Star Trek Adds a Multiverse Version of Starfleet's Prime Directive and It's a Huge Improvement for Canon

Warning: MAJOR spoilers ahead for Star Trek: Lower Decksseason 5, episode 9, “Fissure Quest.”Star TrekThe multiverse has been visited many times throughout the franchise's history, which makes it Star Trek: Lower Decks'new story about the even more important sci-fi trope. Alternative realities have appeared all over the world Star Trek timeline. Along with characters embarking on interdimensional travel in the Star Trek TV shows, they also made the journey in some Star Trek films. As a result, a complex web of worlds was vaguely mapped, and nothing more by one of the saga's newest characters.

Star Trek: Lower Decks season 5, episode 9, “Fissure Quest” is a thrilling ride through the multiverse this quickly becomes as canonically relevant as it is brilliant in its fan service. Captain William Boimler (Jack Quaid) and the crew of the USS Anaximander encounter Star Trek characters in varying forms of recognition, as the Section 31 ship slowly accumulates a group of alternate versions of familiar faces from the franchise. There's one character in particular who returns to the franchise for the first time in nearly 30 years and imparts fascinating information.

“Fissure Quest” Reveals the Existence of Star Trek's Quantum Prime Directive

New Star Trek Guideline Highlights Dangers of the Multiverse

Alfre Woodard reprises the role of Lily Sloan in “Fissure Quest” for the first time since 1996 Star Trek: First Contact. In the Prime Universe, Lily worked with Zefram Cochrane (James Cromwell) to help develop Earth's first warp-capable ship, which changed humanity's destiny forever. The version of Lily that appears in Star Trek: Lower Decks achieved something a little different than her Prime Universe counterpart, as she and Cochrane built a multiversal ship. Advancement comes with a built-in ethical rule, similar to Star TrekPrime Directive.

'We have guidelines that dictate ethical limits for contacting societies that cannot traverse realities on their own.” – Lily Sloan in “Fissure Quest.”

Star Trek: Lower Decks doesn't give the rule an official name, but given its similarities to the Prime Directive and the Temporal Prime Directive, it makes sense to call Lily's statement the Quantum Prime Directive. Just as Starfleet officers are trained not to interfere in the development of pre-war civilizations, nor should they change the course of history in the case of time travel, Lily and her crew are under strict orders to remain hidden from the inhabitants of the other realities they visit. – unless they also have the technology to travel between realities.

Why the Quantum Directive is more important than the Prime Directive and the First Temporal Directive

Lily Sloan's Rule Protects All Star Trek Realities (Not Just Hers)

Although Star TrekThe other two directives are certainly important, they almost pale in comparison to the First Quantum Directive. Of course, pre-warp civilizations could develop entirely differently if contacted too early, and the timeline of a universe could be irreparably altered if events were altered, but at least these errors would only impact one reality. For example, when Patrick Stewart's Captain Picard interferes in Earth's history in Star Trek: First Contactit is “only” the future of the Primordial Universe that will change. Furthermore, the Prime Directive only initially addresses the destiny of a single world. However, the Quantum Prime Directive protects all realities.

Lily's ship is inadvertently responsible for the tears in the fabric of the multiversebut the crew's intentions are not nefarious. They simply wish to be observers of other universes, keeping their distance and allowing events to happen as they otherwise would, as if they were not even present. To those in Lily's reality, the Prime Universe must seem almost as primitive as a pre-warp society would to a 24th century Starfleet crew from the franchise's primary dimension. If the Temporal Prime Directive had not been in effect, the damage could have been much greater to the entire multiverse.

The Quantum Prime Directive is one of the biggest additions to the Star Trek Canon

Other interdimensional ships could be watching Star Trek characters all along

Star TrekThe multiverse is unknowably vast. It is essentially infinite, which means that practically everything is impossible in terms of anyone visiting other realities – whether by intention or by accident. Star Trek: Lower DecksThe last season also reinforced the fact that not all parallel realities temporally align with the Prime Universe. In other words, those who make the crossing may also be traveling through time and into another reality. The infinite possibilities are difficult to understand, but they make one thing very clear: it's unlikely that Lily's universe is the only one that has developed interdimensional travel.

Just as there are realities very similar to the Prime Universe, it is highly likely that there are some worlds that are almost identical to Lily's. Then, there could have been ships visiting the Early Universe for centuriesand the Quantum Prime Directive in effect would mean that it would be nearly impossible to detect the ships in question – possibly even other interdimensional ships. Essentially, it caused a gentle rewind of the entire Star Trek franchise, with Star Trek: Lower Decks ending with a big tease that there have been sneaky eyes in the sky the whole time.