#tng future Imperfect

[filmjunky-99]

s t a r t r e k t h e n e x t g e n e r a t i o n created by gene roddenberry [future imperfect, s4ep8] 'What's important right now, today, is that you have a son who needs you. Spend time with him. You may find part of what you've lost.' - troi

[spockvarietyhour]

Rest easy, you've entered the Shoulderpads Saturday Zone!

[proverbialschoolmarm]

[warpfactor9]

happy birthday riker <3 congrats on turning negative 311!

[Video description: A 10 second clip from Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Future Imperfect." On the bridge of the Enterprise, Riker turns to head for the turbolift, saying, "Geordi, Worf, you're with me." The three are almost out the doors, but Riker stops just inside when Picard calls, "Number One." Riker turns, then the camera cuts to Picard's face as he says, "Happy birthday." The camera cuts back to Riker, who smiles warmly and gives a single nod of acknowledgement before joining Worf and Geordi in the turbolift. The doors close after them. End Description.]

[thegreaterlink]

Reviewing Star Trek TNG - S4E8 "Future Imperfect"

My last review was posted like... nine months ago.

Time flies when you're lazy.

THE PREMISE

Commander Riker’s birthday celebrations are interrupted by reports of strange sensor readings from Alpha Onias 3. He beams down with Geordi and Worf to investigate but they’re quickly knocked out by toxic gases. Upon awakening in sickbay, Riker discovers that sixteen years have passed (though he can't remember any of it) and he is now the captain of the Enterprise.

MY REVIEW

Sixteen years in the future. Assuming that Riker is roughly the same age as Jonathan Frakes, that would put him in his mid-fifties. And if we compare this "middle-aged" Riker to Jonathan Frakes circa mid-2000s...

Not bad. Still, anything beats that weird adult Wesley from Hide and Q.

Then again, if we use Riker's birthday slab as an indicator, then he just turned...

...six.

I guess he was born on a leap year.

Anyway, here we are in the future, where Dr Crusher chalks up Riker's sudden amnesia to a side effect of a dormant infection which he picked up on that away mission all those years ago. An infection which Klingons just so happen to be immune to... and I guess Geordi is just built different.

Dr Crusher recommends associational therapy, with the idea being that surrounding Riker with familiar people and things will help to jog his memory, starting with a trip to the bridge. Because a man fresh out of a coma with a massive gap in his memory is clearly fit to resume command of a starship. Good call.

Riker arrives on the bridge and finds it looking… exactly the same, since new sets ain’t cheap, but there are at least changes among the crew. My boi Data is now First officer, Geordi now has ocular implants so LeVar Burton gets to act without a hunk of plastic on his face, and more species like Klingons and Ferengi are among the crew.

But what concerns Riker is the most is Admiral Picard and Troi arriving on a Romulan Warbird.

That last one is explained by ongoing peace treaty negotiations with the Romulans, which Riker has apparently been leading ever since he rescued the crew of a damaged Warbird which wound up in Federation space. Evidently random acts of kindness go a long way towards stopping wars in this universe. The Enterprise is currently escorting the Romulan ambassador to Outpost 23 to wrap things up and get the treaty signed.

Yep. Here we are in the future, and it's bright. Nothing to fear, no one to fight... I can't believe we've come so far.

Then Tomalak beams aboard.

Future Picard and Troi try to reassure Riker – yeah, he did threaten to take the Enterprise's hull as a trophy last season, but that was one time – but he's still concerned, both by the massive gap in his memory and that he might have to reveal sensitive Starfleet intel to someone he probably can't trust.

With the briefing over and Riker’s memories still thoroughly gone, Troi takes him back to his quarters, where a mysterious child is playing his trombone.

"Hi, Dad!"

Ah. He has his father's... hair?

This is Riker's son, Jean-Luc (Chris Demetral). I remember being surprised that Troi wasn't the mother... but their romance is barely more than subtext at this point, so it's not that shocking. Jean-Luc's mother was actually a woman only known as Min, who Troi explains died two years prior. Even though they have zero evidence of her existing – aside from the child she supposedly birthed, I mean – and Riker can't find any trace of her in the ship's records. They don't even have any photos of her. I guess they had to make room for their... modern art?

I think I saw the Threads logo in there.

Christ, the last time I posted a review Threads didn't even exist it's been so fucking long

The computer's been acting up for a while now, come to think of it. I'm sure Geordi will be done with that diagnostic soon.

Still, I can at least appreciate the script's efforts to make us care about this kid. Riker adjusts pretty well to being a father, though that probably has more to do with Jonathan Frakes' natural daddy– I mean dad energy.

"I guess there's only one thing we can do. We've got to build some new memories!"

But Riker is still bothered that he can't find any trace of his late wife, though Jean-Luc says he's just not being precise enough, and pulls up some old home movies. It's here that we discover that "Min" is actually Minuet (again played by Carolyn McCormick for a single shot – that's dedication for you), that hologram lady he tried to bone way back in his babyface era.

Suddenly everything starts falling into place. And speaking of hologram romantics (or holosexuals, as I like to call them), Geordi calls Riker back up to the bridge.

It's here that the attempts to keep Riker gaslit, gatekept and girlbossed completely fall apart, as he calls out all sorts of holes in the facade, like Geordi taking more than a day to run a simple diagnostic, nobody being able to properly recall past events and even Data using a contraction.

Ha! I knew Lore was going to come back eventually! AND THEY CALLED ME A MADMAN!

...No? It's not Lore? Aight. Maybe next season.

"Would anyone else like to speak up? Or shall we end this charade?"

With the wool thoroughly pulled back from Riker's eyes, Tomalak reveals that the whole thing has actually been a hologram simulation designed to trick him into revealing Federation intel like, say, the location of Outpost 23.

You win this time, Lore.

Turns out that after the away team was hit with the gas, the Romulans intercepted Riker while he was being beamed up. They used their neural scanners to create a perfect replica of the Enterprise and its crew. Add a bit of ageing makeup and some bullshit about amnesia and badda bing badda bang, you’ve got yourself a pretty convincing future AU.

As for Tomalak’s OC, Jean-Luc, he was actually some random kid named Ethan who they had taken prisoner after raiding a research outpost on the edge of the Neutral Zone.

They throw Riker in a cell with him for a lil bit — just long enough for Ethan to tell him about a secret hiding spot elsewhere on the ship — so when the Romulans come back with the intention of taking the intel by force, Riker seizes the opportunity. One distraction and a few punches in the face later, and they’re on the run.

Ethan leads Riker through a convenient crawl space to a convenient forgotten room where some convenient blueprints conveniently tell them the location of the ship’s communication centre where they could send a message to the Enterprise. But there's a catch.

Ethan: The transmitter's on a voice-activated security system only.

Riker: Do you know whose voice activates it?

Ethan: Only Ambassador Tomalak.

...The fuck you say?

Yeah, the plot be thickening. Turns out the original simulation was just crammed inside of another one. So the Romulan ship fades away... as do the Romulans... and Tomalak... until Riker is left standing back in the cave on Alpha Onias 3... with only the boy remaining.

Credit where it's due, decent plot twist.

The boy, whose real name is Barash, reveals that his mother left him in the cave — which essentially functions as Holodeck+ by manifesting anything he wants — to keep him safe. But with his mother long dead and the Enterprise being the planet's first visitors in ages, he baited the away team down to the surface and intercepted Riker mid-transport while Geordi and Worf were safely beamed back up.

But with the game up, Barash drops the facade, allowing the Enterprise to finally get a proper lock on him. Fortunately Riker realises that the kid meant nothing by it and even offers him asylum on the Enterprise, prompting Barash to finally reveal his true form.

Ah... I think you've got the wrong set, my dude. This is Star Trek. Doctor Who is on Stage 4B.

Riker: To me, you'll always be Jean-Luc.

And so Riker has himself and the kid beamed up. Da end.

We're going to see a lot of these "waking up in a different reality" plots going forward, and while I'm usually not really a fan — you're mostly just waiting for the character in question to realise something ain't right and expose whatever tomfuckery is causing it — this one ain't half bad, since it was a bit more subtle about it and had some third act twists to spice things up. So yeah.

7/10 - The first of many.

We are so fucking back.

Previous Episode | TNG Masterpost | Next Episode

[horsechestnut]

Okay but why didn’t they have Riker adopt that kid? The implication was totally that Riker was going to adopt that kid what happened???

[data2364]

via memory-alpha

Jonathan Frakes (Commander William Riker) with Chris Demetral (Jean-Luc/Ethan) and Producer Gene Roddenberry 1990 during the filming of Star Trek: The Next Generation “Future Imperfect”

https://data2364.wordpress.com/2018/09/01/daily-star-trek-1-september-2018/

[startrekplotnthemes]

Season 4 Episode 8 Future Imperfect

Celebrating his birthday, Riker is called onto an away team where he and the rest of the team are exposed to a deadly gas. Riker wakes up but it is 16 years in the future and many things have changed. He has a child and is now the Captain of the Enterprise. In addition, peace talks are underway with Tomalak and the Romulan yet Riker is off put by all the new changes and Admiral Picard arrives aboard a War Bird. However as the negotiations proceed Riker begins to notice inconsistencies, little things such as the computer being slow or his wife being a fictional entity from the Holodeck.

He calls the game for what it is and is confronted by the Romulans who claim to have captured him. They place him in a holding cell with the child who played the role of his son. Riker performs an escape with the child yet even then begins to question Ethan/Jean Luc when he reveals too much information about the Romulans. It is revealed Ethan is actually an alien called Barash whose mother gave him technology to simulate his environment. He wished to keep Riker around for companionship. When his bluff is called Riker understand he is not malicious and beams the two back aboard the Enterprise.

Even if facetious, this episode provides a curious what if for many aboard the Enterprise. Picard finally departs his role of captain and Riker is left in charge of the whole ship. There can be an imposter syndrome that creeps through all of us, but Riker must deal with the stress of dealing with new laws and realities. Suddenly having a son and being in the midst of a negotiation with no idea of who is sided with who. The simulation ends and Riker is returned to the ship but he is left with the what if of this presented reality.

[curator-on-ao3]

Again, cool response to the last question, so I'll let you pick from these options:

And there are things I have fan-fixed in my head to the point that I have to remind myself that the fix-it isn’t part of the actual canon: favourite one of these?

Or

Your/a favourite part of actual canon. Like, maybe something little but it's just so lovely and fitting to you and you're just happy that it exists?

I’ve been a little down on Trek lately, so I’m going to type as fast as I can to brain-dump, in show order, the first things that pop into my mind that I absolutely love in Trek canon:

Kirk calling Nomad his son, the doctor

Christine Chapel’s snark to Roger Korby about schtupping the androids

Mark Leonard’s performance in Balance of Terror

the Horta (a great mama)

“Edith Keeler must die.”

Captain John Christopher, United States Air Force. Serial number 4857932.

Tribbles

the lesson of The Cloud Minders that we must have empathy and listen to others when they tell us about their lived experience in an environment unlike our own

the cheap-ass animation of TAS

Q

Bynars and Minuet

Beverly Crusher’s frustration in Arsenal of Freedom (and the episode’s Good Ship Lollipop joke)

Picard shooting the other version of himself in Time Squared (to clarify: out of respect for those times when we have to stop ourselves from getting caught in loops/doing stupid stuff and we summon up the courage to break a bad cycle and move forward)

K'Ehleyr

Picard out-lawyering the Sheliak

Rachel Garrett; Yar and Castillo

Lal (but I can’t watch the end anymore, it hurts too much)

the Shakespeare and “Set a course for Betazed. Warp 9.” comedy in Ménage a Troi

Best of Both Worlds, I and II (Shelby inclusive)

every conference table discussion in all of TNG

Beverly’s jump in Remember Me (such a damn good episode)

the reveal in Future Imperfect (which one? all of them)

The Dancing Doctor tap dancing with Data

Darmok. And Jalad. At Tenagra.

Ro Laren

Troi saying, “You could have easily been right” to Ro in Disaster

Hugh, Third of Five

the fact that The Next Phase has so many plotholes and they’re forgivable because the episode is so fun and great

Scotty on the holodeck version of the TOS bridge and Picard joining him

Rascals!

Deanna’s “Ancient West” outfit

the Jefferies tube music and make out session in Lessons

Attached. Oh, my heart.

the Enterprise with three nacelles … and that absolutely perfect last shot of the series

“You exist here.”

Sisko’s casual, everyday affection for Jake

“Old Man”

Rejoined. Lenara Khan. The love. That kiss. The emotional stakes. All of it.

the three Ferengi hitting their own heads to try to fix their universal translators so the 20th century Earth military people mimic the movement to try to communicate

every second of Trials and Tribble-ations including Sisko working overtime to stop fuckmaster Dax, tossing the tribbles, Sisko meeting Kirk, “We do not discuss it with outsiders,” and so much more

Kira blaming Bashir for putting the baby inside her when … you know … behind the scenes

The Sons of Mogh helping with the harvest in Children of Time

Far Beyond the Stars — some of the best if not the best science fiction I have ever seen

the monster fakeout (and kindness) in The Sound of Her Voice, even though the end makes me cry

“Computer, erase that entire personal log.”

Solok

Sisko and Kassidy discussing their comfort levels about a simulation in which the reality was segregation

Janeway waterfalling off the sofa to be closer to Mark on the screen

“Warp particles!”

the lizard babies

the two Janeways in Deadlock

Remember (a painfully good Holocaust episode that doesn’t get enough credit and, yes, I know the path the script took and I’m glad it ended up as a B’Elanna episode)

“I don't know what I'm seeking.” “Then I believe you are ready to begin.”

“The child you spoke of, the girl. Her favorite color was red.” Also, Tuvok’s meditation lamp in the window for Kes.

hot damn, Counterpoint, yaaas

everything in Relativity

“The Yankees, in six games.”

Janeway going after Seven in The Voyager Conspiracy

“This is Lieutenant Reginald Barclay at Starfleet Command.” “It's good to hear your voice, Lieutenant. We've been waiting a long time for this moment.” “The feeling is mutual. Unfortunately, the micro-wormhole is collapsing. We have only a few moments.” “Understood. We are transmitting our ship's logs, crew reports, and navigational records to you now.” “Acknowledged. And we're sending you data on some new hyper-subspace technology. We're hoping eventually to use it to keep in regular contact, and we're including some recommended modifications for your comm system.” “We'll implement them as soon as possible.” “There's someone else here who would also like to say something.” “This is Admiral Paris.” “Hello, sir.” “How are your people holding up?” “Very well. They're an exemplary crew, your son included.” “Tell him, tell him I miss him. And I'm proud of him.” “He heard you, Admiral.” “The wormhole is collapsing.” “I want you all to know we're doing everything we can to bring you home.” “We appreciate it, sir. Keep a docking bay open for us.”

“Nice hair.” (Live Fast and Prosper)

Janeway and Jaffen in Workforce

the spot-on legal concerns of Author, Author

“Set a course. For home.”

(Nothing from Enterprise or Prodigy only because I haven’t watched enough of Enterprise or any of Prodigy)

Burnham and Georgiou forming the delta with their footsteps

the CGI on only the shields protecting Burnham from space

“Are we in session? Because I didn't know you were practicing again. Because if I have your undivided attention for fifty minutes, I can think of a whole bunch of other things we could be doing.”

“That's as depressing a trait as I've ever heard.” “I don't give a damn … I still don't give a damn.”

Cornwell beaming in, phaser aimed, taking command of Discovery

Cornwell phasering the fortune cookies

Cornwell’s voice breaking: “So my Gabriel is dead.”

Detmer’s little bounce when Emperor-as-Captain Georgiou takes command

Pike beaming aboard and instantly being all like MOJAVE to prove to the audience he’s the guy from The Cage

New Eden. Everything. Oh my God (pun intended). The visuals. Owo’s backstory. Pollard patching Pike up after he’s shot. The light at the end. Oh my God, yes. That episode. Yes.

Number freaking One beaming aboard and having her lunch briefing with Pike (Chris and Una’s decades-long friendship wasn’t canon yet, but it shows here so beautifully)

Gabrielle Burnham

“In case the shit hit the fan.”

Michael Burnham on truth serum

Book

Laira Rillak, everyone!

Q&A

season 1 Raffi Musiker

Fleet Admiral and Commander-in-Chief Kirsten Clancy

“You owe me a ship, Picard.”

“You need a feather in your hat.”

Riker greeting Picard

Hugh greeting Picard

the separate trio of Raffi, Clancy, and Deanna all telling Picard he’s shit

Rios singing in Spanish

President Annika Hansen

everybody finding each other in the Confederation Universe

Liam Shaw — a character with incredible highs and lows

Majel Barrett as the computer voice when the crew gets to the Enterprise D

“Somehow I figured you might.”

everything in Ghosts of Illyria

Spock and La’an’s mind meld

Spock and T’Pring in Spock Amok

“You cannot resign. The loss to Enterprise would be unimaginable. To me.”

“If you’re going to steal a starship, do it correctly.”

Neera Ketoul

La’an normalizing needing to eat all the time as a teenager (especially important for girls to hear)

Pike and Una visually checking in with each other so often that it’s in their cartoon versions (that whole episode, actually, including, “Riker!”)

That’s scrolling through episode titles and jotting down stuff I love off the top of my head, fam.✨

Thank you so much for this ask, anon! ❤️ I needed this positive energy in my life.

[liquidatorbruntfca]

in s4 e8 of tng, “Future Imperfect”, when riker loses his memory, and admiral picard is like “to lose 16 years… is almost beyond belief…”

[startreksetplans]

The Galaxy project - new release

Full pdf booklet and individual images of pages:

This is the latest update of my project to reverse engineer blueprints of the studio sets of Star Trek TNG.

This version took a lot time to get out as it was a complete redo from scratch to replace all of the outdated previous version.

Current version: 2023/10/07 - Standard Doors - Turbolift Doors - Future Imperfect Doors - Panels - Straight Arch corridor section - K-Arch - Hathaway Warp Core and warp conduits - Button panels (long and small) - Small capsule Labels - Alcove Console (used in med lab, science lab and many other off-ship locations) - Shuttlebay (series 1& 2) - Shuttlebay (series 3-7) - Holodeck and arch (now including arch panels and Control PADD) - Cargo Bay (cargo lifter and cargo transporter) - Jefferies Junction

Note: there was a format change part way through the project to make things easier for me, so some of the pages are still in the old portrait format. These will be updated to the new format in later editions.

These plans have been produced for non-commercial fan creations / productions. It is not this plan's intention to encourage any commercial activity regarding the Star Trek properties. Star Trek is copyright Paramount Global

[darsynia]

Present Imperfect | Ch. 1: Day One

TONY STARK MASTERLIST | STORY MASTERLIST | NEXT

Summary: After losing Pepper to Extremis, Tony decides to get the shrapnel (and thus his arc reactor) removed-- but he wakes up as President of the United States.

Tony's heart surgery is the last thing he remembers, a worst-case amnesia scenario that leaves the country with a leader who doesn't remember the last year of office, the election, or his marriage to the First Lady, Natasha Romanoff Stark. The country is two days into a national tragedy that's still unfolding, a biological attack on Washington, D.C. that has Tony and his key advisors underground as they coordinate the response-- but nothing about his situation feels right. Is Tony a national leader, a hero poised to save the country with a beautiful and beloved former colleague by his side? Or is he a billionaire superhero in need of rescue? Length/Warnings: 4,311 words // None this chapter

Note: Inspired by a Star Trek: TNG episode about long-term amnesia called Future Imperfect; Tony spends the story unraveling the truth about not just his own situation, but how he relates to someone he's known for years. This story has intrigue, twists, romance, and humor. It is at its heart a tale about two friends who don't truly see each other until that relationship is tested in various ways.

Excerpt:

“You’re not real,” he responds confidently. “I’m probably in a recovery room somewhere, and this--” Tony taps against the metal housing of his arc, under his sleep tee. “--isn’t going to be there when I wake up.”

Nat grabs the bedpost, her expression grave. “Cut it out, Tony.”

“That’s what the surgeons did, yes. No more shrapnel for me.”

The landline phone at his bedside table rings, and before Tony can pick it up to see what his narcotic-fuzzed mind will conjure up, Natasha’s already there. She picks it up and drops the receiver in a single motion.

“The surgery to remove the shrapnel failed five years ago. Are you saying--” she breaks off. Tony’s never seen her like this, casual, fond, half-naked under a fuzzy robe.  

“I’d like to wake up now, is what I’m saying.” He slides his legs over to get up, but Nat doesn’t move away, which is odd. The worried affection on her face is odd, too. “Come on, President of the United States? I’d never be that stupid. National Security Advisor, maybe. All the credit, none of the bullshit accountability.” He stands up to mess with dream!Natasha, but she doesn’t move away. They’re right up against each other, enough that he can smell the spicy sweetness of her shampoo. Fuck, he misses incidentals like that. “We’d need more than five years of build-up for you to be willing to wake up in bed next to me, don’t you think?” Tony says harshly. He actually doesn’t know if that’s true, but he expects her reaction will be pretty revelatory.

Prologue, Christmas Day, 2013:

“Tony, I can’t regulate.”

He can’t let himself understand what she means, at least not before he clears his head. They’re crouched precariously on the ledge below where Pepper had nearly fallen, and he’s sure his ankle is broken. Tony doesn’t know which suit pushed the two of them over here after he’d jumped to catch her, but there’s no way to ask JARVIS. His earpiece fell into the flames below.

“Tony?”

“Give me a minute,” he says, his mind racing. “I gotta tell the suits you’re not a target.”

“I am a target. And Killian’s coming. Tony, promise me--” Pepper says, making a face and looking down, her eyes welling with tears. There’s a finality to her tone that he utterly rejects. Why didn’t he build a comm into his arc?

“It seems like your valiant rescue has warmed the lady’s heart, Stark!” Killian taunts, from across the twisted debris and open space.

He’s right; Pepper has started to glow slightly, her expression turning resolute. 

“I almost figured this out drunk, Pep. Hold on just a couple more hours, okay?” He holds up his hands palm out as if he can stop her with just his will alone, shouting the words to remind their tormentor that Tony has info he needs.

“You don’t have that kind of time!” Killian jeers. He rears his head back and a jet of actual fire projects from his mouth, heating the metal gangway behind them, cutting off any escape.

“Do the suits know to catch you without the earpiece?” Pepper whispers.

Every cell in his body is stubborn iron. “I’m not leaving you.”

“How do you like the hot seat?” Killian asks, as Tony and Pepper scramble toward the edge to escape the heated metal.

“You’ll have comms, once I call one over with this,” she whispers, touching her chest as the eerie bright orange under her skin grows brighter.

“But, you said you couldn’t reg— Pep, Honey, don’t!” He can’t breathe; dread has displaced the air in his lungs. 

Aldrich Killian leaps over, causing the structure to sag with an awful metallic groan. “This is better than live theater! No, no, do go on,” he exhorts, holding his arms wide.

“I love you,” Pepper whispers to Tony fiercely. “Take care of yourself? The company? I need to know you’ll let yourself be happy again.” 

“Shut it down, Pepper. We’ll find another way!” 

All of his suits are fighting elsewhere, too far to risk the jump. Shit.

Pepper’s come to that same conclusion. “This is taking too long. JARVIS, WE NEED YOU!” she screams, standing up.

Killian tsks. “Not sure you want to do that, Potts.”

“No, NO. Get down!” Tony begs desperately. She doesn’t know JARVIS is targeting the Extremis heat signatures-- but that’s just it: Extremis. If he can push her off, she’ll survive. He’ll be able to jump after her, if the approaching light he can see in the distance is what he thinks it is. Mark 42’s whole purpose is to stop him from the fatal fall he dreams about every night.

“Stay back, you arrogant jerk!” Pepper cries out, thrusting out her hand toward Killian. “We just want to live!” she adds, and the obvious lie shoots adrenaline through Tony’s body. He’s burning up-- the metal underneath him is searing, and Pepper’s gone so hot that her pants are burning off of her. His ankle has stopped hurting, probably because of the shock, so Tony forces himself to his feet, bracing himself for her outrage when he pulls them both out into thin air.

“You ready?” he says, directing his words toward Killian, but Pep should know they’re about her.

“As I’ll ever be,” she answers sweetly, still facing their enemy. With a quick look over her shoulder, Pepper says, “Forgive me,” and throws a red-hot hand toward each of them. Her palm strikes his chest hard just above his reactor, launching Tony off of the edge.

The pain from the immediate burn is nothing compared to how much it hurts to watch Pepper sink her other hand into Killian’s chest, pulling out his heart and reducing it to ash in seconds. She’s fighting Tony’s battle for him, and he can do nothing but watch, as he falls. The surface of the water is rapidly approaching, so he plugs his nose, hitting the water right before the heated flare of explosion shoves him deeper. A second later, the familiar comfort of an Iron Man suit encloses his body. Tony shuts his eyes, his soul and body aflame, adrift.

He knows what the explosion was. Pepper’s gone. 

Day One

A gentle hand on his shoulder wakes him up.

“Mr. President? I’m sorry, sir. I let you sleep as long as I could.”

Tony opens his eyes. He’s hearing things, probably thanks to the anesthesia or whatever pain meds they’ve put him on, because his chest doesn’t hurt at all. He scrubs a hand over his face and rolls onto his back.

A strange woman is standing there with an apologetic look on her face.

He jumps back in surprise, scooting up to a seated position and pulling up the sheet in an exaggerated action of pretend modesty. Tony looks at the stranger in a business skirt set standing beside the bed. “Weird outfit for a nurse. I’ll hand it to SHIELD on the level of hospital bed luxury, though.”

“Tony?”

The voice is Natasha’s, and she’s buried in the blankets beside him like she belongs there. As he watches in stunned confusion, she lifts up, blankets falling away from her barely-there nightgown as she reaches a concerned hand toward his forehead. Tony doesn’t move away, even though his instincts tell him to. It’s been so long since anyone touched him. In the months since losing Pepper, he’d lived a monk-like existence, acting more like a recluse widower than his old carefree self.

“Forgive me Mrs. Stark, but the security briefing is in ten minutes, and--”

“It’s fine, Cora, thank you. Tell them he’ll be ten minutes late, will you?” Natasha says briskly. Tony tries to pay attention in the midst of all this confusion because there’s a lot of skin on display here, but, security briefing? Mrs. Stark?? “You can blame it on me, if you like,” she’s saying now. Her tone is loving, playful, and he actually relaxes. It’s obviously a dream. His attention-starved mind has finally lost it. The real Natasha Romanoff will kick his ass if she ever finds out this is what he dreamed about post heart surgery.

Tony folds his arms behind his head and watches as ‘Cora’ picks her way across the small, dark room and opens the door. The hallway beyond looks just as he’d have expected, utilitarian and soulless, logical for a medical facility in the heart of SHIELD. Does that mean he’s hallucinating instead?

“Okay, were you playing dumb to punish Cora for waking you up? I know you’re sick of being stuck down here,” Natasha says, getting up and putting on a robe that hides everything fun about Tony’s bizarre dreamallucination.

“You’re not real,” he responds confidently. “I’m probably in a recovery room somewhere, and this--” Tony taps against the metal housing of his arc, under his sleep tee. “--isn’t going to be there when I wake up.”

Nat grabs the bedpost, her expression grave. “Cut it out, Tony.”

“That’s what the surgeons did, yes. No more shrapnel for me.”

The landline phone at his bedside table rings, and before Tony can pick it up to see what his narcotic-fuzzed mind will conjure up, Natasha’s already there. She picks it up and drops the receiver in a single motion.

“The surgery to remove the shrapnel failed five years ago. Are you saying--” she breaks off. Tony’s never seen her like this, casual, fond, half-naked under a fuzzy robe.  

“I’d like to wake up now, is what I’m saying.” He slides his legs over to get up, but Nat doesn’t move away, which is odd. The worried affection on her face is odd, too. “Come on, President of the United States? I’d never be that stupid. National Security Advisor, maybe. All the credit, none of the bullshit accountability.” He stands up to mess with dream!Natasha, but she doesn’t move away. They’re right up against each other, enough that he can smell the spicy sweetness of her shampoo. Fuck, he misses incidentals like that. “We’d need more than five years of build-up for you to be willing to wake up in bed next to me, don’t you think?” Tony says harshly. He actually doesn’t know if that’s true, but he expects her reaction will be pretty revelatory.

“Don’t sell yourself short, babe,” she says, arching up to press a brief but luscious kiss to his lips. He doesn’t have time to react further, because she sidesteps over to a wardrobe, pulling out a suit and matching shirt. “Hot rod red for the tie? Or are you going to wear the yellow one again and bitch about not getting to see the sun?”

“The latter, obviously,” he says. This… doesn’t feel unfamiliar. “Uh, can we go back to the five years thing? I know this is a dream and you’re just as likely to sprout tentacles as anything else, but--”

Natasha's expression of vulnerability is back. “Get dressed? I think this-- how about I call Rhodey. If it is what I think it is…”

He starts undressing in front of her, but it occurs to him that out of all of the Avengers, Nat can keep her composure through just about anything. So much for trying shock value to jumpstart her out of whatever farce this is.

She’s standing there holding out his shirt, and he needs to put underwear on. “Turn around?”

Her face crumples for a split second, but Natasha blinks and nods, laying the shirt down on the bed. “One sec.” She makes her way past him, holding her hand in a fist as if preventing herself from reaching for him on the way, which is interesting. Lifting the phone, she asks for Rhodey rather than dialing anything.

There’s a tap on the door, accompanied by the words, “Ten minutes,” but Tony’s distracted by the fact that there’s a cover over his arc reactor. He walks the few steps to the narrow mirror atop a small dresser, noting that the cover is fitted, even beautiful, with a circular design not unlike his first model etched in relief on the metal.

“Put this on,” Natasha says as she comes up behind him with his shirt.

“Undershirt?” he objects, but she shakes her head.

“No time. We need you out of the security briefing with no more than five minutes overtime if you want to talk to Rhodes.”

“I thought I was the President! Shouldn’t I get to do what I want?” he teases, knowing full well this is not at all the case.

Her response is sobering (and more confirmation of the unreality of his situation). “There’s a reason why we’re in a tiny room with no windows, Tony. Do me a favor and try not to look surprised at anything you hear at this thing? If you do, play it off, and we’ll get you caught up after.”

He allows himself to be led through the process of dressing, impressed by her competency in using the brief moments in between to put together a killer outfit of her own. Tony’s slipping on his dress shoes when the door flies open with no knock, and the woman from before (Karen? Cara? The jury’s out) comes in. She leads Tony out into the cramped hallway, where two obvious Secret Service agents wait on either side of the door.

“Mechanic’s moving,” one of them says quietly into his wrist.

Tony’s so pleased they’ve chosen that over ‘Superhero’ or ‘Merchant of Death’ that he doesn’t take note of the path across the complex at all.

The security briefing doesn’t run long, which is good, because Tony has to employ every single ounce of acting ability he has not to react with incredulity. He has to repeatedly quash the urge to stand up, throw down the bullshit documentation, and yell that he wants out of the simulation. The problem is, if they really are facing a coordinated biological attack from both foreign and domestic enemies, having a President who seems to have lost his mind in the thick of the response would be absolutely horrific.

Tony crumples the summary briefing page in his hand as he waits in the ‘Bunker Oval’ to speak with Rhodey over a secure connection. The final line on the damned thing is still fucking with him.

The last body has been removed from the White House, so decontamination procedures will be underway by noon.

The landline phone he’s seated beside rings, and Tony lifts the receiver, wishing Nat was in the room to make forbidding faces at him again.

“Hello?”

“Tony! Natasha sent me the keyword, so I’ll skip to that in a minute,” Rhodey says. “But first: how is she, how are you? No one’s sick down there, right? They won’t tell us anything, but D.C. is shut down. Checkpoints to leave, the whole--”

Ordinarily he’d love to hear the difference between what he’d just been told and what’s really happening, but Tony’s on a strict timetable. He interrupts with: “Yeah, I got an update on that just now. I’m set to call the family members of those lost in the White House now that they’ve recovered them all. D.C.’s under quarantine.”

“Seems like a great time to lose all your memory and a shitty time to lead the country!” Rhodey says. Then, his tone sobers. “Tony, for what it’s worth: I’m sorry. What can you remember?”

“I went in for the surgery. I figured if it killed me, it’d be a better look in the obit than the past four months of articles about the Iron Hermit. Woke up the leader of the free world, but… what a world.” He sighs. “My Catholic grandmother would call this purgatory.”

Rhodes whistles under his breath. “You know, right around your wedding to Natasha, we talked about whether you should try to trigger this, set it off and fall in love all over again, so you could schedule it instead of living in fear. You said you didn’t want want to risk losing her.”

Tony realizes belatedly that everything he’s saying is probably being recorded, both in this office and on the line. The resulting sense of responsibility is almost crushing, so he does what he always does when that happens, and sloughs it off. His PR team was great back when he was ‘just’ a billionaire. Now, good PR for him is probably a matter of national security.

“What the hell did Killian do to me, Rhodey?”

“He didn’t. The water did. Some brain-loving organism that went dormant while you were wallowing, right up until the surgery triggered it. Your vitals went haywire. When they got you stabilized, the team decided it was too dangerous to take out the shrapnel. Stress of the surgery, that kind of thing.”

“You’re telling me I never tried to do anything about it? And neither did any of you?”

“We thought you were in the clear!” Rhodes sounds defensive. “Hell, Tony, you ran for President! If that stress wasn’t gonna do it, what would?”

“WWIII, I guess,” Tony says quietly, looking around the room. The recessed lights above two landscape paintings are doing their best window impression alongside the wood paneling, but no shrunken replica of Oval Office furniture in a room with a vaguely curved wall can hide where he really is. “Something inside me wants to reject all of this, Rhodey. They’re saying almost a hundred people are dead, from various locations all around the city!”

“I hear you. Two and a half days in and I’m still in denial,” his friend says. “At least this memory shit got you on the phone. I was worried.”

Tony can’t sit still anymore, but he’s used to JARVIS or a cell phone. It feels very 1990’s teen movie to have to grab the handset to start pacing around.

“You should be here. I don’t know any of these people.”

“I’ve got problems of my own, Tony.”

“What’s more important than supporting your President!” Bitchy and facetious, his favorite way to goad.

 “That’s right, you don’t remember. I turned down all of your appointments, so you punished me by making me the Secretary of the Air Force. Gotta run, Mr. President. I’ll see if they’ll let me deliver the briefing tomorrow.” 

There’s something alarming about how comfortable Rhodey is with the idea that they’ll still need the bunker by this time the next day, but Tony doesn’t get the chance to object before the man he trusts most in the world hangs up.

He needs to think, and he’d kill for a computer and access to JARVIS right now, so Tony keeps the receiver in his hand so they don’t realize the call is over. Whoever they have babysitting him is too smart for that, though, because there’s a knock before a minute passes. 

“Yeah,” he says, already weary.

“Excuse me, Mr. President.” It’s Cora, someone he’s started to dread the sight of for no better reason than she always has an onerous task for him. He nods, and she steps in and closes the door. In a low voice that Tony identifies as discreet, she says, “Sir, I’ve taken the liberty of having the speechwriters come up with some language for the phone calls this afternoon, with the families of the victims? I understand that you are a good public speaker, and you’ve done well with condolences in the past--”

Tony raises his hand and nods, failing in his battle to stop himself from pinching the bridge of his nose. “I get it. Thank you. Have them copy over the text in those files with something else, something very boring, would you?” He holds his hand out for the folder.

Cora hands it over, brows furrowed.

“Erasing it would be against Presidential records law,” he says, clenching his jaw hard when he opens the folder. The list of names is long. “Writing something else over it is just a reasonable mistake made in a time of crisis.” Tony looks up, forces a charming smile. “You-- we worked with these people. We owe that to their families.”

“Yes, Sir.” Her eyes are wet. “Your next meeting is in seventeen minutes. I can come back two minutes before?”

“Good.” She’s almost through the door before Tony realizes that he needs Natasha to help him with the personal touches the scripts have left room for. “Shit. Find Nat for me, will you?”

The figure at the doorway freezes, and it takes him too long to realize why. He lifts up the folder. “The First Lady. Sorry, these…”

Cora bobs a nod that’s almost a curtsey, and leaves.

His next meeting is awful, all bad news. Lunch isn’t much of a highlight, though they have nailed his smoothies to a degree he’s almost jealous over. Despite his repeated requests to speak with Natasha, the hour he’s scheduled to call fifteen families with Presidential condolences looms without a First Lady in sight.

Finally, when Cora reports that there are twenty three minutes until he’ll be connected with the first family on the list, Tony snatches her cell phone out of her pocket and holds it up so it’ll unlock with her shocked expression.

“Wha--”

He sidesteps her half-hearted attempt to retrieve it, opening up the contacts. Once he finds the one designated First Lady, he taps to call her.

When it connects, Tony speaks up right away, still half-certain this is all some sort of elaborate ruse, an April Fool’s joke funded by the Avengers’ overflow slush fund or something. He knows just how to derail them. 

“I resent that there are no kisses scheduled. I feel like they’ve been removed from the schedule, and I demand they be reinstated, starting in…” he looks at his watch, noting that it’s not the prototype he’d been designing with an emergency gauntlet and EMP pulse built-in. He’ll have to look more closely later. “Two minutes.”

With that, Tony ends the call, tossing the phone at a flabbergasted Cora, who nearly drops it. “That’ll be all, Jeeves.”

Tony paces as he waits, having foregone reading most of the platitudes in favor of speaking the names aloud using the special pronunciation cues so he can mark down the ones he's struggling to get right. Even if this is a fever dream, he doesn’t want to fuck with people’s worst memories just because he’s lost a chunk of his own.

The door flies open without preamble, leaving everyone in the desk-filled ante-chamber the chance to see the supposed First Lady of the United States stalk into her husband’s private room, grab him by his ugly yellow tie, and plant a brief but rough kiss on his lips.

“You realize I was on the phone with the Australian PM, right? Coordinating the MOM response?” she demands, letting go of him so she can shove the door shut.

Tony blinks at her. He’d been sure she wouldn’t kiss him at all, but figured if there was some kind of set up, he would at least get to enjoy a ‘dedicated to the bit’ kiss before telling her the gig was up. What Natasha did instead was more confusing, but so was his body’s reaction to it.

No time for that right now, though.

“Marmite Only, Mate?” he guesses, before snagging the folder with the names he needs to ask about.

“Multinational Organizatio--” Nat breaks off, frowning at him. “Right, never mind. What did you need, Cora told me ten minutes.”

“I’d take that as a challenge, but these people don’t seem to want to knock, so…” he dangles. Tony’s fifty percent sure this is all bullshit, and it’s worth it to him to chip away at everything that’s going on, just in case it is. He hands her the folder. “Whether this is real or not, it’s not worth risking giving these families trauma to make a point. Will you help me do this right?”

Nat’s brows furrow for a split second, but she doesn’t look guilty, just surprised. “Of course,” she says, dragging over a chair. Pointing to the Presidential chair of comfy overkill, she adds, “Sit.”

His lips twitching with amusement, Tony settles into the desk chair. Her aggressive affection is endearing enough as it is, but her ability to shift into professional-mode is impressive. Natasha goes over the correct pronunciations with him, adding a mentionable personal detail about each lost staff member as she does so, finishing just in time for the first call.

Though he’s struggling with finding the entire situation credible, the condolence calls are persuasive; these people are more than just names on a list, and the grief in the voices of their families sound so real that he falters in his task once or twice.

Each time, Natasha Roma-- Natasha Stark is right there beside him, silently supporting him in his task by squeezing his hand so hard he’s more worried about broken fingers than broken platitudes.

His schedule is solid right up until 11 PM. Tony gets into the ‘Presidential Suite’ at 11:05 to find Natasha asleep in a fire-haired huddle on ‘her’ side of the bed. Tony had been hoping to speak to her in quiet, hopefully un-recorded whispers, but he opts for a quick shower, instead.

The bathroom is laughably small, and the light in there is strangely dim for being in a bunker without access to natural light. The first thing he does is spend time examining the cage of metal around his arc, but it’s just too dark and cramped to get a good view of the thing. It’s obviously not designed to come off, meaning it's either a weak link in whatever treachery is going on, or there’s some security risk to the glow or resonance it gives off.

Tony supposes that if your world leader action figure comes complete with enough volatile substance for a dirty bomb, that’s probably reason enough to make it hard to access.

He gives up after his third yawn, stripping naked and stepping in. The water gets hot pretty quickly, and the towels are high quality, so that’s something. Tony doesn’t bother to be thorough, enjoying instead the feeling of the hot water and privacy. 

When he starts drying off, he sees that his left inner elbow looks strange and feels tender to the fingertip. What’s more, when he drags his fingernails over the area, they come away with flesh-colored gunk underneath.

Tony grips the sink with both hands, suddenly wide awake. He runs the water, grabbing a wad of toilet paper instead of the tan washcloth he’d been given. The first swipe shows a vague peach color, and after he tosses that in the toilet and lathers up the area, the wet TP is smudged with what has to be skin-colored makeup.

On close examination, the area underneath is lightly bruised.

Tony flushes the second wad, his heart pounding. He dresses in a t-shirt and sweatpants, glad for the darkness in the bedroom that hides the part of his arm he's scrubbed raw. They’d put in an IV before administering the anesthetic, of course, but though he lies there in the dark for a long time thinking about it, Tony can’t remember where it had been located.

He decides to continue pushing buttons, but keep his discovery to himself. One thing is certain: he’s in danger, whether it’s from external lies or falsehoods from his own mind.

Next chapter...

[spockvarietyhour]

The return of the stand-up jefferies tube!

Star Trek V and TNG had stand up access corridors/jefferies tubes before the crawlways were introduced:

Also that TNG set was reused a few episodes later in "Sins of the Father"

and in the season 4 episode "Future Imperfect", this time as a (fake) Romulan base.

[thegeminisage]

ok, belated tng update time. idr what day it was (monday?) but we did "remember me" and "legacy."

remember me: THIS RULED!!! i absolutely cannot believe that 1. they give beverly crusher nothing to do ever 2. she was almost KICKED OFF THE SHOW FOREVER? 3. i used to dislike her so much. when you give this woman half a chance she totally, absolutely steals the show. not only can she act in the most technical sense, but beverly herself can be stubborn and brave in the face of danger and she is SO MUCH MORE than Just A Mom! (tm) which is all we were getting from her for season 1. and then in season 3 she really only got a few chances to show her stuff, most notably the terrorism episode, which is a bummer cuz that was not the best episode but SHE was great in it. and she was also also in this

the point being i want more of her being cool and good. i really loved everything she had going on here. running around and talking like a crazy person and not ONCE (ok, one time) did anyone suggest she was crazy. they just believed her!

WHICH IS NUTS BECAUSE IT TURNED OUT SHE LITERALLY WAS CRAZY. like it all happened that way bc she got too deep in her cups about her dead husband

speaking of: the plot twist in this episode. mwah. so good. and she was so smart to figure it out on her own where they couldn't help her, and it was so smart that EYE also was tricked but it didn't feel like unfair trickery. because i knew SOMETHING had happened.

the whole episode was just so spooky and cool, i was on the edge of my seat every minute, it never felt too slow or rushed, it was perfect

anyway support women. support women in the medical field. support women in the workplace. support women with sons who trap them in warp bubbles.

legacy: once again we dishonor the memory of tasha yar...not really but it BROKE me knowing she DIED FOR SOMETHING but nobody in this timeline would remember that!!!!!!!!

i like her sister honeypotting data. he literally almost bagged both yar girls and good for him

once again: rape gangs mention. it's been so long. after all this it was almost disappointing not to see them. almost.

actually though it's really fucked up that tasha just left her and revenge would've been a good motivator...but in some ways, it's even more fucked up that it wasn't. like she just doesn't care. she doesn't care about anything but her shitty gang war on this shitty planet, and goes back to it and (i looked it up) never appears in canon again. that's just her life. sister left and then died for nothing and she will also die for nothing and data will carry around that little holographic photo and now that bomb implant for the rest of his little android life. wack.

NEXT TIME: "reunion" and "future imperfect."

[gayfour]

I designed some starfleet rank/combadges!!!!!

And then i made them in real life!!!!

The original design is inspired by the tng era badges and rank pips and also the "future imperfect" badges which also had rank built into them, the pips on the badge have the same meaning as the collar ones in the shows, with gold being a regular pip and silver being the black one. The ones i made are made of metalic effect Fimo polymer clay, and I don't think I've quite done justice to my original design but I still like them!

If anyone wants to use this design for art or whatever then please do, and please show me it, id love to see it!!

[geekcastradionetwork]

Reviewing Discovery S3, Episodes 10-13

In this episode of “Future Imperfect,” Admiral Phillips returns with Birdman and Alex from ThisWeekinGeek and Aaron Pollyea to discuss Star Trek Discovery Season 3, Episodes 10-13! Trainwreck aside, we’re glad it’s over…for now. Next time, we get to explore favorite episodes of TNG Season 1. All this and more on Future Imperfect!