had referred to both of them being worried about a child.

“I’m sorry, Captain.” Tuvok nodded his head. “It won’t happen again.”

“Good.” Janeway smiled and stood. “Why don’t you help Kes down here for a while and then come back up to the bridge when you are ready?” She looked at Kes. “That is, if Kes is alright with that.”

The young woman smiled. “Of course, I’d love some help.”

Janeway nodded and turned back to Tuvok. “Be sure to let us know when you’re on your way back up.”

“Of course, Captain.”

She patted him one last time on the shoulder and turned back to Chakotay. They fell into step beside one another and entered the elevator.

As the doors whooshed closed, Janeway turned to Chakotay with the intention of reclaiming Harry, but stopped. A smile grew across her lips as she watched Chakotay bounce Harry gently, allowing the little boy to palm his tattoo in curiosity. Even as one of Harry’s chubby fingers poked him in the eye, Chakotay simply chuckled and took the tiny hand in his own.

He finally turned to look at her. “What?”

Kathryn just shook her head, grinning wider. “I was going to take Harry from you, but I can’t bear to break up this cute little arrangement.” She motioned to the two of them with a long finger.

The corner of Chakotay’s mouth kicked up a little higher. “Captain, did you just imply that I’m cute?”

Her brow arched, but her smile didn’t diminish. “It would be hard for anyone to look unappealing with a cute baby in their arms.”

Her heart stopped suddenly as she realized what she had just said. From the look of Chakotay’s face, he had caught it too. Implying that he and the baby were cute was one thing; calling him “appealing” was another. Before she could say anything else she might regret, Kathryn turned back to the lift door, schooling her features back into the face of the Captain.

If she had turned but a half-second later, she would have seen a wide smile break across Chakotay’s face.

-----

“I’m sorry, Captain, but I need more time. I won’t deactivate myself until I have a solution, but this situation is very delicate and I can’t risk rushing my tests. You’ll need to find somewhere for the children to sleep. Hopefully I’ll have a solution tomorrow.”

Kathryn nodded. “Of course. Thank you, Doctor.”

With a grim smile, the feed from sickbay switched off, leaving her to look at her dark reflection in the black screen. Something like relief swept over help alongside a touch of regret. On one hand, she could really use her senior officers back in functioning shape. On the other hand....

Her eyes drifted back down to Harry, who had pulled a bit of her hair out of it’s ponytail and was curling it around his tiny fist in unbreakable fascination. A smile tugged at her lips as she cuddled him a bit closer. 

She could get used to this.

The thought struck her before she even knew what she was feeling and, as soon as she admitted it to herself, she took that feeling and shoved it as deep into the recesses of her mind as she could. She was the captain of a ship that was constantly in danger and she shouldn’t dwell on things she couldn’t have.

Kathryn sighed, rubbing the back of her neck. “Well, Harry, looks like we need to find you a place to sleep.”

Turning back to the computer, she moved to set him down so she could use both hands to search the crew quarters layouts for a suitable place to keep the children overnight. As soon as Harry’s feet touched the ground, a wail rose from the back of his throat and his face scrunched.

Kathryn quickly scooped him back up. “Harry? What’s wrong?”

The boy’s cry of protest faded into whimpers and he buried his head in her shoulder, clinging to her tightly.

A warm feeling washed over her. “Ah,” she smiled, “I see.”

She pulled him closer and turned back to the computer, tapping buttons with one hand. “You can stay up here with me, then.”

The door to her quarters chimed.

“Come in.” 

Before she could turn to greet her guest, mischievous giggles rose from the door. Eyebrow raised, she whirled around to find Chakotay standing in the doorway, a stack of PADDs in his hand, a tiny engineer on his left leg, and a tiny helmsman on his right.

He stepped forward with far less difficultly than she would have expected, given the extra weight on his legs. He crossed the room quickly and passed the PADDs to her. “The crew reports you requested.”

“Thank you.” She smiled, glancing down at the still giggling forms. “Not to alarm you, Commander, but it would seem that you have a couple of lifeforms attached to you.”

Chakotay’s eyes grew wide in mock surprise. “Really?” He turned his head and shuffled around, as if to look at his back. “Where?”

Tom and B’Elanna’s laughter grew. Suddenly, Chakotay leaned over and scooped the two of them off his legs, lifting them both up over his shoulders as their shrieked in delight.

He turned back to Kathryn with a wide smile. “Not to worry, Captain, I’ve apprehended the life forms.” 

She smiled back with a soft chuckle. “We need to find a place for the life forms to stay tonight.”

Chakotay’s smile faded into a more serious, but not displeased look. “The Doctor doesn’t have a solution yet, then?” He lowered Tom and B’Elanna to the ground. They scampered off to the viewport, excitedly chattering about the stars.

“No, he needs a bit more time.”

Chakotay nodded. “Maybe I could take them for the night, that way someone is there to keep an eye on them.”

Kathryn shook her head. “I have no doubt in your babysitting abilities, Commander, but four children is a lot for one person to watch alone and your quarters are not big enough for Trouble 1 and Trouble 2 to run around in.” She gestured to the kids at the window. 

“Fair point. Maybe I should take Harry and Tuvok then, and you could take Tom and B’Elanna?”

She turned Harry away from Chakotay. “Trying to take my boy again, are you Chakotay?” 

He chuckled and shook his head. “Do you have another idea, then, Mom?”

Her breath caught in her throat, but she managed to smirk at him and continue speaking without any indication that his previous sentence had impacted her. “My quarters are the largest on the ship. If we set up cots here in my living room we could easily both keep an eye on the children overnight.”

“Sounds good to me.” He glanced up at the clock on the wall. “How about I go collect Tuvok from aeroponics and some food from the mess hall while you get the cots set up?”

“Sounds like a plan.”

He gave her one last lingering smile, which she returned, before heading out the door and down the hall.

-----

Apparently the lunch they had shared earlier that day had been misleadingly easy. Supper was, to put it lightly, a challenge.

“B’Elanna, eat your own food and stop taking from Tom’s plate,” Kathryn said firmly.

“But Tom isn’t eating it!”

“I was going to eat it! I’m just a slower eater than you are!”

“Well eat faster then!”

“B’Elanna!” Chakotay set down the spoon he had been using to feed Harry and fixed her with a stern look. “That food isn’t yours, and Kathryn already asked you to stop taking Tom’s food. You won’t be asked again.”

B’Elanna mumbled out an apology and stuffed another bite of her own meal into her mouth.

Kathryn shot Chakotay a grateful smile and turned to Tuvok, who was holding up one of his vegetables to the light. “Tuvok? What are you doing?”

“I’m looking at the xylem and phloem of this plant.”

She bit back a smile. “I appreciate your curiosity, Tuvok, but I need you to stop studying your food and start eating it.”

The young Vulcan turned to her and nodded. “Of course.” He politely chewed and swallowed his food and turned back to the captain. “Did you know that this particular plant is a distant cousin of Terran broccoli? You can tell by the-”

Chakotay smiled as he watched Kathryn listen to Tuvok’s fourth lecture of the evening on plant biology. Neither of them were certain of what he was talking about most of the time, but his enthusiasm for the subject was nearly infectious and neither of them minded listening.

“Chakotay?”

He turned away from the scene across the table and looked at Tom next to him. “Yes?”

“After dinner, will you read to us?”

“Of course.” Chakotay smiled and ruffled Tom’s hair. “Anything particular you want to hear?”

“I want to hear about your missions with the Maquis!” B’Elanna bounced in her seat, all of that barely-contained Klingon energy starting to spill over. 

“Or perhaps you could read to us from a classic story,” Tuvok raised a brow. “I’m fond of the works of Tolkien, maybe Tom and B’Elanna would like ‘The Hobbit’ too?”

“What’s a hobbit?” Tom’s face scrunched in confusion.

“Maybe,” Kathryn interjected before Tuvok could give a detailed recounting of the beloved childhood book, “Chakotay could tell us a story from his tribe.” Her eyes met his across the table. “He is pretty good at recounting ancient legends.”

Heat crept up the sides of Chakotay’s face as he held her stare. “Maybe.”

“Nah,” Tom’s voice broke through the pleasant tension between them. “I wanna know what a hobbit is!”

Chakotay chuckled. “Alright, ‘The Hobbit’ it is.”

-----

It took some time to get the older three to settle into bed, but finally, they began to yawn and snuggle deeper under their blankets. As their heads grew heavier, Chakotay wrapped up his story telling and the command team began to tuck their young companions in for the night.

As Chakotay wished Tom and Tuvok a good night’s rest, Kathryn carefully extracted B’Elanna from where she was snuggled into her side and took her over to her cot. As she got the small girl settled, she suddenly reached up and captured Kathryn in a tight hug. Surprised, Kathryn’s eyes widened, but she returned the gesture in earnest.

“Kathryn?”

“Yes, B’Elanna?”

“You’re my best friend.”

Kathryn blinked and pulled back to look B’Elanna in the eyes with a small smile. “I thought Chakotay and Tom were your best friends.”

“I can have more than one best friend.” B’Elanna’s voice was filled with deep confidence, despite how sleep-laced it was.

“Fair enough,” Kathryn chuckled, pulling the blankets tightly around the girl.��“Goodnight.”

She met Chakotay in her bedroom, Harry still in his arms.

“Any time I try to set him down he starts crying.” Chakotay grinned sheepishly. 

She grinned back. “I had a similar experience earlier today.” She reached up and brushed hand over the boy’s soft, black hair. “Its a good thing he weighs next to nothing.”

At Kathryn’s gentle touch, Harry stirred. His dark eyes found Kathryn’s and he reached out for her. With a look of mock hurt, Chakotay transferred the boy to his desired location.

“I’m trying not to be offended right now, Harry.”

Kathryn simply grinned and bounced the baby in her arms gently. “It’s alright, Chakotay. He has excellent taste.”

Chakotay shook his head, dimples flashing. “I suppose I can’t argue with that.”

She turned toward the bed and settled herself on one side, her back resting against the pillows and Harry resting against her chest. “Let’s see if we can get this one sleepy enough to not notice if we set him down.” She looked back at Chakotay, who was still standing, rather awkwardly. She patted the bed next to her with a smirk. “Come on, Commander. Get some rest. We’ve has a big day, wrangling the kiddos.”

He smiled and crossed the room to the other side of the bed, gently sitting next to her, his legs stretched out. “It has been a long day,” he said with a sigh. “But, I can’t say I haven’t enjoyed it.” He tilted his head to look at Kathryn, who was already looking up at him.

“Nor I.” Her voice was barely above a whisper.

Suddenly, Chakotay was very aware of how close their faces were. He watched as Kathryn’s eyes slid down to his lips. Before he could do something he couldn’t take back, he took a deep breath and turned away.

“Well,” Kathryn cleared her throat, sounding more like the Captain now, “it’s been fun but we should get some sleep. I’ll keep an eye on Harry here and take him to his cot in a few minutes. You should go ahead and rest, Commander.”

“Of course.” He tilted his head and gave her a small smile. “Goodnight, Kathryn.”

She grinned back. “Goodnight, Chakotay.”

-----

Apparently, Kathryn didn’t stay awake long enough to take Harry back to his cot, as evidenced by the weight on her chest as she stirred awake the next morning. She slowly became aware of her surroundings and the previous day’s events came flooding back to her.

She also became distinctly aware of the warm, comfortable presence beside her. As she opened her eyes, she realized that her first officer’s arm was settled around her shoulders and that his shoulder was currently her pillow. His head rested atop hers and the hand that was not draped around her shoulders was resting on top of Harry’s back next to her own.

The situation was all rather snuggly and, were it not a violation of every professional barrier Kathryn had erected between her and the commander, she would have had no issue in savoring the moment.

Then again.... maybe she could allow herself just a few moments to pretend that the baby in her arms wasn’t her star technical officer and that the man holding her close wasn’t her XO and that this was a perfectly normal situation.

Before she could get too far into her fantasy, however, Chakotay stirred next to her, his dark eyes fluttering open to find her own.

“Good morning,” he said, his voice huskier than her own as sleep clung to it.

“Good morning.” 

They looked at each other for a moment before Chakotay carefully extracted himself from her side, helping her up so she could carefully place Harry in his cot in the living room without waking the boy or the other children who were still sleeping. Without a word, they quietly prepared breakfast and coffee, steeling themselves for another day of handling the kids.

-----

“I’m afraid I’m a bit.... stuck,” The Doctor ground out with obvious difficulty.

The captain raised an eyebrow. The EMH admitting that he was struggling to solve a problem was a rare instance indeed. “How so?”

With a huff, The Doctor turned back to his desk, flipping through experimental results from a stack of PADDs. “Kes was right; the DNA reversal process I initially thought might work will not account for the de-aging of the officers’ brains, so I decided to look at the type of radiation that might have caused this and, to be completely honest, Captain,” he turned back to look her in the eye, “I have absolutely no idea how this even happened. There’s no evidence of radiation, the temporal energy around them is unidentifiable, and I can’t figure out how their cells and their minds were reversed.” He lowered his head. “I’m unsure of how to even proceed from here.”

Kathryn nodded, taking the emotions that were beginning to tumble in her chest and stuffing them as far down as she could. “Very well, Doctor. Take a rest and we can all come back to the issue later once we’ve had time to think.” She rested a hand on his shoulder, causing him to look up. “Don’t despair yet; there’s a lot of other brilliant minds on this ship besides your own. We’ll figure it out together.” She smiled and gave his shoulder a squeeze before heading into the turbolift.

As the doors slid open, she found Tuvok waiting in the lift for her. She smiled down at him and stepped inside, calling for the bridge.

“Chakotay to the captain.”

She tapped her badge. “Go ahead.”

“We need you on the bridge, there’s a bit of a situation.”

She raised a brow, glancing down at Tuvok, who was gazing at her intently. “On my way.”

-----

“So they want to.... interview us?”

“They want to interview you specifically.”

“To see if we are worthy of going through their space.”

“Something like that.”

“And going around their space isn’t an option?”

“It would add another 7 months to our journey, so this interview is our ideal option.”

“No pressure, eh, Commander?” Janeway shifted Harry from one hip to the other with a long sigh. “Alright. Hail them.”

After a moment, a blue and red humanoid alien appeared on the screen.

“Greetings, Ambassador.” The Captain flashed a polite smile. “I’m Captain Kathryn Janeway of the Federation Starship Voyager.”

The alien woman inclined her head. “Hello, Captain Janeway, I’m Ambassador Tel Parah of the Doonian Delegation.” Her eyes swept the bridge. “You’re ship is heavily armed, which, according to the laws of our people, requires that we do a personal interview of the commanding officer to ensure that violence or other manners of chaos will not be instigated as you pass through our space.”

“Of course, I understand.” Janeway smiled again. “What questions may I answer for you?”

Over the course of the next 30 minutes, Janeway was grilled on their purpose in passing through Doonian space, the types and numbers of weapons they carried, and the journey they had made so far. Just as Janeway thought there wasn’t possibly anything more she could tell them, Ambassador Parah paused and looked up from the computer device in her hand to study Janeway. After a moment, she spoke again.

“Just one more thing, Captain Janeway,” a slow smile slipped onto her face, “What’s your son’s name? He’s absolutely precious.”

Janeway raised her eyebrows in surprise and glanced down at Harry, who she had nearly forgotten was still in her arms. At some point, he had removed her combadge and was currently turning it over and over again in his tiny hands, taking a moment here and there to bite parts of the object he must have found particularly interesting. Kathryn exchanged an amused glace with Chakotay, who shrugged off screen, before turning back to the ambassador. 

“This is Harry.” Janeway smiled, turning the boy so the ambassador could see him better.

The other woman smiled widely. “How adorable. He has the brightest eyes.”

“He does.” Kathryn smiled back down at him.

“You know,” Parah leaned back in her chair, “I usually don’t allow anyone through our space that isn’t from a system or planet we are already know and trust and so I wasn’t planning on letting Voyager pass. However, when I saw your baby and how well-cared for and happy he seems, I felt that I could trust you somehow.” She smiled again. “We value children highly in the Doonien Delegation. Children are often a reflection of a parent’s character. I can tell by Harry’s disposition and curiosity that you are of a fine character, Captain.”

Janeway cuddled Harry a little closer, heart warming. “Thank you, Ambassador, I take that as a high compliment.”

“As you should.” Parah leaned forward again. “You may pass through our space. We will have you stop at three checkpoints on your way though which I will send you the coordinated for in a moment. Have a safe journey.”

The screen went blank and Kathryn turned to Chakotay.

“Should I feel bad that I let her believe Harry is my son?”

Chakotay chuckled, stepping close enough and lowering his voice enough that the rest of the bridge could pretend not to hear him. “Are you saying he’s not?”

Her gaze grew softer. “I guess he’s sort of been like a son to me since we got on board.” She looked back down at him. “I feel very protective of him.”

Chakotay rested a hand on her shoulder. “I know.”

They smiled at each other again. Chakotay opened his mouth to say something more but, suddenly, there was a tug at Kathryn’s elbow.

“Captain? Now that the negotiations are over, I think I have an idea about how to fix Tom, B’Elanna, Harry, and me.” Tuvok’s eyes were bright and eager.

“Alright,” Captain Janeway smiled down at him. “Let’s get The Doctor up here and we’ll hear your idea together.”

-----

Chakotay exchanged glances with The Doctor and the Captain over the table as he bounced both Tom and B’Elanna on his knees. “Could that really work? It seems almost too easy.”

“Well, if this is a phenomena that’s inexplicable and is tied only to the anomaly the shuttles passed through, I feel like sending the children back through isn’t our worst idea.” The captain rubbed the back of her neck. “Doctor?”

The holographic man continued typing into his PADD for a moment before stopping and reading. “I- I honestly think this could work.” He slid the PADD over to Janeway. “It’s hard to predict, since we have no idea what exactly caused this, but if we send the shuttles through the anomaly opposite of the way they first went through, I think it just might turn them back to their usual ages.”

“How do we know it won’t just make them even younger?” Chakotay watched as B’Elanna slipped off of his knee, pulling Tom along with her to go play in the corner.

“We’d have to run some tests to be sure that they don’t. Perhaps we could send a plant through first, or some other organic life form.” The Doctor took the PADD back and made a note.

“We would also have to make sure that, if the tests show some promise, Tuvok can take the shuttle back through the anomaly.” Janeway turned to the boy sitting at her right. “Well, Tuvok? Do you think you could pilot the shuttle?”

He shook his head. “Since I don’t have my older self’s memories I don’t think I could.”

“We could use the tractor beam to send the shuttle through,” Chakotay said. “If we give them enough of a push to go through the anomaly, they should be able to pilot themselves back to Voyager once they get out the other side and have returned to their normal ages.”

Janeway raised her eyebrows. “Well, it’s worth a shot and I don’t have any better ideas. Commander, set a course for the anomaly. Doctor, prepare the experiments.”

-----

Tom and B’Elanna seemed to sense that something was up as they suddenly became even more clingy. The whole trip back to the anomaly, B’Elanna shared the captain’s chair with Kathryn, insisting with all of her Klingon passion that the older woman tell her more stories from earlier in their journey through the Delta Quadrant. At the helm, Tom hung on to Chakotay’s arm, watching the stars go by and asking Chakotay a hundred questions about piloting starships. Tuvok sat in Chakotay’s usual seat, interjecting with questions of his own here and there, and Harry sat on Kathryn’s knee, chewing on her jacket sleeve, her combadge still clutched tightly in his left hand.

After they reached the anomaly, it took a couple of hours for The Doctor to complete his experiments and, once he had declared that plants that had gone through the anomaly twice were returned to the same age the started as, they began preparing the children to enter the anomaly themselves. 

“Will it hurt?” B’Elanna asked in the smallest voice she had ever used in her life as Kathryn tucked the small Starfleet uniform that she had come through the anomaly with around her shoulders.

“It won’t,” Tuvok said. “It didn’t hurt when we came through the first time, did it?”

She shook her head, but didn’t look very reassured.

“It’s okay, ‘Lanna!” Tom grabbed her hand. “I’ll be right beside you.”

Kathryn stood and took a step back, feeling almost as if someone had filled her chest with some of Neelix’s heavy stew. She had to let them go, of course, this wasn’t the way they were supposed to be, but she was certainly going to miss seeing the level of innocence her officers had now. B’Elanna was unburdened by trust issues, Tuvok was passionate and bright, and Tom - well, she supposed he hadn’t changed all that much, but at least he seemed to be genuinely happy, not just putting up a front of humor to protect himself.

It would be hard to see them go back, but maybe, now that she understood how the world and time had changed her friends, she could help them.

She was shaken from her thoughts by a tug at her collar. She looked down to see Harry pulling at her pips, completely enamored by the gold metal.

“Oh, Harry.” She nearly choked on his name. Since he was so young now, she didn’t have any insight into his personality after having seen him as a baby, but she was going to miss his innocent curiosity and familiar weight on her hip.

Before she could think too much about it, she handed Harry over to Tuvok. The younger boy scrunched his face up and whimpered at the change of hands, but Tuvok bounced him gently and he settled down, reaching for the pointed tip of Tuvok’s ear.

Kathryn took a step back, feeling Chakotay step up behind her so that they were nearly touching. “Best of luck, you four.” She gave them her most reassuring smile. “See you on the other side.”

She and Chakotay hurried up the bridge and gave the go ahead for the ensign who had taken over Harry’s post to begin using the tractor beam to move the shuttle out into the anomaly. They stood side-by-side on the bridge and watched the shuttle go through. At come point, they grabbed each other’s hands and squeezed each other tightly.

There was a flash as the shuttle passed through the anomaly. After a few terrifyingly quiet moments, the shuttle came bursting out of the other side and a voice crackled over the comm.

“Cochran to Voyager,” confusion leaked through Tom’s voice. “What the hell just happened?”

Kathryn and Chakotay smiled at each other in relief. “What’s the last thing you remember, Tom?” Chakotay asked.

“B’Elanna, Harry, and I were coming back to Voyager when we- wait a second, how did you get here, Tuvok?”

Janeway laughed. “Why don’t we get you four back on board and then we’ll explain everything.”

“Copy that. See you in a few.” Tom’s voice grew quieter, like he was leaning away from the comm. “I have a feeling this is going to be one heck of a story.”

-----

After everyone had been debriefed and left to process the last two days of strangeness, Chakotay found Kathryn in her favorite spot; on her couch and staring wistfully out at the stars as they drifted past. She had shucked her jacket and taken her hair out of it’s clip, leaving her in her grey turtleneck with her hair falling around her shoulders and face.

“Got a lot on your mind?”

She turned to smile at him, a note of sadness in her eyes. “It’s been an interesting couple of days.”

He settled on the couch a ways down, turning to face her. “It sure has.” He was quiet for a moment. “I’m going to miss our kids.”

“Me too. It was fun having little ones around, playing at being a parent.” She fidgeted with the seam on the couch. “It was different and they sure did give us some challenges,” she chuckled, “but I loved it.” 

“Have you ever thought about having kids of ou-” he coughed, “your own?” 

Her crystal blue gaze caught his. “Yes.” She smiled and looked out the window again. “I always thought someday I would be a mother.” With a snort and a smirk, she continued; “Of course, I never thought I’d be mothering my helmsman, security officer, engineer, and technical officer.”

Chakotay laughed softly. “I think you were mothering them before they were turned into actual children.”

“Perhaps.” A pause. “What about you? Did you ever think about being a father? Outside of the whole instance with Seska, of course.”

He nodded. “When I was in the Maquis, no. My life was too fast-paced to be a proper father. If I was going to be a dad, I wanted to do it right and I couldn’t have done that from a Maquis ship.” He took a deep breath. “After joining this crew, though.... I’m in a better place now, and I think I’d be thrilled to be a father.” He looked over at Kathryn to find that she was already looking at him with something like wonder in her eyes. He held her gaze for a moment and, finally finding a bit of courage, he said: “I’m more at peace.”

A smiled played at the corners of her lips, and her eyes looked a little like they were silver-lined, though Chakotay couldn’t quite tell for sure in the low light of her quarters.

“You were really good with the kids. You would make an excellent father, I have no doubt.”

He smiled. “You would make an excellent mother. You’re a natural.”

“Thank you, but I barely felt like I knew what I was doing.” She chuckled.

“You could have fooled me.” He grinned for a moment, before his countenance grew more serious. “I hope you get your wish someday, Kathryn. I hope you get to be a mother.”

She was quiet for a moment, and Chakotay suddenly felt his chest tighten. Had he said too much.

Before he could fall too far into his panic, her hand slid over to his, giving it a squeeze. He looked up into her eyes, which definitely had tears in them now.

“I hope you get to be a father too Chakotay. Someday.”

He squeezed her hand back and they both fell into a comfortable silence, enjoying the view of the stars outside Kathryn’s window.

[twentiethcenturymoviesandtv]

Star Trek: Facets of Filmmaking

As it turns out, before Star Trek was fully realized in the form we know today, the show was originally not going to be about Kirk and the Enterprise at all.  In fact, it was going to be about a ship called the S.S. Yorktown, captained by a man named Robert April, on a mission to explore the Milky Way galaxy.  The original concept, still named Star Trek and set in the 23rd century, was loosely based on the Horatio Hornblower novels, and took inspiration from The Voyage of the Space Beagle, the Marathon series and the 1956 film Forbidden Planet.

By the year 1964, when this idea began to take shape, Gene Roddenberry, creator of Star Trek was an experienced writer for western television shows, and was well accustomed to (at the time) television’s favorite and most popular genre.  By 1964, however, Roddenberry was tired of the shootouts, and wanted to do something different, something with a little more depth to it.

Still, Roddenberry knew what the executives, and the public, was used to.  As a result, the first draft of this new Star Trek idea was generalized as a sort of ‘Wagon Train to the Stars’, a formulaic type of show where every episode was a standalone adventure in the continuous exploration of the final frontier: space.

As Roddenberry wrote the draft, a few things changed.  Gone was Robert April, replaced by Captain Christopher Pike, who would be portrayed by Jefferey Hunter, and the rest of the crew.  The name of the ship changed too, to the more familiar Enterprise.  As these changes came about, so too did the true nature of Roddenberry’s dream show: both an adventure story, and a thought-provoking morality tale.

Armed with his script, Roddenberry brought Star Trek to Desilu Productions, (a rather large television production company headed and half-formed by Lucille Ball herself) and met with director of production Herbert F. Solow.  Solow saw promise in the concept, and signed a three-year development contract with Roddenberry.

Star Trek moved into the next stage of development.  Further drafts were drawn up and the idea that would later become the episode The Cage was revised, until it was shown to CBS as part of the ‘First Look’ deal with Desilu productions.  CBS wasn’t impressed with the show, declining to purchase it.  They had another ‘space show’ in development that seemed too similar, a show that would become Lost in Space.

However, another company became interested: NBC.  In May of 1964, Grant Tinker, the head of the West Coast programming department, commissioned the pilot that would become The Cage (which would later be reworked into the episode The Menagerie).  After it was completed, NBC turned it down, claiming that it was ‘too cerebral’, but although this was a mild defeat, Star Trek wasn’t beaten.  NBC still showed interest in the concept, and made the highly unusual decision to commission a second pilot: the episode that would become Where No Man Has Gone Before.

With this came quite a few changes.

Christopher Pike was scrapped as a character, as was the vast majority of other cast members.  Only the character of Spock, as portrayed by Leonard Nimoy, was kept, and of the other cast members, only Majel Barrett stayed, demoted from playing the second-in-command (scrapped due to the unthinkable notion of a woman Commander) to the ship’s nurse, Christine Chapel.  With this new pilot came an onslaught of new, more familiar names and faces: William Shatner as Captain Kirk, Chief Engineer Lieutenant Commander Scott played by James Doohan, and Lieutenant Sulu, (originally a physicist in the first episode, but a helmsman afterwards) played by George Takei.

This pilot passed with flying colors, and with that, NBC added Star Trek to their fall lineup for 1966.

Still, there were changes to be made.  In this first pilot, the ship’s doctor was Mark Piper, played by Paul Fix.  Dr. Leonard McCoy, played by DeForest Kelley, would join the cast when principal filming for the first season began.  Also joining the cast was Nichelle Nichols, playing Lieutenant Uhura, and Grace Lee Whitney as Yeoman Rand.  (Whitney would depart halfway through the first season, after being on the receiving end of sexual assault from one of the executives of the show, but would later appear in the film series beginning in the 1970s.)

Besides Where No Man Has Gone Before, NBC ordered 15 episodes to start off the show.  The first episode of Star Trek, The Man Trap, aired at 8:30 PM on Thursday, September 8th of 1966 as part of NBC’s ‘sneak preview’ time slot, received with mixed feelings.  While some papers and reviewers genuinely liked the new show, (such as The Philadelphia Inquirer and the San Francisco Chronicle) others, such as The Boston Globe and The New York Times didn’t.  Variety described the show as ‘an incredible and dreary mess of confusion and complexities’, and predicted that it would fail.

Fighting for position against reruns of previous shows, despite the critics’ warnings, Star Trek won a time slot, and began with decent ratings.  However, it didn’t last long.  By the end of the first season, Star Trek was sitting at 52nd out of 94 programs.

Star Trek was sinking, fast.

But even then, it wasn’t without its supporters.

The editor of Galaxy Science Fiction, Frederik Pohl, offered up his amazement that Star Trek’s consistency remained good, with no drop in quality after its Tricon winning early episodes.  He expressed his fear that the show would be cancelled due to its low ratings, and pleaded with audiences to help save Star Trek, writing letters to prevent its cancellation.

At this time, the only thing that was keeping the show on the air in the first place was the demographics it was reaching.  NBC had become interested in the demographics of the shows it was producing in the early 1960s, and by 1967, was using that as part of the decision making as to which shows got dropped.  

And something about Star Trek’s demographics interested NBC very much: it had managed to attract ‘quality’ audiences: high income, high educated people (primarily males).

As a result, NBC ordered ten more episodes for the first season, and ordered a second in March of 1967.  The network then changed Star Trek’s timeslot, moving it to 8:30 on Friday nights, a timeslot that seemed doomed for failure among the audience that Star Trek had gathered.

The next season, things didn’t seem to be getting any better.  It was at this point that the show added on Walter Koenig as Ensign Chekov (as George Takei was working on The Green Berets and was not as available for shooting), although some might have wondered why they would have bothered.  The show’s ratings were still dropping.  William Shatner, expecting the show to be cancelled, began to prepare for other projects.  

Again, the demographics saved the day.

Roddenberry’s initial concept of adventure alongside morality tales intrigued the audiences Star Trek had attracted.  The show had values, values that had to be applied to every situation.  The show was sincere, and serious in its exploration of issues like racism, war and peace, human rights, technology, class warfare, and imperialism, far different in tone and content than the other chief sci-fi show at the time: Lost in Space.  As a result, the show generated a more interested fanbase, perhaps the first true ‘fanbase’ of any franchise in history.  In the end, it was they who saved Star Trek.

By the end of the first season, NBC had received well over 29,000 fan letters.  During the second season, Roddenberry began a campaign to persuade fans to write in to NBC, to support the show and save the program.  Between December of 1967 and March of 1968, NCB had received nearly 116,000 letters from people who did not want to see Star Trek cancelled.  Science fiction conventions, magazines, and newspaper columnists encouraged readers to save what was called ‘the best science-fiction show on the air’.

The fans didn’t stop with letters.  Over 200 students of the California Institute of Technology marched to NBC’s studio in Burbank to protest the cancellation of Star Trek in January of 1968, carrying signs that said things like ‘Vulcan Power’.  They weren’t alone; other groups of students of MIT and Berkeley did the same thing in New York City and San Francisco.

Interestingly, the letters that NBC received were not of the typical ‘fan mail’ quality.

“Much of the mail came from doctors, scientists, teachers, and other professional people, and was for the most part literate–and written on good stationery. And if there is anything a network wants almost as much as a high Nielsen ratings, it is the prestige of a show that appeals to the upper middle class and high-brow audiences.” (Lowry, Cynthia (January 17, 1968). “One Network Goes ‘Unconventional’”. Nashua Telegraph. Associated Press. p. 13)

“The show, according to the 6,000 letters it draws a week (more than any other in television), is watched by scientists, museum curators, psychiatrists, doctors, university professors, and other highbrows. The Smithsonian Institution asked for a print of the show for its archives, the only show so honored.” (Scott, Vernon (February 7, 1968). “Letters Can Save 'Star Trek’”. The Press-Courier. Oxnard, California. United Press International. p. 17.)

After the episode The Omega Glory, on March 1st, 1968, the announcement came:

“And now an announcement of interest to all viewers of Star Trek. We are pleased to tell you that Star Trek will continue to be seen on NBC Television. We know you will be looking forward to seeing the weekly adventure in space on Star Trek.” (“Letters For 'Star Trek’ Hit 114,667”. The Modesto Bee. April 14, 1968. p. 26.)

If this was intended to stop the letter writing campaign, it was a dismal failure.  A comparable number of letters came in to NBC following this announcement, full of thanks for renewing the show for the third season.

In March of 1968, NBC moved Star Trek to another time slot: 10:00 PM on Fridays, an even worse shot than before.  To make matters worse, it was only being seen by 181 out of 210 of NBC’s affiliates.  Roddenberry fought the network to move it to a better time, but he was denied.  Exhausted, Roddenberry quit working on production of Star Trek, remaining executive producer in name only.  The running of the show went to Fred Freiberger, who was with the show as it stood on its last, shaky, legs.

And it was on its last legs.

Star Trek season three was a dying breath, the death-rattle of a show that was being intentionally destroyed by its own network.

To quote Nichelle Nichols:

“While NBC paid lip service to expanding Star Trek’s audience, it [now] slashed our production budget until it was actually 10% lower than it had been in our first season … This is why in the third season you saw fewer outdoor location shots, for example. Top writers, top guest stars, top anything you needed was harder to come by. Thus, Star Trek’s demise became a self-fulfilling prophecy. And I can assure you, that is exactly as it was meant to be.”

It showed.

While I hesitate to call season three of Star Trek a mess, it is difficult to deny that the show was definitely struggling.  Episodes dropped in quality, characters became more exaggerated and less ‘true’. Star Trek stopped filming in January of 1969, and after a total run of 79 episodes, the show  was cancelled.

As a newspaper columnist advised:

“You Star Trek fans have fought the “good fight,” but the show has been cancelled and there’s nothing to be done now.”

Rather incongruous with the image of the pop-culture giant we know it as today, wouldn’t you think?

So what happened?

As it turns out, Star Trek had enough episodes (thanks to the third season) to enter syndication.  Desilu Productions, which at that point had become Paramount, licensed the syndication rights in order to turn a profit, and reruns of Star Trek began airing in late 1969.

In syndication, Star Trek became a cult classic, finding a larger audience on reruns than it had during its original run.  The show, which was airing in the afternoons and early evenings, was attracting a young demographic, and, ironically, Star Trek became known as ‘the show that wouldn’t die’.  By 1970, Star Trek was boosting Paramount’s ratings, and becoming extremely popular.  In January of 1972, over 3,000 fans attended the first Star Trek convention in New York City, kicking off a previously unheard-of trend of organized fan gatherings where they could buy merchandise, meet cast and crew, and screen episodes of the show.  These people, coming to be known as ‘trekkies’, took pride in their knowledge and extreme love for this series, which was becoming renowned for being a smart, heartfelt science fiction show that had been cancelled too early.

17 years after Star Trek was cancelled and started reruns, Star Trek became the most popular syndicated show of all time.  By 1987, Paramount was bringing in $1 million per episode, and by 1994, reruns were still airing in over 90% of the United States of America.

The rest is history.

It has been over fifty years since Gene Roddenberry’s vision of a wagon train to the stars first took flight, and it was a hard battle fought to get as far as it did.  Never before had a show garnered the support and devoted love from a fanbase, never had it inspired such huge leaps and bounds in television and fandom alike.  Never had a television show meant so much to so many, and continued to do so well past its end.

For a show that struggled through a third season, it seems incredible that Star Trek still holds the weight that it does today.  The show that wouldn’t die gained new life beyond the grave, still capturing people’s attention decades after it was cancelled, growing to become one of the best known and best loved television shows ever made.

Against all odds, Star Trek lives on, remaining one of the greatest television shows of all time, for very good reason.

Join me for one last article as next time we take one last look at Star Trek in our Final Thoughts.  If you have any thoughts, questions, suggestions, recommendations, or just want to say hi, don’t forget to leave an ask!  Thank you all so much for reading, and I hope to see you in the next article.  

[writingsfromstarfleet]

Liebesträume - Kira Nerys X Reader

A/N: This is for another Anon, so whomstever you may be, I sincerely hope you like this! And you lot too, you’re all wonderful! :)x

Kira why must you be so beautiful aahh

Music was a passion of yours, and it always had been, many moons before you had discovered your love for science. When faced with the choice of career, your head said to follow your music, your heart said follow your science. You chose science, and that was the beginning of the story that led you to Deep Space Nine.

You were always fascinated with science, specifically quantum mechanics, and it took over your life for a long period of time. Finally deciding on taking it up as a study, you enlisted in Starfleet Academy's science department and was accepted. From there, your studies took up a good 3 years of your life, leaving little room for your music.

Coming to Deep Space Nine was the best thing that had happened to you. Aside from getting to explore your love for science and making friendships that were going to last a lifetime, you also managed to rediscover your love for music, and often you could be found in Quark's holosuite, playing to a room of people. Long gone were the days you'd do that, now you played to yourself in your quarters. Nobody aboard knew you could play the piano or the guitar. Why you kept it a secret, you didn't know.

"So what's everyone doing tonight?" Jadzia asked the group, currently sitting around one of the tables in Quark's. Everyone looked between each other, nobody having any plans for the evening. Julian, Kira, Miles, Keiko, Worf and yourself had no excuses. She grinned.

"Dabo night then?" No one could say no to Jadzia when she had that grin on her face. It was settled between the group; drinks night and dabo.

Excited, your day couldn't have gone any slower, though the time soon came around. On your walk back, you were joined halfway by Kira, her excitement matching your own.

"Ready for tonight, Y/N?" she asked, nudging your arm as you walked. You laughed, shoving her back slightly.

"Absolutely, I hope it's teams, my team's gonna beat yours hands down." She feigned insult at your statement and placed a hand against her forehead with a dramatic gasp.

"Is this a challenge I see before me?" The two of you burst out into laughter, scaring an ensign walking the other way; you only laughed harder. The giggles died down and the rest of the walk was calm, you two talking generalities about your days.

Reaching your quarters, she smiled at you and grabbed your arm.

"Catch you in an hour, Y/N, you better be ready." Kira shot you a wink and a grin, and headed off down the opposite corridor. Looking down and smiling, you turned to enter your room.

Kira and yourself had always had banter, flirty for the most part, and you got on really well together. You couldn't deny she was attractive. Very attractive. When you first met her, you were drawn to her, and once you got to know her, you realised she had the most wonderful personality. Slowly, you knew you loved her.

Entering your quarters, you took a quick shower and dressed yourself. By the time you were finished, you still had twenty or so minutes before you said you'd meet Kira. Looking over at your piano (which you kept hidden behind a curtain) you figured a song or two wouldn't hurt while you waited. Sitting down, you began to play a familiar melody, a melody that turned into three other songs.

Kira stopped outside your door, faintly hearing the sound of singing come from inside, backed by the keys of a piano. She recognised the song from one of Quark's holosuite programmes she'd been dragged into by Julian; it was Liebesträume by Franz Liszt. She never knew you listened to music like that. Kira stood a while longer, before opening your door. Stepping in, the last thing she expected was to see you playing it. Astounded, she stayed still and let you play.

Your song finished, and clocking the time, you rose from your chair and turned around.

"Kira! I-uh.." struggling to find the words due to shock, you stuttered and looked everywhere except at her.

"You never mentioned you were a musician, and a hell of a good one at that." Facing her now, you smiled slightly.

"I guess not, it's not something that's ever come up" you chuckled, scratching the back of your neck in embarrassment. "How much of it did you hear?"

"Enough to recognise it was a Liszt, I never knew you were the romantic type, Y/N," she teased, walking towards you as the door closed. "Who's the lucky person then?"

Your eyes widened and you raised a brow, wondering how you could get out of it.

"The lucky person?" you asked, feigning innocence at her obvious query.

"It's a classical piece, yet you sung. You took the time to write some lyrics to match the melody, I assume there was someone who served as inspiration; those type of songs don't come from just anywhere." She smiled. "You tell me everything, Y/N, I won't snitch."

You looked her in the eye again, sighing. Choosing to reply with actions given you didn't trust your voice, you stepped closer to her and took her face in your hands. When she didn't pull away, you placed your lips on hers and kissed her. Kira kissed you back, wrapping her arms around your torso. The kiss was like magic, and pulling back, you felt like it lasted forever.

"If you can't tell, it was for you" you spoke, breathless, and she looked at you with red cheeks and a small smile.

"I hadn't noticed, care to show me again?" She leaned back in and connected your lips once more.

"We're going to be late, as much as I'm enjoying myself," you laughed out, and she buried her head into your neck as you held her close. "Perhaps we should get going."

"Perhaps you should sit down and show me your music instead, dabo can wait." Kira shot you a look that you could never say no to. Chuckling, you brought her to the bench and sat with her, beginning to play.

Music had always been a love of yours, but now you could share it with the woman you loved, and for that, you were content.

[sabraeal]

He Who Studies Evil [Part 2/4]

Part 1

A prequel to Wanting Is More Pleasurable Than Having (And Other Things Vulcans Don’t Know a Damned Thing About), written for @bubblesthemonsterartist 

There are pleasantries to observe when the runabout docks. Haruka hardly expects them from a group of war-mongering mine managers, but when he steps through the airlock, ensigns flanking him to either side, he’s pleasantly surprised to find a greeting party.

“Welcome,” their leader says, the tallest among them, though none of the Cardassians are what he would consider small. Perhaps not as broad and muscled as he would expect, but then again, alien biology holds a cornucopia of oddities. One only underestimated a Vulcan once before believing in their superior muscle density. “You are invited to meet with Gul Dukat presently.”

Gul Dukat, the prefect of Bajor. A man much maligned by the planet’s population, as far as he can tell, though he doubts the Bajorans would welcome even the most benevolent overlord if he were Cardassian.

He is also the man brokering this peace. The representative Cardassia wished to pit him against.

Already they are trying to throw him off his guard, but no one makes captain without a degree in quick-thinking. “Thank you for the warm welcome. We are honored by the prefect’s invitation and will join him after we--”

“There’s no need,” the ranking Cardassian tells him. “Your effects will be brought to your quarters, and you will go to Gul Dukat. Follow me. You do not wish to keep him waiting.”

Haruka hesitates. The Federation wants this treaty, yes, but allowing himself to be summoned as a supplicant to this Gul Dukat would set himself at a disadvantage, would make this so-called prefect believe that he held all the power in this exchange. A dangerous place to be, when the only thing separating him from an unfortunate mining-related accident was two junior crewman.

“He means that,” Ensign Shidnote mutters, jostling his shoulder in a way that could be easily be an accident, two men in too-close quarters -- except for the way the boy is so careful not to look at him, to pitch his voice low. “Punctuality is a religion to these people.”

He stares, and not for the first time, wonders exactly how that ensign got that scar across his nose.

“Sir,” he adds belatedly, an afterthought.

“I thought the Union didn’t allow religion,” Haruka manages, still rooted to the spot.

“Well.” Shidnote shrugs, sauntering off the docking platform. “Had to replace it with something, I guess.”

It is said Cardassia used to be covered in old Hebetian vaults, a marvel of sweeping architecture, the cradle of humanoid life. But those ruins are all but gone now, instead replaced with the style enthusiastically purveyed by the Union -- tall, imposing buildings; architecture meant to intimidate rather than inspire. Unless, of course, one wished to inspire fear, in which case, the Cardassians had gotten that down to an art.

Terok Nor was a microcosm of that fear, of that oppressive sensation of being watched. Their escort led them across what he brusquely introduced as the promenade, an open area where it seemed brisk trade was conducted, and both the Bajoran workers and their Cardassian overlords could relax for a spell, though never in the same place. Even here, Haruka could not shake the feeling of a hundred eyes on his back, not until he followed the soaring spikes of the pylons upward, up to where the higher level loomed, every banister lined with armor-clad Cardassians.

“It’s a trick,” Shidnote tells him, voice pitched low, so no one but him and Sui can hear. “Meant to make you feel observed. They think it cuts down on the peons getting uppity.”

“And do they?” Haruka asks, trying not to show how much this display unnerves him. “Get uppity, I mean?”

“No.” His mouth curves, bemused. “At least not where the Cardassians can see.”

They meet in a board room, a level field compared to the experience on the promenade, but Gul Dukat is an intimidating presence nonetheless. All Cardassians were broad in the shoulders -- or at least wore armor to make it so -- but the spiny ridges down his neck make him seem even more forbidding than the rest, and the bone at his brow protrudes so starkly that his eyes seem deep-set, more skull than man.

What’s more, every move the man makes says he’s aware of it, that he enjoys the discomfort his presence brings to his guests. Even the other Cardassians are deferential, flinching when his gaze flits over him. This is how the prefect keeps control of this station, even with tension bursting at its seams; he relies on this overbearing mien to get his work done, to keep both the Bajorans and his people in line.

And thus when he smiles, teeth bared in the human way, Haruka knows he has found a formidable opponent.

“Ambassador!” The man sweeps his hand out over the table, laden heavily with food. Haruka has eaten any number of foreign cuisines, but these dishes -- they must all be from this sector from how little he recognizes them. “I hope we have made you feel welcome to Terok Nor! A home away from home, I think you say on Earth.”

“Just so.” The words come out stiffer than they ought; for all that the Cardassians needed this treaty, Haruka could not help but think, as he surveyed the steaming stews and flaky pies and whole roasts of meat he could not account for, that it would be all too easy for a human to eat poison and never even know it.

“Here, let us start with a toast.” The prefect pours a pale blue liquor into fluted glasses, smile still firmly in place. “To our most important duty. May we each serve the State as we ought.”

His own smile pulls tight, but Haruka drinks the wine down. It’s both smoother and sweeter than he expects.

“That’s not kanar,” Shidnote remarks, blinking at the glass. Haruka stares at him, eyes wide.

It’s unfortunate his attention was not the only one the ensign had caught.

“Correct. A fine vintage though, is it not?” Gul Dukat asks, turning the question back to him. Still, Haruka can feel that he captures only half the prefect’s interest, the other firmly on Shidnote. “Springwine, from Bajor. Made from kava juice. I must admit, I have quite a penchant for it.”

“Really.” He keeps his tone even, hand steady. From what they’d heard from Bajor, Gul Dukat is responsible for countless atrocities, but here he is, admitting a weakness for their wine. “I had not expected to hear a Cardassian praise Bajor.”

The man’s smile grows even wider, and Haruka trusts him even less. “The Union would not waste resources bringing Bajor into the modern age if there were nothing of value.”

Shidnote’s mouth pulls tight, but he stays silent. To his other side, Sui looks like he might faint from the very insinuation one might violate the Prime Directive.

“I had been of the impression that its value was to be found in the uridium ore mined from the planet’s surface,” Haruka ventures, keeping his tone conversational, light. He has no intention of provoking the prefect, but he wouldn’t suffer the whitewashing of the occupation right in front of him. “Not it’s culture.”

Dukat’s smile takes on more teeth, not in threat, but in delight. “Can it not be both?”

He makes to serve himself, and the ensigns follow their host’s invitation. Sui delicately arranges his plate with things that look vaguely familiar, while Shidnote digs in with aplomb, serving himself heaping portions of everything at the table. Ah, to be a young man again.

Haruka is more reserved in his appreciation of the spread, taking from the same plates Shidnote does at half the volume. Dukat watches them with unfeigned pleasure as they each take their first bites into Cardassian cuisine. Or at least, his and Sui’s; Shidnote has barely stopped to say more than, “It’s been forever since I’ve had Tuli!” before tipping a half dozen tiny fish onto his plate.

“Careful,” Dukat warns, as Shidnote reaches to take a spoonful of what looked to be souffle. “The station’s replicators make the hasperat especially spicy.”

The ensign’s face falls flat, blank. “You have Bajoran food too?”

“Of course,” he drawls, “I consider myself a connoisseur of the planet’s delicacies. Little...diamonds in the rough, as you humans say. There’s much to admire, if one dedicates themselves to discovery.”

Listening to this man speak sets Haruka’s teeth on edge as much as a dentist’s drill. “I wasn’t aware the Union allowed the admiration of those outside of it.”

Gul Dukat pauses, hands frozen in the act of cutting his pie. Kain would kill him for making such a bald remark, for veering far too close to the sun, but --

But one does not get things done with men like Gul Dukat by playing their game. He’s ceded too much ground, allowing himself to be summoned straight from the docking bay. It’s time to let the prefect know that the Federation will not just lie down in this negotiation.

Dukat blinks, lets out a laugh. “I had not thought a man from the Federation would be so versed in the statutes if the State.”

“I took up some light reading before coming here,” Haruka explains. “A friend recommended one of your classics. The Never Ending Sacrifice.”

“Ah, yes! An excellent example of Cardassia’s literature!” Again, his enthusiasm is unfeigned. “The repetitive epic is our highest form of art.”

The Hebetians must weep for what was lost, if that passed for high art. “It is quite...illuminating. I was surprised to see how highly the family as a unit is regarded among your people. I had always thought your duty was foremost to the State.”

It is an impertinent observation, and if he was at a Romulan table it would have ended in death for one of the men here, but Gul Dukat only continues to smile, unfazed.

“Ah, it is an older piece of work, though its themes have translated well into a more modern age. And besides, is not a strong family that is best for the State?” Dukat proposes, warming to the topic. Of course Haruto would be right in this -- the Cardassians did view a meal as a venue for philosophical debate. “Our children are our future, and our elders mark the path.”

Haruka nods, and his heart pounds in his chest as he decides his answer. “That had been my thought as well. However...”

Gul Dukat leans forward, intrigued. “However...?”

“I heard a rumor,” he confides, “and I’m afraid it made me doubt what I thought I understood.”

The prefect stiffens, smile wrapped tight around his face. “A rumor?”

“Oh, yes.” Sui is still beside him, eyes wide and mouth opened, but Shidnote is blank-faced, watching the exchange with little more than cursory interest. “I heard that you were keeping a prisoner aboard this station.”

“A prisoner? Here?” Gul Dukat laughs as if the very thought were preposterous. “I must admit, my constable is very good at apprehending men and putting them in the brig, but those are dissidents and drunks. Minor crimes, no more than a night in a cell.”

“I didn’t mean a member of this station,” Haruka presses, keeping his tone guileless, almost helpful. “Rumor put it as a Federation prisoner.”

“You cannot believe that,” the prefect says, hardly blinking. “I’m sure there are ships that have taken their adversaries, but Terok Nor is a refinery, not a place for the Union to keep political prisoners.”

Haruka lifts an eyebrow. “Even though it is so close to Bajor?”

“You did say Federation prisoners,” Dukat manages though his clenched teeth, “did you not? As far as i know, there are no...Federation actors on the surface of Bajor. Though I believe we are allowed our...prisoners of war, as you say.”

Haruka lets the lie settle between them. Perhaps there was no official Federation presence on the planet, but hardly a news cycle went by without more reports of losses from those who went to aid the rebels.

“Our articles do allow such things, yes,” he allows, “but I was told this wasn’t an acting member but instead...a child.”

“A child.” Haruka has known sheer cliff faces less forbidding than the tone Gul Dukat takes now. “Preposterous. The Union would never do such a thing.”

“Of course not,” he agrees. “I am only relaying the rumor that has been circulating among the high-ups of the Federation. As a courtesy.”

“Yes. Thank you,” the prefect grits out. “It is most...gratifying to find out what sort of...pernicious propaganda has been spread about my people. You do not believe it, I hope?”

“How could I, if you deny it?” He offers Dukat a thin smile, one that says quite clearly that he has noticed how the Gul has done no such thing.

“Good.” The man must be agitated, to not see through him, even now. “After all, you know how much we revere children.”

“Oh yes,” Haruka agrees. “Cardassian children, at least.”

Haruka had thought he’d known bad mattresses -- after all, it wasn’t as if Federation-issue sleeping bags did much in the way of muting rocks at one’s back -- but it takes only a moment laying on his bed to realize that Cardassians had only mastered the art of torture because they first slept on bed like these.

“Computer.” The room buzzes with silence, and he remembers -- this isn’t the Wistal. There is no computer keyed to talk to him here.

He huffs, swinging his legs off the bed. There’s no other way to do this than the old-fashioned way, then.

His PADD comes easily to hand, and it’s easier still to call up Ensign Shidnote’s service record, far longer than a man his rank should have. He scrolls through all the beginning matter -- born to a freighter family, recruited on mission, other details that seem more and more bog standard now that there’s humans spread all over the alpha quadrant and beyond -- but his eyes catch on the first posting: USS Fortissia under Captain Lido, stationed under Admiral Bergatt and the USS Wilant. Admiral Bergatt, who has been fighting the good fight against the Cardassians for the past half decade.

The would explain a thing or two, save that he should have had no need to contact Bajor --

Something niggles just at the back of his mind. Lido, Lido. He had heard that name before, years ago, and it leaves a bad taste in his mouth.

It takes only a quick search, and there it is: Captain Amos Lido, with a dozen postings over his illustrious career, the last being the Fortissia at the Cardassian border. Well on his way to Admiral, it seemed, until the mutiny against Starfleet, and his flight into Bajoran space. He’d nearly made it a year working with the resistance, but he’d fallen in with the Kohn-Ma and gotten himself back on the Federation’s radar.

He, like many of his Kohn-Ma compatriots, chose death over capture. His crew had been given the option to return to the fold, so long as they had not worked with the separatist splinter cell. Zakura Shidnote had been one of them.

Haruka dropped to his bed with a groan. Here he was, meant to make peace with the Cardassian prefect, and he’d gone and brought a resistance fighter on board. Potentially even a terrorist.

He reaches for his PADD again, and calls up Shidnote’s file. He flicks past the neatly scrubbed service record, only stopping when he get to the end, when he gets to his assignment to the Wistal, and right there, clear as day, the name on his recommendation --

The tablet drops from his hands, and Haruka scrubs a hand over his face. He should have know, he should have known.

Special recommendation from the Federation, signed by Haruto Wisteria.

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 198 “Otonoshin’s Tricycle”

The new chapter is out and so let’s dig into the second part of Koito’s past.

To be a relatively new character (he was introduced in vol 10) Koito is getting quite a long flashback space considering characters like Tanigaki or Tsukishima only had a two chapters flashback... but I think this is because this flashback isn’t just about him and his motivations but it’s working as a setting for future developments.

Anyway we resume where we left, with Koito staring at his brother’s grave… filled with dark thoughts like that he’s the failure of the Koito family and can’t become his brother’s replacement…

...while Tsurumi wants to take advantage of the moment he has carefully created to push him to open his heart to him so as to gain more of his trust.

Really, Tsurumi is amazing as a manipulator… telling young Koito it would be better if he were to let out what he’s holding in he sounds so nice and caring…

Koito though, resists a bit, admitting he said too much to someone he just met… which was wise. Too bad he’s up against Tsurumi (was Tsurumi smiling when Koito refused to speak up further? I’m not really sure due to the ballons hiding part of his face... but can it be things are going EXACTLY as he predicted and even Koito’s resistance was part of the plan? Considering the editor’s words ‘I know the words you want to hear’ I’ll say he too thinks so)… who hurries to point out Koito shouldn’t feel obliged to replace his brother in his father’s eyes.

Have I already mentioned how Tsurumi amazes me?

Even though Koito refused to open up, Tsurumi’s answer is the perfect answer to Koito’s inner monologue. Koito WAS feeling like an unfitting replacement for his brother and Tsurumi told him he didn’t have to be one.

True, Tsurumi lead him to this point but it’s still amazing how he has done it.

Koito’s reaction is one of surprise as it’s very likely no one ever told him this or understood how he felt.

Probably they all expected him to replace his brother and, at the same time, criticized him because he wasn’t up on the task.

In short he was at the same time pressured into replacing his brother and yet not trusted to be capable to do so, as if following in his brother’s footsteps was merely a fool’s errand if handed to him.

It should have felt quite sad and depressing.

Or maybe the poor boy never realized it wasn’t his duty to preplace his brother. It’s still rather sad.

And finally we can see what’s written on his brother’s grave.

Tsurumi reads it for us. Koito’s brother was the navy ensign Koito Heinojou (鯉登 平之丞), who died in Meiji 27 or, if you prefer in 1894, Sept. 17th, which is the date of the battle of Yalu River, a naval battle in the Sino-Japanese war.

Attentive readers might notice the first kanji in his name is also the first kanji in his father’s name, Koito Heiji (鯉登平二), which hints at how Heinojou, being the firstborn, was meant to take his father’s place and continue his line.

According to Sei Kobiyama Heinojou means “the heir of Heiji 平二 and descendant of Samurai” as Nojou was a job title name for Samurai.

Koito, naïve child that he is, at this decides to open his heart to Tsurumi… which really, isn’t a bright idea. But well, very few people can resist Tsurumi’s manipulation abilities, especially when the man was probably being the only one offering to a young teenager boy some sort of understanding.

So Koito tells Tsurumi (and to us), he and his brother were 13 years apart and that he was 8 years old when his brother died… which confirms I did the math correctly and this is taking place in 1900.

It also makes Koito’s brother 21 when he died. Now, if I also did the math right in regard to Koito’s age, currently he should be the same age his brother had when he died. Symbolic and meaningful.

I’m really curious to see Koito’s reaction at the situation he was when we left him before the flashback started. Believing he was going to be praised for his ‘success’ and seeing he’s about to lose everything, feeling his life threatened again by someone who speaks Russian… how our boy is going to react?

I want to know.

Back to Koito’s brother’s story, the guy was on the “Matsushima” during the Battle of the Yalu River. For who has never heard about it, the Matsushima was the flagship of Admiral Itō Sukeyuki, the first Commander-in-Chief of the Japanese Combined Fleet.

Also, in case you don’t know already, a flagship is a vessel used by the commanding officer of a group of naval ships, characteristically a flag officer entitled by custom to fly a distinguishing flag.

Too bad during the Battle of the Yalu River the Matsushima lost 57 men (including three officers) and had 54 wounded (including four officers) in the battle – more than half of the Japanese casualties during the entire battle. And yes, Koito’s brother was one of them and Koito senior had to watch, from an adjacent ship (the “Hashidate” maybe? It’s the ship on which Admiral Itō was forced to transfer his flag), as the “Matsushima” took the huge damage that killed his son.

It was likely quite terrible to watch this, to be only able to watch as your son’s ship is damaged so seriously, knowing this can mean he’ll die too… which is exactly what will happen.

I find interesting how what are likely stress lines under Koito senior’s eyes can seem tear on a close up examination.

The man is likely not crying, at least not openly, but the visual suggests he is crying internally.

Tsurumi likely knows this story well, as he was in the Sino-Japanese war, though he belonged to the Army and not to the Navy (and this was a pretty well known story even for who wasn’t in the war)… though Koito can’t know this little info about the ‘kind’ stranger he’s talking with.

Anyway we see Koito senior standing on the deck of his ship and watching. We might think he’s being impassible, he’s watching still after all, although not with the binoculars, as if afraid to check the situation for himself. Also we can’t see his eyebrows hidden by his hat but I find interesting how the line below his eyes seem to resemble tears, the hat partially shadowing his face and his mouth apparently slightly opened.

Koito senior is keeping still but he’s likely a lot less impassible than he looks like.

Proof is the experience was likely traumatic to him as, when he came home, Koito noticed his father had changed, now never scolding him nor smiling to him.

Koito senior likely closed up on himself, causing his younger son, who was also trying to cope with the trauma of losing his brother as well as having people’s expectations suddenly tossed on him, feeling ignored and neglected in his time of need.

Koito is tormenting himself on his father’s behalf, trying to picture in his mind the horrific scene his father saw and of whom his classmates at the Naval Officer Academy chat, likely with a mix of horror and fascination, without a care for how Koito might feel at hearing them saying people his brother might have ended up carbonized or splattered on the deck.

It’s rather terrible as for them it’s likely just an interesting gossip while for Koito is his personal tragedy. They don’t mean ill yet it was probably as if they were pouring salt on Koito’s emotional wounds.

It’s a situation very different from bullying yet equally painful.

It gets so bad for Koito he can’t stay on a boat for too long or he ends up thinking about his brother’s death and gets terribly seasick… which is also something that shouldn’t happen to someone who’s going to a navy school and his expected to follow his father’s footsteps.

Young Koito too was traumatized by the loss of his brother, even if he hadn’t witnessed it. Maybe for him it’s even worse as his fantasy likely comes up with even worse images.

Still it’s interesting how Koito’s eyes darken, becoming the visual clue of how ashamed he is of the fact since he can’t stay on a boat for longer than a day, he can't become a good naval officer.

It’s interesting how, according to 海壁 marmuro, in Japanese he uses a phrasing similar to when Ogata said "I had a feeling I wouldn’t be able to pull this off. I guess things just don’t work out how I want".

Koito and Ogata have similarities in weird, twisted ways, among which the fact they both had a brother who they believed had what they were missing.

As they leave Koito comments his brother might end up feeling lonely as they’ll have to move to Hakodate due to his father’s work… which is likely why Tsurumi got his eyes on young Koito. Since his father now would work close to him and could be an useful usable commodity, Tsurumi was studying how to proceed manipulating Koito senior through Koito junior.

Really this man is so clever and capable to plan in advantage it’s scary.

Anyway Tsurumi comments on how he thinks Koito will like the place and proceed to describe it.

Koito asks him if he knows the place and really Koito, you should study more Japanese geography as Tsurumi points out how Tsukisappu (the place that made those anpan) is in Hokkaido as well… so yes, Tsurumi knows it. Of course he does, I bet he even went to check the place.

Once they’re back where they started Tsurumi thanks Koito for the lift and says they should meet again. Koito doesn’t seem to believe it will happen but, at least he’s smiling. It’s not exactly a happy smile but a smile none less.

In a way it’s the saddest part. Tsurumi was right, talking about things likely helped Koito a lot… but this will likely end up being used against Koito in the future as this will make him an easier target for Tsurumi’s future manipulation.

In fact Tsurumi uses even Koito’s doubtful attitude in his favour by declaring if they then were to meet again by chance, Koito would have to become his friend because then their meeting would have been decided by fate.

Basically, he’s subtly sealing young Koito’s fate. I bet those words will also play a part in Koito’s future ‘friendship’ decisions.

Time skip.

We jump to two years in the future, In Hakodate. Koito is now 16 and still riding that vehicle (please notice how Noda decided to depict him in the same way as he did when Koito was 14, only a little bigger and with clothes slightly different),

...people still commenting behind his back he’s a ‘bonbon’ or a 'pampered little brat’ if you prefer, that he’s problem child at the Naval Academy cram school and expecting him to  fail at the Naval Academy entrance exams.

Long story short Koito hadn’t really got better from how he was when he met Tsurumi. Actually he might have possible gotten worse, both in the pressure he had to sustain and in character, in fact this time he complains loudly when a horse places itself in front of his vehicle, not realizing a carriage a stopped next to him.

The next Koito knows is 2 men had gotten off the carriage, one had wrapped a cloth around his face and, likely, he ended up forced into the carriage and kidnapped.

Fundamentally we see only 3 kidnappers, horse guy, wearing what looks like a flat cap or a newsboy cap (not too sure about it),

the guy in the carriage, wearing a white fedora hat

and the guy who covers Koito’s face wearing a black bowler hat.

This guy might or might not be also the carriage driver.

Hard to say.

We see people wondering what had happened then, next, we see Koito’s vehicle now under the rain and next to a gate. This is clearly not the place in which Koito was kidnapped, so the vehicle was moved.

I wonder... does the fact it rained in that particular moment have some relevance in the future? After all it wasn't raining when Koito was kidnapped nor after it. It's just when they show Koito's vehicle near the gate. Ah, it's hard to say.

The narration tells us it’s 4 days later, still in Hakodate, in what is the Koito Residence (which in real life was Saigo Judo’s European-styled and themed house if you’re interested in seeing it in real life and of which @osomanga posted some photos).

And now let’s meet who’s inside Koito’s house.

The first to show up is Koito’s mom, whose name we learn is Yuki (ユキ), who shares with Koito his characteristic eyebrows (and who’s really pale in case you had forgotten what was said in the past chapter).

Yes, her name is in katakana. I’ve researched a bit on the topic and it turned out in Meiji it was pretty popular to call girls with names all written in katakana because that, along with the kanji alphabet, what the alphabet for official documents.

The trick though is that katakana was used for girls because poor people who didn’t know kanji would still hire someone to tell them good kanji to use for their male sons but won’t judge girls names worth the same care so they would just get a name in katakana.

But… well, this was for people who didn’t know kanji. So… does this mean Koito’s mom comes from a commoner family? I would have expected her to be upper class and therefore come from a family who would know kanji (after all Umeko, O-Gin, Chiyoko and even Asirpa have names written in kanji… the only exception being Fumie, Tanigaki’s sister who, however wasn’t rich and Tome of whom we know absolutely nothing and who could have been foreigner or Ainu or imaginary for all we know…) so… no idea.

Anyway Koito’s mom is clearly nervous and worried as she asks info aboutthe Army officer who was asked to take part to her son’s research.

The one who answers to her fears is the naval captain Nakayama (中山海軍大尉 ‘Nakayama Kaigundaii’).

To give you a general idea of how high the guy is ranked the navy goes (from the lowest officer rank to the highest):

OF-1 海軍少尉 Kaigun-shōi (Ensign) [Koito Heinojou] & 海軍中尉 Kaigun-chūi (Sub-lieutenant/Lieutenant junior grade)

OF-2 海軍大尉 Kaigun-daii (Lieutenant) [Nakayama]

OF-3 海軍少佐 Kaigun-shōsa (Lieutenant-commander)

OF-4 海軍中佐 Kaigun-chūsa (Commander)

OF-5 海軍大佐 Kaigun-daisa (Captain)

OF-7 海軍少将 Kaigun-shōshō (Rear-admiral) [Koito Heiji]

OF-8 海軍中将 Kaigun-chūjō (Vice-admiral)

OF-9 海軍大将 Kaigun-taishō (Admiral)

OF-10 元帥、海軍大将 Gensui-kaigun-taishō (Grand admiral)

大元帥　Dai-gensui (Lord high admiral) = The emperor of Japan

Nakayama is an OF-2 大尉 daii (Lieutenant), Koito’s brother Koito Heinojou was an OF-1 少尉 shōi (Ensign). Koito Heiji is an OF-7 少将 shōshō (Rear-admiral) in Vol 13, though in this chapter they referred to him as OF-4  中佐 chūsa (Commander)… but I think they aren’t really talking about his rank, they’re probably merely referring to him as the commander of the base. Otherwise it would be impressive if in 5 years he managed to jump of 3 ranks.

In short, Nakayama is technically slightly higher than Tsurumi (who’s a OF-1 中尉 Chūi (First Lieutenant)).

I wonder if Nakayama serves under Koito senior or he’s under some other official.

Anyway, back to the story, Nakayama hurries to answer to Koito’s mom, explaining the guy handling things is a sharp guy from Tsukisappu's intelligence division really proficient in Russian, so they had to entrust the whole matter to him.

Wanna start place your bet on who this guy is?

Do we know someone who was recently mentioned to be stationed in Tsukisappu, who works as an intelligence officer and who’s proficient in Russian?

Koito senior is seated down and, if you ask me, he also looks pretty down.

The bags under his eyes are shadowed to emphasize on them. He might seem calm and collected but he probably didn’t have 4 nice days. Koito senior was traumatized by his firstborn’s death and now he has to deal with his other son being kidnapped.

He however manages to remain an navy man who clearly doesn’t trust army men and therefore asks if they couldn’t have found a navy person who spoke Russian and could take care of the matter.

For who doesn’t know it there was a strong rivalry between the army and the navy and very poor relations. No wonder Koito’s dad didn’t want an army man to be involved.

As if on clue, no scratch it, on clue, Tsurumi appears introducing himself and surprising Nakayama and Koito’s mom. Koito’s dad instead doesn’t visually show signs of surprise.

His son described Koito Heiji as a man who didn’t scold nor smile anymore after his brother’s death. This guy is suppressing all his emotions, even a natural surprise at having a complete stranger appear all of sudden in your house.

Tsurumi, who has clearly come in unannounced explain he got in from the back entrance (so he could look professional, serious, dedicate and clever, surprise/impress everyone, show he’s actually in control of the situation and also eavesdrop the discussion without being noticed… I love how clever this guy is).

Although polite Tsurumi starts ordering people around likely taking advantage of their surprise. Mind you, his orders make sense but they would probably be met with more resistance considering the distrust there was between army and navy if he hadn’t surprised them and filled them with a sense of urgency and secrecy as well as the impression he’s in control of the situation (remember? He’s the lowest in rank there…).

In fact he politely orders to close all the curtain, claiming they’ve to do it or people will discover their strategy to recover the Koitos’ son.

It’s subtle but we can see Koito’s mom standing up at this.

She likely got up and went to do as Tsurumi says because he also filled her with a mix of hope and fear. Tsurumi shows up like a savior who has a strategy to save her baby but if they don’t obey him all will be lost.

Koito senior doesn’t react, just stares at Tsurumi. Either he’s not impressed/not buying it or he’s still trapped into his shell.

And now we’re shown a better picture of the place where Koito’s vehicle had been left…

along with explanations from Tsurumi on where it exactly is and it turns out it’s inside the Russian embassy’s closed gates, which, according to Nakayama is CONVENIENTLY deserted in summertime although, since it’s technically a Russian territory, they CONVENIENTLY couldn’t get in.

Now… I’m not a Russian kidnapper but if I were, since the purpose would be to get Koito senior’s cooperation and not to alert Japan government I’m trying to blackmail him to force him into cooperation, I wouldn’t put around a GIANT sign saying RUSSIA KIDNAPPED KOITO SENIOR’S SON for everyone to see.

Maybe it’s just me but I value discretion in this sort of things so I would contact Koito senior secretly and make my demands BEFORE he could get to warn EVERYONE, especially the Army who’s not under duty to obey his requests, about how I’m trying to blackmail him.

You know, so the Army wouldn’t keep an eye on Koito senior or demand for him to be removed from his duty as soon as he attempts to obey my requests. Or risk a diplomatic scandal. But well, okay, it’s just me.

I don’t really have a degree in kidnapping so I might be wrong.

In fact some guys instead might want for everyone to know that hey, RUSSIA DID IT, IT’S RUSSIA, IT’S ABSOLUTELY NOT ME and that the ARMY NEEDS TO BE INVOLVED BECAUSE A CERTAIN RUSSIAN SPEAKING OFFICER WORKS THERE AND HE NEEDS TO BE INVOLVED SO HE CAN SHOW OFF AND CHARM KOITO FATHER & SON so I guess they might not care about privacy and secrecy.

At each his own.

Tsurumi keeps on showing he’s perfectly in control by smoothly saying of course there wouldn’t be someone in the consulate because of course ‘Otonoshin-kun’ likely isn't in there (that’s how Tsurumi refers to Koito in the Japanese version).

Note that Tsurumi is using Koito’s name not for an excess of familiarity but because it’s a pretty common thing to do when there’s more than one person with the same surname around, so as to avoid confusion. And of course he probably sounds more caring and subtly reminding them of how Koito is young (he used ‘–kun’, not ‘–san’).

Koito’s mom is worried they’re after money but Tsurumi OF COURSE knows that’s not the case though he tactfully says it can’t be because there's plenty of rich kids in this town… which ensures her kid wouldn’t be targeted why? I mean, more kids among whom to choose don’t mean some are save and some aren’t, they all have the same probabilities of being kidnapped, if it’s about money.

Then Tsurumi subtly gives a painful jab at Koito senior by pointing out how if Russia is participating in a kidnapping the matter would be pretty serious.

Tsurumi doesn’t explain why, we’ll get why in a few minute through young Koito but, to better give you a view on the situation and on how it’s extremely clever to show Tsurumi looking up and standing tall over Koito Heiji, whose gaze is downcast the truth is that what Tsurumi is implying is that Russia is actually targeting not Koito Otonoshin but his father, Koito Heiji.

Young Koito was kidnapped due to his father, so as to allow Russia to blackmail him. It’s a dirty jab and something Koito Heiji has likely already realized. This man was likely incorruptible and without any dark secret but Tsurumi still has found a way to stand above him and try to control him.

He placed on him the burden of being responsible for his own son’s kidnapping and is trying to take advantage of the man’s trauma when he lost his first son by threatening to take away from him his second son to then return it to him.

Tsurumi is an amazing chessmaster, really. I can only bow to him.

But, as I’ve said, all this won’t be told to us now. We’ll switch to where young Koito is held.

He’s kept tied to a pole and he has heavy bags under his eyes but he seems fine, unharmed. A man orders him to drink in Russian and hands him some water.

He’s the white fedora kidnapper, the one who was in the carriage. Though he’s ordering Koito around it seems his Russian isn’t that rude (thanks @fg083!) but it can be a matter of translation from Russian to Japanese so I don’t know. The man’s face is completely hidden.

Koito realizes the guy is talking to him in Russian and asks him if he understands Japanese to which he’s merely told to shut up, always in Russian.

Koito, always the obedient kid, doesn’t (well, actually he doesn't understand Russian but he could have figured out the meaning anyway).

Well, truth is I pity him here because his situation is pretty grim and he probably needs to voice what he has inside.

Koito says that, regardless of how he may not look it, he is the son of a man in the navy…

...and his start is already sad because Koito clearly knows those guys know who his father is. What he’s trying to say isn’t to inform his kidnappers he’s the son of a sailor but that he’s the WORTHY son of a sailor and therefore understood his own situation. Therefore he’s not just a naïve and ignorant ‘bonbon’.

Which is Koito’s situation?

That, according to Koito, Russia kidnapped him because his father is supervising the soon-to-be-finished “Ominato Torpedo Division”. Koito though is sure his father definitely won’t bow to Russia’s requests for his sake.

It’s undoubtedly a sad and terrible situation.

We’d like to think our parents would sacrifice everything for the sake of keeping us safe but Koito is sure his father wouldn’t do this for him… and not only it’ll turn out Koito is right but, as sad as it is, Koito’s father would be right in doing so.

But let’s have Tsurumi explain us why as we switch to him.

Tsurumi tells us if the Russian fleet in Vladivostok (remember? The Russian city in which Tsurumi worked as a spy under the name of Hasegawa) were to go through the Tsugaru Strait and make it to the Pacific Ocean, the "Ominato Torpedo Division" and  "Fort Hakodate" would be thorns in their sides.

From a map we can see that basically the two things Tsurumi mentioned control the opposite points of the street. In short they’re the Japanese system to stop the Russian advance in that direction.

The Russian fleet would have then to take the longest road and try to pass through the street in between Karafuto and Hokkaido or the even longer one  that required it to pass in between the Korean empire and Fukuoka… Korean empire on which Japan was already exerting its influence, which will later will become more official by forcing Korea to sign a series of treaties that will turn it into a Japanese protectorate, until it’ll get annexed to Japan in 1910.

Not good choices.

As if this wasn’t enough Nakayama tells us at the moment torpedo boats scheduled for deployment to Ōminato are in Port Hakodate as well. Tsurumi thanks for the info, though I bet he knew about it already and this is just a confirmation.

Anyway he does on and claims that if the kidnappers are Russian, what they want is to destroy those in order to render Japan temporarily powerless... which would mean Russia could then easily attack/invade Japan.

Nakayama though has a clever observation which is that it’s strange that no kind of demand has come from the kidnappers…

too bad Tsurumi will use it to his advantage to bring them all (well, except Koito’s mom) ILLEGALLY in the Russian consulate.

Tsurumi’s eyes darken as he sees Koito’s vehicle.

As this doesn’t mean always the same thing but it varies from character to character, it’s hard to guess what’s going on in his mind.

I can’t really remember when it happened in the past with Tsurumi. His face went completely dark when he saw Wilk and Kiro’s wanted posters…

so is he thinking his plan is going well? Though this time his face isn’t completely dark… does he feels a tiny pang of regret for having involved young Koito? For forcing another father to fear to lose his child as he lost Olga? Or for him is fair retribution as he lost Olga due to his work and to someone likely tattling him out and so Koito senior too should try this even though eh already lost one child?

Hard to say.

Anyway prior to watching Koito’s vehicle he says something might happen from here on out and, of course, something happens. The phone starts ringing as if it  was expecting them… because yes, it was.

Koito’s dad would want to go to answer because he thinks it might be from the kidnappers.

From the way he says it, he betrays he’s worried for Koito and would want to do something for him. Tsurumi though, although agreeing with him, tells him to wait because the timing of their call is too good and therefore the Russian consulate is likely under surveillance by the kidnappers so they should pretend they didn’t hear the call and go back.

Notice Tsurumi’s mastery. Koito’s dad wanted to rush to answer but he manages to keep control of the situation and stop him with his logic and knowledge. He’s a rank 7 ordered around by a rank 1. Tsurumi being there when the phonecall is being made makes him clearly above suspicions. It can’t be Tsurumi calling them as Tsurumi is with them.

Tsurumi claiming one should be always capable to read his opponent movements and keep himself two step ahead makes him look extremely clever and capable, opposed to Koito’s dad who, for a moment lost it and wanted to rush in.

The addition that if they were to mess up the kidnappers would ‘checkmate’ them, feeds the man’s fear his son could die and forces him into compliance even when he doesn’t want to. Asking to Koito’s father to please endure it by calling him Commander Koito-dono is also Tsurumi forcing him into obedience by reminding him or his rank. Koito senior isn’t just a worried father, he’s a rear admiral. He can’t rush into things.

Ah, Tsurumi is clever, I can’t help but really bow to him.

So back to Koito senior house we go after Tsurumi has better worked up an emotional and intellectual control over the guy.

So now Tsurumi can show off how competent he is by trying to figure out where the kidnappers are.

…there are 320 telephones in Hakodate… considering the range one can see the Russian consulate from a telescope and removing public places…. Hey, awesome, there can be only over 50 places in which the kidnappers can hide.

His underlings are scouting them but they can’t really enter in as they’ve to be subtle or everything will be lost but hey, once they’re ready they’ll go to the Russian consulate again and if they phone they’ll have ‘Otonoshin-kun’ come to the phone and confirm he's alive then hang up and get the phone number from the phone switchboard operator and from it find out the hideout.

In short although normally it would be really, really hard to find ‘Otonoshin-kun’ hey I came up with this perfect plan that will make it a piece of cake. Aren’t I awesome? Yes, Tsurumi, you are.

I wouldn’t entrust to you not even my worst enemy but you’re awesome. I bow to you.

Oh, not for what your plan to ‘save’ ‘Otonoshin-kun’ but for how you’re manipulating this people into thinking you’re the best thing after sliced bread. No, never mind, you’re the best thing PRIOR AND AFTER sliced bread as sliced breat started being sold in 1928, while you were awesomely manipulating people from 1891. Possibly prior to it. But well, we’ve no info on what you did prior to tricking Wilk, Kiro and Sofia. We’ll wait for you to enlighten us.

Koito’s mom is touched and start to cry so Tsurumi puts up his best caring act assuring the distraught mother he’ll do all he can so she has to make sure not to throw away all your hope.

Yeah, or all of Tsurumi’s efforts into painting himself as your lord and savior will go for naught.

Image of Koito’s dad’s face. The poor guy is sad, he still has dark bags under his eyes… and likely, even if he can’t cry like his wife he’ll want to and Tsurumi’s words are actually targeted to ensnare him more than his wife.

And so back to the consulate we go, with Tsurumi, Koito senior and Nakayama.

They… have broken in.

Not just in Russian territory as the consulate is in Russian territory but also inside the building. If Koito senior never did anything wrong before, now he risks causing a diplomatic scandal if this turns out. It’s all blackmail material for Tsurumi… though I think Koito senior would shoot himself in the head prior to let himself be forced into submission.

Anyway Nakayama claims he found a phone but points out they could have just phoned to Koito senior’s house since he too has a phone.

Good observation, Nakayama.

Tsurumi claims since the Russian consulate is the highest up on Mt. Hakodate's slope it's easier to watch the whole town from there…. so the kidnappers would choose that phone why? Because they wanted to show Koito senior a place? Is this the theory now?

Bah, I’m more concerned in why Tsurumi would want the kidnappers to phone there. Is he really planning to use the breaking into the embassy against Koito senior? I’m really not sure it’ll work…

Anyway we’re in the past so making phonecalls is tied to the time in which the phone operator office works. As it closed at 19:00 a phonecall can come only after 6:00. Meanwhile they’ll have to light a lamp and warn the kidnappers (and possibly Hakodate police) they had break into the Russian embassy illegally… because the kidnappers were supervising the embassy the past time and made a perfectly timed phonecall but they clearly wouldn’t do it now. No, respectable kidnappers go to bed when it’s late in the night.

Comes to wonder how they can notice the light if they’re sleeping but well, let’s let it slide.

So let’s turn on the lights of an embassy in which no one should be and chat a little.

The chat isn’t a pleasant one.

Koito senior states that if the perpetrators’ demands are to neutralize the Ominato Torpedo Division and Fort Hakodate and they were to comply the Russian navy could immediately start a war and come to easily invade Japan.

Now, we’ve to remember Koito’s father isn’t just Koito’s dad he’s also a REAR ADMIRAL. He has been in a war. He has been responsible for the lives lost in a war, included the one of his elder son. It’s his duty to protect Japan. Faced with such a situation he can’t help but asking himself how many hundreds of thousands of… no, how many millions of Japanese citizens would die due to the war he had caused for the sake of protecting his son.

A war of invasion is a massacre. If Russia were to invade Japan it wouldn’t be just the Japanese soldiers dying but also the civilians. And we also have to remember this massacre could end up involving his son and his wife as well. Never mentioning he can’t just say in front of another navy officer and an army officer he would gladly sell off Japan for his son’s sake.

If he were to do so Tsurumi could very well report him and have him arrested for betrayal. The whole Koito family would be ruined, Koito included.

We see Nakayama is sweating.

I think Nakayama is probably working below Koito senior and would want to help him but he likely understands the gravity of the situation.

Tsurumi isn’t sweating at all. He knows they’re perfectly safe because he’s perfectly in control of the situation ( and there’s no Russia behind this).

Still the face off is interesting. Tsurumi never had the chance to chose to betray his country to save Olga. I wonder what he thinks when, faced with all this, Koito senior claims he has no choice as the best option is (not bow to the kidnappers demands) and to let Otonoshin, HIS OWN SON, die.

Koito senior’s face as he speaks is shadowed but we can see tiny lines in the white of his eyes. I think the idea is they’re meant to signal to us the guy has red eyes, either from lack of sleep or from the effort to control himself and not to cry.

Koito senior is talking as a rear admiral, responsible for the life of everyone in Japan. He doesn’t curse Japan for the situation in which he was put, for first taking away from him one of his sons in a war and now having his other son being kidnapped by Russian. Koito senior is still thinking at the biggest picture, the well being of his country.

His son, his own feelings as father are necessary sacrifices to ensure the survival of milions of other people who trust him to protect them.

Tsurumi never had to face such chance. As he was doing his job he had his own child gruesomely murdered, a bullet going through her face, murdering her and disfiguring her.

A calculation error, a mistake on his part as he didn’t expect Fina to worry for him and come back for him and getting caught in the crossfire.

Tsurumi had to hold his own child who probably still had to learn to call him dad against his chest and watch her once lovely face being ruined by an ugly wound from which blood poured and think over and over he was to blame, that it was his mistake. His mistake?

Or it was all due to Japan, who used him for such job? If his family had remained rich… would he have ended up in Vladivostok as a spy? Would he still have to face losing such a young and beloved child as well as a person who loved him? Because even if he likely married Fina only to have a cover, in the end they clearly ended up loving each other and, more importantly, loving their own child.

Tsurumi plays father for all the men in the 7th, ultimately sacrificing them on the altar of his own ambitions, men of the 7th who all had troubles with their parents and needed them, from Ogata who was abandoned to Tsukishima who was abused, to Koito who felt neglected, to Tanigaki who disagreed with him and now that he has discovered his father was right feels too ashamed to face him.

Tsurumi, the father who lost his child, opposes to Asirpa, who plays the mother and WHO’S ACTUALLY A CHILD who never had a child of her own and lost her own mother (and father). The fake father who manipulates men for his own goals versus the fake mother who takes care of them and would want to heal them.

The ending will likely be a battle between ‘fake parents’… though if Asirpa will manage to kick Tsurumi’s ass Nihei will be proved right again. Women sure can be scary.

Anyway for now this flashback is turning into a flashback that’s not anymore about young Koito’s traumatic loss and experience but about two fathers facing each other. Two fathers who should have both fought for Japan… and whose loyalty was tested by taking away their sons.

Tsurumi ultimately became a rebellious officer who’s trying to steal Hokkaido from Japan while Koito senior, so far, despite his loss, is still loyal to Japan and willing to lose another son.

Honestly I’m curious to see how it will develop.

Young Koito will be saved, that’s for sure, but what about Koito senior? Will he become completely Tsurumi’s pawn as Tsurumi will have the means to blackmail him? Or will he just end up becoming his ally merely because he was tricked by him? Will Koito senior loyalty to Japan crash? And how Koito senior’s presence will play out in the future?

We’ll see.

… but the good part of this flashback is it might also explain why Koito senior accepted to support Tsurumi when he attacked Abashiri… because Koito senior would know there was no grasshopper attack. They were cannoning Abashiri prison and murdering everyone who was in attempting to get Nopperabou. And after he drove Sugimoto and the others away.

Is his true purpose to get Koito THE HELL AWAY from Tsurumi under the guise to turn him into a good officer? We’ll see… but I think in his own way he cares for his son…. Even though he’s a duty devoted man who doesn’t show openly his emotions.

After all he couldn’t think Nopperabou had a daughter only to use her.

Back to the kidnappers’ hideout the white fedora guy offers Koito something to eat. Koito looks fatigued, even though he still doesn’t look mistreated. Clearly being held tied for so long doesn’t do wonders for the health.

We could visually recognize the food the kidnapper offers to Koito but Koito only does after taking a bite.

It’s the ‘Tsukisappu Anpan’ Tsurumi offered him when they first met.

Sei Kobiyama let us know the Tsukisappu Anpan was only sold in shops of the Army … so the kidnappers couldn’t have bought it if they weren’t in the Army.

That or someone from the army sold it to them as a signal for young Koito that help was coming his way (assuming he were to remember the taste and look of a sweet he ate 2 years ago).

Personally I’m sure the Tsukisappu Anpan is a signal for Koito, no way Tsurumi offered them to young Koito and then, by coincidence, they were offered to him again by his kidnappers.

The hardest part though is to pinpoint who the kidnappers are.

@chibivesicle , I and the other guys at discord had been considering various options but it’s pretty hard to say something for sure.

We know they are surely 3, maybe 4 (one might be driving the carriage and never be shown). One of them talks Russian, we never heard the others speak. Is it a sign they can't talk Russian? A coincidence?

Hard to say.

After Koito is kidnapped we only see the white fedora guy. For all we know the others could have left for other jobs.

Very, very likely they aren’t Russians as I like to hope Russia would come up with a better plan… though yes, if Tsurumi managed to put a mole into the ‘Russian kidnapping squad’ maybe poor Russians too are being manipulated by Tsurumi (is there someone in this manga who has never been manipulated by Tsurumi?) into kidnapping Koito and following Tsurumi’s plan.

Another option would be Tsurumi hired some goons… and had one of his Russian talking men with them to keep an eye on them. As they all keep their faces covered the goons might not know who hired them and who among them is Tsurumi’s man. Advantages of hiring goons would be Tsurumi would have someone unrelated to him to arrest and possibly shoot to show off how good he is at saving people. Also if they screw up and Koito manages to see their faces there’s no future risk for Koito to recognize them among Tsurumi’s men. On the other side it would mean to trust them to follow a plan without being there to supervise them. Risky, I would want at least a man I can trust between them.

And, of course, it can be all the men involved are actually men of the 7th. As all this happened in 1902 and they had to be trusted I’ll say we can skip the private first class as they’re obviously new recruits who weren't working yet for Tsurumi in 1902.

Superior privates like Ogata or Usami (who’s older than Ogata according to Noda and therefore can be in the army by slightly longer time) might have been around but I don’t know if Tsurumi would trust them as back then they would be the new guys. This is a task I would entrust to my most trusted henchmen… though it’s true we only see the white fedora man interacting with Koito. The others might not have much to do.

I guess to figure out their identity it would be relevant to know if Tsurumi plans to shoot at them during an heroic rescue action or not.

We know there are few men who can speak Russian in the whole army… but well, we hear only 1 of the kidnappers using Russian. The others might not know it. So the Russian speaking one as far as we know is only white fedora guy.

Among the men from the 7th speaking Russian instead we know only Tsukishima and Ogata (well, Kiro too but back then he wasn’t in the 7th). The story seems to want us to focus on Ogata but, unless Ogata had been working with Tsurumi by a long time, I don’t know if Tsurumi would trust him with such a delicate task.

Among the other old timer, though we don’t know if they can speak Russian, there are Tamai and Kikuta. It would make sense if Tamai were another who had done dirty work for Tsurumi and now wanted to rebel against him. Kikuta… I’m not sure. He seems to be a man who serves the most profitable master but I don’t know if he’ll go and take part to the kidnapping of a real admiral’s son. Looks risky.

Honestly I’m not even sure Tsurumi would use him as Kikuta is clever and could use this against Tsurumi.

Tsukishima could be a good choice as he’s really loyal to Tsurumi but… is he morally and emotioanlly up to handle a kidnapping plan? Of a young boy? Though this could explain why he’s so tolerant with Koito, he merely feels guilty.

Of course there’s also the guy who appeared in the Tuskishima flashback and who’s still unnamed...

...and Tsurumi’s coach driver, who accompanied him to his secret meeting with Ogata after Hanazawa was killed in the Ogata's flashback.

Whose guys might be Tsurumi’s men in this job.

Hell, Tsurumi himself might have been the guy on the horse for all we know, as he was shown riding.

Back to Ogata though, it would make things interesting if it was him because it would explain why he insulted Koito in Russian. He would want Koito to remember this specific experience. But it’s really hard to say.

Tsukishima’s Russian never caused Koito to remember that experience. Of course it’s possible Koito believes Tsukishima worked as a mole for Tsurumi among his kidnappers and therefore knows he was involved but has no idea how much.

Also, in the same way as it wasn’t the anpan’s shape what caused Koito to remember but the situation, it can’t be it’s not the Russian that’s causing Koito to remember but the situation, being a hostage of someone who’s speaking Russian.

LOL, it would be really fun if it were to turn out it was the doctor who was involved in the kidnapping but since he showed no reaction to seeing Koito and instead he was interested in Ogata honestly I don’t really think so.

Anyway that was all for this chapter.

[blizzweirdo]

No Omen, No Country’s Cause Ch. 9

You’ll LOVE this POV, guys. LOL.

AH HA HA HAH HA HA HA!

And you’ll have to wait for... stuff (no spoilers).

DON’T PUNCH ME.

Also, sorry this is late.

     Troy Reeves walked purposefully across the deck of the hangar bay, carefully composing himself. The crew must not see any shred of weakness or a lack of decorum. He straightened his jacket and set his cap. Talking with Stukov disturbed him. He was the last person he had expected to see here, or again, and one of the people he would want to least want to see ever. It had made him perversely happy to see his old rival disfigured and tainted by the race he had closely studied, but disturbing to learn that he now wielded their power. Stopping in the hallway, he pressed the button to call for a lift. Groups of soldiers, captains, and crew walked past him, their loud talking amplified by alcohol. Reeves tipped his hat to them and gave them a grit-teethed smiled. As he got in, a young ensign followed blithely behind him. Once he realized who he had boarded the elevator with, he clearly had tried to turn heel to walk out, but stopped, realizing it was too late. Reeves smiled at him. At least he registers my authority.

     “I won’t bite, ensign. What floor do you need?”

     “S-seven, sir.”

     “Seven? Crew quarters?”

     “Yes, sir. Not one for parties, sir.”

     “Good boy. Neither am I.”

     The ensign stepped off the elevator and Reeves continued to the bridge. When he got there, it was empty; they had celebrated briefly earlier, and he had given them the night off. He walked into his office. All was silent.

     Silence. He enjoyed it. Too much of his job was either loud with the sounds of war or with the sounds of mass humanity. Reeves took his meals in his office or in his quarters. With the end of their first battle and after dealing with Stukov, he needed the solitude—and he also needed to compose a message to Henri, his husband. He didn’t want to seem upset, especially when he had good news. He was alive, one, and they had taken Tarsonis. Of course, if Henri registered he was upset, he couldn’t tell him about Stukov—he couldn’t tell anyone. If Stukov’s true fate was widely known, he couldn’t imagine the fear that it would engender that someone as distinguished (it wasn’t the word he wanted to use, but he couldn’t think of another) as Stukov had been overtaken by the zerg. It would demonstrate just how dangerous the zerg were.

     He had to stop thinking about it. Reeves sat at his desk and turned on his console, positioning himself in front of the screen so that he was in range of the video feed. But then he saw he already had a message from Henri. There was no way for them to speak in real time. They would be passing each other endlessly for the entirety of the conflict. It would be an ongoing call and response conversation. Henri had gotten the first word in. Reeves opened the message. In the study of their home in Charleston, Henri sat, his arms draped over his cello on a leather chaise lounge. He was wearing the silk shirt Reeves had gifted him for his birthday last year.

     “Troy, honey, hello! I hope this gets to you before you get into Tarsonis. If not, well, you know me… Always fashionably late. Sometimes even missing the party!”

     Reeves snorted with laughter. He had missed the “party.”

     “I don’t know what to say. I miss you? I’m definitely afraid for you, and I pray for you, even though I know it won’t do any good. Since I’m at a loss for words and I’m pretty sure we’re being monitored by whatever censors are on this channel, I thought I’d play you something… Here goes…”

     Henri began to play, his long arms languidly crossing his cello. Reeves had always been captivated by the sensuous way he moved. As the tune began, he recognized it. It was one that he had played before but not often. It was faster than much of the music that he played and darker. He searched for the name of it, but only came up with the composter—Stravinsky. A Russian. Reeves anger suddenly returned.

     Reeves’s XO, Commander Gorman, appeared at his door. Reeves turned off the recording. Gorman took a step back, reading the anger on his commander’s face. Reeves demurred.

     “Come in, what is it?”

     “There’s been an… incident… in the brig. We’ve had to restrain one of the prisoners.”

     “Which one?”

     “A ghost? Did you know about this?”

     Reeves stood up so quickly his chair fell over backwards. Gorman jumped at the sound.

     “Was he harmed?”

     “No, but he took out all the electronic equipment on the cell block and even some above and below. Some sort of telekinesis.”

     “Was it an escape attempt?”

     “If it was, it wasn’t a good one. He could’ve walked out, but he’s still down there. We put an external psi dampener on him but…” Gorman handed Reeves a datapad. “There are some irregularities in his file… I thought you might want to take a look. Why was he being held? I didn’t see…” Reeves interrupted him.

     “Gorman, don’t stick your nose into this. From this point forward, I alone deal with this ghost. Any inquiries go straight to me. I want no one to speak of him. There’s no ghost in our brig, and there never was. Is that clear?”

     Gorman went white. Reeves knew he understood. He generally allowed him more freedom than others of his staff—he had known him the longest of any of the crew—but because of this Gorman also knew how quickly Reeves could turn on someone. And when he turned, the relationship was soured forever.

     “O-of course, Admiral.”

     “Dismissed.”

     Gorman left quickly. Reeves read through Gregory Stukov’s file at his desk. He was young—22 biologically but 27 chronologically—and had entered the UED’s ghost program late either because he had been shielded by someone or because he was a late bloomer. His psi index was midrange and he had no reason to have been brain panned—no covert missions or erratic behavior. This appeared to be his first major mission.

     On brain-panning, Reeves aligned more with the Terran Dominion’s view of the practice than with his own government. Degenerates with psionic powers, he felt, needed to be tightly controlled. Brain-panning, he believed, made them docile. They knew no better than to follow orders and could do nothing for themselves if the practice was used judiciously. It had been standard operating procedure until around the time when Reeves had just begun maturing into his military career. Reeves’s first choice of posting had been a ghost “academy” in Montreal. He had already begun living there, and it was where he had met Henri. But the door to that opportunity had suddenly slammed shut. The same year a paper had been put before the UPL Council written by a group of anonymous military officers. It was titled “The Treatment of ‘Degenerate’ Psionic Assets in Training and Combat: An Analysis of Statistics and Subsequent Recommendations.” In it was a scathing deconstruction of many of the academy’s training methods and processes, the most notable of which their usage of “brain-panning” or memory erasure. Common wisdom was that eliminating an agent’s past made them more loyal. This paper, with statistics, case studies, and even some experiments, seemed to prove that it didn’t. One rhetorical question always stuck out to him, and it was the one that was his career’s undoing: “How can soldiers be loyal to a country they don’t remember?” Of all the arguments—that soldiers who were brain-panned could not relate to their commanders, that not being able to remember their families made them unable to form familial bonds among their comrades, and that making them unable to care for themselves in any practical sense put them at a disadvantage in survival situations—the question was the one that shut down the academies temporarily until they could be reformed. Reeves had sided against the paper and the revisions it would make. But the paper’s ideas had just enough patriotic spin on them. The regime changed and was out. And he was out with it.

     Years later, a few months before the Expeditionary Fleet was about to leave, a memo was forwarded to him by a friend who had survived the change in leadership. It was from Vice Admiral Stukov. His friend had written a note with it saying, “Notice anything?” In his memo, Stukov had sent along Admiral DuGalle’s call for the number of ghosts that they needed to accompany them to the Koprulu sector. With it, he had sent his own qualifiers since they would be directly under his command. He “under no circumstances” wanted any ghost that had been brain-panned for any reason—and he explained why. In his explanation, there were several sentences that were worded in almost exactly the same way as the paper that had made its way to the UPL Council years ago. Either Stukov kept a copy around or he had written at least part of it. Reeves looked up the paper and read it again. Sure enough, in the passages where the language was the most heated and blunt, there he recognized Stukov’s voice. He had sidetracked Reeves’s career from afar—and it hadn’t been the first time.

     But now, as he read Gregory’s file, he wondered how Stukov had been so prescient. How had he known his son—who wouldn’t have shown signs before Stukov left—would be a degenerate? Unless his father was. Wouldn’t that be the icing on the cake, Reeves thought. The bad egg. The spoiled apple. DuGalle’s pet a psionic. Gorman had been right about there being something fishy about the file. His psi index was rated at 5.5—too low for telekinesis and for the damage done to the brig. There were ghosts that were exceptions, but not many. His other scores were above average but not exceptional—as if he had been purposefully lowballing his tests or someone had changed his scores keep attention away from him. He would make some discrete inquiries to see who might be the culprit, but some of the information he was hoping the boy himself would divulge. A high psi index, holding back his powers, being too connected, or behaving erratically—all of these circumstances could potentially warrant brain-panning if presented the right way.

     A brain-panned son would be just what Stukov deserved. Gregory needed it, he thought, all ghosts needed it. But if Gregory had any loyalty to his father—and if he had been trying to escape—it would be necessary regardless of how he felt about Stukov. He couldn’t lose him, and the look on Stukov’s face when he realized his son no longer knew who he was would balance the ledger that Reeves had been tallying of his misdeeds.

     Reeves looked up the name of the chief ghost wrangler and trainer on board. He had seen several messages about a “missing ghost” from him but he had been ignoring them. He found his name—Special Ops Chief Shin. Shin picked up immediately when Reeves called. A weathered man appeared on the screen with close-cropped silver hair and one eye that was all white. In another place, he would have a prosthetic, but in the UED, such things weren’t allowed.

     “Shin!” He said curtly as a greeting. Reeves didn’t like that.

     “Chief Shin, this is Admiral Reeves…” He said, waiting for his authority over him to sink in. It never did.

     “Yes? What do you need?”

     “I have a recalcitrant ghost that needs to be re-educated.”

     “You mean brain-panned? A drastic measure. I would need to evaluate them.”

     “That will not be necessary.”

     “Yes, it will. Is this about my missing ghost?”

     “That is not your concern.”

     “Like hell it isn’t. Where is he?”

     “If you don’t have that machine ready in an hour, you’ll be in the same hole I put him in.”

     “What? This is out—”

     Reeves cut him off. He knew what he had to do, but he wanted to speak with the boy first.

     The lights had been restored in the brig by the time Reeves entered. A tech was still working on the guard’s surveillance terminal, her head in an access port under the desk. The guard looked on, standing nearby, bored and helpless. An ensign was still sweeping up the glass in the hallway of the cell block. The guard quickly stood at attention when Reeves entered. The tech hit her head on the desk, but also stood at attention. Reeves barely acknowledged them.

     “I want both of you to still be here when I come back out. Talk to no one, let no one leave, and send anyone who comes in away. Do you understand?”

     “Yes, sir!”

     Reeves skulked into the cell block, gripping the datapad Gorman had given him in his hand. He stopped at Gregory’s cell and looked in at him. When Gregory saw him, he quickly stood, his large green eyes meeting his fleetingly and then darting away. There was a thick, white metal collar around his neck—the external dampener they had fitted him with. Most ghosts had a failsafe surgically implanted in their brains, but they were calibrated to the psi index in their files. If he had one, it would be incorrectly fitted if his file was wrong. As he looked at him, Reeves saw little of his father in him. Maybe the eye shape and the body type, but the rest was his mother, whom Reeves had met infrequently but vividly remembered. That made it easier to talk to him. If he’d looked like Stukov, he thought, it would have been a lot harder not to kill him there in the hangar. But it would be harder to brain-pan him, and, if it came to it, kill him later, When his father inevitably pisses me off.

     He briefly thought about how hilarious it would be if it turned out Gregory wasn’t actually his son, and his wife had already been halfway out the door that long before their divorce. But he knew that wasn’t possible. The mandatory DNA screening most children went through to predict psionic ability would also have established paternity. Gregory had avoided testing—officer’s family privilege—until he most likely began to show signs of what the UED saw as an affliction. That was the first of many oddities of his file, which he would discuss with him.

     Reeves held up the datapad for Gregory to see. “I have your dossier right here, Gregory…” Gregory’s eyes followed it nervously. “There are a few items I think you’d better explain.”

     “Okay…” Gregory murmured.

     “First, your file says not a thing about you being a teek. That’s a little odd, don’t you think?” He said, his voice raising with the question.”

     “I… guess?”

     “You guess? Any idea why that pertinent information was kept out of your file?”

     Gregory was silent for a moment.

     “Clerical error?” He finally said. Reeves’s eyes narrowed. He saw more of his father in him now. That was exactly the kind of flippant remark his father would make.

     “Are you trying to be funny, son?”

     “No, sir,” he said quickly. Reeves watched his face. He was obviously afraid of him. The remark had been guileless if a bit stupid.

     “It also says your psi index is five and a half—and we both know that can’t possibly be right.”

     “Why not?”

     “Don’t play coy with me. We both know a human must have at least a PI of at least eight to be telekinetic. Tell me what your real number is.”

     Gregory was silent again, looking away.

     “Boy, if you don’t tell me, I’ll have it beaten out of you.”

     “Eight point two,” he said wearily, “What does it matter?”

     “Because one of my most powerful ghosts is exhibiting ‘erratic behavior,’ and may need some more permanent restraint than that psi dampener.” Gregory took a step back, the back of his leg hitting the bench behind him, causing him to lose his footing and fall against the wall.

     “No, that’s not necessary…”

     “You tried to escape.”

     “I didn’t!”

     “That’s enough!” A voice said from down the hallway. Dressed in a greying, threadbare ghost’s uniform covered by a long, black duster, Shin marched towards Reeves. Gregory stood up when he saw him. Shin ignored Reeves.      

     “Finally, I found you. I thought you’d gone AWOL. But that wasn’t right.”

     “I’m sorry. I’ve been in here since we got here…”

     “Don’t apologize. What have I told you about that?”

     “I’m sor… I mean…”

     “How did you get in here?” Reeves said, blustering.

     “I’m a ghost? How else? You’re not hard to find. All I did was ask the computer where you were. You really should have your whereabouts clearance-locked.” Reeves fumed. “They didn’t hurt you, did they?” he said, turning back to Gregory.

     “No, but he put a gun to my head.”

     Shin turned quickly to Reeves, “You what?”

     From down the hallway, another prisoner had woken, hearing the three of them talking. He began banging on the wall.

     “Hello? Who’s there? I am a Terran Republic citizen, damn it. I demand due process and a lawyer.” It was Marcos Marinakis. Reeves had almost forgotten about him, but he needed him later.

     “Shut up!” he yelled at him. Reeves’s rage was about to get the best of him. He turned back to Gregory.

     “I sense your anger, Reeves,” Shin said calmly, “But this boy is not his father.” Reeves became irater at the imposition of Shin on his thoughts. He had accessed what amounted to classified data. Shin had not been privy to any briefings on Stukov and his appearance in the Koprulu sector.

     “That thing is not my father!”

     “What?” Reeves said, taken aback.

     “It is a zerg-infested zombie and an abomination.” Reeves never considered that Gregory would not see Stukov as his father anymore. It hadn’t even occurred to him that Stukov may not be Stukov but instead a reanimated version of him. But the way Stukov had spoken to him, the stunt he had pulled—he had been more vicious than usual, but it wasn’t out of character. He had been his same, sardonic self. It had to have been the real Stukov; he felt it. His body may have been tainted by the zerg, but his mind was still there. Gregory had not been able to speak to him. He had only seen what he had done and had to believe that he had not betrayed and abandoned them all those years ago. Reeves realized that brain-panning would be a kindness to Gregory and to his father. He would not use it on him—not yet anyway. Down the hallway, Marinakis began making noise again.

     “You can’t do this! I am a presidential candidate!

     “You’re right, Shin. He’s not his father. His father is dead. We should be more respectful of that. Of course that thing we’re allied with is an abomination… But we must play along, right?”

     Gregory nodded slowly, suspicious.

     “There’s no reason to punish him, Reeves,” Shin said quietly.

     “No, there isn’t. But he’ll have to stay here for his own safety…”

     “Fine. As long as we don’t have need for the operation room…” Shin began. Marinakis bellowed in the background.

     “Hold that thought, Shin. I think I still have use for your machine…”

[phantom-le6]

Episode Reviews - Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 7 (1 of 6)

At last, we’ve come to the final season of Star Trek: The Next Generation, which inevitably kicks off with the resolution to the season 6 cliff-hanger…

Episode 1: Descent

Plot (as given by me):

Captain Picard, Counsellor Troi and Lt. Commander La Forge are taken prisoner by the individualised Borg led by Lore, who apparently found the Borg in disarray after the return of Hugh disrupted their hive mind. Believing lifeforms like himself are superior to organics, Lore is attempting to help the Borg become fully artificial, and has now enlisted Data to aid them. As the trio are taken prisoner, Data relieves La Forge of his VISOR; while Lore explains to Data that the connections La Forge uses for his VISOR will aid them in their experiments, La Forge has a separate explanation. His VISOR could detect a carrier wave from Data to Lore; this is being used to feed Data certain emotions from the emotion chip Lore stole a few years ago, and has also disabled Data’s ethics programming.

 On board the Enterprise, Dr Crusher remains in command as the Borg ship emerges from the far side of the planet. She manages to beam up much of the crew, but 47 people remain stranded on the planet, including Data, Picard’s team, Commander Riker and Lt. Worf. On Riker’s orders, Crusher takes the Enterprise back to the transwarp conduit, but rather than heading back to Federation space, Crusher orders a message buoy sent through the conduit in their stead. She then orders the ship back to the planet to try and beam up the remaining crew members. On the surface, Riker and Worf head off together while the other away teams are advised to scatter into cover and avoid all contact with the Borg.

 Riker and Worf are soon found by a group of Borg, but these Borg are dissidents against Lore’s rule led by Hugh, the Borg the Enterprise crew managed to return to individuality. Hugh explains how Lore exploited the weakened and confused Borg to his own ends, and that his deadly experiments in making the Borg purely cybernetic life forced himself and others underground. Hugh is resentful of Starfleet for this, and while he is willing to give Riker and Worf some information to help them save his friend La Forge, he is not willing to risk direct confrontation with Lore.

 In orbit, the Enterprise returns and manages to beam back most of the missing away teams, leaving only the senior staff unaccounted for. As the Borg ship pursues the Enterprise, Dr Crusher orders the ship into the corona of the planet’s sun, using the metaphasic shielding developed by Dr Reyga to protect the ship. Acting on the suggestion of junior science officer Ensign Taitt, they then use the tractor beam emitters to generate a particle beam that triggers a solar eruption, destroying the Borg ship and enabling the Enterprise to return to the planet unmolested. Meanwhile, Picard and Troi manage to implement an idea of La Forge’s to trigger an energy pulse that restarts Data’s ethical programming. This happens just in time to prevent Data doing irreversible damage to his friend in Lore’s experiments, prompting him to return La Forge to his cell with the others.

 Lore soon learns of Data’s wavering determination, and attempts to use his control over the emotions Data receives to assert dominance. However, not sure if this has worked, Lore then asks Data to kill Picard. When Data refuses, Lore plans to kill Data in front of their Borg followers, but Hugh suddenly rushes forward to stop him. At the same time, Riker and Worf appear, strafing the room with phase fire as the Lore loyalists and Hugh’s dissidents clash with each other. In the ensuing chaos, Lore attempts to flee, but he is pursued by Data, who fires on and then deactivates Lore. Hugh is then left to try and organise the remaining individualised Borg into a new society free of Lore’s influence, and the Enterprise returns to Federation space. Data, having retrieved the damaged emotion chip from Lore before he was dismantled, prepares to destroy it to prevent his actions causing harm in the future, but La Forge stops him. La Forge explains that he can’t let Data give up on his life-long dream of having emotions, and insists on holding onto the chip for Data in hopes that one day he’ll be ready to use the chip properly.

Review:

This is a pretty decent follow-up to the part 1 episode that ended the season before, though not as good as perhaps it could have been in some respects. We basically have three plot threads to shift between throughout this episode; the Data-Lore dynamic, what happened to the Borg as a result of the original incident with Hugh in ‘I, Borg” and Crusher having to command the Enterprise.  So, let’s look at each of these in that order.

 Data’s story is, for me, not as good as it could have been.  For a start, rather than following up on my suppositions about Data from part 1, namely that Data’s reaction to having emotion was akin to an addiction reaction, the show gives him a cop-out and says ‘oh, he has a program that governs his ethics and that’s shut down’.  To my mind, that makes Data’s situation far less relatable than if the emotions were just overwhelming him, either from his sudden exposure to them or Lore not giving him the full program.  Real people don’t have programs that make us act good, so why do artificial lifeforms, and why are those programs so black-and-white?  It’s like the moment any sci-fi writers gives ethics to machines, they make it binary and don’t allow for any of the grey areas of morality humans enjoy.  Surely if Dr Soong made Data to be so human that he had the appearance of breathing, a pulse and hair growth, you’d think he would build into Data the ability to have a fully human morality and not the strict binary one of a machine.

 The one real upside to Data’s story in this episode is that it ultimately sets up his character arc in the first of the TNG films, where he is finally able to use his emotion chip where the TV show purposely forced him not to use it.  In that respect, the episode helps somewhat with the oft-absent element of continuity and consistency within TNG, which is something that comes to light when we look at the question of Hugh and the other Borg in this episode.  The TNG film First Contact and episodes of Star Trek: Voyager would establish the idea of the Borg Queen, who would effectively control and regulate the Borg collective consciousness.  Moreover, First Contact suggests the Borg Queen was in place during Picard’s time as Locutus of Borg during the ‘Best of Both Worlds’ two-part episode spanning seasons 3 and 4.

 Now, given all of that, I find it hard to believe the entire vessel Hugh was taken aboard after the events of the ‘I, Borg’ episode could be individualised as they were.  Part of the Borg Queen’s duties would be to purge any thoughts deemed as irrelevant or harmful to the hive mind, and considering that individuality and freedom would be considered as both in a hive-mind society, there should have been no way that this could have happened if things were working as they’re supposed to.  Frankly, I think this should have been followed up later in this series or on Voyager to explain the why of it.  Was the Borg ship that retrieved Hugh somehow cut off from the hive-mind?  Did the hive-mind not work as I’ve noted until after the events of this episode?  This is the sort of problem that being an episodic TV show by conception brings up; a total lack of proper consistent continuity with proper in-series, on-screen exposition for every detail, no matter how apparently minute or irrelevant.

 The only real compensating factor is it gives Lore a chance to play the Hitler/Trump of the individualised Borg; take one group that is weakened, confused and ready to accept salvation in any form, add someone morally bankrupt enough to exploit that opportunity, and the result is inevitable, and ultimately polarises the exploited group until the group with a conscience rises up over the side without one.  In essence, Lore’s part in this story is a cautionary tale about being wary of accepting salvation from anyone who offers it to the desperate; sometimes that salvation is genuine, but more often than not it’s someone in power looking to exploit those without power.

 Finally, we have the whole ‘Crusher in command’ situation, which isn’t really that well developed to my mind.  It adds some extra continuity by having the metaphasic shielding from the episode ‘Suspicions’ make a come-back, which I suspect is part of why Crusher is in command of the ship for part 2, and the same actor who played the man trying to steal the shielding prototype in ‘Suspicions’ actually plays one of the substitute bridge officers in this episode.  I think in the end it’s really only worked to for that and three other reasons, not all of which were probably intended.  First, it gave Dr Crusher’s character something to do in while everyone else was somewhere on the planet.  Second, it helps to set up the future timeline in the show’s finale, and the third reason is to help with the Voyager set-up.

 The 1993-1994 season for the Trek shows was apparently the busiest year ever noted for Trek; not only were TNG and DS9 in active production on their seventh and second seasons respectively, but TNG was going to go straight from doing their series to making a feature film with only a week’s break in between, and a new show was being developed to take over TNG’s position as a ship-based Trek show.  That series, of course, was Voyager, and it was ultimately going to be the first show where the commanding officer would be a captain.  As such, I suspect that engineering situations in TNG where Crusher and Troi could take command or a female officer of high rank could come up were probably as much to lay the groundwork for Voyager as other concepts like the Maquis or Native American tribes having dedicated colonies along the border with the Cardassians.

 The bottom line is the episode is pretty good, but falls short of what part 1 gave us.  Overall, I’d give this one 8 out of 10.

Episode 2: Liaisons

Plot (adapted from Wikipedia):

The Enterprise welcomes two Iyaaran ambassadors, Loquel and Byleth, who are visiting the ship as part of a "cultural exchange" that will also send Captain Picard to their planet. Before Picard departs, he assigns Counsellor Troi to act as Loquel's liaison and asks Commander Riker to do the same for Byleth. But Byleth has other ideas, and instead demands that Lt. Worf serve as his shipboard guide. Soon afterward, Picard departs for the Iyaaran homeworld with Voval, the Iyaaran shuttle pilot, who is gruff and uncommunicative. Their awkward silence is disrupted by a malfunction aboard their ship. Crashing on an unknown planet, Voval receives a concussion, but Picard is seemingly unhurt. He decides to seek help outside, but falls to the ground trying to traverse the planet's stormy surface. While he lies unconscious, someone silently drags him away.

 Picard awakens on the distant planet in a small, dimly-lit cargo cabin. He is approached by a solemn, attractive human woman who informs him that Voval did not survive the crash. Picard learns that the woman's name is Anna and that she is the sole survivor of a Terellian cargo freighter crash that occurred seven years before. After Anna tells him that he has three broken ribs, he sends her to retrieve the shuttlecraft's com panel to send a distress signal.

 Back on the Enterprise, Troi has introduced Loquel to dessert, and Loquel is so intrigued that even the next morning he is drinking sweet juice. Worf has had about all he can take of his abrasive, demanding guest. Riker decides that the tension might be eased by a "friendly" game of poker. The game is anything but "friendly," and Worf realizes that Byleth is stealing chips. Before long, Worf loses control and, despite Riker's insistence that he calm down, attacks his guest. But instead of getting angry, Byleth is pleased. He expresses admiration for Worf's display of anger and politely excuses himself to document the experience, leaving everyone confused (with the exception of Loquel, who is still revelling in his dessert).

 Meanwhile, Anna brings the transmitter module back to her cargo ship, and admits to Picard she accidentally destroyed it, using a phaser blast to remove it from the shuttle. Picard is then shocked when Anna suddenly kisses him and tells him she loves him. Picard becomes enraged at Anna when he realizes that his ribs are not really broken, and the woman, who continues to beg for his love, is actually holding him captive. He angrily alerts Anna to his discovery, at which point she becomes distraught over failing to gain his affection and rushes out the door, breaking off her necklace and locking Picard inside. Voval comes and opens the door, and talks to Picard.

 Voval explains that he only appeared to be dead because, when Iyaarans are injured, their metabolic rate slows in order to promote healing. He and Picard set off in search of Anna, eventually separating. Picard finds her at the edge of a cliff, threatening to commit suicide if he does not tell her that he loves her. When he notices that Anna is again wearing her necklace and that Voval has again disappeared, Picard senses that something strange is going on and tells Anna to go ahead and jump. At that moment, she transforms herself back into Voval, who explains that he is not really a pilot, but an Iyaaran ambassador. He staged the crash in order to study the emotion of love, non-existent on the Iyaaran homeworld, by using Picard as a subject; the scenario was based on a journal left behind by a survivor on the cargo ship, a human woman. Similarly, Loquel and Byleth were sent to experience pleasure and antagonism, respectively. Picard is taken aback at first, but upon returning to the Enterprise, acknowledges the experiments of the three ambassadors as being productive.

 Upon their departure, Worf and Byleth inform Riker of their marathon eleven-hour session in the holodeck doing battle exercises, which has enabled Byleth to explore the concept of "antagonism" in a less destructive manner. Loquel offers a sampling of Iyaaran nourishment to Troi as a token of his appreciation, but apologizes that it is not as delicious as the dessert he has enjoyed while in Troi's company. Troi accepts the food, stating that the volume of dessert they have consumed has surpassed even her threshold, and she will be quite content to eat something bland.

Review:

This episode is basically Trek doing an homage to/ riff on the Stephen King story Misery, so for any Stephen King fans who are also Trekkies, this is probably an episode they’ll enjoy, or at least the Picard-centric plot that carries those elements.  The other side of the episode is a B-plot aboard the Enterprise that ultimately links back up with Picard’s plot when it’s explained to be three ambassadors trying to experience certain aspects of humanity, based on a journal recovered from a cargo ship long before anyone from Starfleet encountered this alien race.

 Leaving aside how cringe-worthy a lot of moments in the B-plot were, my main problem with this episode is when Picard suggests the aliens have been taking a direct approach.  I’m sorry, but having one ambassador pose as a human woman, another stuff themselves silly with all things sweet and the third go around spoiling for a fight with no initial explanation is not being direct.  Being direct would be all three coming the Enterprise and saying ‘right, we’ve found this journal, we don’t understand these concepts, can you demonstrate them to us?’  The crew could then have set up holodeck programs, given them access to human literature on the subjects, perhaps even organised some discreet social observation in Ten-Forward.  That is being direct, and these aliens were nothing of the kind, and I can tell because as an autistic person I always want to take the most direct route in almost every situation I’m in, and anything even slightly indirect isn’t direct at all.

 This being said, I do agree with Picard’s comment about how it can sometimes be a refreshing change of pace to explore something to a limit rather just having a ‘little go’.  There are things I’ve come across in life that I’ve sometimes wished to take further than most people would necessarily take them, and it’s very annoying that all too often finding kindred spirits in such areas can be almost impossible.  For example, for most people casual adult relationships are part of being young and then abandoned as part of complying with the societal expectation to ‘settle down and commit’.  Me, I spent all of my teens and early 20’s focused on the committed relationship idea, but have since abandoned that as not for me, only to find that there is no easy or obvious way into exploring casual adult relationships in a way that works for me and my particular circumstances.

 So, in summation, the episode has at least one good point to make and doesn’t do too bad a job with the Picard story, but the B-plot and the mischaracterisation of the approach taken by the ambassadors just rubs me the wrong way.  I therefore give this episode only 6 out of 10.

Episode 3: Interface

Plot (as given by me):

Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge tests out a probe with an interface suit control system; the suit allows Geordi to perceive whatever the probe senses and direct its actions as if he were there in person (represented on-screen by Geordi appearing in place of the probe and seeing through human eyes). The probe works, though the level of sensory input from the probe has to be carefully controlled to avoid feedback to Geordi. The idea is that the probe will be able to enter environments where it is unsafe for the members of the Enterprise crew to go.

 As preparations to use the probe to any survivors and data from the USS Raman proceed, the ship having become trapped in the atmosphere of a gas giant, Captain Picard receives news from Deep Space 3 that the USS Hera has disappeared and is presumed lost with all hands. The vessel was under the command of Geordi’s mother, Captain Silva La Forge, and Picard is forced to relay the news to him. Despite the news, Geordi insists on proceeding with the probe mission; he confirms no one is left alive aboard the Raman, but during the probe’s investigation, a fire breaks out and the neural feedback results in Geordi’s hands being burned.

 Picard wants to still retrieve data from the Raman, but not at the expense of Geordi’s safety, and Geordi assures him he can modify the interface to prevent any further danger to himself. While the modifications are made and the probe moved to another part of the Raman, Geordi learns from his father that a memorial will take place for the Hera on Vulcan, as the ship’s crew were mostly Vulcans. Edward La Forge also wants their family to hold a separate ceremony for Silva, but Geordi believes this to be premature and is determined not to give up on the possibility that his mother is alive. This possibility is then further reinforced for Geordi when, during his next use of the probe, he sees his mother aboard the Raman. She claims that she and her crew are trapped deeper in the atmosphere, but the neural input levels become too high and Geordi is forced to disconnect as he goes into neural shock.

 Geordi is convinced he saw his mother, but the rest of the crew is sceptical, and Picard orders him not only to avoid using the interface suit, but also to see Counsellor Troi. Troi suggests that Geordi may be creating a fantasy that his mother is still alive to avoid guilt over not taking an opportunity to see her a few weeks ago, which Geordi dismisses. Later, a plan is agreed to retrieve the Raman using a relay system of tractor beams; Geordi also tries to convince the captain that his mother’s ship could be trapped deeper into the atmosphere despite having last been heard of some distance away, but Lt. Commander Data is forced to note his friend’s theory is almost impossible. Commander Riker then tries to empathise with Geordi, having lost his own mother when he was a baby, but Geordi retorts that Riker’s mother was definitely dead, and there was conclusive evidence of this fact; the Hera is just missing, could be trapped in the gas giant’s atmosphere, and Geordi refuses to give up on her.

 Geordi opts to take one last stab at using the interface suit against orders, and manages to cajole Data into assisting, and even into raising the neural input levels to a dangerously high levels, as he tries to take the Raman lower into the atmosphere. However, it soon becomes apparent that the Hera is not there, and it is not his mother that Geordi has been seeing. As Picard and Dr Crusher arrive, having learned of Geordi’s efforts, Geordi learns that the Raman accidentally picked up some kind of subspace life-forms that lived in the gas giant’s atmosphere. They tried to communicate mentally with the ship’s crew, but accidentally killed them in doing so, whereas the use of the probe and the interface suit shielded Geordi and allowed him to perceive the alien message as his mother. Geordi takes the Raman low enough into the atmosphere for the aliens to escape, and narrowly avoids dying from neural overload in the process.

 Afterwards, Picard reprimands Geordi for disobeying orders, but expresses regret that he wasn’t able to find his mother. Geordi notes that while the entity he encountered wasn’t his mother, the experience did enable him to say goodbye to his mother in his own way.

Review:

According to the Mission Overview: Year Seven featurette on the TNG Blu-ray boxed set, this seventh season became known as the ‘Family season’ because all/most of the main cast of characters had a family member or two show up at some point in the season.  We certainly began the series in that vein with having to resolve the Data-Lore sibling story in the Descent two-part episode, and this episode continues that by bringing in Geordi’s parents and mentioning that he has a sister.  It’s a great change for Geordi-centric episodes, because he’s usually spending the episodes centred on himself either floundering romantically, dealing with the latest engineering crisis of the week, or both.

 That said, I have to agree with Geordi’s original attitude of ‘no body, no death’.  Part of that is down to the later Trek series Voyager dealing with a ship that ‘disappears’, and is officially declared lost but which is actually in one piece and trying to get home as soon as it can.  If that could happen to Voyager, and could also happen to at least one other Federation ship that appears in that series, then surely it could also have happened to the Hera.  Another part is that as a superhero comics fan, the absence of a body following a death often means any character who has ‘died’ in such a manner will ultimately return, and even some who have left a body behind don’t actually die.

 However, the biggest part is that we’re dealing with humans in a very science-governed, secularist world for humanity.  Because of that, I find it strange to buy into the idea of a failed search meaning a ship gets written off as dead.  No evidence of the ship means you have no proof it’s actually destroyed, and I have a hard time believing a crew that routinely doesn’t believe anything it can’t scan, analyse and quantify would just buy into the idea that lost ship equals dead ship.  The problem with this story is it started life around the probe concept and just swapped out Riker (who was the protagonist of the original draft) for Geordi.  To my mind, they should have either taken that out or focused it more on La Forge convincing the ship to find the Hera, and then maybe used the probe in its rescue. That, to my mind, would have been a better episode and more consistent with a science-minded crew.  Got a missing ship?  Go look for it and confirm definitively that it is still ok or not; don’t just be lazy and assume after a few days of just searching one tiny bit of space that it’s gone.  Some areas of Trek may have room for faith, but the human side is always the scientific side, and that side goes on proof, not belief based on an absence of data.

 I also disagree with something I’ve read on Memory Alpha for this episode; apparently, some of the show’s writers felt this episode marked the moment when they felt TNG really had to end, because they were having to bring out the family members of the main characters to get plots.  To my mind, that’s not a mark of creative burn-out; if you’ve got some issue to explore or character to develop and bringing on a family member helps that, great. That’s Trek being Trek, as opposed to just dealing with a random sci-fi concept of the week with no issue exploration or character development involved.  In true Trek, the sci-fi is window-dressing for something topical, something character-centric or both, and if the writers on TNG felt that anything true Trek was a mark of creative burnout, my thinking is they needed to be writing for anything other than Trek.  Anyway, final score for this episode, 7 out of 10.

Episode 4: Gambit (Part 1)

Review (as given by me):

The senior staff of the Enterprise investigate the disappearance of Captain Picard via undercover means, and discover he was apparently killed in a bar fight on Dessica II. With Commander Riker now acting captain, he convinces Starfleet command to allow the Enterprise to investigate so that Picard’s killers can be brought to justice. Riker interrogates the witness they have brought on board, and he explains the group responsible are a mercenary band who would kill him for divulging too much information. However, when Riker threatens to turn the man over to the Klingon authorities regarding several outstanding warrants, he reveals that the group mentioned the Barradas system as their next destination.

 When the Enterprise reaches that system, Riker leads an away team to the surface of Barradas III over the objection of his acting first officer Lt. Commander Data. They encounter the mercenaries amid some ruins on the surface, and a firefight ensues, during which Riker is knocked out and abducted by transporter. A ship subsequently flees the planet, and the Enterprise tries to pursue, only to swiftly lose the ship from their long-range sensors despite being fast than the mercenary ship. They soon learn from Starfleet intelligence that the ship has raided numerous archaeological sites in their sector, and is made of a material that is energy-absorbent, making it undetectable to long-range sensors. With Data now acting captain, away teams are sent back down to the planet to try and find clues to help them locate the mercenaries.

 Meanwhile, Riker finds that the mercenary ship is led by a man named Arctus Baran, who uses devices known as neuro servos to control the crew. The servos are wired into each crew member’s nervous system at the neck and can cause them any level of pain Baran chooses if he wishes to punish them. Riker has been fitted with one himself, and he is stunned when he sees that one of Baran’s crew is actually Captain Picard, alive and claiming to be a smuggler called Galen. Picard manages to help Riker by dropping hints that he should play a version of himself on the verge of leaving Starfleet due to his chequered past, and then sets up an engine failure that Riker is uniquely experienced to easily solve.

 While the crew of the Enterprise deduce the mercenaries are heading for Calder II and begin moving to intercept them, Picard meets with Riker in private about Baran’s ship. Apparently, when Picard found an archaeological site on Dessica II had been ransacked, he went looking for those responsible. Due to the mercenaries having weapons that could double as teleportation devices, his abduction was mistaken by witnesses for him being vapourised. Picard then pretended to be a smuggler called Galen to get inside Baran’s operation. The mercenaries are striking specific sites looking for a specific artefact, and Galen is responsible for helping Baran to identify their prize; however, Baran has not revealed much about what they are seeking, only a particular particle signature that their prize will be a match for.

 Picard instructs Riker to act as a rival to his character of Galen, who is already at odds with Baran, so that Riker can gain Baran’s confidence. Riker agrees. Later, as the mercenaries plan their assault on Calder II, Picard suggests they use Riker to talk their way past the staff manning a Federation science station on the planet, thereby enabling them to seize the next set of artefacts without engaging in battle. Tallera, Baran’s top lieutenant and supposedly a Romulan, supports the plan, and Baran agrees, but he insists the crew be ready to fight just in case the plan fails.

 At Calder II, the plan goes awry as the Enterprise has sent word to the science station to try and delay the mercenary ship. Baran is prepared to go straight to attacking, but Picard intervenes, using a phase-resonant pulse to disable the facility’s shields. They manage to beam up half the artefacts before the base shields are restored, and any attempt to attack is then forestalled by the arrival of the Enterprise. Baran holds Riker at gunpoint and demands he make the Enterprise withdraw. When Data initially refuses to obey the order, Riker sends his command codes. The codes are invalid as they were changed following Riker’s capture; knowing that the commander would be aware of this, Data realises it is part of a ruse and orders the shields to be lowered.  Baran then orders his ship to fire on the Enterprise, and multiple disruptor blasts begin to strike the ship’s starboard warp nacelle.

Review:

This episode is the last in a trio of mid-season two-part episodes that have been major events in the last two seasons of the show.  However, in a manner similar to the first of the sixth season two-parters, ‘Chain of Command’, ‘Gambit’ shakes up the status quo of the Enterprise for its duration. First, we have Picard supposedly being killed off, and then Riker gets kidnapped, so all of a sudden neither of our normal commanders are in the driving seat.  It’s quite interesting in this regard because it gives Data a chance to rise to the fore and show a bit more of what he can do as a commander. We’ve only seen this a couple of times before; once way back in ‘The Ensigns of Command’, and then again in the second part of the season-bridging two-part episode ‘Redemption’.  We don’t get much of what Data can do in this line in part 1, but the premise still holds a lot of promise at this point.

 Second, we get Riker playing just a slightly disgraced version of himself on the fly while Picard is very much undercover, calling back to episodes like ‘Captain’s Holiday’ and ‘Starship Mine’ in terms of making Picard a bit more rounded and action-capable rather than always being the ‘talky and cerebral’ character he initially appeared to be on this show. It’s fun to see, especially Patrick Stewart playing Picard who, in turn, is pretending to be Galen.

 Apparently, the show concept went against one of Roddenberry’s rules, which was that Trek wouldn’t have any ‘space pirates’, and producer Rick Berman was among those initially opposed to developing this episode, thinking it was going to be a ‘campy’ episode, which he felt the show didn’t do well at all.  However, speaking as someone whose idea of camp is usually Kenneth Williams in Carry On films or Round The Horne, or the horrid 1960’s Batman played by Adam West, this episode was nothing of the kind.  This was a good, serious episode that was giving a lot of the characters a bit of something different to do, which for some would effectively develop them to small degrees.  Also, why not have mercenaries in the Trek universe; humanity is meant to have gotten its act together, and that’s fair enough, but not every other race has. Moreover, just because the bulk of a society ends up working ok, that doesn’t mean you get rid of everything naff in it.  Yet again, we get an episode that’s refreshing just for tempering the raw Roddenberry idealism this show started out with.

 Overall, I give part 1 about 8 out of 10; good as it is, there’s a lot of set up, not much development and certainly no issue exploration as yet, so it’s not quite up to maximum warp yet.

Episode 5: Gambit (Part 2)

Plot (as given by me):

The damage to the Enterprise is negligible, and Data orders that the Enterprise play along, simulating certain battle damage and returning fire with minimal power. Aboard the mercenary ship, Picard likewise claims more damage is being inflicted on them than is actually being done. Nonetheless convinced by the subterfuge, Baran orders their ship to withdraw, and much to Lt. Worf’s consternation, Data does not order pursuit, believing Commander Riker would not want them to do so as part of his ruse. Instead, he orders Lt. Commander La Forge and Counsellor Troi to review the transmission sent by Riker for any additional information.

 On board the mercenary ship, Riker and Picard continue to pretend to be rivals. Picard soon identifies the artefact Baran has been seeking amid those they stole from Calder II, which interrupts Tallera from interrogating Picard about his antagonism towards Riker. Baran is speaking with Riker when the news comes in, and he informs Riker that Galen will soon out-live his usefulness; once Galen has verified a second artefact they are en route to collect, Baran will no longer need him. Riker is acting as if he now needs a new career, given his own actions at Calder II, and Baran notes he could use a man like Riker, but to earn the position, Riker will have to kill Galen when the time comes.

 The analysis of Riker’s message indicates the mercenaries are heading for the Hyralan sector; Worf estimates it will take them 15 hours to reach it while La Forge notes the Enterprise could reach it in 5 hours. When Data orders the Enterprise to head to the location, Worf voices a notable irritation at his commander’s apparent slowness to order any kind of pursuit or interception. Data takes Worf into the Ready Room and explains this kind of behaviour is unacceptable if he is to serve as acting first officer, as no first officer should ever show impatience or irritation about an order in front of the crew. Offered the choice of returning to tactical and letting La Forge be first officer, Worf declines and agrees to keep performing his duty, and the two officers also resolve not to let the incident tarnish their friendship.

 Riker and Picard confer, and Riker explains Baran has ordered him to get close to Picard’s alter ego of Galen to root out any crew members who might object in the event of Galen being killed. Picard, in turn, reveals that the artefacts they are gathering are not Romulan as they originally suspected, but are in fact Vulcan. The second component is being delivered by a Klingon courier to the Hyralan sector, which the mercenaries are en route to. Picard begins trying to sound out the crew regarding who might support him in staging a mutiny, and he is soon confronted by Tallera, who demands to know who Picard really is. Tallera reveals she is not actually a Romulan, but a Vulcan security operative named T’Paal, which prompts Picard to reveal his own true identity.

 T'Paal explains that the artefact the mercenaries are seeking is the Stone of Gol, a weapon of ancient Vulcan known as a psionic resonator, which was dismantled when the Vulcan people embraced logic and turned their backs on violence. The weapon is apparently being sought by Vulcan isolationists who believe that to keep Vulcan culture ‘pure’, their world must withdraw from contact with all alien species. T’Paal claims her mission is to prevent the weapon being reassembled at any cost.  Meanwhile, the Enterprise has intercepted the Klingon shuttle in the Hyralan system and brought it aboard, feigning a health and safety inspection in an effort to search the vessel without violating the Klingon-Federation treaty.

 When the mercenary ship arrives, Baran orders a raiding party board the ship to find the Klingon pilot and obtain the second artefact; Riker is assigned to the party to assuage Galen’s doubts about his loyalty, but in reality Baran wants Riker to kill Galen when the mission is completed. The party initially beams into the shuttle bay, where they learn the pilot must still be carrying the artefact and is currently in the observation lounge. Riker stuns Worf and Dr Crusher, then uses a shuttle’s transporter to beam the raiding part to the observation lounge. There, the second artefact is retrieved and Picard pretends to shoot Riker dead, beaming away with the mercenaries.

 Back on the mercenary ship, Picard leads his little mutiny against Baran as Galen. Baran tries to kill him using the remote for the neural servos, but only succeed in killing himself; somehow Picard managed to switch their transponder codes, ensuring Baran would only hurt himself if he used the device again. Picard destroys the remote, and then orders the ship to Vulcan. Riker, meanwhile, contacts Vulcan security to update them on the situation, only to learn they have no operative aboard the mercenary ship. Picard begins to deduce this for himself when he sees Tallera’s reaction to informing her that he asked Riker to notify the Vulcans.

 At Vulcan, Picard tries to make Tallera beam down with only one artefact, which results in both of their ruses being uncovered. As the mercenaries are only concerned with being paid, they decide to beam down to Vulcan with Tallera and Picard, where their payment is supposedly waiting. Once paid, they will leave, killing Picard in the event they don’t need him as a hostage against Starfleet. On the surface, Tallera adds a third piece to the other two and re-assembles the psionic resonator, which she then uses to kill the two mercenaries. However, when she tries to use it on Picard and an away team from the Enterprise that arrives not long after, it fails. This is because Picard deduces the resonator relies on violent thoughts to be effective; a mind at peace renders one impervious to the weapon.

 The resonator is later destroyed as Tallera and the remaining mercenaries are taken into custody. Back on the Enterprise, Picard tries to resume command, but Riker notes that since the captain has been declared dead, he cannot give orders. Data notes that by the same token, Riker has been declared a renegade and is also unable to take command. Picard therefore opts to retire for the night and jokingly suggests Data take Riker to the brig. Data, not apparently understanding that Picard was joking, then begins to escort Riker to the brig.

Review:

For me, part 2 was a pretty decent follow-up to part 1.  Picard and Riker are brilliant across both parts, and we get to see a lot more done in terms of having Data and Worf in command of the Enterprise.  This is especially interesting because Data is having to reprimand Worf for an emotional outburst in a way that seems slightly emotion driven, yet Data currently has no emotions following the events of the ‘Descent’ two-part episode.  It’s strange how at times the show has had Data approximate emotion without actually feeling it, because while it keeps the character interesting, it blurs the line about Data’s ability to feel a bit too much.  In many ways, this is why I ultimately came to prefer the Doctor on Voyager to Data in terms of AI characters; with him, at least emotion was bake-dried in from the start.

 It’s also interesting, and yet also puzzling, that Worf would be the first officer under Data’s command.  He’s only a lieutenant at this stage, whereas La Forge and Troi are both Lt. Commanders and Dr Crusher is a full-fledged commander who was captaining the ship right at the start of the season.  I think the episode should have set aside a moment or two to explain Data’s decision in this regard.  Why have the main cast character who is lowest in rank serve as acting first officer when you’ve got three officers of higher rank in that same main cast to pick from?  It just doesn’t strike me as logical.

 The second part also picks up some points for at least trying to be true Trek from the issue exploration side, as it tries to put forward a message of peace through the idea that the artefacts form a psychic weapon that can’t hurt anyone thinking peaceful thoughts. It’s certainly in the tradition of Roddenberry, but more the unrealistic side of his idealism that irritates me than the side of it that you believe might be doable. I mean think peaceful thoughts to overcome one psychic weapon, fine. However, if anyone thinks that just thinking peaceful thoughts will make peace a reality, they’re out of their minds.

 The desire for peace has to be expressed through actions that create peace, or otherwise nothing gets done and the violent and war-mongering will steam-roller over the peace-lovers every time.  This is a basic point frequently made in franchises like the Transformers or some superhero lore; you’ll get one character who hates having to fight all the time and wants to give up, but by not fighting things are just made worse.  This is because inaction against violent, power-hungry villains doesn’t stop them; they still want to get their way and are still willing to do whatever they feel like to get it, and standing on the side-lines singing ‘we are the world’ isn’t going to matter diddly squat.  Only suiting up and opposing them makes a difference.

 So, all in all, the second part of ‘Gambit’ is a good episode, but not quite up to the best that Trek can be.  End score is another 8 out of 10.

[ofdvnamisarchive]

WHICH GREEK GOD DO YOU RELATE TO THE MOST

Hestia is a goddess of the hearth, architecture, and the right ordering of domesticity, the family, the home, and the state. She upholds her traditional values, and believes strongly in her symbolism.

WHICH FAMOUS KING OR QUEEN ARE YOU

Richard I –– Chivalrous and charming, you are Richard I – The Lionheart (1189-1199)! A natural leader, you were born to rule - not just forced into it. Others flock to your magnetic personality, and are swooned by your genuine charm. You are not only a gifted leader, but one who leads by example, a rare feat. Richard I was a crusading King who gained fame for his chivalry, courage and indefatigable spirit. He earnt the respect of his great enemy Saladin through vast crusades, sweeping the entire continent of Europe.

HOW WOULD JANE AUSTEN DESCRIBE YOUR LOVE LIFE

''Where the heart is really attached, I know very well how little one can be pleased with the attention of any body else.'' –– You believe life is all about finding your one true love, and you're not about to waste your time on Tindr dating an endless stream of "Netflix and chill"-kinda guys. You're searching for a soul mate, and there's no way you'll settle for anything less.

WHAT IS YOUR FATAL FLAW

Fatal flaw: You’re an idealist in a cruel, callous world. You want the world to be good. Here’s the problem: it’s usually not. At best it’s subpar. At worst it’s a nightmare void, and your naiveté is simply a plot device used to emphasize this point. Your inability to accept the world’s present darkness will lead to your untimely downfall, but not before your dewy-eyed idealism and rosy visions of utopia erode away. You will become a shell of your former self. Sorry about that. Yikes.

HOW WOULD YOU DIE IN A SHAKESPEARE PLAY

You’re going to throw yourself away. What does this even mean? Nobody knows. Probably that you’re going to die in a dumpster or something. This is the one I got. Typical.

WHAT SHAKESPEARE ARCHETYPE ARE YOU

The Flawed Hero –– You are the hero of this play called life, but you are plagued by inner demons and glaring personality flaws. You are the Romeo, the Hamlet, the Macbeth, the Othello. You’re a good person, mostly, but you’re also impulsive, or vengeful, or ambitious, or jealous and easily tricked by dubious ensigns. You will make one mistake, and then also like twelve more mistakes just to bring it all home, and then? Well, then you will die. (But that’s just the worst-case scenario.)

WHAT WOULD YOU DIE OF IN THE MIDDLE AGES

You would’ve died in the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381, also known as the least successful uprising ever attempted by a group of unruly farmers. Following the Black Death, the abrupt lack of able-bodied workers made labor more valuable. The emerging middle class got together and said, “Hey, I think we deserve fair wages,” to which Richard II responded, “Okay, that sounds fair,” and had them all executed. Whoops. If it helps, things eventually got a little bit better. Not for you, obviously, but for the people who had the good sense to still be alive.

ARE YOU THE PROTAGONIST

Ho hum. You are not the protagonist. At best you are a secondary character, and at worst you are an expendable extra. Look, it's fine. It's like I said: not all of us get to be protagonists. Some of us have to be the guys playing music in the background while the Titanic goes down and all the important, Kate Winslet-type people get to run around having actual plotlines and spitting in Billy Zane's face. It's just what has to happen—otherwise, there's no story at all!

WOULD YOU SURVIVE A SHAKESPEARE PLAY

You would not survive a Shakespeare Play. Yikes. In the death realm better known as "every Shakespeare play ever written," you, unfortunately, would not make it out alive. I can't tell you how exactly you'd shuffle off this mortal coil—whether by your own hand, or due to a betrayal on the part of someone you loved, or because of some hilarious accident—but I can tell you that you simply don't have the vigor to survive a five-act structure.

[ricepips-blog]

The Game

(For @jhelenoftrek and anyone else who loves JC!) The air was warm and balmy on Janeway's skin as she approached the clearing, PADD in hand. She stopped to admire the view - this shore leave had been a long time coming, and like the rest of the crew, she was glad of some down time. She settled herself onto a naturally made rock chair and closed her eyes, allowing the warm air to soothe her frayed nerves and tired soul. Some quiet time, reading a book, gazing at a view that wasn't holographically made, was a luxury she had looked forward to all day. As she started to read, she inhaled deeply at the scent of the campfire wafting upwards from the camp the crew had created below. She sighed happily, it was times like this that you appreciated the small things in life. All the technology in the world couldn't compare to the smell of wood burning merrily. She could hear voices softly billowing upwards, and she tried not to listen in. The crew had no idea she was there and they'd feel uncomfortable talking freely if they knew she was listening. The sound of Tom Paris' voice was suddenly quite clear as the wind direction changed. He was obviously with B'Elanna and Harry - no doubt up to no good as usual. "Oh, come on, B'Elanna! Don't be a stick in the mud, it's just a game!" "A stupid game thought up by pigs like you!" B'Elanna's response was equally clear. "It's a bit of fun, come on! Harry, help me out here!" Tom whined. "I'm not sure, it does seem a bit...immature," Harry responded sounding hesitant. "Look, let's play it for a bit, then you can choose," Tom reasoned. "Oh, go on then if it'll shut you up!" B'Elanna huffed. There was the sound of glasses and bottles being opened and Janeway tried to get back into her book. "So, Harry, you first. Megan Delaney. Kes. B'Elanna." "What? That's not fair, you can't use people in the circle!" B'Elanna exclaimed. "Of course you can!" Tom laughed. "Go on, Harry!" "Erm...I'd snog Megan. Erm....marry B'Elanna and avoid Kes," Harry said after a while. The group below exploded into laughter and Janeway grinned to herself. Obviously playing an old Academy game. "Go on, Harry, set one for us!" encouraged Tom. "OK, B'Elanna, this is for you. Tom. The Doctor. Tuvok." Tom's explosive laughter followed, but B'Elanna's response was even louder. "You're a pig, Starfleet!" "Go on, B'Elanna!" "Kahless....I'd have to avoid Tuvok, I'd marry the Doctor and....snog Tom," B'Elanna answered, sounding like it was killing her. More laughter followed and Tom said something that made B'Elanna react because Tom yelped as if he had been hit. Janeway chuckled softly to herself and tried to focus on her page. "OK, Helmboy, here's one for you. Kes. Ensign Rowlins, Janeway." Janeway put her book down and sat upright at her name. She wondered if now was the time to make her presence known, but Tom was too quick. "Easy! Avoid Rowlins - not my type!, marry Kes, snog Janeway!" Janeway felt herself blush as if he'd just propositioned her. The laughter was raucous below. "It's the power thing! It's hot!" Tom was protesting as the others ribbed him. Janeway felt a laugh bubble up, but quickly quelled it. Suddenly, another voice joined in. "Is this a private party or can anyone join?" "Commander!" Harry's voice took on a higher octave. "Grab a beer and settle down, we have a game you might like!" Tom said and Janeway could almost hear the smirk in the younger man's voice. "Why do I get the feeling I should be worried?" Chakotay asked. "It's a bit of fun, come on, Chakotay. It's a nice night, we're on leave, nobody needs to be put on report!" Tom encouraged. Janeway put her book down. There was no way she could read now. B'Elanna was explaining the game, and to her surprise, Chakotay seemed happy to play. Harry was up next, Janeway could imagine his blush at his choices, but was also quite quick to chose. "I'm with Tom, it's a power thing," he explained his choice of marrying Janeway. She regretted not being able to see Chakotay's face, but he certainly made no verbal comment. She acknowledged to herself that this was doing wonders for her self-esteem, even if it was a bit weird hearing it. She'd thought of Harry as almost a surrogate child, clearly he was harbouring other ideas! Tom complained bitterly when he was put in a category with Chakotay, saying, "That's unfair! Look at him! How can I compete?" Chakotay's laughter floated upwards and he said, "Don't be defeatist, Tom. It's only a game!" The laughter and game continued and Janeway felt her ego growing each time one of her young crew members chose her in a positive way. She noted however, that Chakotay hadn't really taken part, until now. "Megan Delaney, Neelix, Janeway," he said and there was no doubt of the smile on his face. "What? Since when are we using the same sex in this?" B'Elanna exclaimed. "Not that I'm against that, but it's not my thing!" "Come on, it's just a game!" Tom reiterated. "It's not real!" "Too right! There's no way I'd really marry you!" B'Elanna spat. "Your words...they wound me, I know it's because you really actually love me!" Tom sighed and it was punctuated by a resounding smack. "Well, now my fist will wound you even more!" she snapped. "You have to answer!" Chakotay said and Janeway could hear the laughter in his voice. He had a wicked sense of humour when he was relaxed. "Is this a fantasy of yours old man?" B'Elanna demanded, causing the other two men to laugh heartily. "Just answer!" Chakotay answered. "Erm....well avoid Neelix. Obviously. Marry Megan and....snog Janeway" The men guffawed. "It's that damn power thing again!" B'Elanna protested. Janeway almost guffawed herself. She was by now floating on cloud nine. A few more rounds ensued where B'Elanna got her revenge, making Tom admit he'd snog Chakotay and marry Harry. It wasn't lost on Janeway that Chakotay hadn't been asked yet. Until now. "Right, come on Commander, your turn!" Tom crowed. "Let's think. Hmm, Kes. B'Elanna. Annnd, Janeway!" Janeway froze, her heart pounding and she strained her ears to hear his response. She was certain she had a good idea how he would answer that. And though she wasn't technically there, to hear it would be one of the greatest gifts she could receive. It would warm her for many nights to come. "Well.....I'd.....well, avoid Janeway....." Chakotay's voice was clear, if a little awkward. Up on the rock above, Janeway's world came crashing down. She couldn't have been more shocked if he'd punched her in the face. She reeled back and slumped into the hard rock behind her. She didn't hear the rest of his answer, but she heard the ensuing silence followed by uncertain laughter. The blood was pounding in her ears and she sat like this for what seemed an age. Finally, she pulled herself back and wondered why she was so bothered, but deep down she knew exactly why. Because she knew how she would answer if he was in her choices. Silently, she cursed her own ego and the constant need to have it stroked. "Pride comes before a fall..." wasn't that the saying? She was certainly in free fall now. All she had thought about him, about his feelings for her had obviously been an illusion. Stupid, vain woman! She couldn't take anymore. She gathered up her book and quietly slipped away back to the transporter site. Tonight, she would lick her wounds and tomorrow all would be the same. Only with the carefully hidden knowledge he didn't feel for her the way she had thought. As she approached her quarters, she felt dismay turn to anger. Damn him and his loosely veiled declarations! The following morning, Janeway gathered all her confidence and held her head high as she entered the bridge. Chakotay was sat in his usual spot, Tom at the helm and Harry at Ops. She summoned the feelings from last night, of how those two young men had made her feel. She sashayed towards Harry and spent time talking to him, appreciating the blush that spread up and over his face. She then moved onto Tom, resting her hand on his shoulder she laughed and joked with him before moving back towards her chair. Chakotay was looking at her with a bemused smile. "You seem happy today," he said, softly leaning towards her. She casually leaned back and offered him a knowing smile. "Did you enjoy your evening?" he asked. "I did. It was....enlightening," she answered. "What did you get up to?" he pressed. "Oh, I went up onto the rocks above the camp to read. It was....good for the soul," she replied enigmatically. "Oh?" "I heard the crew playing a game. It put a few things in perspective," she said staring him dead in the eye. It took a few moments, but he suddenly seemed to realise, he sat back in his seat. "Kathryn..." She leapt up from her seat, "You have the bridge, Commander," she said, louder than she had intended, drawing a look from Tom. She moved with as much grace as she could muster and headed towards her ready room. She slumped onto the sofa and rubbed at her head. She had only been there a minute or so before the door chimed. "Come," she called, already knowing who it would be. Chakotay stepped into the room and she noted he looked rather contrite. He stepped up to her seating area and stood at Parade rest. "You heard the game we were playing." It was a statement not a question. She forced a smile, "I did." He sighed, "Kathryn, let me.." "Explain? No need Commander. I have to admit to being a bit surprised...I guess I made the wrong assumption. After New Earth." "Kathryn....it wasn't what it sounded like." "Oh really? So what did it sound like then?" "Like I was...I don't know, blowing you off. I had no idea you were there." "Would that have changed your response? Actually, don't answer that, there's no reason to even be asking or discussing this." "There is reason. I want to explain. I want you to know." He was almost pleading now. Janeway didn't answer, but gave a brief nod. "It was just a game. It meant nothing. I meant nothing by my answers, except that I couldn't be truthful in front of them. Especially not Tom." Janeway had to concede that made an awful lot of sense. Despite them being on shore leave, he was still their commanding officer. Chakotay sat down next to her, hands clasped in his lap. "It wasn't the only reason..." "Oh?" "It might be just a game but.....when there's someone involved who you really feel something for, you feel the need to protect yourself and them," Chakotay's voice faltered as he spoke. "You were protecting me?" she asked, her voice barely a whisper. "In a way, yes, though I had no idea you were listening." he sighed softly, "Kathryn, those were not my honest answers.....the truth is that the moment your name came up, the game for me was lost and won. It might be a game, but my feelings are real. There could only ever be you. I'd have to avoid you because I couldn't ever choose between the other two options. I want them both." Her head snapped up, heart pounding, hardly daring to believe he had been so honest about his feelings. "I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings." His words were soft and honest. She dropped her gaze, "I don't know why it bothers me so much," she admitted with a sad shake of her head. "I think I know why. I hope I do anyway," he said softly, dipping his head to try and meet her eyes. She looked at her lap, a small tear spilling down her cheek, she gave a soft nod, a silent agreement. "Just know this Kathryn, any choice where your name is involved - it's a simple answer. You'd win every time." He reached for her hand, squeezed it and then quickly stood up. He strode towards the door before turning back to look at her. "Always," he said and then disappeared out onto the Bridge.

[enterprisetrampstamp]

best of the best

also on ao3

The turnover rate of Operations ensigns on the Enterprise is one of the highest in the fleet, for reasons both macabre and not. With her predilection for danger and position on the galactic frontier, the crew mourns a different security officer each day (or so it seems, sometimes); none begrudge the living who remain transfer away to less dangerous commissions, simply wish them on their way. The regular outflux of engineering officers is more bemusing (at least to everyone but the Enterprise’s Chief Engineer himself), but nonetheless--it exists.

Standing in the sickbay, running preliminary check-ups on a fresh group of red shirted officers, then, isn’t the rarest of circumstances; nor is Scotty’s uncanny ability to pick out the engineers from the crowd.

McCoy shoots him a glance, a smile tugging at the corner of his lips. “Naw, that one’s definitely security; see that musculature?”

Scotty whistles, quick and sharp, to pull the young woman’s attention away from the peers she’s chatting with while they patiently wait out the whirring of the nurses’ tricorders. She snaps to attention, probably fresh from the Academy, and out of the corner of his eye he sees McCoy hide a smile by glowering down at a tricorder he doesn’t even have turned on. “Engineering or security, ensign...?”

“Randers, sir, and engineering!” she declares cheerfully. “Looking forward to working with you, sir!”

“You, too, lassie,” Scotty says, waving her back to her friends, and clasps his hands behind his back with a smug grin as McCoy gives an exasperated huff.

“How?” he demands, giving a good-natured prod to Scotty’s ribs with one particularly pointy elbow.

“Can’t hardly give up me secrets, can I?” He jostles McCoy right back, until he nearly knocks into a tray of hyposprays and the indomitable Nurse Chapel shoots them both a side eye. He clears his throat, feeling himself flush slightly red at the unspoken admonishment, and leans slightly in to the doctor to confess, “Most of ‘em you can guess, too, eh? The security officers have a certain bearin’ me lads ‘n’ lasses don’t. For the rest of ‘em I just look for the ring--and it’s no’ fool proof, given how archaic the tradition is, but plenty of us engineers still indulge.”

McCoy’s gives him a sly look, hands clasping behind his back as he rocks forward on the balls of his feet. “The ring?” he asks, voice as neutral as he can get it.

Scotty isn’t fooled by the doc’s attempt to play coy in regards to his curiosity, but he’s given up 90% of the gold now; may as well follow through all the way. “Aye, the ring,” he says, pulling back the collar of his uniform shirt just enough to find the fine chain and tug it up and out--McCoy’s eyebrows shoot up, watching the little silver band spin until Scotty stills it.

“I dun wear it on duty, in case I end up elbows deep in a bit o’ machinery it could catch on and take me finger with it,” he explains. “Order the rest of the department t’do the same.”

“So those giant brains of y’all’s do understand safety precautions,” McCoy mutters, dry, and Scotty shoots him a glare.

“Aye, and we use appropriate eye wear ‘n’ heavy gloves, too; unfortunately things’re frequently explodin’ around us in the middle o’ a firefight.” He pauses, then begrudgingly admits, “Though the ensigns c’n get a bit lax on protocol if I take me eyes off ‘em for too long.”

“And you and your lieutenants think you’re above all that safety mumbo jumbo when you’ve done those things a thousand times!” McCoy waves a finger in his face. “I know how you lot think, Mr. Scott, and it keeps me up at night! Your department gets so many burns and bruises--” he breaks off, eyes narrowing, and his accusatory finger flicks the ring on its chain back into motion. “You’re distracting me.”

“I think you’re distractin’ yerself, Doc,” Scotty teases, “but I’ll forgive ya the accusation.” He winks, and McCoy rolls his eyes but waves him on. “It’s a centuries old tradition--started in civil, me thinks, but over time spread t’ most the disciplines. See, there was a bridge, ‘n’ the engineers on the project dinnit do their duty properly. Hard t’ say if it were negligence through carelessness or hubris, but the end result was th’ same either way.”

Scotty spins the ring himself this time, heaving a sigh. “People died. So other engineers who saw what happened made ‘emselves rings out o’ the same grade steel as that bridge ‘n’ wore ‘em on the li’l fingers o’ their dominant hands, so they remembered those lost lives every time they went t’ sign off on a project, ‘n’ they’d stop ‘n’ make sure they did their jobs right.”

He tucks the ring back under his shirt, smoothing it with one hand, and quirks a smile at McCoy. “You and your department dinnit think you were th’ only ones with the crew’s lives in their hands every day, eh?”

“How could I, with Jim up on the bridge, directing us through those firefights you were complaining about?” McCoy quips, but he squeezes Scotty’s shoulder as if to say I never thought about it quite that way before.

“I take me job awful serious,” Scotty offers, more quietly. “It’s why s’many transfer out; I expect the world of ‘em, ‘n’ they find out quick if they can’t cut it.”

“That why the ones who get promoted to lieutenant are always in demand from other ships, too?” the doctor asks, shrewdly, and Scotty beams.

“Aye, lad! We’re the best o’ the best on the Enterprise, and no one’d dare forget it.”

[prosperopedia]

The Mormon Church’s Financial Responsibility Should Be Emulated, Not Criticized

Recently there has been a lot of buzz about how much money the Mormon Church has in its possession after an accusation came out from former church members and twin brothers David and Lars Nielsen. David was a former employee of church-owned investment firm Ensign Peak Advisors. The claim from the Nielsens is that the church is essentially too wealthy, and that its members don’t understand that the church is not using their charitable contributions, namely tithing and fast offerings, for the right purposes.

That accusation is dead wrong for lots of reasons. A brilliant point by point rebuttal of the allegations was published in the Deseret News shortly after they were made.

The title of the Washington Post headline is immediately condemning: Mormon Church has misled members on $100 billion tax exempt investment fund.

That sentence is bold enough to make one assume that a judge and jury had investigated, a trial was held, and the church was found guilty as charged. As I’ve read comments online of people responding to that story and other versions of it, it’s clear that too many people believe the story the Nielsens are using for their own publicity and potential financial gain.

As a lifelong member of the Mormon Church (it’s actually The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but we’ve been called Mormons for a long time, and we’re sometimes referred to as Latter-day Saints or LDS), I feel a responsibility to weigh in on this debate about whether the church has too much money and whether it’s using the money we contribute to the church through tithes and other offerings for worthy and appropriate purposes.

Let me just say that I think I represent by far the popular opinion of tithe-paying members of the LDS Church in saying that I’m confident that the church uses the funds for what they’re supposed to be used for. Let me also say that you will not find a group of men with more integrity than you will in the LDS Church’s governing body, including our prophet and president, Russell M. Nelson, along with others who serve alongside him in determining the spiritual and financial direction of the church.

Understanding the potential damage to the church and its mission from insidious and purposely deceptive misinformation spread as widely and quickly as the Washington Post is able to broadcast because of its extensive reach, those men who lead the Mormon Church promptly responded to the accusations. This is what they said.

We take seriously the responsibility to care for the tithes and donations received from members. The vast majority of these funds are used immediately to meet the needs of the growing Church including more meetinghouses, temples, education, humanitarian work and missionary efforts throughout the world. Over many years, a portion is methodically safeguarded through wise financial management and the building of a prudent reserve for the future. This is a sound doctrinal and financial principle taught by the Savior in the Parable of the Talents and lived by the Church and its members. All Church funds exist for no other reason than to support the Church’s divinely appointed mission.

Claims being currently circulated are based on a narrow perspective and limited information. The Church complies with all applicable law governing our donations, investments, taxes, and reserves. We continue to welcome the opportunity to work with officials to address questions they may have.

I absolutely believe their response to be genuine and accurate. Not necessarily because I’ve seen the church’s accounting books and had a chance to review how each dollar is used. But because I’ve had a lifetime of opportunity of being involved in the church and its efforts to spread the gospel, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, help people get on their feet and become self-reliant, and generally follow the Savior’s example and admonition to lift people. In fact, I’ve been bold enough to assert in the past to many people, and I’ll say it here now: without the efforts and influence of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, this world would be a much different place in a way that it would never want to experience. The positive influence of the 15 million member organization is felt in ways that few give it credit for, including David and Lars Nielsen.

My Own Experience

Over the years that I’ve been a member of the LDS Church, I have paid hundreds of thousands 0f dollars in tithing and other offerings to the church. I’ve never once felt misled about what’s being done with my contributions.

I’m satisfied in knowing that I can take my family to worship in a simple but comfortably reverent building on Sundays, that there is air conditioning in the summer and heat in the winter. I’m grateful that there is an organ, a piano, and hymnbooks to use for worshiping through music. I’m grateful for classrooms, chairs, and “cultural halls” (places to play basketball and socialize). I’m thanking for temples where advanced instruction and meaningful revelation is received.

With that being said, I certainly understand that not every dollar contributed is used in the most perfect of ways. In a church full of imperfect people, admittedly including those who are the highest leaders in the church, there is bound to be some waste. In fact, I worked for the church’s IT department for two and a half years, from 2009 to 2011. I saw waste among employees in my department and others we worked with, including having people fill positions that they weren’t qualified for, and many who were there to watch the clock and not contribute much, ultimately being content to just not get fired until they ultimately earned a pension. Those people are paid with tithing money, and in many cases it did seem like they weren’t producing as much as they were consuming. That situation was unfortunate, but it’s also simply an unavoidable part of human life. The overall goal and intention to use tithing money to support and bless the church was always there.

Compared to any other large organization, I haven’t encountered anything that rivals the efficiency of the LDS Church when it comes to helping people with whatever it is they need.

In the 40+ years I’ve been a member of the church, I’ve also contributed somewhere close to 10,000 hours serving in volunteer positions and on as-needed projects.

If you’ve ever been anywhere near a natural disaster, you’ve probably heard of “Mormon Helping Hands,” the people with the yellow shirts who show up as volunteers to clean up after earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, and other emergencies.

I had the chance to participate in one such activity (a comparatively small-scale one) with my daughter and my brother recently. At our own expense, we traveled two hours away to Linden, Tennessee to spend the day with hundreds of other local church members clearing damage done to people’s homes (most of them not members of our church) from a storm that spawned tornadoes. The financial value of the work that we contributed to this community on a Saturday where more than 300 people came together along with chainsaws, rakes, shovels, and manual labor to clean up an entire community had to be in the range of tens of thousands of dollars. But we provided it all for free. And we were grateful to serve without payment.

But where did that value originate? What is it that creates a situation where hundreds of people are motivated to set aside their Saturday plans, spend their own money and time, and go help a community of strangers?

The deep commitment to volunteering, contributing more than you take, helping those who are less fortunate, and all of the above come from the church and its members and the divine interaction of faith consistently working to finance the development of more faith.

The evidence is clear that members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are some of the most (if not the most) giving people on the planet. The latest survey from Serve.gov estimated that Utahns (where the church is headquartered and where the majority of the population observes the faith) volunteer the most out of any state in the US and have held that spot for thirteen straight years. Serve.gov’s 2018 study estimated that $3.2 billion worth of value was given by Utah volunteers in that year.

On the money side, the top 3 metro areas in the country as named in a SmartAsset.com survey are all in Utah: Provo-Orem, Ogden-Clearfield, and Salt Lake City.

Why the Nielsen Brothers Got it Wrong

One thing that is clear from watching the videos and reading the accusation David and Lars Nielsens’ attack on the church from which they’ve become disillusioned is that the Nielsens either never did understand (or they have chosen to forgotten) the purpose of tithing. Lars’ public accusations especially take a faithless approach to a principle of faith, an error that itself disqualifies his entire argument. He asked, “Would you pay tithing instead of water, electricity, or feeding your family if you knew that it would sit around by the billions until the Second Coming of Christ?” For faithful Latter-day Saints, even if that characterization (our money “sit[ing] around by the billions”) was accurate, we’d still say “absolutely”. Why, because we’ve seen how faith creates miracles in our lives. We don’t go without water, electricity, or food. God provides for us because we live by a principle that was revealed to the ancient faithful (see Malachi 3:8-11, where the Lord promises to open the windows of heaven and pour out a blessing upon those who bring “tithes into the storehouse”) as well as again to those who we faithful Latter-day Saints consider to be modern-day prophets.

Emulating the LDS Church

In a society that is heavily burdened by debt, it is ironic that people would complain that the church is too wealthy, essentially that it has been too responsible, too successful in teaching its members to sacrifice and give, that it’s not wasting enough money on things that are of no worth, which is what we’ve come to expect of government and other non-profits.

According to most economists, the next financial crisis will be made much more severe (possibly worse than 2008) because of the enormous debt load being carried by individuals, households, and sovereign governments throughout the world. It’s just a matter of time before contemporary society’s addiction to spending more than it makes will create a potentially desperate situation.

For me, I’d much rather see at least $100 billion in the possession of worthy men and women who have shown that their fruits (through their membership and through their own examples) are ones of giving, carefulness, and thoughtful stewardship of resources than in the hands of the IRS to pass on to organizations that have been found guilty repeatedly of misuse.

It is not unrealistic, maybe even probable, to anticipate that a situation similar to what is recorded in Genesis to have happened in Egypt, a famine for which Joseph and the Egyptian Pharoah were prepared because of stockpiling, could happen once again, this time affecting millions of people throughout the world.

I trust that the leaders of the LDS Church to be ready for such a time as that.

The post The Mormon Church’s Financial Responsibility Should Be Emulated, Not Criticized appeared first on The Handbook for Happiness, and Success, and Prosperity Prosperopedia.

from WordPress https://ift.tt/2QHMKAy via IFTTT

[zandra53g77799-blog]

Property Student Excellence.

When it involves imagination and also spontaneity many of our team believe that they come naturally. There are lots of practical techniques to change the method you react to the thoughts you have, off regular acceptances to a lot more comprehensive workouts that examine and deconstruct the limiting beliefs you store about your own self. They call for basically various methods given that creative writing and also expository writing have generally different purposes and attitudes. These approaches require the mergance from a wide range of ideas to spark off brand-new ideas as well as procedures. In my sessions and helped with conceptualizing treatments, we use several thinking tools like ONE HUNDRED MPH Presuming cents â, Intergalactic Presuming cents â as well as 180 ¡ Æ Assuming cents â to motivate the energetic thoughts and to lead our team to new, possibly much better options. If you loved this article so you would like to collect more info relating to yellow pages online phone book (embrace-gr8nessnfun.info) generously visit our web-page. Each one of these are actually examples from reframes, due to the fact that the crucial attributes from the occasion, item or even individual didn't modify-- merely your perception from them. On the other hand: a lot of our daily obstacles are actually much better handled along with the typical, vertical reasoning method. As you build up your shows understanding, you might utilize your pc gaming knowledge to make new enjoyable ready individuals. That is the situation, once it is actually one-of-a-kind or even amazing complex that requires the imaginative method. Artistic folks certainly not just do better in their work, however have even more fulfilling individual lifestyles as well, due to the fact that they can resolve complications much more effectively, as well as discovering means to commonly make life extra fascinating as well as enjoyable. The investigation on this one is still small, but one research revealed that for college students, those which took a trip abroad scored higher on creativity examinations than those which stayed at their primary university. If you want to promote creativity, instructor should reformalize the concept behind pedagogical directive. You've listened to the phrase work hard and also play hard." All you need to understand is actually that they're the same trait to a creative thinker. They use the technology and also techniques readily available to make better appearing components in the least amount of time. The majority of pupils blunder their means with and also cultivate these skill-sets and abilities on their own. While that is trivially precise, certainly not everybody is actually as innovative as the following individual as well as some are rarely artistic whatsoever. This greatly happens within the creative realm from the mind but could commonly be actually caused by external variables. Oftentimes the environment where you reside or even function blocks your creative thinking. Creativity entails pupils in discovering how to produce and use originalities in certain contexts, seeing existing scenarios in a new way, determining alternate explanations, and seeing or making brand new links that create a positive outcome. An analyst that showed our team a great deal concerning our thinking processes, Eduard DeBono, tagged this process as 'Vertical Thinking': the flow of thoughts moves like an arrowhead that continues its activity up until the intended is actually struck. It is actually unquestionably obvious therefore, that to keep above the floodings and secure persuade in his/her field, everyone must, in these opportunities, should automatically get capabilities in self-expression. In a try to locate a solution to this inquiry I turned to among the pioneers of reasoning, Edward de Bono, and found that his influential work on the 6 Presuming Hats ® administers wonderfully to the art and craft from creating. The road to damaging thought is actually quick and easy to have and also that usually shuts the door to imagination reasoning. Consequently, organizations must first offer a lifestyle (promoted through best administration as well as the panel from supervisors) that supports as well as compensates key presuming rather than reprimanding or preventing the mindsets as well as actions detailed at the starting point of this particular part. The secret in ordering to get a wonderful gift for your little one's teacher is actually to certainly not wait till the eleventh hour to begin considering that! People who seem to be to be extra artistic have actually just spent additional time and energy understanding as well as practicing to become more innovative. There is actually an outdated stating, If you could not express your suggestion in three sentences - you do not possess a suggestion!" Among one of the most vital innovation abilities is actually the ability to present a very clear and also really short description from an originality (2 to 3 paragraphes - like shouting through the closing door of an escalator) and making a quick discussion (two to three mins - what is actually named an escalator sound"). Some innovative tips are actually impressive and also dazzling, while others are actually simply basic, excellent, functional concepts that nobody seems to have thought of yet. Unlike solving an analytic concern, innovative understandings originate from allowing our thoughts stray along tangents and also right into apparently irrelevant locations. With a little bit of imagination and also imagination, you will absolutely locate a lot more typical home products that you could utilize for prudent scrapbooking suggestions. Often this is called purposeful reasoning which is significantly a sub-category of essential thinking. With all the beneficial comments concerning using imaginative electronic media, much more firms, tiny as well as large equally, are actually beginning to produce our team from this. With that in thoughts, this is virtually vital that business begin thinking about that prior to that ends up being far too late. In this particular streamer venture I needed to change or stating this much better improve the interpretation sentence after the seek visual information (graphics & and also photographes) for the ensign. One has to create the environment that assists creative thinking initially, to make sure that workers could transfer to a greater degree of developing brand new product or services. Our team today move toward show business of my solution where it is achievable to know why your supervisor desires to find even more of the innovative, association of ideas. Free Brainstorming Qualifying from Infinite Innovations Ltd - Discover innovative as well as essential strategies for conceptualizing. This will certainly interest observe if such technique activities can nurture imaginative and key thinking likewise that teambuilding games were actually anticipated to improve crew job. Like very imaginative settings at Facebook as well as Google, the a lot more motivational the group property events reside in your work environment, the much easier that is actually to damage the creativity block as well as uncover originalities. A particular kept in mind concerning imaginative individuals that deserves pointing out is determination. Before reviewing this distinction, having said that, that is essential to keep in mind that innovation is actually a brainpower anyone is capable of, not just the artists one of our team. When most of our team think of imaginative individuals, our team typically reveal a special ability like the capability to draw, painting, sculpt, compose, participate in music, vocalize, dance, etc This asymmetry and hindsight accessibility triggers a quite serious problem: every useful, creative concept will definitely regularly be rational in knowledge. However, once they do, after that the crew that has been actually stuck in the limits from that sector needs to have that off certainly there, and also a creative thinker coming from outside the sector needs to relax and note, but get involved to a lower level. For a lot of students in the basic education populace today, the emphasis from learning gones on their ability to use as well as assume problem fixing skill-sets.

[writesandramblings]

The Captain’s Secret - p.16

“Stay on Target”

Full Chapter List Part 1 - Objects in Motion << 15 - Threat Assessment 17 - As You Like It >>

Two arrows flew through the air in quick succession, and across the room, one of them hit dead center on the target. The other at least hit the target.

The first arrow belonged to Morita, shooting a polyalloy pulley/cam compound bow. The second was Lorca, with a traditional Japanese bow. "You didn't miss," said Morita amiably, offering Lorca his bow back.

"It has good balance," said Lorca, admiring the layered wood and bamboo a moment before making the trade. "Still can't believe you brought that on-board." They were in the largest cargo bay on the ship, rows of supplies pushed aside to provide the longest possible shooting corridor.

"It's only a hankyu. Half-size." She shot off an arrow with the bow and it struck next to the arrow from her compound shot. "A yumi is much larger. And it was a wedding present."

"You make that look so easy."

Morita almost smiled. "Years of practice, sir. My father insisted." As a child, she had resented all the archery practice forced upon her by her father's enthusiasm for cultural history, much preferring phaser weapons, but there was something to be said for the usefulness of knowing traditional ways.

When Lorca had outlined the details of his plan, he had originally called for a sniper rifle, as large as they could locate. Morita had countered, "Why not a bow?" And when she showed Lorca the size of the bow she had in mind, he'd agreed wholeheartedly, with the caveat that he hadn't shot a bow in years. Thus, the cargo bay refresher course.

Returning to the compound bow, Lorca's next shot was very close to dead center. "Think they'll buy it?"

"That we're rich, eccentric hunters with a passion for archery?" asked Morita. "I'm sure they'll agree we're eccentric."

Lorca held himself back from laughing. Everything on the ship was somber and tense now. He needed this plan to work more than ever to restore confidence and remind the crew firsthand the importance of their mission in space.

He lowered his bow and looked at Morita. "How are you holding up?"

She loosed another area. It went a tiny bit wide of center. "Fine, sir."

"Off the record?"

Morita looked over at him, feeling mildly annoyed. She didn't like the idea that her captain doubted her ability to keep it together when she had given him no cause for such concern. "Walter's loss is a blow, but... that's space. We all understand the dangers we signed up for. I miss him, but I'm here to do a job, and I intend to do it. To honor his memory." The last words were directly lifted from the short memorial address Lorca had given the crew that morning.

"If it were possible, I'd sub you out for this next part, but..."

"Is there another expert archer onboard?" said Morita, sharper than she usually addressed him. "Or maybe Captain Georgiou is good with a bow. I hear a lot of aliens can't tell us apart. Off the record."

Lorca pursed his lips and then his eyebrows jerked up momentarily in acceptance. "All right, I deserved that. You're too much a part of this for me to replace you, Reiko. I apologize."

Morita nodded her head in approval of the sentiment, nocked another arrow, and let it fly. It landed dead center on Lorca's target. "Thank you, captain."

They headed to retrieve their arrows for another round. "You should probably get in the habit of calling me Gabriel for the next few days."

"You're probably right... Gabriel." It was hard for Morita to say it. "Actually, Da Hee suggested I invite you to dinner tomorrow night. She can give you some pointers on being my wife." They both heard it at the same time. "Husband," Morita corrected herself breathily, almost amused at the slipup.

Lorca suspected Morita was probably the more decisive of the two in the relationship, and wondered if that same dynamic was going to play out between himself and Morita over the next few days as they faked it for the hunt. The idea didn’t particularly bother him. "Tell Daisy I accept."

"I hope you like Korean food."

"I guess we'll find out."

They retook their positions. Lorca took a breath and gently exhaled, loosing his arrow as he did. It hit dead center.

Preparations for the final phase of the operation continued, but otherwise all was quiet. It wasn't just the ship-wide malaise at the knowledge one of their own had fallen. It also felt like the calm before the storm. There was a tenseness in the air, an expectation of something still to come.

At least grief was starting to loosen its stranglehold on the crew's state of mind. There was too much to do on the ship to wallow. The grieving could be sorted into three groups: the first, and largest group, knew Chen only in passing. The sum effect of his death on them was that they were propelled into a state of ready mindfulness, reminded of their own mortality and the dangers of deep space, which would continue for about a week before subsiding back to the previous level of tension they had felt about their lives in deep space prior to the incident. They would be more cautious, and then resume living as they had.

The second group consisted of people who were taking this loss as a chance to project their own self-importance and insecurity onto the situation. They were the most outwardly affected, but almost to a fault, none of them had known Chen very well or suffered anything by his loss other than a glimpse of their own mortality. Their response to his passing was to make it somehow about themselves by pretending they had known Chen—even known him well enough to count him as a friend—and they wanted to make sure those around them knew how much Chen had meant to them and how very sad they were about his passing.

The third group were those select few who actually had known Chen, worked alongside him, and considered him a friend long before he had drawn his final breath. They were the quietest group, because what they felt was an empty gaping hole where Chen had been that would follow them for several months to come, and which they did not as a general rule want to give voice to, lest the hole's presence overwhelm them. While the members of the second group loudly worried about what Chen's death meant to them personally, the third group stood to the side and thought to themselves, "But you didn't even know him. You barely spoke a word to him at any point. This grief shouldn't be yours."

Lorca, of course, belonged to a fourth class of people: the non-grieving. There was nothing he could do about Chen's death at this point. He'd done his bit memorializing Chen and communicating Starfleet's regrets to Chen's family, and now he had other things to worry about, like the transponder.

Arzo had set up the transponder project in engineering where he could easily fall back upon the engineering crew's expertise to make the necessary modifications. When Lorca arrived to inspect their progress, he found them well ahead of schedule and on track to finish the transponder a day early. He listened intently as Arzo outlined the revisions they had made and what would be necessary to operate the device upon reaching Luluan, but his eyes wandered to the middle of the engine room. Billingsley was checking the warp coil field alignment, her magboots clicking faintly along the walkway as she made a good show of performing an entirely superfluous inspection in his eyeline.

To the casual observer, she seemed to be pointedly ignoring Lorca, but she lingered just a little too long at certain spots, shifting her weight and chewing on her finger as she pondered her field modulator for no good reason. Lorca had little trouble remembering what she looked like under the uniform or recalling her affection for biting, which seemed to be the point.

"Good work, Arzo," said Lorca as Arzo finished his project summation. "Chief!"

Billingsley pretended not to know she was being called for, looking around in blatantly feigned confusion before letting her gaze settle onto the captain. "Sir?"

"Would you mind checking the viewscreen in my ready room? I think Russo left something out of alignment."

"Certainly, captain," she said coolly, but with an intense smolder in her half-hooded eyes, and turned back to the warp coil.

Oh, she was good. "Now?" he said pointedly.

Billingsley passed off the field modulator to an ensign who probably should have been running the check in the first place and followed Lorca out.

"Turbolift?"

"Sure."

But when the turbolift arrived, it wasn't empty. Ensign Kerrigan was standing inside. "Bridge?" he said helpfully, looking at the two of them.

"If that's all, I'll get back to engineering, sir," said Billingsley immediately, turning on her heel.

"Thanks, chief," Lorca called after her bitterly. He stepped into the turbolift with a deeply annoyed sigh which Kerrigan mistook as the usual flagrant animosity between the captain and chief engineer. The turbolift hummed to life. "How're things with Lalana?"

Kerrigan seemed almost to startle at the question. "Oh, fine."

"Just 'fine?'" said Lorca, intending it as a joke. Kerrigan seemed almost to shrink in response. Lorca immediately sussed out that he'd stumbled onto something that, while hardly the action he'd been looking for in the turbolift, was at least of interest. "Ensign?"

Kerrigan realized that his lackluster response had been horribly insufficient and blurted out, "It's great, sir! Everything's great!"

"Computer, halt turbolift."

Kerrigan's face fell. He had over-corrected and made it even worse. He stared at Lorca in abject terror, failing to form anything more than a nervous "ah" sound.

After a moment in which it became clear Kerrigan was not going to produce an explanation on his own, Lorca asked, "Is the problem Larsson?" That morning, Lorca had approved a second interspecies project with their lului guest from a most unexpected source: Lieutenant Einar Larsson, a member of Lalana's security detail. The Swede's proposal had been extremely blunt. I will ask the lului questions about the history of her planet and record what she says without any of the waste of time interpretation bullshit historians do. Also I am the best person to do this because Lalana already knows me and if you ask her she will pick me to do it. The proposal had even read like Larsson spoke: a monotonous run-on sentence. When questioned, the Swede had admitted to a personal passion for history – minus the "interpretation bullshit" – and Lorca had been sufficiently impressed by Larsson's straightforwardness and confidence to let him go forward with the project despite it being well outside the man's professional wheelhouse. (While some ships had a historical officer posted onboard, the Triton did not.) As a bonus, since Larsson was already assigned to watch Lalana, his project wouldn't entail the redistribution of any more personnel resources than were already being used, and as a final bonus, on some level, Lorca thought Larsson's historical survey was going to be unintentionally hilarious, as the man's proposal had been. Let Starfleet make of that what they would.

Kerrigan looked genuinely surprised to hear the name. "Larsson? No, sir."

So not Larsson, but the poor ensign's responses were practically screaming something was amiss. "So there is a problem."

Kerrigan shook his head frantically. "No, sir. No."

Lorca, already an imposing figure beside the scrawny ensign, drew himself up and crossed his arms. "Ensign, spit it out." There was no mistaking his tone. It would be unwise for Kerrigan to make the captain ask again.

Still, Kerrigan hesitated a moment. His options seemed to consist of being stranded in the turbolift forever with an irate captain or coming clean. He wasn't sure which was worse, but the first prospect clearly presented more immediate peril. "It's... it's not a problem, per se, captain. It's just, she doesn't like me very much. But it hasn't affected the work any, I promise. The next time Starfleet encounters a lului, we will be able to communicate fully." On that point, at least, Kerrigan sounded very confident.

Which was all well and good, but Lorca was more interested in the first part of Kerrigan's statement. "Lalana said she doesn't like you? She likes everyone." Though she had expressed a dislike for crowds, Lorca had never heard Lalana express anything less than ardent enthusiasm for any individual she had met, even ones she shouldn't like, like Peter Bhandary, Margeh, and T'rond'n. She hadn't even seemed particularly put off by Beldehen Venel, a man who was organizing the slaughter of her people for profit.

"She didn't... say it," clarified Kerrigan.

Kerrigan had spent more time with Lalana than anyone else on the ship, and might have gleaned some behavioral cue Lorca had missed. "Then how do you know?"

"Uh..." Kerrigan seemed entirely lost.

"Does she... knock her hands?" Lorca knocked his finger joints together twice in perfect imitation of the way Lalana indicated distress. "Twitch? Vibrate? Change colors?" Kerrigan's head shook back and forth. "Help me out here, Mr. Kerrigan."

Kerrigan pondered a moment. "It's more... what she doesn't do, captain."

"The hand spin?" asked Lorca, thinking he had it, and then realized Lalana didn't always rotate her hands when they were talking, so that couldn't be it, unless she secretly disliked everyone on the entire ship.

"Partly?" said Kerrigan, voice cracking. "It's more like she doesn't look at me. And... and she walks around a lot."

Lorca let that sit in the air a moment. "She walks around the room?"

"Yes, sir."

Lorca gave up. "Computer, resume turbolift." Kerrigan visibly relaxed as the turbolift started to move again. And then Lorca went, "Computer, halt." Kerrigan wanted to die. "I don't think she hates you, ensign. I get the impression, to her, the universe is all sunshine, rainbows, and unicorns. My guess is she hates being stuck in quarters all day. Maybe move your language survey to the gym?"

"The gym? Sure." Kerrigan didn't sound very confident.

Lorca cleared his throat and fixed Kerrigan with a mildly disapproving look.

"I mean, yes, captain!"

Confident he'd solved the issue, Lorca ordered the turbolift to resume once more. It moved all of six inches and the doors opened onto the bridge.

As Lorca relieved Benford and Kerrigan relieved Russo, the young ensign thought to himself, Sunshine, rainbows, and unicorns? Really? He couldn't think of what words might actually be used to describe his impressions of Lalana, but he was certain it wasn't those.

Lorca was pacing when the comms beeped. "Incoming transmission from the Shenzhou," reported Kerrigan. "Personal for you, sir."

"I'll take it in the ready room," said Lorca automatically, wondering what it signified.

Quite a lot, it turned out. After the brief exchange of pleasantries, Captain Georgiou went right to the point and informed him of Starfleet Command's request for her thoughts on the Triton and its captain. "I only thought it right to inform you, Gabriel, and let you know what I said in the report." She was, as always, measured, calm, and magnanimous. Every bit the legendary captain.

"Thank you, Philippa," said Lorca calmly. It was the first time he'd ever addressed her so familiarly, but inwardly his thoughts were roiling. "I appreciate it."

Georgiou's smile seemed somehow grim in light of the seriousness of their conversation, but it softened slightly. "And perhaps one day I will get to meet your alien. Lt. Saru was very impressed with her."

The phrasing jumped out at Lorca. He sniffed in dismissive amusement. "Oh, she's not my alien," he said casually, as if he hadn't a care in the world. "She just happens to be on my ship."

Georgiou's smile gave way to a small laugh. "Well said, captain. Good luck on your mission." The transmission terminated on the other end.

Luck has nothing to do with it, Lorca thought, jaw tightening in anger. He grabbed the foam ball on his desk and threw it against the wall. It bounced off, harmless and totally unsatisfying. Damn that Walter Chen.

Every remaining step of this mission was going to need to go off without a hitch, or else.

Part 17

[shonamargaret9-blog]

Devices To Advertise Artistic Thinking Amongst Your Employees.

Our function as managers is actually to ensure our staff achieves the highest degree from effectiveness. The very first step right here will be actually visual images, a substantial as well as considerable element from imagination; that is trying to in fact form an image or even goal in your mind of all your thought and feelings and also tips. For example, along with a brand-new issue, the pattern might be: white colored (to get information); green (for proposals and also ideas); yellow adhered to through black on each alternative (to assess the alternatives); reddish (to evaluate feelings at this point); adhered to through blue (to choose exactly what thinking to carry out upcoming). You only need an internet connection as well as your pc; put your keying abilities into make use of, make that a resource for additional profit. This is definitely not a cake walk given that you are actually not useded to figuring from package however creating these abilities is actually rather an engaging procedure. We offer an extensive program from workshops, workshops, layout thinking problems as well as ingenious jobs, targeted at encouraging competent, resourceful individuals which know their value in cultural, economic and also social terms. That is suggested that she initially possesses a clear definition of this term if one wants to urge innovation. In fact, our experts are actually all creative each day since our company are continuously changing the ideas which our experts store about the world concerning our team. Creativity does certainly not have to be about creating one thing new to the globe, this is more to perform with creating something brand new to ourselves. Remember, no matter where your communication abilities currently are, you can easily regularly be actually better. If a homeowner is actually thinking of marketing in the following pair of to 5 years they should communicate assess the thinking for the following house improvements as they perform not include any type of market value to the equity of the home. It is definitely fascinating to understand about outstanding unusual animal truths that could really leave you presuming as to the amount of you understand about your family pets or other pets apart from the presumptions that we believe hold true. Right here are 5 pointers and/or strategies you could make use of to protect, sharpen and promote the ingenuity and technology that exists within you. I really thought muteness could turn out to be the most effective sound for creative thinking, yet it appears that background sound amounts are just right Unlike loud popular music or silence, background noise degrees have confirmed to become best for strengthening creative thinking. Suspending opinion and also criticism to offer duct to concepts and concepts is the crucial from lateral thinking. This needs to additionally be the scenario for the remainder of our team if this is actually the situation for pupils. Therefore I have discussed 100 visionary thinking duties, much like those I have actually specified my craft and also medical students, in a brand-new book' Tips Are Your Only Unit of currency' The real currency from our time isn't amount of money. Make use of the Design Your Solution component of this site to analyze how you might utilize our Capability Building ® Device to support the building from a fresh thinking capability in your advertising and marketing organisation, then download a customised PowerPoint presentation that you may use as a thought-starter along with your group. Another innovative person may view in the very same gear box the required gears for a multi-speed very hot pedestrian for his steed. If you want to begin working at home, and you have some fantastic typing skills and also making information for websites; then an inputting work may be the project you are searching for. Although both the rational as well as the artistic parts from your thoughts are necessary, your mind could not do each tasks properly at the same time. Your creative procedure is going to be actually especially complicated because not many people recognize this. This just suggests you are actually various, certainly not incorrect. You'll know methods will present you ways to view the solutions you have actually been blind to, as well as leave the training course teeming with non-traditional knowledge and equipped along with practical imagination strategies that will certainly help you to eliminate the challenges you've had problem with. What the black hat depicts is actually important thinking, judgment- negative attitude or even considering all the things that may make a mistake. The goal from these tasks have to thus be to build students creative capabilities till they can easily become 'independent as well as creative issue solvers who can presume as well as intervene artistically' and, 'produce imaginative end results. that are actually authentic as well as of value'. I strongly believe depression is primarily efficient in the way our experts believe to come to be active or imaginative, and also avoiding our packages (illusive packages). Likewise, the area of imaginative creating is actually bigger in comparison to any person therefore it is impossible to coat a perfect picture, as what you see as best might be to an additional male, dreadful. Making use of imaginative electronic media, in the beginning, could seem pricey yet that does not take long for advertisers to understand that this's really cheap in the end and the advantages that this brings are actually quickly obvious. Being innovative is a splendid trait, but certainly not all ideas are actually equal or be entitled to financial investment, and it is necessary to know the reasoning responsible for choices. Gradually through presuming outside package, so to speak, lots of impressive solutions have actually been actually made that in advance were actually believed to be inconceivable. Ahead up along with definitely brand-new and different suggestions, our team need to get even more theoretical in our thinking. To find more information on yellow pages uk reverse lookup [dieta-zdrowa-teraz.pl] stop by the web site. Recognizing all the critical causes and collapses from an aged concern is very important yet what is more crucial is producing brand-new innovative remedies for the outdated problem. Although innovation is an intrinsic trait, our team rarely exploit this natural capability in our company. We may boost our innovative skill-sets by making using of 'set thinking' approaches such as Feature Directory, Morphological Evaluation as well as Reframing Source, to locate brand-new solutions. Exclusively, associations should evaluate their constructs and bodies that could act as obstacles filling in the method of calculated thinking. It is actually popular that our experts are actually extremely innovative when our company are children, yet only a few folks take care of to stay innovative when they maturate. With all the favorable reviews about using imaginative digital media, an increasing number of providers, small and major alike, are beginning to produce our company of this. Keeping that in mind, that is actually nearly important that firms start dealing with that prior to this comes to be late. In this particular ensign venture I must change or claiming this a lot better raise the definition sentence after the seek graphic information (images & and pictures) for the streamer. Kids do not require all the greatest playthings and also many high tech computer game to possess a really good time-take every thing off of them and also they will certainly find something to play with. Typically I wind up along with some beautiful strange and ridiculous stuff I will never discuss, however I consistently experience an improvement from creative energy after that. Detailed up structure is just like important as thinking in several imaginative paths horizontally. Deal with: A publisher with increasing creation expenses as well as an overstocking from publications developed a program to eliminate schoolbooks by selling the material straight to educational institutions. In addition, acquire totally free documents on ingenuity at his web site Innovation Overdrive visit this site as well as install a HALF AN HOUR audio MP3 for relaxation and boosting your creativity. Weisberg & Alba 93 checked out complication addressing by having participants complete the 9-dot concern (find Assuming outside package #Nine dots problem) - where the attendees are actually asked to attach all 9 dots in the 3 lines from 3 dots making use of 4 straight series or much less, without lifting their marker or mapping the exact same line two times.

[esprit-de-corps-magazine]

ON TARGET: Let Edward Cornwallis Be Remembered For Who He Really Was

By Scott Taylor

There has been a lot of controversy recently in Halifax over the statue of Edward Cornwallis, that city’s founder.

On Canada Day, a crowd of Mi’kmaq and their supporters gathered at the base of the statue to decry Cornwallis as a perpetrator of genocide against Indigenous Peoples. In their opinion, Cornwallis symbolizes a ruthless chapter in Canada’s colonization.

Challenging the First Nations demonstrators was a group of five Proud Boys waving the alt-rights adopted symbol of Canada’s old Red Ensign national flag. Embarrassingly, the gaggle of Proud Boys turned out to be members of the Canadian Armed Forces. All five were immediately suspended with pay, and Rear-Admiral John Newton hastily offered a full apology for their actions.

Following up on this incident, on July 15 another crowd gathered in Cornwallis Park with the stated objective of tearing down this alleged tribute to genocide. But cooler heads prevailed and, in the end, the compromise solution was to cover the image of Lord Cornwallis with a tarp. Halifax Mayor Mike Savage was on hand at this second demonstration and he acknowledged that removal of this polemic statue may yet be the final solution.

One could argue that, on the plus side, at least it has generated interest in what was heretofore just another bronze image of a British historical figure in a Canadian public space.

Edward Cornwallis was born into nobility in 1713, and at the age of 18 he purchased a commission in the British Army. His one claim to fame during the War of the Austrian Succession came at the Battle of Fontenoy in 1745, when he stepped up to take command of his battalion. The public mocked him for his subsequent retreat with the appalling loss of 8 officers and 385 of his men.

Cornwallis also fought at the Battle of Culloden in 1746, wherein the English army shattered the Jacobite Highland clans. While he played only a bit part in the battle, in the aftermath of the Scots’ defeat, Cornwallis led a punitive force into the Highlands.

It was here that Cornwallis committed his first atrocities. His orders were to bring back no prisoners, and his elite unit used mass murder and rape to pacify the rebellious Highlanders into submission.

Pleased with his actions, British parliament dispatched Lord Cornwallis to North America in 1749 for the purpose of establishing a colony that could compete with the French foothold of Louisbourg on Cape Breton. The site that Cornwallis chose was Halifax, perfect for its deep harbour and easily defended approaches.

One problem with this location was that it violated a former treaty with the Wabanaki Confederacy of First Nations, which included the Mi’kmaq tribes. The Wabanaki allied themselves with France, and the Acadians and Mi’kmaq did kill British settlers. In retribution, Cornwallis ordered his elite Rangers to hunt down the Mi’kmaq and he made the now-infamous offer to pay a bounty for Mi’kmaq scalps.

This conflict became known as Father Le Loutre’s War and it should be noted that the French also paid the Mi’kmaq for English scalps. It also should be pointed out that Cornwallis left Halifax long before those clashes and massacres were concluded, but nobody has yet to decry his successor, Peregrine Hopson, as a symbol of colonial genocide. But then again there are no statues of him.

Personally, I believe the statue of Cornwallis should remain in place so that it can be used as an educational tool for taking a closer look at the past myths that have shaped our nation’s history. Not only did Lord Cornwallis and other individuals like him commit heinous war crimes against, in his case, the Scots and the Mi’kmaq, but we were so immune to any empathy for his victims, that we actually glorified his ‘accomplishments’ with a statue and street names.

This is the lesson that needs to be taught.