A hostile planet in the Theta 116 system where an unknown intelligence built a replica casino hotel from a pulp novel to house a stranded twenty-first-century astronaut.
Theta VIII is the eighth planet of the Theta 116 system, a world of nitrogen, methane and liquid neon with ferocious winds and surface temperatures far below freezing. It is the setting of the second-season Next Generation episode The Royale.
In 2365 the Enterprise-D finds wreckage in orbit bearing the markings of NASA and a flag of the United States with fifty-two stars. On the surface is a small zone of breathable air containing a revolving door, behind which Riker, Data and Worf find a twentieth-century hotel and casino that they cannot leave.
The hotel was made by aliens who accidentally contaminated the ship Charybdis, launched in 2037, and killed all but Colonel Stephen Richey. To provide for him they recreated the world of a paperback novel he carried. The away team escapes by playing out the book's ending.