Hi everyone and welcome to Tomorrow's Possible.
To address the obvious elephant, this is more than a little inspired by MrDrP's Kim Possible: The Next Generation - an outrageous concept and yet it works beautifully. If you have even a passing interest in Star Trek: TNG, go read that.
Please enjoy the story and leave a review. Updates every Saturday around 12:00 UTC.
It goes without saying that KP belongs to Disney and Star Trek belongs to the weirdos at Paramount who can't even pick a single place where you can watch all of their content.
"I highly recommend that you two keep your distance from the MACOs. The only reason you're not in the brig right now is because their CO wanted this dropped rather than get you into trouble. Is that clear?"
The two crewmen looked terrified and barely mustered a "Yes, Sir."
The officer sat back down behind her desk. "Dismissed!"
As soon as they were out the door, she slumped forward and let out a deep sigh at another bad day at work. This was supposed to be her dream job, an officer on the flagship, assistant department head no less. Pretty decent at 27, it would have made her past self at age 7 beyond proud.
The catch, as for all things in this day and age, was the war. Far from the dream of boldly going where no one had gone before, Starfleet was unrecognizable. Sure, the ships all looked much the same, but Starships became Battleships. MACO, disbanded shortly after the formation of the United Federation of Planets (What would a peaceful democracy need a Military Assault Command for?), was re-established. No serious exploration had taken place in a decade. Most civilians in the core of the UFP wouldn't even begin to tell the difference, they still had access to the same automation and luxury. Behind the curtain, the war machine was struggling. Morale was lower than ever, as evidenced by ridiculous altercations – a bar brawl aboard a Federation ship, with no hostile aliens involved, no mind control, no alien pheromones or uncommon forms of ice, just two crewmen… really two kids, barely out of high school, causing trouble with a group of soldiers being ferried to Starbase 375.
"This was so not what I signed up for…" Lieutenant Kim Possible mumbled to herself. Although her peers respected her, and her superiors recognized her talent and skills, she was stuck filing paperwork on dozens of daily security incidents (few of which merited as much as a word of caution to those involved). The war was going poorly, and the chain of command's instinct was to cover their assess with as many reports as possible. At this rate, if the war wasn't lost in a year, Starfleet would be consumed by bureaucracy – if only paperwork could be weaponized against the Klingons… Not that disciplining rowdy kids was any better, it just meant another 10 minutes stuck in the security office, and another report to file. Kim checked the time, the PADD read 02:04. Less than two hours left in her shift and zero bridge time. More than boring, it was not conducive to career advancement. That's plenty of paper-pushing for today, these can wait for tomorrow, she thought and left her desk to head up to the bridge.
As she walked to the turbolift, her combadge sounded: "Lieutenant Possible, report to the bridge." She tapped her combadge to reply: "On my way, Commander," taking faster steps. No alert had been sounded, but for the bridge to be calling something relevant was happening.
After the short turbolift ride, Kim stepped onto the bridge. Lieutenant Commander Data sat in the captain's chair and turned slightly to speak to Kim: "Lieutenant, we encountered an unexpected Starfleet transponder signal just off our flight path. Long range sensors did not pick up any meaningful objects until we began receiving the transponder signal. We will be in visual range in 90 seconds."
Kim approached the main tactical console, taking over from Ensign Roberts. "Commander, sensors confirm what seems to be a small vessel. Construction is consistent with Starfleet norms, but the transponder code is invalid. Recommend we go to Yellow Alert."
"Yellow Alert, shields up," Data called out. "Lieutenant, do you have a reading of the vessel's type?"
"No, Commander, but I am getting very high chroniton readings. I'm not seeing any anomalies, though, if there was anything to pick up, it's gone."
"30 seconds to visual range," the Ensign at the helm called out.
At the same time, Kim's console showed a new warning. "Commander, we're being scanned… Standard Starfleet Type VI sensor array on auto-scan."
"That would be consistent with a shuttlecraft, put it on screen as soon as we enter visual range," Data answered.
Kim configured the viewscreen to show the visual of the object, soon a small ship – an oversized shuttle, really – was shown. "Commander, that looks an awful lot like a Danube-class runabout…"
Data took a moment before answering, "I believe you are correct Lieutenant, however the Danube-class is not yet in service, to see one here is most unusual."
The ship did not appear to be in significant distress. The hull bore a few scorch marks and several panels had been replaced with less-worn ones, but its attitude was stable and, visually, nothing was wrong with it. The nose section read U.S.S. Rio Grande.
"Roberts," Kim called out, "get Utopia Planitia to confirm the status of all Danube runabouts, in particular the Rio Grande. Registry is… NCC-72452."
"Aye, Sir," he responded.
"Commander," she continued, "that ship is loaded for bear, it's carrying an external weapons payload… But sensors indicate that all weapons are powered down and safed."
Data looked down at his console to review some of the data. "Lieutenant, please assemble an away team to inspect that ship. I want you to determine whether it is safe to bring aboard."
Kim answered, "Yes Sir. Helm, keep us aft of the runabout, I'd rather not sit directly in the path of that thing's torpedo launchers." She summoned an engineer and two men from Security to accompany her on the away team and began to review the latest sensor readings. "Commander, I have two life signs on board. One human, one Earth rodent…" The other bridge officers gave each other puzzled looks. "Both in the aft module, in close proximity. All systems appear nominal. With your permission, Commander, I'll join the away team."
"Please proceed."
Kim motioned for Roberts to take over the Tactical console and walked over to the turbolift. Away missions were by far her favorite part of the job, and with a good mystery thrown in, this one should at least make for some interesting meetings with the senior staff. The turbolift stopped and she walked the short distance to Transporter Room 3. The rest of the away team had yet to arrive, but a familiar face was present.
"Chief O'Brien, suffering through Gamma shift again?"
"Oh, Lieutenant, you can't really call it suffering when you get to play with toys," he joked. "I've scanned the ship, I'd love to have a beer with whoever's been maintaining her, it's rare you see auxiliary craft treated this well."
Kim chuckled, "I'll be sure to let you know if we find out."
Two crewmen in yellow uniforms walked into the transporter room and came to attention. "Crewmen Ayers and Barros, reporting as ordered, Sir."
"At ease," Kim replied, "we'll wait for Lieutenant Shrass from Engineering and I'll brief you all. In the meantime, set your phasers to maximum stun and check your tricorders."
As the two crewmen checked their gear, an Andorian engineer entered the room. "Sorry about the delay, Kim, I had to check out an interface adapter for the quick-access recorder from Shuttle Bay 2. Incredibly, we don't have any down in Main Engineering."
Kim was not bothered, "No big, we needed to check our gear anyway. So, here's the sitch: We came across a mystery Starfleet runabout, Danube-class. They're not yet in service and we don't know how this one got here. All systems are nominal, as far as we can tell, and we have two life signs aboard, one human and one rodent of some sort."
The away team was surprised at the 'rodent' part, much like the bridge crew earlier.
"Our objectives are as follows. One: Determine whether the ship is safe to bring aboard – is the warp core stable, are the weapons safe, that sort of thing. Two: Identify the occupant and get their story. Three: Gather any intel on what the ship is doing here and how the hell it even got here. We'll beam into the cockpit area, avoiding the runabout's transporter until O'Brien's team can run a full diagnostic. Medical will send someone over after we do the initial sweep. Any questions? Okay then, let's move out."
The four members of the away team stepped onto the transporter, phasers in hand. "Energize," Kim asked of O'Brien.
The transport cycle was uneventful, and Kim found herself and her team aboard the Rio Grande. At first glance, nothing seemed unusual, so she reported in. "Away team to Enterprise, we're aboard the runabout and, so far, we have no surprises. I'm not familiar with the Danube layout, but everything feels familiar. We're beginning our sweep now."
Data's voice came across the combadges, " Enterprise acknowledges. Lieutenant, we have received additional information from Utopia Planitia: All Danube-class ships are accounted for, and the Rio Grande is parked at the shipyard and has not moved in a week."
"Understood, Commander."
Shrass interjected from the left seat as she examined the computer console, "Sir, the last ship's log is from 2378!"
" Enterprise, did you catch that?"
"Affirmative, Lieutenant. Combined with our previous chroniton readings, it stands to reason we may be dealing with a temporal anomaly. However, at this time, we are reading nothing of the sort and the chroniton density has declined to near-background levels. Proceed at your discretion."
"Understood, we'll go ahead with our sweep."
The interior, much like the exterior, revealed careful maintenance but an eventful service life. Slight color mismatches indicated panels and components that had been replaced at different times, older parts showed plenty of scuff marks… but everything looked to be in its place, down to the inspection stickers on the emergency gear locker. Kim turned to the rest of the away team after opening the weapons locker, which held two Type 3 phaser rifles.
"Anything on the scans?"
"Everything's nominal, Lieutenant. No surprises, just the two life forms in the rear compartment." Barros did not move his eyes off the tricorder in his hand.
Ayers added, looking up from the console he was inspecting, "No signs of trouble."
Kim looked over to the Andorian engineer.
"Everything looks good so far, matching the Enterprise's sensor readings. Warp core is stable, antimatter reserves at 80%, containment is nominal. I'm still waiting for the Level 5 diagnostic, but I suspect it'll be fine, too."
"So why is this ship stopped out in the middle of nowhere?"
"The autopilot is just set to position and attitude hold. Navigation equipment is reporting the correct position, sensors read the Enterprise, and the transponder is recognized. I figure the occupant just told it to hold position and went to do something else."
The situation was bizarre, but Kim was most concerned about the human occupant of the ship – they hadn't shown themselves yet, and the away team was not particularly quiet. Was it a trap? Were they in distress? It was time to find out.
"Ayers, stay here with Lieutenant Shrass and keep an eye on our six. Barros, you're with me."
Kim took point and pressed the Open Door control, causing the door to the rear compartment to woosh open with the typical satisfying sound of Starfleet doors. Behind it and past a short snaking corridor, a large room took up what must have been a third of the ship's length – but instead of spartan military furnishings, or even the clean clinical look of the craft's cockpit section, the room felt like… a convention center? A table took up the central position of the room, with six chairs. Not Starfleet-issue hard-backed chairs, they were padded and even had a purely cosmetic two-color look, downright decadent if faced with a looming energy shortage, but also a reminder of what things felt like before the war. To top it all off, a fruit basket sat on the table. Not even admirals got fruit baskets aboard ships! Surrounding the table, large bench seats occupied the outside walls, beneath the slit-like exterior windows. Even these seats were upholstered in a downright decadent way.
But there was not much to see, although there were some signs of occupation – the fruit basket was half-empty, a used glass sat on the table and one of the chairs was out of place. Closer to the door at the front of the compartment, two sets of bunks were set against the side walls. Three of them were clearly empty, but the one on the bottom right had its curtain drawn, the faint sound of snoring could be heard even through the curtain. Kim motioned for Barros to keep an eye on the bed, and walked around the table, looking for anything amiss. There was nothing else to inspect, it was time to face the ship's occupant.
"Stay back and cover me," she ordered.
Barros moved back and slightly towards the rear of the ship, to get a good angle, while Kim approached the head end of the bunk. She holstered her phaser and reached out to pull open the curtain, counting down from three on her left hand before opening it.
"What is that freaky thing?"