Spoilers Section 31: Control by David Mack Review Thread

[Jarvisimo]

I finished it too; the discussion here is important, and signifies what the novel can engender for utopian representation in Trek. Will that utopia end now?

My questions are

--- a continuation of my earlier post about the lack of follow up to Bashir's letter from The Crimson Shadow, and continuity things like the lack of Reta Kelanis or an allusion to Garak's stability with Parmak. (And how will the novel tie into Enigma Tails, the novel I am looking forward to this year? )
--- why does Control actually try to stop Bashir and Data at the end if their mission is its mission? It seems like conformity with narrative expectations - that there must be a terrible fight at the end of the story, costing the heroes their lover or body. Ultimately, this felt a bit forced, especially since Control wanted them both to delete Uraei. Must we always have a fight. Structurally the in media res opening also felt unnecessary.
--- What will happen to L'Haan and the other surviving directors...did Control kill them or will the cabal continue, in a new form?
--- Will we ever see Admiral Ross again??? Or is he dead too?

Things I really enjoyed

--- The chapter from Uraei's 'perspective' deciding and accounting for the fates of Admiral Ko and Ikerson; I wonder what happened to Rao too.
--- The overall implications - Mack, as he did with Vanguard, to an extent deconstructs the Federation as we understood it, portrays its morality far more complexly than is generally afforded.

Things I am not sure of

--- the novel, as someone says upthread, essentially condones Control and/or S31 by suggesting its methods have resulted in the Federation surviving. I think this needs more critique or thought. Further it recalls the handling of this in Hollow Men, and also the conflict that resulted in the Obsidian Order which McCormack wrote of in The Crimson Shadow - I did want Garak to allude to this with Bashir, to explain shadowplay better, but also to condemn it in the way that good intentions go awry (rather than his 'are you sure?' refrain at the Castellan's complex). Perhaps this is one of the roles the 22nd century story plays, and it is well-done, recalling Mack's other 22nd century narrative very well!
--- I really hoped Jedburgh would turn up - it does feel like Hollow Men is the red-headed stepchild of S31 novels, when it is such a beautiful novel!

Regarding the reception of the novel

Regarding some people's reading of the novel as 'everything in Trek is the result of Control', I want to ask - how reliable a narrator is the Control we see in the novel? Especially the grandstanding - and seemingly contrary-acting - Control seen in its final chapters...

 

[jaime]

I finished it too; the discussion here is important, and signifies what the novel can engender for utopian representation in Trek. Will that utopia end now?

My questions are

--- a continuation of my earlier post about the lack of follow up to Bashir's letter from The Crimson Shadow, and continuity things like the lack of Reta Kelanis or an allusion to Garak's stability with Parmak. (And how will the novel tie into Enigma Tails, the novel I am looking forward to this year? )
--- why does Control actually try to stop Bashir and Data at the end if their mission is its mission? It seems like conformity with narrative expectations - that there must be a terrible fight at the end of the story, costing the heroes their lover or body. Ultimately, this felt a bit forced, especially since Control wanted them both to delete Uraei. Must we always have a fight. Structurally the in media res opening also felt unnecessary.
--- What will happen to L'Haan and the other surviving directors...did Control kill them or will the cabal continue, in a new form?
--- Will we ever see Admiral Ross again??? Or is he dead too?

Things I really enjoyed

--- The chapter from Uraei's 'perspective' deciding and accounting for the fates of Admiral Ko and Ikerson; I wonder what happened to Rao too.
--- The overall implications - Mack, as he did with Vanguard, to an extent deconstructs the Federation as we understood it, portrays its morality far more complexly than is generally afforded.

Things I am not sure of

--- the novel, as someone says upthread, essentially condones Control and/or S31 by suggesting its methods have resulted in the Federation surviving. I think this needs more critique or thought. Further it recalls the handling of this in Hollow Men, and also the conflict that resulted in the Obsidian Order which McCormack wrote of in The Crimson Shadow - I did want Garak to allude to this with Bashir, to explain shadowplay better, but also to condemn it in the way that good intentions go awry (rather than his 'are you sure?' refrain at the Castellan's complex). Perhaps this is one of the roles the 22nd century story plays, and it is well-done, recalling Mack's other 22nd century narrative very well!
--- I really hoped Jedburgh would turn up - it does feel like Hollow Men is the red-headed stepchild of S31 novels, when it is such a beautiful novel!

Regarding the reception of the novel

Regarding some people's reading of the novel as 'everything in Trek is the result of Control', I want to ask - how reliable a narrator is the Control we see in the novel? Especially the grandstanding - and seemingly contrary-acting - Control seen in its final chapters...

It is as reliable as Data, who outright says that AÍ can do anything. The unspoken bit is that what it will do comes largely down to its own moral code as evolved from its original directive. Data says it can do the things it claims to have done, it has no reason to lie, especially not in internal monologue.

 

[Enterprise1701]

Anyone else slightly disappointed

Spoiler

that there was no scene of L'Haan getting arrested? It would have been priceless to see the smug stoicism get wiped off her face at long last.

Also, I totally did a Schadenfreude laugh when Jhun Kulkarno was reported to have committed suicide when confronted.

Anyone here recently read TNG - Section 31: Rogue and can remind me in that novel how much Data learned of Section 31?

Spoiler

I hope Admiral Connaught Rossa is one of the admirals who is arrested at the end of this novel.

Couple minor nitpicks: On page 78, Bashir states he has not met Data (and Data met Garak once) in 17 years, give or take, since the Enterprise-D's visit to DS9 in "Birthright". I can't swear to it, but has Data really not set foot on DS9 in all the other times the Enterprise-E was there or else encountered the Defiant?

Also on page 262, Bashir states that he first visited the mirror universe in 2372. It was 2370, in DS9 season 2's "Crossover".

We now that S31 was sorta kinda began (or was teased) at the end of Elusive Salvation, so maybe there was some kind of pre-actual-31 organization with the same name, but without the level of organization, competence and etc of the Uraei version?

Maybe it would work out like this:

This gets into theory territory, so just in case this counts as a story suggestion, here's a spoiler box!

Spoiler

• 1996: Some sort of early S31 starts to evolve out of MJ12 as a single line of defense between Earth and the rest of the universe
• This organisation proves to be somewhat effective but immoral and was subsequently shut down.
• Someone (or more likely a group of people) thinks that this immoral group might have been needed again at one point if Earth is faced with a thread that can't be defeated with its moral standards, so they included a loophole in the Starfleet Charta. To allude to the original group it was placed in the thirty-first section of article 14.
• Over time multiple people make use of article 14 section 31, including Harris who once recruted Malcom Reed.
• 2150: Uraei finds itself at a problem as it couldn't respond to the Xindi thread. Uraei loops back to its primary directives: Protect Earth. Protect the human race and its allies. Defend human settlements, colonies and institutions from harm. Uraei finds the loophole in the Starfleet Charta and creates an agency that has no physical address and to which Uraei can refer intelligence of credible threats requiring the preemptive action that would be prohibited by the rest of Starfleet or to Earth's civilian countersepionage agencies. Uraei indentifies and recruits potential biological agents into its service, however it would take years to adequately staff, equp, train and deploy its new biological agents.
• Its agents are (among others) those who used the loophole previously, like Harris. However most of them were not part of an organization, they just acted on the same article and section from the charta. Uraei first unites these self-proclaimed defenders of Earth into one organization.
• And to get into osme further speculation: Malcom Reed is still allied with Harris but leaves the organization early on to join the Enterprise crew, after he witnessed members of the organization do something really horrible.

I mainly added that last one because Reed refers to an organization, so according to my theory (wild speculations with near to none basis) he had to still be around when Uraei created the S31 organization.

I guess we'll have to wait for Hearts and Minds to clarify the 21st century end of things, but your theory sounds plausible.

I might just be imagining it, but has there ever been another Star Trek non-canon work which implied or stated that Section 31 was born on pre-first contact Earth? This theory seems really familiar to me for some reason.

 

[Jinn]

Anyone else slightly disappointed

Spoiler

that there was no scene of L'Haan getting arrested? It would have been priceless to see the smug stoicism get wiped off her face at long last.

Also, I totally did a Schadenfreude laugh when Jhun Kulkarno was reported to have committed suicide when confronted.

Anyone here recently read TNG - Section 31: Rogue and can remind me in that novel how much Data learned of Section 31?

Spoiler

I hope Admiral Connaught Rossa is one of the admirals who is arrested at the end of this novel.

Couple minor nitpicks: On page 78, Bashir states he has not met Data (and Data met Garak once) in 17 years, give or take, since the Enterprise-D's visit to DS9 in "Birthright". I can't swear to it, but has Data really not set foot on DS9 in all the other times the Enterprise-E was there or else encountered the Defiant?

Also on page 262, Bashir states that he first visited the mirror universe in 2372. It was 2370, in DS9 season 2's "Crossover".



I guess we'll have to wait for Hearts and Minds to clarify the 21st century end of things, but your theory sounds plausible.

I might just be imagining it, but has there ever been another Star Trek non-canon work which implied or stated that Section 31 was born on pre-first contact Earth? This theory seems really familiar to me for some reason.

No, not really. I don't even think that S31 was used in any novels before the Section 31 miniseries.

However there were implications:

If the Starfleet conspiracy discovered by the crew of the USS Enterprise-D in 2370 was part of Section 31, the individuals encountered claimed the conspiracy traced its roots back to the threat of alien contact perceived following the Roswell incident in the mid-20th century. (TNG - The Space Between comic: "An Inconvenient Truth")

That would line up with From History's Shadow, as the Roswell incident resulted in a couple of agencies, including Project Blue Book and MJ12 being created.

 

[Enterprise1701]

Aha! The Space Between! That's what I was thinking of, though it may or may not be compatible with the novelverse.

 

[MHJH]

So, spoilers and all that:

It, um….It didn’t work for me. Didn’t work for me at all.

The book’s well put together, it flows right along, and it’s a propulsive little thriller, as Mack’s work pretty much always is. It was really nice to see Data and Lal again, and a decent continuity bandage put on the conflict between Data’s position on Orion at the end of Cold Equations and where they were when The Light Fantastic started up. I absolutely loved the chapter told explicitly from Uraei’s point of view, largely in code. That was a nice POV shakeup in the book. I quite liked the idea of the backbone of 31’s surveillance and omniscient viewpoint being a code base that continually re-wrote and updated itself into the omnipresent LCARS system (and others) that we see in every 24th century episode.

The biggest problem, though, is that it took every erg of gray out of Section 31. There is no questioning of the morality of what 31 does in this book. It is simply assumed to be bad. Based on the actions we saw Uraei and its operatives take in this book, that’s understandable, and that’s part of what kills the story for me. Section 31 always worked for me as a cautionary tale. How a group of people could talk themselves into doing horrible things in order to preserve a way of life for a culture. How the things we do in the shadows look to those who live their lives largely in the light, and how you can’t always condemn people who do despicable things to serve a larger purpose. That we can question the motives for these actions, but that sometimes the ultimate result is a greater good. Section 31 works incredibly well as a storytelling device that way.

But this book destroys that.

The reason S31 does things the way it does is because a security AI decided that was the best way to do things. Simple, easy, done. No conscience, no questioning of itself or of its authority. The people who work for 31 may have questions and conundrums, but the orders always come from a source that wouldn’t regard these questions as valid. The people who created the AI made a mistake, and we can look at them as having their best efforts corrupted, but 31 itself is just evil.

The book paints 31 as essentially omnipotent, predicting just about every action of every person, pulling every string of everything that’s happened in the Federation for two centuries. The Romulans never having their genetic link to the Vulcans revealed after the war? 31 did that. The peace with the Klingon empire in 2293? That wasn’t due to the heroic actions of Kirk and Spock, or of a man questioning his own deep-seated hatred of certain people, coming out of a long dark tunnel into the light. Turns out 31 arranged all that. It even seems to be attempting to take credit for the Caeliar’s destruction/transformation of the Borg Collective.

There’s never anything but lip service paid to the fact that Graniv’s expose of 31 could do far more harm than good. I mean, we get what, a couple of sentences at the end of the book saying the Typhon Pact and the Romulans are kinda pissed? I guess we’re meant to accept “Well, the truth is always good” and just go with it. Because, again, the book removes the shades of grey that the best of the 31 stories always showcased so well.

And, of course, in the end, nothing matters anyway. Because all of Bashir’s work is pointless, because 31 is in the background, petting a cat, and saying “No, you see, Mister Bond, I had this planned all along…” and just continues on with its plans.

It bugged me, and I feel like the book is destined to be largely forgotten, because it has to be. Apparently nothing of any consequence happened in the 23rd or 24th Century without 31 knowing about it ahead of time. If anything is happening to the characters in the Federation, we can basically assume that it only occurred because Control let it, and will continue to let things happen depending on whether it allows it. These revelations probably should’ve started a quadrant-wide war within days. The Federation has planted malicious code in the systems of its enemies and allies alike. And not a couple of backdoors, a full on surveillance state. The Klingons should’ve been bombing Earth by the end of the day. But that won’t happen (Or at least I assume it won’t) because that’s not the way the books are trending right now. Probably the only major fallout for this will be that Bashir, who was already basically a background character due to the Andorian thing, will be even more so for a while.

No disrespect to Mack. I’ve always liked his books, and I’ll be there for the next one. But the concept behind this one was fatally flawed.

 

[Markonian]

Whatever your position, this book is certainly thought-provoking.

 

[Snaploud]

David Mack. Destoyer of Worlds. Now Destroyer of Roddenberry's Vision.

Just kidding. This book was awesome. Though, I think:

Spoiler

L'Haan really should have been part of Bashir's final fight with Sarina. As written, her revelation (that her boss was an AI) never really got a chance to impact the ending. She should have gotten a closing monologue explaining why she was still fighting for the AI (or alternatively had decided to change sides and help Bashir fight Sarina).

 

[Christopher]

^Isn't L'Haan female?

 

[Snaploud]

^Isn't L'Haan female?

Oops. Yeah, she's female. I don't know why I switched her in my head to male.

 

[Idran]

and a decent continuity bandage put on the conflict between Data’s position on Orion at the end of Cold Equations and where they were when The Light Fantastic started up.

This was set after The Light Fantastic; that book was set in November 2385, this one was late 2386. That's why Lal had her own house separate from Data in this one.

 

[MHJH]

This was set after The Light Fantastic; that book was set in November 2385, this one was late 2386. That's why Lal had her own house separate from Data in this one.

That's not what I was referring to. In the first Cold Equations book, it's stated pretty clearly that Soong liquidated the casino on Orion in order to buy the planet where he created the new body intended for Data. the one that was destroyed by the Borg during Destiny. When The Light Fantastic starts up, even though Data is exploring other personalities and jobs, it's stated that as "Mr Soong" he still owns and runs the Casino, and he's shown in the process of administrating it.

In this book, they're still on Orion and Data has basically retained access to certain "perks" in the Casino, written in to the contract at the time of sale. So he still has a suite, is still known to the employees, etc.

It's not perfect, but it works, and it provides a reason why Data returned to Orion for TLF, when CE said that there was really nothing much left there for him.

 

[Ronald Held]

Speculation, but Data could have asked for, as part of the selloff, to keep one of the penthouses and one hotel in the complex.

 

[Idran]

That's not what I was referring to. In the first Cold Equations book, it's stated pretty clearly that Soong liquidated the casino on Orion in order to buy the planet where he created the new body intended for Data. the one that was destroyed by the Borg during Destiny. When The Light Fantastic starts up, even though Data is exploring other personalities and jobs, it's stated that as "Mr Soong" he still owns and runs the Casino, and he's shown in the process of administrating it.

In this book, they're still on Orion and Data has basically retained access to certain "perks" in the Casino, written in to the contract at the time of sale. So he still has a suite, is still known to the employees, etc.

It's not perfect, but it works, and it provides a reason why Data returned to Orion for TLF, when CE said that there was really nothing much left there for him.

Oh, aha, I see. Forgot about that!

 

[The Wormhole]

Spoiler

Okay, so the final chapter told from Control's perspective makes reference to an impending catastrophe that will strike the Romulans. So we actually just got that event foreshadowed?

 

[MHJH]

Speculation, but Data could have asked for, as part of the selloff, to keep one of the penthouses and one hotel in the complex.

That's essentially the patch that Mack puts over it. Basically, he retained a permanent residence at the hotel in perpetuity as part of the sale. It doesn't match perfectly with how it's portrayed in Lang's book, but it works well enough. Honestly, the only reason I noticed it at all was because I tore through Cold Equations and The Light Fantastic within the last couple of months before reading these last two S31 books.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

@The Wormhole: If that's true...

Spoiler: spoiler

I must commend David Mack for getting it past the Bad Robot "censors".

 

[The Wormhole]

Well, it's not the first time the novels have made a passing reference to something from the Abrams movies. We've in the past had references to Scotty's outpost on Delta Vega, Red Matter, Kirk's uncle Frank, and in this very book the USS Franklin. The thing I mentioned is a lot more ballsy, especially since it represents an elephant in the room which the novel continuity has been studiously working hard to avoid the past few years.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I'm just wondering how Bad Robot managed to overlook these things, as they have made it abundantly clear that they refuse to allow the novelverse to mention anything from a Kelvin film.

 

[Snaploud]

I'm just wondering how Bad Robot managed to overlook these things, as they have made it abundantly clear that they refuse to allow the novelverse to mention anything from a Kelvin film.

Well, it doesn't have to be a reference to a Kelvin film. We're just interpreting it that way. Something else (perhaps with similar consequences) could be in store for the novelverse.