//------------------------------// // A Cup of Water From the Oceans // Story: Where No Pony Has Gone Before: Supplemental Logs. // by FoalsHalf //------------------------------// A Cup of Water from the Oceans Starbase Independence- Year 2372 "You know, Captain, Temporal Investigations would flip if they knew what you were about to pull. I've had a look at their file on you: Seventeen separate temporal violations..." Admiral Garrett smirked. Kirk chuckled. "Only seventeen? I guess someone wasn't paying attention." "Well, we both know how potentially dangerous this mission is." "But necessary," Kirk replied. "Starship crew don't grow on trees. As for Temporal Investigations, as Spock once said: A difference which makes no difference is no difference." "Speaking of the Ambassador, how is he?" "He's fine. He and Captain Spock have been training together. They tell me they are certain they can close the loop on their end. Hopefully, Captain Satak will be open-minded." "Hopefully," Garrett agreed. "And Captain Scott? has he finished installing the cloaking device that Kang sent us?" "He wasn't exactly thrilled with it but he's got it running." "I'm not thrilled either. I sacked Eric Pressman for violating the Treaty of Algeron and here I am, with all the best intentions. violating that same treaty." "Well, when we get back, we'll ship it back to Kang and you can drink a bottle of Romulan Ale in penance," Kirk replied. "But Scotty's complaints are more about the cross-patching he had to do to get the thing hooked up, to begin with." "Ah! Well, as long as it works then, I can live with it." She answered. "Have you decided your targets? We can't exactly justify snatching Judge Crater, after all." Kirk nodded. There had to be limits on the stunt they were planning and one of those limits was that the targets of interest at least had to have potentially useful skills to justify possibly shedding his engines on. That placed the extreme limit at the mid-22nd century. Kirk and his officers decided that the year 2161 was a practical limit to their exercise. "We came down to five possibilities. The earliest and easiest would be the USS Essex NCC-173. We know where she went down and when her last contact with Starfleet was made. We can head her off and evacuate the crew. There's no way a Daedelus class could survive Warp Breakaway. We'll have to scuttle the ship." Garrett nodded. "And the others?" "I gave serious thought to the USS Defiant, NCC-1764. We had very strong arguments for intercepting the ship before she reached Tholian interspace. We could save the ship and her crew. The Defiant was practically a new ship, fresh out of spacedock and she could definitely survive Warp Breakaway. Morally... Knowing now where the ship went, we could yank the teeth on a dangerous reflection of our own selves. Prevent centuries of slaughter and oppression." "But..." "But that would directly affect my own timeline. There is a small but definite chance that would affect my judgment on the Sunset Files with my experiences no longer including that particular set of memories." "And potentially undoing all the good we've done." "Yes. I don't like it. But we can't save the Defiant." "And the others?" "Possibly..." *** 2267 "Captain's Log: We are fast approaching planet Omega IV. Given the time index on the logs recovered from the Exeter, we should arrive soon after Captain Tracey's beam down. As soon as his landing party beams back, we will begin jamming subspace frequencies. I will then attempt to make contact with the Exeter's crew while there is still time." Captain Kirk switched off the log and turned to Spock. "Preliminary scans?" "The Exeter is currently in orbit. Life signs indicate that the crew is quite alive, Captain." Kirk stood up from his command seat and went over to the science station. "Very... good, Spock." He turned to Communications. "Commander M'Ress, begin tapping the Exeter's com system." "Aye, Captain." Her arms stretched over her console almost reflexively. After a moment, she almost seemed to grin predatorily as the Exeter's MC1 circuit chattered through the air. After a few minutes of routine intraship chatter, they finally picked up the signals they had been waiting for: "Landing party to Exeter, Commander Nash here. Prepare to beam us up. Captain Tracey will be staying ground side for a bit but we've found the source of the signal. Looks to be an old Earth survey drone. Check the database for anything on the ECS Philidelphia." "Acknowledged, Commander. Beam back at the original coordinates then sir?" "Affirmative, lieutenant." "Exeter standing by." "Five to beam up! Energize!" Spock turned to his station. "They're beaming aboard now, Captain." "Commander M'Ress, begin jamming communicator frequencies." "Beginning jamming," M'Ress answered. "I'm sending an ionic pulse into the atmosphere. That should scramble dirtside communication for a while." "Good. Hopefully long enough to convince those people over there what just happened... Hopefully, their own words just might convince them..." *** "I just can't believe it..." Commander Nash shook his head sadly as he read the report. "I never would have believed the Captain would go that far." "Not your fault, Commander," Doctor Carter told him as they sat in Enterprise's main briefing room some several hours after Captain Kirk's hail. "You've been aboard six months. I've worked with the man for years and I wouldn't have predicted it." He turned to Kirk. "I guess we never know what we're truly capable of until we're pushed to the limit." "Well, speaking for myself and the rest of the crew of the Enterprise... We wouldn't have survived without your courage, doctor." "So what happens next, Captain?" Nash asked. "Starfleet needs good officers, Commander... Even in the 24th century. We have some stops to make first but eventually, we'll be in the year 2372. You'll be asked to renew your commissions and if you do, you'll be trained on new equipment and then reassignment to a new ship." "So... Captain, that Emergency Medical Hologram," Doctor Carter noted. "Is that standard?" "I know what you're thinking, Doctor. For a program, he has his moments. But rest assured that we need flesh and blood physicians as much as holographic ones." "Good to know, Captain." In the meantime, copies of the Exeter's logs from the mission that so nearly had been, were now being entered into Exeter's computer, and Spock had gone aboard with a copy of Doctor Carter's log, ensuring that the Surgeon's log would be found when the Enterprise boarding party arrived in six months time. The bigger task had been to lay out the empty uniforms and piles of chemicals to complete the scene. An unsettling task to be sure, but one that needed to be done correctly... In the briefing room, a chime sounded. "Bridge to Captain Kirk, Lieutenant Stadi here. We're now entering system L-374..."