Date with Destiny (Part 2)

Deep in the bowels of the Arcadia they sat: Twelve Vulcans, reclining on couches which resembled biobeds, molded to their humanoid shapes, arranged in a circle, facing each other.  They looked into the empty space between them with empty eyes, like zombies: A misleading appearance, for their minds were active, on a scale and level beyond those of the personnel around them, monitoring the equipment to which they were connected.

Andorian lieutenant Ty'amra Marlang, one of the few known Andorians with telepathic ability, and current chief of engineering Lieutenant Jefferson Walker, supervised the team of operators and engineers, attentive on what their complants and comtacts told them, in addition to the array of display screens and consoles.  Ty'amra maintained a tenuous link to their Vulcan guests, as ordered by Admiral April, enough to ensure their nominal condition.  If something went wrong, she would know.

At a cue from the bridge, the air seemed to charge, turning electric.  Walker swallowed.  This was it – the threshold.  Crossing over into a new era, a new future.  If he wanted to leave, he had less than ten seconds to beam out of the ship.  He resisted the thought.  He did not have to know that he had, already in a sense, willingly relocated to the future.  He had chosen to go.  He wanted to go.  He was going.

Ty'amra Marlang was not as reticent as her husband, who nearly refused to go.  She wondered if she would have gone without him – if this would have been the final straw in a marriage sometimes strained, which might have broken it.  She wondered if it was wise to have let Bron ignore his inner voice, decide against his personal judgment, and come with her because they were married... if that was a good enough reason to stay together, when he did not want to go.  Only time would tell.

On the bridge, the Vulcan, Vallien, lifted his blond head from the tactical station and set his brown-eyed gaze on the man standing next to him.

"Temporal slipstream locked."

Dark-haired Admiral Stephen April nodded in acknowledgement, and watched the two holospheres dominating the center of the bridge.  Each a duplicate of the other, they orbited, moving closer and closer together... each displaying the same data, of the same area – the same ship – in two separate timeframes.  Arcadia moved not through space, but time – timespace – crossing years in a matter of minutes.  Guided by quantum computations, housed in quantum computers in each era, relay-facilitated by the Vulcan esper-navigators – a new development in starship navigational systems – the ship proceeded to lock itself in on the combinative target... the year 2407... at which the two holospheres aligned, perfectly synchronized, and merged.

Intense colors and images sliced through the entire scale of April's senses.  Colors and sights he could feel, physically; almost touch.  Brown bloody tones bubbling and frying on metallic chrome.  Blue-dyed pink sheets and patterns, twisting and rending, ripping and rippling past him like the torrent of an endless ocean.  Dark gray stripes of sky emanated in circular crescents between rays of diffuse white and pale yellow sunlight from some planet he could not quite make out, a dark mustard blotch in a gaseous region of space somewhere.  So intense.  So vivid.  So real.

If he concentrated... if he reached out... could he touch it?  Could he bring it in to make physical contact?

Eyes closed, he lifted a hand, then pushed, slowly, gradually, palm out, into the world behind his eyes... extending his arm.  Reaching.  Reaching for contact.

A soundless cry ricocheted through the layers of perception, shattering the spell; he flinched, recoiled instinctively, yanking his hand back, as if about to touch something hot.

In his mind, he opened his eyes – on the bridge, he had not actually closed them – and looked for the source of the warning.  It carried a distinct impression, a 'taste' and 'flavor' of voice known to the history of his mind's awareness.  It could only come from one source... a source he recognized instantly:

"Cadie?"

There was no response.  The universe's assault upon his mental senses did not lessen, but washed around him harmlessly; the opening for contact had come and gone.  It was Cadie.  He was sure of it.

The transit shredded, came apart and faded from his perceptions.  April refocused on the bridge around him.

"Jump complete," Mala Hendriksson reported, astonished at an experience in which she had been more of a bystander, in a sense, merely guiding a set of equations in one timeframe, as they were brought into alignment by another... a quantum energy force unlike any her cybernetics had ever allowed her to touch, of which she was only now becoming aware.  A force which dwarfed her, on the scale of a universe to an individual.  It was almost like being touched by the hand of God... but of course, she didn't believe in God, so that aspect baffled her.

Stephen April knew the feeling.  He fell into his chair, literally fell, wilted and withered within, mind-crushed by the scope and magnificence of the QX phenomenon.  It was dangerous, fatally dangerous, to expose one's self to it, even with the added layer of Vulcan protection boosted by Cytherian operational codes.  Once he tapped his complant in, just enough to get a glimpse – more than enough – it was almost too much.  It wasn't necessary, they told him; and because of the danger, inadvisable.  He didn't know what was wrong with him, what made him do it.  Maybe just the mystery – so mesmerizing.  Something he had only experienced once in a lifetime, which lasted an eternity, yet a lifetime ago, and a dream, no longer real... except for now, just now, for a few brief moments.  Tantalizingly brief.

April put a hand on his chest, and sat up slowly, grimacing with pain.  Like they said: a danger.  It could kill.

Before he could say anything, an internal, soundless voice he recognized as Tabatha Brisk's came through, confirmed by an eyeblink of photocommed data identifying her as the sender:

~I should have known you couldn't resist~, Brisk chastised him.  ~Feeling heart palpitations?~  Even as she said it, he felt the pain easing, lightening up, until it suddenly disappeared.  ~Don't worry; I've adjusted your nanomods.  Why do you do it, Stephen?~

~Do what~, he thought, but suspected he knew the answer.

~Make me warn you again, and again, about what I've warned you about too many times already.  Stop poking yourself into energy phenomena not meant for human experience!~  There came an impression of a sigh; April pictured Brisk in Sickbay, shaking her head, wondering why she put up with him.  ~I'll be monitoring you.  Brisk out.~

April turned to his XO's chair – currently occupied by the man who once was his XO, and formal captain of this ship, but was neither any longer: Jordan Rampart.

"Welcome to the 25th century, Admiral," Rampart said.

"And now what?"

Rampart stood up from the chair, preparing to beam out.  "Now, there'll be another admiral along shortly to explain to you what to do next, answer any questions you have... and then, you're all free to go on with your lives in this era.  Aboard this ship, or, if you choose something else."

April fostered him with a curious look.  "Why would you say that?"

Rampart shrugged.  "Why not?  It may be only twenty years, but... take a look at me.  I used to hate time-travel, and anything to do with time-travel."

April briefly ruminated: What had happened to Rampart on Cardassia, to engender such a life-shifting change in him?  Perhaps it would be in his Starfleet file, when he got around to reading it.  He said with a wry note, "And now you're a temporal agent."

"True... but I don't go hopping through history by choice.  My job is to make sure others don't, and don't screw it up when they do.  And, speaking of my job, it's time for me to get back to it.  But before I go – if you don't mind..."

April intuited his meaning, and turned to Vallien.  "Time to send the transmission, Lieutenant."

With a few quick glances and the touch of a holographic interface sensor over his console, Vallien signaled April.

April faced the holorecorder on his chairside console.  "This is Admiral Stephen April.  We've just arrived in the year 2407, having time-traveled into the future... to this time... by Starfleet order."  It was the same message he had received, from himself, a matter of mere hours ago.  "Since I've already seen this message, I'm now here, composing it, sending it back, so that I will..."  He paused.  "So that I'll see it and know what to do.  What must be done."  He paused again, murmured, "I feel like I'm talking to myself...."

Once he was finished, Rampart prepared to depart.

"Before you go," April stopped him, "one thing: Your wife, Vor'ana.  Where is she?  Can you answer that now?"

"She's around," Rampart said.

"Still married?"

Rampart gave April a grin, to let him know he was being friendly.  "We're... working on it.  Oh, and one word of advice: since you aren't the head of the Slipstream Program in this era... you might want to consider going back to Captain."

"I'll think about it."

"Good seeing you again.  All of you."  Rampart turned in a half-circle, gazing around the bridge.  His gaze settled briefly on Stasia Nyerko and Mala Hendriksson, two officers, among many, with whom he had become friends during his service aboard this ship.  To the perspective of most aboard Arcadia, he had only been gone a few hours.  To his perspective, he had not seen them, physically face to face, in years.  "Be careful in your brave, new world out there," Rampart said.  "It's a lot like the old one you left, just... not exactly."  At a mental command, he vanished, faster than the blink of an eye.