CAMERA PULLS BACK RAPIDLY to show Kirk, Spock and the rest just behind her, and as CAMERA FILLS we see mountains that rise up into the sky, till they become vague and whispy.

SPOCK

The tracks…straight for the mountains.

CAMERA MOVES BACK IN and TO THE LEFT to come in CLOSER on Kirk, and past him, as if they were miniatures right over his shoulder, the mountains, with a strange glittering on one far, distant peak.

KIRK

(almost dreamily)

Mr. Spock: do you see a great city up there?

SPOCK’S VOICE O.S.

It is there, Captain.

KIRK

Like a city on the edge of forever.

CAMERA HOLD as Kirk moves away and the others move with him. CAMERA HOLD on the gleaming city, seen almost in opaque dimness as we

DISSOLVE TO:

21 PLATEAU OF THE GUARDIAN—LATER DAY—CLOSE SHOT

ON KIRK as he climbs up the last of what is obviously a mountain pass. The stones are a peculiar silvery material, with buried shimmers of light in them. As Kirk climbs up onto the plateau, CAMERA GOES WITH HIM as the ANGLE OPENS to show us bracing rock walls and niches all around us.

22 THE PLATEAU—ESTABLISHING SHOT—KIRK’S POV

PANNING SHOT from Kirk’s immediate right, around the bowl of the plateau. Gray sky past the rock prominences, light and eerie mist that gives the entire area an ethereal look, niches up in the rock walls, boulders of the same bright substance here and there, and on a higher peak but still quite far-off—the city, glittering like a hypersensitive’s dream. And as the CAMERA PANS AROUND we see, for the first time, THE GUARDIAN OF FOREVER. The shot continues a beat and then CAMERA ZOOMS IN on “him.” For that beat, he had looked almost like another sparkling rock in the stone walls. But as CAMERA CLOSES in the ZOOM we see “he” is something quite different: The GUARDIAN OF FOREVER is pure thought. Resting in a shallow bowl on a pedestal, he looks like a globe of flickering light…like a shimmering handful of fog…like something totally alien and omnipresent. (Construction of the Guardian should combine a minimum of expense with a maximum of ingenuity.)

23 CLOSING SHOT—KIRK & SPOCK

as they move toward the Guardian. Spock moves in behind Kirk and the others follow, fanning out. They move closer, awed (for it is an awesome presence).

SPOCK

(softly)

It’s alive.

KIRK

(with wonder)

The power, Mr. Spock. Can you feel the power coming from it?

There is the SOUND of a deep, sepulchral VOICE OVER. A voice that rings out in the rocky enclosure, seeming to come from nowhere and everywhere at once. It is the VOICE of the GUARDIAN.

GUARDIAN

(a voice of power)

I am the Guardian of Forever. Welcome.

KIRK

You live in the city?

GUARDIAN

Once. Before we became pure energy. A time before your sun burned hot in space. Before your race was born.