Final Thoughts


It's Monday morning as I wrap up this article for the Sunday journal to be out a week from now, Reader. I'm sitting on my lounge chair next to the pool at the Intercontinental. Dr Julian Mendez is across the pool at the bar bringing me another banana daiquiri.

When I went into this assignment, I went expecting my existing opinions to be confirmed for me. I went in expecting to write another article about the FCRU's failure to do anything that any of the three uniformed services can't already do. To me, this team is an overreach, at best. At worst, it's a Frankenstein creation pulling parts from things that already work to assemble some monstrosity to appease the ego of a man that really doesn't know how to quit while he's ahead.

And, because I'll be honest with you, dear reader, if no one else, my opinion hasn't changed.

But after spending time on the ground with these men and women, I understand that I might have been wrong about something. I can recognize the value of what John Liley, Susan Markstrom, Dan Beckenridge, and the brave, courageous men and women under their command, are trying to accomplish.

Let me put it to you like this. The Klingon invasion of Cardassia has been quite possibly one of the most idiotic, foolish decisions that has ever been made – the possible exception of the FCRU notwithstanding. But as another, oft-maligned quote says, even a broken clock is right twice a day.

In this galaxy, where uncertainty and unrest seem to be spreading by the hour, it's no longer enough to simply react. The Federation, as both a people and a nation, needs to be proactive. The FCRU doesn't just go where they're sent to respond to the next emergency. They try to anticipate what might happen next. Already, as Julian passes me my daiquiri, he's also signing off on a Starfleet design for environmental suits that can withstand 10 000 Celsius. After lunch – once I change out of my swimsuit that is – we'll be joining Sergeant Pella and his Squirrels for a shooting tournament. They want to show me how to use a det-pack to open a bank vault, because there might be one day when I just might have to know how to do that. And tonight, Julian and I will be sharing our dinner date when Nia joins us with Sergeant Pella in tow. She wants Julian and Pella to help her draft a new manual for Quantico on crisis de-escalation.

And that's what I was wrong about, Dear Reader. This team isn't a Frankenstein. Its Eudaimonia.

Time for another history lesson, but don't worry, this one will be quick. A long, long time ago, there was a really smart dude named Aristotle who lived in a place called Greece (the country, not the lubricant). Aristotle was asked by one of his students what the ultimate end state could be for a Human being to exist as. Aristotle explained that life wasn't momentary pleasure or happiness, but leading a life of moral and intellectual excellence. If you cultivate the virtues of wisdom, courage, justice, fairness and temperance you'll learn to combine these virtues into the best possible state that anyone could live in.

The FCRU has become an eudaimonic creation of one man's vision. To explain this in non-philosophical terms, John Liley and his team have become more than the sum of its parts. He's taken the very best parts of Starfleet, Fed-Sec and the Federation Marines, and created something that does what the other three agencies can do on their own, but when combined, does so in a way that is more proactive and more effective than the individual effort. They save lives.

Like I said, I came into this assignment expecting to find a crack in the foundation. What I found was a team on the cusp of something rather remarkable. They've got a lot of work to do, and I'm sure they'll make more mistakes along the way. But I'll sign off with a cautiously optimistic note, even with all the increasing uncertainty occurring in the Alpha Quadrant and beyond.

The FCRU is exactly what the Federation needs right now – whether people like me are ready to admit that or not.

- Kirn Terev, FNN.


─•~:~•─