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Notes: Here is our glimpse into the minds of Janeway and Chakotay as they lived the latter half of the Year of Hell. Please send comments to [email protected] or [email protected]
*****
Day 70 - Janeway
How could he do this? Why would he do this? I will not let him take Voyager. I will not let them take our crew.
Days 73 to 133 - Janeway
I will get this family back together. I will get us out of this mess. I will get Tom Paris back. I promised B'Elanna.
I will get Chakotay ... I can't believe you are not here. Sometimes I see you in that chair sometimes I hear your voice reminding me, focusing me, giving me a better view of the picture.
Where are you? I need you here. Where are you?
Chakotay you have no idea how hard the run and hide game is for me. I had no idea how hard it was to be Maquis. I'm not very good at hiding. It is not my nature.
As I walk the corridors of Voyager I have to hold myself rigid. I can't allow myself to remember what she looked like. If I do I will cry. I will not cry. If I cry will I be able to stop?
You would smile, 7 and Tuvok have been come a team. Inseparable. It would seem that he is dependent on her but in fact they desperately need each other like a father and his lost child. He cannot see and she cannot make sense of the confusion.
B'Elanna aches for Tom. The look on her face when she glances at the helm. I can't comfort her the way that you could. I have to remain rigid.
I ache for you.
*****
Sometime between Day 70 and Day 133 - Chakotay
Oh, Kathryn.
I might as well direct my thoughts to you since you are so much in them.
I'm sitting in the dark, with my back against the wall, alone, hungry, aching ... and thinking of you. I don't know how long it's been since I left you and Voyager. Days, weeks, months even? The time stretches out like one long endless minute, one long hour - infinity. Maybe it hasn't been that long after all. Too bad I don't have that chronometer with the mechanical movement.
The Krenim examined me like some kind of specimen for their database. Scans, and scans, and more scans. They got right down to cellular scans, examining my DNA, as if I hadn't had a few of those done by our EMH after my recent aging experience. Or not so recent I suppose. I wonder what the Krenim would think of that, if there were any residual signs. They were also very interested in my senses, my eyes, my ears, and they tested, in particular, my threshold for pain.
Then they just left me alone in this cell. I don't know whether to be glad for this or afraid that they won't ever come back.
I know you must be worried, Kathryn, but I don't know how Tom is doing. I'm sorry for that. But they wouldn't tell me anything. They wouldn't even speak to me. So I don't know if he is alive or dead. I feel like I've failed him somehow, as a commanding officer. And failed you, for not keeping a member of our family safe.
Our family. How are you doing? I wonder this all the time, as I sit in the dark. I guess we weren't able to hold the group together in the end. So many dead, so many injured, Tom and I lost to some endless void of nothingness...
I'm so hungry. I try not to think about it but sometimes I can't help it. Then my mind plays tricks on me by remembering times in the mess hall on Voyager. I have a crystal clear image of a group of us at a large table, eating and laughing. Tom and Harry giggling over the trick they played on Tuvok the night he received his promotion. Or Neelix suggesting an idea for a new holoprogram to Tom. Us toasting victory over the latest dangers lurking in the Delta Quadrant. The adventure of eating Neelix's unorthodox cooking and groaning over his exuberant use of spice and leola root.
I would gladly eat leola root right now, that's how hungry I am, Kathryn.
Suddenly, as sharp as the memory was, it all fades from my inner vision. I realize I've been sitting here for an eternity thinking about Voyager and food and you. Or maybe it's only been a few minutes. But I can't seem to remember what we ate, or drank, or what we were laughing about. I can't hear your voice anymore.
I miss you.
A while back I found myself almost talking aloud. I was trying to meditate but I couldn't focus very well. I'm wondering, if I could seek comfort with my animal guide, would she be able to find me here? I am truly far away now. Far from my home, far from my family, far from all the ones that I love. Distance seems to take on as little meaning as time. We are separated, for a moment or for a year it matters not. You could be sitting across the room and I wouldn't know. Or you could be across the galaxy and home. Either way I am alone.
I then had the most absurd desire to do a log entry. First Officer's log stardate ... stardate ... stardate ... oh hell, what difference does the date make anyway? My rank, my position, it means nothing here. It should be Chakotay's log. Chakotay the person, the man, not the officer. But what would I tell the log? That I don't know what time it is? That I don't care? Perhaps I would admit to the log that I'm alone and hungry and afraid.
No, that's not really the case. I'm not afraid for myself. I'm too numb for that. But when I think of Tom and what they might be doing to him I get chills. And when I think of Voyager and her crew, and when I think of you, Kathryn, oh, I'm so afraid for you.
I must have fallen asleep there for a bit. Maybe a long while. I woke up from a dream of us, our crew, our family, on the bridge, heading for home. Nothing can stop us, can it Kathryn? Not Kazon, nor Vidiian, nor Trabe, ... nor Borg. What's a few Krenim compared to the Borg Collective and Species 8472?
I wish you had allowed me to give you the chronometer. I can appreciate all the times you didn't accept my advice, or you disagreed with my ideas, or you listened but ignored my opinions. You are captain and the responsibility is ultimately yours to make the decisions. But I wish you had allowed me just once to give you something. I suppose in the grand scheme of things it seems insignificant but as I sit here now thinking of it, I wish more than anything for you to have it and remember that it came from me and the it represents a will of immeasurable force. Your will. Your determination.
I loved the story of Captain Cray. It reminded me so much of you. A captain so determined to see her crew home no matter what obstacles get thrown in her path! You are so strong for everyone, everyone but yourself.
You were right, of course, that its matter could have been transferred into food or medicine. In times of crisis these are more important things than sentiment. So now I'm wishing I hadn't kept it. I didn't keep it to disobey you; if the need had arisen I would have recycled it in an instant. But I thought I'd hang onto it just a little while longer. Just to see what time would bring us.
I hope I can explain that to you in person, Kathryn. So that if you stumble across it, assuming it hasn't been smashed to bits, you won't think that I willfully ignored your orders.
I'm laughing now. Perhaps this is the beginning of madness. I just realized that I can't have both of my wishes at the same time. Either you have the gift and cherish it, or I dispose of it as you ordered. And the truly depressing thing is that neither of my wishes will come true.
It is so dark here. There is no time here but the now.
*****
Sometime between Day 70 and 133 - Janeway
The ship is failing us. Her pain is palpable. The outer hull is all but gone. We have no weapons left to speak of.
I have taken to sleeping in my ready room, or what is left of it. Last night I awoke and thought I heard your voice whispering in my ear. I felt the touch of your breath on my neck. I felt your hands smoothing my hair and massaging my shoulders. I was back on New Earth. I had been dreaming again. I hate that dream. Because I never want to wake up from it and I always do.
*****
Day 133 - Chakotay
I'm standing in my new quarters. What a contrast to the cell I left earlier today! It would be easy to forget we are still in a jail.
Something amazing has happened Kathryn. I don't know how I can explain it. One minute I was alone in the dark and mumbling to you and the next I was sitting at a table laden with food from all over the sector. Food from extinct races - no not extinct, races that had never existed because of Annorax's time weapon. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Of course, it wasn't as quick as one minute to the next. I remember a blinding flash of light as the door opened. It was so bright I couldn't see as I was dragged from the cell. I guess they'd finished with all the investigating their equipment could do and had decided on an interview. It was so amazing to be treated like a sentient being again that I forgot to be bitter about the treatment they'd given us - almost.
Us. Yes, Tom is still alive and thriving. As soon as I heard Annorax complain about Tom's attitude I knew he must be all right. And what a feeling of relief that came over me to know he was well enough to be a pain in the ass. He's a little thin, but then I suppose that's not surprising.
Tom was disgusted by Annorax and all but told him so. I admit to having my stomach turn at the thought of all the species, all the life that this man must have destroyed. Saying that it never existed is a cop out. He killed them all as surely as if he'd bombed their cities. Sitting talking with him, drinking that wine, eating that food, I felt nauseated as for one instant I feared that he'd managed to wipe out our existence on Voyager and that you and the ship were gone. Tom and I were the only remnants, the only proof of Voyager's existence. All of you were merely a memory in our minds, never existing outside of our recollections. It was a frightening, sickening thought.
Then Tom hit the nail on the head. You weren't gone, you were hiding. He couldn't find you and needed our help to be able to understand you. He obviously has a lot to learn about us if he thought we would willingly cooperate in the hunt for you.
Something he said about his weapon intrigued me though. He spoke of being about to change time for even the most miniscule molecule. If this were, in fact, possible, then there should be a way of changing time so that Voyager was restored, maybe even a way of putting her back into the Alpha Quadrant! Or at least closer. By leaps and bounds we make our way ...
If I could figure out how to do that without wiping out any species in the process then all the time alone in the dark would have been worth it. I'd do it again, ten times over, no a hundred, to be able to give you back Voyager whole and fully functioning and have our family together again.
Tom didn't see it that way. He doesn't trust Annorax, and with good reason. I can't say that I entirely trust him either. But if I can get him to share his technology and his research with me, then perhaps we can help each other to make things right again. He told me I have an instinct for time. I hope so, since I don't have nearly the same kind of grasp of temporal mechanics as you have, or B'Elanna. With the two of you here we could have this thing beaten in no time at all.
For the first time since we were separated I feel a sense of optimism.
*****
Day 133 - Janeway
A toast to missing friends ... and loved ones. I will get us out of this mess.
I will hold myself rigid.
Our senior staff is with me. You don't know that I have sent them, our children, our crew away. You were right you know.
I hate it when you are right and I am wrong. You never rub it in you stand there and look calm. Is that an act or is that just you being Chakotay?
I am at the window in the mess hall. How can space be this colour? We are in a pink nebula. I will never like this colour again.
Chakotay I miss you.
They are a good crew. They are working as hard as they can but we cannot make this a permanent residence.
I am worried about Harry he has stopped talking.
*****
Day 161 - Chakotay
I'm tossing and turning, unable to sleep. My thoughts are all a jumble of confusion and calculations. I can't seem to find my centre; I can't focus.
If I listen hard enough I can almost hear your voice.
"Report Commander!"
Today I could have killed 8000 civilizations. How could I fit that into a report and make you understand? I don't think I fully comprehend it myself. Annorax's tone had a hint of amusement when he told me the results of my experiment. I was quite frankly stunned by the idea.
The power of his weapon is awesome; it's overwhelming. It's ... seductive.
I'm looking for that piece of the universe whose non-existence would change our course to avoid the Krenim. I thought a comet was innocuous enough. But how many lives that comet had touched! Perhaps there isn't anything that is truly independent. Perhaps all matter touches something. It makes me wonder at the intricacies of all our lives, so woven together.
If only one of us had never existed, what a different life we all would have. I wonder, for example, if there was no Tom Paris how that would have affected our journey. Well, for one thing, I would have died in the tunnels on the Ocampan homeworld. You would have had to deal with hostile, unforgiving, and potentially violent Maquis crewmembers ... I don't think I want to think of the possibilities.
And a universe without Kathryn Janeway? It would have sounded the death knoll for the Ocampan people, and put a powerful weapon in the hands of the Kazon. And that's just here in the Delta Quadrant.
Maybe it won't be possible to find something in the universe, living or matter, which hasn't had an affect on something else. Annorax and his crew have been trying for 200 years to put right the wrong he unleashed when he first fired the weapon. Anyone else might have given up by now. He is so driven. He bears a great amount of guilt on his shoulders. The non-existence of so many races ... too many lives to count.
When he suggested that the odds are that we will never see the Alpha Quadrant again I was shocked, then amused. He doesn't know you, Kathryn. What are odds compared with Kathryn Janeway? I suppose it does seem nearly impossible for us to see our homes again, in our lifetimes. Yet I've always felt that if there was a way, you would find it. My god, you even pushed us through Borg space ...
If there is a way for me to find a speck of the universe that is wholly independent, I will. And I will restore Voyager and put us back on the path to home. That's a promise.
*****
Day 180 - Janeway
Something happened today that would make you very angry. I'm sorry. I put myself in unreasonable danger. There was no choice and I would do it again if it means getting this ship underway. If it gets us one step closer to regaining our crew. If it gets you back to Voyager. If it gets you back to me.
I am burned, Chakotay, and it hurts and I need you to soothe me. To look at me and tell me that the scars make no difference.
The Doctor tried to relieve me of command. Was he right to try? Yes, of course, he was. Would I let him? Hell no! I will stop breathing before I will let anyone take Voyager ... what is left of Voyager. She is our only hope.
*****
Day 207 - Chakotay.
I'm surprised to look down at my hands and discover they're in fists. I don't even know why. Paris has always had this effect on me. Maybe because I haven't felt it in so long I'd almost forgotten how much it stings when he challenges me.
I have to resist the urge to sweep the computer console from the table, or to smash my fist down onto it hard enough to smash it. Laugh, laugh, Chakotay, do not rage. Let it go.
I haven't seen Tom this confrontational since the time you set him up to flush out Jonas. This time it is no act. I'd like to do more than revoke his holodeck time! I am tempted to smash my fist into his face, the same way I want to hit the computer.
Let it go.
Tom feels desperately in need of action. Who can blame him? Rattling around this big ship with only our jailers and me for company. He misses B'Elanna; he's afraid for her. We still don't know where you are and whether the ship is in one piece.
I have to believe you're all right. I have to. To even think otherwise might open the door on the possibility that Voyager is gone. I can't accept that. I won't. Because I'm not sure I'd be able to bring you back, no matter how many calculations I do.
I'm calculating in my sleep. I lie awake thinking of you; I fall asleep dreaming of the weapon. It makes for long nights.
My eyes are blurring as I examine the computer screen. I would know if you were dead. I would know.
If only I could make Tom understand without resorting to pulling rank on him. Starting a mutiny now isn't going to help Voyager; it isn't going to help the Krenim. Too many people have been affected by this weapon for us to simply stop trying to restore the timeline.
There is a klaxon blaring...
*****
Day 207 - Janeway
Your quarters. Oh God Chakotay it is a mess! I haven't been here in a very long time. Your inner sanctum is destroyed. I am so afraid to look any further, terrified at what I might find.
Are you dead? You can't be. I would know if you where dead. I would know.
I found it.
You disobeyed orders.
Thank goodness.
I can't cry now. Chakotay, don't make me cry. Neelix is here with me, please not now.
I'm sorry. I should have taken the chronometer. But when you told me that story I was afraid that I couldn't live up to who you compared me to.
It is a truly wonderful gift. I wish that I could see the smile on your face and the look in your eyes if I had accepted it. I wish I had the moment again to thank you, to touch your face. I have been thinking about that lost moment. In fact sometimes I have to stop thinking about it.
Your gift is with me wherever I go, just as you are. Your gift is hope.
I know you are alive, Chakotay. I know that we will be together again.
*****
Day 207 - Chakotay
Never before have I been able to so clearly read Tom Paris's body language. His expression is of disgust, dismay and a hint of triumph. I told you so, his posture screamed at me from across the bridge before he came over to confront me.
My mind cannot conjure up a time when I felt so helpless, so frustrated, so powerless. I thought I understood this man, Annorax, yet he turned from me and coldly ordered the elimination of an entire race of people. No hesitation, no visible remorse, no regret. As cool and calm as any Borg on the verge of an assimilation. This is for the good of us and damn whoever might get in the way!
If it were Voyager in his path would he have still fired? Yes, Kathryn, he would.
Stay away. Stay far away.
My brain is a jumble of calculations and desires and images from memories of happier times. I spent my first two months on this vessel in a void of darkness. I'm beginning to feel I've spent the last 2 1/2 months in a place just as dark.
*****
I don't know how Annorax has managed to do this for 200 years. I can feel the ghosts of that lost civilization sweeping through me. His cold justification hit me like a slap.
My research into his work had led me to believe more and more that this was a personal mission for Annorax. Now I know this to be true. He does not see all life as sacred; he is merely trying to get back to his home and family.
How long before I am as desperate as he to restore my home and family?
Kathryn, he's been at this for so long he's begun to think that time bears him a grudge. To speak of time as a person, with moods, is one thing. But to take the metaphor further and accuse time of seeking vengeance is quite another.
What right has he to play god with the lives of the quadrant, perhaps the galaxy?
What right have I, Kathryn?
*****
I haven't seen a genuine smile on Tom's face in a long time. He has been relieved from the burden of inaction at last.
We are a ship of lost families. Tom is right. He and I have lost our home no less than any other member of this crew has. But while the crew mourns their dead Tom and I are still clinging to the hope that we will someday be reunited. One crew, one community, one family. You are shouldering the weight of responsibility alone now. I am unable to ease your load anymore. I was never sure how good a job of that I did for you anyway.
What did you say to me when I suggested we split up into small groups? We'd be vulnerable apart. You were angry and bitter. Once again I was proposing something you didn't want to contemplate. But in showing anger and bitterness you demonstrated that you hadn't lost your ability to feel.
I wonder if I've lost that. I think perhaps I have ...
I still think that I can get through to Annorax, to make him see that wiping out civilizations isn't the way to fulfill his quest. But I am no longer certain that I can find a part of the universe separate enough so that its loss won't affect others.
Tom and I could spend two centuries trying. We've already spent too long outside the space-time continuum as it is.
I am torn between hoping that you receive his message, that you will know we are alive, and hoping that you are beyond range. For you to be able to receive means that you are also all right, something I desperately want to believe. But I'm not sure I want you coming after us and putting Voyager in the path of this weapon again.
A part of me can dream that you've evaded the Krenim, you've taken our crew to a safe place to repair the ship and that you've resumed a course home. If I never see you again, I will believe that you made it. And if you do get Tom's message and you decide to engage Annorax and his crew, please Kathryn, only do so if you have the means to protect yourself. Please. Oh please.
If it came down to it, I suppose Tom and I could destroy this vessel from within. And our deaths would be a small price to pay to prevent more loss.
*****
Day 226 - Janeway
You would be proud of me. I have formed an alliance. You never thought I could do that, did you? I have seen that smile on your face, the way your lips round at the corners just enough to show me how amusing I am but not enough to make me court martial you.
I will bring this family together.
*****
Hope.
I have heard from Tom. This is the first time I have smiled in months.
Chakotay, I replay the words over and over. I can see Tom's face in my mind when you told him to give your best. Did you call me by name? Did you get that look in your eye that makes me blush?
*****
Chakotay, I have made a decision. I am sending the senior staff off Voyager. Yes I know but I know, I should go with them but I can't.
I can't leave her, Chakotay. I know you would understand. I know that you love her as much as I do. I know that this is the only way we have to set things right. He can play with time but he cannot escape time. No one can.
If only we had more time together. I look to your chair and I know that I would not have been able to make you leave. In my heart I see you there smiling grimly. Hating the decision and standing beside me. I have it with me I hold it near.
*****
Day 257 - Chakotay
Oh, you got Tom's message! What a strange mixture of relief and fear I'm feeling now. To see your signal on the sensors, approaching steadily, with other ships. If only I can convince Annorax not to fire.
Tom has done well to foster the friendship of Obrist. Annorax's first officer has spent too long in the pursuit of this goal; it means nothing to him anymore. He is a willing Fletcher Christian to the Krenim's Captain Bligh.
Annorax is not listening to me when I tell him I know you. You are only here because you think you can win. He has been outside the space-time continuum for so long he cannot believe he can lose.
Tom, where are you Tom?! Time is running out ...
*****
Day 257 - Janeway
Chakotay, I just heard the message - you are safe. I could feel it.
This is amazing and terrifying. I have set a collision course; inspiration born of desperation is my only plan. I can see space where the view screen should be.
Damn him! Damn him to hell!
Time's up.
*****
Day 257 - Chakotay
Where are we? As quickly as we were taken from Voyager Obrist has sent us to the Mawassi ship. Looking around at our unfamiliar allies I catch sight of a very weary looking Tuvok. And there in my vision is Tom on his knees as Seven tells him that Harry and B'Elanna were lost on the ships that Annorax has just erased.
Where are you? My eyes are drawn to the viewscreen to see the battered Voyager. I feel such an ache in the pit of my stomach to see her. Even though you must be aware of the damage, I am glad that you cannot see her as I do.
Our ship is rocking under Annorax's conventional weapons. All around I hear the sounds of the battle. Tuvok's voice. Your voice.
Your voice, sounding as strong and determined as I remember. But what are you saying?
No!
I know what it's like to turn one's ship into a torpedo. It's dangerous. It's painful. It's means the loss of the ship. No, Kathryn, don't!
I feel someone behind me and turn my head to find Tom there. I hadn't realized I'd cried out. His trembling hands grip my upper arms preventing me from flying through the viewscreen as though I could hold you back. He buries his head between my shoulder blades, unable to watch.
Could it be that I spent all this time working on a way of getting back to you, only to have you die in front of me when I do?
Voyager is gone. You are gone. We are out of time. Suddenly, I want to be back in the darkness again.
*****
Day 1 - Chakotay
Harry and Seven have done a superb job with the astrometrics lab. They made good time of the project. I wonder if Harry has gotten over his crush on Seven. Probably, or she would have eaten him alive.
Kathryn looks pleased as well. It's high time she smiled about something. She was so strung out by the alien implants that she didn't sleep for days.
A party is a good idea. It is always a boost for morale.
Kathryn, I would share a glass of wine with you anytime.
*****
Day 1 - Janeway
First contact with no complications, how refreshing.
Ships systems running well, what a relief.
He is smiling about something again. What is that grin about? Why is he looking at Harry and 7? What is he thinking?
A celebration. We need to celebrate; this is an important moment. I feel like sharing a bottle of wine. I wonder if Chakotay prefers red or white. Red perhaps ...
He is smiling again, this time at me. I wonder if now is the time? I think I will suggest it. No time like the present.
When time offers you an opportunity don't ignore it.
*****
A Final Scene for this was written by Sheena after we finished.
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