Marta Batanides Marta " Marty " Batanides was a 24th century Human Starfleet officer . In 2327 , she graduated from Starfleet Academy with the rank of ensign . Along with her classmates , Jean - Luc Picard and Cortan Zweller , she visited Starbase Earhart to await her first deep space assignment . During her time there , she and the others got into a bar fight with some Nausicaan s , in which she was knocked out and Picard stabbed through his heart . The incident resulted in Picard getting an artificial heart . Picard and Batanides both had a crush on each other though neither decided to pursue it further . Picard later regretted that decision ; however , when Q showed him what his life would have been like otherwise , he later came to realize that it would have meant the end of their friendship . ( TNG : " Tapestry " ) . Background information . Marta Batanides was played by actress J . C . Brandy at the age of just seventeen . According to the script for " Tapestry " , her surname is pronounced " buh - TAN - ih - deez " . She is also described as " " a short , pretty woman , and is " [ . . . ] " roughly twenty - one . " " This would put her year of birth somewhere around 2306 . She was named Marta Vasquez in the first draft script . Apocrypha . Batanides has appeared in numerous non - canon works . In the " " novel " Well of Souls " , Batanides meets Commander Rachel Garrett at Starbase Earhart , who is there awaiting transfer to the USS " Carthage " , where she will assume the position of first officer . The two women strike up a casual friendship , but they only meet each other for a couple of drinks at the local bar before they both go their separate ways . By 2336 , she has risen to the rank of Commander , and has been assigned to Starfleet Intelligence . The criminal cartel , Asfar Qatala , becomes one of her major concerns after one of her operatives , Lieutenant Laura Burke , is captured and killed by a Qatala operative . The assassin then falsifies orders in Batanides ' name in order to remove an officer from the USS " Enterprise " ( NCC - 1701 - C ) . Fortunately , Batanides is able to contact Captain Garrett and the plot is foiled . The " " comic " Judgment " , sees her promotion to Admiral in the year 2370 , shortly after the recovery of the . In 2373 , she then serves on a tribunal to consider the punishment of Omega Squad after their unauthorized journey to the forbidden world of Talos IV . The " " novel " Rogue " states she has a special fondness for Andeluvian chocolate and 22nd century Earth " splitter " music . It also tells of her time at the Academy , where she becomes romantically involved with a Barangarian until his premature death . The relationship leaves her pregnant , and she soon falls into an irreversible coma due to Fetal Incompatibility Syndrome . Picard and Zweller then risk their careers to bring Marta to the black - market genetic labs on Yrskatdon , where she is cured by an illegal genetic procedure . In 2373 , she becomes part of the Federation team sent to Chiaros IV to calm hostilities between the government and rebel factions , and to oversee a vote on whether the planet would join the Federation or the Romulan Star Empire . During the mission , her fiancé , Ambassador Aubin Tabor , is killed and revealed to be an agent of Section 31 . With confirmation of this shadow group ' s existence , Batanides vows to bring it down . In the Pocket DS9 novel " Hollow Men " , set in the year 2374 , she is friends with Benjamin Sisko , who admits to her his involvement in the death of Senator Vreenak . Batanides appears briefly in the " " novel " Lost Souls " , during the Borg invasion of 2381 . She is summoned to the Palais de la Concorde by Federation President Nanietta Bacco and Starfleet Admiral Leonard James Akaar , where she reviews reports on the progress of the Borg attack fleets . Following this , in the Pocket TNG novel " Losing the Peace " , she is among several flag officer s who attend a briefing by Captain Jean - Luc Picard regarding the absorption of the Borg Collective into the Caeliar gestalt .