The bridge of the USS Enterprise was a mess. PADDs on the ground, panels, bit of bulkhead and random crew members had been thrown from one end of the room to the other. Bumps and bruises covered every last being unfortunate enough to have not been holding onto something when the Enterprise had suddenly been thrown into turmoil. Mr. Spock was the first to awaken, partially draped over the railing near his station, a green tinted bruise forming on the left side of his face and burns on his right hand from where the science station had short-circuited. He looked around the bridge, the rest of the Alpha shift crew had begun twitching into consciousness. They appeared to be alive at least, he finished pulling himself up from the floor to analyze the smoldering remains of his scanner. As he worked the rest of the crew members also began dragging themselves up from their own resting places on the floor, joined by grunts and groans of pain.
The damage to the scanning computer was rather minimal. Spock would not be able to scan the chemical compositions of anything around the ship until later, but he could get the scan history and attempt to find out what happened to them. His Captain made his presence known.
"Spock, what happened to us?" He ground out and he heaved himself up with one arm, the other apparently dislocated.
"Unknown Captain, too much use of the science computer could lead to another short-circuit." Spock replied.
"Keep me upraised, Chekov, sensors operative?"
"Yes Keptin, location…Earth."
"Excellent, Uhura, open a channel to Starfleet advise them we need assistance."
"Yes, Sir. Damage reports coming in. No casualties thus far."
"Some good news at least. Spock, any updates?"
"Whatever it was is reading as a subspace anomaly, however, the readings are slightly too far off for it to have been simply that."
Kirk was about to comment on that when Uhura cut in again.
"Captain, I'm not getting any readings on Starfleet. Or any ship on any channel. Everything is fully functional. Yet all I'm getting is static."
Great, just great. The Captain thought.
Several hours past after the incident and they had finally gotten the turbolifts up and running enough to get all the senior staff to a briefing room. The room was still somewhat dim thanks to various malfunctions all over the ship. It seemed that not a single system had been left undamaged by their ride through the cosmos. Kirk sighed, whatever happened he knew it could potentially take weeks to fix. Weeks out in space, near an Earth they couldn't contact, Starfleet AWOL, warp drive out. Kirk rubbed his temples. At least the situation couldn't get much worse.
"Alright ladies and gentlemen. Lets try and sort this mess. Reports, doctor you first, how's the crew?"
"No casualties, bumps, bruises, and a few broken extremities at its worst, we lucked out, Jim."
"Excellent, Scotty, how's operations?"
"Everything's been damaged to some extent. We got sensors and replicators working. Warp core and dilithium crystals have been severely damaged, we're dead in the water except for impulse power. If I must state plainly, we may be here for several weeks."
Kirk sighed again. Damn it all to hell.
"Spock, you have an analysis of what happened to us?"
"A partial one, based of what minimal sensor readings could be retrieved in the time allowed without overloading the computers."
"Understood Spock, proceed."
"As I understand it, while we were at warp, there was a flux in our engines creating a wormhole effect which transported us to a sun, which was undergoing a particularly violent ion storm. The resulting forces of these are what caused such damage to our ship."
The doctor cut in.
"Are you saying, that we've gone back in time, and are stuck here until god only knows Mr. Spock?"
"Doctor McCoy there is no deity involved, and I am saying nothing. Our sensors are still attempting to ascertain whether or not a time warp did or did not indeed take place."
A boatswain whistle pealed through the air.
"Captain Kirk, Uhura here…I've picked up something on the sensors. I can't explain it…but you definitely need to see, it. I have it recording and I'm piping it onto your screen in the conference room."
The lights were automatically dimmed and the screen on the far side of the room was activated. And the voice of…Captain Kirk filled the room.
"-Seek out new life forms and new civilizations. To boldly go where no man has gone before!"
The sound of an old Earth instrument, coupled by an operatic vocalization rang though the room as words flew across the screen.
William Shatner as Capt. Kirk
Leonard Nimoy as Mr. Spock
Deforrest Kelley as Dr. McCoy
The song ended and a view of the hull of the Enterprise filled the screen, across the image were the words.
"City of the Edge of Forever"
The officers of the Enterprise watched silently, slack jawed in shock as that well remembered mission was displayed before their eyes for all to see. Kirk watched in horror as his love for Edith Keeler grow and be snuffed out. Spock watched himself build mnemonic circuits out of "stone knives and bear skins", neither incident having made it to either of their reports at the end of the mission. McCoy saw his insanity from the outside for the first time. Scotty finally saw the reasons behind the deadened look in his captains eyes that was never spoken of after that mission.
The lights returned and the screen flicked off. The room was deadly silent.
"Spock."
It was a moment before he answered.
"Yes, Captain?"
McCoy finished Kirk's answer combined with what the room was thinking.
"Just what in the holy Hell was that?!"