On Stardate 43745.2 Captain Picard was persuaded to take a holiday on the planet Raisa. Here he encountered Vash, a Human woman who was looking for the legendary Tox Utat. The Utat was said to have been left behind in the 22nd century by a visitor from five hundred years in the future. Vash had worked with Professor Samuel Estergon for five years on the search for the Utat. Shortly before his death Estergon had located information which pinpointed the Utats location. She claimed to be planning to donate the Utat to the Daystrom Institute. Unfortunately a Ferengi named Sovak was also after the Utat, claiming he had paid Vash to steal the information from Estergon.
Picard also met two individuals who claimed to be Vorgon security officers from the 27th century. They were looking for the Utat and had found records which said that Picard had found the device - a crystal fitting into the palm of the hand - on Raisa. The Vorgons explained that the Utat was a quantum phase inhibitor capable of stopping all nuclear reactions in an entire star. Some criminals had wanted to steal the Utat from its creator, Cal Deno, and he had been forced to hide it in the 22nd century to evade them.
Picard and Vash set off to look for the Utat, but both Sovak and the Vorgons followed them in order to get hold of the device. However, when they reached the Utats location they were unable to find it.
Back at the resort, Picard confronted Vash and made her admit that she had planned the whole thing in order to get hold of the Utat for herself. She found it before anybody else had arrived, and carried out an elaborate charade to convince everybody else that the Utat was still lost. Picard retrieved the Utat and was planning to give it to the Vorgons when Vash pointed out that they could well be the criminals who had attempted to steal it in the first place. The Vorgons attempted to take it from him by force, and Picard destroyed the Utat to prevent them.
Picard commented that the Vorgons could have simply returned to the past and tried to retrieve the Utat again, but Temporal Investigations stepped in and captured the criminals before they could make the attempt. The agency maintains a vigil on this event rder to prevent any further attempts to gain access to the Utat.
Typhon Expanse/45652.1/FI
This time loop was caused by an apparently natural phenomena located within the Typhon Expanse. In 2278 the USS Bozeman entered the expanse and encountered the anomaly; the ship was catapulted through time to the year 2268. At this time the Enterprise-D had just located the anomaly and was investigating; the Bozeman emerged her time trip on a collision course with the Enterprise, and despite the efforts of both ships the Bozeman struck the Enterprise's Starboard nacelle.
At the time the Enterprise was suffering a large scale power loss, and had no shields or structural integrity fields in place. The impact thus caused massive systems damage, resulting in a warp core breech. The energy release interacted with the anomaly, causing a 'temporal reset' which threw both ships back in space-time to their relative positions of about twenty four hours earlier. The whole situation then recycled itself over and over in a classic time loop, each time resetting with the destruction of the Enterprise-D.
As with all time loops, however, the reset was not perfect but rather involved small variations on the original situation. These variations were cumulative, and so gradually built up to the point where they fell within the range of conscious perception. The crew of the Enterprise-D experienced this distortion as an increasingly strong sense of Deja-Vu, which eventually became strong enough to cause them to investigate the situation. In addition, events of some preceding cycles intruded on the current cycle to a small degree - manifesting themselves as sounds of various kinds. The crew of the Enterprise was able to bring these clues together and use the information to avoid the impact with the Bozeman, breaking the loop after seventeen cycles.
The ultimate impact of the anomaly was to bring the Bozeman forward in time; Captain Bateson requested permission to return to his own time via a stellar slingshot, and his crew offered to undergo memory erasure in order to avoid Temporal Prime Directive concerns. However, detailed scanning indicated that the disappearance of the Bozeman was a part of the preferred timeline and so this request was denied. Captain Bateson and many of his crew continued to serve in Starfleet after undergoing re-training. The anomaly dissipated when the loop was broken; a class one probe remains in place at the location and has since detected no signs of a return.
Gamma Quadrant/50800/AT
In 2373 the USS Defiant was returning from a patrol mission in the Gamma Quadrant when it discovered a planet enclosed within some form of energy field. The ship passed through the field and discovered a colony of some 8,000 people on the surface. On beaming down, Captain Sisko was surprised to find that the colony was composed of the descendants of the Defiants crew! They told Sisko that when the ship took off in three days it would pass through an anomaly in the energy field which would throw it some 300 years into the past and disable the flight, causing it to crash. The survivors of the crash would found the colony.
Sisko was naturally reluctant to purposely crash his ship, but the colonists claimed to have a way to ensure that the energy field created a duplicate Defiant which would allow one version to crash and another to escape. However, it transpired that they were lying in order to ensure that the ship did in fact crash as it originally had. The crew initially wanted to leave the planet, but after spending some time with the locals they decided to go through with the crash in order to preserve the culture which had evolved there.
Unknownst to anybody in the colony or ship, Odo had decided to program the Defiants computer to avoid the anomaly. The Constable was in love with Kira Nerys, who had originally been killed after the crash. Odo was willing to sacrifice the 8,000 inhabitants in order to preserve her life. His plan worked, and the colony was erased from existence when the Defiant exited the energy field.
This event showed a large degree of poor thinking by the Defiants crew. Had the ship avoided the accident they would not be killing anybody as such; the colonists would never have existed in the first place. On the other hand, the very real friends and relatives of the Defiant crew would suffer from the loss of their comrades and loved ones. It was also suggested that account should be taken of those offspring who might be born to the crew if they continued with their normal lives, but this seemed to be a trivial concern next to those who were alive at that moment. Ultimately they decided that the loss of the Defiant was a price worth paying for preserving those lives.
Unfortunately, this fails to take into account the changes that had already been introduced. Given that the original crash was an accident, then the simple fact that the Defiant personnel were now aware of what was going to happen in the future would constitute more than enough change to create a timeline which would be significantly different. Once they had gained fore-knowledge of the accident, then the colony was essentially doomed no matter what happened and the best the Defiants crew could do would be to create a somewhat similar colony. However, in doing this they were essentially sacrificing real lives for hypothetical future lives - exactly the action that they had decided was not worthwhile earlier.
Temporal Investigations investigated this matter thoroughly and decided that no censure of the crew was needed, although Captain Sisko was required to take a refresher course in temporal logic. No further action has been taken and the case file has been closed.
Alpha Quadrant/ 3242.8/AT
This case file predates the creation of the Temporal Investigation Agency by several years, and so there is limited information available. The logs of the Starship Enterprise NCC 1701 indicate that whilst the ship investigating unusual temporal phenomena the ships Doctor, Leonard McCoy, was accidentally injected with a massive overdose of cordrazine. Suffering from paranoid delusions as a result, he beamed down to the alien planet which was the source of the phenomena. The landing party which persued him discovered what appeared to be an ancient artefact capable of transporting objects through large amounts of both time and space. The artefact appeared to be sentient; in response to their voices it explained that it had been waiting for "a question... since before your sun burned hot in space and before your race was born" - a period of at least five billion years. The artefact called itself the Guardian of Forever, a gateway to other times and places.
Whilst the landing party was distracted McCoy entered the device and was transported to 1930's Earth. His actions there created an alternate timeline which differed from the preferred one in many respects; most notably, the Federation was never created in this timeline. The landing party was isolated from these changes, apparently as a result of their proximity to the artefact.
The Enterprise Captain, James T. Kirk, and the science officer Spock followed McCoy, emerging some weeks before him. They were able to use tricorder records of the Guardian to discover the key event which McCoy had altered - he had saved the life of a woman named Edith Keeler, who had gone on to prevent US entry into World War II. Germany thus developed atomic weapons first and conquered the world with them. In the preferred timeline the war was followed by decades of fierce international technological competition which, amongst other things, resulted in the development of space flight. Temporal scanning has shown that in the altered timeline the world-spanning German Empire lacked any such motivations, and so never pushed out into space.
Although Kirk's logs do not describe his time on Earth in any detail, it is widely rumoured that he developed considerable personal feelings for Edith Keeler. Nevertheless, when he located McCoy he prevented him from saving her life.
The very presence of the three officers in the past would normally mean that the original timeline would not be perfectly restored. Temporal scanning has proved that at least one other resident of Earth died as a direct result of McCoys arrival, when he stole the Doctors phaser and accidentally activated it. Many other minor changes would also have been introduced as a matter of course. However, the Guradian indicated to Kirk that all aspects of the original timeline had been restored after his arrival. Detailed temporal scanning has indicated that the events of this trip into the past had an overall zero impact - something that is normally conisdered impossible. There is as yet no satisfactory explanation for this, although many suspect that the Guardian itself could have somehow "repaired" the timeline.
Considerable study has been made of the Guardian of Forever over the last century. Unfortunately, the object still defies all analysis. Despite decades of exhaustive scanning no mechanisms have ever been discovered within the Guardians structure; it appears to have nothing remotely similar to information processing systems or moving parts, nor any kind of any generation system - although it must be able to generate and control massive amounts of energy in order to do what it does. The Guardian itself is quite willing to converse with researchers, but maintains that its operating principles are beyond our comprehension.
Alpha-Delta Quadrant/79900/AT
On the tenth anniversary of the U.S.S. Voyager's return to Earth in 2393, Admiral Janeway embarked on a conspiracy to alter the timeline in order to return the ship to the Alpha Quadrant early. Janeway was dissatisfied with the way in which events had unfolded on Voyager; in the original timeline her close friend Seven of Nine had died in 2380 after being injured on an away mission. Seven's husband Chakotay had been grief-stricken by the loss and had never fully recovered. Commander Tuvok also did not fare well in this timeline; he developed a neurological condition in 2377 which could only be cured by a mind meld with a compatible Vulcan. Since none were available in the Delta Quadrant, Tuvok's condition gradually worsened until he was largely incoherent.
Twenty two Voyager crew members had been killed between 2377 and the ship's arrival at Earth, and although most of the crew went on to live happy lives Admiral Janeway had become a much more cynical person after the journey.
She acquired a tachyon projector from the Klingon government through Ensign Miral Paris, daughter of Voyager crew members Tom and B'Elanna Paris, and a supply of the drug chronexaline from Joe, the Voyager EMH, in order to allow her to survive using the device to go back in time.
Before she could go back in time the USS Rhode Island, a Nova class vessel under the command of Captain Harry Kim, apprehended Admiral Janeway but she was able to convince Kim to allow her to proceed with her plan. Janeway successfully travelled back to 2377 and met with Voyager. She gave the ship complete access to the technology of her shuttle, including transphasic torpedoes and the ablative armour generator.
Using this technology Voyager penetrated a nebula in which they had previously detected dozens of wormholes. They had investigated the nebula only to find dozens of Borg vessels there, and had rapidly retreated. Now fitted with technology twenty five years in advance of their own, Voyager was able to batter her way through the Borg and reach the centre of the nebula. There they found not wormholes, but a transwarp hub - a set of gateways into transwarp conduits which allowed the Borg to reach any part of the galaxy in just minutes.
Realizing that Admiral Janeway had lied to her, Captain Janeway withdrew from the nebula. Despite her older self's advice, Janeway decided to destroy the transwarp hub whilst within the conduit in an attempt to both reach home and deny the Borg further use of the network. The two Janeway's hatched a plan by which they could do this; the Admiral infected herself with a neurolytic pathogen and allowed the Borg Queen to assimilate her whilst Voyager returned to the transwarp hub and headed for Earth. With the Queen destroyed and her Unicomplex damaged, Voyager was able to successfully destroy the hub whilst heading for Earth.
Unfortunately, a Borg sphere managed to catch up with the Starship. Captain Janeway allowed it to bring Voyager aboard, riding ahead of the shock wave all the way back to the Alpha Quadrant inside the sphere. Once clear of the conduit, Janeway destroyed the sphere from the inside and sailed clear of the wreckage to be greeted by a Federation fleet.
Although Admiral Janeway's actions were clearly illegal and immoral, her plan brought Voyager to Earth sixteen years early, allowed Tuvok the chance to seek treatment for his condition before it could become serious, saved the life of Seven of Nine and twenty one other crew members, and gave the Federation technology that has put it decades ahead of the other major Alpha Quadrant powers. As such, it can only be called a success.
Delta Quadrant/48579.4/P-FIvW
In 2371 the Federation Intrepid class Starship Voyager was abducted by an alien being known as the Caretaker and deposited in the Delta Quadrant. The ship has been attempting to return home ever since via normal travel methods, but in addition they crew have been investigating various forms of spatial anomaly and unique technologies.
Some weeks after arriving in the quadrant, the ship encountered a wormhole which could possibly have offered them a way home. Initial investigation proved disappointing - the wormhole was in its final stages of collapse, only centimetres across. However, a small probe was able to penetrate deeply enough to broadcast a message through to the other side. The far endpoint was in Sector 1385 of the Alpha Quadrant, in Romulan space. A Romulan vessel picked up Voyagers transmissions and two way communication was soon established. Voyager was eventually successful in modifying the transporters to allow beaming through the wormhole, and a Romulan officer was brought on board. Unfortunately, it was discovered that the wormhole also had a temporal displacement - the Romulan end was located in 2351. The Romulan crewman was returned with messages from Voyagers crew, to be delivered to Starfleet shortly after the ships disappearance. Unfortunately, Voyagers records indicated that the officer died in 2367 and was unable to send the messages.
Devron System/47988.1/ICMUT
Encounters with the mysterious and powerful species known as the Q tend to consist of more questions than answers, and this case is no exception. Since first contact with the Q in 2364 one particular member of the continuum has shown considerable interest in the USS Enterprise crew in general and Captain Picard in particular. In that first encounter, Q put Picard and his crew on trial for the crimes of Humanity; at the time it appeared that they had been exonerated of those crimes, but in 2370 the Q apparently decided to subject Humanity to further testing.
Details of the events are incomplete, but it appears that the Q created at least two alternate versions of history then caused Captain Picard to shift between the present and these two periods at random. One was a perfect copy of the preferred timeline as of Stardate 41124, shortly before Captain Picard took command of the USS Enterprise. However, the timeline did not develop as it should have - an emergency developed regarding an anomaly in the Devron system, causing the Enterprise to be ordered to divert from its Farpoint mission. Picard ordered the ship to proceed on its original assignment, but failed to make contact with Q as he had in his own past.
The other timeline was a version of an unspecified future period apparently derived from the preferred timeline. This future had some interesting changes from the present - the Klingons had taken control of the Romulan Empire and abolished the neutral zone, relations between the Klingons and the Federation had deteriorated almost to the point of open conflict, Deanna Troi had died, causing a rift between Commander Riker and Lieutenant Worf. The former had remained in Starfleet and progressed to Admiral, while the latter had left and become governor of a Klingon colony. In this timeline Picard had become an ambassador before retiring, and had finally begun to develop a medical condition which caused his thought processes to deteriorate.
All three timelines appear to have been partially discontinuous, with the majority - but not all - of the events in any one timeline having little or no impact on the others. This is a direct violation of both temporal physics and common sense, and it appears that Q was deliberately controlling these events at his own whim. Whilst Picard was struggling to understand the events he was now caught up in, Q issued a stark warning - the trial of Humanity had been carrying on all these years, and had resulted in a guilty verdict. Not only would Humanity be denied existence, but the Captains own actions would cause the destruction.
The one common thread between the three periods was the Devron system, a planetary system in the Neutral Zone. In both the past and present Starfleet ordered a fleet to the area after detecting an anomaly there, and in both cases Picard took the Enterprise to the system and initiated a tachyon scan of the area. In the future he had a little more trouble, but did convince Captain Beverly Picard to take the USS Pasteur to the system and also initiate a tachyon scan. The combination of three beams on one point in three different timelines apparently caused a time/anti-time rift which expanded as it moved back in time.
Q took Picard to Earth three billion years ago, when the anomaly covered a large section of the galaxy. The disruption caused to organic matter by the anomaly prevented the formation of life on Earth, destroying Humanity before it had ever existed. Although Picard ordered the beams shut off as soon as he could, the damage was done. Fortunately, Data suggested that the rift could be healed if the Enterprise-D's from each timeline co-operated in generating static warp shells. All three ships proceeded into the rift and attempted to seal the anomaly. Two versions of the ship were destroyed in the attempt, but the third survived just long enough to repair the damage.
Q revealed to Picard that the entire affair had been arranged as a test, to see if he could comprehend the nature of the paradox involving the anomaly. By resolving the situation Picard had shown that Humanity had potential for considerable future growth and understanding of "the unlimited possibilities of existence", as Q called it.
Much about the affair remains a mystery, but given the nature of the Q it is far from certain that any aspect of these events will - or can - be resolved satisfactorily. Detailed temporal scanning has revealed that the future timeline was a viable event sequence, but since events have already moved down a considerably different path it appears that this future is not a part of the preferred timeline. The past timeline appears to have been identical to the preferred timeline up to the moment of Picards interventions, but appears to be entirely discontinuous from our own present.
The situation appears to have been satisfactorily resolved by Captain Picard and although the file will remain open while so many unanswered questions remain, no further action is contemplated at the present.
PentharaIV/45349.1/P-FTI
While attempting to correct the ecological damage wrought by an asteroid impact, the Enterprise-D was visited by a time pod from the 26th century. The pilot, one Professor Berlinghoff Rasmussen, claimed to be a historian conducting research into the Enterprise's role in the Penthara IV situation. He stayed on board the ship for two days, interviewing several of the senior officers and passing around detailed questionnaires. Rasmussen declined all invitations to comment on the success or failure of the Enterprise's efforts on Penthara IV or other present day events.
During the mission, the Enterprise drilled into several large pockets of carbon dioxide on the planets surface in order to boost the greenhouse effect. Unfortunately, the crust around the drill sites became unstable and extensive volcanic activity threw a great deal of dust into the atmosphere, compounding the original problem. It was suggested that the Enterprise could use the navigational deflector to place a charge on the debris in the atmosphere and then use the ships shields to act as a 'lightning rod', drawing the debris out of the atmosphere and into space. Unfortunately, calculations indicated that there was relatively little margin for error in the procedure - and should the procedure fail, there would be a cascade reaction in the atmosphere which would destroy all life on the planet.
Captain Picard again asked Rasmussen for some clue as to the eventual outcome, and was declined. He proceeded with the attempt anyway, and was successful in clearing the debris from the atmosphere.
Subsequently it was learned that Professor Rasmussen had been stealing various items of technology from the Enterprise; Captain Picard ordered Lieutenant Commander Data to accompany the Professor into his time pod in order to establish his guilt or innocence. Once inside, Rasmussen revealed that he was in fact from the 22nd century, where he had killed a genuine time traveller and stolen the time pod. Rasmussen was arrested and placed in the brig, and subsequently sent to a Starbase for trial.
Temporal scanning determined that Rasmussen had indeed vanished without trace from the preferred timeline in the 22nd century. Temporal Investigations therefore allowed him to remain in the present, where he has now been released from his rehabilitation centre and become a unique source of information for historians.
