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From: karmin.st.jean@busilink.com (Karmin St.jean)
Newsgroups: alt.startrek.creative
Subject: "Accusations"
Date: Tue,  6 Jun 1995 21:10:00 GMT
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                         STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION
                                   "Accusations"


     Captain Picard regretted having gone to the party as soon as he started
to wake up. He had gone in order to help the Federation further peaceful
ties with the Ferengi, and he was beginning to think he'd been given some
alcohol that he hadn't asked for. No doubt the Ferengi had slipped him a
hard drink to get commerce in some illegal fashion. He winced at the
headache the hangover was giving him, then realized he was lying on top of a
woman. He prayed she was not a Ferengi and opened his eyes, expecting the
less than attractive appearance of a Ferengi woman beneath him. Instead, he
saw a beautiful blonde woman. She was unconscious and there were bruises on
her face. She looked like she'd been severely beaten. She woke and stared up
at Picard with absolute horror in her eyes.
     "Not again," she sobbed, "please, I beg you, don't rape me again."
     Picard felt sick. He couldn't believe he'd actually rape anyone. Surely
the Ferengi had set this up to blackmail him. It had to be! 
     "I didn't rape you." He told her. "The Ferengi did something to your
mind so you'd think I raped you, then they inflicted these injuries upon you
in order to back up your belief."
     "You raped me." The woman accused. "I came to you for help and you raped
me! I thought you cared about people, Picard. I guess for once in my life I
was wrong."
     The doorchime sounded. Picard felt the hair on his neck stand up. It was
Doctor Crusher, there for their morning tea. If she saw this woman... he took
a deep breath and opened the door. If she hadn't been raped by him, but only 
thought she'd been, Doctor Crusher would be able to discern so. He opened
the door.
     "Captain," Doctor Crusher began, "I'm sorry I'm late, I was..." she saw
the battered woman and stopped. "Captain! What happened to her?"
     "He raped me." The woman accused.
     "Who?" Doctor Crusher asked.
     The woman pointed at Picard. "He did." She sobbed.
     Doctor Crusher was horrified. She didn't believe any of it and scanned
the woman so she would have proof of Picard's innocence if the woman decided
to press formal charges. She read the results of the scan and her face went
white. She turned an angry look at Picard.
     "How could you?!" She demanded, her voice firm and angry. She tapped her
communicator. "Security to Captain's quarters." She said. "I'm sorry," she
told Picard, "but I have no choice. The scan I did on her indicates that she
was raped last night and that you are the attacker."
     Picard felt sick. He couldn't believe he'd ever commit such a horrible
act, but the evidence was staring him in the face. All the facts said that
he had raped this woman, and he could not recall any of the previous night.
     Worf arrived a short while later. "You called, Doctor?"
     "Take Captain Picard into custody." Doctor Crusher told him. "Have him
confined to the brig until further notice."
     Worf looked at the battered woman, then scowled at Picard who had the
impression that he wasn't going to enjoy the trip to the brig.
     Doctor Crusher examined the young woman, again, and took her to sickbay.
She felt that there was something wrong, but she couldn't determine what it
was. The woman was hurt, and had been raped, but there was just something
that felt wrong. Perhaps, she reasoned with herself, it was just her being
unwilling to believe that Jean-Luc Picard would do such a thing when all the
evidence said that he had. 
     A trial had been arranged. Riker offered to defend Picard and Starfleet
had no problem with such a defense. There was nothing wrong with a friend
defending another friend. It was when a friend of the defendant was working
on the prosecution's case that there were problems.
     The prosecutor in the case was Judge Advocate General Phillipa Louvois,
the same one who had tried Picard following the loss of the Stargazer, and
she was not happy with the task she'd been handed, to try Picard for the
charge of forcible rape.
     She gathered up data on Picard and spoke to his victim. She was young
and scared, and said little. But Louvois put it all down as the young woman
being afraid to speak up against someone in a position of power such as
Picard was.
     "Picard," she told him, when she saw him, "you are a disgrace to your
uniform. When I'm finished, you will never wear a Starfleet uniform again."
     Picard hung his head in shame. He didn't want to believe he had done
what he was being accused of, but all the evidence said he did. He sat in his
cell, glared at by the other inmates, while Louvois gathered prosecution data
and Riker gathered information for defense.
     At last, the day of Picard's trial came. The prosecution went first, the
young woman tearfully telling the judge and jury how Picard had invited her
to his cabin, had shown her around the room, and then had forced her to have
sex with him, ignoring her sobs and begging, until he was finished and had
passed out on top of her.
     Riker called several character witnesses, and all of them told Louvois
about Picard's sterling past, but could not produce one single witness who
had any kind of alibi for Picard's whereabouts on the night of the rape.
     "Under the circumstances," the judge said, following the closing
statements of both the prosecution and the defense, "I'm afraid that I am
forced, however unpleasantly and unwillingly, to..."
     "STOP!" 
     Everyone turned. Picard raised his head. Guinan was standing in the
door of the room, out of breath, she'd run all the way from the transporter
room where she had first heard of the trial. 
     "Guinan!" Picard gasped.
     Guinan didn't look at Picard. She looked, instead, at the woman who had
accused him. Her eyes narrowed, her body tensed. "Q." She said.
     "What?!" Picard asked.
     "She's right, Picard." The young woman sneered. She changed back to her
true form. Everyone who was unfamiliar with Q gasped. "All your crew adores
you, Picard." Q said as he strode over to Picard. "They all think you're
wonderful. I just wanted to see how many of your so-called friends would
still admit to that friendship if you were suddenly accused of something
truly hateful."
     "Well, it looks like they all remained my friends, Q." Picard said,
evenly. "Now get off my ship."
     "I really wish you'd come up with a better parting line." Q sneered as
he vanished.
     The judge let out a sigh of relief. "Case dismissed." She said.


... Q: I wasn't the one who misplaced the entire Deltived Asteroid Belt!
___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12