Star Trek

07
Jun
2013

Review – First Born

Background

First Born has an irresistible background, I feel.

Barking Up The Muse Tree | jespah | Janet Gershen-Siegel | First Born

First Born (Jun Daniels Sato)

In response to prompts about disciplining and decisions, I wrote First Born, a story about Richard Daniels, the Empress Hoshi Sato and their son, Jun Daniels Sato.

The story works as a bridge between In Between Days and Times of the HG Wells. Other such bridges include November 13th and More, More, More!

First Born Plot

In Reversal, I established that the Empress had given birth to Daniels’s child, but she thought him (the elder Daniels) to be dead. But Daniels isn’t dead.

Therefore, there had to be another side to the story.

This story explores the fallout at the Temporal Integrity Commission, and in time itself. Eleanor Daniels, Rick’s sister, is a docent at the Temporal Museum on Lafa II. She begins by lecturing about Empress Hoshi’s five children, but suddenly she shakes very, very slightly and ends her sentence talking about Hoshi’s six children.

Uh, oh.

Fallout

Variant logo based on the Terran Empire symbol...

Rick is hauled into his boss, Carmen Calavicci‘s, office. She is, understandably, livid. Carmen has been looking the other way for a while as he’s been bedding women in time. She has been figuring that it’s a way for him to cope with the fact that there are often deaths, or he has to restore deaths. So she has been kind or, at least, indifferent. But this is something else entirely, as the Mirror government is breathing down her neck. They demand that Jun Sato‘s existence be wiped out, thereby restoring Aidan MacKenzie‘s son, Kira, to his rightful position as first born heir.

Rick and Carmen meet with a Mirror government representative and begin to sort everything out. Rick wants Jun to live, but how much of a pound of flesh with the other side of the pond extract in order to make that happen?

Story Postings

Rating

The story is rated K+.

Upshot

I like the interplay among Carmen, Rick, and the Mirror representative (Ray Jiminez), as they essentially wheel and deal the past. It makes you wonder if that might eventually really happen.

Posted by jespah in Hall of Mirrors, In Between Days series, Review, Times of the HG Wells series, 16 comments
04
Jun
2013

Portrait of a Character – Josh Rosen

Portrait of a Character – Josh Rosen

Josh Rosen was originally an afterthought – sorry!

Origins

First seen in The Light, Josh starts off as something of a background character in my Star Trek fanfiction. Friends with Ethan Shapiro, Karin Bernstein, and Andrew Miller, Josh was originally just meant to be more expositive filler material and not much more than that. Along the way, I found other ways to make him shine.

Portrayal

Josh is played by Seth Green.

Portrait of a Character – Josh Rosen

Seth Green as Josh Rosen

I like how this actor can be rather affable in some portrayals whereas, in others, he can be utterly menacing and evil.

I also like that he plays nerdy rather well. Josh in the prime universe is an engineer, and that is often my experience of engineers. Since he is a security guy in the Mirror Universe, that also works with the actor.

Personality

Dutiful and loyal to a fault, Josh is almost like Malcolm in that he will do nearly anything for the people he works for.

In the prime universe and prime timeline, he is pleasant and funny. In the E2 stories, he is a romantic guy but also is truly perplexed as to how to fix the problems that his marriage has created, and the wedge it has forced between him and his friend, Ethan. And in the Mirror Universe, in both the Temper first alternate timeline and in the prime timeline, he shows a loyalty and devotion to his mother that no other Mirror Universe denizen shows except, perhaps, for Doug Beckett.

Relationships

Karin Bernstein

Josh’s relationship with Karin only happens in the E2 stories, although they marry in both iterations. He is playful with her, calling her angel and generally surprised that she would go out with him, let alone marry him. In the second kick back in time, Karin herself wonders a bit about why she didn’t pursue Andrew herself. But the answer is the same for both iterations – Josh gets there first.

Yimar

In the Mirror Universe, the start of this relationship shows up in He Stays a Stranger. Josh has fairly recently 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 doesn’t know anyone, she tells him, “You know me.” When Branch Borodin, a millennium later, explains that time period’s events to a tour group at the Temporal Museum on Lafa II, he mentions that Josh became High Priestess Yimar’s consort.

Mirror Universe

In the mirror, Josh Rosen is a security crewman, and often guards the Agony Booth.

Barking Up The Muse Tree | jespah | Janet Gershen-Siegel | Seth Green as MU Josh Rosen (image is for educational purposes only)

Seth Green as MU Josh Rosen (image is for educational purposes only)

But he wants to get out. He also well aware – more than most Mirror Universe denizens – that he needs to help others so that they will help him.

Hence in Temper and The Conspiracy, he is a part of the plot to get Chip, Lucy, and Chip’s two children off the Defiant.

Once they are gone, he still wants to get away, but he’s realistic about his chances. In Bread, he helps Leah Benson leave, as a fulfillment of his mother’s dying wish.

His continued caring for what his mother would have thought of him marks him as one of the few righteous persons in the Mirror Universe. This puts him on a par with Doug Beckett.

Quote

“We’re members of the same tribe. There aren’t a lot of us left. My, heh, my mother sent me a last message last week, before she died. She said I should look out for anybody in the tribe.”

Upshot

This below decks character shows up a lot. And he has been a bit of a utility infielder character, ending up in nearly every series but Hold Your Dominion and Mixing it Up. Not bad for the guy who, at the end of The Light, is neither the star (Ethan) nor the romantic lead (Andrew).

Posted by jespah in Hall of Mirrors, In Between Days series, Interphases series, Portrait, Times of the HG Wells series, 18 comments
28
May
2013

Review – The Reptile Speaks

Review – The Reptile Speaks

A reptile speaks?

Background

I can’t recall the precise circumstances, but I was a fairly new member of Ad Astra and we were talking about mixed-species couples in Star Trek fanfiction.

Barking up the Muse Tree | Jespah | Janet Gershen-Siegel | The Reptile Speaks

The Reptile Speaks

My point was, as we get deeper and deeper into the future, we’d start to see a lot of – to us – bizarre combinations.

Why wouldn’t a Gorn recite love poetry to a lovely, blushing Cardassian maiden?

And so someone threw the gauntlet down and told me, write this.

Plot

For teenaged boys Bron and Skrol, the upcoming Sadie Hawkins dance is an occasion for nerves. Skrol is trying to make time with his girl, Tr’Dorna. Skrol encourages Bron to ask out Tr’Dorna’s roommate, Etrina. But Bron will have none of that – he likes Sophra.

Oh, and did I mention that the boys are Gorn, Etrina and Tr’Dorna are Xindi Reptilian, and Sophra (and her roommate, Ylinka) is a Cardassian?

Perhaps that detail shouldn’t have been left out.

But, truly, teens are teens, wherever you go, and whatever age adolescence happens for a particular species (for Vulcans, it apparently happens somewhat later). And so there is a bit of a push and pull. Who will end up together? Will she accept or repel Bron’s advances? Bron’s got a secret weapon, but you’ll have to read the story in order to find out just what it is.

Story Postings

Rating

The story is rated K.

Upshot

Finally, Gorn are nearly universally hissing, sneering bad guys, and I wanted there to be a way to redeem them. After all, they’re not too terribly different from Xindi Reptilians, and that species saw redemption by the end of ENT. Plus, I would hope that, eventually, the entire galaxy will be at peace. That means breaking bread with Gorn. And if they are at all like Bron, and even Skrol, it’ll be easy.

Posted by jespah in Fan fiction, Mixing It Up Collection, Review, 7 comments