Sleeker than most of the shuttles Kirk had ever seen, the class-K craft carried two pair of engine structures. The lower set appeared to house an impulse drive and also to serve as landing gear, while the upper nacelles composed a small warp system. The bow came to a point, and the lines of the hull swept aft in a streamlining effect. The shuttle’s name had been rendered in cursive letters across its nose, while its registry-NCC-1701-B/1-marched in block characters near its aft end.
Toward the bow, Kirk reached up beside the hatch and tapped the hull within the outline of a small rectangle, which slid aside to reveal a control panel. He touched the entry switch and the hatch folded down across the landing gear, down to the deck. Kirk climbed aboard, sealing the shuttle behind him.
At the forward console, he took a seat and activated the internal power of the Archimedes, though not its engines. He accessed the craft’s deflector systems, then worked to tune their frequency. It did not require much time. When he’d finished, he had configured the shuttle’s defenses in such a way that the Enterprise’s sensors would not be able to penetrate them. He also set the shuttle’s own sensors in such a way that their use would avoid detection. Kirk then moved into the rear compartment, which housed a refresher and a two-person transporter. It also provided storage for a number of items, including an emergency survival cache and environmental suits. In addition to powering up the transporter, he also found there the two last things he required: handheld phasers and individual transporter recalls. He took one of the latter, set it, and slipped it into his uniform beside the blue data card.
Having completed his preparations, he left the shuttlecraft and the hangar deck, heading for the transporter room. There, he told the operator, Ensign Odette, that he’d completed his tour of the ship and wanted to beam back down to Starfleet Headquarters. After Odette informed Rousseau, Kirk stepped up onto the platform and waited while she worked her console. The whine of the transporter rose around him, accompanied by the blue-white light of dematerialization.
Kirk reappeared back at Starfleet. He dismounted the platform and exited the building, then left the campus and started toward his old San Francisco apartment. Once he arrived there, he removed his uniform jacket and replaced it in his counterpart’s closet. Then he pulled out the recall device he’d purloined from the Archimedes.
For just a few seconds, Kirk paused, pacing around the apartment in an attempt to make certain that he hadn’t forgotten to do anything. Believing that he’d done all he needed to here, he activated the recall device. Once more, the high-pitched hum of the transporter surrounded him. This time, when the blue-white light released him, he stood in the rear compartment of the Archimedes, in the middle of the hangar deck of the new starship Enterprise.
Kirk deactivated the shuttle’s transporter, but left the deflectors powered in order to mask his life signs, though he doubted anybody would be performing any internal scans of the ship before he’d be gone. He accessed the emergency survival cache, pulled out a ration pack, then took a seat to begin his wait. Later, he would program the shuttle’s sensors, antigravs, and thrusters, as well as the communications panel. Beyond that, though, he would have nothing else to do until tomorrow morning, when he would take action to prevent the development of the converging temporal loop, while at the same time avoiding any disruption to history.
And after that? he asked himself. He had some ideas about that, but at this point, he didn’t know. His own fate, as well at that of hundreds of millions-and possibly even many more than that-might depend on the Guardian of Forever.
That thought did not fill him with confidence.
FIFTEEN
2293
In all his years exploring the galaxy, Jim Kirk had never seen anything quite like it. The massive whipcord of energy twisted through the void like some spaceborne tornado. Jags of lightninglike bolts writhed around it, and dust and debris trailed from it in cloud-gray sheets. Already the strange phenomenon that filled the main viewscreen had claimed two Federation transport vessels, and with them three hundred sixty-eight lives. Scotty had managed to transport forty-seven survivors from the second vessel, the S.S. Lakul, before its hull had collapsed, the ship exploding violently.
Now, the Enterprise-the upgraded Excelsior-class NCC-1701-B-lurched to starboard, then back the other way. Kirk caught himself on the railing, then pulled himself up onto the outer, upper ring of the bridge. Behind him, he heard an explosion, and he looked in time to see a hail of spark’s flying from the navigator’s station. Smoke, shouts, and an alert claxon filled the bridge as the great ship trembled.
Kirk reached for the outer bulkhead and pulled himself forward, toward the sciences station. “Report!” he called as he passed behind the freestanding tactical console. He took hold of the bulkhead again beside the science officer.
“We’re caught in a gravimetric field emanating from the trailing edge of the ribbon,” she called over the chaotic sounds around them.
In the center of the bridge, the ship’s captain, Harriman, cried, “All engines, full reverse!”
The right order, Kirk thought. The shaking of the ship eased as the power of its drive strained against the pull of the energy ribbon. He pushed away from the bulkhead and stepped down to the lower portion of the bridge, over to Harriman. Scotty, he saw, had already taken over at the forward station for the downed navigator.
“The Enterprise’s engines are far more powerful than those of the transport ships,” Harriman told Kirk. “We might be able to pull free.”
It sounded more like wishful thinking than a plan of action, but Kirk knew that it was the proper course to attempt. He’d never before met this new captain of this new Enterprise, but he’d known his father, the redoubtable-and difficult-Admiral “Blackjack” Harriman. This younger man seemed far different from his take-no-prisoners parent. Where the elder Harriman took bold, often rash, action, this younger man seemed more thoughtful, his approach more reasoned and cautious. Kirk understood the value of both approaches, though he knew that a truly successful starship command required a combination of the two.
“We’re making some headway,” Scotty said from the navigator’s station. “I’m reading a fluctuation in the gravimetric field that’s holding us.” Kirk peered up at the main viewer, at the coruscating field of pink and orange light, brilliant white veins of energy pulsing through it. Despite the obvious danger it posed, he found it strikingly beautiful. He walked forward, around Demora Sulu at the helm, to stand in front of the viewscreen.
“You came out of retirement for this,” a voice said quietly at his right shoulder. He looked at Harriman and was surprised to see a hint of a smile lifting one side of his mouth. The statement, the expression, both spoke volumes to Kirk, revealing a confidence in the young captain that he hadn’t seen before now. Of course, Harriman had been hamstrung by some admiral in Starfleet Command eager to generate some positive media coverage. After the recent complicity of several Fleet officers in the conspiracy to disrupt the peace initiative between the Federation and the Klingon Empire-a conspiracy that had effected the assassination of the Klingon chancellor, Gorkon-Kirk couldn’t argue that the image of the space service hadn’t suffered. Still, even if nobody had anticipated the Enterprise having to mount an emergency rescue mission during this public relations jaunt, you didn’t send a starship out of space dock without a tractor beam, without a medical staff; you didn’t send a newly promoted captain out with a bridge filled with members of the media and a “group of living legends,” as Harriman had earlier referred to Kirk, Scotty, and Chekov. The circumstances could have daunted even a seasoned captain.