Star Trek fandom idea

[Cold Heritage]

Hello fellow Elliquiyan. Thank you for taking the time to look at my humble thread.

This is an idea that I already pitched as a group game, but did not get enough interest to feel confident about pulling the trigger and launching. Feel free to take a look if you like.

This is a Star Trek fandom idea. I'm not the world's biggest Trekkie by any mean. I wouldn't even call myself a Trekkie, so don't feel like this is one of those instances where one needs an encyclopedic knowledge to participate. A lot of my knowledge comes from reading articles on Star Trek wikis, half-remembered viewings of Star Trek from when Space and Spike ran hours-long blocks of Trek and I needed something to watch while I ate dinner, and more recently from playing Star Trek Online. As I've also mentioned elsewhere, this idea owes a debt without doubt to John Scalzi's Old Man's War series, and probably a lot of other military science fiction that's just stewed in my brain.

From a timeline perspective, this idea is set twenty years after the end of the Dominion War and the end of the events depicted in the Deep Space 9 television series. In those intervening twenty years the USS Voyager returns to Earth after its journey in the Delta Quadrant. The powers of the Alpha and Beta quadrant have been rebuilding after the war with the Dominion, which has likewise been rebuilding but honouring the peace treaty and keeping to the Gamma Quadrant. It has not been an easy time for anyone, and the usual trials and tribulations have ensured that times after the Dominion War continue to be interesting.

One element that has not been idle by any stretch of the imagination is the enigmatic agency known as Section 31. Likened to the Tal Shiar and the defunct Obsidian Order, Section 31 is a covert intelligence agency that operates outside Starfleet jurisdiction with complete autonomy. No official record of its existence exists and the organization has a decentralized structure without, ostensibly, any truly rigid chain of command or rank structure. It is not entirely known where funding for Section 31 comes from or who sets policy and goals for the organization. It has a single mandate, however, and that is to defend the integrity of the Federation by any means necessary.

Following the Dominion War, which saw the first attack on Earth in centuries and the loss of Betazed to Dominion Forces, certain elements within Section 31 regarded the use of genetically engineered soldiers as a tool that they needed at their disposal. The disastrous attempts of the Tal Shiar and Obsidian Order to employ conventional military force against the Dominion was, to some, an argument against this notion. Ultimately, however, the elements within Section 31 in favour of the project went ahead. Employing the research of Dr. Arik Soong and the works other species with less taboos regarding genetic manipulation, a new generation of augments was fashioned. It was hoped that changes made to the genetic makeup would ensure that their superior abilities would not be tarnished by inferior empathy and that any superior ambition that might arise could be channeled into useful directions. Individuals such as Julian Bashir showed that humans could be augmented without resulting in another Khan.

On an M class planet named Garden, the faction of Section 31 raised their creations. A thousand augments, raised and cared for by some of the brightest minds in pediatrics. From an early age the augments were educated in what their nature and purpose was. Their augmented minds were quick to grasp the situation. Only one augment child tried to escape and was allowed to flee; the rest remained and continued along the path they were created for.

The augments were given the best training that could be provided, employing holodecks with safeties progressively lessened and dangers progressively increased. Simulations could only teach so much and eventually some of the augments - those most deemed ready - engaged with pirates and criminals. There were injuries, but not deaths. The first augments to see combat were twelve, but by age thirteen each augment had fought in a real engagement at least once. These were dark times for Nausicaan pirates and the Orion Syndicate.

Secret shipyards had constructed a small fleet of small vessels for Section 31's exclusive use. Lacking large numbers, Section 31 could never field large starships, and so ships of the Defiant class and similar classes that required complements of one hundred or less were constructed. Such vessels also allowed for the subtlety that the organization required for its operations, and these vessels benefited from bleeding edge technologies not widely known of in Starfleet and whose use might very well be deemed illegal were they known. These ships, when in use, were made up of mixed crews of augments and regular Section 31 members. They conduct combat operations to achieve the ends of Section 31 when other options fail or are unsuitable.

And all of it outside the view of the greater view or knowledge of the Federation at large, as well as the rest of Alpha and Beta Quadrant powers. The Tal Shiar might suspect certain events to be the work of Section 31 and have some notion that the organization exists but they were largely in the dark about the true nature and extent of Section 31's existence and capabilities. Within the Federation, a small, select cadre of officers, such as individuals like Julian Bashir, who were approached and used by Section 31 but rejection the group's overtures on moral grounds, attempt to expose and undermine the group in a cold shadow conflict.


So with all of that establishing exposition out of the way, one might wonder exactly what I want to do with it.

What I would do is write a main male character who is one of the augment soldiers, and also a handful of main NPCs - the captain of the Section 31 ship the augment soldier is part of, for one, and others as they come to me or the plot needs. Perhaps a conventional Starfleet officer for whom Section 31 is their white whale. The augment character is likely to be cocky, brash, and with that sort of easy overconfidence that edges into arrogance that comes from being really good without trying. He likes to fight. He's been engineered to like it and on an intellectual level he values the Federation and acknowledges its positive traits and believes the values of the Federation are ones worth upholding. But he's also aware that it is a paradise within which he does not belong in any capacity save for the one he occupies now. The Section 31 ship captain is someone I imagine as a melancholic Jeffrey Combs who has passed the moral event horizon a long time ago and has so much blood on his hands he's forgotten they were ever anything but red . . . but not a sadist, just a realist who sees himself as one of the few with what it takes to keep the barbarians at the gates from getting in. These characters would have adventures in the darker side of Star Trek, engage in combat, and do morally questionable things in the name of the greater good without the hand-wringing and moral gymnastics that is typical of Star Trek characters.

Ideally I would like a partner who would depict a female character who becomes entangled in these events and is forced by circumstances to remain involved in them. My ideal preference would be that this female character is a Vulcan, with the logical outlook and behaviour that is characteristic of that species. And I'll admit that I just really dig the character of T'Pol from the show Enterprise (and that there's shades of the T'Pol/Tucker opposites attract story in this idea as well). I'd like it if the characters could have a romantic relationship, but I also want it to evolve organically and not have the pair in bed by our second respective posts. Nothing wrong with stories that go that way but it isn't what I'm looking for here. If the story ever reached the point where sexual content became appropriate, I envision the game taking place in a light section with the characters engaging in consensual sex with few kinks involved.

I'm not looking for rapid posting. I'd probably only post once or twice a week. Just the way life is now. I'd aim to give larger, detailed posts to make up for the pacing whenever possible, although I admit to a weakness in creating lengthy posts during times of dialog between two characters.

Thanks kindly for taking the time to read this, and I look forward to contact with any interested prospective writers.