milliways_bar | Entrance post

Entrance post

Naraht is heading down to the conference room reserved for the Enterprise's weekly briefing for the Science Department. All in all, he'd much rather be tunneling. Lt. Peck is handling the meeting today and is capable of sucking all interest out of a discussion and boring just about every sentient life-form the Federation has encountered to tears (or the nearest biological equivalent).

So his joy was understandable when the door let him into Milliways instead.

"Wha...YES! FREEDOM!"

He makes a bee-line for the Bar. "A quarter kilo of graphite, please," he says. "And I must say, Bar, you are a sight for sore radiation recievers."

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It's hard not to notice a small land mass on near-collision course for the Bar. Ray looks over as he gets his usual soda and grins. "Good to see you again, Naraht," he says. "Long day?"

Naraht grabs the graphite as it appears with all the enthusiasm a drowning man would give a live preserver.

"You have no idea, Ray," he says. "Debug this, troubleshoot that. 'Oh, Naraht, could you please eat some of this strange mineral conglomerate and tell us what's in it?'"

He takes a huge bite of the graphite. "I'm so glad to find my way here. The last thing I needed was to be forced to listen to Peck drone on for two and a half hours."

Ray was going to say something about the eating part, but the last bit of Naraht's tirade caught his attention first. "Peck?" he asked suspiciously. "Let me guess- red hair, pale skin, slightly bulgy eyes?"

Naraht pauses in his munching. "Well, it's hard for me to make that fine a distinction in human coloration, but I believe his personel file has him as having alburn hair. And several of my fellow crewmen call him 'Froggie' behind his back. Why do you ask?"

Ray pinches the bridge of his nose. "Because one Walter Peck of the Environmental Protection Agency nearly destroyed our firehouse- and the entire city of New York- when he insisted on shutting down our containment grid. He's an absolute sphincter, if the terminology translates for your people at all, and frankly I wouldn't be the one to cry if I found out that the Barman's exploits as a mad bomber happened to blow Walter Peck over a five-county radius. Unfortunately, it sounds like he might have a descendant in your day, so his DNA's still out there somewhere by the smell of it."

Naraht winces. "Sounds depressingly familiar. Lt. Commander Wallace Peck is in charge of Enviornmental Impact Minimization...and I believe the correct terms are 'mulish, dull and hasn't the sense God gave a hamster'. There has been a theory going around that he is an anthropomorphic personification of Entropy itself."

Naraht sighs. "All I know is, when he chairs a briefing, I can feel my very lava hardening from the tedium. Fortunately, the higher ups generally keep him out of our hair. Except for the damned EIM briefings."

"Yeah," says Ray wearily. "Yeah, that's him. I think I need to tell Barry about this. We were speculating on the existence of different people at different points along the timeline across the multiverse just today. Never really thought the absolute jackoffs would be included in that along with the good guys."

"But why should the multiverse be partial to 'good guys'?" Naraht asks. "Hideously unfair and annoying as it is, the Universe seems to be no respecter of persons...Or perhaps it is more a need for balance if you hold to the idea that Good and Evil cannot be created or destroyed ultimately."

He chuckles a bit. "Though, in this case, it would be more Pleasantness and Annoyance than Good and Evil."

"It had very little to do with balance. MOre to do with a story I'd read about a particular hero from twentieth-century Terran fiction, who happens to be real in Barry's world. A multiversal traveler came to Batman in one of these stories and told him that every twenty years, in one world or another, the murder of his parents happened and set that world's version of him on the road to becoming the avenging hero Batman, and did he want the opportunity to go to the world where it was going to happen within a few days' time and maybe change it. Barry was speculating about that and what it might mean about the Universe and heroes."

"Hmmm...Perhaps I should be on the look-out for a Raymond Stantz coming out of Starfleet Academy soon," he says, only half joking.

"I've already asked a woman who's here from the twelfth century CE of my planet to look for anyone with my last name on the rolls of the synagogues or academies of Prague," Ray says. "Why not keep an eye on the future, too? I'm almost completely certain the Spengler line survives into your time and beyond in at least one alternate future, though the name's gone after five hundred years."

Naraht makes a mental note to do a geneology search when he gets back...if he survives the Peck Briefing.

"It may be a challenge. A great many records were lost in your planet's Eugenics Wars. And I have also heard that a great many people assumed new names to avoid...unpleasantness."

Amusement creeps into his tone. "But I will keep an eye out for anyone who has a resemblance to you. Or to Dr. Venkman."

Ray nods. "Q told me about some of the other unpleasantness lurking in the future," he says. "Like I said, though, I'm not fazed by the name being lost. I know a Spengler when I talk with one, even if her family name is Tam."

"As Shakespeare said, 'A rose by any other name would still smell as sweet'. However, when you start calling roses lilies, it can make tracing hortacultural records difficult."

He winces as his mind plays back his last sentence. "Damn, I actually said that word."

Let's just say that Naraht's had it up to his dome with jokes about his gardening ability.

"It helps if you pronounce it properly," Ray suggests. "There's an 'i' in there. Horticultural. Not such a problem."

"Unfortunately, it has been the punchline of so many jokes in my presence that the misproununciation has burned its way into my brain," Naraht says in disgust. "Moving on to more pleasant topics of conversation, did I miss anything interesting while I was away?"

Ray thinks. "There's a lot of interesting to go around," he says. "I met one of the founding fathers of my country the other day, and I think I gave the poor guy something of a shock when I told him just how potent America had become since his time. Uh, and ... I forget, were you here when I met Claudius?"

Naraht thinks. "Oh yes! You mentioned him to me. Student of ancient languages from ancient Rome. Have you seen him since?"

"Afraid not. Just thought I'd check and see if I'd mentioned him. Uh... oh, Peter says he got engaged to Dana, don't know if you heard about that..."

"Oh, really!" Naraht says, delighted. "That is very good news."

He was quite pleased that Peter had managed to overcome his misgivings. "Have they set a date?"

"Not yet that I know of," Ray admits. "He gave her two of the synthetic opals I made in the process of learning how to produce photonic crystals instead of a ring- I think they're using one to pay to have the other set in some kind of band, since it's traditional in our country to mark an engagement that way. I'm a little surprised that he got to that kind of token exchange, frankly, but hey, more power to him."

"Well, it appears that our dear Dr. Venkman has done some extenisve re-thinking of his life," he says, raising his graphite in a toast. "To their happiness. After all, the two of them will have some major issues to face."

Naraht wonders if Peter has done full disclosure to his friends back home and to his fiance. If Peter hasn't, Naraht hopes he will very soon.

Ray nods and raises his own glass, since clinking glass and stone together is probably not all that practical. "He told me he talked over a lot of those with Dana, actually," he says. "Partly because he was afraid of what might be lurking in the genome of any kids they might have, partly because Dana's already taken quite a few hits from the supernatural. I kind of wish I could've been a fly on the wall for that conversation, I have to say."

"Very good. My species doesn't reproduce in the same manner as yours, but I should think that the time to discuss such things is before one begins the reproductive process. Not when one is about to give birth."

"Believe it or not, he's been worried about that since before he came un-Bound," Ray says. "He said he didn't want his children to be freaks, which is a word I wish he'd stop using, but since we don't know if the abilities would manifest at all without outside stimuli,it's kind of hard to tell."

"Uncertainty. I imagine that would be unsettling for any prospective parent," Naraht says. "However, when last we spoke, I think I managed to get him past the 'freak' bit." If you think he seems a little smug, you would be right. "I asked him who tended to make the most difference in the world? The normal people or the misfits."

"Good," says Ray firmly. "He wasn't listening to me. I'm glad someone was able to get through to him- I was beginning to think I'd have to crack his skull to let the light in."

"I suppose that sometimes you have to hear something from two different sources before you can believe it," Naraht suggests. "And I don't believe you can get more different than the two of us."

"Well, we could," Ray says, "but one of us would have to breathe hydrogen to do it."

Naraht laughs.

"Oh, I can almost do that. Of course, it has an affect similar to nitrogen narcosis in humans."

"I was referring to a science-fiction series in my world called the Uplift Saga," Ray says. "All life in that civilization, except for humans and the semi-mythical Progenitors, was brought to full sapience by older, sponsor races. The Civilization of the FIve Galaxies divided life into Orders- Oxygen Breathers, Hydrogen Breathers, Retired, Transcendent, Machine, Memetic. Most of the ones in Retired, Transcendent and so on didn't interact with the rest of the galaxies, though."

"Ahhh...somewhat of the antithesis of the Prime Directive, I see."

He adds that series to his list of "books from other universes to read".

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