Part 5 (2/2)

Suddenly, the chronometric radiation intensified a hundredfold, setting off a klaxon-like alarm on the bridge, and Picard felt the universe-his memory of the universe-begin to s.h.i.+ft like windblown desert sand.

With his last rational thought, he barked out the order that sent the Enterprise plunging into the Arhennius corona only seconds behind Scott and the Klingon s.h.i.+p. But even as the Enterprise shuddered under the strain, new images began to appear on the viewscreen, images beyond the corona they were shooting through at impossible speeds.

Images of a solid phalanx of Borg cubes.

Then that universe winked out and there was only the terrible shuddering of the Enterprise as the conflicting forces of the straining warp drive and the intense gravity field of Arhennius battered at each other and at the s.h.i.+p caught in the t.i.tanic crossfire. Finally, after microseconds that seemed to stretch into minutes, as if the Enterprise and its crew were relativistic particles descending the last few millimeters before plunging through a black hole's event horizon, the fabric of s.p.a.ce-time was ruptured for the second time in less than a minute, and the Enterprise was sent hurtling through time.

Eight.

FOR PICARD, the shuddering and kaleidoscopic roller-coaster ride seemed to go on forever, threatening to tear the Enterprise apart and scatter its fragments across centuries of time.

But all he could see in his mind's eye were the Borg cubes that had appeared-had seemed to appear, he told himself again and again-in the universe he had just been catapulted out of. Even though Scott had launched himself into the past only seconds before the Enterprise had followed, something Scott had done at the far end of his arc into the past had already disrupted the timestream, bringing the Borg-Suddenly, the bone-jarring, eye-searing ride was over.

Like a plane emerging from the fury of a hurricane into the silent stillness of the storm's eye, the Enterprise reentered the s.p.a.ce-time continuum. Behind them, Arhennius was a rapidly shrinking ball of nuclear fire. Ahead was only a familiar and unremarkable star field.

”All stop,” Picard snapped. The image on the viewscreen s.h.i.+mmered briefly as the Enterprise dropped out of warp.

”Where- ” Picard began but broke off. ”When are we, Mr. Data?”

”The computer's preliminary survey of the coordinates of nearby stars indicates we are in the latter half of the twenty-third century.”

”And Captain Scott's s.h.i.+p?”

”Sensors indicate no s.h.i.+ps within the Arhennius system, Captain.”

Picard winced inwardly at the words, even though they were far from unexpected. If anything, they confirmed what he-what they all had been thinking as the Enterprise dove into the Arhennius corona: Slingshotting through time on the fly is not an exact science. Under these conditions, there was simply no way of determining the precise trajectory either Captain Scott or the Enterprise took. There was therefore no way of knowing precisely when either vessel had reentered normal s.p.a.ce-time with respect to the other.

”Can you at least estimate how far apart our arrival times might be, Mr. Data?”

”Not with any certainty, Captain,” Data said as he consulted his instruments again. ”Ensign Raeger appears to have come as close to duplicating Captain Scott's trajectory as is humanly possible. There was no way, however, to compensate for the Enterprise's greater ma.s.s. I can only say that it is unlikely that our arrival was more than a few months before or after Captain Scott's.”

”So he may not have arrived yet?”

”That is correct, Captain.”

A flicker of hope brushed at his mind. ”Check for warp trails, Mr. Data. If he is already here, he certainly would have left a warp trail, no matter where he went.”

”He would.” Data scanned a new set of readouts. ”However, the only warp trail within the Arhennius system is that of the Enterprise itself.”

Picard felt relief wash over him. ”So he hasn't arrived yet. Perhaps we can lie low and wait for him, then stop him from doing whatever he was planning to do. And hope that no one from this era notices us.”

He was silent a moment, looking at the deceptively familiar star field on the viewscreen. ”Mr. Worf, maintain complete radio silence, but scan the subs.p.a.ce spectrum for any time-coded traffic.”

”I have been scanning since we first arrived,” the Klingon said, ”but I have found no subs.p.a.ce traffic.”

”Subs.p.a.ce frequencies in use in the twenty-third century- ”

”I have already compensated for all known differences, Captain,” Worf said, a touch of reproach in his I-know-my-job tone. ”There is no subs.p.a.ce traffic on any of the frequencies used by members of the Federation or by either Klingons or Romulans during the second half of the twenty-third century.”

The relief Picard had experienced moments before turned to a chill, his eyes drawn again to the viewscreen. ”Mr. Data, how reliable is the computer's estimate of the current time? Could it be off by centuries rather than decades? Could we have gone back to a time before subs.p.a.ce radio was used in this quadrant?”

”It is highly unlikely, Captain, but I will know for certain in a moment,” Data said, consulting a new set of readings that had just appeared on his control panel. ”The computer has just completed a luminosity scan of the fifty nearest variable stars, including Sol, and is comparing these values with the values that Starfleet and other organizations have recorded continuously since before the founding of the Federation. That will narrow it down to a period of a few months, and then- ”

Data broke off as another set of readings appeared. ”In terms of Old Earth chronology,” he continued after a moment's study, ”the year is 2293. Now that we know the year, the computer can scan remote galaxies for known supernovas whose light would have reached the Arhennius system during that year. Because of their distance and faintness, this will require more time, but...”

Data continued to explain, but Picard was no longer listening. Hearing the year-2293- had been enough.

It was not the year Captain Scott had signed onto the Jenolen.

It was a year earlier, the year the Enterprise-B had been launched.

The year that James T. Kirk, Scott's captain and friend, had died saving that other Enterprise.

For a moment Picard resisted the inevitable conclusion, but as his mind darted back to the conversations he had had with Scott in the days after his rescue from the Jenolen, all doubt vanished. The man's nostalgia for the first Enterprise had been huge, but his loyalty to its captain had been monumental.

Monumental and, no matter how n.o.ble, ultimately and obviously misguided.

There was no question in Picard's mind as to where and when Scott had intended to go.

And what he had intended to do.

But that knowledge, Picard told himself grimly, did nothing to resolve the one question that really mattered: Where and when had Scott actually gone?

And what had he done that could have changed history so drastically that the Federation no longer existed-or at least was not using subs.p.a.ce radio-in 2293 and had been replaced by the Borg by 2370?

Scotty cursed silently as he listened once again to the time-coded subs.p.a.ce messages he had finally been able to tap into with the G.o.ddard's comm system. Instead of several weeks, he had only days before the destruction of the Lakul and the near destruction of the Enterprise-B!

In his rush to slip away from Picard's Enterprise and then to keep from being overtaken by it, he must have miscalculated his trajectory. Or the actual ma.s.s of Arhennius or of the Bounty 2 itself was a minuscule fraction different from the values he had entered. Or any of a hundred other possibilities. Even the formulae themselves, as recorded in Spock's log months of subjective time after the event itself, might have contained minute errors. Spock was, after all, half human.

He would probably never know which number or calculation had tripped him up, and in fact it didn't matter. It was done. He was where he was, when he was, and there was still a chance he could pull it off.

If the Bounty 2 held up.

Against all odds, it had already survived the warp eight race to Arhennius and the bone-jarring, hull-plate-rattling pa.s.sage through time, so there was no reason-other than a wee dose of common sense-to think that it would not survive the next five days. He could-and almost certainly would-spend his every waking hour monitoring the drive, nursing it along, adjusting each and every variable before any had a chance to drift even a micron off their optimum values.

And at least Picard had not followed him-or hadn't been able to. Either way, Scotty was grateful for small favors. He would need all he could get, not to mention some large ones as well.

Entering the coordinates at which, in little more than five days, the Lakul and the Robert Fox would be-had been?- destroyed, he murmured a prayer to whatever G.o.ds of the Highlands watched over errant engineers and engaged the warp drive.

As Picard had expected, Data's supernova survey revealed they were within two weeks-before or after-of the moment Kirk had died saving the Enterprise-B.

Briefly, he told Guinan and the bridge crew what he was virtually certain Scott had been attempting to do. Only Riker looked doubtful.

”Could he be that irresponsible? The man was a Starfleet officer for nearly half a century.”

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