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[taraljc]

loneraven's In Service is an absolutely awesome Scotty & McCoy friendship story, as they are sent off in a runabout to do their jobs while Enterprise does Enterprise things.

In other news, I am trying to mentally reconcile Number One's background in Vulcan's Glory with what we know about Eugenics

Comments

[ancarett]

I like your take on her Ilyrian background that this isn't some Eugenicist dreamworld, but another take on producing children.

It might also be considered that Ilyrians don't conceive children between couples in a personal relationship but "match up" the genetic potential and "shore up" the genetic weaknesses of one parent by turning to a genetic bank. So a couple who wants a child puts in to have the sperm or egg of one parent matched up with a "best possible" fit, thinking this is the best way they can counter the otherwise random and possibly debilitating effects of the parents' genetic potential coming together and leading to problems. (All of the above, just free-wheeling from the idea of the Ilyrian back-story on my own.)

I really like the idea that Number One runs away from all of this pressure to Starfleet, though. 'Cause I think there's something of a rebel in her perfect make-up!

Thanks for the story rec -- always looking for more of those, too!

[taraljc]

What I love about the Pike/Number One storyline in VG is how the perception of her "perfection" is limiting, and how it stands between the two of them actually forming a relationship. Because if she's perfect, she's not supposed to be awkward about forming clsoe personal relationships, and if he thinks she's perfect, then he thinks why the hell would she be interested in a less-than-perfect dood like him? And then by the end, they've both adjusted their expectations and started to relate to each other (even that tiny bit) as people, rather than being intimidated by "ideals".

[ancarett]

Yes, it would have to mess with your head to believe that you had to be relentlessly perfect. I think that Pike could be a lot better at getting past that blockage in their relationship than Number One, given how it would have been drilled in her from early on, but, still. . . .

[taraljc]

I really want to play with Cait Barry and Number One's friendship, because Number One is friends with Cait and Boyce, while she and Chris have a strictly professional relationship on the Yorktown, and Phil and Cait know how delightfully "imperfect" she can be, but she doesn't show that side to Chris--who finds her a bit intimidating and aloof, while theys erved together. Only now in 2258, they've been friends for years, and become lovers relatively recently, and it's as if he never knew her at all and now he's making up for lost time learning who she really is, and what she means to him.

I always saw them both as lonely--just the type who do not enter into relationships casually. Married to the job, as it were. And so there's this intensity that comes with being starved for physical affection, as well as not just physical intimacy, but emotional intimacy.

[sl_walker]

That or, you could say that her planet wasn't a part of the Federation and she left of her own accord -- she certainly could have gotten into Starfleet if she had asked for amnesty at a young age. I would imagine that an enlightened Federation wouldn't bar her from having a life, building a career; maybe, if you don't mind there being a slightly darker tone, to her actually even being encouraged to it, as she would be quite an asset to Starfleet.

Or, your theory, which works fine as well. ;-)

[taraljc]

From what I recall, the whole reason Julian keps his augumentation a closely guarded secret was because he would have had to have resigned his commission. Because he'd been somewhere on the autism scale as a child, but then his parents not only had him "corrected" but he was then part of a programme that had every single aspect of his development and physicality altered for extreme excellence. And the Federation is so frightened by the spectre of another Khan, they woul never have allowed an Augment in Starfleet. I need to rewatch the DS9 Augments eps again, tho. Cos from the ENT Augment eps, I remember the Denobulans engaged in genetic manipulation, and they were Fed members. So there must be some sort of rule or guideline that says 'up to here is fine--anything beyond this is illegal".

[sl_walker]

Well, Julian might have had to keep it a secret because you can get booted from Starfleet for lying on your application (ala TNG), not necessarily for the augmentation itself. And there may, indeed, be some kind of guidelines -- Number One might have skirted in. I imagine they probably do have some genetic capacities for deformities and that, or diseases.

But really, your theory's fine. I was just tossing out another idea.

And if you're in the mood for Scott and McCoy, here ya go: http://community.livejournal.com/fic_simplicity/25370.html (Me? Shamelessly self-promote an older story? Never.)

[taraljc]

I think it's the specific nature of the enhancements that preclude you from serving in Starfleet. That you can be genetically modified to correct genetic conditions and birth defects. But you can't be augumented specifically to be enhanced or exceptional, and serve in Starfleet. Like I said, I need to rewatch "Doctor Bashir, I Presume" and the two eps with the Jack Pack, as well as the ENT Augments epsiodes (I've seen the first one, but not the otehr two) with Arik Soong

[fizzixrat]

Wait...so what you're trying to say is that Number One was a Nietzschean?

Sneaky, sneaky Gene.

[taraljc]

It wasn't Gene--it was Majel Barrett and Dorothy Fontana. But since that novel was first published in 1989, I imagine Gene would have had to have signed off on the proposal adn the finished manuscript. So he must have been aware since his wife and one of his oldest friends and co-workers were involved.

[skywaterblue]

This is why the books aren't really canon. At best they're secondary canon. (Ugh, when I found out about that Immortal junk I wanted to thwap Peter David upside the head, but when don't I, recently?)

[taraljc]

I've always adhered to "Only What Airs Is Canon" with Trek because that was the party line from the start.

But when you're dealing with a character with only an hour of screentime total, I'm pretty much adopting my fave bits from fanon as I see fit. And I adopted Vulcan's Glory as part of my eprsonal canon a long time ago, along with Fontana's animated episode, "Yesteryear". So now I'm just trying to make the pieces fit.

[skywaterblue]

I think it might be more productive to just scrap it all and start over, but yeah.

[fizzixrat]

"I've always adhered to "Only What Airs Is Canon" with Trek because that was the party line from the start."

Well, except that Gene himself indicated (while still involved with TNG) that he was willing to ignore the animated series and chunks of the third season of TOS...

Me, all of TOS and the animated series are in my canon. The entire seven years of Voyager can be liberally ignored, however, as can parts of DS9. :)

[kernezelda]

According to Memory Alpha, genetic enhancement was outlawed on Earth, but several colonies were founded to carry on that kind of research before the UFP banned it. That law might not apply on Number One's planet, and she could have been designed and engineered from scratch. That seems a more reasonable cause for Starfleet officers to feel uncomfortable about her rather than selective breeding, which, while deliberate, is still a natural way to reproduce.

[taraljc]

But Starfleet wouldn't allow a genetically enhanced eprson to serve, even if genetic enhancement was legal on their homeworld.

[kernezelda]

According to the transcript of "Doctor Bashir, I Presume", there hasn't been a case dealing with 'any of this' (DNA resequencing/genetic enhancement) in a hundred years. (Judge Bennett says two hundred but refers to that leading to the Eugenics War, which was actually three hundred years before.)
Since Arik Soong was two hundred years previous in the 22nd century, maybe there was a lot of flux in the laws between then and the 24th. And it could be possible that Number One was the/one of the cases in the 23rd century - maybe she won the right to serve? An exception that hardened the anti-genetic engineering faction into toughening the law so no more exceptions were allowed?