[REVIEW] Season Four | Episode Two | Desperate Measures Part 1

[Scott Archer]

After taking some time to prepare for their next mission, the crew of Ariana arrives in 2151. Their mission is simple, make sure that Enterprise NX-01 reaches P'Jem successfully and on schedule.
After scanning Enterprise, they find nothing more than a few temporal anomalies that TIA tells them not to worry about (see Ent: Cold Front) and so they expand their search further and eventually find an unidentified temporally phased object directly in Enterprise's path.
After some scanning, they realise it was a bomb and the yield could virtually obliterate Ariana - Enterprise stands no chance. They mean to destroy it, but to keep Enterprise safe, they hack into her sensors and make them think there is a small ion storm ahead causing them to make a big enough course change to completely avoid the device. With Enterprise safe, they go about trying to figure out how to disarm or destroy the bomb when another phased ship approaches.
Aboard is one man, Captain Haliwell - after a brief dialogue, he confirms his identity and Savage allows him onto Ariana and calls a senior staff meeting where he informs them about the future Federation and the Parathans:
Haliwell is here, under orders from the remnants of Starfleet command in the 34th century to stop the Federation ever being founded.
In the 34th century, the Federation has expanded rapidly and gained some powerful allies and impressive new technology allowing them to easily traverse galaxies and the vast majority of the Milky Way, Andromeda and Triangulum has been explored, colonised and thousands of species have joined. 
Almost all threats have been eliminated, The Borg, The Sphere Builders and the Kelvans and many who were being oppressed by them have been set free.
The 3 galaxies are virtually at peace, everyone is working towards improving themselves, their species and the Federation.
Until the Parathans.
They are a hive parasite like race, originally confined to a handful of systems in LGS3 - a tiny galaxy orbiting Triangulum.
They're all connected by some form of low level telepathy that is impossible to block and expands the galaxy and they attack in force, in a swarm and inject their young into their victims. Their young then gain the knowledge of the host and every single Parathan learns that same knowledge through the hive mind.
They feed on all forms of energy - weapons fire - phasers, disruptors, antimatter - virtually all forms of weaponry apart from projectiles will have no effect and only make them stronger.
They drained an entire star in their home system and they drain the life force of their victims but until they do, they control you and you have no control over what you do but you are fully aware of everything and you are fully aware of your long, agonising death.
They're like the Borg but when they're finished with you, you die in agony.

The first Federation ship to encounter them was also one of the most powerful and it fell to the Parathans in 3 days and they used it and subsequent ships they infested to spread across the large 3 galaxies and most of their satellites in less than a decade.
All has failed, the Federation was too perfect, too easy to conquer, had technology that was too advanced.
They've also gained access to Temporal Technology and have used it to block access to virtually all parts of the timeline where they could be stopped - Haliwell has managed to temporal lock this time and place and it is virtually their last chance of stopping the Parathans.

His plan is to destroy the Enterprise NX-01 before it reach P'Jem.
Their projections show that doing so will lead to an eventual war between the Vulcans and Andorians - leaving humanity pretty much alone during the Xindi attack
Vulcan and Andor will be decimated and Earth will be destroyed by the Xindi meaning that when the Romulans come, they will conquer the 3 crushed powers and the Tellarites - who aren't strong enough to defeat the Romulans alone - removing the Federation from the picture and leaving the Romulans and Klingons as the key power.
Without the Federation, the Parathan homeworld will never be discovered and even if it is, the technology won't exist to allow their rapid spread across the universe.

The command staff are horrified, but convinced that there has to be a better way and tell Halliwell so. After some discussion, Haliwell stuns Lieutenant JG Klaw using a hidden weapon and triggers his tricorder, beaming him back and dragging Ariana in the 34th century.

As they arrive, they are greeted by a Universe Class (Enterpise-J class - see Ent: Azati Prime) ship and 64 smaller vessels.
Savage tries to hail them but is unable to make contact and whilst Okane is able to destroy a couple of the approaching vessels, several latch onto Ariana and start cutting through the hull.

Dulmur arrives in engineering with a security detail just as they break through...
To Be Continued