Edward Fields

Edward Fields was a 23rd century Human individual who served as a Starfleet officer until his death in 2286.

In the 2280s, Fields was the captain of the Federation starship USS Cluster, assigned as a training vessel with a handful of senior staff leading a crew entirely composed of cadets and trainees. Fields considered his vessel one of the more decorated vessels in Starfleet.

In 2286, Fields and his command crew beamed down to a class M planet in sector 9, investigating evidence of alien encroachment. Fields's landing party found colony with a Romulan population, which was being defended by the CHR Harrier. Romulan military personnel attacked Fields and party, killing all of them with disruptor fire. Romulan Commander Lazar used a disruptor pistol to kill Fields, execution style, in the final shot of the masssacre.

Fields's final act was to use his communicator to order the Cluster's cadet commanding officer, Commander Ronald Penn, to raise deflector shields and bring the vessel back to a Federation base, out of range of Lazar's cruiser, the CHR Harrier. As acting captain], Penn chose to disobey Fields's order, and kept the shields down in order to beam Fields up before the Romulans could fire the final shot. Penn's order was seconds too late, and only part of Field's disruptor-shot remains were brought aboard. Captain [[James T. Kirk later chastised Penn for not following Fields's simple last orders, a decision that Penn made that cost the lives of many of the cadet crew.