The last best hope for peace.
“Fifteen years ago…you led us out of the darkness. You commanded the greatest rescue armada in history. Then...the unimaginable. What did that cost you? Your faith. Your faith in us. Your faith in yourself. Tell us, why did you leave Starfleet, Admiral?”
Star Trek: Picard: The Last Best Hope is a Prequel to Star Trek: Picard. It chronicles the events leading up to the supernova that destroyed Romulus in Star Trek (2009) as well as their fallout.
Romulus is going to be destroyed. Its sun is set to go supernova and the Romulan Empire cannot evacuate all of its citizens. Accepting responsibility for the mammoth task, Captain Picard accepts a promotion to Admiral and begins the enormous task of trying to resettle close to nine hundred million refugees—only to find out that the job may require much more from the Federation.
The Romulan government is covering up how quickly their sun is about to explode and also shutting down any efforts by the Federation that could potentially make them look weak. Meanwhile, Bruce Maddox and the Daystrom Institute have been dragooned into using their genius into manufacturing unintelligent synthetic laborers to help in the evacuation.
This book contains the following tropes:
- A God Am I: Bruce Maddox has a relatively benign example of this as he is obsessed with creating sentient life. He finds working on non-sentient androids to be demeaning.
- All for Nothing: Essentially the nature of the book due to being Doomed by Canon. Picard and the Federation devote uncountable resources and five years of its officers' lives to try to save as many Romulans as possible, only to have the vast majority of their work undone by the Mars' attacks.
- Berserk Button: This is revealed in-story to be the reason why Picard doesn't use the Enterprise as his flagship during the Evacuation (apart from tying down the Federation Flagship on a single multi-year mission). The Enterprise is the symbolic embodiment of over 200 years of enmity between Earth and Romulus (beginning with Jonathan Archer's NX-01 and then continuing with James Kirk, Rachel Garrett, and Picard). There's simply too much baggage attached to the Enterprise and involving it in any way will only really piss off the Romulans.
- Big Bad: Surprisingly lacking one. The problem is the petty politics and bigotries of citizens running up against a natural (?) disaster.
- Brainwashed and Crazy: The Tal'Shiar goes to town on Vritet in order to get him to agree his figures were wrong and the Romulan Sun will not be going supernova for several more years yet. It prevents him from evacuating with the rest of the refugees when it's clear it is happening now.
- Broken Pedestal: Geordi comes to respect and like Bruce Maddox despite their past history. This is all gone when Geordi blames Maddox for the destruction of Mars.
- Call-Back: Clancy brings up the incident on Soukara as reason why Worf shouldn't be trusted to command the Enterprise. Picard vouches for Worf, suggesting that he learned his lesson and treats it as a Career-Building Blunder. Picard also figures that nine out of ten officers would've made the same call; Sisko himself admitted that he would've done so.
- This also doubles as loose Canon Welding with the Novel Verse's TNG Relaunch. There, Picard similarly vouched for and championed Worf after the Klingon felt unworthy of succeeding Riker as the Enterprise XO because of the Soukara Incident.
- The Cameo: Spock has a brief, VO cameo during the ongoing exodus from Romulan space. His return to Federation space acts as a bridge between his previous chronological appearance in TNG's "Unification" and his entry into the events of the 2009 Star Trek film. James Swallow further expands on this bridge during Spock's cameo in The Dark Veil.
- Did Not Get the Girl: Bruce Maddox plans to go off and continue his research into the Soong type androids but requires leaving the Federation. Doctor Jurati is unwilling to leave behind her life and their relationship ends.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?:
- Very deliberately so, many of the sentiments and actions on display are reminiscent of Brexit. Particularly that the Federation has several planets threaten secession over the refugee crisis and claims that it is diverting supplies from their own planets. In a bit of ironic real world synchronicity, the novel was released the same week the United Kingdom formally withdrew from the European Union.
- The Romulan denial of how fast their sun is collapsing is based on climate change denial.
- The attack on Mars is shown via the reaction of the public and it's meant to strongly invoke 9/11.
Word of God is the Paris cafe conversation is based on a real-life incident that happened during the actual attacks.
- Downer Ending: The fleet of relief ships is destroyed, Mars is devastated, the relief effort is cancelled, and billions of Romulans die that might have otherwise been saved. Admiral Picard tenders his resignation from Starfleet and it is accepted, leaving him adrift. Raffi is fired for her substance abuse and her marriage is dissolved. Worse, no one knows who is responsible for any of this.
- Greater-Scope Villain: Several times it is hinted that the supernova is probably artificial in nature (a possible shout-out to the depiction of of the supernova seen in Star Trek Online) but who is responsible, if anyone, is unknown.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Bruce Maddox and Doctor Jurati have this reaction after the Mars attacks. They think they're responsible. They're not.
- My Greatest Failure:
- The events of these become Picard's, surpassing even becoming Locutus and attacking the Federation.
- Bruce Maddox can't discount that he might have made some catastrophic error that resulted in the Synths destroying all of Mars.
- No, Except Yes: Olivia Quest claims she doesn't want to leave the Romulans to die but all of her suggestions amount to this. In the end she gets her wish in the most horrifying manner possible as the Federation cancels all relief efforts after the attack on Mars.
- Obstructive Bureaucrat:
- Olivia Quest is a Federation Council member representing a small farming colony that becomes the face of the movement to discredit the evacuation process.
- The entire Romulan government proves to be this as they don't ask for Federation help until the very last second and actively cover up the speed at which their star is collapsing.
- Offscreen Inertia: One example from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine that finally gets resolved. The series ended with no word on whether or not Bajor would restart their application for Federation membership, and the issue was never brought up again on-screen. In this book, a conversation between Bordson and Clancy reveals that Bajor did indeed join the Federation.
- Retcon: The book retcons the events of Star Trek: Countdown that established the star that went supernova was one called Hobus and systems over from the Romulan Star System.
- Shout-Out: Picard is described as "accustomed to believing many impossible things before breakfast". This is also considered an on-point description of Luna Lovegood.
- Sleazy Politician: Olivia Quest is one of these, gladhanding at every opportunity and undermining the Federation relief effort.
- Spreading Disaster Map Graphic: Raffi's presentation on the impending supernova includes a demonstration of how much destruction the nearby star systems will suffer.
- Teacher/Student Romance: Bruce Maddox and Doctor Jurati have one of these. It is initiated by Doctor Jurati (the student), notably.
- You Are in Command Now: After accepting a promotion to admiral, Picard leaves Worf in command of the Enterprise.
