He shook his head.  “No, she’s from the past.  A few years after the first Enterprise was launched.  The craft she was in didn’t even have a Warp Five engine, but it did match with a ship from that era.”

Kara looked at him and frowned.  “Warp Five engine?  I thought a Constitution class could go to warp seven.”

He frowned at her, then realized what she meant.  “Well, aren’t we rusty on history.  I’m talking about the first Starfleet starship, not even a USS attached to it.  Enterprise, NX-01.”

She frowned, then realization coursed over her face.  “Ah, yes, I seem to remember reading about that now.”

He took one last look at the beautiful face, then turned around and headed for the exit.  “Keep her sedated for now, we’ll figure out what to do with her later.”

“Aye, sir.”

Vendar let herself basically fall into the couch of the Mess Hall, her mind exhausted.  She didn’t even look at the data PADD she held in her hand…  She pulled her legs in under her and leaned back, wishing above all that the couch had a higher back.  Her couch in her quarters did…but if she went there, she knew she’d probably fall asleep.

For the past two hours she had reviewed all sensor data taken from the anomaly as well as the sensor data Kalia had sent her.  Kalia hadn’t finished her scans yet, but so far it didn’t look like the problem was in the warp system at all…

Ok she thought to herself.  You can do this…just concentrate!

Lately, that hadn’t been much of a problem for her.  Thanks to people’s efforts at Starfleet medical, she was feeling fine…

She sighed quietly before she finally lifted her head back up…and brought herself to look at the data PADD.

OK…what’s odd about this temporal anomaly…what makes it different from all of the others?

She shook her head slowly, realizing that almost every temporal anomaly was different.  So let’s identify those differences and see if they could be the cause.  Tachyon emissions were in bursts, not the standard emissions we usually see that are constant or fluctuating.

She thought further about that fact.  Never had Starfleet recorded tachyon emissions as bursts coming from an anomaly…so what did this mean about the anomaly?  Was it unstable for some reason?  Most temporal anomalies are, in one fashion or another…

Was that the answer?  Just how was this anomaly unstable?  Well…let’s look at some of its other properties.

The size wasn’t that large at all…in fact, it was one of the smaller ones that was ever recorded.  The one in the Kalium galaxy was absolutely huge, no correlation there.  The temporal vortex created by the Borg was very stable…the only time it created bursts of tachyon emissions instead of a stream was when it was being created, so that was to be expected.

It wasn’t a rift, either…or at least, not like the one the Enterprise D had once catalogued.  Rifts were like wormholes…they had a certain ‘opening’ where ships would have to pass through…trying to enter it from any other direction could have…who knows what kinds of consequences.

Another unique aspect was that the anomaly wasn’t spatially based…it was locally based somehow.  In both times, it was in the same location in the upper atmosphere of Earth…  So what did that mean?

That’s when it hit her…was it possible there was some sort of spatial variance that the anomaly caused?  Something even focused scans couldn’t detect?

She stood up slowly, her mind racing with that possibility.  Not just spatial, but temporal as well…  It had never been a problem with anomalies before…but considering the fact that the anomaly caused bursts instead of a stream of tachyon particles, it was very possible…

She quickly moved towards the exit, tapping her comm. badge.  “Perkins to Sall…I might have a solution in the works here!”

There he is! Tom thought, finally seeing where Chris was.  He smiled as he moved with quick strides in the direction.

Then he realized just what Chris was doing.  He was sitting on the edge of the cliff, facing the Dragon in the valley below…and he appeared to be meditating!

His steps slowed…he didn’t want to disturb him…but he had to tell him the news!

When he was about five meters away, he stopped and stared at him for a moment.  He seemed at peace there…with the valley and graceful ship giving him a beautiful panoramic view.

Chris turned around quickly, startled…then relieved to see it was only him.  “Hey, Tom,” he said quietly, blinking hard.  He smiled easily and pushed himself off of the stone ground.  “What’s up?”

This was a side of him Tom hadn’t seen very often since their days aboard the Enterprise.  He was at ease…something he usually wasn’t during a crisis.

Tom caught himself and shook his head.  “Sorry,” he said, smiling.  “Ummm…Vendar discovered a way to restore power.  Apparently there’s a spatial and temporal differential caused when we went through the anomaly.  We can compensate…but the problem is, we can’t fully compensate.”

Chris frowned questioningly.  “What do you mean?”

“We can’t restore full power…but just enough to get us back up to the anomaly.”  He chose his words carefully.  “That is…if we are lucky.  We might have enough power to get back up to the anomaly.  If we don’t, and we get too close to the anomaly, there’s a possibility that the differential could change…and we’d instantly lose power again, sending us crashing completely out of control towards Earth.”

Chris half smiled.  “Damn, you sure are good at giving too many bad details.”

Tom let out a light laugh.  “Well, then, to make things seem better, if we have enough power, we’ll get home, spend a week in dry dock, and be in space again!”

“Oh, well, that makes things different.”  He grinned easily, then tapped his comm. badge.  “Harriman to Dragon, beam Commander Halkrat and myself directly to the bridge.”

Minutes later, he was in the first officer’s chair next to Chris, his console showing him that they were already set for lift off.

This is it, he thought, trepidation overtaking his thoughts.  Please, please let us live through this!

He keyed in a few commands…then looked over to Chris, who nodded to him.

“All hands, this is the Captain.”  He paused.  “Go to condition blue…prepare for lift off.”

Yet again, several bulkhead panels on the bridge turned a blue color, giving the bridge an even darker, ominous tone.

“Main power is as high as it’ll go,” Vendar stated from her station in the back.  “I can’t guarantee that we’ll make it…but we have a good chance.”

Chris stood up and quickly moved to the helm, relieving the ensign yet again.  He keyed in a few commands…then turned around to look at Tom as well as Vendar behind him.

Tom nodded his encouragement to him…and he smiled and nodded back.  He swiveled back around, then stated, “Engaging lateral thrusters…”

The ship started to shudder for a moment, enhancing Tom’s anxiety.  For a moment, he wondered if they would lift off.  The ship’s shuddering increased…but a moment later, they finally began to lift off.

The valley started to ‘fall’ from his view, and within moments, they were above the hills and cliffs.

The ship quickly started gaining forward momentum, Chris seeming to decide immediately that momentum would be the best way to get there, not sheer strength.  They soared over the open hills and formations, seemingly unstoppable.

With a grace only precision could make, the ship banked to port, and after a large, close to one-eighty degree turn, they leveled out…and started to climb.  Ahead, through the light cirrus overcast, Tom could see the anomaly.  It blended in quite well with the sky, being blue…but because of bursts of white energy, it set itself apart through movement alone.

“Impulse engines are at maximum power,” Chris said.  “I don’t know if we have enough momentum or not.”

“Power is too erratic to tell,” Vendar added.  “I won’t know till we actually get to the anomaly.”

“Five minutes until we reach the anomaly,” Chris reported.  “I hope…”

Tom noted on his console that power was fluctuating the closer they got to the anomaly…but it was so minor that he wouldn’t have noticed it had it not been for the computer.  Most of the power reserves were being routed through the impulse engines…but that very well might not be enough.

He looked up from his console to see they were already passing by the cirrus clouds, their crystallized moisture no match against the Dragon’s deflector field.  The sky was quickly turning a darker blue as they had already left the lower atmosphere.  There were fewer and fewer particles of air to resist them…but momentum alone was the only thing keeping them going, and the power fluctuations were getting worse.

He noted that, as expected, impulse power was now below the amount it would need to break Earth’s gravity well…even if only by a little bit.  It was expected…and it was at the time they thought it would happen…which meant they were still unsure as to whether or not they would make it.

The ship started to slow drastically as fluctuations in main power started to increase seemingly exponentially.  That was happening far too soon…

He looked up, and was shocked to see just how close they had come to the anomaly…but knew that it was too late.

Suddenly, the ship jolted hard, sending him out of his seat for a moment, and causing him to land back in it hard.  That was not where it ended, either.  The ship bucked and heaved in all directions.

The lights suddenly dimmed dramatically as his console started to blink on and off.  Everything on the bridge was blinking on and off, everything but the view screen, which displayed the horror in every detail.  The anomaly could be seen as a bright blue blur while stars streaked by…and dominating much of the picture was the Earth’s ocean.

“Main power is offline!” Vendar reported, her voice strained as she tried to hold onto her console.  “Auxiliary power is already failing!”

The bucking and heaving let up, leaving behind only shuddering.  “I’ve lost all power to the thrusters!” Chris said.

That’s when Tom looked up again from his console, getting nothing from it.  The view screen was still somehow active, as were visual sensors…giving him a horrific view of their fate.  They had just passed through a layer of clouds…and were screaming straight towards the ocean.

He started to stand up slowly from his chair as the bridge took on a silence like never before…but that silence was short lived, for they were going past the sound barrier…and those clouds were low.

He suddenly flew forward towards the view screen at an incomprehensible speed…and a moment later, darkness…

K’Taul was looking frantically over the data, realizing that his ship might already be on its way to its grave…

The ship took off…gained momentum…pulled up and attempted to reach the anomaly again.  The spatial and temporal shielding couldn’t compensate at that close range, and the ship drastically lost power.  Then main power went offline…and right before the ship plowed into the ocean, auxiliary power went offline, as did all sensors.

Apparently, the Admiral had also just read over the data in the XO’s chair.  “So what can we do to prevent this from happening again?”