COMMODORE MATTHEW DECKER (William Windom), in The Doomsday Machine and In Harm's Way, was a senior starship captain, and an old friend and associate of the celebrated Captain James T. Kirk. In Star Date 4202.1 he encountered the entity that would cost him his crew, his reason, and finally (as everyone thought) his life. His death, and the destruction of his last command, is one of the greatest tragedies of the Expansion Era of the United Federation of Planets. Contents [hideshow] 1. Constellation 2. Enterprise 3. 1969-2006 4. Aftermath 5. Alternate Reality ConstellationCommodore Decker was the assigned commanding officer of USS Constellation, NCC-1017. His last mission began alarmingly enough: he encountered one destroyed solar system after another. The stars involved were in good-enough shape. But of the planets, nothing remained but asteroids and rubble. He also encountered very heavy subspace-radio interference, so that he could not inform Star Fleet Command of his findings or his whereabouts.Then he entered System L-374--and saw what was destroying those systems.The first report was bad enough. His Science Officer, an Israeli named Masada, reported that the fourth planet seemed to be breaking up. He ordered Constellation in to investigate and duly noted this in his log. And when he reconnoitered the planet, he could only stare in shock and horror.Before him, on the main viewing screen, floated a monster of a vessel. It was an elongated funnel, at least one Earth statute mile long, with a mouth large enough to swallow every starship in the Fleet at the time. (These were, of course, the MK-IX Constitution class heavy cruisers, not the modern generation-style cruisers of today.) It was emitting a directed-energy beam that was slicing the planet to pieces, using deadly precision cuts. Masada ran an analysis of the beam. His finding: pure anti-proton. Absolutely pure. Just the thing to carve up a planet with.He acted purely on instinct. He attacked.At first the berserker (for that is the name that Star Fleet would later give it) ignored his ship's weapons. Phasers literally bounced off it. But then the berserker, having finished with the fourth planet, attacked the Constellation. The results were devastating. Decker fought with everything he had. Photon torpedoes proved no more useful than the phasers had proved. (He would later learn that the berserker's hull was of solid neutronium, the same material found at the cores of white dwarf stars and consisting of collapsed matter.) The berserker lashed back with its anti-proton beam. The shields failed.And then Decker made the fateful decision that cost four hundred twenty-nine lives. He evacuated the crew of his ship to Planet L-374-III.As captain, he was the last man aboard the ship. Before he could transport down himself, the berserker fired its primary weapon yet again. Result: he had no transporter.And then his crew started begging to be taken back aboard! And on his view screen (in Auxiliary Control, after the bridge was totally hulled and uninhabitable), he saw why. The berserker was feeding on Planet III, just as it had done on Planet IV. Decker could only sit and watch, before that viewscreen died.EnterpriseDecker lapsed into catatonia after that. The next thing he knew, two men were shaking him awake: Captain James T. Kirk of USS Enterprise NCC-1701, and Kirk's CMO, Lieutenant-Commander Leonard E. McCoy. He barely felt McCoy give him a major tranquilizer (neo-chlorpromazine), which let his mind clear enough to recognize Jim Kirk when he was talking to him. Decker could barely bring himself to tell Jim Kirk what he had seen, and what happened to his crew. But he did. Of course he broke down sobbing when he got to the part about his crew calling him and begging him for help he could not give.Jim told Matt to go back to the Enterprise with Dr. McCoy while he, Jim, rigged Constellation for towing. But Jim's Transporter chief had barely finished beaming him over when he heard the stylized Klaxon alarm sounding. McCoy told Matt to follow him into a turbolift, which they rode to the bridge.And there it was d Show less «