Star Trek: Eleventh Fleet

Chapter 4: Old Friends

"Captains Log, Stardate 82419.5. It has been a week since we began the first steps of setting up Project Phoenix and we are already finding plenty of ships viable for the upgrades. Starfleet is pleased with the initial data. They have given us allowance to select ships from any Star Fleet operated junkyard. I have Chief Bigos running through the logs for potential vessels.

"Work has officially begun on the Stargazer, the Oklahoma, and the Vladivostok, which will have to be renamed in due time. We have over four hundred and seventy engineers working on this project. The vast majority of them are non-com cadets finishing their certification in engineering. This gives me the feeling of being at a school rather than a shipyard. I enjoy the energy, but I'm reminded daily that I'm not as young as I used to be; I see in many of these eager kids the attitude I first had when I joined Starfleet. One thing is for certain, they are doing a damn fine job, as they want to impress their superiors for better grades, which will mean a good placement after graduation. I just pray this project helps tip the scales in what is going to be a bloody war, otherwise all these kids will never get the chance they deserve."

Captain Henderson walked down a starship corridor with an engineer's tricorder in one hand and a padd in the other. Beside him walked a cadet with a small stack of padds in her hands. The ship they were on showed signs of aging, with interfaces that were twenty years out of date, ragged carpet, and flickering lights. Where the ship's lights were completely offline, they placed lightstands here and there to provide extra light.

Kal paused at a door and ran the tricorder up and down it. "Okay, in here." He handed her the padd and pulled a small device out of his pocket. Attaching it to the door, it gave it a small charge of energy and it opened halfway. He used his hands to shove it the rest of the way.

They walked into an old laboratory with all kinds of star chart equipment lying around. In the center of the room, there was a table with a half globe on it that could project any sector of chartered space for study. "Astrometrics," He announced.

"Sir, what do you need in here?" The cadet frantically shuffled through the padds, dropping two on the ground.

Kal snickered at her and helped pick up the dropped padds, "For you to be less nervous, I know this is your first day and I'm the commanding officer of this entire operation, but I'm just an engineer out here. Set the padds down and get what you need. I don't need you to carry them all and then take notes at the same time."

"Yes, sir." She didn't appear less nervous, but set down her stack and pulled out the one she needed. She typed onto it, while speaking, "astro—metrics. Okay, what do you want with this room?"

Kal scanned around the exterior. "Rip it out. This ship will be another battleship. This space will be perfect for installing the secondary targeting sensor system. Send all the non-usable parts from this lab back to the scrapper station to be reprocessed into materials."

She finished typing, "Ma-ter-ials. Got it." She sent the message on to the primary computer station keeping track of this.

Kal stepped out of the room and scanned up and down the corridor. "All right, cadet. I think that's enough. We can clear the USS Alabama for use. It won't take much to refit her."

The cadet came out with her arms loaded in padds again, "Sir, I have one question."

"What is that?"

"There is currently a USS Alabama in service. My father served on her last year before transferring to the academy to teach. It's still in service. What will happen if we have two ships with the same name?"

"Well, Starfleet has a policy about not having two ships with the same name. So we'll have to give her a new name."

The cadet cocked her head at him. "We'll give the ship a name? I thought naming starships was an important matter?"