It took the Doctor nearly half an hour of explaining and convincing, before Janeway would accept the truth. Finally though a plan was formed. It was quite clear that one person did not belong on this ship, and yet to simply expose him could be dangerous.
"We have no idea how this memory weapon works. If he is exposed he could simply erase all our memories once more, and start again." Janeway said as Tom put forward the barrelling in there and pinning him to the table approach.
"Ok then can we at least agree that going and starting a war with these Lanterians is probably not a good idea. In fact it seems this isn't even our quadrant, let alone our enemy." Tom said folding his arms. The problem was bigger than he had imagined. Only an hour ago his main concern was figuring out a way to return everyone's memory. Which was a pretty big problem, but it also held some interesting facets. Including his now Captain, who was already visibly distancing herself from him.
"Agreed, but convincing the rest of the crew who they really are is going to be harder than it sounds. I mean, I know you say I am the Captain, that we have been travelling home for nearly six years, and there is no way we would attack another race, but I don't remember any of that. I have been living as someone else for nearly twenty four hours, and right at this moment she is far more familiar to me than Captain Janeway." Hanging her head slightly Janeway placed her hand on the nearby bio bed. She felt a light touch on her shoulder. Looking up into the eyes of the Doctor she studied his smile for a moment before he spoke.
"There is far more Captain in you than you realise Kathryn." He said giving her shoulder a light squeeze.
"It's not about a title, it's who you are." The Doctor finished, removing his hand and turning to look at the scans Paris had taken earlier. Janeway thought back to the moment she had first stepped onto the bridge. How it had seemed somehow more familiar than even her own quarters, that something way down deep inside her had told her this was home. Now she watched Tom closely as he looked everywhere in the room except at her.
"Ok I think I have a plan. Doctor you stay here and see if you can try and find a cure for this memory loss. Tom come with me, we are going to need some help." With a final nod to the Doctor, Janeway exited sickbay with Tom in tow. He walked just a step behind her left shoulder, and she did not like this new position. Halting her stride for a moment, she allowed Tom to catch her up. He stopped next to her, looking down at her with a quizzical expression.
"I think we should keep what we know to ourselves for now. We cannot risk, anyone going to Commander Anderson, or whatever the hell his name is, and saying we are trying to ensue a mutiny. No we will start with B'Elanna, send her to the Doctor and get him to convince her, like he did with us. We will ultimately need her help." Janeway said now moving forward once more but keeping her pace unusually slow.
"Ok so what are we going to do, we must only be a few hours away from reaching the Lantarians borders." Tom replied as they boarded the turbo lift and Janeway called for the bridge.
"We are going to tell the Commander that you have found a cure for the memory loss and attempt to force his hand." Janeway said as she quickly tapped her comm badge and spoke briefly to B'Elanna, who was less than happy to have to go to sickbay, but complied all the same. Just as Janeway ended her communication with the chief engineer the doors to the turbo lift opened.
Chakotay had been stewing in his chair for the past hour, the scenes he had witnessed in sickbay were still bothering him. It wasn't just the fact that he was he was kind of jealous, but it was something deeper, within himself, that Kathryn Janeway belonged to him, or at least something about her did. It was silly really, and totally inappropriate for it to be occupying his mind whilst he was also in charge of formulating the crew battle drills. Deciding he would work better on the bridge. He picked up his PADD and walked out of his office, down the hall and onto the bridge beside the Captain's ready room. He noticed Anderson in the Captain's chair, and assumed that no one had come up with an explanation as to why the Captain had turned off, or for that matter how.
"Chakotay, how are those rosters coming?" Anderson said as Chakotay sat himself in the first officers chair. The sensation, for a moment, was overwhelmingly familiar.
"I am about done, it was getting a bit quiet in my office." Chakotay said giving Anderson a quick smile before turning his attention back to his PADD. It could have been no longer than a minute before the turbo lift doors opened and who walked out, but the two people he had been trying to avoid.
To add insult to injury, as the pair walked down the ramp to join them on the main deck, neither of them paid him any attention. Both focused on Commander Anderson. It was Janeway who spoke first, she seemed to be carrying herself differently, more upright, more confident. If anything Chakotay secretly thought it made her look even better. His thoughts were suddenly quelled by Janeway's request to speak to the Commander in private. Her tone was serious and the entire bridge seemed to still before Anderson stood up and invited her into the ready room. Chakotay watched the three as they walked off the bridge, the muffled noises of hushed conversation filled his ears and he could control himself no longer. What he heard was something in his current frame of mind, was the final straw.
"Get on with your work, speculation and rumours are not part of your job description." Silence followed, but only for a few minutes before Chakotay heard Janeway and Paris's names mentioned again followed by hushed giggles. This time he chose to say nothing.
"What s it that I can do for you?" Anderson said, sitting in Janeway's chair and placing his hands on her desk. It was hard for Janeway not to go immediately to Tom's first idea of pinning him to that desk and forcing the information out of him. Knowing however that that could put her ship and crew in danger, the only evidence of her anger was a slight eyebrow twitch. It was clear only a moment after, that Tom had noticed her change in mood, but Anderson lent back in his chair completely unaware.
"Umm I think I have found way to reverse the effect of the memory loss." Tom said jumping in before Janeway said something she may come to regret. It was also the reason why they had come here, there was no point putting it off any longer.
"Oh well, umm that is good news." Anderson said, his words were of pleasure, but his body language told another story. He slightly squirmed in his chair, and his hands clasped together tightly.
"Yes we think the answer lies in the hypothalamus, stimulation of that part of the brain, over several days should slowly bring back the forgotten memories stored there." Paris continued, hoping that this alien would have no idea that he had just made all of that up.
"This is good news, but probably won't be in time for our scheduled attack on the Lanterians, maybe we should postpone any medical treatment until our mission is complete." Anderson replied, coming back to sit with his hands resting on the desk.
"I don't think that is wise sir, I mean if something goes wrong out there, surely a crew with their memories in tacked would be a better option." Janeway said trying to press the issue as Anderson eyed her with contempt.
"This attack has been co-ordinated at Starfleet we need to be at the base on time, or this entire mission may fail. No my decision is final, leave the memory experiments until after we have completed our mission." With that Anderson told them they were dismissed. Janeway gave Tom a rye smile as they left the Captain's ready room. For now their job here was done, they had to go back to sickbay and see how the Doctor was doing. Walking into the turbo lift Tom went to call out the destination but a hand appearing in the gap at the doors stopped him.
"Chakotay." Janeway acknowledged, she was unsure how to treat him now. He was her first officer, and according to the Doctor her best friend. Yet all she felt from him now was distance.
The icy atmosphere inside the lift was horrific. No one moved, no one even seemed to breath as the lift made it way to their destination. The only noise the humming from the machine they were stood in.
"Ok I can't take this any more, will someone please say something, or I may have to break out in song." Tom said finally exasperated as Janeway gave him a death glare, and Chakotay fixed his gaze on the wall in front of him. It was just as Janeway was about to say something that the doors opened on deck six and Tom stepped out quicker than a rat up a drain pipe. Janeway followed him, sure that Chakotay would be continuing on his journey. His voice behind them made her stop.
"I need a word Kathryn." He said his tone light.
"Sorry Chakotay I have something very important to do." She replied thinking that would be the end of it and she turned away from him.
"Lieutenant, that wasn't a request." Chakotay intoned, and Janeway almost didn't respond, forgetting for a moment that she wasn't a Captain to him, not yet, she was his subordinate.
"Sorry sir. Tom go ahead I will be there soon." Janeway turned and quickly ushered Tom away. With slight reluctance he went. Knowing that Janeway could handle herself, she also knew time was of the essence.
"What can I do for you Commander?" Janeway said cautiously, taking a quick glance behind her to make sure Tom was out of ear shot.
"I want to know what do you think you are doing, I know strictly speaking your relationship with Tom is none of my business, but it becomes my business when it is interfering with your duties." Chakotay said now folding his arms and looking directly down at her. Janeway felt her fist tighten at her side. She knew it wasn't his fault he didn't know, and in all honesty he was sort of right. It didn't however quell the urge to punch him in the nose.
"For your information sir, I have been working with the Doctor on a cure of the memory loss, we are close, and that is why we came to see the Captain. I have been order back there to continue." Janeway said now raising herself to full height, intent on turning on her heal and leaving. The hand on her shoulder to prevent her from doing so came as a bit of a shock. Next thing she knew her fist was connecting with the underside of Chakotay's nose. His head snapping backwards thumped into the bulk head. His eyes for a second popped wide open, before he pitched forward and fell flat on his face at her feet.
"Shit." Janeway exclaimed poking the now unconscious Chakotay with the toe of her shoe. Grabbing him under the armpits, and virtually dragging his face across the floor. Janeway dragged the man down the corridor and, huffing for every breath, she managed to activate the door sensors to sickbay.
"A little help here." She called out as quietly as possible, as three heads appeared around the corner.
"Now that is funny." B'Elanna said moving forward first as Kathryn dropped Chakotay's body unceremoniously onto the floor.
"Ok less sniping more helping." Kathryn glared at the woman before the half Klingon moved towards her and grabbed one of Chakotay's arms.
"So Captain how are you planning on explaining this one?" B'Elanna asked as the guys came over and positioned Chakotay on one of the bio beds in the back.
"Well i'm not sure, but for now that doesn't matter. Umm Captain?" Janeway said cutting off mid sentence and giving B'Elanna a small uneven smile.
"Yeah the doc here filled me in, then gave me some stuff. I think I can remember somethings from before. They are still fuzzy, but definitely memories." B'Elanna continued as the Doctor strode over with a hypo-spray.
"This may make you feel a little disorientated, and may cause you to have flash backs. But it will bring back your memory." The Doctor said raising it to Janeway's neck before she backed away.
"I need a clear head right now Doctor, you can do me when its all over." Janeway replied as the Doctor turned to Tom who was already holding up his hands.
"I think I will be ok until this is done. But may I suggest you start with Chakotay. This might all be easier to explain when he wakes up, if he kind of knows who he is." Tom said looking down at the man below him, who was now developing two nice black eyes.
"Ok, but as soon as this is over I want everyone in here to have their memories reversed." The Doctor said conceding as B'Elanna, Tom and Kathryn walked over to a corner of sickbay.
"Ok the plan now is to sabotage the ship. Get anyone you can with the hypo-spray. It will make them easier to convince to help us. The main thing is we don't alert Anderson to all of this, we have no idea how his memory weapon works, and we can't afford to go through all this again, there would be no guarantee that next time we would figure out what was going on." Janeway said as B'Elanna and Tom both took a hypo-spray and tucked it away inside their uniform.
"Ok Tom and I will start with the bridge crew, we will try and mess things up from there. B'Elanna you go down to engineering. Get the engines off line, without damaging them too much. Once all this has happened, hopefully we will be in a position to take care of Anderson." Janeway finished.
There was no more than needed to be said, all three moved out of sickbay and off to their prospective destinations.
Their walk to the turbo lift was silent, as was their ride to the bridge, but both Janeway and Paris knew they would have much to discuss when this was all over. And for a moment colour rose in her cheeks, as she thought not only about their encounter in sickbay, but of poor Chakotay lying on the bio bed. How on earth was she going to even start explaining that one?
TBC... XxX