| “ | A lucky shot, sir! | „ |
| ~ The Klingon Gunner, trying to get out of trouble with Kruge. |
The Klingon Gunner was a minor antagonist in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock. The Gunner's actual name is unknown, he was credited in the film as Klingon Gunner #1, and played by the late Bob Cummings.
In the Earth year 2285 the Gunner served on an Imperial bird-of-prey commanded by Commander Kruge. He manned the ship's weapons console. The Gunner followed Kruge's orders to destroy the freighter Valkris was on when Kruge realized that Valkris had seen the Genesis Project data. Ordered to completely vaporize the ship, the Gunner kept firing until the ship was completely vaporized. However, despite all that a couple of the crew did survive to warn the Federation Starfleet of what happened.
After the freighter was destroyed Kruge ordered a course for the Klingon/Federation neutral zone. Before leaving the bridge Kruge ordered the Gunner to feed his alien monster dog, a task the Gunner was not exactly thrilled about.
When Kruge's bird-of-prey arrived at the Genesis Planet, they found the Starfleet vessel USS Grissom in orbit. Wanting to obtain prisoners for more information and to use as hostages, Kruge ordered the Gunner to target the engines only in order to disable the Grissom. The gunner fired a torpedo at the Grissom, but instead of disabling her the torpedo impact caused a massive explosion that destroyed the Grissom.
Kruge then yelled at the gunner that he had wanted prisoners. The Gunner attempted to explain that it had been a lucky shot but Kruge was having none of his excuses. Pulling out his disruptor pistol, Kruge vaporized the man on the spot, then called the dead man a Ha'DIbaH (animal).
A different member of Kruge's crew then manned the weapons console. Remembering what happened to the Gunner, this new gunner was much more careful when firing to disable the USS Enterprise.