Date: 28 Jul 2014 07:42 Title: Chapter 9
The thing I love best about this story is that Spock influenced the future by trying not to influence the future. That's always been my problem with the Prime Directive, in a way. What if non-interference is the interference with fate that causes a problem? Even non-action, at it's most basic is action. Choosing not to choose is still a choice. We simply don't have enough information to know how the choice we make will or won't affect the future. As Spock is fond of saying, "Fate unfolds as it must."
I like the idea that it was Spock who influenced Surak to bring about peace on Vulcan, but time travel stories like this always make me overthink and over-analyze the situation. Spock wasn't born during the time of Surak, so how did the peace come about the first time? How can the events of the past, which made conditions possible for Spock to be who he is in his present time, still produce Spock as he is, so that he can go back to the past to affect the change that allows his future to remain intact? That's a rhetorical question--I think abstractly enough to get it, but won't promise I've ironed out all the implications of that.
I love, love, love this story.
Author's Response:
LOL! That was always the thing that broke my brain about 'Yesteryear' - how could an adult Spock go back and save himself as a child, when at that time he hadn't reached adulthood yet?
Much smarter people than I have speculated that time is fluid, and that past, present and future exist alongside one another. Won't pretend to understand it, but felt confident enough to use it here...;-)
I agree, and that's the irony I was going for - Spock saw the danger McCoy's action presented to the future in CotEoF, and tried so hard not to make the same mistake. And yet, even just by being himself he was able to influence the past so that the future would unfold as it should. Yep, messing with the past has the potential to be a very risky move, no matter what one does...