Stardate 100703.2, Ba’aja system.
Tomorrow will be one year since I transferred from Mars to Deep Space 13. I will not claim it has been “one hell of a ride so far”, as Earthers like to say. It has kept me busy, that is for sure. Then I transferred to USS *Cassini, Titan-class, earlier this year. A ship full of surprise and I am not just talking about the static warp field generators and internal emission sinks based on lithium.
While the ship itself is the pinnacle of modern Starfleet technologies, I can see some traces of designs of other Khitomer Alliance members. It’s hard to pinpoint them, but I know they are there. I can feel their presence. Working at Mars’ division of Allied Cooperative Starship Development Board makes technological designs easily recognisable.
I took the opportunity to visit the Engineering Labs where I worked on software updates for Deep Space 13 and it seems the initial hurdles were resolved. Though how many of my recommendations were implemented, it is difficult to say. Being out of the loop for a year is… loopy and gappy.
My time on Cassini was… slightly less static. Not that I did not like DS13, but as Pakleds say, I too like “things that go”. This newest discovery of Iconian Gateway imitation is a confusing puzzle. We still don’t know who built the gateway or converted the older Starfleet shuttle into scaled down Baltim-class vessel, but is definitely difficult to crack down on it.
Not everything is work though. While I am not quite mingling with the senior crew, I do get along with most of my fellow “lower deckers”. It is good for body and soul.
I am… a little confused with my Captain. She is very relaxed in her approach to the crew. Whether that is typical Andorian approach to command or is it just her, I still have to discover. She was… kind? Trusting? Chill? Pick an appropriate adjective. She was trusting enough to let me have the conn.
It was during the more or less uneventful warp cruise to Ba’aja system, but still… sitting in the central chair for those hour or two made me wonder - perhaps I shouldn’t focus just on operations, engineering and such.
We all daydream about being ship captains, but at the SFA, those dreams disperse, dilute or, in my case, recrystalize into something different and seemingly permanent. I take much delight in tinkering with all kinds of systems, hardware and software alike, to see what is going on “under the bulkhead”, as Rigelian space traders like to say.
But the central chair, like any seat of power (and responsibility, of course), has its temptations.