victim of gravity and momentum, with no way to control his flight. He was just an object in motion, floating through space. Like one of the ice crystals in the planet’s rings.
Slowly, steadily, the ship drew nearer, eating up the meters between them. Open space doors exposed an interior cargo bay. A mechanical arm, resembling a large metal crane, swung out of the bay toward Kirk. A clamp opened at the end of the arm.
The robotic arm reached for Kirk, but he was still too far away. He extended his own arm, stretching as far as the suit would allow. His gloved fingertips grazed the metal clamps, but, maddeningly, he couldn’t get a grip on it. Or vice versa.
“Damn,” he muttered.
It dawned on him that his legs were a good deal longer than his arms. He kicked upward, stretching out his right leg. The clamp closed tightly on his foot, which was protected by a rigid white boot. Kirk winced slightly. He prayed that whoever was operating the clamp knew just how much pressure to exert without tearing open the boot — or crushing his foot.
The arm drew him back toward the ship, feet first. It was hardly the most dignified way he had ever boarded a vessel, but he wasn’t complaining. Seven hours of air would tick away far too quickly. Better to be taken aboard an unknown ship than to suffocate in a vacuum.
He wished he knew what was waiting for him, though. Lifting his head, he spied a name emblazoned on the hull of the spaceship. Large block letters spelled it out in English:
For a second, he wondered if he was reading it right. This wasn’t the
He leaned back and saw the huge, mustard-colored planet filling the sky below him. Its crystalline rings sparkled in the reflected light of the gas giant, whose true identity Kirk could no longer deny.
No wonder the woman kept hailing Shaun. Kirk suspected that the year wasn’t 2270.
Somehow, he was two hundred fifty years in the past.
Eleven
2270
Space went away.
Gravity seized Shaun Christopher for the first time in months, and he collapsed onto a hard red platform. His bare hands struck the platform, and he realized with a shock that he wasn’t wearing his spacesuit anymore and was no longer floating above Saturn.
Instead, he found himself in a spacious, well-lit chamber that bore no resemblance to the familiar confines of the
But he wasn’t alone.
Four unfamiliar figures faced him. A dark-haired man wearing a bright red tunic and a worried expression manned the instrument panel, assisted by an attractive young woman wearing a short red dress. Another woman stood a meter away, her face hidden by a shimmering golden veil. An electronic tablet was tucked under her arm.
And then there was the other… man?
Pointed ears rose from both sides of a distinctly elfin countenance that reminded Shaun of the old
“Captain?” he inquired, getting Shaun’s rank wrong. “Are you hurt?”
He lowered his gadget and came toward Shaun.
“Stay away from me!” Shaun blurted. He scrambled backward, frantic to get away. Gravity weighed him down; he wasn’t used to it anymore. His limbs felt like lead. He banged into a solid metallic object resting behind him. Startled, he stared at the charred lump of machinery; it took him a second to recognize the probe, which looked much older and more damaged than it had only seconds ago. He didn’t understand what was happening. “Where am I? How did I get here?”
“Captain?” the pointy-eared stranger repeated. He let go of his device, which hung from a strap over his shoulder. “You appear disoriented.”
“What’s happened, Mr. Spock?” the man at the control panel said. A pronounced brogue betrayed his Scottish roots. “What’s wrong with the captain?”
“Page Dr. McCoy,” the man named Spock ordered briskly, as though he was in command. “Tell him to report to the transporter room at once.”
“Where am I?” he demanded again. “What is this place?”
“You seem to have suffered a severe neurological shock,” Spock attempted to explain. “You require medical assistance.”
He reached out for Shaun.
“Don’t touch me!”
Until he found out what this was all about, he wasn’t going anywhere with anyone, let alone somebody who looked almost more devil than human. Back on Earth, he would have dismissed the man’s tapered ears as just some sort of eccentric body modification, like tattoos or piercings, but out here in space, millions of miles from home, more alarming possibilities leaped to mind.
He reached instinctively for his father’s dog tags, only to remember that Fontana had them now. He couldn’t help recalling that UFO his dad had spotted and his own experiences at Area 51. Dr. Jeff Carlson, the head of the DY-100 project, had given Shaun a firsthand account of the notorious Roswell incident back in ’47. Shaun stared at Spock with mixed fear and wonder.
Was this… a Ferengi?
Dr. Carlson had always said they had large ears, Shaun recalled, but what was a Ferengi doing out here by Saturn… with a Scotsman, of all people?
Nightmarish images of invasive biological probes and experiments flashed through his brain. He had always thought such stories were merely the stuff of cheesy sci-fi movies and supermarket tabloids, but now he wasn’t so sure. How else to explain any of this?
“Please, Captain,” Spock said. He gazed down at Shaun, while making no sudden moves. “Let me assist you.”
Why did they keep calling him Captain? Did Earth ranks confuse them?
“I don’t understand!” he protested. “This is insane!”
“It was the probe,” the veiled woman stated. “There was an unexpected energy discharge. Please, let us help you.”
She approached him from the left. Was she an alien, too, beneath the veil? Did she have three eyes or fangs? Was she even truly a woman?
“Keep back!” he shouted again. “All of you! You’re not getting near me until you tell me where I am!”
