I don't own Star Trek in any form.

I always loved First Contact since it showed off the beginning of Starfleet and space exploration in the Trekverse. Enjoy this little one-shot.

Please let me know what you think.

Flight of the Phoenix.

Geordi knew he was grinning like an idiot, but he could not help it; here he was, sitting on board the legendary Phoenix, Earth's first warp ship, with Zefram Cochrane right in front of him. Okay, sure, as a Starfleet officer he knew travelling into the past was never recommended, but if there was one thing his time in Starfleet, notably his tenure as chief engineer on the Enterprise D and now the Enterprise E had taught him it was to try to make the best of a weird situation.

It was impossible for any child born in the 24th century to not know anything about Cochrane. After all, he had built the warp engine, ushering in a new era of peace and exploration, metaphorically turning Earth into a phoenix which rose from the ashes, uniting humanity and eliminating poverty, disease, war and starvation in only half a century following the first meeting with the Vulcans, which would lead to the NX project, giving humanity the first warp five ships, and the seed which had been planted following the First Contact would begin to grow, culminating in the foundation of the United Federation of Planets.

Geordi had encountered many strange, wonderful, terrifying, amazing things in his time in Starfleet - his meeting with Montgomery 'Scotty' Scott, being on the bridge and witnessing the Enterprise D being pushed by the thoughts and equations of the Traveller, visited 19th century San Francisco and meeting (although he had barely interacted with) Mark Twain, encountering the Borg and even befriending one - but he had never imagined he would get to meet the legendary Zefram Cochrane.

However, the scientist had been a near disappointment, and Geordi knew that everyone else felt the same way in some respects since they had all grown up hearing of how the scientist had achieved warp drive; they'd all seen the man as a visionary, instead they had a drunk who had a short-term view of his legendary project.

It disgusted Geordi that a scientist would spend years and years working on the first warp engine, devising the theory and working through tonnes and tonnes of calculations that Geordi like so many others knew had taken him a very long time just to get right, surviving through a nuclear holocaust and working on the warp ship by refitting one of the last nuclear missiles in Montana, had just planned to sell it to one of the barely hanging on space agencies without looking back, just wanting to retire on some tropical island somewhere in the middle of nowhere without looking to the future of humanity.

It was disheartening, but what made it worse was how Geordi knew he should have seen the signs of impending disappointment; he remembered how Guinan had told him before Leah Brahms had appeared on the Enterprise D when they encountered that space-dwelling life form that he shouldn't get his hopes up or focus on his first impressions of someone until he knew them better.

The El-Aurian had been right then, and she had been right now (a part of him wondered what the long-lived, wise woman was doing right now; he knew thanks to that visit to the 19th century following those aliens who drained neural energy, masking their activities by using a plague that was already killing people, Guinan had visited numerous planets over the years, but he wondered what the Guinan of this time was doing), he shouldn't be focusing on his preconceptions.

When Cochrane had just run off like that, stopping for a drink along the way which only served to disgust the engineer more, Geordi had been forced to accept that perhaps it was their own fault since they had shoved so many expectations on him, but once he'd been brought back to the Phoenix everything had gone as they'd hoped.

The launch had been hard; it was one thing for humans of the 24th century to know their ancestors had used chemical combustion to get their ships into space, but to experience the g-forces of primitive space flight for himself, being crushed down into his seat, Geordi had been relieved when they had left Earth's gravitational pull.

Cochrane had been more grounded when they found themselves in orbit; for a man who claimed to prefer trains, hated to fly, and truly was not looking forwards to going to the stars to initiate the first warp flight in Earth's history, Geordi had been delighted when he had heard the awe in the scientist's voice as he looked over the surface of the Earth.

The scientist had further impressed Geordi as he became more focused on the task ahead. Cochrane may have had a problem with drinking, but when the scientist was sober and focused, he was sharp. However, what worried Geordi the most was how the Enterprise had followed them, and they had fired those three quantum torpedoes; he and Riker had kept their silence from Cochrane, who had been surprised by the ripple effect caused by the warp distortion created by the wake of the projectiles. The scientist had tried to escape from them on the planet when he learnt of some of the things he would be doing in the future if he had found out from them their own ship was firing three torpedoes so close to them, there was no telling what he would have done.

For the two Starfleet officers thrown back in time to stop the Borg from preventing the First Contact, their worst fears had been confirmed.

They had been worried the Borg might be in control of the ship, given how Captain Picard had suddenly turned from enthusiastic to studying the missile complex in Montana to terrified and calling up to the ship to ask Worf if anything was happening. Those torpedoes had confirmed their very worst fears.

The Borg were in control of the Enterprise.

Of course, there wasn't much that could be done, all they could do was make sure history took its natural course in spite of the Borg's attempts to change the course of history.

The warp effect had seemed more….ballistic than what he and Riker were used to; all early United Earth, later Federation starships had inertial dampeners installed to take away some of the instability of the warp jump, however, the Phoenix used something more primitive. It wasn't Cochrane's fault he hadn't had access to enough equipment to make something better.

Still, it had been great to hear Cochrane scream with terror and awe as the ship travelled at warp for the first time, watching the stars streak by as they broke the light barrier. The scientist calmed down when he released the ship wasn't going to be destroyed by the acceleration. After that, he had taken to looking at the expanse of space with awe. Now they had dropped out of warp, throttling back Geordi could not help but smile when he caught sight of Earth, now much smaller in the distance; he remembered how he had first gone into warp himself after reading and hearing about Cochrane's first warp flight. It had been incredible arriving a planetary system many light-years away, the stars magically streaking past as the warp field was generated. Magic.

But this was different. Geordi had never expected to share in the experience with the legendary scientist and pilot, but he was glad he had.

In this point in history, the United Federation of Planets had yet to be created. At the moment humanity was just eking out a meagre type of existence, hemmed in by remaining militants although why they hadn't died out yet, Geordi couldn't work out; they had lost everything, the planet was devastated, 600 million dead… What was the point?

However, at this point humanity had truly risen from the ashes.

"Is that Earth?" Cochrane asked, the faint uncertain awe in his voice amazing Geordi.

"That's it," the engineer confirmed.

"It looks…small," Cochrane whispered in amazement.

Riker grinned. "It's about to get a whole lot bigger."

Geordi grinned behind Cochrane's back. He wasn't going to get his hopes up, but he was beginning to wonder if the scientist in front of him was starting to see the wonder the future held. Granted, Geordi knew he had gotten too overexcited, blabbing about that stupid statue which had overwhelmed Cochrane to the point where he'd tried to escape his future, but perhaps by showing him this, he would begin seeing the possibilities ahead of him. Possibilities that would lead to the next fifty years where the Vulcan' presence would inspire humanity to grow, the first warp ships and probes such as Valiant and Friendship One, the launch of the NX-01 Enterprise commanded by Jonathan Archer…

A part of Geordi wondered if he should tweak the future a little, drop in little hints about warp theory to make it better…. But he quickly pushed it aside.

The future was already set in his mind.

Earth had burnt in the Third World War, but now it had risen from the ashes