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Takes place in: 2375, continues from Dark Victory
Teilani is being treated by Admiral McCoy on Qo'noS for her poisoning, when Picard arrives and reports that Kirk had failed to return from Tiberius' base in the mirror universe. Kirk unexpectedly appears and provides the antitoxin which cures Teilani. Teilani then gives birth to Kirk's child, but the child appears to be malformed and had to be placed in stasis, while Teilani falls unconscious again. Kirk begins to suspect that Project Sign had poisoned his child, just as they had poisoned Teilani. Kirk gives Picard a Tantalus device before he suddenly departs on Tiberius' Enterprise which had decloaked in orbit. He had made a deal with Tiberius, in exchange for the antitoxin, he would bring Tiberius to the secret First Federation base.
Meanwhile, the mirror Enterprise attacks the Enterprise-E, while Enterprise-E sends two shuttlecrafts into the asteroid base's entry crater. The Enterprise-E follows mirror Enterpise into the asteroid and disables the mirror Enterprise. In the mirror universe, Tiberius discovers that the base did not exist there. Tiberius fights with Kirk, and a while later, they both materialize back inside the First Federation base, where they find that the fleet of Fesarius-class starships had been destroyed and were in ruins. Kirk was rescued and Tiberius was taken into custody. The Enterprise-E scans the debris and detects a Preserver obelisk, which was then taken onboard for study.
In the meantime, a group of psychohistorians had predicted that the universe would be destroyed soon. Picard consults two psychohistorians at Memory Alpha regarding the Preserver obelisk discovered in the First Federation base, which was determined to be only six years old. This could indicate that the Preservers, a billions-year-old race which had distributed lifeforms across the galaxy could still be alive and active. Shortly thereafter, Picard was kidnapped by the psychohistorians.
One month after Tiberius was arrested, Starfleet had taken mirror Picard and his crew into custody along with the mirror Enterprise, while Tiberius was imprisoned on an impregnable prison on Qo'noS, since Tiberius would be resourceful enough to escape from any Starfleet facility. Also, Tiberius would be able to provide information on the mirror universe through dialogue with Kirk. Teilani continues to receive treatment on Qo'noS. Spock speculates that the Preserver obelisk was placed in the First Federation base in order to draw an asteroid to strike the base and destroy the Fesarius-class fleet so that Tiberius would not obtain it. Hence, the Preservers could be manipulating the Federation as well as different alien races for unknown reasons. After receiving news that Picard is missing, Kirk decides that he must track down the Preservers. Kirk and Tiberius goes to Vulcan onboard the Sovereign to seek help from Spock and mirror Spock.
Picard is subjected to an interrogation to determine that he is free of any alien influence. Through a dialogue with the psychohistorians, Picard discovers that James T. Kirk could be responsible for destroying the universe. Riker receives information from Project Sign on where to retrieve Picard. The Enterprise-E rendezvous with the Sovereign at Vulcan. At a meeting onboard the Sovereign, it was determined that the Preservers could be responsible for Earth's first contact with aliens, as well as the unexplained advancement in the careers of certain Starfleet personnel including Kirk and Kathryn Janeway. Spock deduces that in order to locate the Preservers, they must identify the most recent Preserver intervention with possible connection to Kirk. Kirk then realises that they must locate Captain Christine MacDonald, who was abruptly assigned the USS Pathfinder, an Intrepid-class starship significantly more advanced than her previous command, the Oberth-class USS Tobias.
The Enterprise-E locates the Pathfinder at Halkan, where Kirk had first entered the mirror universe 108 years ago. A Ferengi spacedock is in orbit of Halkan, and the Pathfinder had been assigned to assist the Ferengi in a geomagnetism experiment. Picard realises that the experiment could ignite the dilithium reserves on Halkan and he demands a stop to the experiment, but Captain MacDonald refuses to halt her first mission on the Pathfinder without proper orders from Starfleet Command.
Meanwhile, Kirk and Tiberius transported themselves on a shuttlecraft into the mirror universe in an effort to locate the Preservers. They find a gigantic Preserver obelisk in orbit and enter into it. Kirk encounters several alien shadows, while Tiberius sees visions of enemies and returns to the shuttlecraft. Kirk then receives a vision, before he realises that the shadows were attacking Tiberius, and he decides to save Tiberius and they return to the Enterprise-E. From his visions, Kirk sees that the obelisk will fire upon Halkan soon, and Spock determines that if the experiment also happen at the same time, the resulting explosion could destroy the universe. Teilani then volunteers to go to the Pathfinder to negotiate with MacDonald for an end to the experiment.
A Ferengi vessel suddenly attacks Pathfinder and Enterprise-E. Pathfinder is severely damaged and begins to fall into the atmosphere. Enterprise-E destroys the Ferengi vessel before it could begin the experiment. Pathfinder attempts to land but continues to break apart. Enterprise-E manage to beam aboard the surviving crew, but Teilani was lost when Pathfinder exploded.
Starfleet allows the mirror Enterprise (designated NX-1701) and her crew (including Tiberius) to return to the mirror universe to fight for the Vulcan resistance against the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance, under the command of mirror Spock.
Kirk returns to Qo'noS where he picks up his son, Joseph, and they return to Chal.
. The Preservers are an ancient alien race which is believed to have transplanted lifeforms across the galaxy onto different worlds so that in the event of a planetary extinction on one planet, life would continue elsewhere. They are also believed to have found colony worlds dedicated to keeping alive endangered cultural groups and modes of living. The first Preserver artifact PA-1 (determined to be 1,000 years old) was discovered by Kirk in 2268, and a total of 119 artifacts have been found, including the one in the First Federation base. PA-28 (determined to be 2 billion years old) was discovered by Hikaru Sulu.
. In the mirror universe, shortly after Tiberius had become Emperor, mirror Spock overthrew Tiberius in a bloodless coup. Tiberius then brokered an alliance between the Klingons and the Cardassians to reclaim his empire. Ten months after Tiberius was overthrown, the Alliance Armada defeats the Imperial Starfleet at the Battle of Wolf 359 and proceeds to decimate Earth. Tiberius knew that the Alliance would betray him, so he had planned that both the Alliance and Starfleet would be devastated by the war, and that he would wait on the sidelines, return and conquer the remaining forces. Tiberius and his followers escaped onboard a hibernation ship intending to return after a year. However, the hibernation ship went off course and travelled in space for 78 years, before a Klingon research vessel found the ship and revived its crew. Tiberius and his crew were to be arrested, but Tiberius seduced a female Klingon historian, who helped him take over the Klingon vessel. Tiberius then killed the female historian.
. The psychohistorians study the past to predict both the future and the past. They study the behaviour of groups of people and collection of events so as to identify key decision points in the progress of history, and to suggest where individuals might arise to force those decision points along one path or another.
. Starfleet had kept the discovery of duplicate worlds secret. As of 2375, Starfleet had discovered three duplicate Earths, four duplicate Qo'noS, two duplicate Vulcan, and one duplicate Andor.
. Captain Christine MacDonald was initially assigned the Sabre-class USS Endurance, before she was reassigned the Intrepid-class USS Pathfinder. The Pathfinder was destroyed at the end of the book.
. Preserver takes place in 2375. There are several mentions that the Dominion War was coming to an end soon, and the Dominion War only ended in 2375. Several discrepancies suggest that the book takes place in 2376. Again, Admiral McCoy's age is mentioned as 149, which would place the story in (2227 + 149) = 2376. I disregard this discrepancy, and any other which suggest a 2376 year for the book.
. According to Spock's investigations, Project Sign was created in 2275. Project Sign's key personnel were drawn exclusively from an earlier study group formed in 2268, designated as Project Magnet. However, according to Kirk, Project Magnet had already existed in 2267 or before. Therefore, it is unknown as to exactly what Project Sign was created in response to, the mirror universe (discovered in 2267), the Preservers (discovered in 2268), or some other discovery.
. The Martian colonies were said to have struggled for independence from Earth. An organization called the Consortium had opposed the Martian colonies and its militia carried out terrorist attacks. Earth eventually revokes the Consortium's development licenses and grants independence to Mars, with Earth's government recognizing that all worlds are created equal.
. A manned submersible named Nautilus was once sent to Europa, one of Jupiter's moons. However, the Nautilus was attacked by a Europan squid, which cracked the Nautilus' hull and sank the submersible. It was fifty years before another crewed vessel returned to Europa's oceans.
. It was mirror Spock who ordered the execution of mirror McCoy.
. Scotty now believes that the crossover device mentioned in Spectre and Dark Victory was a giant replicator, which Tiberius used to replicate the Enterprise-E.
. According to Preserver, the mirror universe was created when Zefram Cochrane flipped a coin and decided to tell the visiting Vulcans about the Borg threat. As a result, a military alliance between the Terrans and the Vulcans was formed, and when the Borg were detected far earlier than in Kirk's universe, they were successfully defeated and did not remain a threat.
Of course, we know what actually created the mirror universe. Zefram Cochrane flipped a coin, and decided to blame the Vulcans for having attacked Earth a few days before. When the Vulcans landed on Earth, Cochrane and his men stormed the vessel and managed to stop the Vulcan invasion force. (All these happened in ENT "In a Mirror, Darkly", okay perhaps not the coin flipping part.)
Both cases support Tiberius' recollection of first contact, that of the attack on Cochrane's Montana base.
The Ashes of Eden
The Return
Avenger
Spectre
Dark Victory
Preserver
Captain's Peril
Captain's Blood
Captain's Glory
Ex Machina
The Fearful Summons
The Last Roundup
War Dragons
The Captain's Daughter
The Sundered
Dark Mirror
Crossover
Ship of the Line
Dark Passions, Book 1
Dark Passions, Book 2
Vulcan's Soul, Book 1 - Exodus