Xavier boldly goes . .

As I rolled onto the bridge of the USS Enterprise, I couldn't help but be underwhelmed at what I saw. I have been on the Enterprise several times in the past, for Captain Picard's excellent Christmas parties. That ship has rather impressive arrays of advance looking computer systems and command stations. This Enterprise, on the other hand, looked like a cheap late 60s plywood set held together with gaffer's tape and luck.

An Asian man in a plain, ill fitting red shirt and black pants ensemble came up to me and offered to assist me in getting into the Captain's chair. "That's alright," I told him, "I brought my own."

"Er, yeah, but this is that Captain's chair," he insisted. "You're the Captain so you have to sit there."

With a sigh, I flipped open the control panel of my combat-mode hover chair and was shortly hacked into the main computer system controlling this holographic simulation. I accessed the bridge personel protocols and had the man in the red shirt deleted. With a shimmer of light, he was gone. Then I had the Captain's chair removed.

"Captain," a rather shaply African American woman in a skimpy red dress to my right called out. "We are getting a distress signal from the Kobayasi Maru!"

"What's that?" I asked, a little distracted by the amount of leg she was showing.

"The ship is a Class III neutronic fuel transport. Her captain, Kojiro Vance, says the ship has struck a gravitic mine and is rapidly loosing power to life suport. There are over 350 people onboard, Captain! He is requesting emergency assistence."

"Fine," I said. "Get on with it."

"Captain," another odd looking man in a blue shirt said. He had pale greenish skin and pointy ears. Also the worst bowl haircut I've ever seen. "I must point out that the location of Maru is deep within the Neutral Zone."

"Well if it's a neutral zone, then it shouldn't be a problem, right?" I responded. "By definitition, it's neutral terriotory."

The man with the pointy ears looked a little perplexed. "No, Captain. Starfleet's treaty with the Klingons specifically prohibit any Federation ship from entering the zone. To do so would be an act of war."

"War? Well . . okay then. Let's go find a nice bar somewhere. I've always been curious about those green girls."

"Damnit, Charley!" a scrawny man to my left called out in a ridiculous country accent. "We can't just let all those people die!"

"To violate the treaty would mean war with the Klingons," Pointy Ears said. "Millions would die."
The scrawny hick started to turn bright red. "You would just leave all those innocent people to die out there?!" he yelled at Pointy Ears.

"Is it not logical to let 381 people die, rather than cost the lives of millions in a protracted war?"

"Why you green blooded, inhuman . . !"

I quickly accessed my chair's controls and had both of them deleted. Turning to the helmsman, I said, "Take us to the Maru. Make it so."

I had heard Captain Picard use that line once. It felt right.

"Captain!" the black lady cried. "I've lost contact with the Maru!"

"Captain!" the man in the yellow shirt in front me shouted. "Three Klingon battlecruisers have materialized! They are rapidly closing on our position!"

"Captain!" the girl in the red micro skirt yelled. This was getting annoying. "The Klingons aren't responding to hails!"

"Captain!" the man in front whispered. Okay, it was really a shout. "They're charging their weapons!"

Acting quickly, I used my chair's link with the simulator's control computer to delete the three Klingon ships. "Alright, start beaming over the crew and passangers on the Maru," I told my crew. "And let's get a tractor beam on that ship. We'll tow it back safety."

The crew looked around a little startled, as if they had never made it this far in the simulation before. Then they sprang into action. I fiddled with my chair controls again and a rather large glass of cognac materialized in my hand.