This chapter is mostly dialog, and there's a lot of it. In this chapter two temporal properties are mentioned. One of them I got from a TNG episode (the one where Worf keeps shifting through different timelines, I don't know the name of it) and the other one I made up for the story. It helps keep things going in upcoming chapters.

I really really really hate begging, but seriously, I could have just one review for this story so I know people are actually reading it, that'd be awesome.

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"What," Jenna asked after getting over the shock of Telsa's statement.

"You heard me, Commander. Because of that beam, Earth will implode on itself in the 49th century."

"How," Jenna questioned.

"That beam wasn't a scanner," Telsa explained. "It was a transporter."

"What was transported?"

"Rafritzia," Telsa said sadly. "No one will tell us why the rafritzia was officially created, just that we have to stop it. They were transported to the center of Earth."

"What is this 'rafritzia'?"

"Officially, that is not our concern," Lenear replied. "Unofficially it was designed with some military purpose. Our people didn't know what it could do, and your planet was chosen as the testing grounds."

"You still haven't answered my question," Jenna said.

"I'm getting to it," Lenear said impatiently. "When nothing happened within the first fifty years, it was deemed a failure and our people moved on to find other ways of killing each other."

"You see, what we didn't know is that the rafritzia were laying dormant waiting to become active," Telsa added.

"There have been no unusual scans from Earth's core recorded."

"They're lying dormant in this century. It's going to take time for them to become active."

"How long?"

"In 4666," Telsa explained, "there were experiments going on involving the Earth's core that somehow triggered the rafritzia to go from their dormant state to being active. This crippled the planet."

"What happened?"

"The change over from dormant to active caused a massive shockwave in the Earth's core that triggered a series of tectonic plate movement. All throughout the planet there were earthquakes, hurricanes, volcanic eruptions," Telsa's voice trailed off. "It was horrible. The after effects of these events caused a massive climate change. There were such massive dust clouds covering the sky it blocked out the sun. Natural plant life morphed to survive this nightmarish environment. Even the animals changed to be more vicious.

"Earth fell into such disarray because of these events and the resulting changes. All the governments from other planets immediately recalled their ambassadors until the humans could find a way to handle this problem. By 4735, all the planets that now make up your Federation had cut off all contact and support to Earth."

"Some allies," Jenna murmured.

"Although not much is known about the rafritzia," Lenear continued, "we do know this: they prefer to make their home in molten rock, like what's found at the center of your planet."

"If I may quickly interject with a question," Jenna said, picking up her coffee, "what do these rafritzia look like? Are they tiny microbes? Are they bigger than the dinosaurs?"

"We weren't given those details," Lenear said. "Once in the center of your planet, they began to feed on the rock surrounding the magma."

"Uh-huh," Jenna said. "Just so I get your story straight, you're telling me that your people, knowing full well it would probably harm my planet, transported beings who like hanging out in Earth's core, just kind of chilling and eating the planet from the inside out, which will one day create such damage that the Earth will just kind of implode on itself centuries from now. Did I miss anything?"

"Bodily waste that comes from the rafritzia is a gas that has been slowly seeping out from the center of the planet into the planet's atmosphere. This gas can alter human physiology if there is enough exposure, making them more aggressive," Lenear explained. Indicating toward Kathryn and Chakotay, he continued saying, "Our scans of these two have shown they somehow remained unaffected by the gasses. We've yet to determine how, but at this point, I'm not sure it matters much."

Once he had finished speaking, he looked at Jenna, who just stared blankly at him before saying, "Ok, so not only are these beings causing the planet to implode, but are causing anyone who breathes in their excrement to become aggressive and paranoid." She sat and thought about this before saying, "I've heard stranger."

"You believe us," Lenear asked skeptically.

"Of course," Jenna said, "your story is far too extraordinary to be made up. People who make stuff up try to stay in the realm of reason. You have successfully left that realm far behind."

"This is wonderful," Telsa exclaimed. "It took us so much longer to convince Capt. Braxton."

While taking a sip of her coffee Jenna asked, "Now what do you want me to do about it?"

Everyone's eyes snapped to her while Lenear angrily asked, "What do you mean? We want you to help us prevent Earth's destruction!"

"I gathered that, but I'm not allowed to alter the timeline."

"Even if it means the destruction of your planet?"

"Nothing lasts forever."

"You can't be serious."

"You have to understand where I'm coming from," Jenna calmly explained. "I cannot for any reason, no matter how real or imminent the danger, alter the timeline. If temporal agents started doing that, the timeline would be a chaotic mess, constantly having to alter itself for all the changes. There are several theories out there that say if mess with the timeline too much, it could collapse altogether. Personally, I'm kind of curious at how that would turn out." At the confused looks she was receiving from everyone, she said, "But I digress, as I have clearly fallen off topic. Long story short, I can't step in unless certain criteria are met. Criteria that you clearly don't meet."

"What criteria needs to be met to make you step in."

"The ship in question must violate temporal laws." When she saw the looks on everyone's faces, she said, "You've got to believe me, I want to help, but if I do, it could mean death for me and my family. There are certain procedures I have to follow, and you have to give me a good reason to risk my life for you."

"The destruction of your planet isn't good enough?"

"No," Jenna said, "we get countless reports of Earth's destruction all the time."

"What," asked Telsa, confused.

"Alternate timelines," Jenna explained waving her hand, "obnoxious temporal property. You don't need to worry about that. What you need to worry about is convincing me life on Earth was horrible as a direct result of this incident. You convince me, and I'll stick my neck on the line for you."

"What about your laws," Lenear asked.

"Let me worry about those," Jenna said, "You wouldn't believe the loop holes you can find when you get creative."

"Kathryn, Chakotay," Telsa asked, "would you please tell the Commander your life stories?"

Kathryn went first. She described growing up in a world run by clans, how the fight for survival never seemed to end, how she found her family the day she met Chakotay. This is where she stopped and Chakotay told his story, and then they tag teamed their time together.

When they were done, Jenna asked a few questions that linked their life situation to the rafritzia. Once she was done with her questions, she just shook her head and said, "Sounds like you were living in a state of nature."

"A what," Chakotay asked.

"A state of nature," Jenna said. At the confused looks she explained, "It was a theory proposed by Tomas Hobbes in the 17th century. He wrote a book, The Leviathan, in which he makes an argument for the need for a government. If there was no government, he argued, than society would be reduced to a 'state of nature.' Life would consist of three things: finding food, finding shelter, and being safe. That's it. Eventually, to look out for everyone's mutual interest, clans will start forming. But even the clans offer no guarantee for safety from other clans, or your clan mates for that matter. You are always the slave of the strongest person or clan. It's a war of all against all."

"That is my world in a nutshell," Chakotay said.

Jenna sat there, running things through her mind for a couple minutes, before standing and saying, "Wait here."

She made a beeline for Derrick's office. When she found him he was buried under a stack of padds even bigger than what was on her desk.

"I've got a hypothetical question for you," Jenna said.

"Hypothetical as in 'I wanted discuss this theory with you' or hypothetical as in 'I'm actually in this situation and I'm not exactly sure what to do, but I don't want to admit I'm in it because it could get me into a lot of trouble,'" he asked without looking up from what he was reading.

"The second one," she answered.

This caused him to look up. "Go on."

"Our two friends came to warn us of Earth's destruction."

"Is it credible?"

"Yes, it's too weird to be made up, but…"

"But we can't step in and prevent it, no matter how real the warning is," Derrick finished.

"Exactly. What do you think I should do?"

"What was life like before Earth's destruction?"

"Remember when we had to read The Leviathan back in American Philosophy at Starfleet Academy?"

"Wow, that bad?"

"Worse. Telsa and Lenear brought with them people who actually lived there. But that doesn't change the fact that we can't prevent that event from happening," Jenna said, frustrated.

"We can't," Derrick said, thinking out loud, "but they can."

"What are you talking about?"

"A substitution."

"A substitution," Jenna said, wide eyed. "Derrick, are you nuts? We can't do that! We don't have the clearance."

"Let me handle setting it up," Derrick said. "You just make sure the survivors are ready, willing, and able."

"Alright," Jenna said sighing, "but you better know what you're doing."

When she got back into the room, everyone was staring at her, listening attentively. Jenna took her spot at the table, not sure what to say.

"Well," Lenear demanded impatiently. "Will you help us?"

"About that," Jenna said, stalling to try and think of something. "You see, that's up for debate…" Just then the door opened behind her and Derrick walked in.

"We got the go ahead," Derrick said, handing her the authorization form.

"That was fast," Jenna said, "I thought it took months to get through everything."

"The 'powers that be' have been watching this case develop since Braxton took over this," Derrick explained. "He went too far in regards to this case, and now he's in the middle of a court martial. They wanted me to pass on to you their hope that you can properly handle this situation, since Braxton proved he was unable to."

Jenna looked at the form, then back and Derrick and said, "You and I are going to have a fun talk later."

"I'm looking forward to it," he mumbled.

"What's going on," Lenear demanded.

"It's as I said before," Jenna said, "there no way the Temporal Integrity Committee will do action to prevent this event from happening." Before anyone could protest, Jenna said, nodding toward Kathryn and Chakotay, "They are going to stop it."

"Us," Kathryn asked. "How?"

"Through substitution," Jenna said. "This is my colleague, Lt. Cmdr. Derrick Johnson. He'll explain it to you."

"A substitution is just what it sounds like. We are going to replace the two of you with two otherwise influential people so that you are in a position to stop this from happening."

"You're going to replace us with people," Chakotay asked. "How's that work?"

"What we are first going to do is get background information from you to see if any of that information matches anyone from that era."

"Background information," Kathryn asked. "We already gave that to you."

"We want specifics," Derrick explained. "Names of parents, pets, geographical location you grew up in. There is a weird temporal phenomenon we've discovered that," he paused, trying to think of the right words, "repeats people every few centuries. If there is a repeat of the two of you, it would make things much easier."

"Time repeats people," Lenear said. "And I thought they'd have a hard time believing our story."

"Truth is usually stranger than fiction," Jenna said.

"If there are no matches," Derrick continued, "than we will search for the closest replacement possible."

"How will we become influential enough to stop this from happening," Kathryn asked.

"Remember that alternate timeline property I mentioned," Jenna asked. When they nodded, she continued, "That comes into play here. There are a lot of details that even I don't understand, but basically, we'll look into what you've described and see if is unique to our timeline. If so, we'll look for differences between our universe and one that it didn't happen in. Then, we'll see what we can do to copy it."

"This whole alternate timeline thing confuses me," Kathryn said.

"Join the club," Jenna and Derrick said at the same time.

"Look," Derrick said to Telsa and Lenear, "it's going to take us a few days to sort everything out, but there's some stuff that we need you to do. We need for you to come up with a violation of the temporal laws. This is just in case something goes wrong and someone outside of the council who approved of the substitution wants to know what we are doing."

"We'll give you a copy of the temporal laws," Jenna said.

"What if we can't find one," Telsa asked.

"We are very lenient in what could constitute a temporal violation, and if the background of the incriminating document is not of legitimate means, we would be willing to look the other way."

"The translation of that statement is," Jenna explained, noticing their confused looks, "'If you have to fake it, we won't question it.'" When Derrick shot her an annoyed look, she said, "What? You were confusing them."

"Get us the documentation by any means necessary, and by then we should have people to substitute them with," Derrick said while turning and walking out the room.

"Are we coming with you," Kathryn asked Telsa.

"No," Jenna answered for her, "you'll stay with us until we have everything sorted out."

"This may take some time," Telsa said to Jenna.

"If your government wants to prevent this as much as you say they do," Jenna said, rising, "then be sure to impress on them how it will be almost impossible for us to do anything until we get those documents."

"We'll do what we can," Telsa said, before she and Lenear were escorted back to their ship.

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Chakotay stopped there, allowing what he said to sink in.

After a few tense moments, Adm. Nechavey stood up, and asked, "With the court's permission, I'd like to question the defendants."

"Go ahead," Pellowa said.

"Is it your testimony that it was this temporal agent, Lt. Cmdr. Garcia, who had the two of you impersonate Kathryn Janeway and Chakotay?"

"Yes Admiral," Chakotay said.

"And why did they choose these to individuals to be 'substituted'?"

"We repeated them," Chakotay responded. "That and they were in a position to stop this from happening."

"Can you elaborate?

Neither answered.

Annoyed, Nechavey said, "Not silence again. Fine, I'll try a different question. What ever happened to Telsa and Lenear?"

"We don't know," Kathryn answered. "After they left the conference room we only saw them one other time, and that's when the dropped off the documentation."

"You never stayed in contact with the beings who rescued you," Nechavey asked condescendingly. "The beings who worked so hard to try and save Earth?"

"Our mission didn't involve them. Our mission was to stop the event from happening."

"I'm curious," Nechavey asked, "what are the details of you mission?"

Silence again.

"Your Honor, the defendants are once again refusing to answer any questions. I request they are both placed in a holding cell until they are willing to answer all questions related to this trial."

"That won't be necessary," shouted a voice from the back. "I can answer your questions."

"Who said that," Pellowa asked. Everyone's head seemed to turn and stare at the mysterious person. "Bring her up here," Pellowa ordered.

The crowd parted to reveal a Hispanic woman with her long black hair tied back. She was wearing a pair of jeans and a black windbreaker with a blue and sliver diamond logo on her right sleeve near the shoulder and a Federation symbol in the same place on her left arm.

"Who're you," Pellowa asked, "and what information can you bring to this hearing?"

"I have many aliases," the woman said, "but you probably best know me as Lt. Cmdr. Jenna Garcia. Kathryn and Chakotay were under strict orders from the Temporal Integrity Committee not to inform anyone, no matter what, any details of their mission unless instructed otherwise by myself or Cmdr. Johnson. It is our fault they refused to answer your questions and stonewall your efforts to bring this matter to a conclusion. I'm sorry for the inconvenience, but we have our reasons."

"Sorry for the inconvenience," Nechavey repeated. "Is that all you have to say for yourself? You owe us more than that."

Jenna turned to Nechavey and said, "Who are you that I should do as you say? I'm here today to save Earth from destruction and out of loyalty to them," she said, nodding toward Kathryn and Chakotay. She then turned to them and said, "Something's come up. We're throwing the plan out the window and improvising. Right now Derrick and I have both agreed the best course of action is to tell them everything we can and watch the fallout."

"That's your plan," Kathryn asked, dumbfounded. "Just roll the dice and hope for the best?"

"Good analogy," Jenna said. "That's exactly what we're doing."

"How do we know that things will work out the way they're supposed to," Kathryn asked.

"The way they're supposed to," Jenna repeated, voice dripping with sarcasm. "The way things are supposed to end is little rock eating creatures are going to eat the Earth from the inside out. We are trying to prevent that."

"Isn't there a more, I don't know, certain way of handling this matter," Kathryn responded, just as sarcastic.

"No," Jenna said. "Haven't you figured that out yet? A la mierda woman! That's the one thing you should have gotten in everything leading up to the substitution: when you mess with the timeline nothing is certain."

"Lt. Cmdr. Garcia," Pellowa started, but was quickly interrupted.

"It's Commander now, your Honor."

"Commander Garcia," Pellowa amended, "could you stick to the matter at hand? What do you have to add to their testimony?"

"I can tell you everything that led up to the substitution, why we chose who we did, and what we had hoped to accomplish."

"What changed," Adm. Nechavey asked suspiciously. "Why talk now?"

"Last night I entered my office to find Telsa and Lenear's heads perched on my desk." She made her way over to the stand and as soon as she was next to Kathryn and Chakotay, she said, "I think we can take this as a good sign that their people were less than receptive to calling off their plans for Earth."

"Telsa and Lenear are dead," Nechavey asked.

"Nope," Jenna replied, "they're perfectly fine, just out walking around without their heads."

"Sarcasm is not necessary," Nechavey replied tersely, turning and walking away.

"Oh I disagree," Jenna replied cheerfully. "A well placed sarcastic answer can help dissolve any tension that might be in a room. And from what I can tell, this room needs all the help it can get."

"Commander," Pellowa said before the fighting could escalate, "why don't you tell us your side of the events, picking up where Chakotay left off."

"Yes your Honor. After Telsa and Lenear left, Derrick and I started shifting through different files…"