Jonathan stood at the back of a makeshift canopy, which was actually four tall poles with two prayer shawls draped over them. The four poles were held by Andy Miller and Ethan Shapiro, who were wearing their own prayer shawls – tallit. At the front were Karin and Josh. She was wearing a wine-colored dress. Josh had on a full-dress uniform and was wearing a yarmulke, as were all four of the men. Karin had a tiny lacy white veil pinned to the back of her hair.
“And now’s the time where I say a few words,” Jonathan smiled a bit.
Everyone looked encouraging, so he continued. The weather on Amity was pleasant. He could see not only the crew members on the surface, but also their Xindi sloth guests, Prala and Krivan. “I was at a bit of a loss as to what to say. See, I figured I should mention something from the Old Testament. I went hunting around because I wasn’t so sure I wanted to go to Adam and Eve for my inspiration. Josh’s name is from Joshua, who was a warrior. And it didn’t seem appropriate to talk about a battle and the walls of Jericho tumbling down.”
Prala looked lost. Hoshi was sitting nearby and whispered, “I’ll fill you in afterwards, if you like.”
“That would be helpful.”
“Fortunately, Karin came to my rescue, with her middle name, which is Ruth. You may not know the Book of Ruth terribly well, but I am here to tell you that it’s a love story.”
Josh took Karin’s hand. Ethan looked straight ahead, trying to be impassive. Andy stood there, wondering how long he’d have to stand there as his arms were getting a little tired from holding up two of the canopy poles.
“Ruth and Orpah were from Moab, which is a country that we now know as Jordan. Our own Maryam Haroun was born there.”
Maryam looked down, a little embarrassed at drawing the attention.
“Ruth and Orpah married brothers. But their father-in-law died, leaving their mother-in-law a widow. And soon their husbands died as well. Naomi, their mother-in-law, wanted to return to Bethlehem. She told her two daughters-in-law to go back to their own mothers, and find new husbands, but Ruth and Orpah refused. They went along with Naomi on her journey.”
“How far a journey was this?” whispered Krivan.
“I don’t know,” replied Azar Hamidi, who was sitting nearby.
“After a while, Orpah decided she couldn’t go on, so she went back home. And Naomi told Ruth to leave, too, but Ruth said no. She said, ‘entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.’” He paused for a moment. “I guess Ruth was pretty stubborn, eh?”
The assembled crew members and guests laughed a little bit.
“They went to Bethlehem. Now, you’ve gotta understand, Ruth and Naomi were some of the poorest of the poor. They only had the clothes on their backs. And without men to support them, they were in pretty bad shape. So they relied on the charity of others. They used to do what was called gleaning. There were wealthy landowners, and the rule was that they would harvest most of their crops but would leave the corners. And then the poor people would glean – that is to say, they would harvest – the leftover grain from the corners of each parcel of land. In this way, Naomi and Ruth didn’t starve.”
“Like the crops you wish to plant?” Prala asked Hoshi.
“I think so, yes.”
“Now, Ruth was a beautiful woman. And one day, one of the wealthy landowners, a man named Boaz, noticed her. And he asked around about her. One of the things he learned was that she was not just a pretty face. She was also kind and loyal, and she cared for her mother-in-law. Ruth could have just walked away, but she didn’t. Boaz also happens to be a relative of Naomi’s, so this impressed him even more.”
“Nothing like family, eh?” Krivan commiserated.
“Nothing,” Crewman Hamidi glanced ever so slightly in Maryam’s direction.
“Naomi told Ruth to go to Boaz’s tent. And she did. She essentially made the first move with him. And, well, it worked out. She met her – to mix genres and metaphors and mythologies – she snagged her Prince Charming. And it was her beauty that drew his attention to her, but it was her kindness and her loyalty, her gentleness and her thoughtfulness, that kept his attention, and won him over, for I’m sure there was a lot of competition for a wealthy single man’s attentions.”
Ethan continued staring straight ahead, avoiding looking either Josh or Karin in the eye.
“We all see the competition. We all feel it. But there is something to be learned from this story,” Jonathan stated, “It’s that we should be able to look past the surface, and embrace those who are, deep down, truly worthwhile.”
“Hear here,” Hoshi murmured softly.
Jonathan began slowly intoning in Hebrew, as well as he could, and she found herself mouthing the words along with him so as to try to keep him on track. He got to the couple’s names and Andy smiled. He didn’t know much more Hebrew than Jonathan did, but this part he recognized.
“Khana Root bat Rifka v’Itzik,” Jonathan said, “Karin Ruth, daughter of Rebecca and Ian.”
Malcolm smiled a little to himself as he listened.
“Yoshua ben Malka v’Adom,” Jonathan said, “Joshua, son of Melissa and Adam.”
The vows continued and Karin walked in a circle around Josh seven times, and then he returned the favor. They drank wine, exchanged rings and then Jonathan picked up a little glass wrapped in a cloth napkin. It was an old cracked glass that Will and Lili could spare. He gave it to Josh.
Josh set the glass down on the ground and stamped on it, hard, shattering it under his boot heel. He smiled at Karin and kissed her. Jonathan yelled out, “Mazel Tov!” as Ethan looked away, blinking, trying to get some pesky bit of dirt out of his eye.
=/=
At the reception, Lili served as people began to line up for barbecue.
Private Chang was first. “Why aren’t there any cheeseburgers?”
“’Cause they’re not kosher,” she explained, “no milk and meat can be mixed today.”
He was about to whine but Andy Miller was right behind him. “It’s just for one meal, man.”
“Uh, yeah, I guess so. Well-done, uh, please.”
“Here ya go,” she indicated, “ketchup and other fixings are over there.” She continued serving, but the line was getting longer. For some reason, things were just slow. She saw Brian Delacroix. “Do you mind helping a little?”
“Helping how?” he asked.
“Just, can you serve up while I cook?”
“Sure.”
Together, they served the guests, who stood on the line with everyone else. “Oh! You should have been served first!” Lili exclaimed when she saw Prala and Krivan.
“Oh, that is all right,” Prala assured her, “we don’t need to be treated in any special manner.”
“Do you like spicy things? We have mustard with whole mustard seeds, and that’s a little sharp-tasting. It’s the yellowy-orange sauce over there,” she pointed.
“And the other?”
“The red one is a tomato-based sauce called ketchup. It’s, um, a tiny bit tangy, but also a touch sweet. This is potato salad; it’s what’s called German style, so it’s got some of that mustard in it, and the skin is left on the potatoes.”
“Potatoes are an animal?” Krivan asked.
“They’re a vegetable,” Brian explained, “uh; I think they can grow in a place like this.”
“They can,” Lili confirmed, “but these are replicated. Still, we might grow them here anyway, I don’t know. You’d have to ask Shelby. She’s in charge of all of that.”
“And what else can grow here?” Prala asked.
“All sorts of things, things we haven’t fed you yet,” Lili brought over a plate of medium-well burgers. “I think part of the plan is to have fruit trees growing here.”
“We won’t bother you, seeing as how busy you are,” Prala smiled. Jay Hayes was right behind her, and he’d been waiting for a while. “Which person is this Shelby?”
“Over there,” Brian pointed.
The two Xindi sloths walked over to where Shelby was sitting with Andy. “May we sit with you?” asked Krivan.
“All right,” she moved over.
“We were curious as to what can be grown here,” Prala clarified.
“There are four continents, as you know,” Shelby noted, “and two of them are wetter. This is one of the two drier ones. This continent is a bit like an environment on Earth called the Russian steppes. As you can see, it’s a kind of scrubland. The other dry continent is a tad warmer. On both of these, we can probably grow big grain crops like wheat and corn. We can probably get orchards going here, too, for fruits like apples and maybe peaches.”
“And on the wetter continents?” asked Krivan.
“Cranberry bogs and rice paddies, I’m thinking,” she mused, “But we’d start with some experiments in the beginning. At the start, it’ll probably be pretty labor-intensive, as we don’t have a combine harvester or anything like that. Plus anyone down here would have to manually pollinate the plants. We had to do that on the warmer planet, Paradise.”
“I see,” Krivan asked, “so you would need our labor?”
“I, uh, I don’t make that decision,” Shelby looked a tad uncomfortable.
“Understood,” replied Prala, “thank you; this has been most educational.”
The two Xindi sloths got up and walked a bit away. Krivan murmured, “This is a little like – do you remember? When you and I committed to each other?”
“I was more slender then, and my hair was silkier.”
“I have not noticed any changes,” he assured her.
She smiled a little at that. “Can we trust these people? They are on their best behavior but I sense that they are cautious and a bit skeptical.”
“I imagine if we were in their position, we would be equally skeptical. The question is also; would we settle to be their day laborers? Should we not strive for more?”
=/=
On the NX-01, T’Pol sat in the captain’s chair as Chris Harris piloted the craft. “Have we readings from the surface?” she asked.
“We do,” Aidan, looked at his console. “So far, all of the biosigns are remaining very close together. It doesn’t look like the Xindi are breaking off to go too far away.”
“Then perhaps they are not privately speaking of us,” T’Pol concluded. “Mister Masterson, get me main Engineering.”
“Ready,” Chip replied.
“Mister Tucker,” she reported, “it appears that the Xindi are remaining with the party and are not wandering off, as you had feared.”
“Oh, huh,” he was a little distracted, “thanks for checkin’ that out for me. I can’t help being cautious about ‘em. Tucker out.”
“Continue monitoring, Mister MacKenzie,” she commanded.
“Of course.”
=/=
Ethan Shapiro’s Personal log, November eighteenth, 2037
I got through it. It’s funny. I wasn’t in love with her before, not before we were tossed back to 2037, like just so much gefilte fish.
And now I am, and it’s too late. I don’t really know what to do. I suppose I could write bad poetry and try my hardest to be mopey. Or I could get with one of the other women, maybe, I don’t know.
I don’t think the medication is working at all. I just want to die.
=/=
Malcolm Reed’s Personal log, November eighteenth, 2037
Another woman is off the table, for good, I imagine.
It amused me a little, to hear that her father’s name is – or was, or I suppose will be – that it is Ian. For I have never liked the name Malcolm. I would change my name to Ian if I could. Perhaps I could reinvent myself, if I didn’t have so much of this bloody emotional baggage.
=/=
Jay Hayes’s Personal log, November eighteenth, 2037
We had another wedding today. That’s the third. I guess there will be another thirty or so.
There were two Xindi sloths there. I’m not so sure I trust them. They seem nice, but it just feels too soon. I don’t know why they attacked Earth in the first place, but my understanding is that they have a representative government. So somebody had to vote for the attack. To my mind, that means that there are some underlying thoughts against people like us. Is it prejudice? I don’t know.
I don’t see how people can be thinking about weddings when they are still a threat.
The other threat – maybe – is those big beasts we saw the last time we were on Amity. We didn’t see any today, but we weren’t on one of the wetter continents, either. We’re going to go back down soon, and I’ll be sure I’m in that landing party. We need to know what we’re up against. Maybe it’s nothing. But we need to know. I can’t be thinking about girls or anything like that until that’s more settled.
=/=
Sandra Sloane’s Personal log, November eighteenth, 2037
I need a hook-up soon. I am so bored.
=/=
Brian Delacroix’s Personal log, November eighteenth, 2037
Lili had me help her serve today. It was kinda fun. I know there’s an opening for someone to apprentice under her and Chef. I’m considering whether I want to do that.
=/=
Jonathan Archer’s Personal log, November eighteenth, 2037
Well, I made it through all right. We’ll go back down to the surface soon, to see what’s up with those beasts. Once we’ve got that settled, we can start to think about planting.
I am still cautious about the Xindi sloths, but so far, so good. I hope we can work with them.