Guardian of Forever

The **Guardian of Forever** was a construct built by an unknown and ancient civilization. The Guardian was both an entity in and of itself, as well as a functioning portal in time and space. It was constructed on a location where all timelines converged. Because of its very nature, determining a precise age of the Guardian was impossible.

The Guardian of Forever stood at the center of a large city, that ultimately lay in ruins around it. It was a roughly circular, but asymmetrical gateway made of a quasi-metallic substance.

The Guardian had limited abilities and was not able to alter the speed at which it displayed the past through its doorway. The Guardian was capable of speech and understanding external stimuli around it. When opening a portal in time, the Guardian emitted a gaseous fog and the region around the planet would experience spatial anomalies.

The Guardian also had the ability to move its location, and disguise itself in other forms. In its humanoid form, it used the name **Carl**.

## History

The Guardian was asked a question in 4,500,000 BCE. It is known only to the Guardian what this question was. After this, no organic or synthetic lifeforms interacted with the Guardian for billions of cycles.

In the year 3267 CE, temporal ripples emanated from the Guardian of Forever. The reason these ripples were emitted at this time is unknown, except to the Guardian. The USS *Enterprise* (NCC-1701) investigated this anomaly, which led them to a previously undiscovered planet. During this investigation, Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy accidentally dosed himself with cordrazine and, experiencing paranoid delusions, beamed himself to the planet in order to escape the ship.

While searching for McCoy, a landing party led by Captain James T. Kirk and his executive officer Spock discovered the Guardian of Forever. The Guardian displayed images from Earth's past -- and McCoy dived into the portal, arriving on Earth in the year 1930 CE. The landing party soon discovered they had lost contact with the Enterprise -- somehow, McCoy had managed to alter history. The party's proximity to the Guardian protected them from the changes he had wrought and provided them with an opportunity to rectify the situation. With the Guardian's help, they arrived on Earth prior to McCoy's arrival. Once they had restored the Prime Reality to its proper timeline, the Guardian returned all of them to the present -- only mere moments after they had left it.

The United Federation of Planets continued to study the Guardian, and with the Guardians help, all of history. In 3269 CE, the USS *Enterprise* returned to the planet to help in these studies. While Spock was studying the formation of the Orion culture, Spock was inadvertently removed from the timeline. He was once again protected from these changes by the Guardian itself. Discovering the cause, Spock went back to save himself from death during the *kahs-wan* ritual. This proved that, on occasion, the Guardian of Forever was destined to be used to preserve the timeline of the Prime Reality.

The Guardian of Forever proved to be a focal point in the Temporal Wars. In order to prevent its own misuse, it moved itself to the remote world of Dannus V. In 4189 CE, it was finally rediscovered by Michael Burnham and Phillippa Georgiou who were seeking a way to cure the Terran's time/dimensional displacement illness. In the guise of Carl, the Guardian tested Georgiou -- and once she passed, revealed itself to her. It opened a portal to a time where the Mirror Universe was still aligned to the Prime Reality, where she would be able to survive.

After Georgiou passed through the portal, the Guardian of Forever relocated itself again to an unknown location.

## Source

The Guardian of Forever is derived from *Star Trek*. For canon information, please visit:

* Memory Alpha

### Author's Note:

* Star Trek: Phase II Episode "In Harm's Way"
* Star Trek Online Missions "City on the Edge of Never" and "Past Imperfect"