Star Trek Voyager characters are the property of Paramount Pictures
BEFORE THE DAWN
(PG:13)
Chapter Eight
2374
Wrapped in a white bathrobe, Kathryn Janeway stood in the living room of her quarters and stared pale faced at the medical tricorder in her hands. Then she put down the tricorder and picked up her commbadge. With a trembling hand, she activated it.
"Janeway to the Doctor..."
The Doctor's voice answered. "Go ahead, Captain."
"Please report to my quarters at once. Janeway out."
She then put her commbadge down and made her way back into the bedroom.
When she entered the room and found an older version of herself standing boldly before the bed, she stopped dead in her tracks. Her counterpart was dressed in a plain gray Admiral's uniform and her graying hair was very short.
"Hello, Kathryn," the Admiral said warmly.
Kathryn stared at the vision for a moment and then rubbed her eyes. "Now I know I'm dreaming," she said quietly.
"No," the Admiral replied. "You're not dreaming. This is real. And I'm here to stop you making a big mistake."
Kathryn looked up at her at that. "Mistake?"
"We both know what I'm talking about. I was once you and we both know that you've already decided what you're going to do if the Doctor confirms what you already know."
With infinite suspicion, Kathryn scrutinized the woman before her. "If you are who you say you are, how did you get here?"
"Oh, I'm not really here," the Admiral replied. "If you look closely at my left arm you'll see a holo-emitor."
Kathryn stepped closer to her older-self so she could see her obscured arm. Sure enough, a holo-emitor almost identical to the Doctor's graced her left arm.
"They are mass-produced these days," the Admiral continued, "but they have limited memory and life-span and can't hold a progam as large or as complex as the Doctor's. I downloaded a hologram of myself into one and sent her here with a specific message."
Still suspicious, Kathryn questioned further. "How?"
"It's a long story. Suffice it to say I acquired some temporal technology that would allow me to open a corridor to the past just long enough to transport the emitor to Voyager. It was less risky than coming myself and would suffice for this mission."
The Doctor's voice suddenly called out from the living room. "Captain?"
The Admiral's eyes flew in the direction of the door. "Get rid of him."
Kathryn hesitated a moment, but then went into the living room.
"Captain," the Doctor said when he saw her. "You wanted to see me..."
"Yes," Kathryn replied, "but something's come up. I'll speak to you later."
The Doctor sighed. "Yet another wasted trip. I do wish people would tell me when I'm no longer required."
"My apologies, Doctor," Kathryn answered. "But I really am busy right now..."
"Message received and understood," the Doctor said, turning to face the door. "I will be in sickbay until midnight, but then I'm joining Lieutenant Skitler on the holodeck."
Kathryn frowned. "At midnight?"
"Lunch hour for those on night-shift."
"Of course," Kathryn replied. "See you later, Doctor."
The Doctor left and Kathryn hurried back into the bedroom. She half expected the Admiral to be gone, but she was sitting on the bed, legs crossed.
"In normal circumstances my program could run for 72 hours," she said, "but the emitor sustained some damage during the temporal transport and I don't know how long I've got. So, I'm not going to waste time on small talk. We need to get to the nitty gritty." She paused. "You can't freeze the embryo."
Kathryn flinched. "Then I am...I am pregnant?"
The Admiral nodded. "And Chakotay's the father."
Kathryn's eyes widened and the Admiral got to her feet.
"Don't look so shocked. It had to be him, didn't it? And there's no one else you would want it to be."
Tears welled in Kathryn's eyes. "You really are from the future, aren't you?"
"Yes."
Kathryn was silent as she absorbed this, then asked a question she wasn't sure she wanted an answer too."What will happen if I freeze the embryo?"
The Admiral didn't mince her words. "You will kill it."
Kathryn swallowed and looked at the hologram in horror.
"Not immediately," the Admiral continued."The baby will survive the preservation process, but re-plantation will fail."
Slowly, painfully, Kathryn wandered over to the window and looked out at streaming stars. "Perhaps it won't in my future."
"Your future will be my past unless you listen to what I say and act upon it."
"I am listening," Kathryn said quietly. "But I'm in an impossible situation here. I'm in no position to have a baby. Freezing the embryo is my only option."
"No it isn't. You can tell Chakotay you're pregnant, and you can raise the baby together."
Kathryn turned back to the Admiral and looked at her as though she'd gone insane. "Have you lost your mind? I have a starship to run, a crew to get home."
"Yes," the Admiral replied, unmissable bitterness in her voice, "and one little baby is really going to doom Voyager's chances, isn't it?"
Kathryn turned back to the window. "It's not that simple."
"Yes it is. You're so determined to play the martyr that you've totally lost all sense of reality. You need to get a grip and stop blaming yourself for Voyager being stranded. There was nothing you could have done except destroy that array. The lives of the Ocampa depended on it. You have to stop punishing yourself for things that are beyond your control. It wasn't your fault we got pulled to this quadrant and it isn't your fault that you're pregnant. You've done everything you can to prevent it happening, but it has happened, and now you have to deal with it. Freezing the embryo and not telling Chakotay until we get home is not the answer. Right now, an innocent baby is depending on you for life far more than any one on board this ship ever will."
A tear ran down Kathryn's cheek. "But how can I be a mother? I have so many duties and obligations and Voyager is no place for a child."
"Naomi is happy enough, and she only has a mother on board. You think that you have to do everything alone, but you wouldn't be alone. You know that Chakotay would want to be involved, that he would even raise the baby alone if he had too, and there's plenty of people on board who could help. There's young Tal Celes, for example, who would be a better nanny than she will ever be a Starfleet Officer. There is no reason to terminate this pregnancy. You just think you have to because you're scared and haven't thought things through."
"You're right," Kathryn admitted. "I am scared."
"And there's no need to be. All you have to do is find the courage inside to follow your heart. Because I know how much you want this baby. And Chakotay and the crew will be there for you all the way. You can absolutely count on that."
Kathryn turned to the Admiral, a legion of doubt still in her eyes. "But you clearly made it home. And, by the look of you, within the next ten years or so. How can I risk that by changing the future?"
"Believe me, Kathryn. The future I come from you don't want to happen. It won't be just the baby that will die. Chakotay will die too."
Blood drained out of Kathryn's face. "Chakotay?"
The Admiral nodded. "He will be killed on a field trip. The official verdict will be accidental death, but in reality it will be death by misadventure. Because of things that will happen to him, because of things that will happen between you both, he won't be concentrating on what he's doing and will die as a result." She paused. "You can't let it all happen again. You have to listen to me."
Kathryn was quiet a moment, then she questioned again. "If I have the baby, will we still get home?"
"Yes," the Admiral replied. "There is no reason why you shouldn't. Between here and the Alpha quadrant is a nebula containing a Borg transwarp hub. You will reach it in approximately three years time and can use it to get home. I've downloaded into this emitor the exact location of the hub, all the information we collected on it, and the co-ordinates of a gateway within it back to the Alpha Quadrant. I've also downloaded some cryptic information that may help save some lives between now and then." She paused. "In my timeline we had a little help from, how can I put it, another me from another future, to equip Voyager with armor to protect us from the Borg and get us through the nebula safely. Then, when we used the hub to get Voyager home, my counterpart destroyed the array. But, with three years to think on it, I'm sure you and the crew can come up with an even better plan.To make it easier for you, I've downloaded details on how to create a cloak for Voyager. I recommended the challenge for a group of engineering bright sparks at the Academy two years ago, and they didn't let me down. It may require some fine tuning, but you've got plenty of time."
Kathryn raised her hand to her brow, her head aching. "Are you saying there will be another me arriving in three years time?"
"No," the Admiral smiled. "There won't be another you in three years time. At least I hope not. She was part of my timeline, but won't be a part of yours." The Admiral then closed the gap between herself and Kathryn. "I wasn't here when I was you, but I wish I had been. Don't make the same mistakes I did. Tell Chakotay you're pregnant and keep the baby. If you don't, I can tell you with absolute certainty that you will regret it for the rest of your life."
The Admiral's image began to deteriorate, and then she disappeared completely for a few seconds. When she reappeared, the emitor on her arm flashed orange.
"My program is breaking up," the Admiral said, her voice crackling with interference. "But you've got to listen, Kathryn. You can't..."
But then she vanished and the emitor fell to the floor.
For a long moment, Kathryn just looked at it. Then she knelt down beside it and picked it up. The device was warm to the touch and an orange light still flashed on it. Then the light disappeared and the device turned cold.
End of Chapter Eight