“The First Duty” is episode nineteen of season five of Star Trek: The Next Generation.
The Enterprise is heading to Earth where Captain Picard is going to give the commencement address at Starfleet Academy, and Wesley’s flight team is going to do a demonstration near Saturn. Worf tells the captain that the Academy wants an updated time of arrival. According to Data, about 10 hours. The captain and Riker are talking about the current Commandant, Admiral Brand, and reminiscing about their time at the Academy when Worf states that Admiral Brand is hailing them. She wishes to speak to the captain privately. In his ready room, the admiral tells the captain there’s been an accident with Wesley’s flight team.
The captain is telling Dr Crusher that Wesley is going to be fine. She is fretting; he reassures her. Apparently, the flight team, Nova Squadron, was practicing near Saturn in close formation when there was a collision. All five ships were destroyed; four of the cadets transported away safely but the fifth, Joshua Albert, did not. The doctor is still fretting and the captain reassures her again.
At the Academy, Admiral Brand briefs the families of the cadets. One flight recorder was recovered, but badly damaged. Standard procedure is to have an investigation with two command level officers; her and Captain Satelk. There will be a memorial service for Cadet Albert and she and his father, Commander Albert, have discussed the matter and decided to go ahead with the graduation ceremonies as planned. Even after a tragedy, there are still duties to perform and life continues. Afterwards, the captain offers the Enterprise‘s services.
Captain Picard and Dr Crusher arrive at Wesley’s quarters. He doesn’t want to talk about the accident; that seems to be all he’s done for the past two days. Another cadet arrives, Nicholas Locarno (played by Robert Duncan McNeill, who would later play Tom Paris in Voyager), the commander of Nova Squadron. Wesley shows his mother and the captain out; he and Locarno have things to discuss. After they’ve gone, Locarno says everything will be alright if they stick together. Not reassuring.
The captain finds Boothby and introduces himself; Boothby asks what happened to the captain’s hair. They reminisce about something Boothby helped the captain with as a cadet. At the time, Picard thought Boothby was a mean-spirited old man. Boothby says he was. And about the same age that the captain is now. It helped the captain greatly. Picard also asks about Nova Squadron. Boothby knows them. He doesn’t seem that impressed.
Locarno is giving a pep talk to Wesley and the other two cadets, Sito Jaxa and Jean Hajar, before they head in for the investigation. Locarno gives his evidence, then the other cadets are quizzed. One says she was just using sensor readings to navigate; the captain explains to the doctor why this is unusual, given how close the cadets where to each other. Locarno ends up intervening and says that there were problems with Joshua Albert. When asked if he is suggesting the accident was Joshua’s fault, he basically says he is. Brand does not seem happy.
The Enterprise also investigates the crash, as things are not adding up between what was detected and what was said to have happened. It’s pretty clear that the cadets are not telling the whole truth; Wesley, at least, is disturbed by this. But most of the evidence was destroyed when the ships were. The question is what really happened, and whether any of the cadets will admit to it.