A Necessary Conversation

By Seema


Thanks to Liz for writing some of the dialogue and also catching a silly mistake or two.

Oh – and I definitely do not own Ronald Moore, Rick Berman, Rene Echevarria or Brannon Braga. This is story is meant in good humor.

~ * ~

The scene: The Paramount Studios – a conference room. Seated around a long, narrow table are two Liz Logan and Seema G – two writers famous for playing with property that does not belong to them. Also in the room are two of The Powers That Be who actually own the property Liz and Seema, um, like to borrow every now and then.

~*~

 Ron Moore (henceforth referred to as RM): Um, hello…

Liz: Hola!

Seema: Liz, you better use words of one syllable… it might be easier to get our point across.

Liz: Points you have them… it would be ungood if we were misunderstood…

Rick Berman (henceforth referred to as RB): Thank you for taking the time to come talk to us. As you know, we’ve had some issues with this new style of writing called fanfic…(spits on the floor).

Seema: Ugh, gross!

RM: Now, Rick… what my partner here is trying to say, well, we understand that you guys are trying to advance the Trek world and you know, it is a little flattering, but you really have to stop playing with our property.

RB: You’ve got to understand our point of view… we just can’t keep lending our creations out to you folks… the things you do to them! That Garak and Bashir stuff, I mean, come on!

Liz: This is the part where they say they’re going to sue us…

Seema: I hope not… I don’t have any money.

Liz: Let's tell them we're students!

Seema: Liz, you are a student.

Liz: That's beside the point!

RB: We hope it doesn’t come to that, ladies, but what we’re trying to say here is that you’ve got to come up with some of your own ideas, your own characters. You can do it!

Liz: I’m not a Nike commercial…

Seema: You don’t understand… writing fanfic is fun…. I don’t know if I can stop. I keep saying I’m going to stop and I just can’t….

Liz: Yeah… it’s not that easy…

RM: Just make a clean break… just like I did from "Voyager."

Seema: Ron, you're talking about *Voyager!* *VOYAGER!*

(Brannon Braga pops in for a moment, looks around. Ron Moore stands up, with an evil glare in his eye. Rick Berman jumps in)

Brannon Braga: I heard someone mention Voyager...

Seema: And since you're here, mind explaining Seven of Nine to us?

Liz: And I thought Kira's suit was too tight and her heels too high!

BB: Seven of Nine is the best thing to ever happen to Voyager.

RM: No, you had a talented cast on that show and you ran them into the ground... "The Barge of the Dead" is the best episode of Voyager ever, thank you very much. You're just too much of a chicken to admit that Klingons are cool and the Borg aren't. DS9 got along just fine without the Borg, but noooo, you have to go for the cheap way of boosting ratings...

BB: Excuse me... it's my show. I can do what I want. And if you don't like it, you can just leave.

(Seema and Liz watch in fear - a fist fight looks imminent, but luckily...)

RB: Hey, guys… we’re trying to have a conversation here… Liz and Seema came all the way from - wherever it is they came from to talk to us.

BB: Ron, we’ll talk… later.

(BB leaves. The occupants in the room let out a collective sigh of relief).

Liz: Ron, you know, you’re the only one who can save "Voyager" from itself… you can't leave that show.

RM (sadly): I know, I know… but you heard Brannon, you see what he's like...

RB: Hey! Can we get back on track here? Now, these two agreed to hear us out on this fanfic subject and I think we owe it to them to not waste their time…

RM: You’re right… I’m sorry. Where were we?

RB: On that pesky subject of fanfic… look, you guys are obsessed… you spend hours role-playing, writing fanfic on things that will never happen, matching up the most mis-matched people…

Liz: You're right, we are obsessed… but I prefer to think of it as copyright-challenged…

RM: We have a twelve step program...

Seema: Hey! We’re not the ones who made the big mistakes… y’all do a great job of that yourself…

Liz: Remember Worf and Troi?

Seema (winces): Ugh!

(from the Archives of Scenes that Ended Up on the Cutting Room Floor)

(Worf and Troi are lying in bed…)

Troi: Worf, this was fun… let’s do it again!

Worf: Okay…

Troi: Ouch! Ow! Ouch!

Worf: Uh… Deanna…

Troi: I sense... I sense pain… horrible pain… it’s my arm!

Worf (holds up Troi’s arm): I’m sorry… I’ll be more careful next time..

 

RM (holds up hands): Okay, okay. We concede... That was a bad idea… really bad idea.

Seema: And then what’s up with all these one-episode stands? You know… that got really annoying after a while…

Liz: Yeah…fleas have longer romances than characters on "Star Trek"…

(from the Archives of Scenes that Ended Up on the Cutting Room Floor)

(Bashir walks into Ops)

Bashir: I’m in love… again!

Kira: Who is she?

Dax: More importantly, can she function in gravity?

O’Brien: Can she communicate or does she retreat into herself?

Sisko: Will she hang around for more than forty-five minutes?

(Bashir considers)

Bashir: With my luck?

All: Nah!

RB: I think we’re changing the subject here…

Seema: No, I think this is really relevant… you guys do real good on the show and sometimes, just sometimes, you guys do something really stupid and it’s up to us fans to fix it…

Liz: What you had going to between Jadzia and Julian was great. You should have kept it going.

Seema: No it wasn't.

Liz: (looks over) *Yes* it was!

Seema: *No* it wasn't!

RM: (whispers to Rick Berman) Whose idea was it to bring these two here?

RB: (whispers back over our arguing) Uh, I think it was Brannon’s idea. He thought it’d be good to hear from disgruntled fans.

RM: Brannon’s idea? I should have guessed!! He's the reason fans are disgruntled in the first place. Ha! This never happened with DS9! Call security and get these guys out of here!!

Seema & Liz : NO! WE'RE NOT DONE!

(RB & RM sit perfectly still in fear of angering the disgruntled fans further.)

Seema: Don’t get us wrong… when you guys do good, you do really good…

Liz: Like "Honor Among Thieves"…

Seema: "Duet"…

Liz: "Equilibrium"…

Seema: "Necessary Evil…"

Liz: "Civil Defense…"

Seema: "Looking for Parmach in all the Wrong Places…"

Liz: Well? Seema, I don’t know… this whole idea of parmach, well, you know how I feel about that…

Seema: I know… it’s a weird word, isn’t it?

RB: Will you guys get to the point? We don’t have all day!

Liz :Actually you do. DS9 is over and Voyager is not filming today so we've got all the time in the world to talk about this.

(Rene Echevarria enters the room and sits in a corner.)

RM: We’re not trying to be evil here but… do you have a point?

Seema: Well, it’s just that DS9 had some really good moments

Liz: … and some really bad moments

Seema: Like "Let He Who Is Without Sin…"

Liz: "Heart of Stone…"

Seema: "Resurrection…"

Liz: "Profit and Lace"…

Seema: "Covenant"…

Rene Echevarria (henceforth referred to RE): Hey!

Liz (in obvious pain covers her ears): No! No!

RE: How did this become about us? Let me tell you… it’s really hard being a writer these days without people like you taking over our property…

Liz: It’s just sometimes we’ve just got to fix your mistakes…

Seema: Like, what was up with Vic Fontaine? He really wasn’t that interesting…

RM: I thought it was great… an original idea..

Seema: In theory yes, but in concept? Uh-uh…

Liz: You had entire episodes devoted to Vic…

Seema: "His Way"…

RM: You guys wanted an Odo/Kira episode

Liz: Not *that* way!

Seema: Yeah, but we though Vic was a one time deal… but he kept coming back!

Liz: "Image in the Sand"…

Seema: But that was so sad…

Liz: "It’s Only a Paper Moon"…

Seema: "Baddabing… Baddabang."…

Liz: "What You Leave Behind…"

RM: I get the point! We overused Vic…

Seema: Yeah, but we still have issues…

Liz: Yeah, and why did you have to kill Jadzia? Couldn’t you have just sent her out to a Dominion prison camp or something?

Seema: Yeah… then we could have had a really big space battle..

Liz: We really need to talk about this space battle fetish of yours…

Seema (injured): But Liz…

RM (holds up his hands in defeat): Okay, we get the point… we shouldn’t have paired up Worf and Troi… that was Brannon’s idea…

RB: Yeah, sure, pass the buck, Ron… though Vic Fontaine was all yours…

RE: You’re the one who wanted to kill Jadzia!

RB: Yeah… but "Covenant" was your idea!

Liz & Seema (in obvious pain, cover their ears): Agghhh!

RM: Yeah, well who wrote "Resurrection" anyway?

RB: That would be Michael Taylor…

RM & RE: Who is he?

(Liz and Seema look at each other as RE, RB & RM start fighting amongst themselves)

Seema: I think we’ve done our work here…

Liz: I agree. Let’s go… we’ve got some fanfic to write…

(They look back at the three men who are still fighting…)

Seema: Come on, Liz… I’ll give you a ride home…

Liz: Actually... I have a better idea...(Liz brings out a Communicator, hidden in her pocket. Seema's eyes widen. They are enveloped in a blaze of light and disappear).

RB: Hey! Where did they go?

RM: Who?

RE: Did you ask them for money? You know, those FX from "What You Leave Behind" really killed us...

RB: That was your idea! (The three men start fighting again...)

~The End~


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