Stardate
77054.2; January 23, 2400
T H E F I N A L E P I S O D E S
119
• 120
Edited
by Peter Bossley
Edited by Shaun Hayes
Edited by Chris Adamek
Written by Chris Adamek
ADDITIONAL
CHARACTERS
Overseer Artanis
Angela Christopher
Overseer Dra’venn
Captain Allison Duford
Doctor Dana Horner
Admiral Kathryn Janeway
Commander Jerras
Lt. Commander Turathan Karalis
Medic Kharzon
Captain Ryan Landsberg
Lieutenant Steven Marizex
Lt. Commander Ian Meade
Overseer Nahain
General Ordikan
Justin Reinbold
Commander Amy Robinson
Creya Rosat
Lieutenant Courtney Rose
Lieutenant Flora Sanders
Commander Taurik
Praetor Tomalak
Cerebrate Xi'Yor
Overseer Zeratul
Foreword
Wow. This is it.
The last episode of Star Trek: The Final Frontier.
I’m writing this
little foreword with decidedly mixed emotions.
On one hand, I am absolutely thrilled to see TFF end. After six years, my creative energies are
drained, and I’m really ready to move on and try my hand at writing something
different and new. I also want to be
able to stay up late and do something fun without
feeling guilty about falling behind in my writing. Let me tell you, I played some terrible rounds of Super Smash Brothers
Melee because of that guilty conscience (but I shall have my revenge, Mr.
Valentine).
Of course, on the
other hand, I don’t want TFF to end at all.
Each and every character is near and dear to my heart, and as I wrote
this episode, I often found it difficult to part ways with them. Very difficult. That is one of the reasons this episode took
so utterly long to write. The opening
chapters are filled with wonderful character moments—and though I made a
valiant effort to streamline the plot, I simply could not bring myself to cut a
single scene. In fact, I ultimately
wound up adding even more! As such, the
“brief opening” spans some 90+ pages and 22,000 words—MUCH longer than your
average episode—but for those of you who have invested as much time and energy
in these characters as I have, not even 22,000 words seems like enough. And, thankfully, there are tens of thousands
of words that follow the opening chapters, and some of them coalesce into the
biggest battle in the history of Star Trek: The Final Frontier. So, I’m truly hopeful that everyone is
satisfied with this episode. I have
tried so very hard to create something special.
I promised that I wouldn’t let you guys down. And I don’t think I did. So… let us journey forth into the Final
Frontier one last time.
But, before we
take that journey, I have to (not surprisingly) ramble on for a little while
longer. Come on! Humor me!!
This is the last time you’re going to hear my ramblings!
I know that I’ve
done it before. Hell, I’ll probably do
it again. But I would really like to thank everyone for
reading and supporting TFF over the years.
I absolutely could not have come this far without you guys. As of this writing, TFF is the only good fan fiction
out there to have crossed the 100 episode mark and make it all the way to
episode 120. Many of you have asserted
that TFF is the absolute best fan fiction on the Internet—but the only reason
it reached that lofty status is because TFF has the absolute best fans. I have made a lot of good friends over the
years, and your input (both good and bad) has been priceless. Well, except for the person that votes every
episode Pure Crap on the episode poll.
If you’re going to vote an episode PURE CRAP, at least justify your position! (Then again, that won’t be a problem for this
episode… Hehehehe!)
And finally, I’d
like to acknowledge a few of the people who made TFF possible.
Gene
Roddenberry
The Great Bird of the Galaxy. We owe him our eternal gratitude
for bringing to life his vision of the future.
Without him, TFF
probably would have been a “Full House” fan fiction.
Chris
Adamek
Yes, because I have an ego the size of North
Dakota, I am thanking myself. But I’ll
spare you the self-congratulatory speech that I prepared. For some reason, “Ode to Chris” is never popular.
Babacaddon
My cat. Technically, she didn’t really do much of
anything. She just sat there. But she dutifully sat there—occasionally in
front of the computer screen—as I typed each and every episode. But she is such a cute little kitty that I
just had to mention her! Awww!!!
Matthew Badaczewski
Not quite as cute
as Babacaddon, but quintessential in TFF’s development nonetheless. Indeed, he is the very person who introduced
me to Star Trek. He also was the initial
inspiration for Matthew Harrison, but admittedly, they are nothing alike
now. Though to Matthew’s credit, he did try to get his fictional counterpart
some bedroom action, but… unfortunately for Matthew, he made that suggestion
while I was at work, and my response was little more than confusion as silently
wondered “Who the hell is
Harrison?” It wasn’t until I was on
break an hour later that I realized he spoke of Matthew Harrison! Ahh, I am DENSE
sometimes.
Justin Schalk
Five years ago, this man single-handedly
saved TFF from obscurity. Hell, he
probably saved it from oblivion. Early
in the first season, Justin “discovered” The Final Frontier… and as luck would
have it, he just happened to be an administrator at Millennium Pictures, the
place for Fan Fiction back in the day.
Justin was the champion of TFF; he swiftly brought it into the fold, and
provided some much needed advertisement for the then fledgling series. Without Justin, it is certain TFF would have
long ago passed into shadow.
S.C.
Mollmann
Readers rejoiced when S.C. Mollmann introduced me to the fine art of
proofreading. After an unfortunate typo
resulted in one of TFF’s most unintentionally comical
moments (“Talyere went farter in the cave”), S.C. Mollmann
decided that he was not going to put up with the Overseer’s flatulence. He wuz gonna make sure everything wuz
spelt corectklie.
He thusly served as TFF’s editor for the
entirety of Season Two… and while he has since fallen
off the face of the Earth, his impact on TFF is unmistakable.
Pete
Bossley
After S.C. Mollmann
vanished into the unknown, Pete Bossley stepped up to
the plate. He has dutifully sorted
through mounds of grammatical errors since the end of Season Three, and
continues to do so to this very day (assuming I don’t save the episode as “READ
ONLY”). Thanks for all of your hard
work, man! …And just because this is the
last episode, don’t go thinking you’re out of the woods just yet…
Australia
TFF has a lot of fans from all over the world. England.
Canada. United States (especially
Ohio). South Africa. India.
Germany. The
Netherlands. New Zealand. I have had the pleasure of talking to the
fine denizens of each of these countries (and many more), but I really do have
to single out the Australians for a special commendation. Though they rank 7th in number of
visitors… ever since Sydney had that unfortunate mishap with the Elorg in
“Screams of Armageddon,” the Aussies have very easily been TFF’s
most vocal group of fans. I can’t even
go to the bathroom without somebody in Australia commenting on it! Okay, maybe that’s a slight exaggeration, but
my friends Down Under have gone above and beyond the call of duty to voice
their opinions, and for that I am eternally grateful!
You
Thanks for reading! And because you’re sick
of hearing me give thanks, and just want to get on with the episode, I guess I’ll
just leave it at that.
• • •
What was the start of all this?
When did the cogs of fate begin to turn?
Perhaps it is impossible to grasp that
answer now,
From deep within
the flow of time.
But for a certainty, back then,
We loved so many, yet hated so much,
We hurt others and were hurt ourselves.
Yet even then, we ran like the wind
Whilst our laughter echoed
Amidst the glittering stars of the final
frontier.
• • •
Previously…
Stardate
74811.9
• Xi’Yor
contracts Aevedar Syndrome, a potentially lethal
illness (“A Touch of Darkness”).
Stardate
75978.2
• Talyere has a vision of the future in which he sees himself kill Megan
Reinbold (“Screams of Armageddon”).
Stardate
76543.2
• Growing
frustrated with Cerebrate Ra’thenn, Xi’Yor forges an alliance with the
mysterious General Ordikan (“Shadows of an Empire”).
Stardate 76570.7
• With General
Ordikan’s help, the Cardassian fleet is obliterated by the giant lunar base
called Eredas-Il. The moon was an Elorg
base that once orbited the Elorg Homeworld.
• Overseer Xelos defects to the Federation, and provides Starfleet
with one of the Elorg’s new Andrinel-class warships (“The Fall
of Cardassia Prime”).
Stardate
76643.9
• A mysterious
distress signal leads Talyere to Rebena Te Ra.
Unfortunately, the planet is out of temporal sync with the rest of the
universe, and the data he collected on the Elorg Homeworld is several thousand
years out of date.
• The Garidians
attack both the Romulans and the Federation, prompting Praetor Tomalak to
pledge the entire Romulan fleet to the Federation’s defense.
• Xi’Yor
defects to the Federation, claiming Ra’thenn’s
stupidity has grown intolerable (“Rebena Te Ra”).
Stardate
76670.4
• With
assistance from Eredas-Il, the Elorg fleet manages to destroy Deep Space Nine.
• Overseer Va’kyr
kills Cerebrate Ra’thenn. She later
reveals to Talyere that she is actually his daughter, Creya.
• Xi’Yor’s
defection is a ruse to capture the Starlight in an effort to obtain the
data gathered on Rebena Te Ra.
• General
Ordikan reveals that the Phobians control Eredas-Il—but the General himself is
not Phobian (“The Treachery of a Queen”).
Stardate 76717.6
• The Starlight crew is held captive aboard
Eredas-Il while Xi’Yor scours the computer database for any and all information
pertaining to Rebena Te Ra.
• General
Ordikan takes Bator under his wing, and slowly reintroduces him to Phobian
culture.
• With data from the Starlight, Xi’Yor plots to attack Rebena
Te Ra and use its astral observatory to locate the Elorg Homeworld (“Eclipse”).
Stardate 76728.6
• With Ordikan’s
blessing, Bator continues to integrate into Phobian culture.
• Talyere
learns of Xi’Yor’s plan to use the astral observatory on Rebena Te Ra—but when
he sets out to stop his old nemesis, Talyere realizes the situation is
unfolding just as he envisioned it nearly a year prior… And Megan Reinbold is
killed.
• Federation
and Elorg forces clash in the Rebena System.
Eredas-Il is destroyed during the confrontation, and the Starlight crew is freed.
• Prior to its
destruction, Creya Rosat escapes from Eredas-Il with Bator, and turns him over
to Federation forces (“Horn
and Ivory”).
Stardate 76899.1
• Upon the
destruction of Eredas-Il, Ordikan is summoned to the Otherworldly Gate to face
his superiors within the Hegemony. They
insist his mission to restore the Phobians to power has ended in failure, and
demand he return to their twilight realm—but Ordikan refuses.
• Bator is
incarcerated on charges of treason.
Lieutenant Courtney Rose is thusly promoted to the Starlight’s chief of security.
• Lucas
Tompkins and Jayla Trinn discuss the possibility of getting married.
• Attempting to
return to Kalidar, Xi’Yor flees the Rebena System aboard the Jevian. The Starlight
and an armada of the few remaining Cardassian ships corner him in the Paulson
Nebula, but are unable to stop the Jevian. Xi’Yor thusly
reaches Kalidar unopposed, and at long last attains the title of Cerebrate
(“Words Better Left Unspoken”).