Chapter 10

Captain Archer was not all too impressed by the man on the screen. He obviously wasn't a soldier but it was also obvious that he had taken part in many military operations before. Probably more than any MACO he has ever met. Dr. Mckay himself looked to be slouching with a slightly annoyed look on his tired face. Though Archer decided it would be best not to judge the man before meeting, or speaking, with him.

"Hello Doctor Mckay. My name is Captain Jonathan Archer of the starship Enterprise. It is a pleasure to meet you," Archer introduced himself. Mckay took a moment before responding to the captain.

"Hello, hello. Now what is needed from me?" Mckay arrogantly asked. Archer wasn't sure to be annoyed with the tone or just to wait before he knew more about this man again. The latter was the winner, but by a tiny margin.

"I was hoping that you would be able to look at our version of the transporters to see about using the same technology to replicate matter such as armor or food and the like. We have had some success in that field, however I would like this done before my ship has completed the refit," Archer explained. He was getting anxious about the answer he would looked deep in thought at this proposal. In one hand, he had many new projects that he was working on simultaneously. On the other hand, he had the chance to study technology from another universe entirely. Well, his mind was quickly made up.

"Alright, I'll look into it. I should be there soon if I get authorization for the gate," Mckay said. The office was silent for a moment before Carter sat up.

"I'll send a message to Teyla to let you use the gate," Carter said. Mckay was about to respond when Carter cut the feed. She sent a short communication through the subspace network before turning to a very confused Captain Archer.

"What's going on? What is this 'Gate'?" He asked.

"Come with me and I will show you," she said as she walked out of the room. Archer and Natalie quickly followed. After passing through several passageways and stairwells, they came across a large metal door. After inserting a special code into the nearby console, The large door started to open and revealed a large ring. It was covered in what looked like constellations and several arrows facing toward the center of the ring. Though Natalie seemed to know what it was, Archer was thoroughly confused as to what this device was.

He was especially confused as to why it needed the multiple weapon emplacements and armor barriers. What was this device so dangerously capable of that it required such heavy defences? His confusion grew when all of a sudden, the ring that held the constellations started to spin, stopped, and one of the arrows suddenly lit up. This happened several more times before a vortex formed and expanded from the center before settling in the center. What appeared to be a sideways pool formed in the center of the ring. Carter turned to see Archer staring at the Stargate in complete awe. She smirked slightly at his expression then decided to explain.

"This, Captain, is called a Stargate. It's a device that creates a stable wormhole with another Stargate in the network. They were built by a race we call the Ancients several thousand years ago and we have found several different variants. The one we have here is commonly found throughout our galaxy while there is other variants found in other galaxies such as Pegasus. Or even on several of the ancient space-craft we have managed to recover such as the Destiny we have found some version of the Stargate. We try to limit our use of it to lower the chances of one of our enemies using it against us and catching us flat-footed, but we still send out scouting teams to survey worlds that have gates and sometimes we have to travel quickly in an emergency situation," she explained.

"Link to Atlantis secured. I'm reading Dr. Mckay's signal," the voice said. As if he heard his name, the man Archer recognized as Dr. Rodney Mckay stepped out of the gate before it shut down.

"Alright Sam, where do you want me to start?" he asked. Archer grew slightly irritated with Mckay's tone of voice but calmed quickly. Instead he cleared his throat to get the attention of both parties.

"Hello Doctor. It's nice to meet you in person. I hope you can help us out," Archer greeted with an open palm. Though he looked annoyed for some odd reason, Mckay still shook Archer's hand.

"Hi. I would talk further but we are on a time-table if I understand and I would like to get to work quickly," Mckay stated. Archer nodded his head in agreement. The sooner they had this technology, the sooner HIS Earth would be safe.

(Line Break)

Archer was excited, and for several reasons. His ship was less than a week from completion, his crew was in high spirits for finishing their mission, Tau'ri scientists had figured out how to send them back to their universe just a few minutes from the time they had departed, and finally, his entire crew was being treated to a trip to the Tau'ri's version of Earth. Half stayed back at the ship to help with the refit, while the other half went to Earth for two days. The two groups switched after the first two days were up, as to allow everyone the chance to go. Captain Archer insisted that he would be with the second group to go that way everyone else had the chance before him.

He and his Vulcan science officer, T'pol, were standing on the bridge of the Nathan James, a Galahad class destroyer assigned to the 1st Fleet. They were invited to watch as the ship arrived at Earth while other members of the Enterprise crew watched out of any windows that were free. They were only a few moments away from entering Earth space when the soldier sitting at the helm made an announcement.

"Exiting hyperspace now sir," he reported to the commanding officer. At that moment, Archer watched as the blue tunnel of hyperspace suddenly opened to give everyone a good view of the big blue planet. Though it was surrounded by defensive stations and warships, Archer could still see the beauty the planet radiated. The continents of North and South America as well as part of Europe could be seen from orbit thanks to the sun. Lights from cities could be seen in the shadow of the planet. He was taking it all in when the comm officer gave a message to the CO.

"Sir, we have a Yorktown class carrier that is requesting we slow for a moment so they may pass us by," he reported. Though the request was odd, the Captain of the James gave the order to slow. Archer watched out the main view screen as a massive warship came into sight. It was similar in design to the Achilles except it had much larger hangar bays, most likely to accommodate a much larger fighter and bomber compliment. Though, Archer was confused as the lights that normally lit up the ship's designation were turned off so he couldn't see the name of the vessel in front of him. A voice suddenly spoke up on the bridge's speakers.

"Captain Archer? My name is Captain James A. Kirk. I am the commanding officer aboard the ship you see before you. We have somewhere else to be at the moment but I wanted to give you a send-off from the crew of the Tau'ri Carrier Enterprise." As soon as the name was heard, Archer, with surprise clearly on his face, watched as the name of his starship was brightly lit up on the side of the carrier, Enterprise. The ship shifted from starboard to port several times before vanishing off into hyperspace. After the quick spectacle, the James once again increased speed and passed by the orbital defence platforms before heading directly into the planet's atmosphere over the Atlantic Ocean.

As they passed through the cloud layer, A large, mostly complete, floating city came into view before the ship. From what was complete, Archer could tell that it was to be a magnificent city with all of the latest civilian technology that the Tau'ri had created placed on it. The towers that were mostly concentrated on the center of the city were complete and they looked so much more advanced than most of the cities Archer had seen back in his universe. Connected to the central towers were several arms, or piers as the city was in water, that had varying levels of completion on each arm.

The James softly landed in the water near the southern arm and slowly slides into the pier before coming to a stop. Small walkways stretch out from the dock to the ship and lock into place outside some of the external airlocks. Archer was standing near one of the internal airlock doors with T'pol by his side when it suddenly opened with a hiss along with the external door. He had to cover his eyes from the bright sun for a moment but quickly adjusted before stepping outside. At the bottom of the stairs, Archer could clearly see General Carter, whom had left earlier that week on business, and Senator Woolsey along with another man that had a large security detail with him. Carter stepped forward with her hand out to shake. Archer shook it.

"Welcome to Earth Captain. I hope your flight was calm?" she asked.

"Indeed it was. Though I would greatly appreciate it if you sent Captain James Kirk my thanks for the show in orbit before landing," Archer asked.

"Of course. He left you this as a gift by the way. 'From one Enterprising Captain to another,' he told me. Here you go." Archer took the small package from Carter and opened it to find a small plaque and a patch. On the patch was the Tau'ri symbol but instead of the small circle above the arrow, it was the NX-01 with exhaust trails flying behind it. The same design could be found on the plaque right next to the design of the Enterprise patch on Archer's arm. Below both patches was the name Enterprise and the phrase Ut Supra Stellas.

"'To the stars above,'" Archer translated. Carter nodded her head before turning to introduce the other men with her.

"You remember Senator Woolsy," she asked.

"Of course I do. A pleasure to see you again Senator," Archer said as he shook the senator's hand.

"Pleasure is all mine Captain," the bald man said. Carter then introduced the final member of the group.

"And this is President Cameron Mitchell of the Tau'ri," she said. Said president moved toward the two officers with his hand extended. Archer took it with pleasure.

"I'm honored to meet you Captain. I've heard a lot about what you and your crew have gone through and I am sorry for those you have lost. I hope the upgrades we are giving will help you out in your mission," he said. Archer couldn't detect any sort of political ambition from the man in front of him and was glad he still hadn't run into a politically ambitious character trying to use him for political gains.

"Thank you for meeting me Mr. President. Thank you for both the upgrades and your sympathies. Both are greatly appreciated," Archer said. After the quick introductions, Archer was given a tour of the incomplete, and as of yet, unnamed, city, and was told about the history of Tau'ri Earth. He was slightly unnerved with how similar their two histories were, bar the Ancients and Asgard interference. The major event that differed their histories, was the exploration of the Stargate. The historical teams that led the fight against the Goa'uld and the Ori, of which he found out all three of the officials were a part of in some way, were incredible to listen to for both the Captain and the Vulcan. T'pol would ask many questions about the history of the Tau'ri and the galaxy at large.

Eventually she asked about how the Tau'ri had so easily united under a single banner. Apparently this was a bit of a sore spot for the leaders as they momentarily paused with a look of sadness on their faces. As it turns out, several of the cruellest Lucian Alliance factions joined together to try and take out the rapidly growing Tau'ri. They had dropped a captured, naquedah-enhanced, nuclear warhead on the first colony outside the Sol System, Valhalla. What happened afterwards was something the Lucian Alliance was not ready for, Just as the United States had been angered by the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, the Tau'ri were pissed off with the attack on the colony. The war that ensued, lasted several years for the Tau'ri, but only a few months for the Alliance as the Tau'ri trapped them in a time-dilation field until the forces needed could be built up.

When the field dropped, several years had passed for the Tau'ri, with only a few months going by for the Alliance. The space battle lasted only thirty minutes and the ground battle barely lasted a week. The Alliance had lost all but three of their old Ha'taks and all but one of the faction leaders were killed. After that, no one race wanted to fight against the Tau'ri. After hearing the story, both the Vulcan and the Human were amazed.

The duo would spend the next day learning about Earth's past while also learning about Earth now. They were told about the various adventures that SG-1 had gone on with Carter and Woolsy would talk about his time spent on Atlantis with General Sheppard and Dr. Mckay. All parties present seemed to enjoy the stories and the history spoken about both Earths. The second day, Archer was given a tour of San Francisco where his Earth had Starfleet Headquarters. When the trip had finally come to a close, Archer and T'pol left with all of the new history rattling around in their head, and several souvenirs. Archer himself had the gift patch from Captain Kirk placed underneath his NX-01 patch. He would keep it as a reminder of the aide that he and his crew received from their cousins.

Author's Note: I would like to apologize for the tardiness. I ran into a bit of writer's block with this one. I referenced the show 'The Last Ship' with the Nathan James. Also, those of you who think I was ripping Captain Kirk from 'Star Trek', the current commanding officer of the United States Destroyer USS Zumwalt is Captain James A. Kirk and I thought it would be fun to place him in command of the Enterprise Aircraft Carrier. As always, constructive criticisms are welcome as well as commentary. If anyone out there is an artist by the way, it would be awesome if you could design the new patch that Archer received and send me a picture through some fashion, DM, twitter, facebook, or the like. Thank you all for reading my story. Good day!