Passé perdu
Summary: The Enterprise wakes up in the 24th century, but this time, they get to meet Voyager's crew…
A/N: This is something I found on my computer a few minutes ago, I wasn't even sure I had written it in the beginning, but I did – the names and the main subject are too close to those in my other (posted) story to be a coincidence. I just wanted to post this to know what you think and to finally find a way to go on with the story…
Hope you like it!
Oh, and I read it only once now, so the language might not be too great (as English is not my mother tongue), but I have to get something to eat now… If anybody wants to beta this, I'm open to suggestions :-)
Disclaimer: This is of course not mine – I could've never ever created such a wonderful universe as Roddenberry & Co. have done. I'm just borrowing the people and I don't mean to do any harm to them...
PASSÉ PERDU
Prologue
When Charles "Trip" Tucker finally decided to open his eyes, the second thing he observed was the blurry form of a man's head above him. The first was his throbbing headache.
"You've probably got a bad headache, but don't worry, it will go away in a second." The face above him said and indeed, just a short time later, Trip's vision cleared and he could finally make out the man's face correctly. He seemed to be about 45, had lost a lot of his hair already and wore something that could've been a uniform. Trip had never seen him before.
"How are you feeling?"
"Fine… I think." It felt as if he hadn't spoken in ages. "Where am I? Who are you?"
"You are on the starship Prometheus. And I'm the doctor here."
"The Prometheus? I've never heard of that ship before. Are you human?"
"Well, I'm not. But this is a starship from Earth, yes."
"Can't be. What the hell happened here?"
"We had hoped you could tell us." A woman's voice he hadn't heard before either. It took Trip several seconds to move his head and focus on the woman standing next to the doctor with the strange name. She was in her late forties as well, had dark blonde hair and wore a uniform similar to the man's although it had a red collar. "We found your ship drifting in space and the whole crew in a cryogenic sleep."
"Cryo…? Is the crew alright?"
"The rest of your crew is still asleep. But they are going to be awakened soon. Would you mind telling me your name? We haven't been able to access the Enterprise's databank."
"I'm Commander Charles Tucker, the chief engineer and third officer of the Enterprise. And who are you?"
"I'm Admiral Kathryn Janeway from the United Federation of Planets, Commander Tucker."
Several weeks before…
It was a beautiful day in twenty-fourth century San Francisco and Michelle Laplace was once more admiring the weather control system that made it possible to tell exactly what kind of weather it would be. She was sitting in a small café typical for that part of Earth talking to Kathryn Janeway.
"I got a communiqué from Mars this morning saying that the Paris' are going to come here in a few days already. I'm looking forward to meeting that new baby of theirs. They called him Zefram."
"I know that already. Kathryn you're way too giddy for a Starfleet admiral! You've met them half a year ago already."
"Yes, but not the rest of my crew. Chakotay and Seven've been gone for two years. And I haven't seen Harry either for one and a half years."
"My god, I haven't seen any of my friends for hundreds of years, literally."
"I know that, sorry. I just…"
"I was kidding. I'm happy you're going to meet them. And I'm really really looking forward to seeing that first officer of yours!" Michelle just answered grinning. It had been an on-going joke between them since they had had their talk about relationships which never worked.
"Marson to Laplace.", interrupted their relaxed talk.
"Yes, Tom, I hear you."
"Would you come to Starfleet headquarters please? There's something I need to tell you." Now that made her curious. Due to her history, Michelle had been to Starfleet HQ several times, but never on short notice.
"I'll be there in 10 minutes. Laplace out."
When Michelle and Kathryn arrived 12 minutes later at Thomas Marson's office in the headquarters, another Admiral and several scientists Michelle knew from her historical studies were already gathered. They had obviously been waiting for them. Being a Starfleet Admiral, Kathryn Janeway had every right to be there, too, without having been summoned.
"The USS Prometheus found this about a week ago." Marson said showing them all a picture of a starship looking a bit old-fashioned and not fitting into any of Starfleet's starship designs Michelle had ever seen but still bearing enough resemblance with them to be distinctively from Earth.
"What kind of ship is this?" Dr. Dunston, one of the Starfleet historical specialists asked.
"Have a look at the dimensions of this ship. It's small, very small in fact, probably only for about 100 people." another interjected.
"Indeed." Marson pushed a few keys and zoomed in on a small part of the picture. Soon,the ship's name became visible:Enterprise – NX 01.
"The NX-01 was found a week ago in a far corner of the Beta Quadrant. Her systems don't work anymore. But now comes the amazing: the crew is still alive. At least as far as the Prometheus' crew can tell. They found an energy source which is independent of the ship and which supplies 84 cryogenic cellules with energy. The ship and her occupants have been drifting around the area for the last 230 years."
They had all sat down and now, Cmdr. Marson was explaining the situation.
"I've never heard about this ship before." Michelle said.
"Most of you probably haven't." he answered smiling. "The Enterprise is one of the first ships Starfleet sent out to explore space, even before the Federation was founded. We don't know much about it, which is – if the Prometheus' observations are correct – a miracle. The Enterprise is capable of warp five. It has two phaser cannons, a hull armour-plaiting and several other specifications which seem to be at least 100 years before their time. All we know about the Enterprise is her captain's name – Jonathan Archer – that it was started in the 60s of the 22nd century and that it got lost during its fourth year in space. I have no idea though why we don't know more about this ship and its crew. They were kind of pioneers; probably the first ever to encounter species who had never heard of Earth before. We don't even have a picture of Archer or any of his crew for that matter."
"Tom, you knew more about my time. You even have films, series, pictures, everything of interest which happened four centuries ago. Why don't you know anything about Starfleet's first warp-five-ship?"
"One reason is that most of Starfleet's recording of that time got lost in a fire about two years after the Enterprise disappeared. Why there were no back-ups or why we just never converted them into today's data formats and why we never got any data from the races they encountered? I have no idea. But Admiral Nechaijev already agreed to contact the Vulcan High Council to find out if they know anything. We'll probably have a few answers in some days. Until then though, I want you, Michelle, as well as you, Dr. Johansson, to board the USS Victory in three hours. She's going to rendezvous with the Prometheus. Michelle, we'd like to have your support in waking them. We need somebody who knows their situation and who might be able to tell us what we did wrong the last time. Dr. Johansson, your expertise in dealing with people from less-developed worlds might be helpful, too."
Michelle smiled when Tom mentioned the time after they had woken her up. She almost had had to find out on her own where she was, or rather when she was as nobody dared to tell her that she had been sleeping for 380 years just after they had woken her up. They had had no experience in dealing with such a situation and had it not been for Michelle's enthusiasm for the future and everything around her, her integration into the new time could have gone terribly wrong. It was an appealing idea to assist in another person's waking up; although it should be a bit easier for them considering that they had a whole crew to hold onto for support.
"It's okay. I'll go."
"And I'm going with you." Admiral Janeway threw in. She had that look in her face that dared anybody to say anything against that. Michelle was pretty sure that the Admiral just longed for the chance to be in space once more and to just do something interesting again. She seemed to have completely forgotten the meeting with the Voyager crew, but after all – this could be done again, the wakening of a starship's crew from the 22nd century only happened once in a millennium…
Back to the present…
Trip Tucker still couldn't believe it. They had shown him pictures of the Enterprise, pictures of the cellule he had been in and also pictures of their ship, of Earth, the Starfleet headquarters. He had been to the Prometheus' bridge and had seen their warp core as well as star maps from almost one half of the galaxy. He had seen people wearing those new Starfleet uniforms who belonged to races he had never seen before. But he still couldn't believe it.
It had been almost a day since he had been woken up and it was amazing how good he felt after having been frozen for 230 years. He was now on his way to the Prometheus' transporter room, accompanied by Michelle Laplace, Admiral Janeway and the doctor and anxious to finally wake up some of his friends. They had decided that it would now be safe to wake several of the others at once, considering how well Trip felt. They had wanted to wait until they were sure he would not have any problems after his century-long sleep.
When they arrived at the transporter room it finally hit Trip that they were going to use it to go over to the Enterprise.
"How safe is this?"
"Excuse me?" Janeway asked.
Michelle only smiled. "It's very safe. Don't worry. I had a hard time using it myself in the beginning but it's actually fun. And I haven't met someone yet who ever had an accident with it." She remembered Kathryn telling her about the accident they had had once on Voyager when Tuvok and Neelix suddenly became one person after having been transported back to the ship. But she decided to better not tell him. After all, it ended well, didn't it?
"We have transporters ourselves but nobody likes to use them. They are not all that safe." Trip said frowning.
"We had 230 years to make them better, Commander. Don't worry, they are safe. We used them to transport you here.", the doctor said smiling.
Trip only sighed and accepted his fate.
TBC…
So? What do you think? I know it's close to the other story I began (and haven't yet finished), but there are differences…