Portrait of a Character – Richard Daniels
Richard Daniels has more from me than he ever got in canon.
Origins
This character is, of course, Star Trek: Enterprise canon, but he does not have a given name in canon, or even a first initial. Nothing is known of his inner life or personality. In the series, he’s just a time traveler and does not seem to have emotional reactions to much of what happens, except when his own time period is threatened.
Portrayal
As in canon, Richard Daniels is played by actor Matt Winston.
Personality
Richard Daniels (Matt Winston)
Smarter than anyone else in the room, Rick is a natural for time travel. But he’s also a bit bored, and is jaded by constantly putting things back. This includes allowing people to die who seem to be innocents. In order to comfort himself, and to keep himself occupied, he begins bedding women in time.
All goes along fine until one of the women ends up pregnant. This would not matter so much to history (although it matters to Richard), except that the pregnant woman is the Empress Hoshi Sato.
He has a good relationship with his sister, Eleanor. For a long time, she is the only person he confides in.
Rick’s Conquests
Rick is a womanizer at the start of A Long, Long Time Ago. Here are his known conquests, in the order of the conquests (his perspective in time):
| His Time | Her Name | Her Time |
| 3101 | Lucretia Crossman | 1699 |
| After 3101 | Betty Tyler | 1929 |
| After 3101 | Phillipa Green | March, 2763 |
| After 3101 | Empress Hoshi Sato (mirror) | January 30, 2156 |
| After 3101 | Dana MacKenzie | 2380 |
| After 3101 | Irene of Castile | 1417 |
| May 5, 3104 | Carmen Calavicci | May 5, 3104 |
| March 27 – August 25, 3109 | Tina April | March 27, 3109 – August 25, 3109 |
| September 7, 3109 | Annette (Windy) Bradley | May 3 – 4, 1970 |
| 3109 – 3110 | Sheilagh Bernstein | September, 3109 – March 3110 |
| March 3110 | Milena Chelenska | July – August, 1968 |
Relationships
Tina April
Unlike his temporal conquests, Tina is a real-live girlfriend for Richard. They check each other out in A Lesson. Then Eleanor introduces them at the start of Temper. But at the end of A Long, Long Time Ago, he ends it, although he contacts her a few times, during both Ohio and The Point is Probably Moot.
Milena Chelenska
They meet during the events of Spring Thaw. They enjoy each other’s company and are intellectual equals. They’re also both suffering from some melancholy. Hers is more significant than his, as she is a Holocaust survivor. Perhaps in part because he isn’t supposed to have her, Richard finds himself falling for her. It isn’t until He Stays a Stranger that he does anything about it.
Missions
Richard Daniels goes on several missions for the Temporal Integrity Commission. He isn’t just fooling around. Here the only missions of his I know about (so far) –
| His Time | Mission Locale | Mission Time |
| 3096 | NX-01 | 2152 |
| After 3096 | NX-01 | July 10, 2154 |
| After 3096 | Boston | January 1, 2000 |
| Between 3096 & 3101 | American Colonies | 1757 |
| Between 3096 & 3101 | Pompeii | AD 79 |
| Between 3096 & 3101 | Rome | 44 BC |
| Between 3096 & 3101 | Rome | 450 BC |
| 3101 | Pennsylvania | 1699 |
| After 3101 | New Jersey/New York | 1929 |
| After 3101 | Unknown, somewhere on Earth | March, 2763 |
| After 3101 | ISS Defiant | January 30, 2156 |
| After 3101 | USS Enterprise-E | 2380 |
| 3104 | Mirror Universe, Dawitan | November 3, 2012 |
| March 27, 3109 | Lafa II | 2161/2166/2178 |
| August, 3109 | Clear Lake, Iowa | 1959 |
| September 7, 3109 | Kent State, Ohio | May 3 – 4, 1970 |
| 3109 | Rome, Pompeii and Naples | May, 1960 |
| 3109 | Prague | July – August, 1968 |
| 3109 | Oklahoma City | April, 1995 |
| 3109 | Egypt | October, 1981 |
| 3109 | Florida | January, 1986 |
| 3110 | Mirror Universe/Earth orbit and Rura Penthe/Prague | May 20 – 25, 2192/June 21, 1964/July 19 – 20,1969 |
Personal Reactions
As I explain in the HG Wells series, a lot of temporal alterations are minor (otric), and don’t affect the overall timeline. In the E2 stories, Archer and others open Richard’s cabin more than once, as the displaced NX-01 attempts to reach him so that they can get back to their correct time period. While it’s difficult for him, Rick ends up having to ignore them. This is because the Enterprise, in two separate iterations, is meant to be in the 2030s and beyond.
Theme Music
In Temper, his music is The Records’ Your Starry Eyes. But in the HG Wells stories, his themes are Andrew Gold’s Lonely Boy and then, finally, Secret Agent Man by Johnny Rivers, which was the original inspirational music for the series itself.
Mirror Universe
So Rick does not have a Mirror Universe counterpart, and explains the reason for that to Sheilagh Bernstein during Ohio. In First Born, because Rick has fathered a temporally incompatible child, he and his boss, Carmen Calavicci, have to negotiate in order to allow Rick’s son, Jun, to live. One of the conditions of allowing Jun’s survival is that Rick can’t return to the Mirror Universe during the Empress’s lifetime. However, he can go to the Mirror during other time periods and, when he does, in a kind of salute to her, he calls himself Ritchie as she called him that (the nickname is a reference to Ritchie Valens, and A Long, Long Time Ago). An earlier Mirror Universe mission is a part of Pat the Bunny.
Quote
“I’m sorry, but no, though I have never forgotten you, either of you. And I love my, my child, but I know that I have never been a father to you. I wish I had been.”
Upshot
For a guy who doesn’t even have a first name in canon, I think I’ve given Richard Daniels a pretty wild life. Hopefully, readers find him as fascinating as I have.
[…] enjoyed working on and fleshing out Richard Daniels, one of many canon characters who didn’t even have a first name. I first brought him into my […]
[…] a pair of tragic figures for the HG Wells stories. Kevin O’Connor would be a widower, and Richard Daniels would be a womanizer who needed more out of life. Originally, Kevin’s deceased wife, Josie, […]
[…] wrote First Born, a story about Richard Daniels, the Empress Hoshi Sato and their son, Jun Daniels […]
[…] operative Anthony Parker in order to keep him quiet (You Mixed-Up Siciliano), and attempts to kill Richard Daniels and Sheilagh […]
[…] course, time travel is canon in Star Trek. And by the time of Daniels, it’s not only semi-routine, it’s even got a department devoted to it. This is first […]
[…] the Temporal Integrity Commission, Richard Daniels could not possibly be doing everything himself. Quartermaster Crystal Sherwood would need direction […]
[…] best example of this is in the HG Wells stories. As Temper makes clear, the sole canon character is Richard Daniels. Richard needs a support team, which includes people […]
[…] is no canon evidence that it exists in the following centuries, or that time traveler Daniels belongs to such an […]
[…] hit upon the idea of using Daniels as a kind of anchor character, to give people something to hang onto, when reading the stories. […]
[…] His current steward, Preston Jennings (seen in More, More, More!) had been the replacement for Daniels and has been moved over to Navigation. Furthermore, Will can’t just ask Preston to drop […]
[…] idea about Dachau was to tie into Milena Chelenska, who is Richard Daniels‘s love interest. For her, there would be a bit of a back story, as Tripp would deal with the […]
[…] feel strange. He gets up, but he collapses. The steward, Preston Jennings (who has that job after Daniels and before Lili), is alarmed, but the captain waves him […]
[…] Richard Daniels‘s second adventure in time was put together fairly early and fairly quickly. I loved the idea of a bullet’s changing its trajectory and, as a result, significantly altering history. […]
[…] best and closest connection is in the HG Wells series. Those stories, in addition to being about Richard Daniels and his enlightenment, and about various romances and of course about time, they are also, very […]
[…] to this idea was the canon tidbit that Daniels had roomed with a slob. In order to anchor between In Between Days and Times of the HG Wells, it […]
[…] he’ll make roast chicken. This is before Lili O’Day is hired and after time traveler Richard Daniels departs, so his main helper is Preston Jennings. The Xindi War has not yet started, so he has a […]
[…] in the In Between Days series. Concord and Crackerjack have scenes that take place earlier, and Richard Daniels goes to earlier times as well, but this is the first in-history story where all of the action […]
[…] survivor, based on Franz Kafka’s real-life lover, Milena Jesenska. As a love interest for Richard Daniels, I feel that she shines even […]
[…] First Born, we see the aftermath of the first birth. Whether Daniels seduces Hoshi, or it’s the other way around, is tough to say (as of this posting, I […]
[…] introduced in A Long, Long Time Ago, Crystal is busy cutting Temporal Agent Richard Daniels‘s hair when he asks her if she knows anything about historical fashions and haircuts. Her […]
[…] a weekly prompt about making things worse (called “fanning the flames”). Except for Richard Daniels, I had not written too much about the back stories of the characters from Times of the HG Wells, so […]
[…] Richard Daniels didn’t necessarily need to have too much of a contemporary extended family. But I did need someone who could be a bit of an expository mouthpiece. By making his sister, Eleanor, the docent at the Temporal Museum on Lafa II, she can convincingly explain both history and what happened in between, all while pushing the story line along painlessly. […]
[…] this collaboration with thebluesman, we crossed together a bit of ENT (the Daniels character) with TOS, as Kirk and company meet the Iotians again, in Another Piece of the […]
[…] an appearance, thereby tying the story to More, More, More! He is Chef’s assistant between Daniels and Lili. Lili selects Brian Delacroix as her assistant, thereby neatly prefiguring his becoming a […]
[…] does Daniels have the skew? The shortest, easiest answer, is that he is a descendant of Doug Beckett. As Eleanor […]
[…] twenty-one centimeters and is initially just fired into seemingly empty space. Because this works, Richard Daniels is summoned to the Temporal Integrity Commission, as he and Eleanor notice the time change […]
[…] the prime timeline, he rooms with Richard Daniels until Daniels reveals that he is a time traveler and leaves the ship. In November 13th, a far older […]
[…] in Wonderland is evoked more by the HG Wells stories and, in The Point is Probably Moot, Richard Daniels even says to Alice Trent, “Down the rabbit […]
[…] – a wife (twice in the prime timeline and twice in the E2 alternate), a mother, an operative for Richard Daniels, an informal good will ambassador to the Calafan people, an officer (in the prime timeline, she […]
[…] but they aren’t Phillip’s or Liesl’s, so the far-future descendant, Phillipa, who Richard Daniels meets and seduces, as is mentioned in Ohio, has someone else’s […]
[…] a way to continue the saga of the Empress Hoshi Sato and her son, Jun, the son of time traveler Richard Daniels. Furthermore, I wanted there to be more kids in the royal family. For the Empress, it would be a […]
[…] the time of First Born, Hoshi has decided that she wants an heir. When Rick Daniels goes to the Defiant on a mission, they hook up, and she becomes pregnant. She proves to be a […]
[…] Captain Archer and Sam Beckett both being played by Scott Bakula, and Crewman Daniels the time traveler having to fix various temporal issues, and Colonel Grat and Al Calavicci both […]
[…] Avery has not yet been hired, Rick Daniels goes on the mission and, as a part of his preparatory work, he listens to music by all three of the […]
[…] (although it’s possible between Mirror and Prime Universe humans). However, by the time of Richard and Eleanor Daniels‘s births, interbreeding is possible (they are both part-human from both […]
[…] how did I handle that? Rick Daniels says I was brave. I guess; I dunno. I like to think that bravery is runnin’ and dodgin’ […]
[…] is canon for Daniels to say that he is human, more or less. According to the scan that his sister, Eleanor, demonstrates […]
[…] to Richard Daniels, Izo eventually marries in the correct timeline, but he dies childless. I don’t have a name […]
[…] the end of Temper, Rick Daniels notes for posterity that, in the correct timeline, Takeo had a male Calafan lover, but the […]
[…] Reversal, Empress Hoshi is looking for a little brother for her son, Jun. But Jun’s father, Ritchie Daniels, is dead – or, at least, that’s what the Empress believes. Plus she wants a different […]
[…] is also the inventor of the dark matter drive for time ships. Carmen trusts him implicitly. Rick is pals with him. He mentors Deirdre Katzman. And he, along with Otra D’Angelo, is one of the […]
[…] Tom is another distant descendant of Doug and Melissa, and is a very distant cousin of Kevin O’Connor and Rick Daniels. […]
[…] continue Richard Daniels and the Temporal Integrity Commission‘s investigations in time, I decided that a truly […]
[…] the story of Rick Daniels and the Temporal Integrity Commission‘s fight against the Perfectionists, I wanted to cover […]
[…] Varg-i-yeh are coming to attack. Helen Walker and her father escape to the Mirror Universe, where Richard Daniels is not allowed to pursue them. And on Lafa II, Malcolm Reed and his wife, Lili O’Day Beckett […]
[…] specialist in ancient computers is a mid-level Temporal Agent working with Richard Daniels. In Another Piece of the Action, she ends up inadvertently insulting Spock a little, when she […]
[…] in the very deep future, be rather small pieces of equipment. This also worked as a cover, for Rick Daniels and other time travelers would need to carry a weapon to a lot of time periods where carrying such […]
[…] wanted a hippie chick for Richard Daniels to hook up with in 1970 Kent State, and for him to meet at a protest. Enter […]
[…] writing about Richard Daniels‘s conquests, one name that came up a few times was Dana MacKenzie. I liked the idea of a […]
[…] play up just how much of a rat Rick Daniels is at the beginning of the Times of the HG Wells series, he had to have a girlfriend, who he would […]
[…] early 3101, Temporal Agent Richard Daniels is prepared for his 1699 Penn’s Woods trip by Crystal […]
[…] 3102, Temporal Agent Richard Daniels and a historian are accidentally sent to 1417 Cordoba instead of 1616 Padua, and Rick meets Irene […]
[…] 3104, Richard Daniels and Aramjul Sika find out just why the Borg never really got any traction in the Mirror […]
[…] a part of Rick Daniels meeting Milena Chelenska, he is originally hit by a car. Milena, a doctor, thinks she needs to […]
[…] is where, in Star Trek fanfiction, I wanted canon character Richard Daniels to tragically fall in love with a woman he could never […]
[…] and went with Eleanor Daniels lecturing. I was pleased to be able to dovetail the story well with Rick meeting Tina and the Temper story […]
[…] its high levels of secrecy while trying to present evidence of temporal tampering (and keeping Rick and Carmen‘s actions during First Born a […]
[…] Rick Daniels spends the beginning of the 3100s bedding women in time, to try to ease his guilt at witnessing some of the worst moments of the prime timeline. […]
[…] 3096, Richard Daniels joins the Temporal Integrity Commission as a Temporal […]
[…] continue Richard Daniels and the Temporal Integrity Commission‘s investigations in time, I decided that a truly […]
[…] family. His place is as secure as Richard Daniels‘s. He’ll be back (he has to; he’s […]
[…] of all, continuing the story of Rick Daniels and the Temporal Integrity Commission‘s fight against the Perfectionists, I wanted to cover […]
[…] for my own fanfiction, I selected Richard Daniels, right around New Year’s Eve, for the changeover to the new millennium. And Daniels also […]
[…] after You Mixed-Up Siciliano, in January of 3110, Kirko, Spock and the boys join Temporal Agents Richard Daniels, Sheilagh Bernstein, and Deirdre Katzman in handling Bela Oxmyx and his cronies. This is a […]
[…] and went with Eleanor Daniels lecturing. I was pleased to be able to dovetail the story well with Rick meeting Tina and the Temper story […]
[…] If I Could See. For the Twelve Trials of Triskelion, I posted a Times of the HG Wells story about Richard Daniels‘s many conquests, The Stranger, for the Ficlet Flashdance. I dipped into Captain […]
[…] is the sole member. They are a colony, to be sure, but there is really nothing known about them. Richard Daniels refers to them as being somewhat endangered although that might be more a function of their overall […]
[…] In order to resolve the issues in Temper and bring everyone back to the correct side of the pond, I needed for there to be some way to signal Richard Daniels. […]
[…] struck out with Leah Benson (although he did help her to escape the Empress), and he is alone. When Daniels and Tom Grant get the Flux Capacitor back, Josh ends up on Lafa II. Telling her that he […]
[…] I reveal it has resulted in a marriage and a child, Kenneth. Her descendants eventually include Richard and Eleanor Daniels and their mother, Chloe Masterson […]
[…] refers to himself as “the action guy”. Hence he is the one chosen for the mission by Daniels (also because of his twenty centimeter radiation band), for he will get things done. Malcolm has to […]
[…] not yet posted anywhere, Time Out. Furthermore, a second story, Overtime, shows that the changes Richard Daniels wrought turned out to not be quite enough to restore the timeline. However, Overtime remains […]
[…] gets his real chance in Temper and again in He Stays a Stranger, when Rick Daniels gets to go to the Mirror. According to the events in First Born, this is normally not kosher. […]
[…] work, and I made him the anchor character. Martin Madden is the initial anchor character, but then Rick Daniels becomes the secondary. As a result, the story line got increasingly muddled and weird. And then it […]