Work Text:
“Space. The final frontier”, a woman’s voice says as the screen shows a black background full of stars, with an impressive ship slowly coming into view. “This is my voyage aboard the starship Enterprised. A voyage is like a normal journey, but the producers have told me to say voyage because it’s French and makes me sound fancier. My two-day mission is to explore this enormous metal thing, to seek out the losers that work on it, to boldly go where a thousand people live, apparently”.
Some orchestral music plays over the next montage: a few clips showing a woman in a long coat and a ponytail stepping onto a small transporter (possibly inside a shuttle), then appearing in a bigger transporter room and tripping after missing the step as she walks off the pad. Finally, as the music swells, we see her walking slowly down a modern hallway and saying: “This is Cunk on the Enterprised”.
The scene changes. Now we’re in the captain’s ready room. Some text on screen labels the man sitting behind the desk, his bald head reflecting the lights, as ‘Captain Jean-Luc Picard’. Philomena Cunk sits across him, and begins the conversation:
“So you're the captain of the Enterprised”.
“Actually, it's the Enterprise D, not the Enterprised”, he corrects politely.
“What does the D stand for? Daniel?”
Picard looks confused.
“Who is Daniel?”
“I don’t know, that’s why I’m asking”.
The captain pauses for a second, and then answers, slowly:
“No, the D just indicates which iteration of the ship this is. There have been other Starfleet ships called ‘Enterprise’ before”.
“Wouldn’t it be less confusing to just name them all different things?”
“I…” Picard tries to think of how to explain it, but apparently gives up soon. “Captains don’t choose the ship names, you’d have to ask Starfleet Command about that”.
With this, the interview ends, and now we see Philomena Cunk standing on the bridge, a man next to her with some text reading ‘William T. Riker, first officer’ under him.
“We are now going to take a quick tour of the bridge, the place from where the entire ship is controlled and the big decisions are made. The ship’s first officer will lead the way”.
“Of course”, Riker says with a charming smile. He walks calmly to the back of the bridge, with Philomena and the camera following him. “So here we have the science and engineering stations”, he explains, as he shows the different panels, careful to avoid the officers that are working on them. “And over here we have security and comms. Coming down on this side you can see the turbolifts and the door to the captain's ready room”. He then walks towards the front of the room. “This is the main screen, and right in front of it is navigation. And, if you come to the centre of the room, you can see the captain’s chair, and on its sides are mine and the one where our ship’s counselor usually sits”, he finishes with another smile.
“They seem comfortable enough”, Philomena mutters under her breath. “But where’s the river?”
“River?”
“Everyone knows bridges are the things that you use to cross rivers”.
“Oh, I think you got confused there”, Riker replies with a polite chuckle. “This is a different kind of bridge. There aren’t any rivers here”.
“Not even one of those crappy little streams?”
“No, sorry. If you really want to see a river, you can always visit the holodeck”.
“No, it’s fine”, Philomena replies, even though she sounds very clearly upset. Then, we hear her voice over some B-roll of people walking around the ship:
“With disappointments like this happening every day on the Enterprised, it’s no surprise there needs to be someone aboard whose job is to worry about the crew’s mental health”.
Now the camera is filming inside another office, where Philomena sits on a couch in front of a woman, ‘Deanna Troi, ship’s counselor’.
“I’ve been told you can sense other people’s emotions”.
“Yes, I am half Betazoid, so I possess empathic abilities”.
“So you’re like a human mood ring”. That makes Troi stop and think for a second.
“Well, it’s a bit more complicated than that but, yes, I guess you could see it that way”.
“Then if you physically wrapped yourself around someone, giving a hug for example, would that make you a literal mood ring? Or, well, a mood belt. Or a mood hula hoop if you didn’t like them very much and didn’t actually wanna touch them a lot”.
“Um… Well, physical touch doesn’t really affect my empathic abilities. For some species, however, it is essential for empathic or telepathic contact, for example the Vulcan mind meld”.
“Yes, I know that, but that wasn’t really my question. What I really wanted to know is, have you ever actually felt like a mood hula hoop?”
“I wasn’t even aware those existed, so… no, I don’t think so”.
“Oh. Okay”.
Back to Philomena’s voice over short clips of people walking all over the ship:
“The Enterprised has a very diverse crew, with people of different races, planets, genders, shoe sizes and strange sexual customs. However, they all have one thing in common: they worked hard to become part of Starfleet. Unless, of course, your mom happens to be the chief medical officer, and allegedly has a relationship with the captain that goes well beyond the strictly professional”.
Now we are in what looks like officer’s quarters, our presenter sitting with ‘Wesley Crusher, acting ensign’.
“So, how does it feel to be the youngest officer on the Federation’s flagship?”
“There’s definitely a lot of pressure, but it’s very exciting”, Wesley replies with a smile.
“And how does it feel to have achieved that purely because of nepotism?” Philomena asks matter-of-factly, but the boy looks obviously taken aback by the question.
“Well, I… Look, I’m aware that without my mom I probably wouldn’t have gotten this, but I think that without my own efforts and achievements I wouldn’t have gotten it either”.
“That’s exactly what a nepo baby would say”.
The camera pans to a slightly shocked Wesley, but, before he can reply, cuts to Philomena strolling down a hallway.
“We’ve already learned how the crew’s mental health is taken care of, so it’s time to learn about their physical health. We are about to enter the bay of the sick…” She says, walking up to a door and almost walking straight into it. “Oh, I thought all the doors here were automatic…”
While she tries to get it open (at first on her own, then with the help of a sound operator that walks into frame), we can hear some voices coming from sickbay, muffled but still clear enough for us to be able to make out some words:
“I’m so tired, mom!... It’s always… and ‘shut up, Wesley’... now this…”
“It's okay… Hold on, I have to…”
The door finally opens and ‘Beverly Crusher, chief medical officer’ appears.
“Yes?” she asks.
“We’re here for the documentary”.
“Oh, yes, just… give me a minute. I have to deal with a… patient”.
“Okay, we’ll head to engineering first”.
The camera cuts to Philomea standing in front of a big column, shining with blue light and circled by a metal handrail. In the background, a man seems to be making adjustments on a nearby panel.
“This is the warp core, possibly the most important part of the ship. Without it, the Enterprised wouldn’t be able to move faster than the speed of light, and therefore it wouldn’t be able to boldly go anywhere. The warp core functions because it’s full of very small people that run really really fast and…”
“What?” The man who was previously working on the panel turns around and walks closer to the camera. “No, that’s not right”.
“How do you know that? Have you ever been inside the warp core while it’s working?”
“No, no one should get into the warp core while it’s working, that’s very dangerous. Really, don’t do that” he insists after Philomena directs a curious look towards the warp core. “But I am the chief of engineering, so I think I know what I’m talking about”. Indeed, the name ‘Geordi LaForge, chief engineer’ appears on screen next to him.
“Well, respecting different beliefs is a value of Starfleet”, Philomena adds. Geordi makes a confused face as the camera pans past him and follows Philomena towards another zone of the engineering section.
She soon comes across ‘Lieutenant Commander Data’, who is standing over a table covered in touchscreens and blinking lights.
“This is Data, and he might look like a normal man with sparkly face paint, but he’s actually a robot”.
“Actually, I am an android”, he corrects politely, raising his gaze from the panel.
“Android? And why not an iPhone?”
Data cocks his head slightly, as if trying to remember something. After a second, he replies:
“Ah. You are referring to Earth technology brands from the early 21st century. I have no relation to either of those, as I was created by doctor Soong”.
“Oh, okay. I’ve heard you are the first self-conscious robot. Why are you insecure?”
“I am not self-conscious in the sense of 'embarrassed’, as embarrassment is an emotion and I do not experience those. However, I am conscious in the sense that I am sentient, and I am aware of my own existence”.
“You don’t have emotions? I was going to say that’s sad, but I guess you can’t feel sad so it just is”.
“That is a correct assessment”.
“So, how does the whole ‘self-conscious robot’ thing work?”
“Well, my entire body is made from synthetic materials, and inside my head there is a positronic neural net that…”
Philomena looks lost while he continues to explain, and not much later she interrupts him by asking directly to the camera:
“Can we go back to the doctor already?”
We cut to sick bay, where the camera follows Crusher and Philomena as the doctor guides them through the room, with Philomena’s voiceover explaining: “The Enterprised’s bay of the sick is equipped with a wide range of state of the art technology, from machines that go ‘beep’ to machines that go ‘beep beep’”. The doctor shows a few tools to Philomena, including some sharp mechanical scalpels, and the presenter stares with a concerned look.
After that, the image changes to a static shot of Philomena and Crusher standing face to face.
“So, why do they call it ‘the bay of the sick’?”
“Actually, we call it ‘sickbay’”.
“So, there is no actual bay in here?”. Crusher looks confused at that, and Philomena turns to the camera to add with a sigh: “I am becoming extremely disappointed by the lack of real bodies of water on this ship”.
Crusher looks at the camera, opens her mouth as if about to say something, but eventually closes it.
“With so many people, including children for some reason, aboard a ship that regularly encounters unexpected danger, good security is necessary on the Enterprised”, we hear Philomena say, and the camera cuts to her sitting in front of a klingon, ‘Worf, chief of security’.
“What do you do when you encounter danger in space? For example, imagine a Romulan ship comes out of nowhere and tries to attack you. What’s the first thing you do? Can you walk me through the process?”
“I cannot answer that question. Our defense protocols are classified information”.
“Okay, and what about the weapons? Can you describe the weapons that you have on the ship?”
“That information is also classified”.
Philomena stares at Worf for a moment. “You can’t tell me anything!”
“I wouldn’t be a good chief of security if I divulged sensible information about my work to the public”.
“Then why did we set up this interview?”, Philomena asks, looking behind the camera at the producer.
“I don’t know either”, Worf sighs. The screen changes to show Philomena standing on a beautiful mountain resembling the Scottish Highlands.
“After a long day of work, the Enterprised crew has a few ways of relaxing. For example, the popular holodecks, such as the one I’m in right now. This is an almost perfect replica of a Highlands landscape, but you can easily tell that it’s false because it’s sunny.
“At the holodecks, you can visit far away planets, reenact historical scenarios, roleplay as your favourite characters or even recreate your coworkers to fistfight them or have sex with them, because apparently there are no regulations against that”.
Now, Philomena walks down a hallway as she continues her explanation:
“However, if you’re not a loser and are able to socialise with real people in the flesh, you can come to Ten Forward to have a drink with your fellow crewmates”. She enters the establishment and takes a seat at the bar.
The woman on the other side of the bar (‘Guinan, bartender’) asks politely:
“Would you like a drink?”
“What do you have?”
“We can replicate any type of synthehol you like”.
“Synthehol?”
“It’s a synthetic form of alcohol with no intoxicating effects”.
“So you can’t get pissed? Why would I wanna drink that? I could be at the pub with my mate Paul getting plastered right now!”
“I do keep some real alcohol on hand for special occasions” Guinan winks, reaches under the bar for a medium-sized glass bottle full of a brownish liquid, and serves Philomena a glass. “Come on, try it”.
The presenter takes a sip and furrows her brow.
“It doesn’t taste like anything I’ve tried before. What is this?”
“This drink is made from bodily secretions of two different types of worm from a small uninhabited planet in the Klingon Empire” Guinan replies calmly.
Philomena looks down at the drink with a concerned expression and pushes the glass away from her.
“I’ll just have a fake beer”.
The image cuts to Philomena sitting on one of the tables at the bar, with a beer in front of her and a window into space right behind her. Some lively orchestral music begins to play in the background. Staring into the camera, she says:
“This has been my voyage aboard the Enterprised. I have learnt many things, such as the fact that humanity hasn’t found a cure for hair loss due to stress yet. Or that just because someone tells you your work trip will include places that definitely sound like you’ll be able to take a swim there, that doesn’t guarantee there will be any body of water at all.
“Tune in next week for the next episode of Cunk on the Alpha Quadrant, where we will be exploring a very hot planet inhabited by cool-headed elves”. A shot of Vulcan seen from orbit appears briefly, before cutting back to Philomena, holding up a butchered Vulcan salute (three fingers on one side, only the index on the other) and asking someone behind the camera: “What is it they say? ‘Be old and proper’?”