Author's Note: Okay, this chapter is an effort to explain how Jack and co. ended up in the Voyager Universe. I hope it doesn't sound too far fetched! Cheeky.
JANEWAY:
The next few days were busy as Voyager limped towards the Sikarian homeworld. Their government had been overjoyed to hear they had been found and promised to give us a port to conduct out repairs. I was grateful for that. We had reached the planet around two days after our rescue, most of which I had spent sleeping or cataloguing the damage to the ship. Part of me hurt with my ship, and I couldn't stand the thought of her mangled systems.
Jack, Daniel, Riley and Mia had spent the time locked up in a room together, and no one had seen them in days. Both the Doctor and Neelix assured me they were fine and regularly checked on them. I wasn't too worried. My days were busy with overseeing the repairs and resupplying the ship. Being a planet of traders, the Government was very happy to agree.
A week later, Voyager said goodbye to the Sikarians and made her way back out into space – and the long journey home. I breathed a sigh of relief and settled back into my command chair, Chakotay beside me. I finaly had the chance to think again. The rest of my shift was quiet and I spent most of it locked in thought about our capture by the Borg, our time on the planet – but most of all about what Jack had told me.
I didn't want to accept it. Chakotay wasn't in love with me. He couldn't be. And I certainly wasn't in love with him. I glanced over at him and he smiled at me, his brown eyes warm. He wasn't in love with me, was he? Not that it mattered. I was the Captain of the ship. I had to be an example to the crew. I had to be the person they could look up to. But Jack's words came back to haunt me:
"He's a man who loves you, and as a result, is willing to take all you can give him. If that means he can only be your friend, then he will keep being your friend forever."
Was Chakotay only taking all I was willing to give him?
"Just think about this, Kathryn. If he dies tomorrow, will it hurt any less than it would if you knew what it felt like to hold him in your arms and kiss him? Trust me on this: it hurts just the same. The only difference is, that if you give in to your feelings and tell him, then if he does die, then at least you know what heaven feels like."
I looked at Chakotay again and tried to imagine what it would feel like if he wasn't there. I would feel empty. Over the past five years he had become not only my friend, but my confidant. Without him there I would feel so empty and alone. But could I risk it? If he loved me and I gave in, would I still be able to be Captain? And did I love him in return?
Thankfully I was interrupted just before I got up to leave the bridge to Harry, and I banished those thoughts. No doubt they would come back to haunt me as I tried to sleep. "Seven to Janeway." Came the familiar voice over my comm.
"Go ahead Seven." I said.
"If you have am minute Captain, would you come down to Astrometrics?" she asked.
"I'm on my way." I replied.
Curious, I quickly made my way down to Astrometrics. "What is it Seven?" I asked.
"I have been thinking about what the Borg Queen revealed in the assimilation chamber." She said.
I struggled to remember. "What did she reveal?" I asked.
"She said that the reality that Colonel O'Neill and his team had come from was incomplete in some way." Seven said. "She said: what exists in one does not exist in the other."
I nodded. Now I remembered. "And what have you found?" Seven wouldn't have called me down unless she had found something.
"I have been going over the data we recorded during the wormhole and comparing it to other wormholes we have encountered. There is something strange about it."
"Are you sure that's not just due to the way it jumped dimensions?" I asked, my scientific mind thoroughly interested.
"At first that was what I thought too, but now I do not think so. I checked with our data that we recorded during our own encounter with parallel dimensions and it is different." She looked at me. "The wormhole seemed almost incomplete."
"Incomplete?"
"Yes." She nodded. "I believe that somehow the reality Colonel O'Neill came from has been split in two."
"Split in two?" I echoed, my mind whirling. "They mentioned something when they were explaining their Universe." I muttered. "A weapon that was said to manipulate space..."
"The Eye of Ra." Seven nodded. "It was not destroyed like they had believed."
"Yes. Do you think that it could have been responsible?" I asked, thinking back to what Jack had told me.
He had said, of the little we could get out of him, that his friends had died while they were trying to destroy a Goa'uld weapon. Something that they had always believed had been destroyed. The Eye of Ra. It had gone off just as Sam had died. Was that significant in any way? Could this weapon really have split an entire reality?
"If that's true," I said. "Then is there any way to fix it?"
"That is why I called you down here Captain." Seven said. "I believe there is a way, but I am not sure if it will work."
"What is it?"
"I believe that if a great surge of energy caused by the weapon was able to tear the reality apart, then the opposite could draw it back together." She said.
I raised my eyebrow in surprise. "The opposite of a surge of energy?"
"Yes. We need to suck energy out of their reality. I believe the reason it remains separated is because of the increased energy keeping it stable. If we were to remove that energy, then it would knit back together into a whole again."
"How do you propose we do that?" I asked. How could you remove energy from a reality?
Then I smiled. Since I didn't really know a thing about how that energy was added to the reality in the first place, I shouldn't really be surprised when I couldn't automatically think of the answer.
"An antimatter explosion should be able to do it." Seven said. "And a small matter charge would be able to bridge the gap between the two realities."
"An antimatter explosion. That's very dangerous." I frowned.
"Timing would be crucial, but I believe we can do it." Seven said.
"I'll tell Jack." I told her. "The final decision should be up to him."
Then I smiled at her. "I would say that this whole thing was impossible, but I know what you would say to that." I told her.
She nodded. "Impossible is a word humans use far too often." She replied.
"I agree."
JANEWAY:
The next few days were busy as Voyager limped towards the Sikarian homeworld. Their government had been overjoyed to hear they had been found and promised to give us a port to conduct out repairs. I was grateful for that. We had reached the planet around two days after our rescue, most of which I had spent sleeping or cataloguing the damage to the ship. Part of me hurt with my ship, and I couldn't stand the thought of her mangled systems.
Jack, Daniel, Riley and Mia had spent the time locked up in a room together, and no one had seen them in days. Both the Doctor and Neelix assured me they were fine and regularly checked on them. I wasn't too worried. My days were busy with overseeing the repairs and resupplying the ship. Being a planet of traders, the Government was very happy to agree.
A week later, Voyager said goodbye to the Sikarians and made her way back out into space – and the long journey home. I breathed a sigh of relief and settled back into my command chair, Chakotay beside me. I finaly had the chance to think again. The rest of my shift was quiet and I spent most of it locked in thought about our capture by the Borg, our time on the planet – but most of all about what Jack had told me.
I didn't want to accept it. Chakotay wasn't in love with me. He couldn't be. And I certainly wasn't in love with him. I glanced over at him and he smiled at me, his brown eyes warm. He wasn't in love with me, was he? Not that it mattered. I was the Captain of the ship. I had to be an example to the crew. I had to be the person they could look up to. But Jack's words came back to haunt me:
"He's a man who loves you, and as a result, is willing to take all you can give him. If that means he can only be your friend, then he will keep being your friend forever."
Was Chakotay only taking all I was willing to give him?
"Just think about this, Kathryn. If he dies tomorrow, will it hurt any less than it would if you knew what it felt like to hold him in your arms and kiss him? Trust me on this: it hurts just the same. The only difference is, that if you give in to your feelings and tell him, then if he does die, then at least you know what heaven feels like."
I looked at Chakotay again and tried to imagine what it would feel like if he wasn't there. I would feel empty. Over the past five years he had become not only my friend, but my confidant. Without him there I would feel so empty and alone. But could I risk it? If he loved me and I gave in, would I still be able to be Captain? And did I love him in return?
Thankfully I was interrupted just before I got up to leave the bridge to Harry, and I banished those thoughts. No doubt they would come back to haunt me as I tried to sleep. "Seven to Janeway." Came the familiar voice over my comm.
"Go ahead Seven." I said.
"If you have am minute Captain, would you come down to Astrometrics?" she asked.
"I'm on my way." I replied.
Curious, I quickly made my way down to Astrometrics. "What is it Seven?" I asked.
"I have been thinking about what the Borg Queen revealed in the assimilation chamber." She said.
I struggled to remember. "What did she reveal?" I asked.
"She said that the reality that Colonel O'Neill and his team had come from was incomplete in some way." Seven said. "She said: what exists in one does not exist in the other."
I nodded. Now I remembered. "And what have you found?" Seven wouldn't have called me down unless she had found something.
"I have been going over the data we recorded during the wormhole and comparing it to other wormholes we have encountered. There is something strange about it."
"Are you sure that's not just due to the way it jumped dimensions?" I asked, my scientific mind thoroughly interested.
"At first that was what I thought too, but now I do not think so. I checked with our data that we recorded during our own encounter with parallel dimensions and it is different." She looked at me. "The wormhole seemed almost incomplete."
"Incomplete?"
"Yes." She nodded. "I believe that somehow the reality Colonel O'Neill came from has been split in two."
"Split in two?" I echoed, my mind whirling. "They mentioned something when they were explaining their Universe." I muttered. "A weapon that was said to manipulate space..."
"The Eye of Ra." Seven nodded. "It was not destroyed like they had believed."
"Yes. Do you think that it could have been responsible?" I asked, thinking back to what Jack had told me.
He had said, of the little we could get out of him, that his friends had died while they were trying to destroy a Goa'uld weapon. Something that they had always believed had been destroyed. The Eye of Ra. It had gone off just as Sam had died. Was that significant in any way? Could this weapon really have split an entire reality?
"If that's true," I said. "Then is there any way to fix it?"
"That is why I called you down here Captain." Seven said. "I believe there is a way, but I am not sure if it will work."
"What is it?"
"I believe that if a great surge of energy caused by the weapon was able to tear the reality apart, then the opposite could draw it back together." She said.
I raised my eyebrow in surprise. "The opposite of a surge of energy?"
"Yes. We need to suck energy out of their reality. I believe the reason it remains separated is because of the increased energy keeping it stable. If we were to remove that energy, then it would knit back together into a whole again."
"How do you propose we do that?" I asked. How could you remove energy from a reality?
Then I smiled. Since I didn't really know a thing about how that energy was added to the reality in the first place, I shouldn't really be surprised when I couldn't automatically think of the answer.
"An antimatter explosion should be able to do it." Seven said. "And a small matter charge would be able to bridge the gap between the two realities."
"An antimatter explosion. That's very dangerous." I frowned.
"Timing would be crucial, but I believe we can do it." Seven said.
"I'll tell Jack." I told her. "The final decision should be up to him."
Then I smiled at her. "I would say that this whole thing was impossible, but I know what you would say to that." I told her.
She nodded. "Impossible is a word humans use far too often." She replied.
"I agree."