#just how long were janeway and tom missing anyway

[tuttle-did-it]

remember that time Tom Paris went really fast, died, resurrected himself by became a Time Lord, evolved into a salamander, kidnapped the captain who also turned into a salamander (and possibly would have also become a Time Lord), mated with the captain (apparently REALLY quickly, they weren't missing for that long??), had three salamander babies, abandoned the salamander babies and then he and the captain were magically transformed back to normal with not even a scar? and then it was never, ever mentioned again.

[insanewaykathy]

Chakotay:

Also Chakotay:

JANEWAY: Voyager doesn't have an Astrometrics lab. CHAKOTAY: Harry designed it, or will design it.

JANEWAY: Our people? CHAKOTAY: I'm going to be your First Officer.

CHAKOTAY: No. We used Borg technology for that. JANEWAY: Borg? CHAKOTAY: It's a long story.

CHAKOTAY: I'm detecting an active neurogenic field. This could be the day the telepathic pitcher plant put us all into comas. Or it might be the time aliens invaded our dreams.

CHAKOTAY: If it makes you feel any better, you're going to develop quite a knack for dealing with the Borg. JANEWAY: You mean we're going to be seeing more of them? CHAKOTAY: We'll run into them on a few occasions.

CHAKOTAY: In the middle of the journey of our life, I found myself astray in a dark wood, where the straight road had been lost. JANEWAY: I didn't know Dante's Inferno was on the Maquis reading list. CHAKOTAY: Actually, I borrowed your copy. JANEWAY: My fiance gave me that book as an engagement gift. I've never lent it to anyone. CHAKOTAY: Not yet. Anyway, I agree with Dante. If you always see the road ahead of you, it's not worth the trip.

JANEWAY: Like you. How do you get to be my First Officer? CHAKOTAY: Our crews will be forced to work together after we get stranded. JANEWAY: In the Delta Quadrant? How does that happen? CHAKOTAY: Are you sure you want to know?

JANEWAY: What the hell was that? CHAKOTAY: A macrovirus. They infected the ship a few years ago.

JANEWAY: What reasons? CHAKOTAY: You were trying to save lives. JANEWAY: Whose? CHAKOTAY: An alien culture. The Ocampans.

JANEWAY: Really? Just what am I missing? CHAKOTAY: It's not what, it's who. People like Seven of Nine, a Borg Drone who'll become a member of this crew after you help her recover her humanity. Or Tom Paris, a former convict, who'll be our pilot, chief medic, and husband to B'Elanna Torres. JANEWAY: That angry woman I just met? CHAKOTAY: She's going to be your Chief Engineer. Two crews, Maquis and Starfleet, are going to become one. And they'll make as big a mark on the Delta Quadrant as it'll make on them by protecting people like the Ocampans, curing diseases, encouraging peace. Children like Naomi and Icheb are going to grow up on this ship and call it home. And we'll all be following a Captain who sets a course for Earth, and never stops believing that we'll get there.

JANEWAY: So, who is this Seska? CHAKOTAY: She was a member of my crew, who turned out to be a Cardassian spy. She made an alliance with the Kazon and took over the ship. It's all right, we got it back.

[thegeminisage]

STAR TREK UPDATE TIME. last night we watched voy's "scorpion part i" and "the gift." I HAVE FINALLY MET SEVEN OF NINE

scorpion part ii:

ABSOLUTELY loved this one. idk why i was so surprised when seven turned out to be their borg liaison like i had no idea how they encountered her...i guess i was picturing them picking her up like a lost puppy because of hugh in tng

seven hot it must be said. we haven't gotten into the meat of it yet but i do like her. i was a little worried that after all this i wouldn't!

janeway dealing with the borg was sooo fun. literally her no-nonsense take-no-shit mode

i loved also that chakotay was the one to essentially borg meld with seven since he'd had the prior experience...mwah. give him a little borg trauma as a treat

i also really enjoyed janeway and chakotay realizing that seven was right - their fighting and going against each other is why they were losing. what if our future third reminded us that we needed to renew our wedding vows and we were both lost in space?

ESPECIALLY BECAUSE. like on what could have been her deathbed while she was slurring her words she made chakotay promise to do the thing. and immediately he decided to do the opposite even though it broke his heart. like SO TRUE they needed the reminder mom and dad were literally fighting

i have mixed feelings about janeway sort of forcing the detransition from borg onto seven. like yeah no human person wants to be borg especially not the little girl she was when she was assimilated but it's very hard to hear and ignore her wishes NOW when she's stating them so clearly, and when she's so obviously suffering. like i don't think she could have done any different or that i would have done any different but whew! rough

i also think chakotay was SICK with jealousy that tuvok got to go into the cube with janeway and he had to stay out on voyager. i bet tuvcok was so smug about it. idk why but it brings me so much joy to imagine them hating each other and as an extent maybe also fighting over janeway's affection, be it platonic or not

also, i can't remember if this was in this episode or the next one but the bit where seven was in her cell fucking SCREAMING na janeway was behind her grabbing her...sincerely hoping the dyke energy only gets better from here cuz that was gay as hell

the gift:

rip kes...i'll miss you

ik kes left bc they were having difficulties with the actress, but it still sucks that her exit was so dumb. like oh no her powers are going out of control and even though we fixed it every other time this time we can't! anyway bye!

i do appreciate the actresses crying for what felt like...you know, for real, during the goodbye. i almost welled up with them. and ten years closer to home!!! that's 13 years down, 57 to go...

kes is such a rare person in the voyager cast because she has so many connections. she's good friends with tom, she's gort tuvok and the emh as her mentors, janeway as like her fake mom, neelix as her romantic interest...she's connected to so many people. if you name anybody from the rest of the cast you'd get 2-3 connections at most. so it's sad to see her go

and like i hated neelix when he was with kes but their goodbye conversation was so lame. i still can't believe that's all we ever got about their breakup. fucking crazy

on the other hand, seven in this episode was so good, especially with like, b'elanna - her disdain and her sarcasm are useless against b'elanna who can dish it back out just as well and does not give one shit about seven's deal so long as she gets the ship working again. also? lots of women on screen during that scene. let's lez out.

and seven at the end remembering her favorite color :( i was surprised she relented in her willingness to be aboard so quickly - but it just shows that janeway genuinely did get through to her somehow. WOMEN!!!

TONIGHT: ds9's "a time to stand" and "rocks and shoals"

[allisonreader]

I'm going to go off on a tangent and rant/write out my thoughts about Star Trek Picard. I don't think that I'm going to get too spoilery below, but read at your own risk if you haven't watched season 3 up to episode 9.

I can't say that I haven't enjoyed the show, because I have, but in this season in particular I miss the alien/monster/problem of the week format. I'm tired of the high stakes everything is only going to get solved at the end of the season type of thing. You can have an overarching story, while still have an episode wrap up nicely each week.

Also, season 3 feels extremely separate from the first two. On other Star Trek shows previously, you couldn't necessarily tell where one season ended and the next began. With Picard, well, you're definitely able to tell. Each season is kind of its own distinct "era". It's not necessarily a bad thing, but I think in the long run, that the series that do this, aren't going to hold up as well as the shows where you don't have to watch a season from the beginning to understand everything.

I do think that it's part of Discovery's issue as well. Also it's tiring. I was on the edge of my seat the entire last episode that I watched. I enjoyed the nostalgia bate the most. And honestly I could have enjoyed just a whole show of the old crew being back together and catching up with each other. Being friends, sharing in jokes. Not everything has to be high stakes all the time. I'm all for a "do you remember/clip style episode" .

My other big complaint is that I wish there were more references to Voyager. Seven has been such a big character throughout the show, and I just wish that they would capitalize on that a little bit more. Let Seven mention Naomi Wildman, Harry, Tom and B'elanna. The Doctor. Surely at least some of them have kept in contact with her beyond Janeway and possibly Tuvok. I also think that they should have stolen Voyager this season.

In season 2 I really wish that when Seven had been asked where she learned to drive, she would have said Paris, meaning Tom Paris, since he had a long documented love of the 20th century. He easily could have claimed that the crew should know how to drive in case they ever had another time travel incident, as they had been known to do so. It would have been such a nice nod to Voyager and the people she knew beyond Janeway.

Anyways, I think that's my rant for now.

[quarks-pussy]

harry kim for the ask game i need to know your thoughts

(ask game)

Ok so apparently when you were deactivated that one time, your ask disappeared from my inbox and I wasn't notified about the ask again when you came back so I totally missed this message for over a month. Oops 😅

Anyway! Harry time.

Stan twitter: I don't know. I'm not sure Harry would have one tbh, imo Harry would be far more likely to just support Tom's (thoroughly unsuccessful) Bruce Springsteen stan account on main. If we're going with the "Paris and Archer have vicious drama over Bruce Springsteen" continuity, Harry is absolutely jumping in the trenches to defend Tom's opinions despite not even being into Bruce Springsteen.

Weirdest kink: I unironically believe Harry is out there exploring the final frontier by sexualising being stuck in/changed by the delta quadrant. "Came back wrong" is erotic to Harry. And self sacrifice ofc. Also a bit of a mommy/authority kink that only developed after getting mommy issues from Janeway

Corner store: Nothing. Depending on how and where you imagine this corner store, Harry is either there to scoop out some intel from the locals or to keep Tom company while he's browsing the magazines.

And I know it's been a while but if ppl wanna send more asks for the ask game, feel free to, tho I might take a long time to answer them, sorry

[bumblingbabooshka]

What if Tuvok didn’t want to read the letter from T’Pel at first because he was (deep down - he’d never admit to this of course) nervous that she had in fact done the logical thing and moved on. She absolutely could have, couldn’t she? She’s on Vulcan with so many options and it’d be illogical for him to expect her not to, she didn’t even know he was alive after all. It’d be logical to- But then he hears that she’s still calling him her husband and praying for his safe return. And suddenly he very much wants to read it.

[kiradaxx]

Critical Care

This idea jumped into my head soon as I saw the scene with Tuvok and Janeway holding hands on the bridge in the episode Critical Care. This is definitely not a criticism of that scene because I loved it and found it hilarious and Janeway and Tuvok are bros for life. Tuvok's reaction was priceless and both actors crushed it. But I couldn't help reimagining this scene with a J/7 twist, cause, of course. So here we go, enjoy my brief, goofy J/7 rewrite of this episode's fake dating trope.

Also on AO3 here

________________________________________________________________

A powerful headache was throbbing in Janeway’s temples as she waited for the communications link to be picked up by yet another Delta Quadrant inhabitant in the long line of fruitless interviews she’d been conducting all day. Patience was a virtue she did not possess, but diplomacy she had in spades. So she’d been smiling and charming and biting her tongue down on more acerbic comments all day as she attempted to track down the scam artist who had managed to steal their doctor’s program right out from under her nose.

After hours of chasing down contacts and bouncing from one rumor to the next, from one unhelpful, frustrating source to the next, not only was Janeway tired, she was bored out of her mind. However, they had finally found a workable lead in Gar’s current girlfriend. They had just concluded a call with her husband- a sad, weepy man with little dignity left to his name. He had divulged far more information about his wife’s adultery than Janeway cared to know, but at least they had learned something to go off of. Now, they were hoping this woman could give them Gar’s actual whereabouts, rather than just tell them yet another story of how he had conned some unsuspecting soul and made off into the ether.

Janeway leaned heavily against the railing of the main command stage of her bridge, staring at the still empty view screen. Her chin rested in her right hand, her elbow on the railing, and as she stared out into space, she suppressed the urge to tap her fingers restlessly against her cheek. Waiting for the call to be picked up was about as thrilling as watching paint dry, and while she hoped for a more productive conversation this time, she wished she could be doing just about anything else at the moment.

Finally, their hail was answered, and the view screen displayed a pale woman with a large forehead of unique ridges sitting luxuriantly on a couch in what appeared to be a sunroom of some sort. Making quick work of her initial assessment of the woman and the necessary introductions, Janeway wasted no further time in explaining who they were looking for. This held little interest for the woman, though, and rather than offering any information about Gar, she instead asked how they had found her. When she was informed that her husband had given them her name, a look of vague disgust overtook the woman’s features. Janeway lamented internally as she realized the moment the woman opened her mouth that she was about to be subjected to still more details of this couple’s relationship problems.

“You’re a woman, you saw my husband with your own eyes.” Her tone carried a distinct distaste as she continued, “Overweight, depressed. You would have left him too.” A playful spark and a vapid smile lit up the woman’s face next, and she added, “Especially if you had met someone as exciting as Gar.”

Nasty comments about the man’s size or emotional state were hardly necessary, but Janeway couldn’t afford to lose this lead now. Not when they’d finally come so close to getting the scammer’s location. So for the sake of her missing crew member, once more she bit down on the inside of her cheek and held back on her criticism of the woman’s shameful attitude. She was only just able to restrain an eye roll when the woman began extolling Gar’s seductive qualities. But her day had been long and exhausting and filled with some of the most inane conversations she’d ever entertained, and when she offered a placating agreement to the woman’s assessment, she didn’t bother to muster any more enthusiasm than she would have for extensive dental work.

Chin still in her hands, posture slouched, and boredom leaching through every syllable, she said, “Yes, he’s very exciting.”

Somehow, unfathomably, this woman managed to interpret her words as genuine interest in Gar. As a threat of competition for her lover. She stiffened, growing defensive and accusative, throwing a glare through the screen while asking, “That’s why you’re looking for him, isn’t it? You want him for yourself.”

Janeway stared at her incredulously for a long moment, at once both insulted at the implication that she would be attracted to a sleeze like Gar, and baffled at how dense this woman must be to believe her lackluster agreement had constituted any actual desire.

Her patience had long ago run out, and even her dedication to diplomacy was wearing thin at this point. Her battle against the roll of her eyes continued to be hard fought, but not fully won as she felt herself blinking rapidly through her exasperation. She lifted her head off of her hand but changed little else about her posture, and replied, “I assure you I have no romantic interest in him whatsoever.”

The woman’s eyes narrowed and her shoulders remained squared, clearly still offended. “Why, not good enough for you?”

“No it’s not that, it’s just-” Janeway began to reply earnestly, but cut herself off. This was maddening, and she did finally allow herself to roll her eyes then. How did they even get this far off track, and why was she continuing this ridiculous topic? She exchanged a quick glance with Seven, who was serving a duty shift on the bridge and standing not too far from where Janeway was leaning against the rail of the main command well. The quirk of Seven's ocular implant and the amused but critical gleam in her eyes told Janeway she was not alone in finding this woman impressively asinine.

An idea occurred to her then, an absurd one. A ridiculous solution for a ridiculous problem, she supposed. She needed to get their conversation back to the matter at hand without angering Gar’s lover or drawing out this argument any further, and when she looked to the woman standing to her right, she saw a method to do just that. With an expression that made little effort to hide how unimpressed Janeway was with this whole situation, she reached her hand out expectantly towards Seven. She was completely bemused, but understood what Janeway was asking for and, albeit hesitantly, she placed her hand in the outstretched one the captain offered. Their fingers interlocked, sliding into a comfortable position without thought, and Janeway made sure to hold their hands up in clear view of the screen. She squeezed Seven’s hand in silent reassurance, and thanked the universe that she had played along without spoken question, even if she could feel Seven’s confused stare burrowing into her profile.

She intentionally allowed a little extra husk to fill her voice, a smoky lilt accompanying the suggestive look in her eyes as she said, “Gar’s not really my type, if you catch my drift.”

The woman observed them for a moment with no reaction at first, her defensive demeanor unchanged. Tom Paris turned from his position at the helm in surprise, and Harry Kim chuckled to himself while Tuvok merely lifted one eyebrow in their direction. Janeway ignored all of them; allowing herself to be embarrassed would hardly be conducive to getting the information she sought, and she didn’t have the intention of giving any of them the satisfaction. She had nothing to feel embarrassed about anyway. She was dealing with con artists, a little misdirection was necessary. After a few more seconds, she saw the understanding dawn on the alien woman, illuminating her expression. She observed them more curiously now, fixating on their joined hands and seemingly sizing them up. Her hostility deflated, and she appeared to be appeased by the insinuation that Janeway’s interests lay in a decidedly more sapphic direction.

Relieved that the ruse had worked, Janeway tried not to think too hard about the pleasant warmth suffusing her skin where her hand remained cradled by Seven’s. She hadn’t expected Seven’s touch to be quite so gentle, almost tender, and she wasn’t sure what to do with this information now that her brain was aware of it. But this was neither the time nor the place for her to feel a fluttering in her stomach that she wouldn’t want to analyze too closely even in the best of circumstances. She wasn’t actually attracted to women after all, she was simply skilled in the art of deception when the need arose. So, she pushed the thought aside and refocused.

“We have a business opportunity for Mr. Gar.” She said, resolute professionalism twice enforced now to maintain her composure. “One that will expire if we don’t find him soon.”

With all of the fight in her posture vanished, the woman released a slight sigh and finally, finally gave them Gar’s current location. “He’s on his way to the gambling tournament on Selek IV.” She paused, then in a softer tone, she added, “When you see him, tell him to hurry home.”

Janeway bit her tongue down one last time for that afternoon and refrained from saying that there was very little chance Gar considered their affair to be more than a quick romp in the sack, let alone his home. She hoped the look she gave the woman wasn’t too pity filled, but as the connection was terminated and the star filled vacuum of space retook the screen, she indulged in one last roll of her eyes. Just a small one, well earned after having had to insinuate herself even peripherally into the marital drama of several random civilians.

In the next moment, she remembered she was still holding Seven’s hand. Her skin tingled at the comforting warmth still present, and she looked to Seven with a slightly sheepish expression. Seven, for her part, was staring rather intently at Janeway, brows furrowed deep in question. Janeway was about to apologize in case she had made her uncomfortable, but the other woman spoke first.

“Are you sexually attracted to women?”

Well, at least Janeway could count on Seven not to beat around the bush. She fought the flames of embarrassment licking at her heated skin, and instead quirked her lips up in what she hoped was a confident grin.

“I was just trying to get Gar’s girlfriend to focus on the question. I needed to mislead her a little, make her think you and I were an item.”

Seven studied her another moment before replying, voice devoid of inflection. “I see.”

Janeway couldn’t shake the peculiar feeling that she had disappointed or upset Seven in some way, and she returned to her original plan to apologize. She still hadn’t let go of Seven’s hand, though she wasn’t sure why. She squeezed the hand in hers lightly, and said, “It seemed like the easiest way to get the information. I apologize if I made you uncomfortable. Thank you, for playing along.”

Seven nodded but said nothing, leaving Janeway to feel like she was still missing something. She offered Seven one more crooked smile, one more small squeeze of their hands, and finally dropped her hold on the other woman. While Seven returned to her normal work, Janeway strode over to her command chair, sinking into it with purpose. She put aside the seed of worry digging into her mind for the sake of focusing on their task. Crossing her legs and assuming her authoritative positioning, she commanded Tom to lay in a course for Selek IV. She would apologize to Seven again later if she needed to, perhaps find a way to make the offense up to her if she were still upset. But for now, she had a member of her crew to rescue.

[sharpnothashtag]

The Good Ship CrushWay, Chapter 47

Bridge: KJ, Data, Daneel, Tasha, Tom, Patrick

KJ: Conn, current speed? Tom: Warp 3. KJ: Helm, current heading? Ro: 315 mark 47. KJ: When will we be there, Number One? Data: At current speed, 2 weeks, 4 days, 7 hours. KJ: Daneel, any word from Dukat? We'll be entering Cardassian space soon. Data: In 4 days at our present speed. KJ: Thank you. Daneel: (looking down, multitasking) Dukat's last message was a strange one--we'll be picking up a couple of people who need to be ferried to DS9. His neck was very tense, and he was more articulate than usual. Patrick: Was he annoyed, perhaps? Daneel: (clearly working on something else and not concerned about this) Unclear. KJ: (blinking...realizing she is going to have to get used to someone who doesn't read emotions that well) Are there any ships we need to be aware of in sensor range? Daneel: No. (KJ turns away) However (KJ turns back, fake smiling to put her best foot forward with new Lieutenant) there is a Gamma Class Nebula right (bringing it up on the viewscreen) here if you would like to study it. KJ: Would you like to study it, Lieutenant? Daneel: I have been. (buttons) There are some dilithium crystals that could be used as bargaining chips with the Borg, provided they are in a dire enough state to need them. I have also found trace elements of Galantium. KJ: Data, isn't Galantium the normal antidote given for Lyantirum poisoning? Data: Galantium Byzantride, yes, however it is only used for extreme cases. KJ: You saw the elevated Lyantirum levels from the weapon they were using. Are those levels severe enough to cause poisoning? Data: Yes, but all the drones rescued thus far have not needed the treatment. Hypothetically, with their method and frequency of travel, it would have taken a full year for the effects of Lyantirum poisoning to take effect. However, at the rate the drones were dying due to the phase variant disease, many of them did not succumb to the effects. KJ: Tom, take us by the nebula. Collect all the Galantium we can store. I have a feeling that the Borg we are about to encounter need help, and lots of it. Janeway to Seven of Nine. Seven: Yes, Captain? KJ: Coordinate with Dr. Crusher on the information I'm sending to both of you now. We need to know how the Borg reconstruction surgery could be altered due to the effects of Lyantirum poisoning. Communicate with headquarters that we have found a large cache of Galantium and are collecting it in hopes of using it for treatment. Janeway out. (turning to Ro) Ensign Ro, you and Commander Data figure out the most efficient way to dispense the treatment to as many drones at a time as possible. Lieutenant, you're in charge of harvesting the Galantium. Get down to Engineering, and make sure everyone is on the same page. Daneel: For clarity's sake, what page is that? KJ: (typing into the padd on the arm of her chair, over this before it even starts) The page where we save the Borg's asses. Again.

(throw to commercial)

B'Elanna: Emptying the Bussard collectors is going to take time, Lieutenant. Miles: We'll be here another 6 hours just making sure that they're ready--apparently no one at Utopia Planitia thought they were important enough to test before we left. Daneel: Understood. The Captain sent me to help in any way I can. (B'Elanna nods and takes them off to help clean and test the collectors. Miles is left in Engineering to deal with the programming side of things.)

B'Elanna: Can you hand me that plasma spanner? (Daneel hands it to her. B'Elanna clearly feels awkward.) So...Miles tells me that you and Data hung out last week. Daneel: (blushing deeply) Yes, we did. B'Elanna: May I ask you in what context? Daneel: We went on a date. B'Elanna: (beaming) I like the two of you together. You are both very sweet--almost innocent. Daneel: Innocent? B'Elanna: You're both consenting adults, so it isn't a "young love" situation, but it does feel like you two are generally inexperienced. Daneel: I don't come across as cold and jaded? B'Elanna: I don't think so. But I'm not really one to judge. Daneel: You aren't? You seem neurotypical. B'Elanna: That's true. But that doesn't mean that I trust the way I interpret people's characters. If I were fully Klingon, I think I would be a better judge. But (shrugs) I'm half human. Daneel: I kind of thought that I came across that way. B'Elanna: Why is that? Obviously something in your past has scarred you, but I do wonder why you think of yourself in that way. Daneel: Have you ever found someone who understood you in a way you didn't understand yourself? B'Elanna: Yes. Daneel: Besides Tom. B'Elanna: Strangely enough, yes, besides Tom. Daneel: Wesley Crusher is that person for me. (B'Elanna cocks her eyebrow.) We met while we were in the Academy. One day at lunch, I was studying for my robotics class with the textbook that Data wrote. B'Elanna: (sarcastically) A real page turner. Daneel: (enthusiastically) I know, right?! Anyway, the seat next to me in the cafeteria was open, and Wesley just interrupted my study session.

Flashback (Those of you who know me know I am not a huge fan of Wesley Crusher. That isn't Wil Wheaton's fault. I'm about to try to do him justice. Please bear with me, nonexistent readers and Wil Wheaton.) Wesley walks past Daneel without looking at them. It is as if he isn't allowed to go past--like a video game character hitting an invisible wall.

Wesley: I know this is a really weird thing to say, but I feel like I'm supposed to sit here. Glasses: (Daneel doesn't look up from their book) Go ahead. Wesley: (blinking in surprise, sits down. Notices the book.) Oh, Data's book! I really miss him. Glasses: (deeply surprised, about to fan-person) You know him?! Wesley: Yeah, he's on the Enterprise where my mom was assigned. Daneel: Cool! What's your name? Wesley: I'm Wesley Crusher. He/him/his. Daneel: Wesley? (Wesley nods. Daneel sticks out his hand.) Daneel Akares. They/them/theirs. I have a potentially strange series of questions to ask you. Wesley: (smiling, sitting back in the chair with finger guns) Shoot! Daneel: (hearing the screams of their friends as they exploded; immediately panicked, ducking under the table) Who's shooting?! Wesley: (surprised, talking to them slowly and calmly as he sits on the ground with them) I'm so sorry--I thought you knew that slang term. I just meant to go ahead and ask me the questions you want to ask. No one has weapons here. You're safe. Glasses: I'm sorry. (Daneel is hugging their legs to their chest) I'm still processing a lot of stuff from the Occupation. Wesley: That's okay. (He scoots around under the table to sit side by side with Daneel) What did you want to ask me? Glasses: (looking around) Do you know someone called "The Traveller"? Wesley: (shocked) Yes. He and I know each other well. Daneel: He saved my life. I think he was looking for you, though. Wesley: What makes you say that? Daneel: He called me by your name. He said he was "here to help find her." Wesley: I know when that was. I'll never forget it. Stardate 44161.2. The day my mom disappeared. Daneel: Did the Traveller find her? Wesley: Yes. It was one of the scariest times of my entire life. Daneel: I had a bomb inside my chest. He defused it. Wesley: I'm so sorry. (Daneel puts their head on Wesley's shoulder, still shaking a little.) Do you want to come to my quarters and get to know each other? Daneel: I would like that. However, you should know first that I am not romantically or sexually attracted to you. Wesley: (laughing) Nor I you. Come on, let's go. (Wesley gets up, dusts himself off, and offers Daneel his hand to help them off the floor. Daneel accepts.)

Conference room: KJ, Data, Ro, Miles, Bev, Tasha, and Tom

KJ: Data, report. Data: We have devised a solution. As soon as the threat of assimilation is neutralized, we will beam as many drones as possible into our six cargo bays. Galantium Byzantride will filter in through the environmental controls. Once the treatment is complete, Seven of Nine will take a sample drone, input the command to regenerate, and then we will head back to Utopia Planitia. KJ: How long will it take for the treatment to take full effect? Ro: Only an hour. It's a wonder no one has tried this method before. KJ: Tasha, I want security teams on those cargo bays nonstop until we get back. (Tasha nods.) Doctor, will there be any side effects that would affect the reconstruction surgery? Bev: There is a 30% chance of death with our current surgical routine. Data, Seven, The Doctor, and I will have to perform several holographic simulations in order for this to succeed. KJ: Understood. Lieutenant Daneel, are the Bussard collectors prepared? Daneel: Ready, Captain. Miles: Once the Galantium is collected, Dr. Crusher and I will need to coordinate on how to make the vaccine airborne. Bev: I have a plan in place for that--I'm in the final testing stages. KJ: Good work. Daneel, start the collection process. Ro, when we start the collection, drop the shields and immediately start recharging them. Tom, as soon as we're done, I want to be out of here. Ro and Tom: Aye.

Bev and Miles in Engineering

Bev: (typing in several codes) So, I heard the lovely pieces you, Data, Jean-Luc, and Patrick played at Worf and Deanna's wedding. Would you like to play for mine and Kate's? Miles: Sure. I'd love to. As far as the rest of the quartet goes, you'll have to ask them. Bev: Oh, I already have. I talked to Keiko before we left. She specifically told me to mention it while you were doing something else. Miles: (laughing) That's my wife, alright. She knows I do better when my brain is otherwise occupied. Bev: (laughs. Quiet settles in) So, this couple that we're picking up. Do you know them? Miles: Do I ever. Bev: ...do I get an explanation for that? Miles: (pressing a few buttons in a final flourish) Not at the moment. It's time to collect the Galantium! Bev: You can't just leave me hanging in suspense like that. Miles: I'll tell you this much: there is no more confusing couple in all of Starfleet, and of the same token, they are the most loving couple I've ever known. Bev: (smiling) I suppose I can handle that. Miles: (touching his combadge) O'Brien to Janeway. We're ready to start collecting. KJ: Acknowledged.

(Exterior shot of the ship. The Bussard collectors power up briefly, and then from the nebula, a Borg sphere emerges.)

KJ: (understandably pretty freaked out) Ro where the hell was that thing?! Ro: I'm picking up traces of...synthetic Lyantirum? Data: The cloaking device. Ro: We're being hailed, Captain. KJ: Take the damn thing. Borg: We are the Borg. Your technological-- KJ: I killed your Queen, you directionless drones. You report to me. Borg: Insufficient. Your simple human mind cannot possibly organize the thoughts of millions of drones. KJ: You look at me, Borg ship. I am the only person to ever negotiate with you. I am the one that has gotten away time and time again. You keep chasing me around the galaxy. Years ago when I was ripped away from my crew, it seemed that I was almost immediately forced to deal with you AGAIN. You're almost as stubborn as I am. But notice that I said almost. My efforts to help you have finally worked. Borg: We have noticed the voices disappearing from the collective. KJ: Yes, and that's because of me. And a few hundred other very important people. Patrick: (looking for permission) Captain? (KJ nods) My designation was once Locutus. Does the collective remember me? Borg: The collective recognizes Locutus of Borg. Patrick: Does the collective remember the plans of the Queen before stardate 16147.3? Borg: To research synthetic Lyantirum as a source for a superior cloaking device. Patrick: And did the collective achieve this goal? Borg: Affirmative. Patrick: How?

One drone's voice comes above all the others.

Drone: Because they assimilated us.

Three drones walk to the front of the viewing area.

Data: Sissun? Chuti? Keriss? KJ: The members of the Lyantirum think tank on Mars. Drones 1, 2, and 3: We were assimilated, and then the collective destroyed Jouret IV. KJ: I thought you weren't on Jouret IV when it was attacked. Drones 1, 2, and 3: We were not supposed to be. However, our transport ship was delayed by a plasma storm. We were assimilated. The colony was destroyed. We helped form the Lyantirum transport device and the synthetic Lyantirum cloaking device. KJ: Those devices are dangerous to you and to the space you use them in. Borg: Enough. This discussion is irrelevant. Assimilation is imminent. Resistance is futile.

The communication is cut off.

KJ: Ro, raise shields. Tom, prepare evasive maneuvers. Data: (on communicator) All hands, battle stations. KJ: The Borg have engaged us.

[blue-mint-winter]

ST Voy s06e10 Pathfinder

I almost thought I mistakenly clicked the wrong series and this was TNG. The episode is centered on Barclay who tells Deanna about his issues. He’s working on a new way to establish communication with Voyager, but his boss is very doubtful of it. Also, Barclay relapses into his holodeck addiction and spends hours with holograms of Voyager’s crew. When he’s put off the project, he breaks into the array and tries his ideas anyway, and of course they work.

I don’t enjoy Barclay’s character much. In this case, the beginning with Deanna was especially wooden. But, what I really dislike about the episode is how inconsequential it was. It acknowledges that Barclay’s behaviour isn’t healthy, that he’s got a problem, but it all magically goes away when he succeeds in contacting Voyager, he suddenly gets better and even has a girlfriend. What’s more, he’s not punished for breaking rules, instead he’s rewarded because he was successful. What kind of message does it send to everyone else? You can break in and do anything with Starfleet stuff as long as it works and is beneficial? What if it doesn’t? Anyway, I was kind of hoping he wouldn’t succeed and finally realizes and starts working on his psychological issues. I think helping Voyager was just a handy excuse for him.

Good part of this episode was that Voyager made contact with Starfleet, no matter how it happened, I’m happy for the crew. The ep finally showed admiral Paris, Tom’s dad. He seems like a stickler for rules and I can see why Tom would clash with him, but in the end he was fair and even generous to let Barclay off the hook so easily. And he even keeps Tom’s photo on his desk! I was touched when he told Tom that he misses him and he’s proud of him. It was such an important moment.

s06e11 Fair Haven

This episode falls into a category of boring holodeck episodes, unfortunately. I miss Leonardo. The ship is encountering some kind of particle storm and everyone is coming to holodeck to Paris’ program of an Irish town called Fair Haven. The local bartender catches Janeway’s eye and she decides to modify him to her tastes, then backs off when she realizes the fakeness of a relationship with a hologram she has control over. The episode just doesn’t do anything new or interesting with the theme of hologram romance, which was already thoroughly exploited by Star Trek by now.

The good parts of the episode were the small crew interactions, like Neelix asking Seven about singing lessons or Harry getting outraged when Seven is open to an Irish hologram’s compliments. Or Neelix, Paris and Harry worsening Tuvok’s nausea with their meat/entrails discussion in the mess hall. Vulcans are vegetarian, no wonder he didn’t take that well, especially when he was already queasy. Tuvok can never catch a break.

[summahsunlight]

This Way Became My Journey, Ch. 23

While the computer was running its diagnostic on the alien device, B'Elanna Torres had snuck away to the mess hall to grab a ration pack for lunch. Well maybe she hadn't really snuck away; Captain Janeway had after all given her permission to take a small break. But it sure felt like sneaking away, with Michael breathing down her neck wanting to know every little thing that came up about the device. Snatching a ration pack up she went to join a Bajoran, by the name of Seska, who was sitting at a table in the middle of the room.

"I didn't think Janeway was ever going to let you leave the bridge," Seska drawled with that sly grin of hers as B'Elanna took a seat.

B'Elanna shrugged her shoulders. "I think she felt bad that her kid was watching over everything I did. Anyways I don't have a lot of time. I need to get back up there to finish working on that device that Chakotay brought back from the planetoid."

"If you ask me this is a waste of time," Seska replied, pushing her empty ration pack to the side. "We shouldn't be chasing after any aliens that like to harvest organs. It could end up getting us all killed."

"Neelix could die if we don't track them down," B'Elanna said, slightly shocked by her friend's cold tone.

It was Seska's turn to shrug her tiny shoulders. "The Doctor has kept him alive this long; that's better than most people can say if they had just had their lungs stolen."

"And what if it was Chakotay that had been attacked? Or Harry? Would you feel the same way?"

"Of course. Neelix should be counting his blessings while the rest of us get to the real work of finding dilithium to help the power shortage," Seska answered, her dark eyes studying B'Elanna's face. "You don't actually agree with Janeway's decision to go chasing after these aliens do you?"

B'Elanna averted her eyes. "To tell you the truth, I think it's rather noble."

Seska scoffed. "One noble deed doesn't make up for her selfish decision to strand us here."

The hatred for Janeway that was laced in Seska's voice was not lost on B'Elanna and the young Klingon woman suddenly found that she was not hungry anymore. Pushing the tray away from her, she looked her friend, or someone she had once regarded as a friend, in the eye. "Seska, I know it hasn't been easy the past month, adjusting to life on a Starfleet ship, but believe me when I say that Captain Janeway has the best intentions of this entire crew at heart."

"You didn't think that way a month ago," Seska pointed out.

B'Elanna shook her head. "No, I didn't. But the past few weeks I've worked closely with her and my opinion has changed. If we had used the array to get home, there would have been people back in the Alpha Quadrant who thought her decision to sacrifice the Ocampa selfish. Either way, she couldn't win."

Seska got up from the table angrily. "You're starting to sound like all those delusional Starfleet idiots."

The Chief Engineer watched as the Bajoran left the table and stalked out of the mess hall. B'Elanna wasn't sure why Seska was having the hardest adjustment out of them all. Perhaps she felt like she had been slighted by Janeway when she wasn't given a higher rank, after all, she was Chakotay's former lover. And then there was B'Elanna's promotion to chief engineer. It was never spoken between the two, but B'Elanna knew that Seska was jealous of her friend's promotion and the trust that Janeway put in her. She also knew that Seska wasn't too keen on all time the B'Elanna had taken to hanging out with Harry Kim in the mess hall or for a stroll on the holodeck. But Harry had been the only one nice to her, on the Starfleet side that is, for their first few days, and she was grateful for that.

It wasn't her fault that she was sliding into fit with the crew and Seska was struggling. She just needs to make friends outside of the Maquis, that's all. 

B'Elanna decided that the next time Harry joined her for dinner she was going to ask Seska to join them. She was sure that Harry would be friendly and make an attempt to befriend Seska no matter how unreceptive Seska seemed.

Speaking of Harry, B'Elanna was sure that Janeway had given him a fifteen minute break to eat something as well. Maybe she had missed him when she had first come in the room. Glancing around she soon found that it had been easy to miss him. He was seated at a corner table with Sarah Barrett. B'Elanna instantly felt…jealousy.

She was shocked by this, at first. There was nothing romantically going on between her and Harry so she shouldn't be bothered if there was something between him and the counselor. But then she remembered Elle Platt, back from her Academy days. Elle had the same dark, coffee brown hair as Sarah, same enticing sapphire eyes. B'Elanna had thought Elle had been her friend and had told her about her crush on one of their classmates. They never spoke of it again, until B'Elanna had seen Elle with her crush, cuddling on the lawn one warm afternoon. Elle later told her some story about wanting to keep B'Elanna safe because she only would have been hurt, that her crush never would have dated a half Klingon.

B'Elanna, who had always resented human girls, with their silky locks of hair, and smooth foreheads, had shortly left the Academy after that. So was it this fact that Sarah looked so much like Elle that she was jealous of the time she spent with Harry? And if she ever did want to be more than Harry's friend, how could she compete with the perfection that Sarah was?

She was shocked at this realization. Being more than Harry's friend? He was Starfleet, a nice guy, but still Starfleet. Well what's so wrong with that? They had been through so much together on the Ocampa home world, she had connected with him in a way that she had yet to connect to anyone else on the ship, with maybe the exception of Chakotay. And that's when her emotions switched to jealousy to downright anger.

Sarah could have any man she wanted on this ship, with the bat of her pretty little eyelashes, why was she with Harry? Good, even Tom Paris was eating out of the palm of her hand and she had taken the one guy that B'Elanna actually felt…feelings towards. It figures the one nice guy on this ship— 

"Seat taken?"

B'Elanna glanced up to see Tom Paris. She shook her head. "No."

He sat down and dropped his ration pack tray in front of him. His grayish eyes looked up to see what she was looking at and he frowned.

This peaked her curiosity even more. Was Tom's feelings about Sarah more than just wanting a date? B'Elanna suddenly didn't feel so bad that she was not the only one who was jealous on this ship. "Something wrong with the view?" she teased.

Tom only frowned more as Harry and Sarah got up and left the mess hall together, laughing about something. "No, nothing's wrong with the view."

"If I didn't know you any better Paris, I'd say you were jealous," she continued teasing getting up from the table and going to recycle her tray. It was time to get back to working on the alien device and the diagnostic. She would have to push thoughts of Harry aside until further notice.

However, the thoughts of Harry and Sarah eating lunch together, sharing a laugh, just would not escape her no matter how hard she tried to get her work done. Michael Janeway was still standing over her shoulder, soaking in every last bit of information that the computer was coming up with. If that kept up he could his mother the report and B'Elanna could return to engineering where her real work was.

Mindlessly drumming her fingers on the console she noticed Tuvok raise an eyebrow. "Does that form of activity make the computer scan faster?" the Vulcan questioned her.

"No, but it keeps me occupied while we wait." The doors of the bridge swishing open brought her attention about and Paris strode back onto the bridge, no trace of the frown he had worn in the mess hall. How can he let it go so easily? Oh, that's right, he's a pig. He probably has another love interest lined up behind Sarah and the Delaney sisters.

The computer beeping brought her attention about. "Captain," she called out, getting Janeway's attention. "We've completed our diagnostic on the alien device."

Janeway strode over to join the group, which was an odd mix when you really thought about it; a Vulcan, a five year old human boy, and a half Klingon. "What have you got?"

"It appears to be more than a weapon," B'Elanna reported. "It's also a very sophisticated medical scanner and surgical instrument."

"From what we can tell," Tuvok said, handing the device to Janeway, "it uses a neural resonator to stun the victim while a quantum imaging scanner begins a microcellular analysis of the entire body.

"The amount of information this thing can gather puts a tricorder to shame," B'Elanna continued. "You fire this at someone you learn everything about their anatomy, right down to their DNA sequencing."

Janeway turned the device over in her hands. "So we're dealing with aliens who've developed a technology specifically designed for extracting organs from other beings. The question is…why?" Chakotay demanded her attention and she mindlessly put the device down onto the science console.

"The alien ship has dropped out of warp," the first officer reported. "It's approaching a large asteroid."

The captain went to stand on the command station next to Lieutenant Barrett while Tuvok took his own station. "On screen."

"It's entered the asteroid captain," Paris reported.

"Hold position."

There were very little options that Janeway had at this moment. She could either take the ship into the asteroid if it was wide enough or she could try to flush the aliens out some how. But that could take hours, and Neelix didn't have hours. Even though the Doctor had come up with a solution for the time being, no one really knew how long he could survive using holographic lungs, not to mention that if ship's system ever went down and the emitters went off line, Neelix would die.

"MICHAEL!"

The shear volume of Lieutenant Barrett's voice startled everyone on that bridge and all eyes snapped about looking for the child.

The boy was standing at the door to the ready room and immediately Janeway could see that he had the alien device clutched in his little hands. The captain had moved the baby into the ready room so she could comfortably nap and she had no doubt that her son was about to test the device out on his baby sister. How could I be so careless with something that dangerous around? She hadn't even seen Michael move from his spot near the science station, for that matter, neither had B'Elanna. Michael was terribly clever, a trait that Janeway knew had been inherited from her; he could easily slip away from baby sitters, his mother, etc.

So how had Sarah seen it?

Michael looked sheepishly up at his mother. "I just wanted to see Ava's DNA."

His mother gestured that he give her the device back and he complied.

"Sit there," Janeway instructed, pointing to her chair.

Chakotay cleared his throat while the boy did as he was told. "Uh, Captain, we've determined the asteroid is man made."

Fascinating. What's even more fascinating that Sarah knew Michael had that device; another question for another time, perhaps. 

"I think I've located where the alien ship entered the asteroid, Captain," Paris was saying bringing their attention about to the situation at hand. "There's an open crater on the limb of the asteroid."

"Let's see it," Chakotay ordered and the viewscreen changed from the image of the asteroid to the opening that Paris had found.

Janeway crossed her arms over her chest. "How large is that crater, Mister Paris?"

"Two hundred meters in diameter."

"Captain," Tuvok cautioned. "May I suggest that you consider carefully what you're about to do?"

"How do you know what I'm about to do?" Janeway asked, raising an eyebrow and glancing at Tuvok.

"I could describe you in detail the psychological observations I have made of you over the past four years," Tuvok answered, calmly. "Which lead me to conclude that you are about to take this ship into the asteroid, but suffice it to say, I know you quite well."

"One of these days, I'm going to surprise you Tuvok," she replied, with a wry grin. "But not today."

Janeway moved back into the command station and briefly looked at her counselor. "I've already consider other options. If Neelix has any chance of surviving, we have to act fast. Red Alert. Mister Paris lay in a course. Mister Tuvok maximum shields, phasers at the ready."

The Captain turned about in the command station and looked hotly at Michael, "And you stay right there and don't touch anything."

"Yes ma'am."

Voyager glided into the asteroid while Janeway made her way down the command steps to stand next to Chakotay and behind Paris. Her eyes watched the screen intently as the cavern's walls began to narrow.

"Captain," Paris said. "I'm reducing power to the aft-thrusters only. This passageway is getting a little too narrow for my taste."

"Use your discretion Mister Paris," Janeway replied, turning towards Tuvok. "Any sign of the alien ship, Commander?"

"We're still following the ion trail," Tuvok answered, "but electromagnetic interference is limiting our sensor range. I'm only able to scan five hundred meters a head of us."

Chakotay asked the next question. "Are there any indications we're being scanned or probed Mister Kim."

"Not yet."

"Sick bay to Bridge. May I enlist the services of Counselor Barrett please?"

Janeway glanced up at the lieutenant. Was it her imagination or did the Doctor sound anxious? "Certainly Doctor, she's on her way, Janeway out." For a moment the women made eye contact. "You heard the Doctor, he needs your help, we're just going to have to handle first contact without you."

[coffeefairy]

Writer’s Month August 2020 - Day 4

Day four of the challenge, no one is more surprised than I am!

Day 4, Long distance relationship

Fandom: Star Trek: Voyager

Ship: Harry Kim/Tom Paris

Rating: Teen and up

Summary: Tom and Harry get put in opposite shifts and find out that three decks sometimes can feel as far as seventy-five thousand lightyears. Set sometime during season 2.

Excerpt: The next thing he’d known was the ensign at the transporter conn clearing her throat. Pulling away he’d found himself and Tom in the same position they’d been in, huddled together, kissing desperately but instead of being surrounded by the disintegrating shuttle, they were sitting on the transporter pad.

The Captain had looked harried, hair not as neat as normal, but she had relaxed and even afforded them an amused eyebrow raise.

“I’d say as you were, gentlemen, but I think we’d all be happy to get out of this nebula.”

Tags: Love confession, established relationship, long distance (sorta, not geographically), terrible title that may change

Scheduling Conflicts

“Hey, Harry.” 

Harry’s combadge beeped for a private channel and Tom’s voice spoke at a murmur, only loud enough for him to hear.

Everyone was allowed to use private channel communication on the Bridge, but not loud enough to disturb others. As he was at his Ops conn, it wouldn’t bother anyone so he muttered,

“Hey,” in reply.

“Do you want pizza or steak for dinner? I can’t make up my mind.”

“I don’t trust you to replicate steak so I’m voting pizza.”

“Hey, not fair. Didn’t I replicate a great dinner last time?”

“It was tomato soup. Plain tomato soup.”

“Well, excuse me, Mr Cordon Bleu,” Tom chuckled over the line. “Me and my insulted pride will go and make the pizza now.”

“I’ll see you after gamma shift ends. I’ll cheer you and your insulted pride up.”

“Oh, yeah?” Tom’s voice dropped to a purr. “Will you come back and-”

“Bye,” Harry interrupted and ended the call. However amusing his boyfriend would find it, he wouldn’t want to spend the rest of his shift turned on by whatever suggestion Tom had been about to make. 

Smiling at the prospect of heading to Tom’s quarters after his shift, he started another scan of the area. 

They’d only been together a few months, everything still sparkling and wondrous. The change from friendship to romantically involved had been easier than Harry had anticipated. They were still great friends, but now he was allowed to act on the impulse when he wanted to reach out for Tom, run his hand through his hair, kiss him. All the things that had been driving him crazy before, the wish to get closer always ringing in his head, had quietened now that he knew he could follow its lead. 

It had taken almost dying of exposure in a disintegrating shuttle but the feelings it turned out both of them had held back had risen to the surface, the thought of dying with Tom never knowing how loved he was impossible for Harry to even contemplate. The moment, stark in his memory flashed in his mind. The blood on Tom’s face, so bright in the otherwise monochrome world, his eyes shining with fear, regret, and somehow through it all, determination and hope. His surprise, then wonder and awe as Harry tried to get the last oxygen to last for the words he had to say. In the cold impending vacuum he hadn’t heard the first time Tom said he loved him too, but he’d seen his lips form the words. Their lips had met an instant later, Harry prepared for it to be the last thing he ever knew.

The next thing he’d known was the ensign at the transporter conn clearing her throat. Pulling away he’d found himself and Tom in the same position they’d been in, huddled together, kissing desperately but instead of being surrounded by the disintegrating shuttle, they were sitting on the transporter pad. The Captain had looked harried, hair not as neat as normal, but she had relaxed and even afforded them an amused eyebrow raise. 

“I’d say as you were, gentlemen, but I think we’d all be happy to get out of this nebula.”

It had made their relationship public from the moment it had started but any fear Harry may have felt at this prospect had faded quickly. Thomas Eugene Paris, it turned out, was an excellent boyfriend. Attentive, focused, loving, with the edge of fun and the unexpected he had always represented in Harry’s life. 

A light flashing on his conn caught his attention.

“Captain, I’m reading a tachyon disturbance seventy-five lightyears away and it’s-”

The impact was sudden, shuddering through the hull. The Captain, eyes steely and voice cool ordered red alert. Harry bid farewell to the pizza with Tom.

o.O.o

Sometimes three decks could feel as far as seventy-five thousand lightyears. Janeway was trying out new shift configurations in an attempt to iron out the last vestiges of the two crews of Voyager feeling like two. Always championing her “one ship, one crew” policy, she was moving everyone around from their usual rotations to promote “increased understanding”. While Tom approved of the idea in theory, he wasn’t happy he and Harry had ended up on opposite shifts. The little time he managed to see his boyfriend he was either falling asleep or getting up. The fact that he often found him in bed surely had its advantages but he missed just being with him. Hell, he even missed working with him. Hearing that deep voice in its professional mode, coolly assessing and analyzing, stating facts and numbers with the ease of a more experienced officer. You had to have got it bad when you found someone’s work voice sexy. 

Still, Tom would take any abuse his younger (stupider) self would heap on him for acting like a lovelorn fourteen-year-old if he could see him now. That Tom had never known what was good for him anyway. Older (wiser) Tom did and he knew beyond a doubt he’d never do better than Harry Kim. 

It had been surprising to find himself falling so quickly for someone he’d just met, he’d assumed himself too old and cynical for it. But it hadn’t taken Harry more than a few hours to disabuse him of that notion. Harry believed the best of people, and not because he was naive, but because he wanted to. He was handsome, funny and smarter than anyone gave him credit for. So was it any wonder?

Smiling to himself, Tom adjusted the course minutely. He didn’t have to, they’d earn three minutes on their journey time of seventy-five years but it pleased him to fly to the best of his ability. He figured the difference between a pilot who flew and one who cruised on the straight stretches was in the details. 

On his conn, the private messaging function beeped. Opening the side panel he saw Harry reminding him they’d agreed to meet in Sandrine’s at eight. Tom knew Harry was going to stay awake for about an hour before his early start would catch up to him. Still, it was an hour he’d get to see him, conscious and talking. Tapping the message to acknowledge the receipt, he heard the Security officer at the conn Tom thought of as Tuvok’s, inform Janeway of some unusual readings. Posed to change course at her order, he waited for it. The Captain didn’t miss opportunities to explore unknown phenomena. Then his conn flashed, crackled and died. An instant later it began spouting numbers and figures at him that made no sense. Behind him he heard from the others all conns on the Bridge had experienced the same malfunction. Grimly, he looked up to the viewscreen to do his best to fly blind with only the unknown stars to guide him.

There was no way he’d ever make it to Sandrine’s by eight.

o.O.o

After three weeks, Tom and Harry asked for a private word with the Captain. It was easily granted and they explained that while they weren’t asking for special treatment, the new schedule was preventing them from seeing each other, in effect putting them in a long distance relationship on a vessel smaller than what could be classified a village. Janeway had narrowed her eyes, explained no one could be seen getting preferential hours. They had both volunteered for the unpopular night cycle shift.

“No, no need. I actually would like to return to some of the old configurations. And,” she consulted her PADD, “you’re both back to Bridge duty as of next week, on the alpha shift. That said,” she interrupted their congratulatory glance. “As Bridge officers we...we have a duty to the rest of the ship. We can never let our personal lives get in the way of our work. When we work, we’re present. I can’t allow any...change in circumstances, or outside influence affect your work, and if I see that it is, then this shift rotation may well change.”

“Yes, Captain,” the chorused. 

“Very well, dismissed.”

At the door she stopped them with a raised hand. “Tom...Harry, I...As your Captain I’ve told you the rules for fraternization, as Starfleet insists on calling it. But I want you to know that…” she looked out towards the windows to the right, to the stars sweeping by, discovered for the first time by human eyes, to be left behind the next moment. “That I am very happy for you. Where we are, what we are living through, it’s...it’s good to have someone to share it with. Someone who is going through the same.”

With the Captain’s well wishes they left her to stare at her PADDs, chewing at her bottom lip, a far-seeing look in her eye. One or two of their colleagues afforded them a curious glance as they passed through the Bridge after exiting the Captain’s Ready Room. Most focused on the task they had at hand.

In the elevator Tom’s hand found Harry’s. 

“So, now that we have the Captain’s blessing and everything...how about that pizza?”

[missizzy]

New Fic: The Bust Stop, Part 1(Star Trek: Voyager)

Tom Paris had gotten to the point in his relationship with B’Elanna Torres where he could usually tell what she wanted without her saying it, at least on the everyday things, though sometimes he had a nagging feeling he was missing something in what she wanted from him overall. For instance, whenever it was she who planned a date, he knew from the kind of date what she wanted from it. If it was on the holodeck, she wanted to turn her brain off completely and forget about the week she’d been having. If it was just dinner in their quarters, but with her saying, “something special” she wanted romance. He wasn’t sure if she consciously realized that, but every time in the past year he’d formed that conclusion, and every time he’d been right.

If, however, it was again dinner with their quarters, but her saying “nothing special,” that meant she wanted to have a serious discussion with him, the kind that men on instinct preferred to avoid.

Which was why when he came home that evening, from an unremarkable shift which had left him plenty of time to dwell uneasily on the date to come, he was hard put to appear nonchalant. But this just might be painful enough without getting her nervous beforehand, or worse, angry, so he forced himself to smile when he saw the salad and steaks she’d replicated. “I got the dressing you wanted,” she said. “Though there’s no rations left over for dessert, unless we eat it tomorrow.”

“That could work,” he shrugged. If only she’d said “something special,” he thought. Then there could be seduction, which was followed obviously by sex, and then they could nap until 2400, and then have dessert. But no. By 2400 he didn’t know what state they’d be in.

It’ll probably be over by then, he reminded himself. We’ll say whatever we have to say, and it’ll be over with, and maybe it won’t be something that will leave us that upset when we’re done with it. But it was hard to think past a conversation when he didn’t even know what the subject of it was going to be. Especially when his having no idea was a little more unusual these days; usually he had a sneaking suspicion, but that night, nothing.

“Then let’s eat while it’s still hot,” she said, and she dug in. She didn’t look at him as she did, which made him aware she wasn’t looking forward to this conversation either. Which meant it had to be something really important. He was simultaneous more nervous than before, and vaguely relieved. Whatever it was, they just might be in it together. He hoped, because if it was a problem she had with him, he was in really deep trouble, especially since he’d missed it completely.

He ought to let her take the silence to prepare herself, and wait it out, and let his own inner procrastinator decide she could have all the time she needed. But as he watched the meat disappear from her plate, while most of his stayed where it was, because being nervous made her eat and him not eat, he quickly started to feel that the silence was far worse than enduring whatever it was she had to say.

So he tried to chew, and tried even harder to swallow, and listen to her anxious breathing in between bites, and looked up at the ceiling, and out at the streaking starfield, and half-hoped some sort of emergency would call them to their stations, even though in the long run that would leave him more time to dread what was coming up. Finally, when she put down her fork, paused, and then picked it up again, he snapped, “What do you want?”

“What do you want?” burst from her, and their eyes met. She didn’t look that frightened, more just confused.

Which ought to be his gig right now. “What do you mean what do I want?”

“From me. I mean, what...I’m going about this the wrong way.”

“Okay.” He didn’t understand the situation any more than he had when he’d sat down at the table.

“I...” She was having trouble, and he wanted very badly to help, but was at a loss for how. “I talked with Chakotay. After the whole thing with the Barge of the Dead.”

She had not talked much in the month that had passed since, about what she had dreamed about when she had nearly died in Sickbay. After nearly losing her, Tom at least had been too grateful she was alive to press her with questions. Only once had she even indirectly alluded to it, a few days later when they had held Marika Wilkarah’s funeral, following the normal Bajoran rituals as best they could, and after the ceremony had ended and they had made their way to the mess hall for a small reception, she had spoken quietly, half to him, half to herself.

“I want to be the one to seek out her family when we get home,” she’d said, because it was agreed someone would have to do that, so they would know her fate. “I was her immediate commanding officer for the last weeks of her life, after all. And I want to make sure they get her final words to them. No parents should lose their children like that, without a word or knowledge. How must she have felt, knowing they were on the other of the galaxy, and barring a miracle, she was never going to see or speak to them again while she was still alive...” That was all. When she had gone to Janeway at the reception the captain had agreed immediately.

Now it turned out she’d gone and talked to Chakotay about it, and Tom had to tell himself not to get angry she’d gone to him. And then, as if reading his mind, she said, “You have to understand Tom, when I gave it some thought, I found he was the only person in my life where I knew exactly where I stood with him.”

“What?!” Now Tom was getting angry. “And what do you think you are to me, chopped liver?”

“Lover, sure, right now,” she sighed. “But what about in a year? In two? In ten?”

Okay, now maybe this was making sense. “Is this your way of telling me you want me to propose?”

“No,” she shook her head impatiently. “Well, maybe. I wasn’t thinking along those lines. You could marry me and then divorce me five years later anyway. I just want to know what you want with me.”

“For life?” he finished, half to clarify, half to get his bearings.

She nodded. “For life.”

“Okay.” He breathed in. He’d never thought about the future like this. Maybe a little when he’d been a kid and he’d looked forward to success and being happy in Starfleet, or even anywhere. But in the penal colony there hadn’t been much of a future to look forward to, even if he could hope to be freed, because he’d known not much awaited him outside besides the life of a loser. The past five years he’d been too happy counting his blessings to worry about how many more of them he was going to get, especially when that dread had haunted the back of his head, because he didn’t know for sure that he actually was going to get that pardon when they got home.

But after only a moment more of thought, he was able to say, “I want you to stick around, that much I can say immediately. For life.”

“As your lover?” She was forcing herself to press on.

“If that’s what you want to stay. Or...” He gave himself one last moment to hesitate, but no, he would’ve had to be the worst idiot in the universe to not take this if she really was willing to give it to him. He got up from his seat and then down on his knee. “B’Elanna Torres, daughter of Miral, will you marry me?”

When she just sat there, looking mildly stunned, Tom heard himself babbling, “I can’t get a ring right now, but if you’re willing to settle for a simple one I can get you one at midnight, or buy one at the next planet we stop at if you don’t want a replicated one-in fact, if you want to wait to respond until then, that’s fine. I mean I’m really just throwing the question out here, I’m happy to leave the offer standing as long as you want...”

“That won’t be necessary.” She was smiling now, and she leaned down to take his hand and craned her head in as if she was telling him a secret as she whispered, “My answer’s yes.”

That was about when it hit Tom how much he’d just changed things for himself. Not that this was a bad thing, even if it was kind of terrifying too. But after that they were kissing anyway, and when his hand touched the right part of her back he could feel her heart practically jumping, and concentrating on that kept his mind steady, even as the universe was shaking, the ship shaking...

...why was the ship shaking?

B’Elanna pulled away as they both realized something was wrong. Her combadge had fallen off. She had to dive for it, and she clutched it as the ship rocked them further; it took her several moments to successfully comm engineering. “What’s going on?” Tom heard her demand of them as an attempt to contact someone himself failed, with his badge falling off too as the ship rocked again.

The response was a little static and a lot of technobabble that only an engineer could understand, but from how B’Elanna’s face paled, it didn’t sound like good news. “I’ll be there right away,” she said just as the klaxons sounded for yellow alert, and from the floor his own combadge turned on long enough to summon him to the bridge.

Since they needed to go in opposite directions, it had long become typical practice for the two of them to split up and head for different turbolifts outside their door. Tonight, however, even under their current circumstances, they had pause a moment, and flash each other a sort of grin, that unspoken exchange of, “Are we really now? Yes we are.” Even with the ship now rocking so hard Tom could see the floor positively quiver, he couldn’t lose his general feeling of elation.

It lasted all through the turbolift ride and even when he emerged to find a tense bridge and Ayala at the conn trying to pilot with one hand while with the other he clung to the console. When he turned and saw Tom he looked relieved, and was glad to pull himself up shakily and stumble off. Tom himself nearly fell into his seat, but once he was seated he felt fairly confident, especially when his hands were at the controls and the ship was responding to them. The viewscreen was filled with flashing orange light and he tried to maneuver to avoid as it lashed around them.

Even if he had no idea what was going on, at least for a few more minutes, until Captain Janeway commanded Harry to give her a prognosis on the “phenomenon,” and he, doubtfully, replied, “All I can tell you is it’s all over the electro-magnetic spectrum, it’s growing in size at a rate of about two miles per millisecond, we’re not actually in contact with it, but we’re starting to absorb serious radiation anyway-so far the shields have taken it...”

The orange lights on the viewscreen were getting larger. Tom was fairly certain that was bad. He was beginning to get a pilot’s feel for the phenomenon and how it was interacting with the ship, and if it got much stronger in intensity he would have a lot of trouble keeping the ship under control.

Then he heard an exclamation of surprise from Harry, followed by, “It looks like we’re being hailed. Audio only.”

“By who?” the Captain demanded, voicing everyone’s confusion.

“I don’t know.” Harry sounded as confused as the rest of them. “There’s nothing that should be able to hail us for light years around.”

“Well, put it on.” The bridge was filled with a burst of static, before a tinny, vaguely feminine voice followed:

“Hello, and welcome to our Portal. Please be advised the entry process will take between six clacks and ten loughs. Please do not attempt to move after we have taken you into lockhold.”

It was Tuvok, in his manner, who summed it up, “They do not seem to be considering whether or not we actually wish to enter their portal.”

“Well, do we?” Even as the ship shook, Captain Janeway seemed able to contemplate the question with perfect calm. “Would it get us closer to home? Or is there too much risk of us ending up further away?”

“Depends if there are multiple destinations maybe,” commented Commander Chakotay.

“Good point,” said the Captain as the shaking started to subside, and as Tom looked at his console he nearly did a double take.

“Captain,” he said. “The ship has started moving without me.”

“You mean the ship itself is moving on engine power, instead of being moved?”

“Exactly.” The console was even flashing as if commands were being entered into it, while Tom carefully held his hands above the screen, wondering what would happen if he tried to enter anything. If she gave the order, he told himself.

But instead she said, “Let it, for now. But I want to know where we’re going the moment anyone has any idea of it.”

Several minutes passed. The shaking mostly died down, but Tom was aware of the ship moving very fast; he’d always been able to feel it even through the inertial dampeners, and now he could do so even more than usual. That was good, because the screen didn’t really show much of what was in their immediate surroundings; there was too much interference. Harry was providing more information, listing off out loud what kinds of radiation were involved and what levels they were at, though he didn’t sound like he understood his readings much either.

But then the viewscreen was filled with white light, a moment before the ship went completely still, and Harry fell silent. “Is this the portal?” Captain Janeway wondered out loud.

“I think it might be,” said Harry. “We’re being hailed audio only again.”

It was the same voice, and this time it said, “Welcome to our Trans-Dimension Traveling System. Please remain in place and lower your shields to receive your personal negotiator to work out your itinerary and method of payment.”

“Multiple destinations,” said a very pleased Captain Janeway.

“How are we going to pay, though?” wondered Commander Chakotay.

“Shall we lower the shields, then?” asked Tuvok, in his usual neutral tone, though Tom had no doubt he was thinking about whether or not it was a trap.

The thought of it, too, might have been why it took the captain a moment or so to respond. But such an opportunity like this they really couldn’t pass up, so she just said, “Do it.”

Tom for a moment when he heard Tuvok’s affirming response instead worried about the threat of the more natural phenomena around with the shields lowered. But things around them had gotten pretty still. They were still surrounded by electrically charged particles, but those seemed to just be floating around and filling the viewscreen with some somewhat gorgeous blue-violet light.

“How long is it going to take?” was Captain Janeway’s response when at first nothing happened. But no one had a real answer for her, and about a minute later, Harry said, “I think someone’s trying to beam into the bridge-from light years away, it seems; they’re using some kind of...” He groped for the words, and failed to find them before their visitor arrived. Tom turned around at the sound, which sounded kind of like a transporter beam but more high-pitched than any beam Tom had ever heard, and he appeared in light that was such a rich shade of gold it dazzled on a whole different level from the normal sight of the transporter doing its work.

He was baseline humanoid, grey colored, covered with thin scales and sparse hair not on top of his head, but close to his neck and around his shoulders and ankles. His hands had five fingers, but his feet, which were bare, had only four toes. He wore a sleeveless black bodysuit, and two red bracelets on his left wrist.

“Good evening, sir.” Captain Janeway offered her hand, then when their visitor didn’t seem inclined to take it smoothly took a step forward. “I assume you’re here for negotiating with us?”

“And you are the director of this establishment?” he asked in turn. He had one of the deepest, smoothest voices any of them had ever heard.

“I tend to go by the title of Captain, actually,” said Janeway, who of course could be pretty smooth herself when called for. “But yes, I am the one in charge here.”

“Then, Captain-Director, if there is a place to negotiate in private?”

To the less knowledgeable observer, there was no real pause here. But those on the bridge who knew how Captain Janeway did things noticed she made a slight one, before then saying, “My ready room is this way.”

As she led him there, his complimenting their “headquarters” as he went, Tom found himself exchanging a look with the other men on the bridge. Commander Chakotay especially looked uneasy. The guy was simply too slick for them to trust him that easily. Captain Janeway would be on her guard at least, they were sure of that. But her desperation to get them home might get in the way of her caution for her own safety, so they were all in agreement. One real sign, my friend, Tom thought. One solid reason to believe we’re not just feeling paranoid...

The ship was still dead in space, and from the sound of the console hums, neither Harry nor Tuvok nor anyone else on the bridge was getting any readings that would indicate the situation was changing. There was nothing to do but wait.

Wait they did. Inevitably Tom's mind wandered back to the events of earlier that evening. It hadn’t quite sunk in yet that he and B’Elanna had just agreed to spend the rest of their lives together, that if all went well, he’d live and die by her side. Also, he found himself thinking there should probably be a plan about telling people, but under the circumstances it might have to wait until a less exciting day. He was a little worried about Commander Chakotay’s reaction.

Finally the captain and her guest emerged back onto the bridge, and from the way she was beaming, Tom could only conclude the negotiation had been a huge success. “Shipwide announcement to make, Mr. Kim,” she declared, and Harry happily tapped his console to turn on all the comms. “Attention, everyone on board. This is your captain speaking. I am happy to announce that I have just now made an agreement that will, if all goes well, see us back in Federation space within the next year.”

There was a pause while a few cheers escaped on the bridge, and made them all aware of how many were probably being let out all over the ship. Captain Janeway beamed further, before continuing, “We are currently in the portal of an interstellar transportation system that will over the next ten months take us through most of the rest of our journey. In return, we will bring them to the Federation, and they will hopefully extend their transportation services to Federation space.” That was kind of universe-changing for the Federation, Tom couldn’t help but think, though none of them would be dwelling on it too much at the moment.

When the ship started feeling shaky again, Tom initially didn’t worry. They were, after all, within a interstellar phenomenon, and one they knew practically nothing about besides that they had to get through it to get home, and if it wanted to be a bumpy ride, well, that was something surely everyone on the ship was willing to allow. He did take a look at the display on the conn that was showing their speed, current direction, and a rough estimate about how much the ship was being impeded, but the first two things he knew already and the high number on the third wasn’t exactly a surprise.

It wasn’t the display, anyway, that initially made him realize something was wrong. It was his own inner navigator and preceptor instead, the part of him that could subconsciously sense how the ship was moving even through the inertial dampeners, that made him realize the ship was slowing down involuntarily, and the slower it got, the worse the shaking got, and Tom would swear he could even feel something in the space around them starting to squeeze in.

The Captain had something of the same instincts. It was when Tom, looking at the display now also giving out the wrong numbers, was drawing breath in to speak that she leaned over him, her face placid to those who didn’t know her, took a look at the numbers, and immediately said, “Mr. Kim, give me the ship’s vitals.”

Harry had gotten really good, too, at sensing when things had gone very wrong, though he only said, “We’re getting some strange readings off the engines and the shields. The latter are down very slightly, no explanation.” One could hear growing tension in his voice.

Still none in hers, as she turned to their negotiator and asked, “Would you say that’s normal at this stage in going through your portal?”

He remained even more neutral as he replied, “It is difficult to determine the answer to such questions…”

Which was when she grabbed her phaser and pointed it at him. “That doesn’t match what you told me just now. You said that everything about your transportation process was long standardized and tested and nothing ever went wrong.”

“Well,” he looked embarrassed, which was a very strange look on him. “That is the official line, but it might not be…entirely accurate.”

Janeway might have actually been expecting something a bit more sinister, from the way she just sighed, and started, “Keep monitoring the…”

“Captain!” Harry sounded alarmed, and Tom felt the same when the ship was too strained under him, and he knew he’d lost helm control without even looking. “The engine’s suddenly powering itself like we’re at warp; it’s going too fast when we’re not warping; I’m not sure how the ship’s going to hold up.”

“Look,” Janeway said to their guest, “maybe if we could drop out of it for a moment-”

“Oh no,” he said, and maybe it was Tom’s head playing tricks on him, but he suddenly sounded ominous and dangerous. “You are now within the system. We will have you, Captain Janeway, until you’re out-if you all live that long….”

[thebestparisyouhave]

Letter to Adm. and Mrs. Paris

@sevenofninetertiaryadjunctofunim, sorry I’m cutting the deadline a bit close.  Was a tad preoccupied this morning.  Please transmit for me.

Hey Mom and Dad,

I never know how to start these things, so I guess I’ll just dive right in.

I almost died a few weeks ago.  

Mom, before you panic, I’m fine now.  Absolutely, totally fine.  And, in the interest of full transparency – which I’ve learned is very important – I’m attaching the mission logs and medical reports so you won’t have any quesitons. But here’s the brief rundown.

A few years ago, Harry Kim and I were held prisoner for crimes we didn’t commit.  Our captors saw fit to install these things called “clamps” into our brains.  It was a way of controlling the prison population and it messed with our emotions, made us all very volatile. When Voyager rescued us, the EMH removed the clamps and we went on as normal.

Fast forward to a three weeks ago.  Commander Chakotay, Ensign Wildman and I were involved in an incident aboard the Delta Flyer.  I was fine, the other two were touch and go, but we got everyone back in one piece.  When Doc was looking me over he found that I had some lingering damage from that clamp I mentioned, and it was spreading through my brain.  He gave me a choice.  I could have an operation which was super risky and probably going to leave me incapacitated, or I could live out what was left of my life in relative normalcy.  I chose the latter.  Then, I also chose to break up with B’Elanna in the hopes that she would be spared some of the pain of losing me when I eventually died.  Stupid.  I know, Dad, you don’t have to say it.  But I thought I was doing the right thing and quite frankly I’m tired of trying to explain myself.

It was a rough couple of weeks, being still so close to B’Elanna but yet, not with her.  She was so angry with me - everyone was angry with me. And quite frankly, I was pretty scared. Only Captain Janeway and the Doctor knew what was really going on.  Thank goodness for the captain.  I don’t know what I would have done without her.  Dad, she’s doing such an amazing job out here… with everything, every one of us. You’d be very proud of your protégé.

Anyway, one morning, after I missed a meeting, B’Elanna came looking for me and found me unconscious in my quarters. Turns out my condition had progressed much more quickly than the Doc anticipated.  From there… well, you can read the reports. Suffice to say, B’Elanna saved my life by making the decision I wouldn’t.  Doc and Kes performed the surgery; they were brilliant.  My recovery has been much quicker than expected.  I’m off piloting duty for a while but I’m doing most normal activities again.

And B’Elanna… I don’t deserve her.  She’s been amazing through all of this, even after I pushed her away. We have a lot of issues to work through, especially on the trust front, but we’ll manage.  We’ll make it, I know we will.  That ring I told you about in the last transmission?  I’ve got it right here.  You’ll have a daughter-in-law before long, you can believe that.

Speaking of B’Elanna. Dad, I’m hoping you can help me with something.  I’m trying to reach her cousin, Elizabeth Torres.  I don’t know much about her, just that she was the daughter of Carl Torres, B’Elanna’s uncle and that she’s one year older than B’Elanna.  I attached a letter for her, if you can locate her and send it, I’d be really grateful.  B’Elanna has no friends or family back home, I thought if I could reach Elizabeth... well, I don’t know.  Just, thanks for trying.

That’s all the news that’s fit to print from the DQ.  Tell my sisters I said ‘hi’.  I miss you guys.

Love, -Tom

attachments: Mission Logs / Medical Reports  Letter To Ms. Elizabeth Torres

[palukoo]

5 times the Voyager crew think B'Elanna and Seven want to kill eachother... and maybe the one time they realize they're actually gay for eachother. (??)? --chibi PS: sorry prompts are hard

Thanks Chibi! It’s under a cut even tho it’s pretty short because writing anything other than snippets of dialogue? I don’t know her

Janeway looked over at Seven tentatively.

“I’d like you to consult B’Elanna on this,” she said.

“Captain, is that really necessary?” Seven asked.

“Yes, and if you disagree, I’ll make that an order.”

Seven sighed.

“Please don’t kill her, Seven. We need her.”

Seven gave Janeway a look as if to say, “Are you sure?” Janeway rolled her eyes and walked over to her replicator.

Seven sighed. “Very well. I will consult with Lieutenant Torres, though her disdain for me may make that very difficult.”

“You’ll adapt,” Janeway responded pointedly, before ordering a coffee.

“Will that be all, Captain?”

“Yes.”

Seven turned to leave Janeway’s ready room.

“Oh, and Seven?”

Seven turned back around.

“Don’t assimilate her either.”

*

B’Elanna stormed across the Mess Hall and sunk into a seat next to Harry, diagonal from Tom. “I can’t stay for long,” she said. “The Captain has asked Seven to help me in engineering, as if I can’t handle it myself, and knowing her, she’ll get there early and ruin my damn warp core.”

“I mean, it never hurts to get a new perspective,” Harry offered, but he got quieter and sunk back in his chair as she turned to glare at him.

“I don’t need her perspective,” B’Elanna spat.

Tom shrugged. “What’s the harm in letting her look at engineering? If nothing’s wrong, she won’t change anything—“ B’Elanna scoffed— “and if there is something wrong or that can be improved, we’ll get home faster.”

“You’re saying she’ll find something I’ve missed?”

“No, but she is Borg, you know, she—“

“You’re saying she’s a better engineer than me?”

“No! B’Elanna, I’m just asking you to think about this.”

“Whatever. I better get going. She’s probably already assimilated half my staff.” B’Elanna stood up and left the Mess Hall, somehow seeming more angry than when she entered.

“I bet you three replicator rations B’Elanna’ll kill Seven,” Tom said to Harry.

“You’re on. I’ve got three on Seven,” Harry replied.

*

“Alright, dismissed,” Janeway said, concluding the senior staff meeting. She stood to follow her officers out of the room.

“Um, excuse me, Captain, do you have a moment?” Neelix asked from behind her.

“Sure, go ahead.”

“Something has come to my attention and I’m not sure it’s having a great effect on morale. Certain members of the senior staff aren’t getting along very well and I think it’s confusing the rest of the crew and distracting from our mission.”

Janeway sighed. “Let me guess; Seven and B’Elanna?”

“Yes, Captain.”

Janeway nodded. “You’re probably right, but I’m having enough trouble as is keeping them from killing each other. I’ll see what I can do.”

“Thank you, Captain.”

*

“She’s making me work with Seven again,” B’Elanna complained.

“You know, maybe Kathryn’s got a point,” Chakotay said. B’Elanna’s eyes narrowed.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that Seven is very smart and you could probably learn a thing or two from her.”

B’Elanna rolled her eyes. “Yeah, she’s smart. And she knows it, too.”

Chakotay smiled. “She does. She could probably learn a thing or two from you, too.”

“I appreciate the effort, but I still can’t stand her. She’s just so stubborn and always so sure she’s right. And she never listens to anyone else or follows orders unless she agrees with them. It’s so frustrating.”

Chakotay laughed. “Reminds me a bit of someone else I know.” He looked at B’Elanna pointedly. She glared. “Look, I know you don’t like to work with her, but she can help us get home. So try not to kill her.”

B’Elanna sighed. “I’ll try, but I make no promises.”

*

“How was your day?”

Tal sat down across from Billy and sighed. She leaned towards him, a somewhat nervous look on her face. “Lieutenant Torres came into Astrometrics today.”

“Was Seven there?” he asked.

Tal nodded. “She wasn’t too happy about it either. They got into some argument about boosting the sensor efficiency. Torres thought she had an idea, Seven said that the Borg had experimented with it and it hadn’t worked. I was glad when my shift ended. They’re probably still going at it.”

“I’m glad I missed it.”

“I swear, one of these days I’ll report to duty and find one of them over the other’s dead body. Anyways, how was your day?”

“Alright. I think I’m coming down with something, though.”

*

“Torres to Seven,” said B’Elanna through the combadge. Seven ignored it, moving a green piece on the hexagonal board in front of her.

Naomi moved a red circle.

The call came again. Seven took off her combadge. Naomi frowned. Seven took her turn.

“Not that I’m not happy you’re playing Kadis Kot with me,” Naomi began, and Seven turned towards her, her ocular implant rising, “but why are you avoiding B’Elanna.”

“I am not avoiding Lieutenant Torres.”

Naomi looked at the combadge with raised eyebrows. “Are you sure?”

Seven sighed. “I am trying to avoid any unnecessary arguments. They are… inefficient. It is your turn, Naomi Wildman.”

Naomi frowned and looked towards the board in front of her. She moved a red piece over a green piece and took the latter off the board. She grinned.

Seven looked to the board considering her next move.

“I thought you and B’Elanna were on better terms now,” Naomi said at Seven reached for a piece. Seven looked towards her, then back at the board. She moved her piece and removed two red ones. Naomi sighed.

“I… suppose we are.”

“So then why are you avoiding her?”

“I do not like Lieutenant Torres very much.”

“If you say so.”

Seven glared. “Take your turn, Crewman Wildman.”

Naomi smirked. She moved a piece. “It’s just that up until recently, you and B’Elanna seemed to be getting along a lot better and working together without Captain Janeway making you and just a minute ago when I asked you about her you blushed and you aren’t a very good liar, Seven.”

Seven raised her ocular implant. She moved a piece. Naomi moved her own. She smiled triumphantly.

“Kadis kot!” Naomi exclaimed happily.

Seven’s combadge chirped again. Naomi looked at her expectantly and B’Elanna’s voice came through again.

Seven glared and Naomi and rolled her eyes. She tapped the combadge. “Seven to Lieutenant Torres.”

“Finally,” B’Elanna said, annoyed.

Naomi started to put the game away.

[hows-it-holed-up]

Perfunctory Photo Recap: Star Trek: Voyager 1x01

There are 2 genres I enjoy that I would classify as “guilty pleasures.” Ok maybe 3. Ok 6. But the point is that apart from Josh Schwartz teen soaps, I’m really into sci-fi. I grew up watching Star Trek: The Next Generation and all the Stargates with my grandfather, and when Voyager premiered in ‘95 I was HERE. FOR. A. LADY. CAPTAIN. I have such a soft spot in my heart for this show. Despite the fact that it was sometimes borderline terrible, it was also often shockingly creative and delightful. So let’s take a look at this show’s pilot, which launched a series that somehow lasted 7 years. 

My Disclaimer: None of these posts will be in any way comprehensive, because I’m lazy. All of them are probably going to have spoilers of some sort for the entire series…or at least what I remember of it from when I last watched it an eon ago. Exactly what you want in a recap!

Captain’s Log: New(?) Captain Kathryn Janeway is chasing some vigilantes who are part of a group the people she works for (the Federation) see as quasi-terrorists (the Maquis). They all get zapped tens of thousands of light years away by something called The Caretaker. It’s not a great day for anyone. 

We first encounter our captain in a penal colony that is definitely in New Zealand and definitely not just LA nope nope nope. This, as you may have guessed, is NOT our captain, but a random alien extra whose makeup is extremely excessive for his role in the episode.  

Look at cutie pie Tom Paris! Robert Duncan McNeill mostly directs now, which is probably a good thing. I recall a fair amount of scenery chewing from him over the course of the series. But he gives good face!

Sorry Tom!

Anyway, it’s time to meet the captain and her weird signature bun! If you’re not a Star Trek fan and you’re somehow still reading this, you’ll recognize Kate Mulgrew here from Orange is the New Black. 

For some reason, she’s trying to break Tom out of this prison colony so that he can...come watch this mission? Because why? She likes his dad? He knew the Maquis captain for like a week? Don’t they need someone to fly them through the plasma storm anomaly blah blah whatever? Isn’t his whole thing that he’s an awesome pilot? I already need a drink. 

He seems just as confused as I am. 

Okay then!

Do we think if Salt-and-Pepper Commander Who’s Not Long for This World had lived he and Janeway would have boned down? The fact that she and Chakotay never did, and then we had to suffer through that whole extremely forced 7 of 9 thing in the final season always annoyed me. 

Well, he seems to think so. 

And then, because The Caretaker, the ship is thrown through the aforementioned plasma storm whatchamacallit. And because none of these people have heard of a seatbelt despite the fact that it’s the 24th century, it’s a bit of a disaster. There are several casualties. Among them Janeway’s hair. 

Turns out they got thrown pretty far. Like, 70k light years far... 

All the way to a gorgeous Victorian with a wrap-around porch I’d love to be sipping a mint julep on. Until “The Neighbors” arrive. 

“The Neighbors” are aggressively white. 

And (I think unintentionally) terrifying.

Both crews eventually get back to their ships, but they realize two of their crew members are missing – one from each side!

For some reason Tom “Just an Observer” Paris is part of the recovery mission. 

For these guys! B’Elanna and Harry! Even though Garrett Wang doesn’t get a ton to do in the rest of the series besides be a doe-eyed dummy, these are two of the series’ major players. So...here you go! 

Jason Mantzoukas? 

“...for simply taking what we’re given.” Eeeeee. So this is turning into a heavy-handed commentary on the “welfare state” in the second half. Cool. Let’s have a moment of silence for nuance. 

Also, let’s just sit with this hair for a moment. I’ve had pixie cuts. I’ve had YEARS’ worth of pixie cuts. I could not have gotten my hair to sit like this with three cans of hairspray and a thousand answered prayers. This MUST be a wig, but nevertheless, props to the hairstylist wizard who made this happen. 

Anyway, they all escape through the caves (because there were caves!), the white man leads the rescue...

Saves all the minorities. Etc. etc. 

The virtues of bootstrapping are extolled some more. (Do I maybe not like this show?)

And the Maquis crew has to abandon ship and integrate with Voyager, stranded 75 years from home. Honestly, despite its (several) shortcomings, this is still a pretty compelling setup. I think I’ll keep watching for a bit – although I might just skip to an episode Bryan Fuller was onboard for.

The Final Frontier:

- The white saviorism in this show definitely rubbed me the wrong way. As did the not-so-subtle social commentary that quite honestly was antithetical to pretty much everything I’ve ever seen in any Star Trek show. But 1995? So I guess some leeway? Apparently this was UPN’s (remember them?) first-ever telecast. That also helps contextualize/excuse some future extremely upsetting uses of crushed velvet. 

- Kate Mulgrew has such an authoritative voice. Not to mention presence and gravitas to rival a quantum singularity. What good casting. 

- What did they do with B’Elanna’s forehead ridges in the rest of the series? They look SO much better here. Did they try to make her look “more human” later? It’s...less good. 

- Were B’Elanna and Harry supposed to be a thing initially? They have zero chemistry. So I guess good pivoting, show runners?

- How did Janeway decide Tom should be a Lieutenant? Didn't he...not even graduate the Academy? Meanwhile Harry toils for 7 years and is still an ensign at the end of the series...

- How do the universal translators work? I get it if they’re on a ship or in a building built by an “advanced” culture, but if they’re outside with way way less-advanced life forms – like the Kazon in this episode, who apparently can’t figure out how to combine two hydrogen atoms with one oxygen – how do they understand each other? This also comes up later in the series, and I feel like it’s never been explained satisfactorily. Translator microbes? A la Farscape? 

- Speaking of things I feel haven’t been addressed thoroughly enough, I have some questions about the Maquis – which, incidentally, was what the French resistance in WWII was called (you’re welcome for your next trivia night victory). They’re made up of a bunch of randos who hate the Cardassians, mainly because the Cardassians are joyful ethnic cleansers, yes? But how are they funded? How did Chakotay & Co. get that dope looking ship? Where are they getting centralized orders from? Can I see an org chart? Why is the Federation pro-Cardassian? Because power? I’m sure this is at least partially explained somewhere. Help me!

[voyagerafod]

Star Trek Voyager: A Fire of Devotion: Part 4 of 4: Hotter Than Hell: Chapter Twelve

Janeway struggled to her feet, still feeling dazed from when she and the others had all slammed against the wall. She was grateful that the Cyberman ship’s inertial dampeners, or whatever their equivalent was, hadn’t failed or she and the others would be so much splattered mess. She looked around. Tom had already gotten up and was frantically trying to hail Voyager, even though he had to know it was no use. Vorik was helping Gilmore to her feet, while Lydia Anderson was checking the back of Jaffen’s head for injuries.     “Report,” she said.     “We’re near Earth,” Tom said, sounding dejected. “Just not our Earth.”     “Can we contact them?” she asked. A part of her hoped that perhaps the Earth of this reality, the one where the Cybermen had originated, would have something they could use to re-open the rift just long enough to get home. At least the fact that Voyager hadn’t replied when Tom tried to contact them meant that, presumably, the rest of her crew had made it home.     Tom glared at the image of the planet on the main monitor.     “No,” he said. “I was able to tap into the satellite network. The Earth of this universe is still in the early 21st century, though unlike us they didn’t have a Eugenics War. This Earth is more advanced in their 2014 than we were in ours, but not enough to do any good. They don’t even seem to have noticed us yet near as I can tell.”

    Tears began forming in Tom’s eyes. He punched the navigation console. “Dammit, dammit, dammit!”

    Janeway wished she had the words to help Tom, but she just didn’t. He had every right to be upset after all. Being separated from people you loved by over seventy thousand light years was one thing, but now there was an entire universe and hundreds of years separating him from his wife and newborn daughter, a child he’d spent mere days with.     She looked back at the others. She could see sadness beginning to take hold over Anderson and Gilmore already. Jaffen seemed fine, if a bit dizzy. Vorik was as implacably Vulcan as usual.

    Will we forget them too? she thought. Like we forgot about the Cybermen when they came to our universe? Or is it different for us now that we’re in their realm?

    “So. What do we do now, Kathy?” Jaffen said.     Janeway took a deep breath. She felt deep down like what she was about to say was a lie, but she needed to say something to give her people hope. Her crew, anyway. Jaffen would be happy wherever they were so long as he was with her. That was something she was glad for at least.

    “The barrier between our worlds has been breached more than once,” she said. “It can be done again. I don’t know how long it will take, but we will find a way. I’ve gotten my people home before, I can do it again. Hell, if we’re lucky, it won’t take us seven years this time.” She added a smile to that last line, surprising herself at how genuine it felt. This speech was as much for her as it was for the others.     “There is a man here, a time traveler, who helped Captain Picard and the crew of the Enterprise defeat the Borg/Cyberman alliance ten years ago,” she said, though Tom and Jaffen already knew that part. “If we can find him, I imagine he could get us home to our universe.”     “How do we find him though?” Marla Gilmore said.     “She’s right,” Tom said, slumped in his chair. “You heard what Seven said about him. He goes all over time and space, seemingly at random, in a ship smaller than one of our class 2 shuttles.”     Janeway thought about it for a moment. Tom was right about that, but she remembered something else from that briefing; about the kind of man the time traveler was. Everyone looked at her, patiently waiting for what she would say next.     “We make an impression,” she said. “Vorik, Gilmore, let’s get this ship in the best shape we can. Tom, go over this ship’s records. I want to know where the major hubs for information and trade are in this universe.”

    “Ma’am?” Tom said.     “It’s simple. We fix this ship up, we go around looking for sentients in need, and we help them,” Janeway said, now feeling genuinely hopeful instead of just trying to project it. This plan she was formulating had so many ways it could go wrong, but it was the best she had.

    Besides, she thought, is this really that much more difficult than some of the crap we went through in our own reality?

    Vorik raised an eyebrow. “With all due respect, I fail to see how that helps us return to our reality, Captain.”

    “This time traveler,” Janeway said, “this man who simply calls himself The Doctor, has been an enemy of the Cybermen for centuries. Sooner or later, word is going to get to him about a ship belonging to one of his oldest and most dangerous enemies going around doing good in the galaxy.”

    “And if I were in his place,” Anderson said, “that sure as hell would get my attention.”     “Exactly,” Janeway said.     Jaffen walked over to Janeway and casually put an arm around her waist.     “I gotta say,” he said, smiling, “I like this plan.”     “Can’t hurt to try, I suppose,” Tom said, sighing.     Janeway looked up at the monitor. It was almost eerie how the Earth here looked just like the one she called home. She wondered for a moment if maybe it would be so bad to settle here if The Doctor never came.

    No, she thought. I’m not ready to give up yet. Either we get to go back to our home, or we die here as heroes.

---

    B’Elanna Torres cradled her daughter in her arms as she looked at the picture of Tom on the table in Admiral Paris’ home. Physical pictures weren’t the norm amongst the people of the Federation anymore, not with digital photo frames that could easily hold hundreds, even thousands of pictures instead of just one having been available to humanity even in the time before Zefram Cochrane’s first warp flight. The practice had never gone away completely though, and with the fear that the Voyager crewmembers who were trapped on the Cyberman ship when it got pulled through the rift would be forgotten an ever-present reality, they went from a mere act of sentimentality to a necessity. The new project that Admiral Paris, Reg Barclay, Lewis Zimmerman, and others had started on Jupiter Station required physical copies of photos of the lost crew, any information they had on them written down on real paper. The computer records of them were not lost completely but were spotty, incomplete, and easy to miss unless you knew what to look for. Or even that there was something to look for.

    “Thank you for letting me stay here, Admiral,” B’Elanna said.     “Please,” the Admiral said. “No need to be so formal. I’m off-duty, and you’re my daughter-in-law. Call me Owen. Besides, you don’t exactly have a place of your own right now.”

    “That’s certainly true,” B’Elanna said. “I don’t even have a ship anymore.”     Owen Paris sighed. “You heard about that, huh?”     “I figured R&D would want a look at all that Delta Quadrant tech we brought back with us,” B’Elanna said, shifting on the couch slowly so as not to jostle the baby too much. “I don’t understand why they had to hide Voyager away though.”

    “That was Nechayev’s idea,” Owen said, sighing. “She has this idea in her head that the new technologies inside Voyager would be a prime target for the Federation’s enemies. She’s not one hundred percent wrong, I’m sure the Romulans would love to have a look at that slipstream drive, even if it is burned out. But Elena is, well, Elena. Just keeping Voyager in the Sol system isn’t secure enough for her, she has to move it to one of her,” Owen groaned before completing the sentence. “Black Sites as she calls them. I don’t know if she doesn’t know the history behind that phrase or just doesn’t care.”     B’Elanna nodded. “I knew that there was a chance, even with the pardon, that I might not get to serve on Voyager again, but that doesn’t make the mental image of a bunch of Intelligence types pawing at her warp drive any easier to stomach.”     “With your credentials, record, and reputation,” Owen said, “I don’t doubt that once your maternity leave is up that you’ll be in anything less than high demand. There are a lot of captains in Starfleet who would kill to have an engineer with your skills on their team.”

    “I don’t know,” B’Elanna said. “I might just try to join the team at Jupiter trying to figure out how to get Tom back from the other universe. If I didn’t have Miral, I’d be feeling so helpless right now.”     “I can see about that,” Owen said, surprising B’Elanna who just assumed that he would be against it, perhaps arguing that she was too close, too emotionally invested. “Fact is, having people there who have more cause to care than anyone about the people we lost in that rift is probably the best way to ensure that they aren’t forgotten. If my own science training wasn’t a few years out of date since becoming an Admiral I’d be there myself.”

    “Maybe we’ll go to Jupiter together then,” B’Elanna said. “It would certainly make it easier for you to spend time with your granddaughter.”     “Speaking of,” Owen said, motioning towards Miral, “May I? I haven’t actually had the chance to hold her since you got to San Francisco.”     “Of course,” B’Elanna said.

---

    Harry Kim stood outside the airlock to the U.S.S. Delaware, reluctant to go inside. He reached into his pocket and fiddled once again with the folded up paper photo he had of his best friend, what was his name? The one who was in another universe now, or something like that. Why was it so hard for him to remember the name of his own best friend?     “You understand, Lieutenant,” Lieutenant Ayala said coming up behind him “that the ship can’t take off from starbase with you standing in the connector.”     “Right, sorry,” Harry said. “I guess it just doesn’t entirely feel real. I guess I just assumed I’d be going back to Voyager once I returned to duty.”

    “I did too,” Ayala said. “But I guess R&D had other plans. The jerks.”     Harry chuckled. “Yeah. Jerks.” He took a deep breath. “Okay, Let’s do this. At least I’ll have somebody from the old crew here. That should make it easier to adjust.”     “More than one somebody,” Ayala said. “Didn’t you hear? Todd Mulcahey and Susan Brooks got assigned to the Delaware as well.”     “I didn’t know that actually,” Harry said. “I’ll make sure to say hello after I report to the Captain.” The two men made their way through the open airlock onto the Nova-class ship. Harry had to admit it was a bit odd being on one of this class again, considering his last experience with one was the Equinox, but he didn’t want to dwell on it. He felt something in his pocket, not sure how it got there, but he figured he’d take it out later, once the Delaware was out of the Sol system.

    He went through the open airlock first, Ayala close behind. The two quickly made their way to the nearest turbolift and rode it to the bridge, only to find it almost unoccupied. The only person there was a short haired red-headed human woman. Only when she turned around and Harry saw the four pips on her collar did he realize that this was his new commanding officer, Captain Kilkenny.     “Ah,” she said, smiling. “Lieutenant Kim. Lieutenant Ayala. You’re early. I would’ve arranged for you to meet the rest of the senior staff if I’d known. Welcome aboard.”     “Captain,” Harry said, standing at attention. “I look forward to serving with you.”     “And I look forward to hearing some of your war stories,” the Captain said, practically radiating enthusiasm. “I mean, you two served aboard Voyager. You’re practically legends, and here I am, the one who’s going to be giving you orders.”     Harry blushed. He looked over at Ayala, impressed at the man’s ability to maintain his composure. Harry turned back to face the Captain, but something behind him caught his eye, something sitting on one of the arms of the captain’s chair.

Is that a plush cat? He thought.     The Captain realized he was looking at something behind her and turned around.     “Oh, I see you’ve spotted Desmond,” she said.     “Desmond?” Ayala said.

“My kitty,” Captain Kilkenny said casually, as though it should’ve been painfully obvious to him and Harry. “He’s been with me since my first assignment; the Kilimanjaro.” She sighed. “She probably would’ve been my first command if we hadn’t lost her to a Dominion sneak attack during the war. Could’ve been worse though. Out of 900 crew members 893 made it out alive.     “But enough about old war wounds,” she said, her smile suddenly coming back. “Command has cleared us for departure at 0900 hours.” She checked the PADD in her hand. “Both of your quarters are on Deck 3. Feel free to get some rest before we head out.”     “Aye, sir,” Harry said.     “Aye, Captain,” Ayala said.

---

    “A pleasure to finally meet you in person, Doctor,” Bruce Maddox said, extending his hand to The Doctor.     “Likewise, Commander,” The Doctor said, accepting the handshake offer politely.     “I was sorry to hear about what Starfleet Command decided to do with Voyager,” Maddox said. “Any plans, since you’re losing your sickbay?”

    The Doctor looked around, his gaze falling on the Golden Gate Bridge off in the distance.     “Not really. I have been offered a teaching position at Starfleet Medical,” he said. “I may take it, but not this semester. Some of my Voyager crewmates have invited me to meet their families. I think they feel they owe me since I treated them during our time together, as if I ever would’ve not. I imagine their spouses, children, and what not wish to thank me for making sure their loved ones made it home. I appreciate the sentiment, but because of it I can’t help but think about all the people on Voyager I couldn’t save.”

    “I don’t think you need me to tell you even the best doctors Starfleet has can’t save everyone,” Maddox said.

    “I’m well aware of that,” The Doctor, “but it doesn’t make it any easier to accept.”

    Maddox nodded, and turned to look at the bridge as well.     “I imagine that seeing the faces of your crewmates’ families might help. It won’t make the guilt go away, unless you decide to remove it from your program. But if Commander Data can learn to live with the downsides of having emotions, I doubt you will have any problems.”

    “I suppose you’re right,” The Doctor said. “In that case I probably should go then. My first invitation just for today is meet with Lieutenant Carey and his family. Perhaps I’ll see you some other time.”     “I wouldn’t mind that,” Maddox said. “I can read the Voyager logs anytime I like, but hearing about it from someone who was there is an experience no report can properly convey. If possible, I can even arrange for you and Data to meet. He’s mentioned that he finds your story inspiring.”

    The Doctor smiled. “I would very much love to meet with him. I’ll get in touch once I know I have some time to spare, and we’ll see what we can do.”

---

    Seven of Nine pulled her robe tight around her as the air grew colder. She looked at the night sky on the Ktarian homeworld and was amazed at how many stars you could see, even this close to a major metropolitan area. She watched as off in the distance at the spaceport the ship that had brought her and her family here, the Starfleet passenger courier Lois McKendrick, took off.     Naomi was on the other side of the city, spending time with her father and his parents. Icheb had, mere months after arriving in the Alpha Quadrant, earned early entry into Starfleet Academy. Samantha had fallen asleep on a small couch in the room they were sharing while they were here, until their leave was over. Or so she’d thought until she heard Sam walk up to her. She didn’t turn to look as Sam slipped her arms around Seven’s waist and rested her chin on Seven’s shoulder.     “Trouble sleeping?” Sam said.     “Not tired yet,” Seven said. “Just... thinking.”     “Still hoping we’ll see them again?”     Seven didn’t need to ask to which ‘them’ Sam was referring.     “The barrier between the universes has been breached before,” she said. “At least twice, and that’s just what I know of. Who’s to say-”     “It’s okay, babe,” Sam said. “I think we’ll see them again too. If I know Captain Janeway as well as I think I do, she’s probably already got a plan in motion.”

    Seven chuckled. “Probably an ill-advised plan with a low probability of success.”     “Yeah, well, those have worked out for her pretty well so far,” Sam said before kissing the back of Seven’s neck. “Now, if you aren’t going to come to bed, at least close the balcony doors. Ktarian cold winds can sneak up on you. And don’t forget we’re meeting my sister tomorrow.”

    “Okay,” Seven said, watching Sam as she went back inside. Seven turned and looked up at the stars one last time before doing so herself. Even if her crewmates never did return from the other universe, even if they hadn’t survived the breach, she would make sure that they wouldn’t be forgotten.

~The End~

Dedicated to my Dad, an OG Trekkie, for introducing me to Roddenberry’s vision.

My biggest regret was that he didn’t get to see how this story ended.