They’ve got to.

SPOCK

Time is something sacred to them. They may not think as we do—that it should be changed back.

KIRK

(more insistent)

They’ve got to!

RAND’S VOICE O.S.

Ready, Captain. It’s jerry-rigged, but it ought to hold.

KIRK

Energize!

43 ANGLE ON KIRK, SPOCK IN CHAMBER

The dematerialization EFFECT—they become transparent…

RAND

Hurry back, we might not be here when you—

…they dissolve. A few faint sparkles fade. Empty chamber.

44 EXT. PLANET—PLATEAU OF THE GUARDIANS OF TIME

as we left it. The REMATERIALIZATION EFFECT occurs: first the sparkling, then the transparent outlines of bodies, then the solid appearance of Kirk and Mr. Spock. They look around and then the Guardians POP INTO EXISTENCE where they had stood before.

1ST GUARDIAN

The universe you knew…never existed. The ship you came in…never existed. The men and women you knew…never existed.

KIRK

(fiercely)

Let us follow Beckwith. We’ll change Time back.

1ST GUARDIAN

The rope of the time stream knots, and knots again. It is far more dangerous attempting to unsnarl the past than it is to let Time flow on. Let it go.

KIRK

(anguished)

Not that easy for us! Everything we knew, everyone we care about…they’re gone…or changed…

1ST GUARDIAN

You are children, believing you can put smoke back in its bottle.

SPOCK

Is Time immutable? Or can it be set back as it was before Beckwith’s intercession caused the knotting?

1ST GUARDIAN

The man Beckwith…he is a serious impediment in the Time-flow. He is scar-tissue. A clot in the chronal bloodstream. Do you know the concept “evil”?

KIRK

(tense)

We do. Send us back. We’ll retrieve him.

1ST GUARDIAN

There is a problem, of course. There is always a problem. Time cannot be doubled.

SPOCK

(grasps immediately)

Basic physics. Two objects cannot occupy the same space at the same time. You cannot send us back to the precise time of Beckwith’s appearance, can you?

1ST GUARDIAN

Before. Or after. But not the same.

Spock looks at Kirk. They communicate silently, analyzing the options, the two intelligent problemsolvers considering all the possibilities. Finally: they nod to each other.

KIRK

Before he gets there. He won’t know we’re already settled in.

(beat)

How close can you set us down in the past?

1ST GUARDIAN

Soon. Close, perhaps. But we have no way of calculating such things.

SPOCK

Captain, the tricorder. I can set it now to resonate in phase with the Vortex. That will establish a baseline for dating, and once in the Past, we can get our chronological bearings.

KIRK

We’ll grab him when he comes through. We’ll be waiting.

(beat)

I just hope we won’t have been waiting for years.

SPOCK

If we bring him back, then the river resumes its natural course, everything goes back the way it was?

1ST GUARDIAN

(nods)