Starfleet

I honestly could not sit through this one and stay serious.

I was attending a Star Trek convention - one of the old fan-run ones that nobody does any more. And all the old cosplay favourites were there, the old Starfleet fans in their Burgundy Bandmaster uniforms. Some old friends I never see any more - and, sadly, some who are no longer with us any more either.

They were gathering in a queue for something through a set of double doors at the end of the hall. It looked like the Holiday Inn in Leicester, where the old Midcons used to take place. I asked some of the guys what was through the doors, and one of them said "The future."

So out of curiosity, I took a peek in through the doors as the fans filed slowly through.

It was a couple of people in Burgundy Bandmaster Star Trek movie uniforms sitting behind desks, handing out forms for these uniformed people to sign. One of them looked like Captain Stiles from Star Trek III. The only lights were shining on the desks and the people behind them; apart from one other feature at the far end of the room, the room was windowless and dark.

The other feature, at the far end, was a raised dais with some circular glass panels on the floor, just wide enough for people to step onto.

I think you're beginning, by now, to get an idea of what was happening.

I woke up, grinning at the thought that all of those old world Starfleet fans are what the real Starfleet eventually grows up into, and that the recruiters were in force getting people to sign on and beam up to their ships in orbit overhead, and when I awoke it was September 8 2013, and Star Trek TOS was 47 and Star Trek TAS was 40.