Adventure

Posted on 11 Jan 2020 @ 6:58pm by Commander Thiago Teixeira & Captain Harvey Geisler

1,841 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Sentience
Timeline: January 4, 2390

Thiago stood in his office, looking out the large window at the interior of the drydock where the Blackthorne was finishing its refit. The Intrepid-class starship had been his home for seven years, from 2378 to 2385. He'd served first as Chief Science Officer and Second Officer, then as Executive Officer. Since then, he'd served as Exec on two other ships, the Alleghany and the Black Hawk. Each of those ships had meant something special to him. Especially the Black Hawk.

Though he hadn't been on Black Hawk for very much of his nearly thirty year career, it was his last ship posting. He'd developed, in his mind at least, a good friendship with Captain Geisler.

He sat on the sofa beneath the windows, picked up a PADD, and began to compose a letter to his friend.

Harvey,

I'm not sure if you've been informed by Starfleet Personnel about my reassignment or not. If you have, I'm sorry that you had to hear it from them first. If this is the first you're hearing of it...well...surprise.

As my visiting professor term at the Academy was winding up, I was getting ready to return to the Black Hawk. I was looking forward to seeing you, the crew, and the ship again. Instead, I sit here on a different ship and not with you on the Black Hawk.

I am currently overseeing the completion of a refit to the Blackthorne, one of the ships I served on previously. Once the refit is finished, the ship will be heading out on some good, old fashioned exploration. Under my command. That's right; they made me the Commanding Officer. After I turned down the Cochrane to continue serving with you, I didn't anticipate finding myself in the situation of being promoted so soon. I didn't have much, if any, say this time. Admiral T'Vanik didn't seem very interested in my opinion on the issue.

I don't leave the Black Hawk willingly; I wasn't looking to leave. I wish I had gotten a chance to say a proper goodbye to everyone, yourself included. Please let the crew know that I enjoyed serving with them.

I've been in Starfleet since I entered the Academy in 2361. In the last twenty-nine years, I've served with some of the best people Starfleet has, under some of the best Commanding Officers. While the Black Hawk wasn't my longest assignment, I will always have fond memories of my time there. Maybe it's because of all of the crazy things we faced together; at times it felt like the universe was against us. Or maybe it was just the caliber of people serving there.

You, Harvey, are no exception. I didn't know anything about you when I first joined your crew, not anything beyond your personnel file at least. Serving with you, I have learned that you are a caring man, a captain who thinks as much about his crew as he does the mission at hand. I have been happy and proud to stand by your side as serve as your Executive Officer. I hope that my service as Commanding Officer on Blackthorne will be a positive reflection of what I've learned from working with you.

I'm not certain if Starfleet has already assigned a new Exec to you, or if you'll get some say in the decision. Admiral T'Vanik did ask for recommendations from me. I offered three names. Commander Tamarra Herai is a Betazoid I served with on the Alleghany. She's a very capable officer who came up through Engineering before making the jump to Command. She's served as Exec on two other ships. The other two names you are familiar with. I have been very impressed with Lieutenant Commander Terry Walsh and the way he has run the squadron. He has an instinct for command and I suspect that he'll eventually get an offer for a Command position someplace soon enough. With a promotion to Lieutenant Commander, Camila Di Pasquale would serve you well as Exec. She has more than demonstrated her dedication to protecting the ship, crew, and you from threats, an important trait in an XO. Commander Walsh and Lieutenant Di Pasquale know the crew very well, which can be a great help coming into a Command position. They also both know and understand you and will support you excellently. I trust that you well find yourself with a good Executive Officer.

Thank you for allowing me the honor of serving with you. Together, we've seen some real shit. We crashed the first Black Hawk together. We've overcome multiple adversaries. And we also managed to come out the other side in one piece. Mostly. If you ever need anything, I'm here for you. Just ask.

The galaxy is a big place, but I'm optimistic that we will run into one another again.

Thank you, again, for your friendship,

Captain Thiago Teixeira

He reviewed what he had written. He nodded as he concluded and then pressed the control to dispatch the letter to its recipient.

* * *

The memorial was more beautiful than Harvey could have expected. He’d been notified prior to entering the Convergence Zone that his former command was going to be removed from its crash site. The Consortium had not been forgotten within the last year, nor had Starfleet’s presence in the Gamma Quadrant halfway recovered from the crisis. Between the initial reveal and the final cell in Starfleet had been found, nearly fifty thousand lives had been lost. Some were Starfleet officers, blindly following Consortium orders simply due to lack of truth, others were Starfleet officers who’d fallen in the line of duty trying to purge the Consortium.

But most… most were civilians that had been caught in the crossfire.

The Akira-Class USS Black Hawk was one of the last starships destroyed during the Crisis, and amazingly, its crashed hull was the most intact of any of the lost vessels. Federation ambassadors were quick to attempt to spin the entire affair, naming the Black Hawk’s crash site as a interstellar monument in remembrance of those who perished in the conflict.

Flanking the fallen vessel on three sides were three long platforms, each covered to protect visitors from the elements. These platforms overlooked the bow, starboard, and port sides of the vessel. The rear, however, was surrounded by a series of polished granite segments, each brandishing names of the fallen.

An hour had passed since Harvey had received Thiago’s letter. Deep down, Harvey wasn’t surprised. Harvey knew firsthand that one couldn’t stay an Exec forever. Sooner or later, Starfleet would want that experience in a center chair, grooming the next generation of Execs for command. Still, the notice was unexpected. With few exceptions, most of the Black Hawk’s crew, including the Senior Staff, stuck with the starship, guiding its repair and refit as if the starship were their own flesh-and-blood kin. Of those who left, Harvey had just assumed they would come back, like they did before.

Thiago… Harvey should have known Thiago would have been different. Even now as he, in civilian attire, stood on the platform overlooking the ship’s bow, his eyes gazed down to several plaques that told the story of the crisis, and of the Black Hawk’s fall. Both Harvey and Thiago’s portraits had been immortalized on the plaque, heralded for their achievement by steering the Black Hawk away from civilization to crash-land without further loss of life.

After an hour of admiring the memorial, Harvey withdrew to a bench in a quiet corner. He pulled a small padd out of his pocket and began to write.

Thiago,

I should say Captain Thiago. Congratulations my friend. News of your first command came right after your letter, and I consider myself fortunate for having heard of the opportunity directly from yourself.

My feelings, naturally, are mixed. On one hand, I am excited for this new adventure of which you are about to embark. There is no experience quite like command, especially as a Captain gets to know the capability and capacity of the officers under his purview. On the other, I find myself disappointed. None of us are strangers to life and the turns it has for ourselves, much less those around us. We all may walk our own paths, but I shall always cherish the time our paths were joined.

The Black Hawk is due to depart dry dock this week at long last, and it will not be the same, not having you by my side. Of the few who have served in that capacity, none were as noble, as caring, or as dedicated as you have been. Your successor, whoever that may be, will have rather large shoes to fill.

You and I have been through hell and back together. As I write this, I am sitting at the memorial on New Bajor. Our first assignment together is starting to rust and sport moss, but I can still see a smile in her bow, knowing that she got to go out doing what she was designed to do, providing a bulwark in Starfleet’s offensive line. Space may be the final frontier, but none of that matters more than the uniform. We are in the business of exploration and enriching life as we know it, even if that means making sacrifices in order to save souls.

That is likely the heaviest burden of command, making those difficult choices when you know that someone has to die. I pray that you will find your Thiago who can stand by your side, just as you did for me, to help you with those tough choices.

My advice for you, Captain Thiago Teixeira, is to don’t let the chair confine and consume you. Command is fun, but life doesn’t stop with four pips. Be sure to live, seize opportunity, and don’t ever walk alone.

The honor to serve with you was mine, and I do hope our paths will cross again in the future. Ships named Black need to stick together, or so my twisting of the axiom goes. When we do see each other again, the first round will be on me.

Fair winds, my friend, and following seas.

Harvey.


= = = = = =

A wide smile broke out on his face as Thiago read Harvey's letter. He looked out the window, as he had before drafting his dispatch to his now-former CO. The workbees were floating around the dock, moving sections of hull plating from storage to their new homes on the surface of various ships in the yard. A pod ferrying an engineering team to or from some work site drifted by.

"I will miss you, friend," he whispered. Picking up his mug of darjeeling, he lifted it like a toast. "To adventure, Harvey."

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