Starship Enterprise

24
Mar
2017

Review – Paradox

Review – Paradox

Paradox – boy, are we ever in trouble!

Paradox Background

Barking up the Muse Tree | jespah | Janet Gershen-Siegel | Deep Future | Paradox

Deep Future

As a part of a Star Trek fanfiction competition, fellow writer kes7 and I decided to collaborate on this time travel mayhem-style crossover novel. Levi, the most squirrelly and ADHD-addled person in history, nervous and quirky to a fault, would be tasked with saving humanity.

By having to be socially acceptable or at least in the realm of socially competent.

Yeah, I agree.

We’re doomed.

Plot

In which humanity’s survival depends on Levi Cavendish’s social skills. Takes place in 3110.

kes7’s original character, Maren O’Connor (who we decided would be related to Kevin), and canon character Icheb, are an item in her universe. At this stage in their development, they are building their own time traveling device. But this is rather early in the engineering process, and the device is imperfect. It threatens the multiverse and humanity (because why not make the stakes super-high?) and the Temporal Integrity Commission has got to stop them.

Reluctantly, Carmen sends Levi and Otra. However, Otra does not have permission to go to the surface although she can communicate directly through Levi’s implanted communicator. As she feeds him information, he becomes even more confused. It does not help that a girl named Marci is flirting with him, big time. Which is Levi’s mother’s name.

It helps even less that Otra has finally realized that she is in love with him.

Awkward!

Story Postings

Rating

The story is Rated K.

Upshot

We had a lot of fun writing this one, but we will both admit our resolve sometimes wanes. The story remains unfinished after a few years. We need to finish this one. I want to know what happened. Don’t you?

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Posted by jespah in Fan fiction, Review, Times of the HG Wells series, 0 comments
22
Nov
2016

Portrait of a Character – T’Pau

Portrait of a Character – T’Pau

T’Pau is important all around. This is in the prime universe and also in the Mirror Universe.

Origins

This canon character is from TOS and is also a part of the Star Trek: Enterprise Vulcan arc.

Portrayal

Portrait of a Character – T’Pau

Portrait of a Character – T’Pau (image is for educational purposes only)

As in canon, a young T’Pau is played by actress Kara Zediker.

I liked this portrayal a lot more than the one in the Original Series. This T’Pau has passion and fire, even as an allegedly emotion-free Vulcan.

Personality

Ruthless and efficient, in canon she is more than ready to force Captain Archer to submit to a mind meld if he won’t go willingly. Hence I see no reason for her to be any different in fan fiction. As a result, this is one headstrong person in either universe.

Relationships

Kefris

Thrown together several times, she and Kefris bond at least a little bit over their shared fates.

Mirror Universe

Portrait of a Character – T’Pau

Portrait of a Character – T’Pau (image is for educational purposes only)

In the Mirror, because Vulcans are an oppressed species, I write her as a slave.

This is the main place where I write T’Pau.  In Temper and also in He Stays a Stranger, the characters call her someone who performs calculations and looks things up for the Empress.

So without my naming her, she is one of the two Vulcans referenced (Kefris is the other) in Escape. They survive the shuttle crash that kills the Mirror Melissa Madden and leaves Andy Miller bereft. This drives his arc in the Mirror.

Quote

As of the writing of this blog post, I don’t have a quote from her!

Upshot

While mentioned peripherally but barely on screen, I should do more with this character.

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Posted by jespah in Fan fiction, Hall of Mirrors, In Between Days series, Portrait, 0 comments
14
Oct
2016

Inspiration – Injuries

Inspiration – Injuries

Injuries, believe it or not, can inspire.

Background

Inspiration – Injuries

Inspiration – Injuries

What a weird thing for inspiration, eh?

But it’s still something that has happened to me. It can still, in a backhanded way, be inspiring.

The Specifics of Creation

For character injuries, Star Trek always used to go beyond believability and hit a weird Twilight Zone, where everything was magically, mystically cured, with the patient suffering no or nearly no pain.

That’s not how the real world works, and I am so glad Enterprise made it a point of showing cures being neither instantaneous nor perfect.

It’s a weird image, but this is Malcolm Reed in rehab during the Dead Stop Enterprise episode.

Well, sometimes. At least , when Malcolm was injured in Minefield, he was still injured in Dead Stop and, in fact, Phlox had the automated repair station cure Malcolm’s broken leg.

Ouch!

For my own work, I have used it as a jumping off point. It is so easy in fiction to make people into super people, and make it so injuries don’t really affect them. This is deus ex machina-style unreality at its worst. Sprains hurt. Breaks make you limp or make your arm hang useless.  An allergy (not exactly an injury but certainly a medical condition) can make you stop breathing.

Perhaps the worst injury I’ve gotten is a set of three (hey, if you’re going to do something, go all the way, eh?) meniscus tears in my right knee. While this has not yet informed my fanfiction writing, it has affected my wholly original work. Hence in The Enigman Cave, there is a character with that exact same injury.

Injuries in My Work

In  fanfiction, I took the fight from Harbinger and reworked it twice, both times involving Malcolm. Once was with Doug, in Together. The other was in The Three of Us, with Jay  This is as a reprise of the fight, and Lili even laments that it might be a ‘second harbinger’. Also, in both of my versions of the fight, I inflict similar injuries on the men, as an homage to the canon scene. There are eye and kidney injuries, just as in the original. However, the addition of Lili to the dynamic means there is a witness and the aftermath is far more problematic. In Together, Lili is pregnant with Marie Patrice and keels over, overcome by intense kicking. Pamela ends up taking her to the Medical Center nearby in San Francisco, and the upshot is an uneasy truce between the men.

In The Three of Us, Archer finds the two men fighting. He orders the men to sickbay where Phlox begins to treat them, but they both continue posturing and refuse treatment. Archer calls Lili in and she is alarmed at their conditions. Going beyond the original, in this version of the fight, Jay suffers from a lung injury which results in him coughing, a reference directly back to Penicillin.  It’s a fitting internal bit of consistency which also foreshadows that short story’s significance in Everybody Knows this is Nowhere.

Upshot

Battered and bruised characters should not heal immediately and automatically, I feel. Even with advanced medical technology, it just seems as if that would be too much of a cop-out and would severely impair storytelling.

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Posted by jespah in Fan fiction, Inspiration-Mechanics, 0 comments
15
Jan
2016

Recurrent Themes – Soldiers

Recurrent Themes –Soldiers

Background

For Reversal in particular to work, there had a to be a number of people ready and able to go to war.

Barking up the Muse Tree | Janet Gershen-Siegel | jespah | DNA | SoldiersIn particular, as the Mirror Universe is so different from the prime universe, a lot of people would be soldiers there who wouldn’t be so here. Or they would be more violent and less disciplined than in our universe. As it is explained to Lili, the percentage of military personnel is deliberately kept very high over there.

There are more MACOs in particular than the group listed here, but these people are seen the most.

Appearances of Soldiers

Aliwev

This Calafan recruit drills directly under Doug and, in the Mirror, in one of the alternate timelines, assassinates the Empress Hoshi Sato during Temper.

Douglas Jay Hayes Beckett

Doug, a trained killer, spends much of Reversal trying to leave the practice of making war. When he can’t find anything else to do with himself in Together, he eventually becomes the captain of a defense unit on Lafa II, and instructs recruits.

Daniel Chang

Chang, a canon character, defends the Enterprise but, in the E2 timeline, commits crimes.

Tristan Curtis

Curtis is another E2 timeline criminal. In the Temper alternate timelines, he’s named Craig.

Brian Delacroix

In the prime universe, Delacroix is a security guard who becomes a chef. In the Mirror, he nearly kills Doug.

Tommy Digiorno-Madden

Unlike the other five kids, Tommy joins Starfleet and goes into Tactical.

Thomas Grant

In the deep future, Tom is assigned to the Breen homeworld before he joins the Temporal Integrity Commission.

Deborah Hadden

Deb works in Security in both universes. In the Mirror, she kills Brian before he has a chance to off Doug. But her victory is short-lived, and she perishes when he leaves that universe.

Jay Hayes

The consummate soldier, Major J. Hayes is so committed to defending the ship that he has nearly no time for people.

Gary Hodgkins

Yet another E2 criminal, Hodgkins often pairs with Curtis, particularly in the Mirror.

Chandler Masterson

Chip is wasted in Security and moves over to Communications. This isn’t possible in the Mirror, so he stays in  Tactical. In the prime timeline, he escapes the Empress, but in one of the alternates, he rises to become captain of the Defiant.

Travis Mayweather

Travis is a soldier in the Mirror Universe only. He’s a poor soldier, though, and an even worse leader. In the alternate timelines, and in the prime timeline, he is fragged by his own troops.

Andrew Miller

Like Travis, Andy is only a soldier in the Mirror. When the Empress taps him for somewhat earthy duties, he manages to get himself reassigned to Science.

Malcolm Reed

The other consummate canon career soldier, Malcolm is more ambitious and tries for a command as soon as he can get one.

José Torres

José is another person who is only a soldier in the Mirror. He is not cut out for command at all and, in an alternate timeline, destroys his ship, the Luna, and everyone on board is killed.

Upshot

Star Trek fanfiction will always have a place for men and women (and other genders) in uniform.

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Posted by jespah in Emergence series, Eriecho series, Fan fiction, Hall of Mirrors, In Between Days series, Interphases series, Mixing It Up Collection, Themes, Times of the HG Wells series, 0 comments
01
May
2015

Review – Movie Night

Review – Movie Night

Movie Night, of course, is canon. In November of 2159, Malcolm takes Melissa to Movie Night.

Barking Up the Muse Tree | jespah | Janet Gershen-Siegel | IBD Arrangement | Movie Night

In Between Days, the Arrangement

Background

In response to a Star Trek fan fiction prompt about fraternizing, I decided to go with a date that would not really be a date at all. Instead, it is a bit of a cover. Melissa is pregnant with Tommy, but has not yet been ordered off the Enterprise. But that time is drawing nearer. Melissa’s plan is to go home to Ceres and Norri and await Tommy’s birth there.

Plot

Review – Movie Night

Robert Strauss (Animal/Stanislaus Kuzawa) in Stalag 17

The story opens with Malcolm carefully getting ready for the evening. But he then smacks his own forehead – he’s forgotten the flowers.

So he visits Shelby Pike in Botany and she makes him a colorful bouquet with the understanding that the flowers and the ribbon can be any color except for blue. Hence it should be obvious to sharp-eyed readers that this is a reference to Lili. I also spell out that the date is not with his true beloved.

While in the lift with Tripp, Tucker asks if he and Melissa are getting serious. Therefore, Malcolm confides that it is all for show, and he is taking care of her as a friend (and as a part of the Doug/Lili open marriage arrangement), but he does not have romantic feelings for Melissa.

However, he arrives to find the door to her quarters locked, but he can hear Melissa retching. He uses (rather, he oversteps, really) his authority and bypasses the lock. He holds back the flowers, unsure if they will set her off again. Then he also scolds her, and then realizes that that is not his place. Not his child, not his girl. A bit tentative, she insists on going out, and the story ends with them going to see Stalag 17 together.

Story Postings

Rating

The story is rated K.

Upshot

I liked the little touches in this one, as Malcolm seems like he is suiting up for a date, to Melissa’s complaining about being sick all the time, to the colors in the bouquet and then the film, which is also referenced in Day of the Dead.

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Posted by jespah in Fan fiction, In Between Days series, Review, 0 comments
27
Dec
2013

Review – November 13th

November 13th Background

November 13th works as a bridge story. It connects In Between Days to Times of the HG Wells.

For a Weekly Free Write called ‘berth of a career’, I got the idea of a messy bunk in my head, and could not get it out.

Barking Up The Muse Tree | jespah | Janet Gershen-Siegel | In Between Days | November 13th

In Between Days

Adding to this idea was the Star Trek: Enterprise canon tidbit that Daniels had roomed with a slob. In order to anchor between In Between Days and Times of the HG Wells, it made sense to have a younger character.

That younger character would be connected to Daniels, hence bridging the gap between In Between Days and the deep future of The Times of the HG Wells.

Plot

Barking up the Muse Tree | jespah | Janet Gershen-Siegel | Clockworks | November 13th

Clockworks

Craig Willets, now an older man, would be dictating his memoirs, when he’d remember something quirky from his past.

The date is what triggers it for Craig. He remembers a very specific, yet puzzling, event.

On that day, back in 2151, he was just minding his own business, but was remembering his old roommate, who had left in a hurry. It had been explained to Craig that Daniels had been a time traveler. Craig wasn’t sure how he felt about that. As a slob, he has no idea, but a pair of his boots are missing.

Forward into the Past

The action then shifts to 1699, where Daniels is preparing to bed Jennifer Crossman‘s ancestor, the widow Lucretia Crossman, in Penn’s Woods. This is to be Rick’s first temporal conquest. He’s eager to get going, and then realizes that he forgot something back in 2151.

Penn's Woods at Bowman's Hill

Penn’s Woods at Bowman’s Hill (Photo credit: tgpotterfield)

He excuses himself and goes to the only private place – the outhouse. While in there, he taps out a quick message to Craig and has the boots sent to November 13th, 2151. Why that date? That’s what date it is in 1699. But it does not match the date when Daniels departed from the NX-01. Craig realizes, much later, that his old roommate made a mistake with the date.

Story Postings

Rating

The story is Rated K.

Upshot

I like the slight silliness of the story, that something so mild and minor could bring the two series together.

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Posted by jespah in Fan fiction, In Between Days series, Review, Times of the HG Wells series, 8 comments