A/N: In honor of Star Trek's 50th Anniversary, I wrote this little piece. I wanted to go on a glorious rant about how Star Trek examines humanity through the lens of the future, that in this time of dystopian predictions, there is still light in the world...but this strange little crossover came out instead. :)
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James T. Kirk wasn't having a very good day. Their latest mission had gotten three of his crew killed, through no fault of anybody but chance. He couldn't even blame himself for it, and that made it kind of worse. McCoy was talking to his daughter over subspace comm. Spock was on date night with Uhura, somewhere around the base. Scotty was rebuilding something or other. Everyone else was equally busy. So here he was, sitting in the corner of this seedy little bar, alone. He poured himself another shot of Saurian brandy.
"You know, a man drinking alone is the saddest sight there is," a snooty voice informed Kirk, and a man in a black and red outfit plopped into the seat next to him. He procured a glass from somewhere.
Kirk grudgingly poured some in the tumbler. "When a man usually drinks alone, it means he wants to be left alone."
The man waved his objection away lazily. "Not today, Captain." He eyed the captain curiously. "You know, your eyes are very interesting."
Kirk gave him a sideways glance. "If you're trying to flirt with me, it's not working."
"No, no, I'm pretty sure that's against the law of the universe. I'm just saying, in another time, your eyes were a wonderful shade of hazel."
Kirk's eyes narrowed suspiciously as he stared at this stranger. His eyes were drawn by a stylized Star Fleet insignia on the strange man's jacket. "Are you with Star Fleet?"
"Vaguely," the man replied. "I'm sort of what you might call a consultant."
"Hm." Kirk took another sip of his brandy and tried to ignore him.
"Three dead, four injured," the stranger said, a few minutes later. "Not as bad as it could have been."
Kirk flinched violently and nearly spilled his drink. "How do you know about that?"
"I know a lot of things."
Kirk gulped the rest of his drink. "They shouldn't have died."
"Maybe not," the stranger said, "but they died, and you're going to move on, and give their lives meaning, and you're going to change and grow as a person and a species and a Federation. Blah, blah, blah."
Kirk found himself getting angry on behalf of his dead crewmembers. "It's not something to be taking lightly. My crew-"
"Well it's not about you," the stranger retorted nastily. "It has never been about you, Jim Kirk. You, or your father, or Spock, or Nero, or Khan, or Jean-Luc Picard, or Kathryn Janeway for that matter. It's not about the Borg or the Romulans or the Klingons or the Cardassians or the Bajorans or the Xindi or the time travel or the Dominion or Species 8472 or the Krenim or anyone." He gulped down the brandy, made a face. "It's about humanity's eternal struggle to better themselves, to make it to the big leagues, to grow and change and find a way to inspire future generations to make something of themselves. To get over all that petty fighting and prejudice and emphasis on material possessions. Ugh. I sound like such a sap. I think Picard's rubbing off on me. Quick, check my hair."
Kirk stared at this man, this somewhat-consultant. "Who are you?" he asked.
"To you? Absolutely nobody. To a few of your fellow starship captains? Judge, jury, nemesis, and may I add, provider of favorite godsons."
"Give me a name," Kirk demanded.
"Q." The man gave him a lazy salute. "I very much doubt we'll be seeing each other again, Captain, but let me give you one piece of advice. Don't let them promote you. It's horrible for a person's health." He held up a hand, snapped his fingers, and was gone in a flash of light.
Kirk blinked, squinted, and glanced around the bar to see if anyone else had seen what had happened. Nobody seemed to have moved. He frowned, wondered if he should call Spock to see if they could detect any transporter traces, and decided against it. He was not in the mood to deal with strange entities calling themselves a letter of the alphabet.
As he sipped his last glass of brandy (he was a responsible officer, thank you very much), he pondered what Q had told him. It wasn't about him, not really. It was about Star Fleet. It was about the Federation, living up to the ideals they professed in their charter, showing the galaxy what humanity's best could look like. His three dead crewmembers had died believing in that, and hopefully, Kirk and his crew would continue to uphold those ideals.
Kirk finished his last sip and stood up. There were better things to do than brood in a corner.
From a dimension two levels to the right and a smidge forward, Q grinned. "Space, the final frontier, he intoned, going back to his home universe. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. To explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, and to boldly go where no one has gone before."