It was absolutely unheard of - borderline preposterous.
No other starship captain had ever been offered Admiralty in the middle of a maiden voyage, and no starship captain had EVER been offered Admiralty so young.
Of course, James T Kirk was not an average starship captain.
Which also accounts for his odd response to the promotion:
No thank you.
Well, the response was odd for anyone who hadn't been on board the USS Enterprise for three and a half years - to the crew of the now-so-famous vessel, Kirk's response was entirely expected. To the Federation Board of Space Exploration, the young captain's response was also somewhat expected - dreaded, more like.
But to an innocent observer, Kirk's declination of the wondrous promotion was, well...preposterous.
In all honesty, the board didn't want Kirk to be an Admiral much more than they wanted him as a Captain.
"Jim, you are the most dangerous officer in starfleet," Spock had commented on the matter, "you continually twist commands, defy orders, and generally operate under your own judgement."
The captain in question had only laughed.
The perceptive first officer was right, of course - he usually was.
Starfleet had finally in desperation offered Kirk an offer that he couldn't turn down - triple the pay, respect, and three ships he would operate from a base of his choosing.
The best part about the arrangement was that with Kirk as an admiral, he'd be forced to relinquish his command of the Enterprise for a desk.
No more broken treaties.
No more offended alien races.
No more wild scrapes with the enemies of the Federation.
No more Captain Kirk.
"No, thank you," he said, as politely as if he'd been declining a cup of tea. And then he'd walked out amid his crew's joyous celebrations.
That left the Board one option.
Removal from command wouldn't be difficult - Kirk had violated every regulation in the book at least twice:.
In his defense, Kirk had little to say but: "I did what I thought was right."
The testimonies of his officers were similar, many intermittent with tears or curse words - often both.
In a particularly memorable one: "Dammit! Jim is the best starfleet captain the federation has ever had! You - sons of - from - good- -. I oughta - your - until your - are - and -! - you all!"
In the end it did no use - Kirk was relieved of command and the Enterprise was left without a Captain. The board could now sleep in peace knowing that the best ship in the fleet would be manned by...anyone else.
But it was not to be.
The following day, Starfleet headquarters was flooded with hundreds of official resignations. The exact count was somewhere around 472.
The loss of one talented man was acceptable - but the decommissioning of the entire crew of the Enterprise was, well...preposterous.
The Board was forced to endure the next two and a half years - with hopes for lava, alien disease, or falling rocks to do the job they couldn't.
Captain Kirk had won again.
