“Very well,” the ensign said. “I’ll inform her as soon as she’s out of her meeting.”

“Pardon me,” Kirk said, “but do you have any idea when that will be?”

The ensign glanced away from the screen for a moment, doubtless consulting a chronometer. “In just a few minutes,” she said.

“Then if it’s all right with you, Ensign,” Kirk said, “I’d like to wait.”

“Very well,” she said. “Is there anything else, Captain?”

“No, that’s it,” Kirk said. “Thank you, Ensign.”

“My pleasure, Captain,” she said. “I’ll place you on standby then.” Kirk nodded, and the ensign reached forward to a control. The Starfleet emblem returned to the display. This time, beneath it, read the words:

OFFICE OF ADMIRAL MARGARET SINCLAIR

-ALEXANDER, STARFLEET COMMANDENSIGN ELISA TEAGARDEN, ASSISTANT TO THE ADMIRAL

Teagarden, Kirk thought, remembering the name once he saw it. He waited for eleven minutes before the ensign’s face reappeared on the monitor. “Captain Kirk,” she said, “the admiral will speak with you now.”

“Thank you,” Kirk said, and then Sinclair-Alexander’s face replaced Teagarden’s on the screen.

“Jim,” she said at once, “please don’t tell me you’re canceling for the Enterprise ceremony tomorrow.”

“No, against my better judgment, I’m still planning on being there,” Kirk said, hopeful that the admiral’s concern and her awareness of his reluctance would make her more receptive to granting the request he would now make of her. “Unless there’s some reason that you think I shouldn’t,” he japed.

“No, no, not at all,” Sinclair-Alexander said. “Forget I even mentioned it. So what can I do for you, Jim? Ensign Teagarden said that you did want to talk about the launch.”

“Not precisely about the launch,” Kirk allowed. “But you promised me a tour of the ship tomorrow.”

“That’s right,” the admiral said. “Is there a problem with that?”

Kirk recalled the meeting he’d had with Sinclair-Alexander when she’d asked him to attend the launch and first voyage of the Enterprise-B, a meeting she’d had with his earlier self just a few days ago. “Actually, I’m looking forward to seeing the ship,” he said. “I’m just not much interested in being rushed through it with the press at my heels or being ushered around like a plebe who’s never seen the inside of a starship before.”

“Jim, the whole point of having you on board the Enterprise is for the positive public relations,” Sinclair-Alexander said. “It really would be counterproductive to that end to bar the press from accompanying you on your tour.”

Kirk had not only anticipated such a response, he’d counted on it. “What about a separate tour?” he asked.

“The schedule is very tight tomorrow,” said the admiral. “I’m not sure that we could fit anything more in.”

“That’s why I was thinking that I could do it today,” Kirk said. “I mean, I’ll still go with Scotty and Chekov through the ship tomorrow for the sake of the publicity, but if I went up today, I could take my time and really get a good look around.”

“We’ve only got a handful of personnel on board right now,” Sinclair-Alexander said, “and most of them are engineers trying to get the ship ready for the launch. You’d really have to be on your own.”

“That’d be perfect,” Kirk said. Although he could have accomplished what he needed to with an escort by his side, not having one would make his task easier.

“All right,” the admiral said. “Let me get you reactivated today then.” She looked away for a second, then asked, “How does noon sound?”

“That’ll be fine,” Kirk said.

“You can report to any of the transporters here at Starfleet; they’ll send you up,” Sinclair-Alexander said. “I’ll inform the officer of the deck that you’ll be coming. Anything else?”

“That’s it, Admiral. Thank you,” Kirk said. “It should be interesting.”

“Enjoy yourself, Jim,” Sinclair-Alexander said. She touched a control and the Starfleet insignia showed once more, then disappeared in favor of the Earth comnet logo.

As Kirk reached to shut down the terminal, he suddenly saw a light flashing on the console, indicating that he-or rather, his counterpart-had received a message. He thought back to the day before the Enterprise-B ceremony, to when he’d gone orbital skydiving, and he tried to remember whom he’d heard from when he’d gotten home that night. Unable to recall a single message from that day, he quickly tapped a button to play it. When the sender’s face appeared on the display, Kirk felt his mouth drop open.

“Hi, Jim,” said Antonia.

To Kirk, she looked much the same as when last he’d seen her, which had been when she’d walked out of his vacation home up in Canada. The lines around her mouth had grown more defined and a few wrinkles had begun to show at the sides of her eyes, but she still wore her hair long and looked as attractive as ever. It stunned him to see her.

As though reading his thoughts, the recorded image of Antonia said, “You’re probably as surprised to hear from me as I am to be leaving this message.” She smiled with obvious nervousness. “No, that’s not the case. I do know why I’m contacting you. I read that Starfleet was sending out a new starship Enterprise tomorrow and that you would be coming out of your second retirement for a day to preside over the christening ceremony and then to go aboard for its first voyage.”

Antonia paused, a pensive looking coming over her. “I didn’t know that you’d retired again,” she said. “I did know that, not long after you went back to Starfleet the last time, you helped save my life and billions of others from that probe that wanted to communicate with humpback whales. I also knew that, after that, you went back to command the Enterprise again for quite a few years.”

Again she hesitated, for longer this time. Finally, she shrugged. “Even if you’re not in space regularly these days, it seems pretty clear that you belong up there. Anyway, I think I know how much the Enterprise meant to you, and I’m guessing that placing this new ship in the care of another captain might be difficult for you. I just wanted you to know…I just wanted to wish you well tomorrow. Take care, Jim.”

Kirk watched Antonia’s face blink from the screen, and then he pushed back from the computer terminal, stood up, and paced across the room, driven by both shock and bewilderment. At the floor-to-ceiling windows, he peered out at the waters of San Francisco Bay. On one level, it delighted him to have heard from his former lover, who seemed to have forgiven him his transgressions against her, even if she hadn’t said so outright. How else could he explain her contacting him for the first time in nearly nine years?

At the same time, Kirk knew that, in the course of his own life leading up to the launch of the Enterprise-B, he had never received a message from Antonia. Did that mean that he’d already somehow altered the timeline in his efforts to prevent the converging temporal loop? But how? He’d only been in this time a few days, almost all of which he’d spent alone up at his property in Idaho.

Deeply concerned, Kirk thought back to the first instance when he’d lived through this day. He’d left his apartment early in the morning to meet Scotty and Chekov in Wichita, Kansas, where they’d surveyed his landing site outside the city. After that, he’d traveled alone to Tunis, where he’d executed a simulated descent before transporting up to the orbital platform from which he would perform his actual dive. After checking and donning his equipment, he’d then made his jump, ultimately landing in Kansas in the late afternoon. After verifying his safe landing with the team aboard the orbital platform, he had eaten dinner with Scotty and Chekov in Wichita. They’d enjoyed one another’s company, sharing stories of their shared experiences over the years. Afterward, they’d gone out for a drink and continued reminiscing.