Morning for Charlie X

 

Name: Star Trek: The New Voyages 2 – Story 9 “Elegy for Charlie”

Author: Antonia Vallario

Publication Date: 1/1978

Publisher: Bantam Books

Page Number: 2

Historian’s Note: After the episode Charlie X   

Cast of Characters:  Charlie Evans      unknown narrator

Starships and/or Starbases: USS Enterprise NCC-1701

Planets: none

My Spoiler filled summary and review: This section is just a single poem that follows:

My sleep was disturbed by a weeping star

And a voice that I shouldn’t have heard

For the galaxy drifts in the coldness of space

Where dark is incredibly far,

(and a voice cannot come from a star)

O secretly grown, all alone

child-flower plucked from an alien soil

beneath an alien sun,

who wanted most what we could not give

forgive our helpless humanity;

we watched you taken from the bridge

forever lost from human love

and a life you were not meant to live,

The entire universe stretches beyond, and

I have no answers to give

save the words that I send to the galaxy’s end

to comfort a weeping star,

(for Charlie, wherever you are)

 

 

Additional thoughts: Like with my review of “Sonnet from the Vulcan: Omicron Ceti III” I must confess to have no talent when it comes to judging any type of poem.  I will be breaking it down for its Star Trek content alone.

Rand had some reason to feel sorry for him, but also some reasons not to

             The first thing I wonder while reading this is “who is this narrator?” My opening guess would be Yeoman Janice Rand, she had some sympathy for Charlie, tried her best to help him out, and was on the bridge to when he was taken away.  However, he started to stalk her and at one point blinked her into nonexistence.  So, I don’t think it would make much sense for her to overly morn for him.  Lt. Uhura is another possibility, she is a very empathic person and was on the bridge when Charlie disappeared. However, she wasn’t very close to him.  Could it be Captain Kirk?  To be fair, I mostly dismiss this because the words, to me, seem to be coming from a woman.  That could just because the author is a woman.  Kirk had sympathy, was on the bridge, and still tried to help Charlie when the Thasian comes to retrieve him.  Trying to claim that he belongs with his own people.  Kirk realized that was not possible, even when he said it.  So maybe this is Captain Kirk.

Could it be either Kirk or Uhura?

If someone was not familiar with “Charlie X,” the poem might mislead them into seeing him as blameless.  Charlie may have been sympathetic but he was a horrible monster to people. He treated the crew of the Enterprise, like they were mice that the cat torments before killing it.  The situation wasn’t entirely his fault but he still had a role to play.  I wrote this about him in my review of the episode:

   “As a character Charlie Evans is a fascinating creation.  The power of a God in the body of a teenage boy who has the maturity of a toddler, someone who only wanted to fit in but whose lack of maturity and empathy combined with his amazing abilities made that impossible.  Charlie does horrible things to people because of his lack of empathy and is consistent demands for affection that makes him easy to dislike but the viewer can’t help but feel somewhat sorry for him.  He reminds me of some experiments done in the decades after this episode was made on monkeys and chimpanzees who were raised to be human and taught sign language.  These apes never became human but with the way they were conditioned it was impossible for them to live as apes in the wild.  Charlie is like that he isn’t Thasian despite his abilities, but because of them he can’t be human either.”

He maybe innocent looking but he is not very nice

Should it be canon: I don’t see any part of this that isn’t already canon.

Cover Art: As I stated in the first story:

The cover has the Enterprise flying in front of what appears to be a wrecked space station.  Both appear to be in orbit around a planet that you can see part of in the corner.  There is this red haze that surrounds everything.

Final Grade: Final Grade 4 of 5