STRANGE TERRAN CUSTOMS
The Dentist - by Mach Hi'

Disclaimer - this is not written for profit and borrows registered words like
Klingon with grateful thanks to Paramount and Viacom

I Mach Hi' Highbom of Qu’nos am no stranger to pain and have taken many
trials and tests of manhood. However, I recently had reason to experience a
Terran ritual that many humans undergo at least twice per solar rotation.
This barbaric and disgusting ritual is known as ‘going to the dentist’ and I
can tell you my brothers and sisters, it is not an experience I relish
repeating.

The lairs in which these sick and depraved individuals lurk are on their
exterior, plain and unassuming buildings resembling standard Terran
habitation units. On entering one little guesses at the terrors lurking
within.

Inside, I found myself in a small, seat lined preparation chamber known as
the "waiting room". Here, a withered, wrinkled human being, that could
loosely be described as 'female’ addressed me, without looking up. "Name?"
she snapped.

"I am Mach Hi, Highborn of Qu’nos". "You don't have an appointment do you?"
she said, looking at me disapprovingly over the top of her spectacles. "You
can't get in without an appointment unless its an emergency!" "An emergency!"
I roared. "Every moment is but pure agony, but being Klingon I do not show
pain, and you talk to me of emergencies!"  She glanced at the large book on
her desk and looked up at me. "You're lucky, we’ve got a gap, so I can fit
you in now." As she said this she pushed a large red button the desk in front
of her.

In response to the loud buzz that issued forth from the desk, a young Terran
female that seemed engrossed in masticating a small piece of rubber, emerged
and led me into an adjoining room where a large chair dominated, where she
gestured for me to sit down and hung a small piece of plastic round my neck.

It was at this point that the fiend himself entered the room. A tall human
being with a hawkish nose and swept back hair looked at me and pressed a
button causing the chair to recline. "Open your mouth please," he said and as
I did as he instructed, he proceeded to jab a sharp metal implement around my
jaws, whilst all the while reciting banal comments about the local weather
patterns and about how the Arsenal would probably would win on win on
Saturday, although who the Arsenal may be and what they are still remains a
mystery to me. "I'm just going to take some X-rays" he said and the next
thing I knew was my tricorder going crazy as this sadistic individual
bombarded me with radiation whilst he cowered behind a lead shield.

After a short time, during which he hummed and harred to himself whilst
examining some dark plastic sheets, he came back over to me and spoke.
"Impacted wisdom tooth", he said. "Gas or injection?" I replied that as I was
a Klingon I needed no anaesthetic, but just this once I would make an
exception and have an injection.

Moments later, just as my jaw was becoming comfortably numb, I became aware
of a high pitched whirring sound and then it felt as if someone had jabbed a
red hot knitting needle into my gums. I could feel bits of flesh, enamel and
blood flying around inside my mouth and all the time this spawn of a demon
chattered on at me as if we were sitting around a Terran coffee table. This
treatment continued for hours (or it may have been minutes), and when it was
over the devil spoke again. "That should feel better. Please pay on the way
out." At these words the gum chewing female reappeared and led me back out to
the shrew like guardian.  "£37.50", she said to me without looking up.  So
desperate was I to escape this hell, I found myself handing over the credits
without argument before fleeing through the door.

How humans can voluntarily undergo this treatment twice a year is beyond my
understanding and I will be recommending the recruitment of some of these
individuals to the high council for dealing with uncooperative prisoners.

--End--