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Ever wonder what you'd do if the Starship Enterprise suddenly popped into orbit over Earth out of nowhere and you were named by the ship's computer as the Captain? I know that I have many times.
This list is gonna be long. Anything I do with the ship will be geared towards making the world's transition to a MUCH more peaceful/prosperous society at a manageable pace. Too much at once will leave society bewildered and unable to cope with its new abilities and the responsibilities that come with them. Also, I don't expect Humanity to ever achieve that seemingly Utopian society portrayed in Star Trek or solve all of its most pressing problems in my lifetime. This is just to get the ball rolling and give my successors in this mission a good head start.
When writing this, I'm thinking of the Galaxy Class Enterprise NCC-1701-D from Star Trek: The Next Generation. That's the ship that I grew up watching on TV (along with TOS re-runs and the TOS movies), and I'm more familiar with it than any of the others. That being said, most of these ideas could still be done with any of the other ships named Enterprise in the whole Star Trek franchise; Prime Universe, Mirror Universe or Abramsverse.
I.) Initial practical concerns
A.) Figure out how I got there, if the ship is going to blow up/lose power/fall out of orbit sometime soon and make the necessary corrections.
B.) Figure out if it's just this one ship or if there's a fleet/bases/shipyards/support services to go along with it and then if I can control them too.
C.) Ask the computer if it knows what happened to the crew, assuming there was one at some time. (And that there are none aboard when I get there...)
D.) Ask the computer if it knows why I was brought aboard and who's responsible.
E.) Raise the shields and go to Red Alert, just in case someone on Earth panics and decides to launch Nuclear Missiles at me.
F.) If there's a fleet and not just the one ship, start deploying the fleet's assets throughout the Solar System to set up defense perimeters. Just because I'm busy cleaning up a mess on Earth doesn't mean I can ignore the possibility of hostile aliens out there in the universe.
II.) Keeping Earth from panicking and doing something stupid...
A.) Contact various political authorities on Earth (especially the U.S. Government) via radio transmission. Either a text-based message or an audio transmission with a voice filter will be used, to ensure my anonymity. Let them know I'm Human, American, not a threat to them and NOT interested in sharing my technology with them for the foreseeable future.
They will also be told that trying to board the ship/take the technology and hardware by force will have 'unfortunate' consequences. In simpler language, I'd institute General Order 24 from the classic TOS episode 'A Taste of Armageddon' and have the ship start bombing cities. Or, so I'll let them believe. That should keep them from doing anything rash. However, it's unlikely that I would start firing on Earth. Weapons systems in orbit are actually against international law, courtesy of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty.
B.) I'll also explain to them that I will NOT reveal my identity to them for several years, if ever. After all, some of this technology is going to be VERY different from the show, simply due to real world physics. It will take some time to study the technology and become its master. (I won't tell people on Earth that little detail, though. It's best to let them think I'm already quite familiar with using the ship's technology, especially the weapons.) In the mean time, they can just refer to me by my radio handle, Captain Kirk.
C.) It will also be standing Starfleet policy that everyone commanding a ship named Enterprise in this fleet (assuming there is a fleet) will use 'Captain Kirk' as their name over any form of ship-to-ship or ship-to-shore transmission/communication. This allows for the Commanding Officer/Only crewmember to maintain anonymity and walk around on Earth without being mobbed by people. A man deserves to have a private life.
Besides, if there's a ship named Enterprise, there has to be a Captain named James T. Kirk. It's too ingrained into people's minds by popular culture. Picard will never be as popular or as well-known, despite being a very good starship commander.
D.) Establish some kind of online presence for 'Captain Kirk' and the Enterprise via social media. This way, I can communicate with the world and let them know that I'm actually quite Human and personable, despite the fact that I have to keep my true identity a secret. It will also be a great way to keep them informed of all the good things that the Enterprise and/or Starfleet is doing for the world.
III.) Using the technology to make the world a better place and become *quite* rich...
Automotive/Transportation
A.) Use some of the shuttlecraft propulsion technology (or whatever else will do for this particular application) to replace the internal combustion engine in cars.
B.) Copyright the technology, lease said technology to the Automakers of my choice. Laugh at the ones I hate as they slowly go out of business and at the Arab countries that have just lost their huge profits from oil. (Good luck funding Terrorism now, Shitbags...)
Environmental Concerns
A.) The barrier islands and bayous of South Louisiana will be restored by whatever means are necessary/available to me. That region is VERY important to the U.S. (and world) economy and it must be protected from devastating natural disasters at all costs.
B.) Nuclear waste will be beamed into lead-lined containers orbiting the Earth and either vaporized with the ship's energy weapons (I'm not going to assume that they are called Phasers on a real-life version of the ship) or towed to a safe dumping site with no lifeforms, like the Sun, surface of Venus or Jupiter's moon Io. Anyplace where Humans are never likely to go.
C.) Replace current methods of electricity generation with sustainable and safe nuclear fusion reactors. Place them in areas with low populations and where air-tight security can be maintained to ensure Terrorists can't easily attack these important facilities.
D.) Tell those idiots in Washington to use the food they buy through farm subsidies to feed starving people instead of letting it go to waste in grain silos. American farmers grow enough food every year to literally feed the world. Much of it goes to waste because of some bureaucratic government policy that was enacted shortly before and during the Great Depression to artificially inflate farm prices. Not only is it wasteful, it never actually worked in its intended purpose to keep farmers in business. As far as I'm concerned, this practice is inhumane and downright sinful.
Healthcare
A.) Devise a machine that will infuse nanites pre-programmed to locate/destroy certain bacteriological/viral diseases and foreign objects in the body into a patient's bloodstream via IV. AIDS, Cancer tumors, Influenza, Malaria and many other diseases could be treated, cured and/or destroyed this way.
B.) Introduce just enough genetic engineering knowledge/ability to the world to correct serious genetic disorders like Down Syndrome, Classical Autism, blindness, et al. The decision to use this technology on minors will be left to their parents. The technology will also be VERY strictly controlled to make damned sure we don't accidentally create a real-life Khan Noonien Singh. I'm not 100% sure how that will be accomplished but, it must be done.
C.) Prove to Jenny McCarthy once and for all that bad luck and various genetic triggers caused her son to be autistic, not vaccines with a mercury-based preservative.
D.) Tell Washington D.C. that NONE of these medical miracles will become available to the public until Obamacare is rescinded. Washington bureaucrats (especially those ASSHOLES at the IRS) should NEVER have a say in anyone's Healthcare decisions.
IT and related Technological areas of the global economy, including entertainment...
A.) Use some of the ship's computer technology to develop workable/easy-to-use replacements for current (and easily hackable) operating systems like Windows and MacOS. Copyright the software and release to the public via retail for a nominal fee of no more than $50. Laugh as Microsoft and Apple become MUCH smaller companies and are actually forced to compete like everyone else.
B.) Sell my own Desktops/Laptops/Tablets, pre-loaded with the OS and other software at a reasonable price. Laugh as my competitors consistently FAIL to compete with me in any significant way, even though I made the OS x86 compatible and available for licensing like M$ did with DOS & Windows.
C.) Speaking of gaming... I think I'll be buying Nintendo with my new riches and using them to release new consoles that utilize VR tech, possibly even 'Holodecks for the Home' one day. When that happens, the eventual 'Atari Greatest Hits' package that will be released for the system (like every other system since the N64/Saturn/PS1 generation has had) will be a program featuring a 1980's-era arcade with holodeck recreations of the actual arcade machines themselves. :)
D.) While I'm at it, I may as well buy Atari and have them produce some killer apps for the Nintendo consoles. The company that essentially created the Gaming business deserves to be better than what they are now. Same goes for SEGA, especially with the Sonic franchise. I know they can do better by the Blue Hedgehog that once made them a major contender. Sonic Generations proved that to me beyond shadow of a doubt. I love the 3DS version of the game so much that I'm going to order the PS3 version from Amazon sometime very soon.
E.) Release a digital music player like the iPod Touch but with MUCH more memory than anyone could reasonably use. It will also utilize a LOT more formats than just MP3 and AIFF. Good luck competing with that, Apple... (Assuming I didn't buy them out and release my music player under their brand name...)
F.) Purchase CBS & Paramount so that the TV & Film properties of the Star Trek universe are reunited. Then, bring the franchise back to Television once we have a good concept and cast with good chemistry. The mistakes that happened with Voyager and Enterprise will not be allowed to happen again. Since I happen to own CBS as well, I will make sure that the series gets a good slot in PrimeTime during a week night. None of this 'Fridays at 10' Non-sense will be tolerated.
G.) Invest the Trillions I'm sure to make into various charitable projects to improve environmental quality, education and living standards all over the world.
H.) Make sure at least a few Billion of those Dollars are left in a few Swiss Bank accounts that I can access and that Uncle Sam can't tax. That should ensure that I can always pay my bills and provide a comfortable living for my progeny.
IV.) Political Concerns...
This section is going to be a little Machiavellian but, that can't be avoided. Not everyone in the world is friendly and/or rational. After all, Diplomacy is the 'fine art of letting other people have your way'...
A.) Have the United States send two ambassadors of a sort, one civilian and one military, to my ship to personally confer with me on occasion. Their regular visits to the Enterprise will be on a monthly basis and limited to a few hours at most. They will bring written messages from the President to me via diplomatic bag and I will send responses to the POTUS the same way. The ambassadors will probably never know what the messages actually say.
These ambassadors will be people that I handpick myself and will not be forced to take the job if they don't want to participate. I've already got a long list of candidates in mind and know exactly who I'd pick. All of them are people I know personally and that can be trusted to keep my identity secret. It will also NOT be revealed to Uncle Sam that these people actually knew me before I became the 'real-life Captain Kirk.' That could put them in an awkward and/or potentially dangerous position. (Not to mention making them frequent targets of scumbag Paparazzi...)
B.) Help the U.S. and NATO to eradicate terror groups wherever possible via transporting SpecOps units into certain regions of the world and extracting them again later.
This will be done via Shuttlecraft and whatever teleportation technology is available to me. (The Transporters as portrayed in Star Trek won't work for numerous reasons, including the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle.)
C.) Let ALL of the big shots in power all over the world know that I am watching them VERY closely and that misbehaving could be 'rather detrimental to their careers', to say the least.
After all, we want these politickin' crooks/pezzonovante to be afraid of their citizens. That, in theory at least, ensures they'll go out of their way to protect our Liberty and NOT try to grab power for themselves. Party affiliation and whether or not I voted for them won't be a consideration. They will all be treated the same.
D.) I'll strongly advise the Big Shots in Washington to straighten out the U.N. and SOON. That organization has become a Paper Tiger and a HUGE waste of the American people's taxpayer dollars.
E.) I'll have the song 'Angry Chair' by Alice in Chains played over the ship's PA system when I first take the Captain's Chair... And on every radio station in town when I am declared honorary Emperor of New Orleans and take my throne...
\m/O_O\m/
V.) Space Exploration
A.) Provide opportunities for NASA to use a few of my Shuttlecraft for exploration missions inside the Solar System. If there's a fleet and not just the one ship, we might let them use a small science vessel instead. They will be strictly supervised and weapons will be disabled/removed from the vessels.
B.) Send a few probes out into Interstellar Space to replace/relieve the aging Pioneer and Voyager probes that NASA launched decades ago. Those probes will be recovered, have remaining nuclear fuel removed, cleaned up and put on display at the Smithsonian.
C.) Make plans for Interstellar Exploration and Terraforming Mars (if that's even possible) starting when I finally reveal myself to the public, if I decide to reveal myself to them in some way. My real name is liable to remain a secret forever.
If there's a fleet, it will be a fleet heading out into the unknown. If all I have is the Enterprise, then it will be warp-capable shuttlecraft and the Stardrive section. The Saucer will remain at home to act as the enforcer of Starfleet policy on Earth. Even without Warp engines, it's still more than capable of carrying out all of the ship's usual missions concerning Earth. Hopefully, we'll find a few uninhabited/unclaimed Class-M planets to use for colonization and LOTS of natural resources for our civilization's consumption.
D.) Once Mars is Terraformed (or we find another Class-M planet somewhere), start moving some of Earth's overflowing population there. There's bound to be a LOT of volunteers since Mars will offer a fresh start and a chance to explore/build an all-new world. I'm still not sure how they would get there if all I have is the one ship. I'd probably have to work with Earth-bound Space Agencies (NASA, ESA, Intercosmos, et al.) to build colony ships that transport thousands at a time.
Sound good, so far?
- Lord Publius
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