The Federation Tribune - Christmas 2004

[Rob Versteegt]

                  ==== The Federation Tribune ====
                        ==== Christmas 2004 ====

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Chief Editor's notes:
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Hi all! And welcome to a special Christmas Edition of the Federation
Tribune. There aren't any status reports in it this time: just Christmas
stories and articles. I would like to thank everyone who sent in an article:
thanks a lot! Without you, there would be no Christmas Edition of the
Federation Tribune!

So, after this short introduction of this special edition, all I have to do
now is to wish you a very merry Christmas, and a great 2005. And if you
haven't done it yet, check out the Frontier Fleet Christmas Card at
http://www.frontierfleet.org/card.

Best wishes,
Rob Versteegt,
Chief Editor.

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Santa's Last Christmas, by Ben Versteegt
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Santa's Last Christmas

It was bound to happen some day. He had known it all along. But why did it
have to happen on this Christmas Eve? Santa Claus, the giver of gifts, the
big old jolly father Christmas, had a problem. A very large problem that
could ruin this Christmas and all other Christmases in the future...

Starfleet Temporal Security had found out about him.

He had set up a chroniton induced subspace receiver with which he listened
to all kinds of radio traffic (he had to find out one way or another who had
been naughty and who had been nice), but with which he also listened to the
future. This way he had found that Starfleet Temporal had located him. They
had finally found him; it had taken them long enough. Ever since he had
crashed with his shuttle on the north pole, he had managed to elude the
authorities. And he had succeeded, until now.

One of the elves walked up to him and saw his worried face. "Santa?" he
asked. "You don't seem your jolly self today... What's wrong?"

Santa Claus smiled at the concern of this elf. Ever since he had rescued
them from their dying planet, they had pledged an oath to serve Claus as
best they could. Their loyalty and concern was touching. "I just intercepted
some messages from Starfleet Temporal," Santa answered. "They've found out
about me. They're coming to get me."

"You can't let that happen!" The elf responded, obviously shocked at this
news. "Children all over the world depend on you! If Starfleet takes you
away, the children won't get their presents!"

Santa nodded. "They couldn't have come at a worse time. It's Christmas Eve
soon. The children won't..." He covered his eyes to prevent the elf from
seeing him cry.

"Santa!" exclaimed the elf. "You can't be serious! You can't seriously think
about letting Starfleet ruin Christmas!" The elf, called Herbert (although
everyone called him "Pixy"), couldn't hide his anger anymore. "You are
Father Christmas! You represent everything Christmas stands for!"

Santa showed a tired smile. "Presents?" he asked. "Does Christmas stand for
presents? Does Christmas stand for old men beaming -- coming -- down the
chimney to drink milk, eat cookies and deliver gifts?" He shook his head.
"No, Pixy. Christmas should stand for more than that. Children nowadays only
look forward to Christmas because they get presents and lots of things to
eat. That isn't Christmas. It shouldn't be. Maybe it's a good thing that
Starfleet's coming to take me away."

"You don't meant that!" shouted Pixy, his eyes filled with tears. "You
belong here! Without Santa Claus, the world will be a much, much sadder
place."

"I've been telling myself that for the past forty years," sighed Santa. "But
the truth is, the world will go on without me. When we came from the future
to this place, I thought the least I could do was use the advanced
technology we brought with us, to help people. To give them a brighter,
happier Christmas. So I ceased to be Lieutenant Claus, and became Santa
Claus. But I'm beginning to think I have changed the timeline all for
nothing. Despite a joyful Christmas every year, the people of Earth continue
to make war. What is the point in me staying and contaminating the timeline
if I can't even make a difference?"

Pixy was in tears. "You can't believe that! If even you don't believe in
yourself, then what of the people of Earth? How can they possibly believe in
Saint Nicholas if you don't even believe in yourself?"

"Pixy..." Santa began, but corrected himself, "Herbert. The mythology about
Saint Nicholas is ancient. I just happened to fill the role of a dead saint
for a while."

"No!" Pixy cried. "No, Santa, you *are* Santa Claus! You have to believe
that. If anything, believe that!"

Santa smiled. "I must admit, I have believed myself to be the genuine
article for quite some time. I suppose I could continue believing in myself
for a while longer. It wouldn't do me any good, though... Now that
Starfleet's on my tail, they'll be here before I can leave to deliver the
presents. Quite a shame."

"Then ride out one last time," Pixy almost begged. "Give the children of the
world one last happy Christmas. The presents have all been replicated, your
sack has been filled, the sleigh's antigrav and other systems are at 100
percent, and the holographic reindeer program has been initialised. You're
good to go."

"Pixy, I..."

"One last time, Santa." Pixy looked at him with puppy-dog eyes. "For the
children."

Santa carefully placed his hand on the tiny elf's shoulder. "For the
children," he repeated softly. "Will you be standing by at Polar
Headquarters?"

"I certainly will, Santa," Pixy replied smiling. "I'll try to disrupt
Starfleet's scans. That should buy you some time. You should set the
sleigh's shield harmonics to match the Earth's background radiation. We'll
communicate over a coded subspace frequency in the low theta-band. They'll
never discover where we're sending messages to."

"Clever thinking, Pixy," Santa replied, proud of his elf. Realising that
this was a Christmas Eve where there was really no time to loose, he said
goodbye to the elf and rushed towards his already prepped sleigh. "Go
Prancer, go Dancer, go Vixen, go..." he began to yell. "Oh, what the heck. I
don't have time. Go all of you!"

The holographic reindeers appeared in front of the sleigh, and Santa Claus
hopped inside. "Emergency pre-launch sequence..." he said into the comm
system. "Launching... now!" The sleigh, which had been a Starfleet shuttle a
long while ago but was re-built as a technologically sophisticated sleigh,
immediately took off, leaving behind it a haze of blown up snow. Santa knew
he had to hurry; it would only be a matter of time before Starfleet would
find him. With a lot of luck, he would be able to deliver most of the
presents before he had been located. He pushed his sleigh's engines to the
limit; Santa was on the run.

Meanwhile, in orbit of the planet Earth, a Federation Timeship dropped out
of timewarp. Its Captain had his orders: To take Lieutenant Claus into
custody and to prevent him from doing any more harm to the timeline. The
ship's chronometers showed it was Christmas Eve 2004, and the Captain saw it
fitting to bring former Lieutenant Claus back to his superiors as a
Christmas present. Finding him, though, proved to be more difficult. The
specific lifesigns of Claus were nowhere to be seen.

"He must be masking his life signs," Captain Smith said to his science
officer. "Clever. Try scanning for chroniton particles. See if anything on
the planet is out of sync with this timeframe."

"Scanning, sir," reported the science officer. "Wait a minute. I'm detecting
something. Some kind of large disturbance of chroniton particles. It
definitely not belongs in this timezone. I think it could be our target,
sir."

"Location?"

"Pin-pointing now, sir." Suddenly, the screens started to flicker and
alarming sounds were heard. "Captain, our sensor scans..." began the science
officer. "They're being deflected!"

"What? How?"

The science officer shook her head. "Hard to tell. I believe it's being
caused by some kind of chroniton-induced tachion beam aimed directly at us.
It's interfering with our other systems too."

Captain Smith gritted his teeth and made a fist. "Claus." he realised.
"Lieutenant, can you tell where that beam is originating?"

"Checking, sir." Lieutenant Adla shook her head. "Precise location is
unknown, sir, but the beam is coming from somewhere on the northern
hemisphere, that's for sure."

"It's a big hemisphere, Lieutenant. Got anything more conclusive?"

"Best I could do, sir. I'll try to increase power to the sensors and
remodulate them. It might take a while, but it'll make the sensors more
effective."

Smith nodded. "Very well. Proceed. We have to find that Claus, no matter
what. I won't let him ruin our mission to capture him."

>From his hide-out at the North Pole, Pixy grinned. He had just bought Santa
some more time.


A couple of hours later, Santa Claus was ahead of schedule. As always,
delivering all the right presents to the right children was a daunting and
difficult task, but he managed this time as well. He even managed to buy
himself more time by skipping the milk and cookies that had been set for
him. Well, on a few occasions, anyway. Most of the time he had simply poured
the milk in a large can and the cookies in a large jar. Not the most
respectful way of dealing with the children's' gifts to him, but it was
regrettably necessary. ~I needed to cut down on milk and cookies anyway,~
Santa though to himself. ~Stupid diet.~

=/\= North Pole to Santa! =/\= Pixy's voice suddenly sounded through the
sleigh's communication system. =/\= We have a problem! =/\=

"Santa here. Pixy, what's going on?"

=/\= The Federation timeship... They've found us. They've found the Polar
Headquarters! =/\=

"Raise your shields!" Santa cried, distressed by what he heard. "I'm
changing course to help you." Absentmindedly, his hand searched for the
button that would activate the sleigh's never before used phaser banks.

=/\= No! =/\= Pixy cried back. =/\= No, Santa, you must finish your round.
Everything depends on it. Give the children one last merry Christmas,
please. Don't worry about us; we'll defend ourselves. And we'll buy you some
time in the process. =/\=

Santa knew Pixy had a point. He also knew that his Polar Headquarters was
well concealed. The elves were numerous, and they would be able to stand
their ground, at least for a while. They would bring the transporter
inhibitors on-line, preventing anyone from the timeship to beam down to the
North Pole. "Very well, Pixy," Santa replied in a trembling voice. "Do what
you can. I'll finish my round as fast as I can and then I'll come back to
help you."

=/\= There was no doubt in my mind about that, sir, =/\= Pixy said. =/\=
Polar HQ, out. =/\=

More determined than ever to finish his round in record time, Santa diverted
more power to the engines. There was no time to loose.


Just when Santa had finished delivering all the presents to the kids in
Europe, his communications array flared up again. The message was badly
garbled, but it was clear that Pixy was calling him. He sounded quite
distressed. =/\= Santa! ...need to... out of there! =/\= Just as Santa was
about to respond, the proximity alert went off and almost at the same time,
a Federation shuttlecraft nearly grazed his dorsal shields.

Immediately, Santa took action. Realising he had been discovered by
Starfleet despite his sensor-dispersing field around the sleigh, he ordered
the sleigh to go down. As he looked behind him, he saw that the shuttle was
following him. A channel opened and a voice commanded, =/\= Stand down,
mister Claus. =/\=

"I can't!" Santa yelled back. "Don't you understand? I have to bring
presents to the children all over the world! I have to give them one last
merry Christmas!"

=/\= We cannot allow you to continue polluting the timeline. You will come
with us. =/\=

"You'll have to catch me first!" shouted Santa, and he diverted all
auxiliary power to the engines. The sleigh lurched forward, driven by extra
power, and raced on over the ocean. The shuttle followed, also diverting
extra power to the engines. It matched every manoeuvre Santa made and
appeared to have no trouble keeping up.

Apparently, the occupants of the shuttle didn't find this chase amusing any
longer, for a bright orange phaser beam shot right past Santa's sleigh. =/\=
Consider that a warning shot, mister Claus, =/\= the voice said. =/\= Next
one will hit. Now stand down. =/\=

"You really want to take away Santa Claus from the children?" Santa shouted
into the communications system. "What kind of evil monsters are you?"

=/\= We have our orders, mister Claus. Besides, you know as well as we do
that you're not Santa Claus. =/\=

Santa grinned. "We'll see about that," he said and pressed a few buttons.
"Eat my fairy dust." He tapped one last button and immediately a compartment
at the back of the sleigh opened, releasing golden and silver specs of dust.
The moonlight reflected against it beautifully as the tiny pieces of 'fairy
dust' obscured the shuttle occupants' view. As they were forced to slow
down, Santa made use of this by initiating a low-level warp field around his
sleigh, making him go faster. By the time the occupants of the shuttle got
rid of all the golden flakes, Santa had already re-initialised his sensor
scattering field. He had disappeared from sensors and also from view.

"We've lost him, Bud," one of the officers in the shuttle said to the other.

"I know, Larry. How are we going to tell the boss?"

"The Captain doesn't need to hear about this. Besides, he'd never believe
that we were chasing Santa!"

Bud sighed. "Yeah. I am *so* not gonna get any presents from Santa this
year."


To Santa's surprise, he wasn't interrupted even once during the rest of his
trip. But what worried him was that he couldn't contact the Polar
Headquarters either. This was, however, of later concern, as he flew over
the last village he needed to bring presents to. As he put the last present
in little Jimmy's sock and emptied the bowl of cookies and the glass of
milk, he realised he had done it. He had brought a merry Christmas to all
the children in the world for one final time. It saddened him to know that
he wasn't going to bring any more presents to any more children for a long
time -- if ever.

He beamed back to his sleigh, only to find that a subspace message had been
sent to him while he was away. Santa played it. "They've breached through
our defences!" Pixy shouted on the recording as an explosion in the
background made the image flicker. "We have taken refuge in the Toy Factory,
but we can't hold out much longer. They have trapped us here... It will be
only a matter of time before--" The screen flickered again and the recording
ended. Obviously something had happened that caused the transmission to end.
Pixy had taken a huge risk to contact him, since the communications array
was located in the main HQ building, and they were now hiding in the Toy
Factory.

His primary mission complete, Santa could now finally go back to the North
Pole to help Pixy and the other elves. With -- again -- no time to loose, he
sped in the direction of the North Pole; his home. But his great speed could
not prevent that two Starfleet shuttles took up position behind him. This he
could not use right now; he had to go faster to outrun those shuttles. But
his sleigh had already reached its maximum speed, and using a warp field
again would only put a strain on the engines, causing them to explode.

Another warning shot went straight past him and through one of the
holographic reindeers. The signal was clear: stop now, or we will stop you.
=/\= Mister Claus, you are hereby ordered to surrender! =/\= a voice
ordered.

"Not until I save my elves," Santa whispered, and kept going.

The next shot hit his aft shields. Santa considered arming his own weapons,
but he didn't want to fire at these Starfleet people. They were only doing
their job. Unfortunately, their job included firing at Santa Claus. The
North Pole was coming close, but Santa knew his shields would collapse
before he got there. Another phaser beam hit his aft shields. He needed to
do something fast. He was all out of fairy dust, but maybe there was another
trick he could use...

Santa brought his sleigh down towards the ocean. The icy shores of the North
Pole, complete with its icebergs and slippery chasms and glaciers, came into
visual range. Santa smiled; he had a plan. If only he could reach those
shores... Another couple of phaser beams made it clear that the Starfleet
people weren't going to give up. Nor would he. With a tap on a button, he
brought the sleigh's phasers on line and took aim. Just a couple of seconds
more...

He was hit badly yet again. The sleigh started shaking and smoke started to
pour out of a breached conduit. He had lost inertial stabilisers -- he had
to fly manually now. All the better. They were nearing an area of the North
Pole with nasty every-changing cliffs, chasms and lumps of ice that could
break off the wall they were hanging on any moment. It was a treacherous
place. A place where only the best of pilots would dare to fly. "Let's see
if I can't loose them here," Santa said softly.

The shuttles had almost caught up with the sleigh when Santa decided it was
time for a test of piloting skills. He veered to starboard and then suddenly
moved to port, flying around an iceberg, only to come back again and move
his sleigh into a narrow passageway between two walls of ice, where a large
chunk had recently broken off. The shuttles followed, as Santa had expected.
Coming up was another chunk of ice that was on the verge of breaking; if it
did collapse, the road ahead would be blocked. Santa knew this, but knew
that the shuttle pilots didn't know.

At high speeds, the three vessels raced through the chasm as if it were a
race course. Santa managed to avoid quite a number of phaser blasts; he was
in his element here. Impacting on the icy walls, the phaser beams made ice
and snow erupt from the point where they impacted, blinding the shuttles for
a short while. This wasn't sufficient to loose them, though, but the
upcoming chunk of ice just might be. Santa waited patiently until he was in
range, and then fired his phasers. As he flew underneath it in the nick of
time, hundreds of kilos of ice came falling down, blocking the path.

Santa looked back for only a second to survey the situation. ~Santa: 2,
Starfleet: 0.~ The two shuttles were both stopped for at least a while,
buried under a kiloton of ice. Oh, they would get themselves out, of course,
but by that time, Santa would already be at his Polar Headquarters.

And he was. As he touched down his sleigh, several Starfleet troops
surrounded him, pointing their phasers around them. "Ho ho ho!" he roared to
them. "Merry Christmas!" He got out of his sleigh and walked up to the
troops. "May I be the first to welcome you to the North Pole. I would kindly
ask you to put your weapons aside, though. The elves don't fancy weapons
fire. And frankly, neither do I."

A man stepped forward. He didn't carry a phaser, and seemed to be the leader
of the group. At least, his rank insignia seemed to indicate he was a
Captain. "Is that why you left Starfleet, Lieutenant Claus?"

"It was part of the reason, yes," admitted Santa. "But I get the feeling
you're not here to talk to me about my reasons for leaving Starfleet."

"You stole a shuttle, mister Claus," Captain Smith continued. "And while on
the run from Starfleet, you entered a solar storm at full warp, ended up in
a time warp, arrived here, crashed here, and instead of trying to signal
Starfleet for help, you *polluted* this timeline. My question is not why you
left Starfleet, mister. My question is why the hell you messed with the
timeline!"

Smith was getting angry, Santa could see that. "Your version of events is
not entirely correct, Captain." he countered. "My ship encountered a dying
planet, on the verge of its destruction. Its people were dying. The Prime
Directive stated that we couldn't help them, since they didn't appear to
have warp technology. But they were warp capable, Captain. The scans didn't
reveal it, but they were warp capable. Their technology had been destroyed
by the planet's many earthquakes. I suspected there was more than met the
eye, but I was denied permission to take a shuttle down and see for myself.
So I did what I thought was the right thing: I defied orders and stole a
shuttle. When I arrived at the planet, I encountered a village which was
going to be overrun by lava from a nearby volcano. Its population just sat
there, helpless. I beamed as many of them up to the shuttle as I could, and
then high-tailed it out of there. While trying to elude capture, I warped
into the solar storms of that system's unstable sun. I ended up here, forty
years ago, four hundred years in the past, from my perspective, and crashed
here on the North Pole. At first, I lived isolated, together with those I
had rescued. But then I started to look around. I picked up television and
radio broadcasts. I saw how these people lived, and I felt I had to do
something to make their lives more enjoyable. Since my career was already
flushed down the drain, I thought, why not? Why not do all that I can to
make one day in the year more comfortable for them? So I did a little
background on this Santa Claus, and soon after that, well, I became Santa.
Still am today."

Smith was momentarily baffled by this monologue. "You actually play the role
of Santa Claus?" he asked. "Bringing Christmas presents to all the nice
children?"

"That's what I do," replied Santa. "That's who I am. Today is, or rather,
was, Christmas Eve. And so, as I did all those other years, I delivered the
presents today as well. Although, I must admit, it was more special this
year. I had never been chased by shuttles before... And, sadly, this was the
last year I got to make the children happy. There will be no more merry
Christmas for them next year or any other year. No more presents from Santa
Claus, no more ho-ho-ho's down the chimney, no more fat old jolly bearded
person living on the North Pole. All that will be gone."

Captain Smith actually looked at him with a sad look in his eyes. He was
touched. "You *are* Santa Claus," he said softly." Then he continued,
softly, more to himself than to anyone else, "Is it right to rob the people
of Earth of their Santa Claus? Of the embodiment of their tradition?" He was
having a hard time deciding.

At that moment, Pixy came running out of the Polar Headquarters, followed by
a few guards whom Pixy had obviously eluded. Captain Smith told them to
stand down, as Pixy jumped into Santa's arms. "Santa!" he cried. "I'm so
glad you're all right!"

"As am I to see you are okay, Herbert," Santa replied and smiled. "You are
okay, right?"

Pixy nodded. "They're holding us captive down there, but we're being treated
well." He swallowed. "Santa... What's going to happen to us now?"

"I don't know," Santa replied and looked at Smith. "That all depends on the
Captain here."

"I have explicit orders to bring you back, mister... Santa," Smith said,
looking grim. He was obviously thinking very hard about this -- his was a
difficult dilemma. "And there are times when breaking orders is the right
thing to do."

Hope briefly flared in the eyes of Santa and Pixy. Hope that they might
still be allowed to stay and continue their annual activities.

Smith swallowed. "But, it is with great difficulty that I decide that this
is not one of those times. I am sorry, Santa, but I will have to ask you to
come with us." He sighed deeply. "I really wish this could have turned out
differently. Your transporter inhibitors have been taken off line, so we can
beam you up at any moment, but I would advise you to co-operate."

Whatever hope Santa and Pixy had, now faded fast. The Captain wasn't going
to let them go. In a way, they understood; allowing them to stay on Earth
was too great a risk. The timeline could be contaminated in more ways than
one. "But the children," Santa began to argue. "Think of the children,
Captain! Aren't the happy looks on the children's faces worth some damage to
the timeline? Besides, what kind of damage to the timeline would taking away
Santa Claus cause?"

But Smith stood by his difficult decision. "I really am sorry, Santa Claus."
He sighed deeply and averted his eyes. "Smith to the North Star," he said in
a voice thick with suppressed tears, calling his ship. "Begin the beam-out."

Santa sighed and looked around the North Pole one last time. It had been his
home for many years. "Goodbye, good Earth," he said finally. "For what it's
worth: Merry Christmas!"

The wind carried his voice over to the far reaches of the North Pole, as he,
Pixy, all the Starfleet officers and practically everything else that
belonged to Santa, vanished in the blue light of the transporter beam. Santa
Claus had brought a merry Christmas to the children of the Earth one last
time. An era had ended.

An old man watched the proceedings from a distance and smiled slightly.
"It's about time that person left," he told a creature very much resembling
an elf. "He's been taking over my job for the past forty years!" He turned
around and together they started to walk to a building of their own, hidden
by snow and ice. "There is still much work to be done for next Christmas,"
the real Santa Claus said to the elf, his eyes sparkling. "And it seems we
are back in business."

THE END

By Ben Versteegt

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Santa Trek, by Bram Peeters.
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Santa Trek - The Motion Picture
When a destructive space entity is spotted approaching Planet North Pole,
Admiral Claus resumes command of the Starship Sleigh in order to intercept,
examine, and hopefully stop it.

Santa Trek 2 - The Wrath of Sandy Claws
Admiral Claus's midlife crisis is interrupted by the return of an old enemy
looking for revenge and a potentially destructive device.

Santa Trek 3 - The Search for Prancer
Admiral Claus and his reindeer risk their careers stealing the
decommissioned Starship Sleigh to return to the restricted Christmas planet
to recover Prancer's body.

Santa Trek 4 - The Voyage Home
To save Planet North Pole from an alien probe, Admiral Claus and his
reindeer go back in time to retrieve the only beings who can communicate
with it, late 19th century elves.

Santa Trek 5 - The Final Frontier
Captain Claus and his reindeer must deal with Prancer's half brother who
hijacks the Starship Sleigh for an obsessive search for Eggnog.

Santa Trek 6 - The Undiscovered Country
The reindeer of the Starship Sleigh and Sledge must stop a plot to prevent a
peace treaty between the Easter Bunnies and the Christmas Federation.

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A Ferengi Christmas Carol, by Rob Versteegt
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A Ferengi Christmas Carol.

This story is about Loodge, one of the most powerful Ferengi in the Ferengi
empire. He was mean, exploited everyone, and didn't let anything like 'moral
values' get in his way. When that day came... the day humans called...
Christmas.

Loodge was happily doing business. He had just exploited another customer.
Ah, how it felt good to earn profit, even if the people he was doing
business with were now doomed to live a life of being poor. But what did
Loodge care! Hah! He was a Ferengi! A businessman! And a pretty good one at
that!

Loodge was on his way to the planet Bajor, to do some business there. He was
travelling by cargo freighter. (It was the cheapest way to go.) The
freighter was ugly, filled with darkness. The Ferengi was in his room,
counting his latinum, when he suddenly heard someone knocking. ~That's odd.~
he thought, while standing up. ~Why don't they use the chiming button?~ He
sighed. ~Of course... those freighters aren't that modern... they must not
have those chiming thingies then...~ "Enter!" he shouted, while sitting
down, and continued counting his latinum again.

Nobody entered. But the knocking went on. "Enter!" Loodge was now becoming
angry. "Who dares to play tricks with the almighty Loodge?" he shouted.
Still, no response. Angrily, he stood up, and opened the door. There was
no-one there. ~How is this possible? Shouldn't there be someone here?~ He
shrugged. ~Oh well.. I've got more important things to worry about. Like how
to take more latinum from those Bajorans!~ He began to laugh, like only a
Ferengi could. But after a few seconds, his laughing was interrupted by
another knock on the door.

Again, he stood up, and opened the door. Again, there was nobody there! But
when he turned around, cursing in his native language, he almost bumped into
another Ferengi. "Hey!" Loodge shouted. "Can't you see where you are going?
And how did you get in here?" It wasn't until then he looked at the face of
the unknown Ferengi. "By the tower of commerce!" he called out. "Marlon! How
did you get in here!" He paused.

"Wait a minute... Aren't you dead?"

The other Ferengi, called Marlon, nodded. "Yes I am.. my beloved
businesspartner!" The dead Ferengi made his way to the chair Loodge had been
sitting. "Ah," he said. "I see you are doing well? You've made more Latinum
then I would have given you credit for my friend."

Loodge blinked his eyes. "Marlon... Is it you? But how... and why..." He
paused. "And don't touch my latinum!"

Marlon pulled away his hand. "Sorry Loodge... It's just... Sometimes I yearn
back to the days I had some real latinum in my hands..." The dead Ferengi
looked at the one still alive. "That's why I've come back from the Divine
Treasury."

This had peaked Loodge's interest. "What is life like over there?"

Marlon sighed. "You mean what is death like over there... You know, I, and a
lot of others are getting bored by all that eternal greed. There is latinum
everywhere, you don't have to work, and you can exploit all you want!
But..."

"But what?" Loodge was getting curious. "It sounds like heaven to me!"

"It is.. But you'll get bored you know. Every day it's always the same...
You begin the day by taking a latinum bath... then we'll have tubegrubs for
breakfast... tubegrubs for lunch... and tubegrubs for dinner. And all the
beetlesnuff you can buy! But... I hate to say it.. I'm bored. I don't like
those tubegrubs anymore, and my latinum is gone. I've spilled it all on
beetlesnuff. So here I am now, trying to persuade you to take advantage of
all that you have. Go buy something! Spend it all!"

Loodge couldn't believe he was hearing this. "What?" he shouted. "Spend all
my latinum? Never!"

"Okay then." Marlon shrugged. "Then I'll just have to send 3 ghosts to
persuade you. Bye!" And with that, Marlon disappeared.

~Man... that was weird.~ Loodge thought. ~I must have sniffed too much of
that beetlesnuff...~

An hour later, Loodge had forgotten the whole incident. Counting his latinum
seemed to do that to him. Suddenly, there was another knock on his door.
~What now...~

The whole room started to light up when the door opened. "Loodge..." came a
voice. "I am the ghost of Christmas past!"

~A ghost? This can't be right?~ "You're not touching my latinum!"

The lights diminished, and now Loodge could see the ghost. It was... holding
a flashlight?

"Yeah sorry." The ghost said. "We had to cut back on glow in the dark paint,
so we thought we could use a flashlight." The ghost came forward. Loodge
could now finally see it's face.

"You're a Trill?"

The ghost nodded. "Yes." She said. "Did that surprise you?"

"Well... yes..." Loodge said softly. "I was expecting a Ferengi."

This seemed to upset the ghost. "Fine then! I'll leave if you want to!" With
big, angry steps, the Trill ghost marched to the door.

Loodge shrugged. ~Who cares... That stupid ghost is just a waist of time!~

Suddenly, the whole room changed. It was as if the only thing that remained
the same was Loodge himself. He found himself in a tall building, looking
out over... ~Ferenginar? How did I get here?~ He scratched his lobes, and
looked around. There, the Trill ghost of Greed past stood. "Welcome to
Ferenginar." He said. "It's the day before Christmas... the one day in the
year that Greed cannot have a place in society..."

"Hello.." Loodge said to this Trill. "That might work with a lowly huwman,
who do nothing else than celebrate, and earn nothing about it.. but I'm a
Ferengi! I do not share such idiotic values... I'm living my life the
Ferengi way... and nothing that you show me, can change that!"

The Trill smiled. "I wouldn't be so sure. Look over there." He pointed at
some Ferengi, having what seemed like a wild party.

"I don't believe it!" Loodge shouted out. "There's old Weg! He died quite a
few years ago!" He grinned. "Oh, Weg was always too generous, the poor man.
He didn't charge the full entrance fees to this party, even though these
parties were great!"

"Yes... but why did he do that?" the Trill spirit asked Loodge. "Why would
he not want to make profit?"

Loodge frowned. "He always said it made him feel good. Grumpy old man... he
was always too emotional." He shook his head. "That's why the Ferengi
Commerce Authority came to get him... and if I remember correctly, they came
right about.."

The doors burst open, and there, in the dooropening, there were a few armed
Ferengi. "Now." Loodge finished.

The Trill looked surprised. "Ehm.. yeah, this is one Christmas you do not
have to see.. let's go!" And in a flash, which happened faster than someone
could say 'FCA', they disappeared.

Only to reappear again, at another place and time which Loodge remembered.
"Oh! I remember this!" he said, almost shouting out in joy. "This was the
shipyard of which I bought my first ship! Oh, I remember it now..." His face
changed from being happy to being angry. "That ship was no good, I tell you.
Right after the first trip, I was stranded in outer space, because the
engines hadn't been maintained properly." He shook his head. "Oh, how naive
I was back then..."

"Ehm.. right." The spirit said, frowning again. ~This isn't going well..~ He
sighed. "But don't you see.. you even paid more to get your own ship! That
was generous, wasn't it?"

"No it wasn't!" Loodge spat at the Trill spirit. "That guy took extra
latinum off me, and I was too stupid to see! My goodness... I could have
spend 88 pieces of Gold Pressed Latinum, just by haggling! But what did I
do? I thought I had enough, and I spent it! What was I thinking?"

"Ehm.. no, you're not getting the point.." the Trill spirit said. "Christmas
isn't about haggling... it's about.."

"Forget Christmas!" the Ferengi shouted. "Take me back! Now! I cannot stand
this!"

The Trill spirit sighed... and before Loodge knew it, he was back at the old
freighter, in his bunk. There was no spirit anywhere, and... wait a second,
yes, there was! There, in a corner, he saw a light.

The light got closer and closer, and seemed to reach out to him. Loodge
didn't know what this was... but before he knew it, the light was all around
him. "Hello?" he asked. "What's this?"

A human approached. In the bright light, he seemed to be nothing more than a
shadow. "You'd better start believing in ghost stories matey..." the human
started. "You're in one!" With that, the human jumped into the light.

Nothing happened. "Oh come on.." the human started, and let out a slight
sigh. "You're not even a little bit scared?"

Loodge shrugged. "What kind of businessman would I be, if I would be scared
of everything? Not a very good one.."

"No.." the human said, seeming to hesitate. "That's true, but... I'm the
spirit of Christmas present! And.. well, I... I..."

Now, it was Loodge's turn to sigh. "Right. Let me guess... you want to show
me Christmas present? Why actually? I mean... I already know what the
present is like. So why show me? What's the use? I could really use my time
better you know."

The human spirit grabbed Loodge by the hand. "Oh come on.. let's go." And
again, in a bright white light, they disappeared...

Only to reappear somewhere else on this ship. "Hey, I know this place..."
Loodge said. "It's the office I have paid for my secretary. He's a dumb
hew-mon, but for some reason, I like him..."

The human spirit shook his head. "But I bet you didn't know that he has a
wife and kids on some backward colony?"

Loodge shrugged. "Sure I did. That's why I took him in. What can I say... I
have a weakness. Stupid, I know, but I just couldn't leave him on his
colony, with Ms. Cratchett, and their son, called Tiny Tim. He's incredibly
ill, and might die any moment now."

The human spirit looked surprised. "How do you know that?"

Again, the Ferengi shook his head. "I wouldn't be a good businessman if I
didn't know the background of the people I hire..."

"But..." the human spirit seemed to be totally stunned. "Don't you care that
this Tiny Tim is going to die?"

"Why should I?" Loodge answered. "That Tiny Tim won't be a good worker
anyway. Let him die."

"I... I..." The spirit seemed to be appalled. "That's it! Time for the big
guns! You've asked for it buddy! The 3rd spirit will come!"

With that, Loodge found himself back in his bunk on the ship. Nothing seemed
to have happened. However, it didn't take him long to hear a familiar sound:
the sound of Gold Pressed Latinum. ~Now there's a sound for sore ears..~ he
thought, while walking in the direction of the sound.

When he entered the next room, he saw several Ferengi paying each other Gold
Pressed Latinum. *His* Gold Pressed Latinum! "Hey!" Loodge shouted. "Stop
that! That's mine!" The Ferengi didn't seem to hear him though... no matter
how hard Loodge shouted.

"You're dead." A voice from behind him told. Loodge quickly turned around,
and saw a Klingon, dressed up in a warrior's outfit, standing there. "You
died an honourless death, dying with only your latinum around you. You're
disgusting."

"Why thank you for the compliment." Loodge said, in more than just a simple
sarcastic tone. "Ehm.. if I may ask... what are those Ferengi doing with my
latinum?"

"As I said," the Klingon Warrior spirit grunted, "You're dead. I'm the
spirit of Christmas future, and what you see here, is Ferengi buying and
selling your bodyparts." The Klingon shuddered. "Bah.. honourless Km'pekt!"

"Hmmm." Loodge wasn't all too shocked by his demise... especially since he
saw that those disks of him were sold with extremely good prizes! "So... I'm
gone to the Divine Treasury, and those disks are worth a fortune.." He
turned to the Klingon, with a big smile on his face. "Was that why you
brought me here?"

Another grunt came from the Klingon. "There's more. Come with me." Again, a
bright white flash appeared, and the next thing Loodge remembered, he was
standing in a dark room, looking at Bob Cratchett, and his wife... without
the Tiny Tim. "Oh no..." Loodge was obviously shook up about this. "The
horror!"

The Klingon spirit smiled slightly. "Yes... because you paid his dad this
little, he couldn't afford the medical care needed to keep his son alive."

"No, that's not what I meant!" Loodge shouted out. "Look! They're eating a
bird! How disgusting!"

"By Gret'hor! Don't you have any respect for life? For Christmas? Where's
your Christmas spirit?" The Klingon was getting angry... and Loodge backed
off just a little.

"Easy.." he said. "You're my Christmas spirit... why would I need one for
myself?" He paused. "You know, there is a beautiful word for this.. and
ironically, it came from the hew-mons... Humbug. Now, get me back to my
ship."

The Klingon spirit let out a loud roar... and then looked at Loodge in the
eyes. "You may have won the battle... but not the war! You *will* feel the
spirit of Christmas... even if it means that we have to haunt you every
year! You got that?"

"Yeah yeah.." Loodge said, sarcastically. "I'm feeling the spirit of
Christmas now.. .really. Now, please let me go ho.."

Again, in a bright white flash, he was transported back to where he began:
his bunk. This time, he found himself laying in his bed. ~Wow.. that was
some weird dream..~ He shook his head, and stepped out of bed. ~I need a
walk..~

He hadn't walked very far, when he met one of the other passengers of this
ship: a small boy. "Hello," Loodge started, "Do you know what day it is?"

The human boy seemed to be surprised. "Yes Sir... It's Christmas day!"

"Christmas day.." Loodge repeated the boy. His eyes grew wider, and a smile
appeared on his face. "Boy... can you do something for me? You know those
large birds that people eat on Christmas?"

"Turkeys?"

"Yeah, those! I'd like you to get me the biggest one that you can find!
Understood? And Merry Christmas!" Loodge said, smiling from ear to ear.

The boy, obviously surprised, simply nodded, and walked away, only to come
back to Loodge's quarters several minutes later with a large replicated
roasted turkey. "Thank you my boy!" Loodge said, and then got closer to the
boy's ears. "Now scram!"

The boy, with a terrified look on his face, didn't even stay to think about
it... he simply ran away, his face in tears.

"And a Merry Christmas!" Loodge shouted after the boy. With that, he closed
the door to his room, and put this turkey on the table. ~Let's see how this
hew-man dish tastes...~ he thought, and took a small bite. ~Man... I love
Christmas!~

The End.

by: Rob Versteegt

--------------------------------------------------------------------
It's Posting Time, By Martin Miller
--------------------------------------------------------------------

Frontierfleet - Its Posting Time
(Band Aid - Its Christmas time)

It's posting time, there's no need to be afraid
It's posting time, we post till we have to eat or bathe
And in our world of posting we are more than girls and boys

Throw our posts around the world at posting time

We write a post

Post to the other ones
At posting time it's hard, but we are always having fun
There's a world outside our window
But we sit here night and day
Where the only posts we are writing are full of joy and tears
And the Posted email sign appears
Are the clanging chimes of doom
Well tonight thank god, its a post and not you.

No there won't be any posting this time tonight
The greatest gift this year, posting was full of life
(Oooh) Our email boxes over flow
Our pain in our fingers just grows
Do we know its posting time for all.

(Here's to you) Here's a post too everyone
(Here's to them) Underneath our posting storm
Do we know its posting time for all.

Frontier Fleet, Frontier Fleet, Frontier Fleet,
Let them know its posting time for all.

Frontier Fleet
Its posting time for the Calhoun

Frontier Fleet
Its posting time for the Valkyrie

Frontier Fleet
Its posting time for Pandora

Frontier Fleet
Its posting time for Odyssey

Frontier Fleet
Its posting time for the Atlantis

Frontier Fleet
And don't forget the Academy!

Created by Martin M.

P.S thanks to Rob Versteegt. for some inspiration, and to the original Band
Aid song.

==========