Jonathan Archer may not be the best captain. He may not be the smartest captain. He may not be the coolest captain. But he is certainly the captain who’s name is an insult in the most cultures and you can’t take that away from him

ALT

sketch request: Captain Porthos

gonna go✈️crazy mode for a min but putting aside similitude as an allegory for contemporary politics (ie the ethics of biological donorship and where we as a real society need to draw lines regarding that) and simply looking at it as a character study for sim as a person is insane. he's a week-old alien but he's a human baby child teenager adult. he's his own person with his own childhood and upbringing and utterly unique experiences, but-- as unintentional as it is-- the longer he's alive the more he has of someone else's memories. his dna is his, but it's stolen. those memories are his, but they're stolen. some of the people around him think that it's fascinating that he can recall his donor doppelganger prime version's memories, but some of the people (his coworkers but also his babysitters and teachers and aunts and uncles) resent him for having something they don't think he has a right to. (they chose to make him in the first place. he didn't ask to be born). he remembers earth and knows that he needs to sacrifice himself so that trip-- the real original trip-- can save enterprise and enterprise can in turn save earth. (if he has all of trip's memories and enterprise's engine is the only thing his own hands have ever known, he's not exactly sure why he needs to be the one to die). but he knows that earth should be saved and that lizzie should be avenged. he's never stepped foot on earth. he's never even met lizzie (and he never will.)

the memories are easy to separate, but feelings are another thing entirely. they're messy, oozing, chemical cocktails that are crashing through his body at a relentless pace. does he feel like this because of puberty? does he feel like this because trip felt like this? what in his body belongs to him? where is the line? is there a line? sim has everything that trip has and more, he has two lives in one. if one of them has to survive why should it be trip? of the two of them doesn't sim have more? more life, more experience, more perspective? can't trip's feelings be his feelings too? can't it be enough that he knows what trip knows and feels what trip felt and has all of his own thoughts and emotions to boot? does he have to look his father phlox in the eye and let himself be euthanized?

in the end, no matter what he tells himself, there is no choice to be made because he's not in a position to make one. he has his last only first kiss with the woman trip he loves. he tells phlox his father that he loves him, that he's grateful. he lies down on a biobed and slides into the chamber.