Title: The Weight of Numbers
Author: frogfrizz
Fandom: Star Trek Voyager/Battlestar Galactica
Pairings/Characters: Janeway/Seven, Janeway/Roslin and a bunch of co-stars.
Spoilers: Set right before Season 1, Episode 1 of BSG & some four to five years after Voyager first lands in the Delta Quadrant.
Warnings/Rating: PG for language and sexual references.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Summary: Galactica encounters Voyager in the midst of its escape.
A/N: A huge shower of thank you's to a bunch of people for making this story possible.
Hugs to my beta selenay_x, who has read this piece over and beyond the call of duty, numerous drafts notwithstanding.
To selvercy, kjaneway and missfoxie for their invaluable insight on the very first draft (Through Dire Straits).
And not ever least, cookies for technosage, for being as hard on me as I am on myself: thank you for the painful but pleasurable whipping that came with refining this story. You've pointed me in a direction that I never would have taken (or seen) on my own.
All remaining mistakes and irregularities are mine.
This is dedicated to the entire body of Janeway/Roslin lovers (to babylil for providing the initial prompts and radak for spouting such inspiring art on the pairing) and to the community mods who keep the soul of femslash going (that's you, projectjulie!). You have all been an inspiration.
...The Prime Directive is not just a set of rules; it is a philosophy... and a very correct one. History has proven again and again that whenever mankind interferes with a less developed civilization, no matter how well intentioned that interference may be, the results are invariably disastrous."
-- Captain Jean-luc Picard (ST TNG: "Symbiosis")
=-=-=-=
Part I
She emerged from her quarters, looking past her doors and into her bed where a long figure bunched the sheets together and groaned. A bare leg dangled elegantly from the side, blonde hair spread across the pillows, and a metal brow glinted against the star-light whenever she moved.
Seven needed her rest; the poor woman stumbled into Kathryn's arms at almost four in the morning, exhausted by a forty-hour work day that Kathryn had proscribed to anyone but the Borg.
Kathryn's doors closed and crew members greeted her as was customary. She noticed how their eyes glided over her and off, struggling with the new day as they returned to their conversations or to the purpose laid out on their PADDs.
There was something distinctly different from them and her, a childhood memory about the mangled tree…it punched her to wakefulness every morning.
She had been very young then.
A small Kathryn Janeway had stepped off a tree she had scaled, only to be petrified at the sight of it being torn by lightning the next second. To take responsibility, to climb the tallest obstacle, and then, to witness the what-ifs and live through them for every second after. Those were the terrors of command and not something that many could endure.
She put a hand to her temple and tried to soothe herself. Kath, it's too early to be thinking like this. How about a cup of coffee?
She fetched a brew from the mess hall and stopped at the counter to talk to Neelix, the morale officer who was very delighted when she didn't decline his newest leola root creation. It was never polite to gag; she swallowed the concoction without chewing and downed it with a steaming mug before she headed to the bridge with a bitter taste in her mouth.
Today had been a routine skim through uncharted space, a day of sitting at the command chair, listening to Harry Kim's animated croon about this planet, that star, one little anomaly at the edge of that system or another.
She had counted on her crew for most things: for invaluable sanity, for camaraderie, and often enough, for portents. She supposed that a long time ago, when the lack of sensors and shields made life very dangerous in the vacuum, captains compiled predictions of tomorrow by watching how their bridge crew reacted.
Today was one such instance.
Her Vulcan security officer managed to sound slightly off-balance as news of unusual –and certainly alien –company streamed through the ship computers and out of Tuvok's mouth.
"Captain, we have multiple unknown readings on our sensors."
"Mr. Tuvok, red alert."
She should have paid more attention to portents when she saw them:
Harry preserved a frazzled innocence, his grown-up fervor hardening to the rhythm of the warning klaxon.
Paris licked his lips, and his face opened to the scene in bewilderment. Chakotay sidled up beside her, reinforcing her shadow with his own.
Tuvok, her pillar of serenity, leaned forward ever so slightly, his understated concern revealing an entire bible of caution.
Like a seer in a less advanced civilization, she had a nagging feeling that simply being here somehow pulled her into a vortex of unknowns.
She watched, fascinated, as ships dropped out of light, each one's light-trail fading into masses of dull metal.
From every corner of the view-screen, they flared in the vacuum until ships of every size and shape populated the entirety of space for miles around. The last of them faded into a behemoth, which lugged its weight as it coasted over Voyager's starboard side, a hulking, black whale in the sea of space.
She stared like she had that night her tree was struck by lightning, when thunder breached her courage and etched the scene into her memory.
