—- Bridge —-

Captain Nathanial Hawthorne smiled again, trying to move on from the insult. It seemed that as ‘progressive’ as the crew of the USS Seattle had decided the inhabitants of this planet were they were not used to dealing with me. 

“I am the Captain, not because I’m male, but because of my experience. I was assigned to the post and there’s plenty of female Captains in Starfleet,” Hawthorne said, and then he gestured to Commander Adriana Cruz on his right, “As you can see my First Officer and next in command is female. We do not make judgements on gender.”

Cruz smiled, but said nothing.

”Someone else will contact you,” the screen switched off.

”Well this first contact is going swimmingly,” Hawthorne signed sitting down.

”Hopefully cooler heads will prevail,” Cruz said, “It’s the morning shift at a little used space agency, that according to records haven’t flown a ship in over three years.”

”You’d think a ship of aliens would be interesting to them,” Hawthorne said.

About an hour later, give or take, they were hailed from the government capital. A nicer dressed woman appeared on the screen and smiled, if they had met someone who was not wanting to be nice to them on the first try, it was time now to meet someone who was going to sweet talk them.

”Captain I am Prime Minister Tchaka of Maya,” the woman said, “Welcome to our solar system, we have not had contact with outsiders before. How do you speak our language?”

”It’s a universal translator, your languages sounds to me like Earth English, and my English sounds to you like your language,” Hawthorne explained.

”That is quite clever. We all now speak the same language,” Prime Minister Tchaka said, “But I do admire that. I am sorry for the brusque and frankly rude welcome you had before. But my people have not seem a male for a long time.”

”May I ask why?” Hawthorne asked.

”They killed themselves, five generations ago,” Tchaka said.

”Ah we have not… met an all female planet before,” Hawthorne said.

”No? It would seem common, men are aggressive and violent. That is why we assumed you had enslaved your female crew, and wanted to do the same here,” the Prime Minister said.

Hawthorne glanced at Cruz, “My crew is obviously meant to follow my orders but they are not slaves. Commander Cruz are you my slave?”

”No sir,” Cruz smiled, “Not even a little. Ma’am, he’s telling the truth, we’re not slaves or being coerced into being here.”

”We’ve scanned your ship, and realize that you could lay waste to our army from space, so there is little reason for you to lie,” Tchaka said, “So your female officers may come down. You and any males, are not allowed.”

Hawthorne sighed, “We don’t see gender as a reason to assign various assignments. My security Chief and his Assistant are both males, and would go on most missions of this nature. I have the most diplomatic training and…”

”Captain Hawthorne, you are not listening to me. I welcome you here, but only your female officers may transport down not your males. We would see it as an aggressive act,” the Prime Minister insisted.

”Thank you Prime Minister, we will send a team down on a shuttle,” Hawthorne said.

—- Maya, Central Government Courtyard —-

“We can free all of your sisters,” the Prime Minister was saying.

”We are not prisoners,” Commander Cruz insisted. 

”We understand your concern for us, but we do not require saving,” smiled Chief Counselor Kolem.

The Prime Minister looked at them, “You’re telling the truth, odd. Men on Maya, were obsessed with war against each other finally they created a chemical weapon that wiped them all out. We have lived without men ever since.”

”How do you reproduce?” Doctor T’Rala asked.

”We are clones,” the Prime Minister said.

”We have seen human colonies fail when relying on cloning,” T’Rala said.

”Perhaps their sample size was quite small. We began with four billion women,” Tchaka said, “If you are wondering about replicative failing.”

T’Rala smiled, “I was, but yes three billion gives you quite awhile before that would be an issue.”

The Prime Minister looked at her, “Why are your ears different than theirs.”

”I’m a Romulan, and we have big ears,” the Doctor said.

Lieutenant Jara laughed, “Sorry, I just haven’t heard that said before.”

”Would you like to come aboard the USS Seattle Prime Minister,” Cruz suggested, “If men can not come down here?”

The Prime Minister thought about it, “Yes, that would be fine. If I can bring my council.”

”Of course,” Cruz said.

”First though there is much for you to see,” the Prime Minister Tchaka said.

The group was each paried with a woman from Maya and allowed to go where they wished. Commander Cruz remained with the Prime Minister to discuss how society operated and the needs of the planet but the others all split up, with Jara visiting military locations, and everyone else tackling their specialties.

It was hours later that the crew of officer from the Seattle met up at the shuttle the Pearl Jam. 

“The Prime Minister and her cabinet will be beaming up tonight,” Cruz said, “I explained transporter technology to them and they’re excited to see it.”

Jara waited until the shuttle’s door closed, “Their military is, well let’s say they have the weapons to kill everyone on this planet but not the personnel, clearly being in the military is not a popular career choice.”

“Would you expect it to be after half their population killed themselves,” Kolem asked, “And since we’re their first interplanetary visitor, there seems to be no need for one. They have world peace.“

Kolem said, “They are doing well, it seems. There is romance, between women. Violence is rare, and less even than current Earth rates. They have families, two to five mothers in each one.“

Cruz took the reports from everyone then flew the shuttle upwards towards the Seattle.

—- Captain’s Quarters —-

“Lesbians?” Hawthorne said.

”No, not all of them but just like men in all male environments who find comfort in other men, they find what love there is,” Cruz said.

The Captain nodded and looked at the planet below him, a purple green orb. Cruz came up behind him kissing his neck. He knew that she was slumming it with him, and that in a year or so she’d get a command and leave him. Still she was warm and he cared for her, even if she kept making him be a better man which was a lot of hard work.

”All the men killed themselves?” he asked.

”Five generations ago,” Cruz said.

”I’d like to say that’s dumb, but we did the same thing. World War III, eugenics, we came close,” Hawthorne said.

”Men came close,“ Cruz said, “but for the grace of God, there’s a reality were I’m the Captain and no men are onboard.”

“Maybe,” Hawthorne said, “You ever been to the mirror universe?”

”Isn’t that just Enterprise nonsense,” Cruz said.

”You’d be sexy, in an all leather uniform,” the Captain mused.

Cruz pushed him back on the bed, “What’s not sexy about this uniform?”

She climbed on the bed on top of him. They did not live in an alternate reality, evil or not. Men had thankfully survived, and tomorrow they were going to have to show the Prime Minister and her cabinet the advantages of that.

Well maybe not all the advantages, Cruz thought as she leaned down to kiss Hawthorne.