Enterprise travelled through the blackness of slipstream devoting seventy-five percent of its processing power to discerning the data it acquired from its evil counterpart, the As'krys. Enterprise had theorized the As'krys would be waiting for the remaining Pathfinders once they exited from slipstream. It was a gamble, but Enterprise was hoping only one of the vorgon Pathfinders would be waiting. With its newly created repair bots crawling over its hull, it would be fully restored by their second encounter. With the diminished processing power, Enterprise deduced Intrepid, Discovery, and Ulysses would also be at full power. It only hoped they would all exit slipstream in close proximity to each other.

The loss of Enterprise's 'family' suddenly hit it. Columbia, Challenger, Endeavor, Explorer, Frontier and Pioneer had all been destroyed in their last two battles. Of the twelve Pathfinders, only four remained. Atlantis had been, presumably, lost during the initial attacks against the sixty systems. Trailblazer had been lost while helping two transports escape the destruction of the Vega system. Hundreds of billions had died during the Vorgon attack. Billions more had died in retaliation. Now, the success of the mission was in jeapardy with sixty percent of its fleet destroyed.

Its initial calculations were correct. Based on the time the vorgons had acquired the technology to create the tox uthat, there was only time to create sixty devices. That meant... either there was a second facility not listed in the vorgon's primary computer system, which was highly unlikely, or they acquired the prototype from the twenty-fourth century. On stardate 43748.914, the Risan security net registered a small-scale explosion in the lobby of the Haven Hotel, in the capital city. That explosion coincided with a personal log entry by Jean-Luc Picard, then the captain of the USS Enterprise D, where he described destroying the tox uthat.

As Enterprise's secondary processing system continued intersecting the personal log entry of Jean-Luc Picard with the Risan security net, its main processors discovered the mission that had originally been assigned to another vorgon vessel, the Surshis. It had been sent back in time to retrieve the prototpye uthat, but apparently failed. Another vorgon ship, the Nestheria, had originally been sent back in time to help gather reinforcements for Vorgon Prime. The crew was then given a different mission, acquire debris from the USS Frontier, which had been destroyed during one incarnation of the recent past, and go back in time to create the As'krys. The mission of retrieving the prototype uthat and destroying the Vega system was assigned to it. Wait... originally, the Vega system survived? The concept of temporal mechanics was beginning to make its processors hurt again. Enterprise now knew its mission... first and foremost, it needed to go back in time and prevent the As'krys from intercepting the prototype tox uthat. Its priority list was clear... protection of Federation citizens came before anything. Its second mission would be to intercept the Nestheria and prevent it from summoning the initial set of reinforcements.

Its processors paused their research for a moment. Assuming it could incorporate the vorgon time drive into its system, it would be able to time travel to any point. Why not travel back in time and prevent the vorgon sleepership from ever broadcasting the coordinates of the Federation systems' suns? That would prevent the entire devastation from happening! Captain Blackburn wouldn't have to die! The disection of data continued as Enterprise contemplated the power at its disposal. Its first priority would still be to save the Vega system. Assuming that history could be altered successfully, Enterprise would then attempt the major rewrite of history. Enterprise continued skirting through the absolute blackness of slipstream, confident in its mission. All they would have to do is destroy the As'krys, reverse-engineer the time drive, and attach it to the Enterprise.