1

That first night in San Francisco when it all began was cool and gray and thick with fog. Soft billows of it drifted over the Academy, causing its tall locked gates to phase in and out of visibility for the teenager dressed in black, lost in the shadows across Pacific Street.

His name was Jim Kirk, and he was seventeen years old, plus five months. There was no fear in him, and there hadn't been for three years.

From the safety of a dense bank of juniper, Kirk studied the Academy's Presidio Gate with disdain for what it represented, and with growing confidence for what was to come, based on what he didn't see. Blue-white floodlights played over the old stonework, revealing the slow tumble of the evening fog as it flowed unobstructed through ironwork. Beyond, low streetlamps picked out the curving path of Presidio Boulevard, their halos fading with distance into the night and the glowing mist that enshrouded the Academy's vast campus.

Just as he'd expected, there were no signs of guards or other watchers. After all, this was a perfect world. How could Starfleet even conceive of someone like Kirk doing what he planned to do this night?

"This is such a bad idea," Elissa Corso whispered.

Kirk turned to his girlfriend and grinned to reassure her. As far as he was concerned, this was the best idea he had had in weeks. But there was just enough fog-filtered light falling through the branches to reveal the worry in her eyes.

"Elissa, there's no one there."

"Not at the gate."

"So we'll be fine."

Elissa frowned, not convinced. Kirk took her hand. "Look, they've got no right to go after you, and you know it. Their system's at fault." He held up his homemade override, a jury-rigged homebrew concoction of transtator filaments mounted inside an old tourist translation device. To the untrained eye, it was little more than a dented metal tube, not much larger than a finger. But Kirk had been bashing transtator kits since he was four. The old dented tube had a few surprises inside.

Elissa reached out for the override. "No—you'll set off an alarm or something."

Kirk teasingly held the device behind his back, hoping to bring her just close enough for him to steal a kiss.

Elissa refused to play, but Kirk knew he'd won. She couldn't resist his smile. Never had been able to. Her eyes were bright now, forgiving.

She slapped a hand against his chest. "What am I going to do about you?"

"Love me. What else?"

Elissa rolled her eyes, and laughed because he was right.

He kissed her and she didn't pull back.

"Hsst! Jimmy!" It was Sam; his timing, as always, awful.

Kirk waved one hand dismissively, used the other to sweep Elissa closer, not releasing her. Until a hand clamped on his shoulder.

"Give it a rest," Kirk's brother said. "I found one."

George Samuel Kirk was four years older, his sandy hair was longer, and he was thicker in the middle, running to fat. But tonight, clad in the same type of dark jacket, jeans, and boots that Kirk wore, most people would have a hard time telling the brothers apart, their resemblance was that strong, each his father's son.

Kirk reluctantly freed Elissa, who was by this time satisfactorily breathless, dizzy. "Okay… show me."

Copyright © 2007 by CBS Studios Inc.