Captain's Log: Stardate...I don't know what stardate it is.

In fact, the constellations themselves are completely unrecognizable.  It has been a full week, to the best of my estimation, since my last log entry.  I am keeping this record in the event that if I fail, at least someone, be it enemy or ally, will know my fate.  It has now been two weeks since I left the elves at Lothlorien, hopefully, I made good use of my time there.  I only have about one week of rations left and the lembas sustains me better than any StarFleet ration.

The ring that I made in Lothlorien grows heavy around my neck.  This magic, of which I have recently become a scholar, is a strange thing.  It is almost completely illogical, Spock would say.  At times I am tempted to try my ring, but I know that if I use it before its time all will certainly be lost.  The elves did not like the fact that I forged it.  They liked it even less that I kept its purpose known only to me, but they had no choice.  I convinced them that Gandalf would see the wisdom in what I was trying to do. 

Speaking of Gandalf, I had another talk with Celeborn.  His scouts brought news that he was indeed still alive.  Galadriel convinced me that I saw another one of his order die in his place.  I am still not entirely sure how that happened, but I can add that to the bottom of the list of things that I'm not sure about.  I'm finding it hard to concentrate...the ring....the ring.  The eye is searching but I am still hid...what was I writing about.  Ah!  Gandalf!  Celeborn's scouts have brought news that Gandalf has been weakened somehow and in his weakened state a terrible spell has been placed on him causing him to turn evil (been there myself once upon a time...not pleasant).  The traitor wizard Saruman is the cause.  He is holed up in a fortress named Orthanc at Isengard.  The elves have given me a map, but I think that the landscape has changed much in the last few weeks.  Much of the land is dense jungle, where the map says there were plains.  And I have had run-ins with what could only be dinosaurs, and managed to outrun Other Things which I don't wish to write about now.  As best as I can figure it, I'm a few days away from Orthanc at most.  Whether or not I am the equal of this Saruman, time will tell, but I know that my destiny lies with that course.  Galadriel believes that without Gandalf's guidance we are all lost, I tend to agree with her.  Kirk out.

  Kirk carefully rolled up the elven scroll and stowed the silver pen inside it.  He stowed them both in his pack, picked up his walking stick – a tall gnarled piece of yew wood he’d carved from a small sapling – and set out.  He smirked a little.  That staff in hand, in the clothes the elves had given him, and with his cloak of many colors...his own crew wouldn’t know him. 

  One thing was sure.  He knew the direction he was heading in was the right one.  Something inside him, more than intuition, told him so.  Was it Saruman’s magic?  He couldn’t be sure.

  The hair raised on the back of his neck.  He was being watched...and followed.  Well so long as it wasn’t any more of those Things, and they let him about his business, he didn’t care.  He had too much to do and too little time to investigate every curiosity along his path.

  Kirk took another step and felt something tap his walking stick.  He looked.  A black-feathered arrow protruded from the wood.  Kirk looked up just in time to see three others coming his way.  He instinctively knew he wouldn’t be able to get out of the way.  He was going to die...mission unfulfilled.

  Kirk took another step and felt something tap his walking stick.  This time he was ready.  Not only did he see the orc that shot the arrow.  Being unstuck in time did have its uses after all.  He could see the orc’s companions, a full company at least, hiding just beyond the tree line.  He bent down nonchalantly, neatly dodged the other three oncoming arrows, and picked up a fist-sized rock.  He brought the stone to his lips and muttered a short incantation, “Vas Por Flam”.  He tossed the stone straight up into the air, and with flair only James Tiberius Kirk could pull off, smacked it with his walking stick like it was a baseball.  Only it wasn’t a baseball.  The rock had scarcely begun its upward arc before it had metamorphosed into a fiery conflagration.  It smacked down into the midst of the orcs, sending a showering plume of terrific sparks into all of them and setting the jungle ablaze.  This is really getting too easy...Kirk thought.  His sense of fairness was a little hurt.  But only a little...the orcs regrouped very quickly.  And soon they were on him.

  He drew the sword he had forged, Glamcrist, the foe-cleaver, and put his skills to use.  He was in the finest physical condition of his life.  He had left Lothlorien in as good a shape as he ever had been, but the two-week hike had stripped him of any remaining weakness.  The same could not be said for the orcs.  They had been on garrison duty too long and grown soft.  On top of that, they had never encountered a master swordsman like Kirk had become, nor had they ever heard of StarFleet judo.  Soon a neat two dozen lay dead or dying at Kirk’s feet.  The orcs knew they were in trouble.

  One of the orcs, Grimha, brought a horn to his lips and blew three shrill blasts.  Now Kirk could see large things moving from the trees towards him.  From their appearance and the stories he’d heard he guessed they were trolls....and there were more orcs too.  Kirk’s sense of fair play was now fully recovered and satisfied.  He readied another spell.

  But he never got the chance to utter a word of it.

  The trees all around him burst to life as humans in camouflage burst from them, sending a hail of arrows into the orcs and trolls.  From their flank, horses burst from the jungle, their riders shrieking like mad horrible valkries come to claim the souls of the damned.  The horses were large and strong, Clydesdales, or something like them, and they trampled many an orc underfoot as the riders hacked and slew the others.  In a few minutes it was over. 

  Soon the only the sound of the horses and of the men dispatching the wounded remained.  The lead rider stopped in front of Kirk.  Kirk was a bit surprised to see a woman.  She spoke in a manner of one accustomed to the rigors of command.

  “I am the Lady Eowyn of the Mark, Kin to King Theoden, and leader of the Riders of Rohan!  Declare yourself friend or foe to be treated as either.  But be warned, if you prove to be a foe, know this, I have slain the WitchKing of Angmar once, and I suffer no fear to slay thee.”

  Kirk replied trying to imitate their speech, “Fear not fair lady.  I am most assuredly a friend of any who would dispatch the Enemy’s minions with such skill.  I am Captain James T.  Kirk of StarFleet, I am on an urgent mission.”

  At the mention of Kirk’s name a great murmur went up among the riders and men.  Kirk caught snippets of their words.  “..the hope of Gondor...” –  “we are saved...Sauron’s bane is come.”  Eowyn silenced them with her hand.

  “You are known to us in legend Kirk.  What is thy quest?”

  “I seek Saruman of Many Colours.  He has befouled Gandalf.  I must convince him to reverse his arts.”

  “You speak of the Fall of Stormcrow and you have much knowledge of that, which only until recently, was hid.  You must tell us more.”

  “I wish no offense Lady Eowyn.  But my time is short and my story too long.  I must continue.”

  Eowyn brought her fingers to her mouth and blew, issuing a shrill whistle.  In seconds, another rider emerged from the throng, bringing a mount for Kirk.

  “We are but a half-day’s ride from Isengard’s gates, you may tell your tale along the way.  What say you?”

  Kirk puzzled them with his response. 

  “Full ahead.  Warp Speed.”

  Orthanc

  The first of the scouts returned to the encampment, his long loping strides hardly abating though he neared his objective. 

  “Thunder!” He called out the password as he neared the outer pickets of the army and ran past as they lowered their guard.  He was a ranger, born and bred in the wild, and he could have crept past those guards with his skill alone.  He hopped and ran over sleeping soldiers, shielded camp fires, and tent lines as he headed into the center of the camp.  He ran straight for the tall blonde woman who was standing in quiet contemplation among her advisers.

  He knelt on one knee.  “My Lady Eowyn, I return from the tower and my eyes have seen much.”

  Eowyn seemed to snap out of the trance that held her.  Kirk knew she had been deep in thought, her mind sharp and quick.  “Speak.”

  “Before us lie at least twelve full companies of orcs.  Large ones, Uruk-Hai probably.  They are poorly armed and their morale is low.  It seemed to me that they are beseiged at Isengard.  Saruman’s magic keeps the change from encroaching on Orthanc."

  Kirk interrupted, “The change?”

  “Aye.  The evil that befouls this land is too powerful for Saruman.  He is neither the cause, nor can he battle it.  He has established many wards, and for now the land around Orthanc seems as it was of old.  But the wards are weakening.”

  “Is Saruman still in the tower?”

  “Aye, milady.”

  “Then there is still hope,” Kirk now spoke, “we shall wait until two of the suns have set.  Then we shall strike.”

  Everyone’s jaw dropped.  One of the Rohirrim yelled at Kirk, “Did you not hear the scout man?  Twelve full companies of orcs!  Poorly armed or no they are more than a match for us.”

  Eowyn cut the man off, “Heed not those hasty words Captain.  Our swords are thine, should you have need of us.”  She turned to face the man who had spoken, “Be it known that cowardice was not the source of these words, but rather they came from the sense of order belonging to a bygone world.  They have no meaning here.”

  Kirk nodded, “Then it’s settled.  I have no doubt of the Rohirrim’s valor, the fact that you’ve survived this long is proof of it enough.  But, if we play this right, you may not need your swords at all.”

  The suns had dropped below the horizon slightly faster than Kirk would have thought, and it made it a small struggle to get everyone into position unseen in time.

  Kirk set his walking stick aside and walked unarmed towards the host of orcs.  The Rohirrim marveled at this and saw simply Kirk, dressed as a simple wanderer walking unarmed into certain death.

  But what they could not have known was that Kirk had caught terrifying glimpses of the abomination that had slain Radagast.  His imagination filled in the rest, and with the help of his newly acquired skills, what the goblins would see.....would be far far different.

  What the orcs saw was this.

  A poisonous fog, thick as a carpet, began to pour forth from the jungle.  They began stirring in their ranks, for they had seen strange things come from the jungle and they did not fully understand or trust the wards.  They really started to get nervous when the wards offered the fog no resistance.  They slowly began to back up and bunch among themselves, shields outwards, waiting for the terror to spring from the miasma.

  Then, soundlessly, something ponderous and massive shook forth from the trees and seemed to grow out of them.  Soon it was so large, that the inmost goblins had to crane their necks back to catch sight of the shadowy shape which remained undefined behind a curtain of gangrenous haze.  It was impossibly wide, it seemed as if a mountain range had erected itself a mere stone’s throw from Orthanc. 

  Then the ends of the mountain range swung towards the center.  And the more perceptive of the orcs realized that they were wings! Wings!  Appalling wings the size of which could crush the sky itself.

  And impossibly, the thing behind the mist began to move forward.  It lumbered with an impossible mass.  It seemed a tremendous storm cloud taken to ground and given form.  A great and horrible wailing came from the orcs.  They knew there would be no escape from this horror.  And as they thing burst into view, many of the orcs thought they saw an enormous balrog – the father of all balrogs.  A balrog so big it would crush Orthanc in its footstep.  But alas, as their pathetic minds wrestled with the reality of what they saw, they realized that compared to what moved towards them, a horde of balrogs would be far more merciful.

  Instinct took over and the host broke.

  Shields and spears tumbled to the earth haphazardly.  Useless weight to carry as they fled.  Spear shafts snapped and shields shattered and their previous owners now ran over them.  Many of the slower orcs were trampled under foot.

  Then Kirk gave the signal.  From various stations around Orthanc, the Riders of Rohan burst forth.  Their war cries riding high in the wind.  They heartlessly fell upon the orcs.  No sense of pity stayed their hand.  In their eyes, the orcs were as unclean as the other abhorrent beasts that had recently materialized.  Where a uniform sort of panic had existed before, complete chaos and pandemonium now reigned.

  The hapless orcs that escaped the massacre, fled into the jungle, past the wards, and into the thousand waiting maws of a hundred skulking ghastly horrors.

  The Riders didn’t even need to ask.  From the evidence of their own eyes and the orcs’ reactions they knew that Kirk had worked powerful magic.  And they weren’t the only ones.  Saruman knew it as well, for he had sensed the change in the preternatural ether and knew that someone had come for him.  In his tower, he prepared himself.

  Kirk remounted his borrowed steed for the short ride to the gates just beyond Orthanc.  No guards were there to challenge him as they had Gandalf.  Kirk didn’t know what to expect.  He expected the man inside the tower to parley, especially since his army had just been massacred.  But the Rohirrim clearly did not think so.  They rode with weapons at the ready, prepared for nearly every eventuality.  Their edginess couldn’t help but influence Kirk’s attitude.

  He reached the gate.  Now Kirk could actually feel someone stirring within the tower – a disturbing sense of dread and power pooling out from the tower in unseen ripples.  He could sense the confusion within his adversary – could sense Saruman’s probing to attempt to detect anything about him.  He decided to confirm at least one of Saruman’s suspicions.

  He stretched his hand out palm outward and parallel to the gate.  ”Edro,” the words left his lips, a scarce whisper.  The fabric of the gate creaked and it began to give.  Then Kirk sensed a tangible hostility coming from within the tower of Orthanc.

  The gate buckled and snapped back, closed.  The hinges creaked and popped as the massive iron doors felt the pressure of some awesome force from within.  The Riders of Rohan groaned.  It was clear to them that Kirk was outmatched.  Saruman was indeed the stronger.

  Okay, I’ve established that I can sense him and he can sense me, Kirk thought.

  He addressed the Riders, “Prepare yourselves for an attack from any direction.  Things are about to get nasty.”

  Kirk turned back towards the gate, raised his palm again and concentrated.  The words began to form in his mouth, but already he could sense Saruman resisting him.  He heard a gasp from the Riders of Rohan.  Kirk broke his concentration to see what had happened.

  The wards protecting the area around Orthanc were clearly weakening.  Kirk sat amazed as he could visibly see the jungle encroaching on the grassland.  Even from where he sat his mount, he could hear the greedy slobbering of creatures struggling against the wards.  The second those guards went down, he and the Riders would have their hands full.  And if you threw Saruman into the mix…Kirk didn’t like those odds.  His patience wore thin.

  He turned to face the gate for the last time.  Raised his walking stick and called out into the wind, “Ah!  Elbereth!  Bethlamen!” He crashed his stick into the iron doors and there was a blast like the portals had been hit by antimatter.  The doors splintered into a thousand tiny shards, deadly kinetic shrapnel, propelled so hard that when they hit the side of the tower, they shredded the very stone.

  Now Saruman knew that he dealt with no mere apprentice sorcerer.  But with someone who, while not Istari, had certainly had more than enough help exploring the crafts of magic.  Saruman let his concentration drop on the wards and let the jungle and creatures win.  He would need all his concentration to do battle with this new foe.

  Back at the gate, the Riders’ mounts began to whinny and fidget, they could smell and feel the beasts in the jungle.  And they did not like it.  Several riders were thrown from their mounts as the animals got more nervous.  Saruman used the distraction.  He positioned himself in the hole that Kirk’s blast had created in the tower.  He fed the magic forces and let fly with a huge fireball.  Comet-like it reached out from the tower, tail extending from Saruman’s hands.

  Kirk felt rather than saw it.  He was having enough trouble controlling his mount.  He turned the horse just in time to be broadsided by Saruman’s spell.  The horse died instantly, the carcass falling over and pinning Kirk underneath.  He could feel that his left leg was broken where the horse had fallen on it, his right leg…he could feel nothing.  He tried to crane his head to look and saw only a charred stump.  The horse’s innards, boiled from the inside out, splayed over the field.  As he lay his head back he could see more of the streaking fireballs bashing into other Riders, sending men and horses sailing in all directions.  Clearly, Saruman was the stronger of the two as far as the offense was concerned.  Kirk now knew that he had made a grievous error in challenging him head on.  Despair washed over him.

  He struggled to free his one remaining leg from under dead carcass of his horse.  Slowly, he began to feel a great pressure on his chest.  It grew greater and greater, a driving pressure that threatened to squeeze the life out of him.  He grabbed at his chest and his hand landed on something icy cold.  The Ring!

  If only I put on the ring.  Saruman will be little match for me.  I can turn all this around with a simple act of slipping it on my finger.  Then I can subdue the monsters and all the evil creatures and everyone can worship me!

  Kirk purged the thought from his head.  He wasn’t beaten yet.  He still had another avenue to follow.

  * * *

Saruman used the distraction.  He positioned himself in the hole that Kirk’s blast had created in the tower.  He fed the magic forces and let fly with a huge fireball.  Comet-like it reached out from the tower, tail extending from Saruman’s hands.

This time, Kirk was ready.  He struggled with his mount and waited almost until the last second.  Then he raised his hands high over his head, almost with reckless abandon, and cast a desperate spell.  “AN-JUX! KAL-SANCT!”

Saruman’s fireballs continued on their deadly course.  Then some of them burst in mid-air, like giant fireworks, showering the Riders and Kirk with flower petals and fragrant flakes of ash.  Others continued onward and crashed into the Riders but did no harm. 

A great cheer erupted from the ranks of the riders, but Kirk hardly heard it.  To him, everything seemed as if it was happening under water and he was drowning. He had cast two massively powerful spells simultaneously.  The first negated the effects of Saruman’s offensive magic in a radius around Orthanc, and the second established a protective ward around Orthanc to prevent the jungle creatures from penetrating.  Either one would have taxed the strongest of wizards.  Kirk wavered in the saddle and fell to the ground.  He heard gasps from the nearby Riders as he collapsed and they reacted.  He tried to get to his feet to reassure them but found that he could not.  He was so tired.  He needed rest. 

He thought hard, he chose a time when there had been no danger... nothing going on....  boring time.  A memory flooded to him.  Spock, McCoy, and he had been attending a diplomatic celebration on Tau Ceti Prime.  Two weeks of endless toasts and hand shaking...  hesitant mumbled greetings in a dozen different languages...and the tours...  Kirk smiled....It was perfect.  

* * *  

He managed to stumble into sickbay and crashed down onto one of the medical beds.  It automatically turned on flooding the room with the thrumming of Kirk’s electronically synthesized heartbeat.  Nurse Chapel heard it immediately and came into the room.

  The quickly surveyed the captain’s readings.  All were within norms but it was clear to her that the captain was exhausted.

  “Well well, it looks like someone has had too much Saurian Brandy, if you don’t mind me saying so sir.”

  Kirk hadn’t spoken English in so long he almost answered her in Westron, “Not at all, Christine.  I’m not as young as I used to be and sometimes I forget that.  I just stopped in for some tri-ox compound and a stimulant.  I have an Argalian feast to attend tonight and I don’t want to offend their sensibilities by falling asleep through the fifth monologue.”

  “Of course not.” Nurse Chapel began preparing the hypos the captain had asked for.  “But you know the only real remedy is to get some sleep.”

  Kirk summoned what remained of his strength and got to his feet.  In his state, it wasn’t hard to feign someone who had a little too much to drink.  He took the hypos she offered.  “That’s what Bones said.  I’m off to my cabin to get some shut-eye now.  I still have four hours before the traditional Argalian social hour starts.”

  “Sweet dreams.  I suppose that Mr. Spock is holding up all right.”

  “Well if he isn’t, we’ll never hear about it.  You know Spock.  Oh and Christine, let’s keep this between us, I wouldn’t want the crew finding out their illustrious captain can’t hold his liquor.”

  Nurse Chapel smiled, “No problem sir.”

  The sickbay doors had hardly swished to a close and Kirk was starting to lose his footing.  He placed one hand on the wall and forced himself to stand up straight.  He went to straighten his uniform, then balked.  He was still wearing the clothes the elves had given him!  What a wonder that Nurse Chapel hadn’t questioned why he wasn’t in uniform!  It gave him added incentive to get to his cabin.

  Then he could sleep all he wanted.  If he remembered, that Argalian feast, and its customary seventeen courses with a soliloquy between each, had lasted eight hours.  One of the most boring things he’d ever had to submit to as a starship captain.  That meant he would have about twelve hours before the landing party got back.  He’d need to make sure that he was gone by then, it wouldn’t do to add to the long list of anachronisms and paradoxes by running into his past self.

  He reached his cabin and before the doors were closed he had collapsed on the bunk.  Seconds later, he was in the deepest slumber he’d experience in years.  And comforted by the thrumming of his ship’s engines, James T.  Kirk knew nothing else for thirteen hours.

Kirk awoke to the sound of the cabin doors swishing open.  He sat up in the bunk and saw himself looking out into the hall.  Panic gripped him.  He rolled quietly off the bunk and slid into a darkened corner.  He slid the elven cloak off of the chair and pulled it completely about him.  “I tell you Spock, if I never hear another toast again it will be too soon.”  The other Kirk said.

“The Argalian’s are thorough in their celebrations Captain, and were it not for my Vulcan mental disciplines I believe even I would have been taxed.”

Kirk grabbed the hypos off of the dresser, slid back into the corner, and hoped that the concealment arts the elves had taught him would work.

“Well Jim, that’s as close as we’re going to get to get him to admit he was bored.  I’m bushed myself.  I’m going to go sleep some of this off.”

“That’s my idea too.  I’ll see you two later.”

The other Kirk walked into the cabin and thankfully did not turn on the lights.  He flicked on the comm panel on the wall.  “Captain’s personal log.  I’ve just returned from the Argalian traditional feast of new friendship.  It was every bit as extravagant as we had been told.  Just one thing, the next time, Starfleet can send a different Captain of the Federation’s flagship.  I’m done playing diplomat for a while.  Kirk out.”

He turned the comm panel off and only then realized that the doors to the cabin had not closed.  Just as he stepped towards them for a closer look, they swished shut.  As they were closing he swore he caught a glimpse of something like a light shadow darting between them and down the corridor.  He rubbed his eyes, he’d had more of that Saurian Brandy than he thought.

Kirk slipped between the cabin doors and headed down the corridor.  He still wasn’t feeling quite himself.  He slid into an alcove and gave himself the stimulant hypo.  He waited a few seconds until he began to feel its effects.  He had a couple of things to get in the armory and then he could be on his way.  

* * *  

He heard gasps from the nearby Riders as he collapsed and they reacted.  He got to his feet and their apprehension noticeably lessened.  “I have rendered you impervious to Saruman’s works for now.  Remain here however, for if you stray from Orthanc, my works can no longer protect you.”  Kirk slid the tri-ox hypo, one of the two phasers he’d taken, and the additional power packs into his tunic.  He set the phaser in his hand to ‘kill’.  He started out for the hole he’d made in the side of the tower.

  He could see Saruman inside, momentarily confused by the ineffectiveness of his spells.  But then Saruman turned in reaction to something behind him.  A massive swirl of colors and chaos erupted behind Saruman, and a figure stepped out of it.  Kirk instantly recognized it, Gandalf the Grey!  He was traveling through time doing Saruman’s bidding!  Gandalf handed a package to Saruman.  Kirk broke into a dead sprint trying to make it before...he instinctively knew...Gandalf would disappear again.  Kirk knew he would never make it.  Gandalf was already stepping back into the eddy of space-time.  Kirk leapt, launching himself through the hole in the tower, in a desperate attempt to reach Gandalf.  But he was already too late.  The time-gate closed even before Kirk landed. 

  He skidded on the floor, which was covered with tiny shards of stone from the tower wall, and fought to regain his footing.  Only then did he realize, that although he had missed Gandalf, he now had the drop on Saruman.

  Saruman, dropped the package that Gandalf brought, and quickly passed his hands over himself while muttering strange words.  Kirk recognized it as a powerful ward of protection.

  “Stop.  You may not further transgress the boundaries of Orthanc.”  Saruman shouted, his voice was frail despite his bravado.

  Kirk defiantly stepped forward.

  “I know not who you are human, but you dabble in arts and in matters of your betters.  You are far out classed.”

  “I am Captain James T.  Kirk....Starfleet.  I am not of your world, nor do I wholly obey its laws.  I have studied enough of your arts to know that the destruction of the worker results in the destruction of the work.  You have befouled Gandalf.  I am here to ensure you undo your foulest deed.”

  “That fool Gandalf!  That’s why you’re here?” Saruman cackled.  “His primary duty has been completed.  This package which he has delivered has doomed all.  Have you not heard?  Sauron has regained his ring!  All is at an end, and his enemies will be punished.  He shall remember his allies.”

  “Will he?” 

  Saruman moved to try to pick up the package.

  Kirk brandished the phaser, “Don’t.  I don’t like making threats.  But either you remove your own spell or I’ll be forced to destroy you and remove it the hard way.”

  Saruman laughed again.  “Impertinent dolt.  I am Saruman of Many Colors!”  He spread his arms and dazzled Kirk with a sparkling array of brilliant flashes and iridescent lights.  The light show threw Kirk off balance and he shielded his eyes.  Saruman continued ranting.  “You have proved yourself adept as a neophyte in the ways of magic, yet you are as nothing before me.  You have studied well enough to understand the nature of the ward I have place upon my person.  Please, amuse me, by what means of magic do you dare to threaten me?”

  Kirk squinted through the haze of light emanating from Saruman, he could barely make out that the old wizard was concocting a terrible spell behind the veil of brightness he had called up around him.  Kirk fired his phaser.

  The beam struck Saruman in his center of mass and sent the wizard staggering a few feet back before the beam took full effect.  Seconds later, a haunting echo of a final scream and a retinal ghost-image of the wizard’s silhouette were all that remained of Saruman of Many Colors.

  “Not magic Saruman, science.”

  Kirk quickly recovered and grabbed the package Saruman had dropped.  He slid the phaser under his tunic and began to open the package as he eased himself out of the hole in the side of Orthanc.  Eowyn and some of the Riders of Rohan were waiting for him.

  “We saw the lights and feared the worst,”  Eowyn spoke.

  “Saruman is no more.  I slew him.”  A great cheer went up from the Riders at the news.  “But this is but a ray of sunshine betwixt clouds of ruin.  Our greatest trials lie ahead.”

  Kirk finished opening the package and inside was a large book.  Instantly, Kirk recognized it.  He had seen it before.  As if to confirm its identity, Kirk flipped open the book.  The chaotic ever-changing pages greeted him.  He knew instantly what he had to do. 

  He addressed the Riders of Rohan,  “I must go.  There are more battles to be won.”

  Then Kirk did something he’d never tried, he willed himself to a time and place he had never been before.

  Miskatonic University, 1947

  It was a cool gray overcast night in the courtyard where Kirk appeared.  To his right stood a massive structure with inspired columns separating, tooth-like, its entranceway.  He read the massive letters etched classically into the stone.

   “VNIVERSITAS MISKATONICIENSIS”

  Kirk knew he had come to the right place.  It was one of the few places on Earth that the right amount of knowledge, curiosity, and courage (though some might say stupidity) had come together to help lift the veil of ignorance and help enlighten man – for good or ill.  Miskatonic University took the view that knowledge itself, no matter how arcane or occult was not good or evil in and of itself, but rather it was the way one used such knowledge that was good or evil.

  Kirk wasn’t too sure if would agree with that.  But the men and women here stood the best chance of deciphering the book he held in his hand.  And if it was so important to Saruman that he had to send Gandalf to go get it, then Kirk wanted to know what it said.

  A group of students walked towards him and it was only then that Kirk realized that their clothing was off.  Kirk had been aiming for Miskatonic University in the late twentieth century.  But he didn’t recall people dressing like this back then (well at least they didn’t in San Francisco, when he’d come back to get the whales anyway).

  Kirk moved, momentarily breaking the elven illusion caused by the cloak, and allowing himself to be seen.

  Two of the students started a little when they saw him.  A third just kept right on talking to his comrades oblivious that Kirk stood in his path.  He bumped right into the captain.

  “Oh sorry there sir....hey, nice get up there fella.”

  “I’m.....er.....I was just,” Kirk managed to stammer trying to think of an excuse for his attire.

  Another student interrupted, “What’s the theatre group putting on tonight? ‘Midsummer Night’s Dream?’”

  The third student spoke again, “Hey you’d better get a move on if you don’t want to be late.  Dr. Jones just finished his lecture so I think you still have time to make it.”

  Kirk’s mind did summersaults.  Jones!  Jones?  No, it couldn’t be.  But just in case, Kirk played along, “Where is it?”

  “Lovecraft Hall.  Back the way we came.  You can’t miss it.  You look a little old for a freshman.”

  Kirk was already walking away.  He called back over his shoulder, “Late bloomer.”

  Kirk was trying to force himself not to run to the hall.  If Dr. Indiana Jones was indeed here, then Kirk’s chances of finding out what the book said would be high indeed.  That old man will probably have the thing decoded in minutes.

  He turned the corner of the administration building and headed down a slight embankment and then he saw it; Lovecraft Hall, a festering blight on the otherwise pleasant landscape of the campus.  The auditorium seemed to rise out of the campus grounds in much the same way as a skull peeks forth from a too shallow grave.  Kirk didn’t know who Lovecraft was, but if this building was named after him, then there had to be something wrong with him.  Kirk passed inside and began to roam the hallways in search of his friend and ally, Dr. Indiana Jones.

  "Gentlemen...I'll need a close inspection of this craft to confirm my hunch.  But if what I'm thinking is true, we could be on the verge of something truly primal and truly horrible.  And the safety of our Earth and the human race may become the least of our concerns."

  Kirk stopped outside Dr. Armitage’s office, that sounded like Jones....but something was different.

  “Excellent.  We knew we could trust you.  Believe me Dr. Jones, your country will be terribly in your debt.”

  “Yeah?  Well you can start paying me back by having some real experts look into that recent matter I helped you with...not just the your top men.”

  Kirk heard the other speaker laugh nervously.

  “Of course, Dr. Jones.  We’ll look into it.  But often such matters are best left to a higher authority.  We’ll send a car around for you tomorrow.  Will that suffice?”

  Jones sounded resigned, “That’s fine I guess.  I have some books I need to check here first.  So until tomorrow gentlemen?”

  “Tomorrow then.  Dr. Brody, Dr. Armitage.”

  The door swung open, and Kirk fell back into the shadows.  He saw two men leave the room and leave the hallway.  The conversation in the office had resumed.

  “Henry, I’m going to need to get a look at the Special Collections tonight.  I’m going to need photostats from selected pages from Eibon, the Pnakotic Manuscripts, and the other one.  Something they said jogged my memory about something.”

  “Indiana, do you think there’s any truth to this....this....ancient visitors from another world nonsense?”

  “No...not really, but you and I have seen some pretty strange things, haven’t we Marcus.”

  Kirk chose that moment to walk into the room.  The three men inside didn’t look familiar at all.  Kirk was confused, “Dr. Jones?”

  Indy stepped forward, “Yes?  Can I help you.”

  “Um, this is going to sound a little strange...but...what year is this?”

  “1947.  Are you all right?”

  Kirk felt better.  Okay, so he’d missed the mark by about fifty years or so.  That’s when Kirk remembered where he’d first seen the book in question in the first place.  It was Dr. Henry Jones Jr.’s house.  Only that Dr. Jones had been fifty years older.  Everything was beginning to start making sense.

  Kirk handed Indy the book.  “This book is of vital importance.  It is the key to possibly saving everything.  You’re the only one I can think of that has a hope of translating it.”  Kirk pushed the book into Indy’s hands and then headed out into the hall.  If he knew the Dr., that little show would have been enough to peak his curiosity...and then, once he actually opened the book...then he’d have to translate it.

  Now all he had to do was pop forward in time fifty years and get the answer.

  Kirk thought hard.  When he had met Jones at his house he seemed that he was still working on the translation and had muttered something about needing more computing power.  The last time he had seen the old professor, Jones and he had been on a helicopter on the way to Cheyenne Mountain while the whole rest of the world literally went to hell.  Kirk needed to know what Jones had discovered – so, hell or no, there really wasn’t a choice at all.

  Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado.

Headquarters, North American Air Defense Command.

  When the stars came right....  

The Star Spawn and Gaunts were on Kirk before he could even react.

  An amorphous ebony thing smashed into his chest.  Kirk tucked and rolled, instinctively break-falling.  He tucked his knees into his body and then kicked upward with both feet, sending the creature sailing with his trademark throw.  He clambered back to his feet.  He needed to get a phaser out!  What had happened to the one in his hand?

  A sideways glimmer of motion was the only warning, and then Kirk was struggling to keep sharp, black-taloned hands from shredding his throat.  The thing was strong!  It lurched its head forward, snapping colossal jaws too big for its skull.  It’s oversized mouth, laden with hundreds of tiny venom dripping serrations, crunched too near his face, leaving a goopy streak of bacteria-ridden saliva on Kirk’s cheek and neck.

  Kirk lashed out with a front snap-kick.  He satisfyingly heard the crunch of shattered teeth as the thing forcibly bit down on its own mouth.  Kirk instantly followed up with a spinning round-house kick into where the thing’s chest should have been.  It was like kicking pudding.  Whatever matter this thing was made from, it wasn’t sturdy.

  But then, it didn’t need to be.  Even as Kirk watched, the horrid creature was recombining!  The wolfish elongated jaws now absorbed back into the head as the whole skull now took on the form of an over-sized King Nautilus or cuttlefish – the mouth vomiting forth multiple feelers.

  Kirk stood aghast for what seemed an aeon.  In reality, it wasn’t even a second.  His mind, trained as it was to react to an untold number of diverse alien species, was not as adversely affected as the majority of Earth’s now endangered human population.  Where normal men had been stupefied by the polymorphous mold of the organism before them -- long enough to feel the tactile embrace of the tentacled head as those hideous claws rent their spirits from their bodies – Kirk reacted.

  A phaser materialized in his hand and the beam erupted from it almost as quickly as he had drawn the weapon.  The creature before him uttered an earsplitting squeal as the phaser served its purpose.

  Kirk had a fraction of a second to survey his surroundings.

  He stood on what, hours earlier, might have passed for a sloping road, but now lay littered with droppings, half-eaten corpses, and shell casings.  A mountain range, presumably the Rockies, stretched out before him.  Miles away, Colorado Springs burned.  He was precisely where the helicopter had been when he had left it.  Only he had miscalculated!  And now he was on the ground, instead of onboard. 

  Kirk now noticed that the thing’s death cry had attracted some attention, and from below him thousands of other unmentionable creatures where clambering over one another for a piece of his flesh.  In seconds, they would reach his position.  Kirk concentrated and....

  In seconds, they would reach his position.  Kirk blinked, unbelieving, then tried again.

  Nothing happened.

  Then time froze.  Kirk found that he was paralyzed, yet he remained strangely conscious of his surroundings.  A man materialized in front of him.

  Q?  Kirk asked mentally.

  The man answered, “A Q.  Fortunately, not the one you’re used to dealing with.  We Q are...how can I put this delicately...unwilling to further involve ourselves in this matter.  The Q you dealt with earlier went against the Continuum and helped you of his own volition.  He seemed to have a soft-spot for you humans...like favored pets I suppose...but he has been dealt with.  The boon he granted you...’unsticking you in time’ as he put it...has now been removed.  However, since your pathetic mammalian mind showed remarkable resiliency in dealing four dimensionally with your precarious situation, the Continuum, after exhaustive debate, has decided to allow you to keep any trophies you may have gleaned from your temporal displacement.  Q seemed to have a lot of faith in you...myself...I place my wager on them.”

  Kirk wanted to scream, “It’s not fair!” and lash out at the man, but he could do neither.  All he could do was stare unblinkingly at the canvas of horror, frozen, seconds away from pouncing upon him and realizing their most horrid carnal fantasies.

  “You see!  It’s primal, uncivilized, barbarian thoughts like that!  That’s what makes you humans unfit.  Best of luck....  No really, I mean that.”

  And the man was gone.

  And the things were scrambling up the side of the mountain.

  Kirk bit his lower lip.  He was in trouble!

  He turned and sprinted up the road, sweeping his phaser indiscriminately across countless loathsome horrors. 

  Then Kirk heard a new sound.  Over the keening death screams of the creatures following him, he heard the unmistakable bark and chatter of a firefight.  That meant that there were humans still alive!  That was good.

  But they were fighting something ahead of him.  That was bad.

  And judging from the sound, they were still several hundred meters ahead of him.  Kirk concentrated, momentarily relinquishing his phaser’s assault on the things.  He could see them.  A small party of humans were holding off something that Kirk couldn’t see.  In a bend on the road, they had erected a makeshift barricade against the mountainside.  With their backs to stone, and overturned vehicles serving as three other walls, they had erected a miniature fortress.

  Kirk’s momentary reverie almost cost him his life.  It was only when he felt the thing’s fetid breath and heard the puffing of its labored breathing that he spun around and fired at the twenty or so closest things.

  But this time, the phaser did not dissolve them.  And on this setting, it should have.  It simply sliced off limbs and punched burning holes in their substance – a tell-tale sign that the power pack was about finished.

  Kirk reached for the other phaser, but it wasn’t there.  He looked at the distance to the small makeshift fort.  Too far.  He’d never make it.  Running at a dead sprint uphill in the mountain elevation was taking its toll.  And Kirk was slowing down, imperceptibly.  And perhaps not so imperceptibly, the things behind him were gaining.

  Kirk reached into his tunic again and grabbed the tri-ox hypo he’d taken from the Enterprise and injected himself with it.  Almost instantly, he began to feel its effects and a new burst of energy.  He picked up the pace and fired another burst at his pursuers.  The phaser chirped insistently, an engineered reminder that the power supply was nearly exhausted.  Firing the weapon in huge sweeping arcs had prematurely drained it.

  Kirk set it to overload and tossed it backward.  At this point, if he didn’t clear the blast radius, it wouldn’t really matter. 

  He felt rather than heard the blast.  And he was still too close.  The blast knocked him off his feet and singed the back of his hair.  He scrambled back upright and kept running, trying desperately to ignore his pain-wracked body.  Only then did he notice that the Elven cloak was on fire.  Chagrined, he wrestled to strip it off.  His pace slowed, momentarily.  Something swiped at him.  In a moment, what Kirk couldn’t remove had been torn away.  The cloak was gone, and Kirk would not be able to serve himself of its magic any longer.

  Then Kirk had an epiphany!  Praying it would work, he began muttering the words and moving his hands over himself in the cryptic ward signs he had practiced so many times, in what seemed like long ago Lothlorien.  He stopped in mid-stride, hope riding high in his spirit and barked, “I command you, Halt!  I bind you, Stand!”

  It was as if the creatures had struck a wall.  They stood, immobile, mere feet from their prey, growling, snarling, and hissing – choking back rage spawned spit and bile at the indignity they were made to submit too.

  Kirk ran.  He didn’t know how long the ward would last.  Even as he cast it, he could sense that it was weaker now than it was in Middle-Earth, and it still had taken a lot from him.  He knew he wouldn’t be casting any more today.  Still—if it bought him just a few seconds...

  It didn’t.

  Kirk had gotten scarcely more than fifty yards away when the ward collapsed.  And Kirk still had more than a two hundred yards to go before he reached the fort.  He knew he’d never make it.  Casting that last spell had taken too much out of him.  Yet he was too stubborn to quit, and so he ran on, wincing in anticipation of the seemingly inevitable blow that would rain down on him from behind.  He knew he had tried, he had given it his all.  He hoped death would be quick.

  But then, one of the defenders of the beleaguered stronghold saw him.  He heard the man yell and point in his direction.  Several of the defenders shifted their attention on him.  Miraculously, he heard one of them shout over the orgy of noise, “Friendly incoming!  Covering Fire!”

  Their weapons chewed into Kirk’s followers and he sprinted under the hail of bullets.  Where seconds before the refuge had seemed an interminable distance away, now he could make it with an easy jog.

  One of the men helped him up the side of an overturned truck.  Kirk could see that the fortification was held by less than a dozen men and women.  The dead and dying lay within its contrived walls, with wounds too grievous to survive.  A powerful-looking four wheeled vehicle sat at the ready in the middle, small arms and weapons bristled from it.

  Another man called out, “Sarge!  They’re stopping!”  It was true, the mass of creatures had stopped.

  “What the hell are they waiting for?”

  “Quit wondering and use the time to reload, Hudson!”  The man turned to Kirk, “You’re damned lucky mister, civilians don’t usually make it out this way.”

  “I’m not really a civilian,” Kirk sheepishly admitted, “Captain James T.  Kirk, Starfleet.”

  “Sorry, Captain we’re a little short on customs and courtesies right now.  You know how to work one of these.”  The man shoved a stubby sub-machine gun into Kirk’s hands.

  “I’ll try.”

  The man didn’t wait for Kirk’s response, instead shoving several clips into the captain’s hands.  Kirk looked around and, imitating the other soldiers, managed to load and ready the weapon.

  The man continued, “Starfleet huh?  Never heard of it.  Still there are too many damn special projects around here.  I don’t even want to know what that is.  Are they moving yet?”

  “Nothing.  They’re just sitting there.”

  A short burst of fire rang out.  The man Kirk was talking to screamed at another soldier, “Well, Shit, Drake why not just provoke them?  Conserve your ammo, remember, short controlled bursts!”

  He turned his attention back to Kirk, “Well Captain Kirk, I’ve kept us alive so far so I’m not ready to relinquish command.  Sgt. Reese, Technical Command, at your service.  The mighty army you see before you is what’s left of the 132^nd under Perry.  We’ve got six other outposts up here...maybe two or three dozen people in all....Aww man, what now?”  Reese looked skyward.

  Kirk’s eyes were drawn to a bright flare arcing across the apocalyptic sky.  Kirk shielded his eyes from the setting sun to get a better look.  It looked like something big re-entering the atmosphere.  It had the characteristic sputtered burning.  Chunks were falling off.  Kirk couldn’t let himself be distracted by an oversized meteor.  At the rate it was falling, it would hit hundreds of miles from this position.  Just before he tore his eyes away from it, the blanket of flame surrounding it temporarily abated, and for a second, Kirk thought the object reminded him of the Excelsior.  Before he could do a double-take, it was shrouded in flame again.

  Kirk lowered his hand, realizing he no longer had to shield his eyes, the sun was dipping behind the mountain range.  Too quickly for Kirk’s taste, then he realized that the creatures were getting impatient.  He muttered under his breath, “Oh no.”

  Reese placed a hand against an earpiece he was wearing.  “Copy that.  They’ve stopped here too.  We picked up a straggler.  Over.  – Roger that.  We’ve got maybe one-eight-zero rounds per man and the Hummer’s looking sweet right now.  – Copy.  Weirzbesky and Crowe are down.  Detrich and Frost are off the board....”

  Kirk nudged Reese.  “We need to go.  Now!”

  “What?”