Complex Numbers

No Time to Morn

PROMPT May 12th

What TV show character would it be the most fun to change places with for a week? Why?

Well, the obvious choice is The Doctor (from Doctor Who). As a friend said, "Lives forever, controls his [or her] own destiny, has legions of fans." Obvious downside, though: that week is inevitably the one that the Daleks would choose to invade Earth, and I'd be too busy finding out if he has two livers as well as the famous two hearts to do anything about them, as Daleks don't drink. Plus the little matter of having "all of time and space" to choose from, and I'd be not only drinking, but suffering from decision paralysis.

So then I thought of Picard, from Star Trek. Commands the Federation's flagship, and women find him irresistible. But no, not only would I have to deal with the Borg and spotty writing, but I don't know if I could pull off being bald.

Besides, if I'm changing places, that means that either one of them would have to be me for a week, and then they'd have to hunt me down and destroy me.

Some superheroes come to mind, too, but see above about retaliation. This would be compounded if I picked, say, Raymond Reddington from The Blacklist. He's rich and cultured and has a private jet, so it would be fun for me -- until the week is over and he tracks me down and puts a bullet in my brain.

So, since I'm on the "Deep Space 9 / Voyager" phase of my long slog of a chronological Star Trek binge, I got to thinking about which of those characters I'd want to be, and I hit on the perfect solution.

Morn.

It's excusable if, even as a Trek fan, you don't know who that is, so I'll help out. He's a recurring character on DS9, a guy in full alien makeup that has a cameo in most, if not all, DS9 episodes. One of the most fun things about (re)watching DS9, which I haven't done since it came out and even then I missed a bunch of episodes because that was before streaming and partially after broadcast TV and I refused to get cable, was looking for Morn sightings.

They created this character, and did the whole alien suit thing, for (almost) every single episode as an in-joke. Dude doesn't even have one solitary line of dialogue. Morn spends all of his free time at Quark's Bar. I'm not even sure what his in-universe purpose is; probably something like moving cargo around in the station's many copious cargo bays, and the bar is where most of his cameos take place.

As a barfly in a busy space station, he gets to try every possible drink in the Federation - and beyond. The only downside would be having to deal with Quark, which is a character I find highly amusing on the show but who would be a real pain to actually interact with.

Best of all, from Morn's perspective, he wouldn't even have to change his lifestyle much while he's me. After all, I don't talk much, and I hang out at bars. He might even get over not having access to Romulan Ale or Klingon Bloodwine for a week, in exchange for trying many and varied craft beers. And I dunno, maybe I'd have time to leave my secret recipe for Romulan Ale in plain sight before the switch, along with all of the necessary ingredients. Well, actually, I already have those and I'm just waiting for the next Trek series to come out on Paramount+ so I have an excuse to mix up a batch.

Still, if I didn't have to concern myself with retaliation or alien invasion, I'd go with The Doctor. But Morn's still very high on the list.