James T. Kirk's 17 temporal violations

[Enterprise1701]

As we all know from watching DS9 - "Trials and Tribble-ations", the Department of Temporal Investigations in 2373 had records of Captain James T. Kirk traveling through time on 17 separate occasions. I was compiling a list of these events in concert with the novelverse and wanted to see if I was missing anything.


1. Destruction of Psi 2000 (TOS – “The Naked Time”)
2. Discovery of the black star (TOS – “Tomorrow Is Yesterday”)
3. Discovery of the Guardian of Forever (TOS – “The City on the Edge of Forever”)
4. First encounter with Gary Seven (TOS – “Assignment: Earth”)
5. Helping Roberta Lincoln with the Certoss (TOS – From History’s Shadow)
6. Discover of the atavachron on Sarpeidon (TOS – “All Our Yesterdays”)
8. Clan Ru incident (TOS – First Frontier)
9. Guardian of Forever research mission (TAS – “Yesteryear”)
10. Skagway/Saturn incident (TOS – The Rings of Time)
11. Working with Roberta Lincoln to assist the Iramahl (TOS – Elusive Salvation)
12. Retrieving humpback whales (Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home)
13. ?
14. ?
15. ?
16. ?
17. ?

Do y'all suppose that his encounter with Seven of Nine (TOS - No Time Like the Past) and his death at the hands of Tolian Soran (Star Trek Generations) would be known in 2373?

Also note that the subspace confluence crisis in DTI - Forgotten History doesn't count in this list of 17 for reasons described in the novel.

 

[Christopher]

As we all know from watching DS9 - "Trials and Tribble-ations", the Department of Temporal Investigations in 2373 had records of Captain James T. Kirk traveling through time on 17 separate occasions.

Actually the line is "seventeen separate temporal violations." We don't know if "temporal violations" are limited to actually traveling through time -- it could include interacting with temporal phenomena or other time travelers (as in Crossroad, for example) or perhaps even crossing into an alternate timeline (as in "Mirror, Mirror"). And I'm not sure whether accidents like "The Naked Time" and "Tomorrow is Yesterday," or officially sanctioned missions like "Assignment: Earth" and "Yesteryear," would count as violations, which implies a breach of temporal regulations. Arguably, since there was no DTI and no formal temporal regulatory structure until 2270, it's possible that nothing before then would count as a violation in the official sense. Although, since it was Lucsly who said it, he might well have taken a more rigid view.

 

[Idran]

There's also the question of if something would count as a violation if there was no intent. The example you give of Kirk getting pulled into the Nexus while trying to save the Enterprise-B, for example; would that be a violation even if it was known? Is it a violation if someone or something forces you into a situation against your will?

It's kind of like the situation on the Verity in WTC; did Garcia commit a violation just by virtue of the fact that she jumped ahead to the future by no fault of her own? Or Elfiki's situation in same; would that count as a violation, a phenomenon outside her control sending her to the past unwillingly, even though as soon as she was forced to the past she immediately did everything by the book and did everything in her power to ensure no interference in the course of time?

(You could argue that Kirk was involved in changing the course of events with Picard's help, but to him it was all in his relative future still; he didn't really do anything that someone with a quick sublight ship couldn't have done without time travel.)

 

[Christopher]

Come to think of it, I guess it's a question of whether "violation" is being used in terms of a legal/procedural violation or in terms of a causality violation.

 

[Leto_II]

A few more, off the top of my head (many from the comics, rather than the novels):

• Time For Yesterday (2285) - Admiral Kirk and Spock journey through the Guardian of Forever to prevent its malfunctioning. Likely not a violation, though, due to mission being sanctioned by Starfleet Command.
  
• "Time Crime" (TOS DC Vol. 2, #53-57) - In 2290, Kirk and crew attempt to correct the historical timeline, involving not one, but at least two separate, intentional excursions into the past. Not sure about violation-viability, due to being a correctional mission, rather than being instigated by Kirk himself.
  
• "The Alone" (TOS DC Vol. 2, #62-63) - During the final months of the 5YM, Kirk gets trapped in a planet's past, grows old, and dies. The timeline gets removed from existence at the end of the story, thanks to the actions of Spock and the crew.
• "Time's Echo" (Star Trek: New Visions) - An accident causes a future version of the Enterprise to crashland on a radiation-soaked planetoid, marooning the crew, and condemning their descendants to mutational hell. Kirk orders the Enterprise into a temporal-slingshot, erasing their descendants and thousands of years of history.
  
• "1971"/"4860.2" (Star Trek: New Visions #7) - Kirk gets sent through time by Gary Seven in an effort to prevent an alien race from erasing the Federation's existence from history.

 

[Enterprise1701]

I take the view, as shown in the DTI series, that DTI personnel generally consider it Starfleet personnel's fault for landing themselves in dangerous temporal incidents even if it was completely an accident.

T'Viss herself said in DTI - Forgotten History after unlocking her memory that Kirk's count needed to be increased despite the subspace confluence crisis occurring through no fault of his own.

 

[Idran]

I take the view, as shown in the DTI series, that DTI personnel generally consider it Starfleet personnel's fault for landing themselves in dangerous temporal incidents even if it was completely an accident.

T'Viss herself said in DTI - Forgotten History after unlocking her memory that Kirk's count needed to be increased despite the subspace confluence crisis occurring through no fault of his own.

Oh, that is a good point. And there wouldn't even be an "integrity of time/don't change the timeline" concern around his actions in that one considering that it was a cross-timeline incident, so you couldn't use the argument that she meant that either.

 

[TalonCard]

Kirk's brother died in 2267 in ...but by 2287 Kirk said "I lost a brother once. But I was lucky, I got him back," in reference to Spock. Now I know there are a number of ways to interpret the line, but that'd be worth a temporal violation IMO...

TC

 

[Christopher]

Kirk's brother died in 2267 in ...but by 2287 Kirk said "I lost a brother once. But I was lucky, I got him back," in reference to Spock. Now I know there are a number of ways to interpret the line, but that'd be worth a temporal violation IMO...

If every contradictory line of dialogue in a Trek episode were evidence of a temporal violation, then Kirk would probably be involved in close to a hundred, not just 17.

 

[Jinn]

If every contradictory line of dialogue in a Trek episode were evidence of a temporal violation, then Kirk would probably be involved in close to a hundred, not just 17.

Well, Kirk is not required to travel trough time, maybe just everything else.

 

[Avro Arrow]

If every contradictory line of dialogue in a Trek episode were evidence of a temporal violation, then Kirk would probably be involved in close to a hundred, not just 17.

James T. Kirk only had 17 of them. James R. Kirk had the rest...

 

[Enterprise1701]

Clock Wrecker! Time Pirate!