Literature / Star Trek: Enterprise Relaunch

Part of the Star Trek Novel 'Verse, continuing the series Star Trek: Enterprise beyond its finale. The books detail many of the events viewers would have seen in later seasons had the show not been cancelled. These include the Romulan War and the evolution of the Coalition of Planets into what becomes the United Federation of Planets. Most notably, the series is a massive Retcon of the Star Trek: Enterprise finale "These Are the Voyages...", declaring it a historically inaccurate recreation.

• Last Full Measure, essentially the jumping off point for the series proper.
• The Good That Men Do
• Kobayashi Maru
• The Romulan War: Beneath the Raptor's Wing
• The Romulan War: To Brave the Storm
• Rise of the Federation: A Choice of Futures
• Rise of the Federation: Tower of Babel
• Rise of the Federation: Uncertain Logic
• Rise of the Federation: Live By The Code
• Rise of the Federation: Patterns Of Interference

Rosetta, though taking place just prior to the series' penultimate episode, may also count as part of the relaunch, being written following the series' conclusion.

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This series contains examples of:

• Abandon Ship: Several characters are forced to do so as the Romulan War heats up and their defenses prove inadequate against enemy assault. Examples include the crew of Atlantis, who escape before their ship is destroyed over Tau Ceti IV.
• Absolute Xenophobe: The Kalar of Rigel VII, who after a severe case of forced relocation long ago decided they sure as hell weren't mucking around with any of them aliens, and have taken to shooting down any ships that come near them, followed by killing the survivors.
• Action Girl: Val Williams (who is pretty certainly Kirk's great-grandmother, so this is to expected).
• Actual Pacifist:
  • The Aenar characters. Shran, who is now married to a trio of Aenar, has picked up some of their pacifistic philosophies. This causes him much distress as he tries to reconcile these new ideals with his role in the Imperial Guard, and the current necessity of action (which the Aenar don't seem to realize).
  • The newly reformed Vulcan government faces a similar dilemma. Much of the Romulan War story arc revolves around T'Pau wrestling with her pacifist philosophy VS the need for action and military solidarity.
• Adaptive Ability: The Ware may not necessarily be intelligent, but it's capable of adapting (within reason).
• A.I. Is a Crapshoot:
  • The so-called "Antianna" in Rosetta. A mysterious race launching unprovoked attacks on established shipping lanes, they're revealed to be an ancient robotic intelligence left over from a long-concluded war.
  • Then there's the Ware, whose territory lies ahead as the Federation and Rigel expand. It eventually turns out the Ware is malfunctioning tech going really, really wrong.
• Alien Non-Interference Clause: The Prime Directive doesn't exist yet, but it's explored from all sides. As Rise of the Federation goes on, Archer starts to think it probably would be an incredibly good idea. Shran disagrees vehemently. Tucker remains uncertain. Uncertain Logic also shows the reaction from a species on the receiving end, being treated (in her mind) like dumb kids, but the species as a whole takes learning about aliens poorly.
• The Alleged Car: The Vesta is a malfunctioning piece of crap, and it's not even flight-ready yet.
• All for Nothing:
  • In Choice of Futures, Sukel and Kimura investigate the kir'shara theft, find a culprit, track her down... only to be attacked by more of V'Las's goons. Sukel dies, and Kimura is crippled, and by the time he's able to tell them V'Las is behind this he's already revealed himself to Vulcan anyhow.
  • Trip's plan in Patterns of Interference. Section 31 knew all along, his plan gets sabotaged and replaced with one that works, and nothing he does has any impact, besides getting Ruiz killed. Jeez.
• The Alliance:
  • The Coalition of Planets, which becomes the United Federation of Planets.
  • The Rigel Worlds have one of their own, governed by the Rigelian Trade Commission. This winds up joining the Federation.
  • In the Rise of the Federation books, the Orions, led by the Three Sisters D'Nesh, Navaar and Maras, are forming their own alliance of criminal syndicates in an effort to counter the newly formed Federation, which is cracking down on piracy and generally undermining their efforts.
• Alternative Calendar: Chapters featuring scenes given from the viewpoint of major alien cultures - such as Vulcans, Romulans, Andorians and Klingons - often give their dates alongside the Earth date.
• Ambiguous Gender: The Kanthropians in Rosetta. Hoshi Sato addresses Kanthropian Elder Green as "sir", only to be wryly informed that the correct honourific would be "madam".
  • The Rigelian Chelons are hermaphrodites, but after centuries of trade with (and cultural imposition by) the other Rigelian races, who have distinct sexes and genders (the usual two in the case of Zami, four for Jelna), they've taken to identifying with one gender, a pattern resisted by the most traditional tribes.
• Analogy Backfire: Lokog's lover tries using the old Klingon phrase "four thousand throats can be cut in one night by a running man." Lokog points out she just failed to kill him.
• Apocalypse How: The Romulans cause widespread destruction through ramming their ships at planets...while the ship is at warp speed. As a result:
  • Draylax is a class 1 (a great many deaths), possibly even a class 2 (civilization knocked back to a more primitive level), though presumably the allies will help rebuild it.
  • Coridan is a class 1, with more than a billion dead.
  • Galorndon Core is a class 6, with the entire planet left an uninhabitable hellhole (as seen in episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation).
  • Also, Haakona is a class 3a, its dominant species wiped out, when the Romulans release the Loque'eque virus.
• Apologizes a Lot: Tobin Dax, who even apologizes for apologizing.
• Appropriated Appellation: The Orions don't actually call themselves as such, but once they learned the etymology of their human-given name decided they liked the image of being named after a great hunter, and rolled with it.
• Arbitrary Skepticism: The Vanoti investigating the Ware influence on their planet think the idea of it and the Pioneer team coming from space is crazy, because everyone knows there are no other inhabitable planets. Obviously, the Pioneer team are actually cunningly disguised subterraneans. That clearly makes more sense.
• Aristocrats Are Evil: The Romulans, also the First Families of Rigel IV.
• Arranged Marriage: The Aenar in The Good That Men Do. Arranged marriage is actually the foundation of Aenar culture, as is the case with their mainstream Andorian cousins. Quads are brought together after genetic mapping to determine likely success in breeding. See also: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Relaunch.
• Artifact Title: Towards the end of To Brave the Storm, Enterprise herself is irreparably damaged. From the Rise of the Federation subseries onwards, she exists only as an orbital museum while the original crew split up and go their seperate ways to some extent.

• The Assimilator: The Loque'eque virus, weaponized by the Romulans during the Haakona campaign.
• Back for the Dead: Korok, the Klingon captain from "Marauder" returns briefly in Live by the Code, though he doesn't last long.
• Bad Boss: Captain Lokog would dearly like to kill his crew. Only practicality stays his hand.
• Being Good Sucks: In the first half of the novels, the Federation doesn't exist yet, meaning that those who live by an actual code of ethics have it far harder than in later eras. The people of Rigel X and Adigeon Prime demonstrate the lifestyle that ensures prosperity in this era; selfish greed, piracy, and a general policy of closing your eyes to injustice. Indeed, the leader of the Thelasian Trading Confederacy in Rosetta almost pities humans for their appeal to ethics. In The Good That Men Do, Archer and Shran acknowledge that currently the "good guys" are somewhat powerless; while at a slave market on Rigel X, there isn't anything they can do to help, not without bringing a worse fate down on themselves. Of course, as Shran is often an Honor Before Reason character, he almost does it anyway.
• Betrayal by Inaction: Section 31 refuses to intervene on Sauria because they prefer the trade deal they'd get with Maltuvis in charge, much to Trip's horror.
• Big Damn Heroes:
  • The Vulcan, Andorian and Tellarite fleets at the Battle of Cheron.
  • The Endeavour for the Pioneer at the end of Tower of Babel.
• Bittersweet Ending: Patterns of Interference, bordering right on Downer. Trip's actions are for nothing, and only get a good man killed pointlessly. Maltuvis is still in charge, and doesn't need the Orions anymore, but the Federation's reputation isn't damaged. Harris is stopped, but he's okay because he knows 31 will continue, and his final act is to try and kill Trip. And Porthos' time has finally run out.
• Bizarre Alien Biology: A recurring point with Ware client species, especially in the Partnership, is that their biologies are often so bizarre that without Ware-tech they'd never manage civilization at all. A species of bird-like aliens are one of the less unusual examples.
• Bizarre Alien Senses: The Vertians see in infrared. Part of their apparent Fantastic Racism is because of this meaning they don't see other lifeforms as being as "alive" as them.
• Bizarre Sexual Dimorphism: Malurians, apparently. It seems a female is many times the size of a male (males are standard humanoid size).
• "Blackmail" Is Such an Ugly Word: The Rigellians prefer to call it "leverage". Then agents of the Three Sisters and the corrupt aristocrats of Rigel IV get their hands on it.
• Boarding Party: The "Mutes" tend to send one over after their first few appearances; it's step three or four in their standard plan of action toward alien ships.
• Boldly Coming: First contact between Starfleet and the Deltans (but not between Deltans and humans in general) go a little wrong when Deltan pheromones have an adverse effect on several of the Exeter's crew, causing one sod to wind up in a possibly permanent coma. The Deltans didn't realize this would happen, since their encounter with the Horizon was an early one-off, and are pretty embarrassed.
• Both Sides Have a Point: The two arguments for and against the Prime Directive make compelling points.
• Brainless Beauty: Maras, it would seem, who proves that not *all* Orion females are intelligent and sophisticated. Her elder sisters Navaar and D'Nesh, by contrast, are about as far from "brainless" as you can get. However, later books begin to show that Maras is Obfuscating Stupidity...
• Brainwashed: It seems pretty much anyone who crosses paths with Ych'a is brainwashed in some way for some purpose at some point, whether they're her allies and colleagues or her enemies.
• Breaking the Fellowship: Sort of. The Enterprise crew split up after the war, what with there being no more Enterprise to serve on, but they keep in contact. Reed and Mayweather go on the Pioneer, T'Pol and Hoshi go on the Endeavour. Archer's generally stuck on Earth.
• Break the Haughty: Vabion spends much of Uncertain Logic and Live by the Code being greasy and smug. Then he finds out the true origins of the Ware.
• Bring It: Described as being the "hat" of Saurians.
• Brutal Honesty: After a few days of Devna trying every trick she can think of and getting nowhere, one Deltan comes forward and says they know what she and the other Orions are doing, but are just too polite to say anything. She, however, cannot hold her tongue anymore.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Tobin Dax. A Shrinking Violet with absolutely no social skills, a tendency to apologize for anything and everything he does, and a compulsive fingernail chewer, but he's still a Dax. Man's a genius with starships.
• The Bus Came Back:
  • Garos, the one-off villain of "Civilization" is a nuisance through Rise of the Federation.
  • The Three Sisters, the Orion trio who tried to take over the ship.
  • Laneth, one of the Klingon Augments, plays a major role in Live by the Code.
• Byronic Hero: Shran might well be considered this sort of Anti-Hero, with his frequent jerkish behaviour, Honor Before Reason outlook, defense of passion and general pursuit of high emotion.
  • Very arguably Iloja of Prim, what we see of him.
• The Caligula: Romulan Praetor D'deridex was revealed to be this, to Admiral Valdore's considerable vexation.
• Call-Back:
  • After Pioneer gets badly damaged, the crew repeats what the Enterprise crew did in "Catwalk", noting it's easier for the smaller, less packed Pioneer.
  • When her Andorian second officer suggests using torture on some "Mutes" and tries defending it, T'Pol brings up her own encounter with them during "The Andorian Incident".
  • Reflecting on his luck with women during Tower of Babel, Archer notes how outside of the romance in "Civilization", most of the women he's been with were hallucinations, or out to get him.
• Call-Forward:
  • In Beneath the Raptor's Wing, there's a justification for the Zeerust of Star Trek: The Original Series, as newer starship designs get everything "hard-wired" to stop the Romulans taking over the ship. There's a further gag when Tobin Dax, looking at a plans for a bridge covered in big square buttons in disgust, concludes that he'll never grow to like this design aesthetic.
  • Early on in A Choice of Futures, Archer notes the new designs for vessels are starting to move away from the NX-class design to include a new drive section, allowing for faster engines. In other words, the "standard" look of Starfleet vessels in all previous Trek works. Shortly thereafter, it's mentioned someone suggested building a new Enterprise, but Archer feels it isn't right.
  • An Andorian officer working on T'Pol's ship laments the design of the NX class ships, and how it'd be more sensible and practical to have the ship's navigation and sensors next to one another... as in how it will be on the original Enterprise.
  • Shumar's first officer is Commander Paris, who is flippant, glib, damn good at what she does and loves old-timey movies like Captain Proton.
  • Maltuvis, the guy who takes over Sauria, is an important character, and we get to see why Kirk listed him among the likes of Hitler in "What are Little Girls Made Of?"
  • Tower of Babel has Skon and his wife appear, with Mrs. Skon already pregnant with Sarek (the story is set in 2165, matching with Sarek passing at the ripe old age of 203).
  • In Uncertain Logic, Trip encounters Flint working on a mechanical lifeform, though he admits it's going to be a long while before he'll have any workable results. A hundred years or so, but he can wait around... Trip figures, after hearing him talk, that he's trying to make a romantic partner who won't die on him.
  • Soreth from Star Trek: Ex Machina appears briefly as a young man. Fitting with his appearance there, he's a conservative Vulcan who has Opinions about melding and alien species, but is nowhere near as hardline as V'Las and his supporters.
  • At the end of the book, Tobin figures spaceship duty is too exciting for him, but maybe it'll be different for the next Dax host. Seeing baby Sarek, he starts wondering about whether to go back home and see if he can start a family.
  • Ja'rod, son of Duras (the one Archer shot out of the skies a decade before), appears in the Klingon storyline, looking to get into politics.
  • At the very end of Code, Trip has a talk with Flint, who's left all his research to Arik Soong. He notes he's maybe pay him or his descendants a visit, eventually. But in the meantime, he's thinking about bustling off to some out of the way planet and minding his own business.
  • In the same book, the bad example of the Ware scares mankind and Starfleet away from research into bioneural tech. Flint reckons it'll be a few hundred years before they start considering it again.
  • Also in Code, there's an Andorian who is tired of people nagging her about needing to breed to offset the upcoming genetic crisis, saying it won't happen for hundreds of years, by which time they'll have come up with a technological solution. This is a major plotline in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Relaunch novels, where they haven't.
• Canon Immigrant: The Romulan-related books borrowed a lot of worldbuilding from Diane Duane's earlier Rihannsu novels, much of which were Outdated by Canon by ENT and Star Trek: Nemesis. This partially reflects the ENT showrunners' plan to incorporate usable parts of the novels into the series if it hadn't been cancelled after season four.
• Can't Argue with Elves: The intellectually and technologically advanced Vissians treat humanity (and Archer as humanity's representative) as immature children, despite humans having a greater claim to a fully inclusive society. Still, humans swallowing their pride and learning to be more tolerant of others' intolerance is one of Enterprise's more interesting (and controversial) themes.
• Cargo Cult: The Pioneer comes across at least two cultures who took to worshipping the Ware, and were totally okay with sacrificing people to their god in exchange for shiny toys. Done horrifically with the first, since they were barely Bronze Age tech-wise, and managed to effectively kill themselves off in an arms race to pay the ever-increasing toll.
• Cassandra Truth:
  • Mayweather can't get some of the Pioneer crew to believe all his tales about the Enterprise days, even when they're true.
  • The Horizon's claims about Deltans and the dangers of having sex with them were dismissed as typical Space Boomers trying to keep their discovery all to themselves.
• Character Filibuster: Iloja is a Cardassian after all, and Cardassians love to talk. Toward the end of Uncertain Logic, someone gives him access to a public access system and he gives a speech to all of Vulcan lasting several pages.
• Chekhov's Gunman: Frequent in the Rise of the Federation books. Characters, organizations and situations established briefly in one book often take on greater importance in later books; e.g. Professor T'Nol and her Anti-revisionists.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: By Rise of the Federation, Starfleet's started adopting the beginnings of the familiar uniform; grey for security, red and engineering, blue for science and green for command.
• Contagious A.I.: The Roia software intelligence in Rosetta.
• Continuity Cameo: The partnership between Skon and Tobin Dax was established in a short story that was later contradicted by canon and so by the mainstream Star Trek Novel 'Verse. In these books, though, most of the basic details from that story regarding the pair's occupations and activities are inserted back into continuity.
• Continuity Nod: Many, if you're a committed fan and paying attention. Examples include an explanation for "Captain Dunsel", a reconciliation of the Human colonial history of Achernar Prime with the world's later Romulan affiliation, and the possible inspiration for Original Series Romulans' plasma weapons. Also, the characters of Skon (and his work with Tobin Dax) and Lydia Littlejohn are inserted back into the main continuity via Broad Strokes-style cameos. Finally, many of the Romulan and Klingon characters have names which also appear on 24th century starships, presumably their namesakes. The series allows us to glimpse some of the history behind those names - for example, the Klingon warship Ya'Vang in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is named for a character in Kobayashi Maru.
  • The huge, oval-winged Romulan ships in Star Trek: The Next Generation are D'deridex class, the sleeker, Bird of Prey style ship in Star Trek: Nemesis was the Valdore.
  • The Tandarans' temporal warfare disinformation campaign, referenced in Rise of the Federation, was first discussed in Star Trek: Department of Temporal Investigations.
  • Olivia Akomo suggests one of the benefits of the Ware's advanced medical tech might be finding a cure for Delta radiation induced Locked-In Syndrome, as afflicted Captain Pike.
  • Back in DS9, it was mentioned Tobin had studied magic tricks at one point. Uncertain Logic has him use that knowledge to help thwart the Revisionists.
  • Klingons afflicted by the Augment virus are noted to not even be allowed to wear traditional warriors uniform, neatly explaining another continuity gap, this time why the TOS Klingons dressed differently from the later ones.
  • Among the captains under Archer's command is someone named La Forge.
  • While reaming out another captain for not telling him some pretty damn important news because of his pride, Reed notes that the first duty of every Starfleet officer is to the truth.
  • Thinking about the Ware, Archer notes how similar it is to that other bunch of adaptive, regenerative cyborgs he and his crew ran into that one time... only to shrug them off as not being at all related.
• Cold-Blooded Torture: Maltuvis subjects Trip and Ruiz to some. Not for information, as Ruiz expects, because he's actually aware that torture is meaningless for that, but just, y'know, to torture them.
• Cool and Unusual Punishment: Facing an uncooperative Orion who won't give them information, T'Pol and Hoshi force her to talk by... hacking her bank account and giving exorbitant sums to charities every time she doesn't answer.
• The Coroner Doth Protest Too Much: Phlox gets called in by the Klingon High Council to do an autopsy of the Chancellor. It's not that they trust him, what with that plague business, it's just they realize he's not working for any of the Great Houses. He determines M'Pek was poisoned by a genetically engineered virus.
• Corrupt Corporate Executive: The Ware finds allies/tools/exploiters in these. It eventually turns out it was designed by these, and eventually got hoist by their all-consuming desire for profit at any expense.
• The Corruptible: Olivia Akomo is initially horrified by the cost the Ware calls for, but partway through Uncertain Logic she starts thinking that maybe if it serves the Greater Good a little sacrifice isn't too much to ask. Trip, who brought her in to the mission, realizes what's going on.
• Cosmic Deadline: The Romulan War novels were originally planned as a trilogy, but later pared down to only two volumes after the writing had begun. As result, the back half of the second novel suddenly barrels through the final months and years of the war at an alarming rate.
• Crazy-Prepared: While working with the First Families, Garos gathers intelligence on them, which he unleashes after their inevitable betrayal, helping deliver a solid ton of karma on their heads.
• Dating What Daddy Hates: Sam Williams, Valeria William's dad, isn't impressed by his daughter dragging geeky little Kirk home with her. That is, until the end of Patterns of Interference.
• Deal with the Devil: Section 31 sells the anti-Ware signal to the Klingons, leaving the Partnership utterly destroyed and ruining many civilizations, to get the Klingons to back off.
• Decadent Court: Rigel IV.
• Defiant to the End: Lokog goes out telling J'Arod that for all his posturing of honor, he and the other smooth-headed Klingons are no better than he.
• Democracy Is Bad: The opinion of Governor Sen in Rosetta, an important part of his characterization given that he's in charge of a democratic government. One that's close to collapse.
• Disposable Vagrant: One planet's corrupt government using the Ware in Uncertain Logic is doing this. It's gotten them noticed by one particularly plucky cop, and in a private meeting, they're shown seriously considering bumping up to Disposable Traumatized Veterans, and possibly all the way up to Disposable Poor People.
• Disproportionate Retribution: The Three Sisters are out to undermine and ruin the Federation because of their run-ins with Archer and co. back in the series. Sore Loser, much?
• Doomed by Canon:
  • The TV Series included Coridan as a member of the fledgling Coalition of Planets. However, it had previously confirmed that the United Federation of Planets which grew out of the Coalition was founded by Humans, Vulcans, Andorians and Tellarites - no Coridanites. Hence, while the first novel in the relaunch has Coridan as part of the alliance, it also has them withdraw before the Coalition Compact is signed. The Rigellians and Denobulans were also part of the initial Coalition talks, but their absence is explained as their having been frightened off by Terra Prime in the series' penultimate episode.
  • Also Captain Bryce Shumar of the U.S.S. Essex if you remember the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode Power Play.
  • Garos and the Malurians. According to "The Changeling", they'll be gone by Kirk's time, rendering all of Garos's actions meaningless.
  • In Uncertain Logic, T'Nol learns Romulans were once Vulcans, meaning she's going to die before she can get that info out.
• Dying Moment of Awesome: The U.S.S. Vol'Rala, going up against a whole fleet of Klingon ships to buy several Partnership ships the chance to get away. We don't get to see it, but it apparently was good enough to impress the Klingons, so they must've gone out like badasses.
• Elephant in the Living Room: The history of the Kalar. The Rigellians aren't exactly unwilling to talk about it, they'd just really rather not because it's embarrassing for them.
• Emotions vs. Stoicism: T'Pau fears that bringing Vulcan into the war against the Romulans will awaken her own people's bloodthirst and make Vulcan a second Romulus.
• Enemy Mine: When the First Families betray him, Garos saves Val Williams and gives her information needed to help find Kirk and Gav.
• Epic Fail: Dax's attempt to solve the tech problems Starfleet has manages to cause the Pioneer to fall into a wormhole. The end result, the ship's near-completely crippled and falling into the atmosphere of a gas giant, parsecs off course so Starfleet won't even know where to look.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Admiral Valdore cares little for the appalling loss of life in the war of aggression he's waging. Indeed, despite some slight disquietude he shows little restraint in using near-genocidal tactics against Coridan. However, his love for his wife and children is always shown as completely genuine and admirable.
• Even Evil Has Standards: The Vanot Prime Minister is corrupt and in Vabion's pocket, but even she finds the idea of using unwilling poor people as fodder for the Ware reprehensible. She just doesn't say anything because she knows she has no leg to stand on in that arena.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: The Orion Syndicate, by-and-large. When one agent starts developing a conscience, her attempts to explain why enslaving Deltans won't work to her superior just don't get through.
• Evil Is Petty: Among V'Las's goals is getting revenge on Archer and T'Pol personally for the part they played in his downfall. The emotional component of this disgusts T'Nol.
• Evil Old Folks: Maxim Sen in Rosetta.
• The Exile: Iloja of Prim. Prim is a city on Cardassia. Seems dystopian governments don't take kindly to poets questioning them, and he's had to move a long way since.
• Expy: The Fris'len, the vampire/zombie Vulcans from T'Pol's flashbacks, are an expy of the Kurlans from the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Relaunch.
  • In Rise of the Federation, the Saurians are fresh new faces on the interstellar scene; swiftly advancing, eager and ready to make waves, potentially of great importance to the future of the established spacefaring powers, and thus subject of much debate over how they should be handled. Essentially, they're expies of Humans, filling the role Humans played only a decade prior.
• Fake Memories: Terix, thanks to the brainwashing techniques of Ych'a. Trip too, apparently
• Fantastic Racism:
  • First and foremost, between Quch'Ha Klingons and regular Klingons. The absence of head-ridges means the Quch'Ha are massively dishonoured, treated like pariahs and kicked out to the fringes. By Patterns of Interferance, the situation's gotten so bad the Empire is splintering due to it. Thanks to one Klingon, they are at least allowed to still be considered citizens of the empire.
  • Between Denobulans and Antaarans, due to a long history of war between both sides.
  • Saurians don't get ill as easily as other species. They think this makes them better than everyone else, and subsequently freak out when a plague starts spreading around their planet.
  • The Vertians don't see other lifeforms as properly alive. All that talking and firing back from the aliens they experiment on is just stuff to them. It takes some serious work on Hoshi and T'Pol's part to get them to realize what they're doing is wrong.
  • T'Nol and the other Revisionists see Vulcans as inherently superior to all other races, as proven by "logic".
• Fantasy Pantheon: The Andorian religion, featuring Uzaveh the Infinite and the First Kin, is mentioned; see the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Relaunch, where they first appeared. Essentially, their mention in this series is a Continuity Nod to established Andorian customs in the Deep Space Nine novels.
• A Father to His Men: Bryce Shumar, sort of, in a distant, curmudgeonly fashion, but it's there. When three of his crew members are badly hurt by sex with Deltans, he goes down to their government seriously looking for an excuse to start war over it, his anger overcoming the usual Deltan charm.
• Fictionary: Many terms and units are derived from the established Rihannsu language, from the works of Diane Duane. Plus, the Romulan names for established human planets are given in Beneath the Raptor's Wing. There are also many uses of Klingon.
• Fix Fic:
  • As fan response to the show's finale was largely negative, the series is essentially one big Retcon to the events of that episode. This means that Trip's death is actually a fake, part of his new career in intelligence and espionage, thanks to being the only human engineer to have a familiarity of sorts with Romulan tech.
  • The first book shows in great detail how Trip's death was faked, in order for it to appear that he died in the way the episode showed. They used an *extremely* oddly out of character wink from Trip in the episode to justify it, and it works very well. All of the stuff in the episode that makes NO sense whatsoever (like a "pirate" ship only capable of warp 2 somehow catching and boarding Enterprise) is lampshaded, both by Jake and Nog in the 24th century framing story, and by Archer and Phlox in the 22nd century. It turns out that the "pirates" were actually HIRED by Archer to fake Trip's death, and deliberately allowed to catch and "board" Enterprise for this purpose.
• Foregone Conclusion:
  • Inevitable with a prequel series. The basic strokes of history are well established: The Romulan War will end with the creation of The Neutral Zone; the Humans, Vulcans, Andorians and Tellarites will found the United Federation of Planets. Trip remains legally dead, as revealed in the framing story to Last Full Measure.
  • Doctor Antaak's attempts to restore his peoples' cranial ridges won't succeed for another hundred years, give or take.
  • Eventually, Trip starts trying to take down Section 31. Anyone who's seen Deep Space Nine will know how that turns out.
  • Since Sauria and its people are part of the Federation in future stories, Maltuvis' reign won't last forever.
• Foreshadowing: During Uncertain Logic, Val Williams speculates whether the Ware has anyone behind it at all, and isn't just malfunctioning tech. She eventually turns out to be right on the money.
• Framing Story: In The Good That Men Do, with Jake Sisko and Nog in the 25th century, reading over recently released accounts of 22nd century history.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: On his homeworld, Vabion was just a slimy corporate suit. Then some of the Ware crash-landed where he found it... by the time Pioneer shows up, he's figured out just enough to be a major nuisance.
• Full-Body Disguise: The Malurians, who have artificial skin-suits that convincingly disguise them as members of other races.
• General Failure: Praetor D'deridex insisted on opening up a front at Haakona despite the Romulans being occupied fighting the Human/Andorian/Tellarite alliance. Admiral Valdore had no choice but to follow orders, despite knowing a war on two fronts would be a disaster for Romulus.
• Godzilla Threshold: Harris claims that Section 31 only gets involved as an absolute last, last resort. Which is a convenient cover for not acting when they could.
• Gone Horribly Wrong: The Ware. It was originally designed by a conglomerate corporation to provide the best possible service, capable of attending to a customer's every need and desire. Then it got a little broken, and since the people who originally built it had become so dependent they didn't even know how to fix it, and the corporation had brought up every part of their civilization that could've helped... things very quickly turned out badly for them.
• Greater-Scope Villain: When finally ruined, Harris claims there's another, higher echelon of Section 31 he served, who cut him loose when he became a liability. Trip doesn't believe him either way.
• Green-Skinned Space Babe: Navaar, D'Nesh and Maras.
• Handwave: The vortexes the Xindi used to get around are brought up during "A Choice of Futures", with the justification the Xindi can't use them anymore as they were a property of the Sphere-Builders' futzing with the laws of physics.
• Heh Heh, You Said "X": In "A Choice of Futures", Maras' only contribution to a discussion is giggling at her sister saying the words 'bigger and harder'. Navaar was talking about the Federation.
• Historical Injoke: Many.
• Hold Your Hippogriffs:
  • As the Andorians say, "if ice bores kill your ailicorne, make ailicorne steaks".
  • Phlox mentions "putting Pyrithian moon hawks among the bats".
• Honor Before Reason: Shran's behaviour in "The Good That Men Do". Archer practically has to beg him to consider the possible consequences before he makes a very ill-considered attempt to free the victims of a slave market.
• Humans Advance Swiftly:
  • A major reason why Romulans consider them a threat.
  • In Rise of the Federation: A Choice of Futures, Soval and several Humans discuss the fear that swift and capable advancement can generate in others. Soval admits that a desire to protect Earth from undue cultural imposition from the Vulcans was only part of the reason for Vulcan holding back in terms of aiding Earth's advancement. The other side of the issue involved fear of Human potential becoming a threat to the Vulcans. This discussion is prompted by the situation with the Saurians - another race who advance incredibly quickly, and are bursting onto the galactic scene.
• Human Resources: The Ware uses living beings as components for its CPU. It's part of its programming going wrong. It was designed to fix itself with whatever was nearby. Unfortunately, living beings counted as "nearby" and "resources", so...
• I Did What I Had to Do: Olivia Akomo, who is approached by Section 31 to use the means to annihilate the Ware, leaving entire societies completely screwed over without it. Trip quickly realizes she's bluffing to cover up how she feels about it.
• I Have No Son!:
  • Doctor Antaak, when he learns his son poisoned the Chancellor. He's got no remorse when the kid is dragged off to be publicly executed, much to Phlox's horror.
  • Then Phlox himself goes through this, when his youngest son joins a Denobulan hate group, and then murders his sister's father in-law. He eventually turns around on this, because much as he might be pissed, the kid is still his son.
• I Knew It!: In-universe example. T'pol tries telling Hoshi Trip is alive, but Hoshi reveals she'd known since the Battle of Cheron, thanks to spotting a few details.
• I'm a Doctor, Not a Placeholder: When Doctor Antaak is acused of murdering Chancellor M'Rek through an artifical virus, Antaak protests and says that even though he didn't like M'Rek all that much, if he wanted to kill M'Rek he would have challenged him to honorable combat and likely would die doing so since he was "a doctor, not a soldier."
• Improbable Weapon User: The Andorian flabjellah, which serves as both musical instrument and weapon, as might be expected of the Andorians.
• Inadequate Inheritor: Tobin Dax sees himself as one to his predecessor, Leta. He's not, showing many times he's a damn good engineer, and the symbiosis commission wouldn't have let him be the Dax host if he wasn't capable, but try telling him that...
• Insane Troll Logic: Unsurprisingly, T'Nol and her revisionists run on it. T'Nol manages to warp "logic" to impressive levels, outright rejecting reality until she gets to the "pure" logic, which incidentally happens to align entirely with her views.
• Interservice Rivalry: The merging of various institutions into Starfleet causes some of this, such as the UESPA and Andorian Imperial Guard having disagreements over what function they should be serving. Fortunately, it's not serious.
• In the Blood:
  • Skon and his wife are somewhat atypical for Vulcans. Which might explain where Sarek and Spock will get it from. T'Rama is also heavy on the weapons-grade sarcasm, definitely where her grandson gets it from.
  • In the same vein, Valeria Williams and Sam Kirk show a lot of Kirk's character.
• In the Original Klingon: Played with (almost using the trope naming phrase word-for-word). Skon likes to study the kir'shara in the original Vulcan, because there are certain aspects of the writing that just can't be translated properly otherwise.
• Intrepid Reporter: Gannet Brooks, who is far too intrepid for her own good, and eventually has to be pulled back from the front lines by her boss, who is concerned about her deteriorating mental health.
• It's All My Fault: Reed feels a lot of guilt about Trip's antics with Section 31, since he introduced him to them.
• It's Personal:
  • Mayweather is particularly determined to get at the Ware, what with being one of their prior victims.
  • Skon's first wife was a hardline V'Las supporter, who got killed thanks to one of his "peacekeeping actions" with the Andorians, giving another reason for Skon to disapprove his actions.
• Just Think of the Potential!: A recurring problem with the Ware is that it is extremely helpful.
• Keeping Secrets Sucks: The moral of the tale for the Rigelians, it seems.
• Kicked Upstairs: By Rise Of The Federation Archer is an Admiral, assigned to mostly planet-bound and diplomatic missions. He doesn't like being stuck behind a desk, but he has no choice as he has some sort of neurological disorder caused by using the transporter that makes him unfit for front-line command.
• Kick the Dog: Standard Romulan behavior. Such as remotely hijacking random merchant ships and forcing them to fly into the nearest star, as they do to the Horizon.
• King on His Deathbed: At the start of Live by the Code, the current chancellor of the Klingon Empire, M'Pek, is at death's door. Everyone else is getting ready for the inevitable fight that'll follow.
• Klingon Scientists Get No Respect: Live by the Code has a Klingon doctor, who manages to avoid sneers from his fellow Klingons by virtue of being big and scary even for a Klingon (also, his husband is the fleet admiral).
• Know When to Fold 'Em: The Klingons, of all people, when their attempt to invade the Thelasian Trading Confederacy is uncovered in Rosetta. Never mind; they implicitly get control of those worlds anyway, through politics.
• Lack of Empathy:
  • Orions, or at least those in the Syndicate, where social Darwinism is the name of the game. Devna is horrified after an encounter with a Deltan leaves her actually developing empathy.
  • T'Nol, after discovering some moral qualms with V'Las's revenge scheme, warns the Endeveour... so they can save the Vulcans on-board. And her suggestion is get the Vulcans off the ship, then let themselves blow up anyway.
  • Some Vulcans just don't change. When Archer's distracted from the discussion over the Prime Directive by Porthos' diminishing health, Soval tells him to stop being so emotional about a stupid pet already.
• Lady Land: Cygnet, which is heavily female dominated; a fact that causes problems for the Humans when male officers try to represent them in dealings with Cygnian authorities. The Enterprise crew knew that Cygnet XIV was governed by females, and programmed the translator accordingly. They didn't expect it to be that female dominated, though...The Cygnians refuse to take Captain Archer seriously as a leader and openly mock him.
• Lampshade Hanging:
  • Early on in Uncertain Logic, Mayweather recounts the events of "Crossing" with a Pioneer crewman, who asks him why exactly the disembodied aliens needed a space-ship to get around. He can't provide an explanation.
  • A short while later, Mayweather serves as a one-man lampshade installation squad for the events of the Enterprise finale and the novels's own retcons, pointing out all the logical inconsistencies.
• Like Brother and Sister: One of the reasons Archer initially doesn't pursue a relationship with Dani Erikson is because of this.
• The Load: Planet Draylax. A loyal Coalition member, it can't contribute much of anything to the war effort, but Earth is obligated to protect it. It doesn't help that government policy on Draylax is decided as slowly as possible, given that Draylaxians seem to prefer it that way. This means even when Draylax could be of use, it probably won't be.
• Look on My Works, Ye Mighty, and Despair: The anti-Ware task force eventually find the Ware homeworld. It's a desolate ruin, left that way by the last remnants of the four species that originally built it as a memorial and warning.
• The Lost Lenore: Archer is reluctant to try and start a relationship for many reasons (not including the fact most women who he met during his time on the Enterprise were usually spies of some kind), but one of the bigger ones is the absent Erika Hernandez.
• Make It Look Like an Accident: Iloja of Prim, watching a debate between some Vulcans, wistfully recalls how back home if someone pissed off the Obsidian Order, they'd just disappear or be "accidentally" killed in a quarrel with their lover.
• The Man Behind the Man:
  • The Three Sisters (well, two of them, at any rate) are behind a lot of the non-Ware related problems the nascent Federation faces.
  • At the end of Patterns of Interference, Maltuvis turns out to have a second Man Behind the Man: Administrator V'Las.
• May–December Romance: Not an extreme example, but husband Skon is significantly older than wife T'Rama. Since Skon's father, Ambassador Solkar (the Vulcan who greeted Zefram Cochrane at First Contact) was killed in the Mirror Universe version of that event, he must have already fathered Skon in order for Mirror Spock to exist. Thus, Skon is at least 102 at the time of Rise of the Federation. Previous references to T'Rama established her as relatively young, around half this. Since Vulcans usually bond in arranged marriages with age-mates, the unusual nature of their partnership was explained in a manner that cast light on their backgrounds.
• Meaningful Rename: The Romulans initially called themselves the Rihannsu. After their first contact with spacefaring Vulcans they renamed themselves to Romulans to make sure the Vulcans didn't recognize them.
• Mercy Kill: A Malurian infiltrator is hit with Chelonian poison. With no means of getting him to any medical tech in time, Mayweather asks the Chelonian to help the guy. So they ram a big spear through him.
• Mind Rape:
  • In Rosetta, R'shee Theera is put under the Klingon Mind Sifter to access her memories of the Antianna, a mysterious enemy of which she is the only known survivor.
  • V'Las plans to gain the assistance of Archer and T'Pol in this way. Soon after, it turns out he had been on the receiving end of this during the Romulan War, when he tried to get in contact with the Romulans and offer his services. The Romulans, unsurprisingly, tortured him.
• The Mole: V'Las... sort of. His parents were Romulan infiltrators, and he took up their sword. Of course, Romulan loyalty being what it is...
• Mondegreen Gag: Sangupta does some research on species who've had prior run-ins with the Ware. He mishears one of the names as "Rehansu" or something similar.
• My Species Doth Protest Too Much: Gev is a very non-Tellarite Tellarite, being cordial and amiable, rather than loud and blustering. Though he does admit he'll Tellarite it up when he's nervous.
• Mythology Gag: Occasionally mixed with Call-Forward.
  • Tower of Babel has Solkar, a famed Vulcan ambassador with a son who choose a different career than the one he wanted, performing that one last diplomatic job before he retires satisfactorily, much like his grandson will in two hundred years down the line.
  • Iloja of Prim's backstory has a really dark one. Looks like Picard was right when he told that Gul in a society where children are taught to devalue others, they can turn on their parents.
  • At the end of Uncertain Logic, Archer gives a speech wherein he states that Surak's teachings are meant to be the beginning of wisdom, not the beginning.
  • Live by the Code begins with an Andorian arguing with a crewmember on his ship, the only human crewmember onboard in fact, and calling him "red-blooded" at the start of an argument. No resemblance to Doctor McCoy and a certain green blooded, inhuman Vulcan at all...
  • At one point during the same book, Commander Paris winds up manning the Essex helm, just like a certain Tom Paris will one day on another Starfleet vessel.
• Naïve Newcomer: Humans, pretty much, particularly in Rosetta.
• Named After Their Planet: Averted for once with the Saurians. The name "Saurian" was given to them by Humans as their politically disunified species has no universal name for itself. The planet Sauria was then named for the Saurians; it has several native names.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Played with in the case of the secretly evil repair stations, which are here given the name "the Ware". On the surface it sounds innocent and descriptive, but there are other implications there...
• A Nazi by Any Other Name: The hate group Phlox's son joins wear brown uniforms with a red insignia on one side.
• The Needs of the Many:
  • Garos is perfectly willing to sacrifice anyone he needs, friends included, for the greater prosperity of Malur. He feels bad about it, but it's a necessary sacrifice in his mind.
  • Used by two different people for really dark reasons during Uncertain Logic;
    • V'Las "justifies" the sacrifice (read: murder) of many Vulcans on the grounds it serves the needs of the many as a whole.
    • An ethical dilemma Trip wrestles with regarding the Ware, if using the technology is worth the cost of sacrificing some people to it, even when those people are friends. He eventually decides it isn't.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
  • The crew of the Horizon leave a book about early 20th century Chicago mob culture on Sigma Iotia II. One of them feels bad about it because the book was a favourite of his mother. Those familiar with Star Trek: The Original Series know he should actually be worried about the effect the book will have on the Iotians.
  • One of the ships in the anti-Ware taskforce shuts down some Ware tech, and in the process completely cripples a planet's entire society, leaving thousands to suffer and die. It's this disaster that motivates Archer to start drafting what will become the Prime Directive.
• Noble Savage: How at least some of the other Rigelian species tended to view the Chelons. Chelons, due to their swampy rainforest origins, were historically less quick to embrace technology.
• No Endor Holocaust: In Beneath the Raptor’s Wing, several starships explode in orbit over Andoria. The planet is fine, but characters note that had the explosions been a certain degree more powerful, the atmosphere could have been stripped away.
• Not What I Signed Up For: Tobin Dax works with the Pioneer crew for a while, but quits after some Ware ships bust them up, finding space-travel too dangerous, both for himself and the sybiont.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: Maras appears to be a Brainless Beauty. She's actually far more intelligent than her sisters suspect, ever since she was a kid. She just capitalized on her disinterest in traditional Orion learning to look like she was an idiot.
• Odd Friendship: Tobias Dax, a nervous Trill engineer, and Skon, a Vulcan ambassador.
• Old Dog: By Rise of the Federation, lovable old Porthos is... well, old. Archer is increasingly forced to realise even with 22nd century medicine he won't have his furry friend around much longer.
• Once Done, Never Forgotten: 14 years on, and T'Pol is still teasing Archer over the "gazelle speech". Soval too.
• The Only One: No longer the case in later books. Ships other than Enterprise take part in major events, including battles of some importance. Previously, the trope was often justified for once - When Captain Archer says that NX-01 Enterprise is the fastest ship with the most experienced crew, he's right: Enterprise is the first Human vessel capable of Warp 5 (most others are around Warp 2). Then Columbia came along, to share in the missions. As the Romulan War breaks out, the NX-class starts being mass produced.
• Our Zombies Are Different: The Fris'len. They're essentially zombie-vampire mutant Vulcans. They only appear in flashbacks, perhaps fortunately. One of planet Vulcan's many dark secrets.
• Out with a Bang: After learning one of their business partners has betrayed them, the Sisters send Devna to make sure this happens. Maras takes over at the last minute, which slipping the agent enough data to make sure she gets out of trouble.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: During Uncertain Logic, Mayweather and a team go in disguise on a planet of Rubber-Forehead Aliens. However, the disguise is just that, and the local they work with is a trained investigator able to notice some of the flaws in the disguise at close observation (like their gills not working like they should), never mind the numerous social faux pas they make.
• Paper Tiger: It's noted by Devna, an Orion (and who therefore knows better than to judge people's level of influence, power and self-assurance by what they appear to be at first glance) that the Tellarites are often a rather insecure people behind their frequent bluster.
• Pokémon Speak: The unfriendly locals of Rigel VII are called the Kalar after their battlecry, which tends to be all any visitors ever hear from them.
• Pragmatic Evil: Maras tries to get D'Nesh taken out of the picture, not because of any actual goodness in her, but because D'Nesh is an unhinged psycho fond of disproportionate violence, and their bigger sister is starting to listen to her too often.
• President Evil: Governor Sen in Rosetta.
• Proud Warrior Race Guy: By Rise of the Federation, the belligerent, chest-pounding warrior caste has completely taken over all Klingon affairs, bar a few minor holdouts. Most of them no longer care about honourable combat so much as just being in a fight.
• Puppeteer Parasite: When Dr. Liao discovers the secret of Trill symbiosis, she briefly reflects in alarm that nobody ever discovered what a Romulan looked like - she wonders for a moment if the Romulans might not be this apparent body-controlling parasite race she's just discovered. Tobin Dax explains that the symbiosis doesn't work that way.
• Pyrrhic Victory: Frequent for the Coalition of Planets, as the Human, Andorian and Tellarite fleets take a beating even in victory. It gets so bad that Andoria and Tellar pull back from the war effort, leaving Earth and Alpha Centauri to face the Romulans more or less alone.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: T'Pau, though she becomes a little less reasonable by the point of Beneath the Raptor's Wing. Or perhaps too reasonable. She essentially breaks apart the coalition and damages Vulcan's relations with its neighbours and allies, but ultimately she has logic on her side. She's calculating what she believes will be best for Vulcan in the long run. By the end of To Brave the Storm, she makes a compromise in order to set up a Big Damn Heroes moment, and while she appears to remain troubled, the reader understands both her original actions and her subsequent change of priorities.
  • Praetor Karzan seems to be this for the Romulans. At the very least, he's a lot more stable and sensible than D'deridex, and gets the war back on track.
• Redemption Equals Death: ... sort of. T'Nol realizes soon enough that V'Las is a psychopath, and tries warning Endeavour about his schemes, if only to save Vulcan lives, but she gets a hole blown through her chest for her efforts.
• Refuge in Audacity: One of the problems discrediting Administator V'Las is that his actions were so insanely over the top even recounting them makes people look like they're just making stuff up.
• Retcon: Several. The Andorians are skillfully presented here - the seeming contradictions between Star Trek: Enterprise Andorians and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Relaunch Andorians are resolved, helping keep the continuity unified. Then of course, there's the matter of Trip's (un)death, and the whole general business of the "inaccurate reconstruction". Finally, in Last Full Measure, the names of Xindi characters are a blend of screen names and those given in early novelizations. For example, the Xindi known as Dolim was named "Guruk" in the first novelization, so here his full name is given as "Guruk Dolim".
  • Beneath the Raptor's Wing clears up the Laibok/Laikan issue (which is the correct name for Andoria's capital?) by declaring them two separate cities - one the political capital of Andoria, the other its leading hub of industry.
  • Inner Kaferia and Outer Kaferia, resolving the issue of how the Kaferia that is Tau Ceti IV and a human world exists in the same continuity as the Kaferia that is Tau Ceti III and the Kaferian insectoid homeworld.
• The Reveal: The true name of the Basileus of M'Tezir, which trivia-savvy Trek fans will recognise the significance of.
• The Revolution Will Not Be Vilified: Averted. The Romulan dissidents in The Good That Men Do are no better than the government they oppose - and possibly even more dangerous.
• Rock Beats Laser: Mining mass driver versus Federation ship means Federation ship takes a pounding. That their shields weren't designed to deal with low energy impacts has something to do with this.
• Royally Screwed Up: The First Families of Rigel, on Rigel IV.
• Self-Destruct Mechanism: Starfleet introduces them for the first time in Beneath the Raptor's Wing. In the same novel, a Tellarite captain activates his ship's Self-Destruct Mechanism to prevent the Romulans taking control of the vessel. In fact, there are quite a few examples; two Vulcan ships and at least one Klingon use the same technique, denying the Romulans capture of their craft.
• Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: Theras and Shran in The Good That Men Do. Or, as they see it, snivelling coward and ignoble berserker. Shran at least has an epiphany; Theras dies, but possibly managed to grow as a person, too.
• Shame If Something Happened: Praetor D'deridex pulls this on Valdore, after taking his family hostage. This is a very, very common trope when Romulan nobles are featured in Trek novels.
• Shout-Out: Jabba the Hutt shows up in Last Full Measure. Well, Jabba-in-everything-but-name.
  • The alias that Trip is using by 2186 is Michael Kenmore, the name of a character Connor Trineer played in Stargate Atlantis who also turned out to be more than he appeared.
  • Trip and Ruiz snark at one another using references to James Bond. One of their last conversations has Trip calling Ruiz "Felix Leinter", Bond's CIA contact. Ruiz retorts he wanted to be Q.
• Sins of the Father: Thanks to the problems with transporter tech, which her father developed, Danika Erikson is unable to pursue a career in Starfleet.
• Small Name, Big Ego: Maltuvis of Sauria is convinced he's far more brilliant and dangerous than he actually is. True, he managed to send the Federation packing, and he's got complete control of the planet... but he's got Orion backing and most of his conquest was through playing on fear and luck. He's nowhere near as dangerous or powerful as he thinks he is.
• Smart People Play Chess: Kirk and Williams have a game when visiting Williams' father. He spends the match grumbling about their playing styles, which means they go the entire match with neither actually sacrificing any pieces.
• Socially Awkward Hero: Malcolm Reed, who is well aware of this fact and specifically chooses the gregarious Travis Mayweather as his first officer upon his promotion to captain in order to bridge the gap between him and his crew. However, he ends up using Travis as an excuse not to interact with his crew, a situation that only begins to resolve itself when the former helmsman is injured and Malcolm forces himself to open up to the crew, even revealing the reasons for his reserved nature at the same time as apologising for it.
• Space Pirate: Wungki is a fake Space Pirate, for hire. He stages kidnappings, hijackings and general mayhem at the request of his “victims”.
  • The Orions, Malurians and Nausicaans are three prominent factions of space pirates, and the biggest threat to the security of the fledgling Federation's borders.
• Space Whale: Cloud Whales, at any rate. They save the USS Pioneer from sinking into a gas giant.
• Spanner in the Works:
  • D'Nesh's unsubtle and poorly though-out attempts to frame Archer don't just throw a monkey-wrench into Garos and Navaar's separate plans, it actually gives the Pioneer a chance to save Grev and Kirk before it's too late.
  • Devna, suffering a sudden case of nascent empathy, sabotages her owner's ship so the Exeter can catch up and recover the Deltans they took captive.
  • Tobin manages to thwart an infiltrator sabotaging the Endeavor engines, working out who the saboteur was thanks to recognizing them as someone he saw at a Vulcan debate club.
• Spotting the Thread: Manipulated by the Revisionists in Uncertain Logic, who replace the kir'shara. Skon and a fellow linguist notice there's something really wrong with the artefact by radiological dating. Shortly after the news gets out that they're dealing with a fake, Skon figures the forgery was made with just enough subtle flaws to be noticed quickly.
• Stock "Yuck!": Inverted, when a conversation brings up Phlox's daughter, who's always been something of a hell-raiser. When asked if she refused to eat her veggies, Phlox says that actually Denobulan kids enjoy eating them.
• Suicide Attack:
  • The Romulans send a ship to make a suicide run on planet Coridan, causing an antimatter explosion that kills a billion people and leaves Coridan aflame. Later they do the same to Draylax.
  • Not to be outdone, the Klingons ram a ship into a dilithium mine. It utterly ruins the planet, kills off pretty much all the life on the planet, and destroys any chance of the Federation colonising and studying it.
• Take Over the World: Apparently a goal of the Basileus of M'Tezir. Once he's done that, he starts deciding maybe one planet isn't enough...
• Take That!: It's impossible to view the framing sequence of The Good That Men Do, which largely consists of Jake and Nog sitting around talking about how rubbish the Enterprise finale was, as anything other than the writers giving their opinion of the episode.
  • The writers of The Good That Men Do are later given a taste of their own medicine in Uncertain Logic when Travis Mayweather finds out that Trip is still alive and incredulously points out how unlikely and convoluted a story it is.
  • The TNG-era treatment of the Prime Directive is given a major drubbing in Patterns of Interference, when Shran and Archer argue about it, with Shran speculating that sooner or later Starfleet will start obeying the law without regard to its intent, raising the "hypothetical" situation of someone refusing to cure a disease, or prevent a natural disaster on the grounds it's interference. Archer believes that no-one would be so monstrous as to do something like that.
    • Which is also a Take That!, maybe even an explicit one from Shran, to Archer and his action in "Dear Doctor".
• Technobabble: Weaponized by Tobin Dax against an obstructive bureaucrat, when he claims he can use it to narrow down a starship they're looking for. He's actually BS-ing like crazy to spook the ship they're looking for into running. Works too.
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork:
  • Garos despises the First Families, but works with them in the name of protecting Maluria. He's not terribly fond of the Three Sisters either.
  • V'Las finds T'Nol such an irritating, delusional twit that he actually has to resist the urge to strangle her.
• Tempting Fate:
  • At the beginning of Uncertain Logic, it appears T'Nol and her Revisionists have been totally discredited, and Archer declares this is probably the last they've heard of her.
  • Just as Archer declares Admiral Kraal could be a good ally in the Klingon Empire, Phlox informs him the man has just committed ritual suicide for failing to protect his emperor.
• That Came Out Wrong: When Archer and T'Pol are captured by V'Las's goons, she remarks that when the two are together she always ends up "in bondage". There's an incredibly long pause before Archer says he's not even going to touch that.
• That Man Is Dead: In Rise of the Federation, Trip Tucker insists that, actually, he did indeed die seven years prior.
• The Tape Knew You Would Say That: An variant, with the epitaph for Patterns of Interference. It's two quotes from good old Jean-Luc, the first being "no law is absolute". The second is how the Prime Directive is absolute, from "Justice" (from two years before the first quote).
• There Is No Kill Like Overkill: The Romulans want Coridan and its potential warp-seven breakthrough out of the picture. Really out of the picture. Their near-genocidal attack is later repeated on Draylax, to say nothing of a deliberate and total genocide of the Haakonans as a solution to the problem of fighting a war on two fronts.
• Thrown from the Zeppelin: When V'Las's plan starts going belly-up in Uncertain Logic, one of his underlings starts questioning him. So he shoots her dead. His loyalists on-hand are able to sufficiently outnumber the remaining Vulcans with any qualms, and help him get away.
• Torture Is Ineffective: Discussed in "A Choice of Futures", when several Andorians figure torturing the "Mutes" might get them to talk. T'Pol and Archer disagree for this reason.
• Unwitting Pawn: Ultimately, V'Las realizes he was this to the Romulans, genuine loyalty to his people be damned. His attempts to start a war, which he thought was the plan, may well have just been a distraction for the Romulans's real goals.
• Villain: Exit, Stage Left:
  • Garos retreats back to Maluria at the end of Tower of Babel.
  • V'Las flees with a ship filled with loyalists at the end of Uncertain Logic. He reappears at the end of Patterns of Interference.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: The ultimate fate of the Cabal, never given in the show, is revealed: It collapsed (likely because their sponsor, the so-called "Future Guy", got caught by the temporal authorities). Meanwhile, the Suliban Augments were either killed or arrested.
• What Measure Is A Non-Shroomie?: The "Shroomies" ("Mutes").
• What You Are in the Dark: While looking for a captured Kirk and Gev, Williams notices one of the decadent Rigellian nobles is about to do several horrific things to a very young woman. She can't help herself from "dissuading" him, which gets her captured and leaves Kirk and Gev in their captors' hands for a few hours more, and also causing Kirk to refuse to speak to her for some time.
• Wretched Hive: The markets of Rigel X.
• Written by the Winners: Maltuvis takes a kick out of rewriting history, just for giggles. Apparently his people have been doing it for centuries, but he really loves doing it.
• You Have Failed Me: Romulan characters seem to live in fear of those situated above them in the power hierarchy doing this.

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