"Mirror, Mirror, Mirror, Mirror" is a Waypoint comic story, a Star Trek: The Next Generation tale published in 2017 in "Waypoint, Issue 4". It was released by IDW Publishing in honor of Star Trek's 50th anniversary.
Description[]
- What happens when Worf and Dr. Crusher make a startling discovery on a strange planet that leads their being duplicated over and over and over again? Will the real Worf and Crusher please stand up?
Summary[]
- Chief Medical Officer's log, supplemental.
- From a cursory analysis of these flowers, the chemical composition looks promising. I may be able to use them to synthesize a cure for the plague in the Minshara colony.
While checking the one thing on an unnamed planet that isn't a pink flower, Worf and Crusher spot some sort of mirrored statue. Suddenly they find themselves being duplicated, and now there are four Beverly Crushers and eight Worfs, identical in every sense. Captain Jean-Luc Picard beams down and asks the Crushers personal questions to single out the original, but all of the Crushers know the answers.
Data reports having found no record of a sentient person ever having been successfully replicated before. He also finds that every flower on the planet is identical, suggesting that originally there might have been just one flower. Picard speculates that the mirrored object could be a lifeform. As Worf and Crusher grapple with being multiple people, Crusher thinks of the rare vaccines that could be duplicated with this technology, but Worf considers its dangerous military applications in the hands of enemy governments.
Crusher remembers her young self interacting with reflections in her grandmother's dressing room mirrors as if they were almost playmates. Because the entity hasn't done anything since duplicating Worf and Crusher, she has a hunch that it might be attempting to communicate something. Soon, Miles O'Brien has replicated a pair of large, twin mirrors. As the duplicate Worfs and Crushers block the entity's view, O'Brien materializes the mirrors facing each other on opposite sides of the entity. When Worfs and Crushers step aside, they all see reflections ad infinitum. The entity collapses the Worfs, Crushers and flowers back to one of each. Instead of duplicating the mirrors, it duplicates itself, making a companion.
Crusher thinks that it was lonely. Since it couldn't see itself, it couldn't duplicate itself. Picard initially believed the entity might be vastly different than humanity, but that it could be lonely means that their two species are more alike than they might seem. Before departing the planet, the Enterprise places a warning beacon in orbit.
References[]
Characters[]
- Beverly Crusher • Data • Miles O'Brien • Jean-Luc Picard • Worf • mirrored statue entity
- Referenced only
- Jack Crusher • Wesley Crusher • Geordi La Forge • Felisa Howard • Rimbaud • Alexander Rozhenko
Starships and vehicles[]
Locations[]
- unnamed planet
- Referenced only
- Kreetassa • Minshara colony • Paxsor III (Paxsor star system)
Races and cultures[]
States and organizations[]
Science and classification[]
- combadge • communication • distress beacon • language • lifeform • medicine • philosophy • plague • space • starship • technology • thermodynamics • time • transporter • tricorder • vaccine • viewport • weapon
Lifeforms[]
Ranks and titles[]
- captain • chief medical officer • commanding officer • commander • doctor • engineer • first officer • lieutenant commander
Other references[]
- Aaamazzaran flying dog • antique • beam • cat • chief medical officer's log, USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-D) • flower • glass • government • history • honeymoon • lichen • mirror • races and cultures • rank • science • species • Starfleet uniform (2366-2373) • state • statue • title • tree • universe • vase • wine
Appendices[]
Related media[]
- Spontaneously replicated, identical transporter duplicates were created after this story took place in the forms of Thomas Riker and William Boimler, in TNG episode: "Second Chances" and LD episode: "Kayshon, His Eyes Open".
- LD episode: "An Embarrassment Of Dooplers" – In the 2380s, the Doopler species was known to be capable of spontaneously duplicating.
Background[]
- The story takes place between TNG episode: "Evolution" in 2366 and TNG episode: "Second Chances" in 2369.
- Spock was spontaneously replicated in 2270, although Spock One had mirrored biology and thought processes, in TOS novel: Spock Must Die!.
Images[]
Connections[]
| Star Trek: Waypoint Comics |
| #1 ("Puzzles" & "Daylily") • #2 ("The Menace of the Mechanitrons" & "Legacy") • #3 ("The Wildman Maneuver" & "Mother's Walk") • #4 ("The Fragile Beauty of Loyalty" & "Mirror, Mirror, Mirror, Mirror") • #5 ("Frontier Doctor" & "Come Away, Child") • #6 ("The Rebound Effect" & "The Fear") • Special ("Only You Can Save Yourself" & "Consider Eternity" & "My Human is Not" & "Histories") • Special 2019 ("Hearts & Bones" & "Unfathom" & "The Swift Spoke" & "The First Year") |
Timeline[]
| published order | ||
|---|---|---|
| Previous comic: The Fragile Beauty of Loyalty |
Waypoint | Next comic: Frontier Doctor |
| Previous comic: Puzzles |
TNG comics (Waypoint) | Next comic: Consider Eternity |
| Previous comic: Puzzles |
TNG comics | Next comic: Mirror Broken, Issue 0 |
External link[]
- Mirror, Mirror, Mirror, Mirror article at Memory Alpha, the wiki for canon Star Trek.