"Hikaru, look at this."
Sulu paused with his watering can hovering in mid-pour over a window box of blue blossoming zanthia vines, and glanced over his shoulder at Yeoman Janice Rand.
Janice had been feeding the exotic plants in the horticulture bay, the ones with the special diets. Gertrude, the plant that most resembled a human hand, had flipped over "palm up" while Rand petted and stroked her.
"Beauregard loves me," Janice said, cooing like a dove. She went into baby talk. "I told you this plant was a boy. Just look at him. Does Janice know how to scratch Beauregard? Yes! Yes, she does!" She made kissy noises.
"She does like you, Janice," Sulu said with a smile. "But that plant is female."
"How do you know?"
"The salesman assured me—"
Janice flapped a dismissive hand at him. "What does a salesman know?" She continued to coo and scratch the plant lovingly.
Sulu put down his watering can and turned on the growth light over the vines. "We're finished here. Let's get to the rec room. Uhura's going to be singing in a few minutes. We don't want to miss that."
Janice gave Beauregard a final caress and amicably hooked her arm in Hikaru's. "One day, you'll see. Beauregard will blossom, and then you'll believe me."
Sulu turned out the lights. "That'll be the day," he said with a laugh.
"Bye, Beauregard," Janice said, wiggling her fingers at the plant as they left.
G.B., as the plant preferred to call itself, waited for the vibrations of its caretaker's footsteps to disappear. Indigenous of a jungle where plant eating animals abounded, its movement detecting senses were acute. When it could no longer feel the vibrations, it threw itself slightly forward and tipped its container over. Bracing its weight on the tips of its branches, it flipped its bottom up waited for the deluge of loose dirt to stop showering down from its pot and walked on "fingertips" to the edge of the table, then pushed off the ledge, and hopped down to the chair. Soon he was on the floor.
When G.B. was first brought aboard the Enterprise, it resented the fact that its bottom half had been encased in a pot of dirt. It missed the jungle where its roots would intertwine with others of its species and with the larger root systems of trees and shrubs.
In those first weeks, G.B. was depressed being confined to such a small space, but the discovery of mobility forever changed the way it viewed its existence. It could explore and roam all over the ship and no one suspected it of anything. It was, after all, just a plant. If someone found G.B. where it shouldn't be, they exclaimed: "Hey! Who put the hand plant in my quarters?" The crew took it as a running gag. A prank.
Now G.B. thought of pranks all on its own, and it was pleased with its cleverness. Tonight's victim would be its favorite crewman of all, Janice Rand.
"I wish I could sing like that," Janice said later that night. Sulu had walked with her to her quarters after the mini concert. "Uhura may have missed her calling," Janice continued. "Her voice was beautiful tonight. I bet she has perfect pitch."
"I know she does," Sulu said, his eyes dreamy.
Janice leveled her gaze on him for a second. "Why Sulu, you're infatuated!"
He fidgeted and cleared his throat. "I just like her voice, that's all."
She nodded and lowered her chin slightly. "I see." She activated her door, a playful smile on her face. "Goodnight, Sulu, you devil."
"Goodnight." He walked down the hall whistling a happy tune.
Janice had to laugh as she stepped into her quarters. What a nice couple Sulu and Uhura would make. On their wedding day, Janice imagined Uhura would wear traditional Swahili dress. How beautiful she would be!
She sighed dreamily imagining what a wonderful wedding it would be and was already ten steps into her quarters before she realized her lights hadn't activated.
She went back to the door, waved her hand over the motion sensors. Nothing. Not a shred of light anywhere.
"Computer, Lights!"
Still nothing.
She moved to her knick-knack shelf and felt around for the emergency flashlight.
Finding the handle, she wrapped her fingers around it and switched it on.
Then she screamed.
There before her was a ghostly disembodied hand jutting out of the shelf, screeching and flailing like a thing gone mad.
"Sulu!" she shrieked.
"I don't know what's gotten into you lately," Sulu said, reprimanding G.B. like a father would a spoiled child. He carried the plant back to its pot on the plant shelf. "You'd better learn to behave or else the Captain will make me drop you off at the nearest star base, or worse he just might beam you onto the bridge of a Klingon battle cruiser or something. You don't want that do you?"
G.B. chirped and flipped palm up in a sort of shrug.
Sulu stroked G.B. for a moment, and G.B. purred.
"Sleep, Gertrude," he told it with a shake of a finger. "Don't leave this shelf!"
G.B. chirped again, and Sulu nodded as if satisfied he'd gotten through to the plant on the proper behavior expected of it.
Sulu turned out the lights before he left, pausing at the door to look back.
G.B. waited on the shelf as still as could be. I'm just a potted plant, Mr. Sulu. Just a potted plant.
Sulu finally left the room.
The room was quiet and still. G.B. hated the other plants. They never got into trouble. They were boring. G.B. flipped upside down again, shook of the loose dirt and wondered what it would find going on in the rec room at this hour.
It was way too early in the morning for such a crowd to be gathered in the rec room, but rumors of the spectacle spread like wildfire. Last night, the hand plant had come in and challenged Mr. Spock to a game of chess. At 06:00 it was still going on.
"Don't worry Mr. Spock. You can do it," Chekov said. "You can beat a potted plant." the young Russian had bet more than he should have on Spock winning and was now concerned that he would have to pay up.
"Worry," said Spock, with his hand steepled in front of his chin. "Is a human emotional response." He moved his knight up two levels. "I shall have the plant mated in three moves."
G.B. which had been playing listlessly as if it were bored, perked up at this comment. It jerked a "thumb" upward.
Janice Rand, who had since entering the rec room become the plant's chess assistant, grabbed the pot that held G.B. and lifted it up to the third level.
G.B. balled up into a fist and moved its knuckles side to side as if perusing the board for the best move, then picked up a rook and moved it. When G. B. made an o.k. sign with thumb and forefinger, Janice placed him back on the table.
The plant opened its palm. Your move.
Spock lifted a brow. "An unlikely move. Fascinating. Either this plant is a genius and is trying to throw off my game, or it is completely devoid of intelligence making haphazard but correct moves until now."
G.B. balked, spreading out all fingers in a gesture of surprise and outrage.
"I believe you've just insulted the plant, Mr. Spock," Chekov remarked.
Spock moved a pawn forward and glanced up. "Your move."
G.B. flipped a dismissive gesture at the Vulcan and folded up, pulling itself deep into its stalk and disappearing.
Janice stroked the outside layers of the plant. "Come back out, Beauregard. He didn't mean it as an insult…just an observation."
"Yes!" Chekov said. "Come out and finish the game, you coward!"
G.B. ventured out only to make a frightful clawing gesture at Chekov and shrank back again.
"Now you've done it," Janice said in reprimand. "He won't come back out now."
"Then the game is forfeited. The plant has lost," Spock announced arms folded across his chest in satisfaction.
The crowd began to disperse, muttering, "Good job, Chekov. Yeah. Way to go."
"It's not my fault!" Chekov told them. "It's that Cossack of a plant!"
Sulu came forward when the crowd thinned. "I never knew she could play chess."
"And so well, too," Janice added.
G.B. heard this and ventured out again. It made a "come closer" gesture by crooking its index finger at her. Janice leaned forward.
G.B. reached behind her ear and pulled out a coin, offering it to her before slipping back into its stalk.
Janice gasped and held the coin for all to see.
"Slight of hand," Sulu said. "I wonder where she learned that?"
"It's a he, Sulu. How many times do I have to tell you?" Janice said. "And very moody. It's as if he's doing these things to prove himself somehow."
Spock, who had remained at the chess game still sat in thought. "Perhaps it is lonely. You say it is female, Mr. Sulu, and Yeoman Rand claims it is male. Perhaps it would be satisfied if you purchased another plant to keep it amused. Preferably a plant of its own species and of the opposite gender. Whichever that turns out to be."
Sulu looked at Rand. Rand looked at Sulu. They both looked at G.B.
Sulu shrugged. "It's worth a shot."
That evening, Sulu sat in front of his computer and shopped. G.B. sat beside him and watched the pictures click by on the screen. So many plants!
Mail order mates.
Sulu wondered if he were doing the right thing. What if Gertrude and this new plant had offspring? There would be more hands on the ship.
More trouble?
He looked at his plant. "If I do this," he said, "You have to stop being a nuisance. No more roaming around the decks."
G.B. nodded, eager to get on with the shopping.
Sulu sighed. Smiled.
Parenting a potted plant, who would have thought it?
"Well, at least now, by selecting your mate," Sulu said, "We'll find out for sure whether you're a Gertrude or a Beauregard."
Or both, thought G.B. gazing up at him.