Before They Were Captains

[Winterwind]

For some reason, it's always been in my head that it happened planetside as well but I may be mixing whatever references Obsession gave us with one of the Shatnerverse novels.

As for the crew compliment of the Farragut I've always thought she carried the "standard Connie" compliment of 430 and 200 was half the crew. Pike's Enterprise, IIRC, carried around 200 but sometime between his tenure and Kirk's command, the compliment obviously doubled.

 

[T'Girl]

the Farragut I've always thought she carried the "standard Connie" ...

The Farragut was a Constitution Class?



")

 

[Tora Ziyal]

I do believe Picard was a conn officer.

I believe you are correct. Memory Alpha says he started out as the flight controller, aka conn officer, on the Stargazer. Doesn't say where the info comes from, though.

 

[Winterwind]

the Farragut I've always thought she carried the "standard Connie" ...

The Farragut was a Constitution Class?



")

Just another one of those assumptions. Over 40 years, a lot of non-canon bits and pieces pile up and blur together. *shrugs*

 

[Nerys Myk]

Farragut was an understaffed Kelvin-type starship.

 

[Winterwind]

I'm easy. Works for me.

 

[Christopher]

The dialogue in "Obsession" specifically says, twice, that the creature attacked the Farragut -- the ship, not just the crew. So despite what the Shatnerverse novel portrayed, it's probable the incident was in space.

The class of the Farragut wasn't established canonically, but tie-ins and references assumed it was Constitution-class. However, the Farragut was apparently one of the ships in the Vulcan rescue fleet seen in the 2009 movie, so if that was the same ship (which it could've been if it was built before 2233), then it presumably would've been one of the "guest" ship classes seen in that fleet.

But Josan's right -- "Obsession" does say both that half the crew was killed and that 200 people were killed, so it was probably a class similar in size to the (Prime-universe) Constitution class.

I figure Kirk probably went through a variety of stations as part of his command-track training, much as Chekov went from science to navigation to security (and according to a theory from DC Comics' Who's Who in Star Trek, started out in engineering, which is where Khan met him during "Space Seed"). Tactical may have been one of his posts, but I think he occasionally showed some ability to help out in engineering.

I believe you are correct. Memory Alpha says he started out as the flight controller, aka conn officer, on the Stargazer. Doesn't say where the info comes from, though.

Whoever wrote that entry might be misinterpreting a line from "The Battle" where Picard said he remembered "being at the helm of the Stargazer" at Maxia Zeta -- which in that context would have to mean "at the helm" in the sense of "in command."

 

[C.E. Evans]

I believe you are correct. Memory Alpha says he started out as the flight controller, aka conn officer, on the Stargazer. Doesn't say where the info comes from, though.

Whoever wrote that entry might be misinterpreting a line from "The Battle" where Picard said he remembered "being at the helm of the Stargazer" at Maxia Zeta -- which in that context would have to mean "at the helm" in the sense of "in command."

I think the Memory Alpha article was taking into account Picard literally taking over the helm in "Booby Trap" and using a gravity maneuver to sling the Enterprise around an asteroid. A captain who didn't have a background in conn control or lacked "the right stuff*" might not have risked that.

*Apologies to Tom Wolfe

 

[Christopher]

^True, but that only proves he had helm experience, not that it was specifically his post aboard the Stargazer. And the passage on Memory Alpha cites "The Battle" as one of its sources, and it's the only one of those listed that contains any lines that could even be misread to suggest he was that ship's conn officer. (There's also an attribution given for "Bloodlines," although as far as I can tell, none of the information in the preceding sentences comes from that episode.)

 

[C.E. Evans]

Hmm...I thought the listing of "The Battle" and "Bloodlines" by Memory Alpha were just some onscreen references to Picard being in command of the Stargazer.

 

[Timo]

Seems so. The only story to really feature the word "helm" in connection with Picard is "The Battle", in which e.g. Picard describes the execution of the famous maneuver as "what any good helmsman would have done". Still doesn't count as evidence that Picard would have been a helmsman earlier in his career.

The Shatnerverse story Ashes of Eden (both novel and comic) splits the difference regarding the attack against the Farragut. Kirk is down on the planet, but the phasers he controls are up in orbit - he is a forward fire controller who hesitates at a crucial moment in pointing the ship's guns at the cloud. The story involves Kirk reliving the moments of terror in holodeck, in the hopes of doing it right this time - but the holodeck computer decides that even when Kirk orders the bombardment in time, it proves inefficient (just as in the space battle of "Obsession"), and the "angered" cloud leaps up to orbit and supposedly devours all of the explicated 200 crew, including Garrovick.

The story doesn't tell what originally happened, though - only how the simulation turns out when Kirk doesn't hesitate. And as can be seen, the story falsely assumes that the 200 dead would have been the entire crew (minus Kirk and perhaps a handful of others down on the planet). IMHO, it's not a particularly good interpretation of the events, although there's something to be said for the forward fire controller idea.

One thing to consider: why would the cloud stop at only killing half the crew? Its hunger isn't easily sated, it seems. It would seem logical to assume that the other half was safe from the cloud somehow - and difficult to see what could have provided such safety if not the fact that the survivors were in orbit.

That is, we now know the cloud is capable of leaping to orbit, but Kirk only seems to start suspecting this when he learns that the monster from the other side of the galaxy is now lurking on a different planet altogether. Arguably, the cloud might have failed to notice the starship the first time around. We further know that shields and weapons cannot save a starship from the cloud's attack, another reason to suspect the cloud failed to spot the ship.

OTOH, in theory, a hermetically sealed ship might be immune, and the open valve on the Enterprise would have been a rare thing, probably not found on the Farragut.

If being in the ship were the difference between life and death, then Kirk would have to have been manning a console similar to Tomlinson's in "Balance of Terror", rather than standing on a hilltop as in Shatnerverse or like Garrovick Jr did.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[T'Girl]

the cloud is capable of leaping to orbit, but Kirk only seems to start suspecting this when he learns that the monster from the other side of the galaxy is now lurking on a different planet altogether.

Kirk already knew it could reach a Starship in orbit, providing that the Farragut itself was attacked. The surprise was that the creature was capable of star travel.

Kirk would have to have been manning a console similar to Tomlinson's in "Balance of Terror"

Kirk had some kind of direct contact with the creature eleven year before, enough that he knew personally what it smelt like.

")

 

[Timo]

Excellent point. Kirk could have smelled the cloud inside the corridors of the Farragut, though, and not necessarily planetside. But at the very least, this evidence rules out hermetic seals and distance as the reasons for Kirk's survival.

We also have to consider that Kirk orders Spock to scan for the cloud with starship sensors, yet orders a landing party to go hunt for it. If Kirk's original failure to kill the cloud eleven years prior was with starship phasers, it would appear completely insane to send in vulnerable infantrymen with relatively weak sidearms the second time around. Not so if the original confrontation involved sidearms, be it inside a starship or on the surface of a planet.

Also, when justifying himself, Kirk says this:

"what if it is the same creature that attacked eleven years ago from a planet over a thousand light years from here? "

Attacked from a planet... An odd way of phrasing an attack that happened on a planet (and nobody ever says any of the original action took place on a planet, only that it happened in another part of the galaxy). Perhaps more understandable if the cloud pounced the starship from a planet's surface, or from a planet's shadow.

(This doesn't rule out additional surface action, though...)

Timo Saloniemi

 

[tighr]

"what if it is the same creature that attacked eleven years ago from a planet over a thousand light years from here? "

Attacked from a planet... An odd way of phrasing an attack that happened on a planet (and nobody ever says any of the original action took place on a planet, only that it happened in another part of the galaxy). Perhaps more understandable if the cloud pounced the starship from a planet's surface, or from a planet's shadow.

Unless the phrase "from a planet" is in reference to the creatures origin, not its position during the attack. The creature could be FROM the planet, but attacked the ship while in orbit.

 

[Greg Cox]

I think the confusion regarding "Obsession" comes from the fact that they keep comparing the young Kirk's failure to fire promptly with what what happened to Garrovick down on the planet, which leads one to assume it was pretty much the same scenario . . .

 

[Timo]

The thing is, the creature's basic nature is pretty easy to learn - it's a one-trick pony, the trick being the ability to transmute. Yet Kirk only learns this key fact in the second encounter.

Should we take this to indicate that the first encounter was very different from the second one, which explains why different things were learned the first time around? Say, perhaps there was no science officer operating a starship's sensors? Or perhaps no landing party tricorders or Mk I eyeballs and noses to complement the Farragut's sensor readings?

Or should we rather think the encounters were similar, so that information kept on accumulating and finally even Kirk could understand what was going on? Perhaps only repeated pestering with landing party phasers drove the creature to demonstrate its ability to go interstellar, and to attack starships?

In either case, it's very difficult to imagine a first encounter where Kirk would fail to learn that the cloud can shrug off phasers and penetrate starships with ease, regardless of whether we choose that encounter to involve landing parties or starships in the victim role...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Christopher]

"what if it is the same creature that attacked eleven years ago from a planet over a thousand light years from here? "

Attacked from a planet... An odd way of phrasing an attack that happened on a planet (and nobody ever says any of the original action took place on a planet, only that it happened in another part of the galaxy). Perhaps more understandable if the cloud pounced the starship from a planet's surface, or from a planet's shadow.

Unless the phrase "from a planet" is in reference to the creatures origin, not its position during the attack. The creature could be FROM the planet, but attacked the ship while in orbit.

I agree. I think it's meant to be "the same creature that attacked eleven years ago, from a planet over a thousand light years from here." I.e. both "that attacked eleven years ago" and "from a planet..." are modifying the noun "creature," rather that "from a planet" modifying the verb "attacked." Never underestimate the importance of correct comma placement.

 

[Timo]

Alas, that's the best explanation for the phrasing, removing yet another possible piece of evidence one way or the other...

So we're still left with essentially one hard fact - that Kirk could smell the creature; one semantic point - that Kirk thinks the ship herself was attacked, rather than just her crew; and one mystery - that the creature only killed half the Farragut complement, sparing a man who was close enough to smell the beast.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[tighr]

So we're still left with essentially one hard fact - that Kirk could smell the creature; one semantic point - that Kirk thinks the ship herself was attacked, rather than just her crew; and one mystery - that the creature only killed half the Farragut complement, sparing a man who was close enough to smell the beast.

Unless, of course, that Kirk's ability to smell the creature is hyperbole. Just like I can't really smell what The Rock is cookin'.

 

[Christopher]

How is it a mystery? You wouldn't have to be engulfed by the creature in order to smell it. Smells spread through the air, and they linger. And we already know that Ensign Garrovick was close enough to smell the creature and survive the encounter.

By the way, I note that Kirk did say he smelled it "on another planet," further confusing the issue of where the attack occurred. But it could very well be that the incident was similar to what happened in "Obsession" -- the Farragut crew first encountered the creature on Tycho IV's surface, and it subsequently pursued them back to the ship in space, where it badly damaged the ship and killed half its crew.