Starfleet
Names: StarfleetStarfleet wannabes
First appears in Book 4: Heaven’s River, chapter 5 (5. Investigation)
Appearances
What you know
Book 4: Heaven’s River
- Ch 5Starfleet is Morlock's group, obsessed with the Prime Directive, pushing a formal declaration that Bob leave whatever he finds alone.
- Ch 8Starfleet stays silent at the Snark moot, but Bill warns they will not simply fold.
- Ch 9Hugh says Starfleet are no longer really Bobs, holding an obsessive, almost fanatical stance against interference.
- Ch 12Starfleet disrupts a moot about the expedition, then walks out with a veiled threat that they will act if the Bobs won't.
- Ch 20Starfleet has made threats against the Bobs; any attack would come in physical space, possibly affecting Poseidon economically.
- Ch 26Someone, almost certainly Starfleet, has attempted logins to SCUT relays and autofactories using the old common Bob login ID.
- Ch 30Starfleet deliberately disabled BobNet stations running without a resident Bob, using keys captured when Bill changed them.
- Ch 30Starfleet's ultimatum: communications restored only if the Bobs stop interfering with indigenous species.
- Ch 33Starfleet had secretly hacked most autofactory hardware and is now taking autofactories down across the Bobiverse.
- Ch 33Starfleet has erased much of its genealogy and location data from the databases, suggesting a long-planned coup.
- Ch 38Starfleet's access to the autofactories came from a rootkit inserted into the canonical autofactory OS source on BobHub about ten years ago.
- Ch 40Humanity is freezing Starfleet members' assets, cancelling agreements and shutting them out of the infrastructure of human space.
- Ch 40Systems are replacing compromised comms stations with temporary ones, cutting Starfleet's bandwidth to zero.
- Ch 40Most Starfleet activity appears to come from comm nodes toward the Perseus Transit.
- Ch 41Starfleet seized Newholme's relay station and a Bobiverse-owned autofactory, demanding humans and replicants separate and no contact with pre-industrial species.
- Ch 41Starfleet's captured space station at Newholme self-destructs, cutting the system off from the UFS for about a day.
- Ch 43Starfleet booby-trapped seized stations so they self-destruct, damaging ships and endangering human lives at Pangea.
- Ch 46Starfleet members Bill has talked to are as baffled as the Bobs by the hacking; none know who actually did it.
- Ch 55Starfleet's attack spared the Earth project, possibly through luck, respect, or irrelevance.
- Ch 58Starfleet says it never aimed to take over systems, only to sever Bob contact with bios; forced quarantine counts as a win for it.
- Ch 58Lenny says Starfleet's first plan would have caused more damage than the current campaign.
- Ch 58Starfleet's motive is mainly protecting virt, fearing the monolithic-seeming Bobiverse will be blamed for any interference gone bad.
- Ch 60After the Starfleet war, most comms stations were destroyed and Bobs no longer own any comms stations in human space.
- Ch 62Starfleet releases all remaining captured assets and will set up its own BobNet, backups and separate territory.
- Ch 62Starfleet's uniforms have been toned down to look less like Star Trek: TNG.
- Ch 66Starfleet were scared by something they won't discuss and had considered physical intervention before gaining hacked access.
Book 5: Not Till We Are Lost
- Ch 1Starfleet is a recent development back home that Icarus and Daedalus attribute to very weird Bobs.
- Ch 38Lenny had claimed a patch of sky for Starfleet, which is now threatening Bobs who approach it.
- Ch 38During the war, Starfleet notably left the solar system alone, which Bill suspects may reveal a deeper connection.
- Ch 51Starfleet originated with Gerry, a descendant of Charles, and his clones, not with Homer's descendants as Bill guessed.
- Ch 51Charles believes Starfleet's anti-human policy grew from Gerry's clones blaming humanity to cope with what they had done.
Connections
- led byJeremy
- enemy ofBilldebate opponents at the moot
- enemy ofBobiversehas made threats
- has memberLenny
- inPerseus Transitgenerally, not clumped together
- related torootkitused the rootkit to seize autofactories
- enemy ofClaude
- enemy ofPangean Council
- related toSkippiessuspected by Bill of manipulating Starfleet's insurrection
- enemy ofHector (18th generation)threatened him to reroute
- created byGerryvia his clones
Key moments
- Book 4 · Ch 8Moot recruits volunteers
Bob presents the Snarks and topopolis at a moot; volunteer groups form for entry planning, android design, scanning and language work while Starfleet glowers.
- Book 4 · Ch 12Starfleet walks out of moot
Starfleet derails the expedition moot with objections, debates Bill, then leaves with a veiled threat.
- Book 4 · Ch 26Starfleet login attempts
Bill finds attempted logins to SCUT relays and autofactories using the old shared Bob ID, locks down all equipment, and relocates Ultima Thule.
- Book 4 · Ch 33Starfleet issues an ultimatum
With autofactories failing across the Bobiverse, Lenny and other Starfleet members meet Bill and announce they will hold and use the hijacked autofactories; Bill calls it a declaration of war.
- Book 4 · Ch 38Autofactory rootkit discovered
Bill and Garfield find that the standard autofactory image on BobHub was rootkitted about ten years ago, explaining Starfleet's takeover and raising suspicion of a hidden partner.
- Book 4 · Ch 40Humanity cuts off Starfleet
Garfield reports that humans are freezing Starfleet's assets and access and isolating its comms, letting the Bobs trace Starfleet toward the Perseus Transit.
- Book 4 · Ch 41Battle of Newholme
Newholme forces with Claude's help destroy twenty Starfleet busters and nuke the captured autofactory; the Starfleet-held relay station self-destructs.
- Book 4 · Ch 43Pangea declares war on Starfleet
At an emergency UFS session, Pangea reports Starfleet's booby-trapped stations exploded, declares war, and nukes its spaceyard autofactory with UFS approval.
- Book 4 · Ch 58Lenny's failed negotiation
Lenny of Starfleet calls Bill to discuss terms, explains Starfleet aims to protect virt by cutting contact with bios, hints at an unnamed existential threat, and ends the call with the war continuing.
- Book 4 · Ch 60Aftermath of the Starfleet war
Bill reviews the damage: comms stations lost, autofactories recovered with human-only software, and human/replicant relations badly damaged.
- Book 4 · Ch 62Starfleet's parting statement
At a gathering of Bobs, Lenny announces Starfleet will release captured assets and separate entirely, offering a territory map; Bill rebuts their claim of victory and Lenny leaves.
- Book 4 · Ch 66Bill's theory of Skippy manipulation
Bill tells Bob, Will and Garfield he suspects the Skippies used Starfleet to bring down BobNet so Hugh could join the expedition; Bob adds evidence the Skippies withheld information.
- Book 5 · Ch 38Starfleet threatens Hector
Hector, a far-travelling Bob, writes to Bill that Starfleet threatened him into rerouting; Bill decides to investigate Starfleet's possible ties to Sol.
- Book 5 · Ch 51Charles reveals Starfleet's origin
Confronted by Bill, Charles admits Starfleet arose from his descendant Gerry's horrific attempts to restore Homer and the rebellion of Gerry's clones.