Look, they had to give Ensign Perez
something to do.
Headcanoned.
Oh, Gene.



Brilliant, sir.
I'm sure that Decker had a mix of people. Sulu, Chekov, Uhura, Chapel, and Scotty all staying on the
Enterprise doesn't stretch credulity too much, IMO. After all, that's only four people out of a crew of 400+. And Chapel and Chekov had moved up to new positions. But yeah, maybe a couple of them signed on at a moment's notice.
^^ It sounds like this was possibly an homage to
Traitor Winds by L.A. Graf
, where Sulu was working as a Starfleet test pilot in White Sands, New Mexico during the time before TMP. Is that the case,
@Christopher?
In the
1977 rough draft of "In Thy Image" by Harold Livingston, Admiral Nogura basically browbeats Kirk into realizing that he's the best qualified Captain for the job:
I've always thought that that scene worked pretty well, but I guess they decided that the story worked better if Kirk was the motivator of him taking over the
Enterprise.