Disclaimer: Enterprise, Star Trek and all related characters are the property of Paramount Pictures, Inc. No copyright infringement is intended. This story is for entertainment purposes only and no money has changed hands. The original characters and events are the sole property of the author and may not be used without permission.
"Derelict (Pt. V)"
by Darrin Colbourne
It was the second time Enterprise had been headed back to Earth since her voyage began. This time she was bringing back Ulysses for repair and refit. Archer had contemplated contacting another ship, but wasn't quite sure how he'd explain why the Starfleet ship had been blown apart in the first place. Ultimately, he and Will decided they'd deliver their after-action reports to Starfleet Command in person. What they'd say in those reports was a matter for discussion. That discussion was taking place at the Captain's Table. Archer was dining with his Chief Engineer, Science Officer and Communications Officer, along with the Captain and Chief Engineer of Ulysses.
"Here's what I don't get." Will said as he contemplated his steak. "How did you know they'd open the Shuttle Bay doors for us?"
"They'd been going out of their way not to kill us while we were there." Archer said after he swallowed a tasty bite of home fry. "Weapons on stun, giving us enough time to get into the shuttle when they depressurized the bay...I figured they had to make a choice between letting us go 'splat' or letting us go, period. And you'll note they only tried to knock the shuttle off course with those energy packet weapons of theirs, and they didn't detonate it until after we were safely aboard this ship."
"Still, that was not a great deal of data to go on," T'Pol said, as she carefully sawed through a steamed Broccoli stalk. "It was a risk."
"But it was a calculated one," Tucker said, "and it paid off. You should never complain when you manage to beat the house." With that bit of wisdom he forked some potatoes into his mouth.
"I just can't wait to see the looks on the Admirals' faces back at Command when we lay out this story." Mercurio said over her greens.
"What exactly are we going to lay out?" Sato said as she dug into some rice. "I'm not sure myself what happened on that ship."
"That's what we're here to discuss." Archer said, getting the conversation on track.
Meanwhile, two hundred light-years away, the other Enterprise was still traveling at high Warp through uncharted space. Its skeleton crew was gathered on the Bridge, pondering the same question. The Commander of the mission sat in the center chair, contemplating the forward screen. He let himself be lulled for a moment by the amber lights going across the indicator under it, in time with a soft, echoed beeping.
There were twelve people in the crew, eight who'd stormed the ship when Archer was aboard and four from the craft that had attacked his ship. They were unmasked. Six were Human, including the one killed when a team tried to take the Armory. The rest were various races. One of them, an Andorian, came over to the Commander's side.
"It's amazing, isn't it?" The Andorian said, looking around the Bridge.
"It's almost a perfect replica." The Commander said. "It must have taken months to build."
The Andorian nodded. "I seem to recall that Humans take great pride in creating replicas as a hobby. The engineer certainly must have loved his work."
"I never built anything like this when I was a kid." The Commander said. "And this...this is no child's plaything." He grimaced as he spoke. The conversation reminded him of the mission. "We screwed up big time."
"Not completely." The Human at the Science Station said. "We got the ship out of the contested zone."
The Commander shook a finger at the man. "I don't want to hear it from you, Finn! I still can't believe you let them out of the Shuttle Bay! You were supposed to trap them and hold them."
"That's what I was trying to do!" Finn said. "I depressurized the bay to force them into the shuttle. I thought I'd wait till the lack of air knocked them out, and then we could round them up and put them in a holding cell. How was I to know they'd try to fly it?"
"You still should have left the doors closed."
"Finn knew the limitations as well as anyone here, Commander." The man standing next to Finn said. Earth wouldn't encounter his race for decades yet, but he was a valuable member of this Commander's team. The Human regarded his pointy ears and stormy brow as he spoke. "Captain Archer and his people can't be permanently damaged in any way, no killing, no mindwipes. They're too important to the timeline. I would consider 'being smashed against a shuttle bay door' permanent damage, wouldn't you?"
"Finn could have prevented that." Another Human said. "The bay has tractor beams to land damaged shuttles. He could have used them to keep the shuttle on the deck."
"I didn't know that much about the controls." Finn said. "Running the control room was supposed to be Danko's job, but he got stunned."
"Sure...point fingers." Danko said from across the room. "By the way, thanks for letting the air out of the bay while I was laying there stunned." He added as he scratched the scales on his neck ridges.
"I knew your implants would protect you." Finn said, flippantly. Danko just snorted.
"Of course." He said. "In our defense, Commander, the way they blew in the door threw us off guard. We didn't have much time to think."
"It's not really about that." The Commander said. "We had to keep them immobilized long enough to make sure they didn't take anything off the ship that might lend evidence to its ever having existed. I didn't expect them to stand there and let us do it, but we should have done a better job forcing the issue."
"We did manage to destroy the shuttlecraft." The Human at the helm said.
"But those phasers are still missing, and we don't know if they were in the shuttle or if the Enterprise crew still has them. If they take those things back to Starfleet Command...in this era..." His voice trailed off. He let his gaze drift back to the forward screen. "We screwed up big time. That's all. That one little technical delay we suffered was all they needed. This is a total victory for them."
"We don't know that yet." Finn said.
"Oh no? I thought the faction running the Suliban was crazy, but the people who commissioned this replica, who planted it in the rock on Coogan's World...they just fired a huge shot in the Cold War, and the entire galaxy is going to take the hit.
"Archer and the others have seen this ship and its technology, have it planted in their minds, and because of what they'll do in the future there's no way we can remove it from those minds without running an even greater risk. That's bad enough. If they still have the phasers, that clinches the deal. They'll eventually tell their story to someone, and show someone the scans the Vulcan took, and show someone those guns. The seeds have been planted, Finn. All they need now is tending, which the Neutral Faction can now take care of at it's leisure. Those little seeds will grow and spread and effect this entire quadrant in ways we've worked so hard to avoid!"
The hum of the warp engines sounded on the Bridge as the Helmsman slowed the ship down. "Coming up on rendezvous." He said. When the ship was at sub-light, everyone looked at the screen. The extraction ship was waiting for them just a few hundred kilometers off the bow.
The Commander sighed. "I want you all to remember what we lost today, Gentleman." He said, then indicated the dead Human wrapped up on the deck nearby. "I want you to remember why Riley's death was in vain. Because of a stupid glitch in our trip back in time, the efforts of our faction have been unraveled. Everything we did to make sure Jonathan Archer would usher in a new golden age for the Pre-Alliance Quadrant has been turned to dust.
"The Kirk Era has been reintroduced with a vengeance, and it will herald a Galactic Dark Age that it will take over a century for our various peoples to emerge from."
With that, the Commander stood. "Set the automatic helm controls." He said to the Helmsman. "Signal the ship that we'll be coming shortly. The rest of you, let's get to the transporter room."
Two of the men picked up Riley, and the crew began to file into the turbolift.
Minutes later, the extraction ship had completed recovery of the team. Once it had its charges it slipped away, flashing to Warp using technology that wouldn't exist for nine hundred years.
After it was gone, the computers aboard the replica brought the ship into warp, speeding it into a nearby system, on a collision course with the sun. When its journey was finished, the duplicate United Starship Enterprise, NCC-1701, would leave no further trace of its existence.
Its namesake, when it passed through the system a hundred years hence, would be none the wiser.
FINI