What have we done?

[WxMurray 0]

What have we done?

 

In the original history, Captain Kirk and Company make it through Klingon space to Khitomer. They and the USS Excelsor fight one Klingon Bird of Prey, looking to disrupt the peace conference, and they prevent the death and destruction the ironic Starfleet-Klingon rebel alliance had planned to create. There was just one ship.

 

What have we done?

 

The history they were currently watching had a new twist. Four cloaked Klingon ships. They weren't just any cloaked Klingon ships. These ships were heading for Khitomer. Five Klingons. One Constitution refit, one Excelsior. Both ships took plenty of damage as it was from General Chang's souped-up rebel Bird of Prey. There was absolutely no way that either, let alone both, would survive the attack of five Klingon ships. Kirk, Spock, Sulu, McCoy...they would all die. The dignitaries on Khitomer would soon follow. A deadly, lengthy war would come next.

 

What have we done?

 

It's one thing to be able to watch history unfold. It's quite another to be a participant. In this case, history wasn't so much unfolding as it was unraveling. Coming undone. It was like one of those little threads you find on the hem of a shirt – it seems harmless, but the more you tug at it, the more that keeps unraveling. And you keep tugging, trying to just cut it off and minimize the damage, but that thread goes on seemingly forever. And soon you're standing in a pile of thread. It used to resemble something, but you've just pulled it apart bit by bit. Now it's unrecognizable. Maybe you can put it back together, but there will always be that telltale sign that you starting pulling on something, and it snowballed into near-disaster.

 

As Murray stood at his console, his mind reflected on their actions since they had arrived at this location in time. As far as he knew, the Reaent hadn't done anything to change the course of history. They had held back, found the nearest dark corner of space and hid in it. Nothing could possibly go wrong...right? Except it had. They had done something, even nothing, and it was just the impetus that the thread needed to start unraveling the shirt around them. In history, people had often tossed about the idea of the “butterfly effect” - every action, no matter how trivial or insignificant, has a serious of subsequent consequences. Perhaps simply by being in Klingon space, they had set off a chain reaction that caused four Klingon attack cruisers to take aim for Khitomer. Perhaps the Reaent had actually been detected, but rather than investigate, the Klingons decided that they were under attack by the Federation; and rather than go after the guppy, they went after the bigger, more impressive fish in the sea – Kirk's Enterprise at Khitomer.

 

What have we done?

 

And what do we do now?