"Sound Bytes from the Future"

[Archie Phoenix 0]

“What was Archie Phoenix like before his death?”

 

“Not the same. Whatever propaganda they fed people on that planet … no, he wasn’t the same, he was different back then.”

 

“How so?”

 

“Well, in most ways he was a better person -- obviously -- but in some ways he was worse.”

 

“Interesting. What ways was he worse?”

 

“ … ‘shy’ is the first thing that comes to mind, but I don’t know if that would be the word to describe it. I think he was comfortable enough around the crew … maybe even more comfortable than he was afterwards. He was always calm and relaxed around the others, even showed a kind of level-headedness during crisis situations that you would look for in a leader. He just … well, you see, he didn’t understand the others. And the others certainly didn’t understand him. They didn’t even know about his people. At first, only the Captain and Commander knew the truth about the Renazians. They were the command staff and Archie was one of their crew, so they were entitled to know. But aside from that concession, the Renazian government demanded absolute secrecy. Nobody was to know too much about the Renazian … gift.”

 

“You don’t make much effort to mask the disdain in your voice when you use that word.”

 

“Well, you’ve read our reports, haven’t you? It doesn’t matter, though. I’m not looking to debate Renazian morality. You asked about Archie … and … well … look, he wasn’t assertive, okay? He was a brilliant engineer, but he was the worst kind of Starfleet officer. He let people walk all over him. There was an innocence to him, but there was too much innocence, you see? When he was growing up on his homeworld, he was a loner. There was no one to fit in with. Then he came here to Starfleet, and suddenly there was a whole crowd of people to fit in with. It was exciting … but also intimidating. He didn’t want to blow it. He wrongly assumed that Humans and other Federation peoples set as many boundaries of behavior as his own people did, and he was very careful to avoid crossing those boundaries. But he wanted to live, the way he didn’t -- or couldn’t -- on his own world. He wanted to experience the joys that he’d missed out on as a child. But … he just wasn’t assertive enough to pursue those joys.”

 

“ … and that changed.”

 

“Whew … you bet it changed. All of it changed when he came back. I could say a lot of repressed anger finally found its way to the surface … but with those ghastly Renazian factories … who knows what changed. Who knows what was done to him.”

 

“Do you think he knows?”

 

“ … why don’t you ask him?”