USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-C)
The USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-C) was an Ambassador-class starship. The fourth Federation starship to carry the name Enterprise, the Enterprise-C was commanded by Captain Rachel Garrett.
History
In 2344, the Enterprise-C responded to a distress call from the Klingon outpost on Narendra III, which was under attack by the Romulans. When the Enterprise-C arrived at the outpost, she was engaged by four Romulan Warbirds.
During the battle, the Enterprise-C was transported to 2366, twenty-two years into the future, by a temporal rift. The disappearance of the Enterprise-C from the battle into the rift – perhaps seen by the Klingons as an act of cowardice or an abandonment of Narendra III – created an alternate timeline. In this alternate timeline, the outpost at Narendra III had been completely destroyed, and a state of war existed between the Klingon Empire and the Federation.
The Enterprise-C had taken severe damage to her warp nacelles and external hull, with 125 crew members surviving. Her successor, the USS Enterprise-D, encountered the Enterprise-C emerging from the rift and assisted in repairing her. Both ships, however, came under attack from the Klingons, and Captain Garrett was killed. The last surviving senior officer of the Enterprise-C, Lt. Richard Castillo, assumed command of the ship and, under the cover of the Enterprise-D, took her back into the rift to return to 2344 and the battle of Narendra III. Few details are known about the actual battle. What is known, however, is that the Enterprise-C was destroyed with the presumed loss of all hands – the first Enterprise to meet such a fate. Regardless, the Klingons were deeply impressed by this act of self-sacrifice by a Starfleet crew to protect a Klingon outpost, and the friendly relations with the Klingon Empire and the United Federation of Planets were reinforced, leading not to the war of the alternate timeline but a close alliance of peace.
It was later revealed that the Romulans took a number of the ship's crew prisoner.