Kirk saw Arm Darvin fade in, and fade out--not once or twice, but many thousands of times. It was eerie, to say the least.

"Spock, what in blazes is happening to everybody's favorite Klingon spy?"

Kirk's friend shrugged.

"Beyond an obvious statement about temporal flux, Captain, I can only conjecture as to the cause."

"Knock yourself out, Spock."

Spock let the comment pass.

"Darvin has sworn revenge upon you. He also has made statements about being patient in his quest. Perhaps a future self made an effort to affect the recent events on K-7. This would jibe with the chroniton field's point of origin, more than a century hence."

"Captain's Log. Under my authority, and with a skeleton crew, we have jumped to the future origin point of the temporal flux that is expanding in our era. Using uniforms of the era, Lieutenant Uhura and I have snuck aboard a Federation starship called Defiant. We hope to minimize timeline contamination, simply by preventing this era's Darvin from attempting his unsuccessful time-jump."

Uhura looked over at Sisko and Bashir, chatting away while deciding whether to take Darvin's future self on board.

"He--is handsome."

Kirk nodded.

"Sisko seems very much like the kind of man to guide the Federation through this dark era of war."

Uhura shook her head.

"I meant Doctor Bashir!"

As Darvin came on board Defiant, Kirk slipped a sedative patch on him, taking him unconscious. When he awoke, Kirk hoped it was the one called Worf staring back at him, in the brig. Uhura had distracted Darvin, somehow without saying a word.

"I don't get it either, sir. He just--stared at me. Am I clothed?"

"Last I checked. Hey, am I clothed?"

"Sir, it was just a joke."

"Yeah, I know. But then why is everyone staring at us?"

Indeed, all the Defiant personnel were staring over at their chrono-displaced visitors. Kirk gulped. Uhura shuddered at the jaws that dropped around them.

"We----made the history tapes, didn't we?"

Sisko put his hand to his head.

"Temporal Affairs is going to have kittens."

Kirk nodded.

"Just so long as its not Tribbles."