Despite his astonishment that the captain had managed, not only to remember the alphabet in the proper order, but to count the letters correctly, Ducane replied, "Well, sir, that's true. However, there was a small temporal, er... accident... about eighty years before our time, and the Relativity-E sort of... became the Relativity-F. It's one of those things it's best not to think too much about."
And now, the current episode...
Star Trek: Series ?
Episode 73: Yesterday's Relativity
Captain Braxton sat in his quarters with his cat Helix on his lap. He was reading a book, the title of which was "Timeship Captaining for Dummies." Braxton was quite enjoying it. "Wow, this book is so informative! It's like it was specifically geared to people like me! Strange how this book just showed up in my quarters today... The only clue is this note attached to it that says 'This book is not from your crew, so don't even suspect them of this. Really. It's not from us. We mean it. Signed, your crew.' Well, if it's not from them, who could it be from...?"
Helix, apparantly smarter than his owner, shook his head in disgust.
Dax's voice came over the comm. "Dax to Braxton. You'd better come to the bridge. There's something on sensors I think you'd better see."
"Okay. Wait... Isn't it Ducane who usually tells me these things over the comm?"
"Yeah, but since the next episode focuses on him a lot, he won't be getting much screentime this week."
Braxton shrugged. "Whatever. I'll be up in a minute."
He picked up Helix, put him on the ground, and then left for the bridge with his new book in hand. He soon arrived on the bridge. "What's going on?"
Dax pointed at the viewscreen. "That's going on."
Braxton looked at the viewscreen. A huge, swirling vortex had appeared in front of the ship. "What in the name of all that's canon is that?"
"A temporal anomaly."
Braxton settled in his seat and flipped through his new book's index. "Let me see... Aha! Here it is! Temporal anomalies, encountering: See Page 47."
"Uh... Sir? There's something coming through it!"
"Not now, Dax! Can't you see I'm consulting my new book? Okay... When encountering a temporal anomaly, one should raise temporal shields so one won't be affected by changes to the timeline created by the anomaly."
"Too late for that, sir."
Sure enough, it was too late, the object had made it's way out of the temporal anomaly, which then promptly collapsed. With the Relativity's shields down, the effects of the timechange affected it. Suddenly, the ship was fighting with a Borg cube.
The bridge of the Relativity looked just about the same, considering how it was the bridge of a warship in the first place.
The voice of the Borg Collective came over the comm. We are the Borg. Resistance is futile. You will buy some mascara.
Braxton slammed his fist into his armrest. "Never! You may have assimilated everyone except for us, but we'll never buy your cosmetic products of evil!"
Irrelevant. You must comply.
"Yar? Blow them up real good."
Yar grinned wickedly and fired off several paradox torpedoes. The cube blew up real good.
Braxton wiped the sweat off his forehead. "We were fortunate today. Those were only Voyager Borg with mascara. Tomorrow it could be Next Generation Borg with eyeliner!"
Dax peered at the viewscreen and then pointed at it. "What in the heck is that?"
Braxton answered that one. "That's a viewscreen, Dax."
"Duh. What's on the viewscreen?"
Damar looked at it. "I think it's another timeship. But I thought we were the last one left."
Ducane nodded. "I thought we were too. What ship is that?"
Dax zoomed in on the ship and enhanced the image. She read what was written on it. "USS Relativity. NCV-474439-E."
"The Relativity-E? That ship vanished long ago! What's it doing here?"
"I have no idea, but it's hailing us."
"Hailing us? But we just replaced the windshield!"
"Sir..."
"I'm kidding. Onscreen!"
The image of the ship was replaced with an image of it's quite damaged bridge. Captain Christopher Pike was in his futuristic wheelchair, beeping constantly.
Braxton was quite confused. "What's Christopher Pike doing on a timeship?"
Ducane answered. "The same reason that Dax, Yar, Sulu, and everyone else is on our ship: There weren't any qualified officers at the time the ship was commisioned, so they got people from the past."
"Ah. Well, what's he beeping about?"
"I think it's Morse Code. He's sending an SOS."
"I see. Well, we'd better go help him out. If we can fix up his ship, we won't be alone with these pushy Borg salesdrones anymore..."
***
The senior staff appeared on the Relativity-E's bridge in a flash of blue light. As seen previously, the place was in pretty bad shape, but at least now the ship's own crew was getting around to repairs. They were greeted by another familiar face.
Braxton was in shock. "Ro Laren?"
"Yeah, that's me."
"You've got an awfully big chip on your shoulder."
"Well, maybe in the first few episodes I was in, but..."
"No, I mean you've literally got an awfully big chip on your shoulder."
Sure enough, she did have an awfully big chip on her shoulder. She brushed it off. "Sorry about that. I tend to make a mess when eating snack foods."
"No problem. Anyway, where have you guys been? Your ship has been reported missing for decades!"
"As the conn officer, it's my fault entirely. You see, this timeship has three options: Go to the past, go to the future, and go to some random point in history causing major damage to the ship. I accidentally pushed the wrong button, and here we are."
"Yeah, we've had button troubles ourselves, although of an entirely different sort. Anyway, who else besides you and Pike are on this ship?"
"Nobody really big. We've got Christine Chapel as our Chief Medical Officer. We've got Lt. Carey as our Chief Engineer, mostly because it really really sucked that he was killed off only a few episodes before Voyager got home."
"Tell me about it..."
"Lt. Hawk is our tactical officer..."
Braxton was about to open his big mouth and say something stupid, but Ducane quickly said, "Not that Hawk, sir."
"...and Noonien Soong is our science officer."
"I see. Well, we're glad you're here. Right after you guys vanished, the Borg assimilated everyone in the universe! Well, except for us. They've been trying to sell us Avon products for years!"
"That's horrible!"
"No kidding! Well, you're here now to keep us company and to help us fend off the Borg!"
Dax interupted. "Uh, sir? Seeing as how this is a parody of 'Yesterday's Enterprise,' shouldn't we just fix up their ship and send them back to their own time?"
"Now why would we want to do that?"
"Well, the Borg took over right after the Relativity-E vanished. If we send them back, there's a fairly good chance that history will be changed."
"Hmm... That's just crazy enough to make sense!"
"Actually, it makes enough sense to make sense."
"Whatever. But if this is a parody of 'Yesterday's Enterprise,' doesn't Yar have to fall in love with somebody on this ship and then decide to stay with them when they go back in time?"
Everyone looked at Yar. Yar glared back at them all. "I am not going to fall in love with anybody, and that's that!"
***
A short time later, Dax, Damar, Carey, and Soong were working on repairing the Relativity-E's temporal core. Damar attempted to make small talk. "So... Carey? You actually did make it back to Earth?"
"Yes, I did! And the first thing I did was to find the graves of every single Voyager crewmember that did make it back to Earth. Then I danced upon said graves. That'll show them for killing me off just before they got home!"
"Well, that's... uh... twisted."
"Yeah, but it was fun!"
***
Meanwhile, Yar was helping fix up the bridge. Pike was also there, and he started beeping. Yar listened, trying to figure out the code. "S... T... A... Y... W... I... T... H... U... S... Stay with you? No! For the last time, no! I'm not going to fall in love with any of you, and I'm not going to stay here!"
***
Also meanwhile, nearly everyone else was in a shuttlecraft inspecting the exterior damage to the Relativity-E. Braxton sighed. "Well, this is going to require a lot of paint..."
Sure enough, the outside of the ship had a bunch of scortch marks on it.
Ducane nodded. "I'll get people to work on it immediately, sir."
***
Several hours passed by in which the two crews got the Relativity-E repaired. Yar was just finishing up repairing some conduits when Braxton's voice came over the comm. "Braxton to Yar. Are you finished yet?"
"Yeah, I'm finished."
"Then report to the bridge. We're leaving."
She put down her tools and started for the bridge. Suddenly, a baseball bat came out of nowhere and knocked her out. Lt. Carey, who was holding the bat, stepped out of the shadows, laughing. "Hahahaha! I finally have my revenge on you, Kes! Hey... You're not Kes! I knocked out the wrong person! And come to think of it, Kes didn't make it back to Earth with the Voyager crew, so why am I mad at her in the first place? Oh well..."
Carey shrugged and left Yar unconscious on the floor.
***
On the bridge, everyone was making sure that everything had been repaired. Braxton finally got to Ducane. "Is the hull okay, Ducane?"
"Uh... There's just a slight problem with the hull, sir."
"A slight problem?"
"Yes. You see, we didn't have quite enough paint to redo the lettering on the hull."
"We didn't have enough paint? Can't we replicate some more paint?"
"Not this kind of paint, sir. It's non-replicatable."
"That has got to be the stupidest thing I've ever heard of! Fine. How much did you not get done?"
"Well, we almost got it all done. It's just that we weren't able to complete the 'E' in the registry number, so it looks like an 'F' instead."
"We can't finish it with normal paint?"
"No, sir. Normal paint would get worn away by the normal stresses timeships experience."
"Fine. I hereby change the Relativity-E to the Relativity-F. Now let's get out of here. Hey, where's Yar?"
Carey stepped onto the bridge. "Yar... uh... fell in love with me! Yeah, that's it! She fell in love with me and she's staying here!"
"Hah! I knew that would happen! I wish you both a happy life together."
And so, the crew of the Relativity-H (minus Yar) beamed away in a flash of blue light. The crew of the Relativity-E (now F) took their stations and took the ship into the timestream.
As soon as the ship vanished, time was restored to normal. Braxton, still in his chair, looked quite confused. "Hey, what happened to the temporal anomaly?"
Dax ran some scans. "I don't know. It was here one second, with something coming through it, and then it was gone."
Braxton flipped through his book's index again. "Temporal anomalies, vanishing: See Page 48." He flipped to Page 48. "When a temporal anomaly suddenly vanishes, it usually means that the majority of the episode was in an alternate timeline that you managed to fix. Majority of the episode? You mean...?"
"Yes, sir. The episode's over."
"Oh well. Do you think the timeline got messed up any?"
"I don't think so, sir."
"Very well. Carry on."
***
Meanwhile, on the Federation Retirement Colony on Norpin V, a very old Tasha Yar bopped a very old Joe Carey on the head with her cane yet again. "Have I told you how much I hate you lately?"
"Yes."
"Good."
And with that, Carey recieved another bop on the head...
***
When Ducane gets close to solving the mystery of Nimbus III, powerful forces conspire to stop him! Will revealing the truth send the galaxy into turmoil? Find out in the next conspiracy-packed episode! Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
The Relativity-E became the Relativity-F because they ran out of PAINT! That is the stupidest thing I've ever heard!!! Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
Well, I have to admit, it's not the worst explanation. Though I think my joke worked better w/o being explained.
But at least I'm now certain that my episode is canon. :-)
Posted by Vogon Poet (Member # 393) on :
I thought Braxton's Relativity was the F! I had to go check my shiplist. . . 8(
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)