Five-Minute "Who Watches The Watchers?"
by Marc Richard

Riker: Captain, we've received a distress call from a team of Federation anthropologists on Mintaka III.
Data: Apparently the holographic duckblind they are using to observe the natives covertly is about to fail.
Picard: What do we know about the cause of the malfunction?
Data: Only that I had nothing to do with it, sir.

Picard: Tell me more about these Mintakans.
Troi: They're a friendly, peaceful, enlightened group of Bronze Age proto-Vulcans.
Picard: Any sign of patronizing arrogance on their part?
Troi: No, they haven't yet reached that stage of Vulcan cultural development.

Dr. Barron: (on viewscreen) Enterprise, we've just lost our reactor!
Picard: Can you maintain your holographic camouflage on battery power until we arrive?
(KA-BOOM!)
Riker: Apparently not.
La Forge: Serves them right for disguising their station as a spectacular three-thousand-foot waterfall instead of a plain old bungalow-sized boulder.

Riker: Geordi, get started on those repairs. Doctor, attend to the wounded.
Crusher: I only see two of the scientists here. Where's the other one?
Geordi: Could that be him looking at us through the station window?
Riker: I'm not sure. Do any of the scientists have pointed ears?
Data: Not according to their Starfleet personnel files.
Riker: Then we may have a problem.
Liko: AAAHHHhhhhhhh! (THUD!)
Riker: Make that two problems.

Picard: Doctor, I told you not to bring back any souvenirs of your trip to the surface.
Crusher: But he was injured falling off a cliff! I had to help him.
Picard: Oh, very well -- but I want you to fix his brain to make sure that his visit to the Enterprise is not a memorable one.
Crusher: Sheesh. You would have made a rotten travel agent, Jean-Luc.

Liko: I was raised from the dead by the all-powerful Supreme Being!
Oji: The Overseer? But father, he's just a myth our ancestors believed in!
Liko: Our ancestors were right! I saw him! His head and face were perfectly smooth, and he was dressed in wondrous red and black clothing!
Oji: Don't the old stories all say that the Overseer wears white robes and has a long white beard?
Liko: Well, maybe our ancestors weren't quite right about every little detail, but....

Picard: We need to find Dr. Palmer and determine how much cultural contamination has taken place.
Riker: I volunteer to beam down to the planet disguised as a native.
Troi: I'll go with you.
Riker: I'd rather go alone on this kind of undercover mission.
Troi: And I want to make sure you don't make first contact with anyone under any covers, if you catch my drift.
Riker: You think I'd do anything like that? Deanna, I'm shocked!

Liko: Friends, listen to me! I encountered The Picard at the top of that mountain!
Nuria: Yet you did not bring back any stone tablets to support your claim. I need to see evidence before I can believe you.
Hali: (dragging in Palmer) Look what we've found! One of The Picard's servants!
Nuria: That will do nicely.

Liko: The Picard will be pleased we have cared for his servant.
Fento: Perhaps he will reward us -- give us gentle winters, provide good hunting....
Liko: Build pyramids, raise colossal stone statues....
Fento: Perhaps we should stick to basics for the moment, Liko.
Liko: Does that mean I won't get my dead wife back either?

Riker: We're too late. They've discovered Palmer.
Troi: Let's blend into the crowd. Maybe we can get close enough to free him.
Riker: Ironic, isn't it? Sophisticated humans from a ship called Enterprise rubbing shoulders with a group of primitive Vulcans.
Troi: If Ambassador Soval were still alive today, I bet he'd be spinning in his grave.

Picard: Congratulations on getting Palmer up to the ship.
Riker: It didn't go smoothly. I was pursued by an archer, and Troi is now all by herself among dozens of Vulcans.
Picard: At least we can be grateful that she's not wearing clothes which are too form-fitting.
Riker: Agreed. Dressing a psychologist in a catsuit would be a regrettable case of shrink-wrapping.

Picard: How do we keep the Mintakan civilization from degenerating into irrational superstitious chaos?
Barron: You should appear before the Mintakans and give them a set of holy commandments.
Riker: You think that providing them with a codified faith will prevent future religious violence?
Barron: It's always worked on Earth, hasn't it?

Picard: I've brought you aboard in order to convince you of something.
Nuria: Gasp! The Picard! Liko was right! I grovel at your feet!
Picard: That wasn't it.

Nuria: Can you show me where my home is?
Picard: Right out that window. But you may want to hold your breath...it's a long way down.

Dr. Warren: GAK!
Nuria: (to Picard) You could not save her? You are not all-powerful?
Picard: No. The best we can do is build ships that spend seven years under attack on the far side of the galaxy without ever showing damage from one week to the next.

Liko: The Picard is here! He will raise the dead for us!
Nuria: No. He has shown me that he is simply a mortal being.
Liko: Not true! This arrow will prove otherwise!
Picard: Oooompf!
Liko: Gasp! He bleeds! Behold the god who bleeds!
Troi: Captain, I think he finally got your point.
Picard: Well I certainly got his.

Nuria: Will you accept this tapestry as a souvenir of my people?
Picard: As long as you don't tell my Chief Medical Officer about it, yes.
(The Enterprise sails away at Ludicrous Speed)

THE END

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