Deltaverse Raven Uniform

There is a special story behind this uniform. It's unique to the alternate universe that I call the "deltaverse." In the fiction I created, this universe's Starfleet is more "in tune" with the Earth naval tradition that helped inspire its UESPA/Earth Starfleet origins. And that has partially resulted in Starfleet being a more militaristic organization.

Throughout the history of this version of Starfleet, specialized uniforms have existed for combat situations since the days of the MACOs. In those days, they were actually suits of light, black combat armor plates worn over an underlying jumpsuit. As the ENT era moved into the TOS era, the uniforms became simpler and more functional. The "black battle uniform" of the TOS era deltaverse Starfleet was based on the standard uniform tunic, but now featured hardpoints for the attachment of self-replicating armor pieces.

As TOS moved to TWOK, the battle uniform, while retaining its tougher, more weather and weapon-resistant fabric construction and its ability to mount self-replicating armor, had become a largely ceremonial uniform variant. And as with any ceremonial piece, tradition sprang up around it. Officially, it was known as the "Class-C," a category of combat-ready black uniforms available for crewmen to wear with variants for admiralty, captains, first officers, senior staff and crewmen. But unofficially, it was accepted that it would only be donned in times of war, upon receipt of a special fleetwide order from the Grand Admiral (I'm using a rank/position from the Star Trek comic books) serving as CINCFLEET (Commander-in-Chief of the Fleet).

The personnel of Starfleet then gave this black battle uniform a name: the Raven. And from the late 2270s onward, the act of changing into the black uniform - and of physically and mentally accepting the necessity of fighting and the possibility of sacrificing life and limb for the Federation and its ideals - became known as "Going Raven."

In real life, the Black Battle Uniform arose from a Star Trek comic inspiration. On Spike's Star Trek Page, there's a large listing of non-canon uniform variants that have appeared in Star Trek comics over the years, and one of them was an all-black version of the TOS uniform known as an "infiltration uniform." I took that idea and ran with it, developing it into a ceremonial TWOK era battle dress. Then, a friend and I took the idea further and reverse-developed an entire lineage and fictional history for it, detailing how it once was a practical set of body armor that slowly became more of a symbolic uniform.

It is one of the few ideas among all of the AU Star Trek costume concepts that I've come up with that is, more or less, truly my own, with only the black color linking it to the comic infiltration uniform. And it's also one of the designs I've created of which I am most proud.