Seth could not have expected the Excelsior to show up all of a sudden on the day that the Dragonfly was launched. He was especially glad to see it because he was close and personal friends with the new captain, assigned to it only a month ago. It was the original U.S.S. Excelsior, Excelsior-class, commissioned over a hundred years ago. For years there was talk of decommissioning the ship and bestowing the great name to a new class of starship. But short of the failed transwarp drive, the Excelsior was a remarkably sturdy and reliable ship, passed on from one great captain to another. And as more captains fell in love with it, there was even greater resistance to retire it. As long as it worked, there was simply no reason to decommission it, especially at a time when the Federation was in desperate need of more ships. So it stayed in service for over a hundred years, with routine upgrades and refits as it went along.
“Captain, the Excelsior is hailing us,” Ensign Ester announced.
“Put it on screen.” A giant image of Seth’s old friend from the Academy, Alan Santiago, appeared on the front viewer and his eyes stared down at Seth. They were partners in crime at Red Squad. His voice echoed through the entire bridge.
“Captain Seth,” Santiago smiled, “Good to see you finally on your own two feet. Thought I’d come back to Earth to give you a send-off.”
“Your gesture is acknowledged and appreciated. It’s certainly been a long time. Why don’t you stop over, and we’ll catch up.”
“I intend to. See you soon.” The screen flickered off.
Seth moved from the front of the bridge towards the turbolift. “Ensign Ester, tell Transporter Room Three to beam Captain Santiago over. I will meet him there.”
“Aye, sir.”
The doors of the turbolift opened silently, without the usual hissing sound of a normal ship. As he walked in, it also seemed like the doorway got bigger, as if the turbolift engorged him as he walked in.
“Deck Ten,” he ordered. And the turbolift shot off. Sideways.
***
Seth was looking forward to see his old friend again. It was good to see a familiar face. Short of his parents, and maybe a few ex-girlfriends, there were few people other than Alan that he would have wanted to be there to send him on his way. The competitive nature of Red Squad made the Academy a particularly rough time for both of them, and had they not banded together to fight off the other elite cadets, they might not have made it through to graduation.
Captain Santiago materialized on the deck in Transporter Room 3. He immediately walked over to Seth, who stood there waiting for him. He looked very much the same as Seth had remembered him, with the exception of slightly longer dark hair that was spikier and messier than usual.
He shivered. “Brrr….Is it just me, or does transportation feel cold nowadays?”
“I think it’s just you.”
“Next time, change the environmental controls when I get here.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t take orders from subordinates,” Seth joked.
“Hey, I’m a captain, too. And as I recall, I was promoted first. That makes me more of a captain than you.”
“Fair enough,” Seth laughed. He drew closer to give him a hug. “Nice of you to come visit my ship.”
“Hey, just glad to be here. I just completed an exhausting mission involving the Remans. Spending time back in good ol’ Sector 001 is a welcome change.” They proceeded to leave the transporter room and walked through the corridors.
“I said the same thing after my last mission on the Chicago,” Seth said. “I see you haven’t changed much. You look pretty much the same since you left the Academy.”
“Yeah, well, I keep in good shape. You’re looking good yourself. I saw the inauguration from the viewer of my ship. You know, I didn’t get this much attention when I was inaugurated to be the captain of my ship…”
“Hey, you got the U.S.S. Excelsior…and your first command, no less. I’m sorry I wasn’t there to congratulate you.”
“Don’t worry about it; it was almost better that you didn’t come. How the hell did you get reporters to come to your ship?”
“Lucky, I guess,” he lied.
“Everyone’s talking about the new ship in the fleet. And the new captain to lead it. You should be really proud,” Santiago said. Seth couldn’t tell if there was jealousy behind those words.
“Hey, I just wanted to command. I didn’t necessarily want all of the attention.”
“You have to take the bad with the good. Just think about it: we’re only a few years out of the Academy and we’re commanding our own ships. Most officers our age are barely lieutenants,” Santiago said, almost like a school boy. It was true, Captain Santiago and Seth were already two Starfleet officers promoted to captain before the age of thirty. It was extremely unusual, but since the war ended, with casualties as high as they were, there was a shortage of good leaders and enrollment into Starfleet had dwindled. It made Seth wonder if Starfleet was starting to become desperate. But Admiral Roth seemed to make nothing of it.
“Why the hell do you want to command that old clunker? Hasn’t that ship been around since the Middle Ages? Wouldn’t you want to command something a little more modern or with a little more teeth? I think they’re about to make a new war-class starship.”
“No way, the Excelsior’s a classic…” Santiago said half-jokingly, with a childish smirk on his face.
“You do realize you’re driving one big failure, right?” Seth joked, referring to the failed transwarp drive.
“Oh no, I’m not letting you bring me down on this one,” Santiago said. “Still, your ship is impressive to say the least. A self-healing hull, mobile phaser canons, multiple defense modes…it barely feels like a Federation ship it’s so different.”
“First of its kind,” Seth said proudly.
“I can’t even recognize the computer interface.”
“Well, if you get lost, you can always ask the computer. It still talks, you know.”
“Even when I first approached the ship on the Excelsior, I could have sworn that I saw no windows on your hull.” Santiago was referring to the uniformly silver and reflective hull of the ship, which from the outside, made it look like the ship did not have any windows.
“No, we have windows. It’s just that the outer hull is supposedly made of one of those materials that have the property of letting visible light in, but not out.”
“Oh,” he answered. “Guess I need to brush up on the latest.”
“I’m sure my Chief Engineer can tell you all about it, if you’re into that sort of thing.”
“The Excelsior pretty much looks the same as it did for a hundred years. I think there are many in Starfleet who thinks it’s probably close to being time to decommission it.”
“You make it sound like it belongs in a museum.”
“Absolutely,” he replied. “But not before I make my mark,” he joked, patting Seth’s shoulder as he said it.
“Look, I’m glad you’re here. It’s definitely been too long.” He looked at the time on his watch, and decided that it was time for him to remove himself from the conversation. “But…I gotta run. Is the Excelsior still going to be around for a while?”
“Oh yeah, we haven’t received new orders yet.”
“I’d give you a tour of the ship, but I barely know her myself. Tell you what, let’s meet up later in Ten Forward, OK? Say 2000 hours. I’ll buy you a drink.”
“I’m going to hold you to that…”
“Don’t cause trouble on my ship,” Seth warned. He wasn’t joking.
“Why, what’s the rush? Where are you going?”
“What else? It’s time to meet my crew.”
