Janeway of Delta
Rated PG
Previously entered in the Picnic Prose Prize Contest
Summery note: Some ideas are taken from L. Frank Baum’s “The Wizard of Oz” to create this little spoof called 'Janeway of Delta'. Voyager is trying to get back home to ‘Alpha‘, but they seem to be 70,000 light years away in a place called ‘Delta‘. Other names have also been slightly altered for this story.
Setting: From “Caretaker to Endgame”
“I don’t think we’re in Alpha anymore,” Tom Paris commented as he looked at the sudden change of scenery after their ship had been tossed about by a temporal rift.
Strange people began running out of their homes, all filled with excitement. They seemed friendly enough, but their chatter was incomprehensible.
“What are they talking about?” Harry Kim asked with confusion.
“I don’t know, but we are going to find out,” Captain Kathryn Janeway stated as she walked over to a solitary man.
He was called the Caretaker. His people made comments about how powerful he was, yet he refused to help them get home. “The ability to return home is within you, Captain,” he insisted. “Just follow the road of many planets and you‘ll get back to Alpha, but beware of the Queen. She is most evil and won‘t hesitate to make all of you her drones.”
“Follow the Planetary road,” one of the people stated and soon the Caretaker’s people all joined him as though it were a chant.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” the captain stated in reply to the Caretaker‘s warning. She did not understand the man’s warning nor was she sure she could trust him, but she knew space was full of dangers and they were in uncharted territory. Therefore, she had no doubt that they needed to beware of many things and many people.
Then the people began to chant, “Beware of the Queen! The wicked Queen!”
“We just want to go home!” the captain tried again to get the Caretaker to return them.
Instead, he waved his hand and sent the Voyager crew away from him.
“Some help he was,” B’Elanna said with sarcasm when they were safely back on their ship.
“Well, one way or the other,” Captain Janeway stated with determination, “We’ll find another way home and maybe there’s someone else out there, like the Caretaker, who will help us get home.”
“It’s going to be a very long road,” Tom Paris sighed.
“Yes, full of twists and turns, I’m sure,” the captain replied. “But the Caretaker said to follow this road to get home, so that is what we are going to do.”
“Maybe those we meet along the way will be of more help,” B’Elanna stated with a frown and still irritated.
“The Yellow Brick road,” Tom Paris grumbled. “At least the Caretaker’s people were not munchkins, but the Planetary road?”
“Well, it’s the only way for now and along the way, we‘ll find wormholes and temporal rifts. We‘ll study them all to see if they‘ll get us home,” the captain stated. “We‘ve already made some friends and some enemies in this uncharted area of space. We‘ll probably make many more along the way, but some where out there, we’ll find another one just like the Caretaker and maybe they will help us get home.”
“My question is, who is this ‘wizard’ we’ll find at the end of the road?” Tom asked with sarcasm.
“Your question, Tom, sounds illogical,” Tuvok insisted. “For starters, what road is everyone referring to? There is no road out here in space. Secondly, there are no such thing as wizards.”
“Just phrases from an old Earth story,” the captain informed him. “And I can see the analogy all too well. I just wish I had the red slippers right about now, because we‘d all be home.”
“Obviously, the Caretaker has also heard the story,” Chakotay added. “Because there seems to be an awful lot of similarities.”
“Except the red shoes,” B’Elanna grumbled.
The voices of the Caretaker’s people echoed through their minds as they travelled the vastness of space. “Follow the Planetary road! Follow the Planetary road!”
With a sigh, the captain said, “Take us home, Tom.”
Seven years later and deep into to Borg territory: Voyager had been through a lot during their time in Delta. They faced many obstacles on their long journey down the Planetary road.
Finally, the possibility of going home seemed to come by way of an admiral, but the captain had many questions and she was not going to settle for anything less then complete answers. The captain was stunned by the similarities of the one person who insisted she could get them home, but she could not argue with the doctor‘s findings that the woman was her, twenty-six years older.
After they entered Nebula, an extremely large structure was before them. It was known as Borg City and the admiral was ordering Paris to head straight for an aperture in the middle of it.
“Belay that order!” the captain suddenly ordered Tom, then she turned toward the admiral. “That thing holds a city of drones! There is no way we are going through there, only to be assimilated for the Queen’s pleasure.”
“You want to get back to Alpha, that is the way back,” the admiral insisted.
The captain moved closer to the admiral and demanded an explanation, “I’m not entering any Borg city without some information first!”
“That city has a transwarp hub right in the middle of it,” Seven had over heard the captain and began to explain. “It’s one of six Borg cities in Delta. It can take you anywhere you want to go; Beta, Gamma, even Alpha.”
“Mister Paris, take us back out of here now!” the captain ordered.
“Yes ma’am.”
“Admiral, I want to see you in my Ready Room now!”
The admiral willingly followed the captain into the Ready room. Once inside, the captain quickly turned and growled, “Why didn’t you tell me about this before we entered Nebula?”
“And to what end? So, you can make the same mistake I did? Only to stay on this road, losing more members of your crew.”
“We have a chance to destroy that hub and save millions of lives.”
“Putting the lives of strangers ahead of your crew is what got you here in the first place!”
“If we could just destroy it, millions of people would be spared assimilation!” Captain Janeway insisted.
“No!” Admiral Janeway persisted. “You have to get Voyager home!”
“Why? What is so important about getting this ship home?” the captain asked suspiciously.
“I wasn’t going to tell you this, but I made the decision to destroy the hub, twenty-six years ago and we stayed on the Planetary road,” the admiral proceeded to tell the captain about her crew’s journey back to Alpha.
The younger Janeway did not want to believe that it would be the same for her crew, but she was not so sure she wanted to take the chance of history repeating itself. She wanted the best for her crew and she had to make the right decision.
Afterwards, the captain finally made a difficult decision and had her senior officers meet with her in the conference room, so she could inform them.
“I have made a decision. We’re going home, but I think we can destroy the Queen, her drones, her transwarp hubs, and still get back to Alpha,” the captain finally announced.
“How?” B’Elanna asked.
“Throw some water on her, or in this case, a neural pathogen,” the captain continued.
“It would bring chaos to order,” Seven stated thoughtfully.
“Precisely!” the admiral became excited. “And I’m the who can do it.”
“No, too risky,” the captain insisted. “I..”
“I can do it, besides I can’t go back with you anyway,” the admiral tried to smile, but the look in her eyes was sad. “One Janeway is enough for Alpha, besides I can pilot my shuttle into to the Queen’s Unicomplex and infect the Borg with the pathogen.”
The captain sighed, “All right, but you do understand the risk you are taking?”
“Of course I do and I’m willing to do it. There’s nothing in Alpha for me anymore, so I‘m the one who should do this.”
The captain hoped that she never became as cynical as the admiral. “Alright, let’s do this if we’re going to do it.”
“Oh, good! The Yellow Brick road ends here!” Tom said excitedly as he stood to return to the Bridge.
The older Janeway smiled. It was good to see one of her former crew members happy about something for a change. It had been a long time since she had seen that, especially from Tom.
Then B’Elanna sarcastically stated, “Yes, but we haven’t seen the wizard yet and I don’t think we are going to.”
“B’Elanna,” Tom turned to address her directly. “We already have.”
“What? Tom, have you lost your mind?”
“No, I just gained one,” then Tom exited the Conference room.
“Captain,” Tuvok began, “Should I have the doctor exam Mister Paris before we go back to Borg City?”
“No, I think he will be fine,” the captain informed Tuvok. “He’s just excited to get out of Oz.”
Tuvok gave the captain a quizzical look.
“Captain,” Harry Kim asked.
“Yes?”
“If Paris got the brains, who gets the courage and the heart?”
For the first time in a long time, both Janeways laughed.
“I don’t know, Harry,” the captain replied with a smile. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
Admiral Kathryn Janeway appeared in the Queen‘s mind by using a neural interface that had been implanted in her brain before she left Alpha, but the Queen quickly discovered that the admiral was hidden on a shuttle in the Unicomplex.
“Why should I make any deals with you?” the Queen hissed. “When I’d be better off assimilating all of you.”
“I’ll tell you how to adapt to their weapons, if you would just tractor beam them to Alpha.”
“No deal! I see no purpose as to why I should when you hide within my Unicomplex, Admiral,” the Queen insisted as she laughed evilly. “I’ll get you and your precious ship too.”
“Not before I douse you with a little water,” the admiral said with sarcasm. She knew the Queen had found her, but she was not going to turn back. “I should have done this a long time ago, I just didn’t figure it out until now.”
“That is a weakness of humans,” the Queen suddenly beamed the admiral out of her shuttle and directly in front of her. “They believe in their childhood fairy tales.”
“It’s those fairy tales that get us through the rough times in life and if we are lucky, an answer to a problem,” the admiral told the Queen. “And right now, my problem is you.”
The Queen ignored the admiral’s comments and continued to focus on what she thought was a human frailty.
“I wonder if those same fairy tales will get the captain’s crew through being assimilated?” The Queen continued to taunt as she brought her face directly in front of the admiral‘s.
“They won’t be assimilated, not if I have anything to say about it.”
“You delude yourself! You can’t possibly believe they will escape being assimilated!” the Queen shouted with anger. “This is my territory I control everything within it! Including Voyager. I‘m sure you can appreciate that, or do you continue to resist me?”
“Believe me, it’s been no picnic out here with you and your drones. The Planetary Road has been filled road blocks, most of which were placed by you,” the admiral growled. “And I still haven’t forgotten that year of hell; nor have I forgotten all our dealings with you, even so, I assure you, Voyager will not be assimilated today.”
“You don’t seriously believe Voyager is going to get back home?” the Queen wickedly scoffed. “Not when I‘m about to make you one of my drones. Soon, I’ll be finding out all the secrets the captain has and her crew will be one with the Collective. I don‘t need to make any deals with you, when I‘ll soon have the information I need after I assimilate you.”
“All Voyager has to do to get home is fire transphasic weapons three times,” the admiral insisted. Then her voice was filled with anger, “At you.”
“You are delusional! Drones! Restrain her!” The Queen spat as her drones grabbed the admiral to keep her from moving. Now the Queen was again face to face with the admiral. She looked directly at her as she spoke menacingly, “Did you really believe you could strike a deal with me? The Borg Queen!”
“It was enough to distract you, so that Voyager has a head start,” she replied as she tried hard not to show any fear of the Queen. There was no way she was going to give into fear at this stage of the game. She was too old and had been through too much to care about what happened to her anymore. Instead, she was going to stand up to the Queen once and for all, even if it meant her life.
“Why do you continue to believe you can protect that little ship, when you can not possibly save it!” The Queen cackled as she suddenly injected the admiral with assimilation tubules. “Watch your future’s end!”
“My future’s end is your destruction,” Admiral Janeway gasped as she fought the pain of the Queen‘s talons being in her neck.
Then the Queen withdrew them as fast as she had bored them into the admiral and the drones released her. “Really? You must think your younger self is capable of making it home, before we assimilate her and her crew.”
Then the Queen ordered her drones to intercept the captain, but they did not comply. “You will comply!”
“Watch her! With a little help from me,” the admiral hissed. She had begun to feel the affects of the nanoprobes the Queen had injected into her system, but she continued with her thought, “They will get home.”
“You are in no position to help them,” the Queen sneered as she quickly turned back to the admiral. “Look at you. You have nanoprobes running through out your body and being assimilated as we speak. You‘ll make a nice addition to the Collective.” Then she turned back to her drones. “INTERCEPT THEM NOW!” she bellowed, but her drones did nothing.
“Maybe so,” the admiral continued, “but when you injected me with those nanoprobes, you acquired a little something from me in exchange.”
Suddenly, the Queen began to double over in pain. Then one arm fell off her body and then the other, “What have you done!”
“Oh, nothing much,” the admiral scowled. Then her voice was filled with sarcasm, “Like I said, I threw a little water on you, that’s all.”
“You infected us with something!” The Queen shrivelled up with pain as her body began to fall apart. “A pathogen! I‘m disintegrating! You can’t do this to me!”
“I think I just did!” the admiral slid to the floor and accepted her fate, just before the Unicomplex began to crumble with a series of explosions. She was now content to die, knowing she had gotten Voyager home before tragedy had struck them.
“I’m disintegrating!” The Queen screeched her last words.
“Well, she was right. Fire three times and we’d be home again,” the captain quoted when they flew out of the corridor and fired the third transphasic torpedo. “the hub is also destroyed.”
“And here we are,” Chakotay affirmed with amazement as they watched the transwarp hub collapse.
“The Queen is dead!” Tom shouted with joy.
“Don’t go into a song and dance just yet, Tom,” the captain insisted. “We may be in Alpha, but we still have a ways to go before we get to Earth.”
“I don’t ever want to go down that road again!” B’Elanna exclaimed. “I’m just glad we‘re home!”
“Neither do I, but let’s not forget who helped us get back home,” Captain Janeway reminded them as her expression became sad, because she knew her older self had just died in order to help them get back to Alpha.
“I always thought she was some sort of wizard,” Tom stated with a smile as he tried to lighten the mood.
“Watch it, Tom,” the captain suddenly replied jovially. “It might go to her head.”
“There’s no place like home,” Harry Kim quoted with happiness.
|