Disclaimer: Star Trek: Voyager and all things Starfleet belong to Paramount. No infringement intended.

Summary: Another take on the future following Endgame.

Safe Harbor

by Mizvoy

Chapter 12: Arturis, Part 2

Chakotay walked through his San Francisco apartment surrounded by ghosts. He could see Kathryn everywhere, in every room. He saw her curling up with a book on the sofa in front of the fireplace; eating breakfast while standing at the kitchen counter, a mug of coffee in one hand, PADD in the other; brushing her hair in front of the bathroom mirror; working long hours in the study; stretching out on their bed, her hair fanned out on the pillow, her smile an invitation for him to join her. Gretchen had been after him to put away Kathryn’s things, to move on with his life, but he wasn’t ready to let her go.

He stood at the window looking toward Starfleet Headquarters, wondering how the meeting concerning Neelix’s newest discoveries was progressing. He wished he could have attended, but knew better than to try. Admiral Travers barely tolerated him in social situations and would probably reject his presence at an official meeting, especially without Kathryn’s direct intervention.

Time crawled by, and it was late afternoon before Reginald Barclay arrived. Chakotay could tell by the look on his face that he brought bad news. “Come in, Reg. I’ll get us some tea.”

Reg made his way to the living room sofa where he collapsed in exhaustion. “The briefing lasted nearly four hours,” he reported. “They heard everything we had to say.”

Chakotay handed him a steaming mug and sat down across from him. “Let me guess. Admiral Travers was unconvinced.”

Reg studied the former Maquis captain. “Unconvinced and unmoved. I thought you’d be more upset.”

“I didn’t really expect Travers to come to the rescue based on what we have so far. He’s not the type to stick his neck out for anybody except himself.” He leaned back and relaxed into the chair. “But, I had to give the proper channels a try for Kathryn’s sake.”

“Travers said Neelix’s transmission was probably garbled, or perhaps his readings of the debris were distorted by the explosion of the slipstream drive. He even suggested that the data was artificially implanted by the Ferengi again the way my hologram was.” Reg squirmed in his seat, still embarrassed by the deception that had almost destroyed Voyager.

“Frankly, that’s what I expected him to say. I bet he even suspects Neelix of some sort of plot. Maybe he’s captured the Dauntless and wants the Arturis, too.”

Reg smiled. “He implied it. He doesn’t know how loyal Neelix is to Admiral Janeway and Voyager’s crew.”

“So he isn’t going to recommend using the Arturis to check out what really happened? To make sure there aren’t survivors?”

“The idea was never seriously discussed.”

Chakotay frowned. This was exactly what he’d thought would happen, but the reality of it was upsetting. Starfleet always errs on the conservative side, he’d heard Kathryn say a dozen times, and Dallas Travers was the worst. “How about the construction of the second deep space prototype?”

“He thinks it would be unwise to pursue the same design until they discover what went wrong with Dauntless.”

“And how are they going to find that out from 30,000 light years away?” Angry, he stood up and walked to the mantel, picking up a photo of Kathryn with Voyager’s senior staff assembled around her in the ship’s mess hall. He picked it up, studying her face. She’d been such a determined, indefatigable leader, never wavering in her mission even in the face of insurmountable odds. “And what about the survivors?”

“He doesn’t believe there are any.” Reg looked miserable. “But, for what it’s worth, I think there are, and I think we need to help them get home.”

Chakotay turned to face him, his eyes dark with determination. “Then you’ll help us?”

“Did you really have to ask?”

“It’s not for sale.”

Neelix struggled to hide his shock and disappointment when Ruiz, the Rencasi leader, showed him the scarred and gutted shell of a Starfleet shuttle. “I don’t want to buy it. Do you mind if I scan it?”

Ruiz studied the Talaxian, and then nodded at her second in command, Lanthos, as she walked away. “Make sure he doesn’t take anything. And erase any details on our supplies, just in case.”

Neelix opened his scanner and studied the black marks on the exterior, grimly noting that they were caused by a warp core breech, but not weapons’ fire. “May I scan the inside?”

“I’ll have to delete your records of the supplies,” he said, “in case you’re real motive is something quite different.”

“I’m interested in what happened to the shuttle, not in your supplies. You can delete what you want.”

Lanthos silently activated the hatch, revealing an interior filled with stacks of phaser rifles and grenades, power cells, body armor, flashlights and flares, and boxes of emergency rations. None of it was Starfleet, however. Nor were there any sign on the shuttle’s interior walls, seats, or consoles.

“Was it stripped like this when you found it?” Neelix waited for a reply and then said, “I’d pay a good price for seats, consoles, whatever you took out.”

Lanthos shrugged. “We used the seats in our own ships. Some of the panels are now walls in the cabins in the settlement. You can have whatever we aren’t using for the right price.”

“I’ll take it all, whatever you’ll sell me.”

Neelix spent the next four hours scanning scrap metal and reclaimed technology before he beamed a large pile of debris to his ship. Ruiz counted the credits Neelix had paid for them with a look of satisfaction on her face. It wasn’t every day that she ran across a fool willing to pay top dollar for junk. Neelix walked toward her with a big smile on his face.

“Ruiz, I wonder if you’d tell me about finding the shuttle?”

She could see no reason not to tell him. “It was adrift in the Druan system, in the asteroid belt between the fifth and sixth planets. I think it had been towed there by whoever found it first. The nacelles had been sheered off, and the shuttle had been stripped of almost every usable part. If we hadn’t needed it for a storage shed, we would’ve left it there.”

“Were there any signs of the occupants?”

“Not that we could see.” He could tell that she, too, was curious about the alien vessel, but she wasn’t about to quiz him on it. Between mercenaries, there was an unspoken line they wouldn’t cross. “Come back any time you need more supplies,” she said, dismissing him.

Neelix beamed back to his ship where Dexa, his wife, waited for him. “What did you find out?”

“The shuttle was found first by pirates, either Rencasi or Borodai,” he said, plotting a course to the Druan system. “They would’ve taken the survivors, too, and, if they were alive, put them to work. Or, if they were seriously injured, they might’ve just left them somewhere.”

She shivered at the thought. “There were survivors?”

He sighed. “It’s impossible to know for sure. However, one of the consoles was configured the way Captain Janeway always preferred, and there was human blood on one of the seats. Whoever was on the ship was still alive. The pirates would’ve left the dead bodies on board.”

“So what now?”

He grinned at her. “I ‘need’ more Starfleet equipment, so we’ll start searching for it on the black market and see where that leads us. Maybe we’ll even be able to find someone who can repair and maintain it.”

Dexa smiled. “You amaze me, Neelix.”

He thought back to his days closer to Talax, where he’d made his living trading reclaimed and salvaged materiel. “Actually, except for the sadness of it all, I’m having fun.”

“Are they really shutting down the project?”

B’Elanna Torres looked up at the young ensign in charge of supply at Utopia Planetia and shrugged. “I hope they resume the research soon, but only time will tell. They want to find the flaw that made Dauntless explode, first.”

The ensign snorted. “You and I both know the ship wouldn’t just explode like that. Something else happened. They just don’t want to admit it.” He leaned toward her and whispered, “I’ve heard that some of the admirals never had any faith in the slipstream drive.”

So Travers’ prejudice was common knowledge. “Well, they aren’t engineers. They don’t understand the technology.”

“Then, they should believe the ones who do.”

She smiled at him, figuring this was the best time to give her scheme a try. “Not everyone is as insightful as you are, Ensign. Too bad you aren’t one of the admirals.” The guy actually blushed, so gullible that B’Elanna idly wondered if he could be related to Harry Kim. “Just one last thing. I want to check the benamite crystals. I know I’m being a little anal-retentive, but they’ll be critical to the program when we get started again.”

The ensign hesitated, unsure whether she still had access to the critical supplies since the project had been deactivated. “Well . . . ,” he started.

“You can watch my every move,” she assured him. “I won’t be in there five minutes.”

“Okay.” He walked with her to the vault where she keyed in her clearance code. Tuvok had promised her that it would still be active, and, sure enough, the door opened smoothly. The ensign was visibly relieved.

B’Elanna rested her hand on the security console and then entered the room. The quick scan of the crystals took less than five minutes, however, and soon she was on her way.

Unnoticed by the ensign, B’Elanna had placed a tiny computer chip on the console. Later that night, it would briefly disrupt the force field before it self-destructed. But not before she and Tom beamed the benamite out. She left the building and was crossing the street when her husband joined her.

“How’d it go?” he asked her.

“Piece of cake.”

Gretchen Janeway enjoyed cooking and looked forward to Chakotay’s regular Thursday night dinner visit. In the months since Dauntless’ departure, their already close relationship had deepened considerably as they had comforted one another. This Thursday night, Chakotay walked toward the farmhouse uncharacteristically nervous about seeing her. He couldn’t remember being so apprehensive about his mother-in-law since his first visit years earlier just after Seven’s death, when he was still uncertain about his relationship with Kathryn.

He and Kathryn had been married in Gretchen’s back yard during a spectacular June sunset some five years earlier. Only a select few attended the wedding-Gretchen, Phoebe and her husband, Tom and B’Elanna, Chakotay’s sister and her husband-and he could still remember how the golden sunlight had been like a blessing on the ceremony. The reception, by contrast, had been huge, including the Voyager crew, their Starfleet contacts, neighbors in San Francisco and Indiana, and friends from throughout the Federation. It had been held in nearby Bloomington and had been his first meeting Mark Johnson, Kathryn’s fiancé when Voyager was pulled into the Delta Quadrant.

“I never really thought Kath would get married,” Mark had told him after offering his congratulations and shaking his hand. “Every time I pressed her to set a date, she left on a six-month cruise.”

Chakotay smiled. “I thought that you’d set a date when she took command of Voyager.”

“Yes, we had,” he laughed. “And then she disappeared for seven years.”

“That wasn’t her idea, you know.”

Mark just looked away, watching the crowd, thoughtful. “She waited a long time for you.”

“I’m not sure I know what you mean.” Everyone knew that their relationship had endured seven years in the Delta Quadrant as captain and first officer and then his marriage to Seven of Nine, but Chakotay had a feeling Mark was talking about something else.

“I mean that she knew the kind of man she was looking for. In Justin, she had the consummate soldier, but someone who was never really in touch with his emotions. In me, she had a philosopher and communicator, but I didn’t know one end of a phaser rifle from the other. But you, Chakotay, you have it all.”

Chakotay had been instantly taken back to an incident that had occurred during Voyager’s final year when a temporal anomaly had fractured the ship. He’d interacted with a Kathryn from seven years earlier, from before the time when the Caretaker had pulled the ship into the Delta Quadrant. They’d worked together smoothly, as always, easily slipping into the banter and friendship that marked the first years of their relationship. At one point, however, she’d stopped and stared at him with open admiration in her eyes. “You’re a philosopher and a soldier,” she’d said, solemnly appraising him. “Your Starfleet file doesn’t do you justice.”

He looked at Mark Johnson and grinned, “And I always thought it was my dimples.”

He looked up from his reverie to see Gretchen staring at him from the front door of the farmhouse. “Are you coming in or not?”

He took the porch steps two at a time and gave her the usual hug and kiss on the cheek. “I was just waiting for a special invitation,” he teased.

Later, they took coffee to the screened porch and enjoyed the peaceful sounds of an Indiana summer night. As they sat in silence, enjoying each other’s company, Chakotay fretted about bringing up the news he needed to share.

Much to his surprise, Gretchen turned to him and said, “What is it that you need to say, Chakotay?”

Relieved by her typical Janeway directness, he said, “I wanted to tell you that I’m leaving earth for awhile.”

“Really? Where are you going?”

“I’m telling everyone I’m going to Dorvan V to visit my sister.”

“And what are you telling me?”

“Something closer to the truth.” He spent the next few minutes explaining the revelations of Neelix’s close up scan of the debris field, information that had yet to be shared with the public or Dauntless’ crew’s families. “I think the shuttle crew probably survived the explosion,” he concluded, “but Admiral Travers doesn’t think so. He thinks the possibility of survivors is too ‘speculative’ to share with anyone until it’s been confirmed.”

Gretchen stood up and walked to the porch railing, obviously upset by what she’d heard. “Is it possible that Kathryn was on the shuttle?”

“I think it’s more than likely she was.” He joined her, putting an arm around her shoulders to comfort her. “But even if she wasn’t, part of her crew was, and I don’t think we should desert them in the Delta Quadrant.”

“You’re talking about the Arturis?” When she looked at him for an answer, he said nothing, and his silence told her exactly what he intended to do. “What can I do to help?”

He smiled. “You’ll be hearing all kinds of rumors about me in the next few weeks, and I’m sure you’ll be questioned by the press. Tell them that you’ve heard rumors that there might have been survivors. Just mention it, Gretchen, and let the journalists pursue the truth.”

She turned to him, clearly concerned about his safety. “You’ll be back?”

He remembered a similar conversation with Kathryn and echoed her words. “There are always risks. If things go well, I’ll be back in a little over three months, maybe a few weeks longer. If I can, I’ll keep you posted through Reg Barclay and the MIDAS array.”

She put her head on his shoulder. “I can’t bear to lose Kathryn and you, too.”

He put his arms around her. “Maybe I’ll bring her home with me.”

The process of taking Arturis out of dry dock lasted more than a week, but B’Elanna Torres and Tom Paris, who had volunteered for the duty, didn’t seem to mind. The first thing B’Elanna did was tell the two ensigns assigned to ferry the ship back to Utopia Planetia that their assistance would not be needed until later. Always looking for party time, the two young officers gladly spent the week socializing on the Starbase while Tom and B’Elanna poured over all of Arturis’ systems, testing and retesting each one to be sure it was working perfectly.

B’Elanna spent four days initializing the slipstream drive, even though it wouldn’t be put to use for the brief trip to Utopia Planetia. And when he wasn’t checking and rechecking the helm and navigation, Tom spent his free time fooling around with the computer, supposedly designing and testing a holodeck program for his kids, but actually setting up a series of false engine readings.

Once Arturis was tethered outside the dry dock, Tom and B’Elanna moved out of their quarters on the Starbase and took up residence on the ship. Tom quietly carried their essential supplies onto the ship, including a heavily shielded box of curious construction. However, no one was there to ask them what it contained.

B’Elanna set the box down next to the slipstream drive housing and carefully opened it, the blue glow of benamite crystals casting an odd shadow on the walls.

“Are they okay?” Tom asked.

B’Elanna scanned them carefully, nodding. “They look fine. The beam out from Utopia Planetia apparently didn’t hurt.” She lifted one and carefully placed it in the housing, twisting awkwardly to seat it in the proper attitude. If these pilots were as careless as she thought, they wouldn’t even notice that the crystals had been installed.

“How long will this take?”

“Give me two hours. Then we’ll store the excess crystals in the shielded storage area. Are you ready?”

“The program wasn’t nearly as taxing as Captain Proton, my dear. After all, it only has to fool a couple of ensigns into believing that the faulty slipstream drive is about to explode.”

She gave him an irritated look. “If it doesn’t work right, Tom, the whole thing will blow up in our faces.”

“It’ll work. Don’t worry.” He watched her for a few minutes as she strained to get the crystals in position, and then said, “Can I help?”

“Sure,” she said, crawling under the console. “Hang around and when I take a break you can rub my aching back.”

Tom’s face lit up. “My pleasure!”

“Some things never change,” she said, giving him a wink. “Thank goodness.”

Neelix sat across from Dexa as she dumped a bag of Starfleet equipment she’d bought on the black market on the table between them. They’d started taking turns seeking the material to avoid creating suspicion, and, if anything, Dexa had proven herself an even less suspicious purchaser.

“There was twice as much available in this system as the last,” she said as she watched him sort through the pile. “I think we’re heading in the right direction.”

“Hypospanner, power conduit, hypospray, plasma relay. This is a nice sampling.”

“But not what you’re looking for?”

He pulled a small oblong piece of plastic from the bottom of the pile. “What’s this? A PADD?”

“PADD?”

“A ‘personal access display device.’ Starfleet personnel use them to store important information.”

“But this one’s useless or they wouldn’t have sold it to me.”

Neelix wasn’t discouraged. “I’ve worked with these a lot over the years, and I know some tricks they don’t. Set course for the next system while I see what can be done.” He reached across and gave her hand a squeeze. “You’ve done a great job, Dexa. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

“I just hope we can track them down. No one seemed to know anything about survivors, but I did hear that we’re moving into a section of the Empire inhabited by the Borodai.”

“Well, we’ll just keep looking. Captain Janeway never gave up, and neither will we. It’s just going to take patience, Dexa.” He watched her leave the room and stared at the PADD in frustration. “Now, what secrets are you hiding, I wonder?”

Chakotay and Mike Ayala had spent the last few days hiding in a class seven nebula along the route Arturis would take from Starbase 25 to Mars. Quarters were cramped on the small shuttle, but the two men had learned to make do during their years with the Maquis and got along fine. Every day or two they would emerge from the nebula to check in with Reg Barclay, usually getting little more than a reassurance that the plan was unfolding. This time, however, he sent them a large bundle of information.

“Looks like Neelix sent us another update,” Chakotay said as they headed back to the nebula. Once they were safely hidden, Chakotay went to the back bench to see what they’d received. He was gone a long time, but Ayala resisted the urge to check on him. Chakotay would tell him what he needed to know when he needed to know it.

“Brought you some lunch,” Chakotay said as he resumed his seat.

“Good news?”

“Neelix found a fused panel from the shuttle that was in Kathryn’s preferred display pattern.”

Starfleet’s modular panels could be easily programmed into a pilot’s preferred display, putting navigational or control areas in a spot they found most convenient. Over time, the displays became so individualized that they were referred to as the pilot’s “fingerprint,” and shipmates could tell who’d last piloted a shuttle just by glancing at the display. Kathryn Janeway, ever the scientist, was famous for putting sensor data at the top of the panel for easy reference.

Ayala nodded. “That’s good, right? That means she could still be alive?”

“Yeah. That’s good.” Chakotay knew Ayala was right, that he should be glad to know that his suspicions were right. She had been on the shuttle, but where was she now? That question hung unspoken between the two men as they ate their evening meal. “I’ll take the first watch, if that’s okay with you.”

“Sure, Chakotay, whatever.” He made his way to the back of the shuttle, wishing he could think of something to say that would reassure his friend that his wife was alive and well.

But only time would tell.

Tom and B’Elanna turned Arturis over to the two ensigns and resumed their journey toward Dorvan V, supposedly to pick up some household goods they’d had stored there for the last five years. At least, that’s what they told people they were doing. In fact, they were heading to the same nebula where Chakotay and Ayala were hiding. It hadn’t been easy to leave their kids with Tom’s parents, but with any luck, they’d be back soon enough.

Before they left the ship, B’Elanna warned the young pilots about some anomalous readings in the warp core. “I’ve pulled the whole engine apart twice. I’m thinking maybe there’s a problem with the sensors themselves inside the housing. Maybe the engineers at Utopia Planetia can find it.”

Cocky and exuding a confidence that reminded Tom of his early days on Voyager, the two ensigns brushed off the warning and started the preflight checklist. They were anxious to fly and weren’t too worried about malfunctions on such a short trip.

“So far, so good,” Tom murmured as they left the ship.

Eighteen hours into the flight, Arturis’ computer reported that its antimatter injector had frozen in the open position, causing a runaway reaction in the core. Unable to stop the flow or eject the core, the ensigns aimed Arturis toward a nearby nebula to minimize the damage caused by a core breech and used an escape pod to save their lives.

They were too busy guiding the pod away from the upcoming explosion to notice the shuttle that popped out of the nebula and transported four people aboard the Arturis just before it disappeared into the nebula. They did notice, of course, the warp core breech that occurred inside the nebula a minute or so later, but they didn’t bother to scan it and make sure it was proper size and intensity to be the Arturis.

They were too busy congratulating each other for escaping from the obviously flawed slipstream vessel to notice Arturis when she emerged from the far side of the nebula and set course for the Delta Quadrant.

Neelix and Dexa slowly worked their way through the sector looking for Starfleet material and asking questions about survivors. They were becoming well known as individuals who paid well for what they purchased, a fact that was both good and bad. It was good because people tended to seek them out, instead of vice versa. It was bad because people sometimes exaggerated or even fabricated information that was misleading.

They’d been through an especially trying period when Dexa beamed back to the ship late one night. She could tell that Neelix was depressed when he failed to greet her with his usual enthusiasm and didn’t grill her about the information she’d gathered.

“Is everything all right, Neelix?”

He held up the PADD and sighed. “I know this has to have important data on it, but I can’t get it to work. I wish B’Elanna was here.”

She pulled a tricorder out of her bag. “Maybe this will help?”

Neelix’s face immediately lit up as he took the device from her. “If we can find a power source, I can see if it’s working properly.” Minutes later, the tricorder chirped and its display came to life. Neelix swung his wife around in joy. “This could make the difference, Dexa. This might get the PADD to work properly.”

Before he could return to work, Dexa caught his arm. “The only other thing I could find down there was this.”

He took the small metal object out of her hand and studied it closely. An admiral’s rank bar. “Did they say where it was found?”

“They said there were three people on the shuttle. One of them was wearing that.”

He sat down in surprise, his heart pounding. “Go on.”

“The shuttle was totally without power when the pirates found it, and the three people on board were unconscious, close to death. They were taken to a remote Borodai outpost, but no one ever heard if they were successfully revived.”

Neelix looked down at the admiral’s bars with tears in his eyes. “We’re going to assume they’re alive until we get proof otherwise,” he choked, slipping the bar into his pocket. “In the meantime, we find out about these Borodai and what’s stored on this PADD.”

Dexa heard the determination in his voice and looked at him sympathetically. He loved everyone from Voyager and couldn’t face the possibility of Kathryn’s death.

“Of course,” she agreed, patting his hand. “We’ll look until we know for sure.”

In the weeks since Arturis’ mysterious loss and the simultaneous disappearance of four of Voyager’s former Maquis crew, rumors had been running wild throughout Starfleet and the Federation. When it had been discovered that Arturis had not exploded in the nebula, everyone thought the four Maquis had probably stolen it. Were they going to the Delta Quadrant to discover what had happened to their beloved former captain? Were they going to use the ship for some terrorist plot against the Federation?

Gretchen Janeway looked through her curtains at the crowd forming at the end of her sidewalk. She’d told a few of her contacts in the media that she had some comments to make about the situation, and, as a result, about three dozen reporters and photographers were waiting for her appearance.

She remembered well what Chakotay had told her to do. Starfleet had never made public Neelix’s reports implicating the Cardassians and hinting at the possible survival of some of Dauntless’ crew. Apparently, Admiral Travers was still unwilling to accept the possibility that a cloaked vessel had been able to travel so deep into Federation space without detection, unwilling to disturb the uneasy peace following the Dominion War. When Neelix reported finding the shuttle’s stripped shell, Travers had assumed that all hands were lost and thanked him for his help. He was unaware of Neelix’s continued investigation or his occasional communication with Reg Barclay.

Gretchen made her way down the sidewalk to the gate and stood there looking like everyone’s idea of the perfect eighty-five-year-old grandma. Behind her was the same traditional home that everyone remembered from the days when Voyager was lost and she’d been interviewed about her daughter. She raised her hands, and the crowd quieted. “One at a time please,” she said, pointing to the first reporter who caught her eye.

“Mrs. Janeway, do you have any idea of the whereabouts of your son-in- law, Chakotay?”

“He told everyone he was going to Dorvan V,” she replied calmly, pointing to the next questioner.

“Can you speculate why no one on Dorvan has seen him? Why has he and the other three Maquis disappeared from sight?”

“When we last spoke, he was concerned about reports of survivors from Dauntless’ explosion.” This was news, and the cluster of reporters momentarily clamored for more detail. She again held up her hand for silence before she continued. “He’d heard that a Starfleet shuttle had been launched from Dauntless and had survived the exlosion. As someone who had lived through a seven-year exile to the Delta Quadrant, he was deeply concerned about the well-being of any possible survivors.”

The clamor resumed, with several reporters asking whether Chakotay could have hijacked Arturis and headed for the Delta Quadrant. “He never said he planned to do that,” she said smoothly, “and for me to say so would be sheer speculation. I have no way to find out the truth.”

The reporters fell silent, and she could see the wheels turning behind their eyes as they plotted their return to Starfleet Headquarters and decided which contacts would be the most reliable sources for this sort of information.

“Are you alleging that Starfleet has covered up the possibility of survivors, Mrs. Janeway?” one reporter asked softly.

She shook her head, her eyes troubled. “I hope not. I’d hope that Starfleet would do everything within its power to retrieve any members of Dauntless’ crew stranded in the Delta Quadrant.”

Within the hour, the hallways of Starfleet Command buzzed with speculation as the admiralty called an emergency meeting with their chief of research and development. Had he not followed up on possible survivors? Had he really covered up the possibility of Cardassian involvement? By late afternoon, Admiral Travers sat before the commander-in-chief trying to explain why he had failed to use Arturis to travel to the Delta Quadrant, explore the Cardassian shuttle element, and search for possible survivors. Travers answered as best he could, but he knew that whatever happened next, his career had just ended.

Communication between Reg Barclay and the Delta Quadrant was haphazard, at best. Since the time Travers had stopped Starfleet’s active participation in the ongoing investigation, Reg could only use the MIDAS array when it was being reoriented following its extended scans, and only then when it was pointed toward the proper coordinates. He sent and received information from Neelix only when the array was aimed at the tiny Talaxian settlement in the Delta Quadrant, and messages with Chakotay were possible only when the array was pointed toward the places and times where Arturis was to emerge from its three two-week jumps in transwarp.

These problems made it impossible for him to contact Arturis following their first two-week jump, but things had changed dramatically by the end of the second one. Following Mrs. Janeway’s revelations, Starfleet was allowing him access to the array, as needed, but, even so, Reg had to know where the ship planned to reenter normal space after each jump in order to contact them. If they had not prearranged these locations, communication with the tiny ship would have been impossible, like finding a needle in a haystack.

Chakotay was pleased to see his friend’s face. “Reg! What a relief. I’m glad things worked out for you to use the array this time.”

“Things have changed a lot in the last six weeks.”

Chakotay could feel the presence of Tom and Ayala behind him on the bridge, their interest in the conversation suddenly doubled. “Like what?”

“Mrs. Janeway mentioned to the press that she’d heard rumors about survivors from Dauntless’ explosion. Once the journalists got their teeth into it, Starfleet had a definite public relations problem.”

Chakotay smiled. “She has all kinds of contacts in Starfleet, you know.”

“Right.” Reg smiled back. “The end result is that I can make use of the array on almost a daily basis, if I want. Plus, you guys are being hailed by the press as heroes for taking the rescue into your own hands.”

“That’s good to hear,” Chakotay laughed. “I’ve been worried about what Kathryn would do to me for reverting to my Maquis ways.” He could tell by the look on Reg’s face that he had bad news. “What’s new, Reg?”

“I want to stress that these are only rumors. Neelix is still trying to confirm what he’s heard.”

Chakotay felt sick at his stomach. “Just tell me,” he whispered.

Reg told them how the pirates found a powerless shuttle with an unconscious crew on board, including one wearing an admiral’s rank bar that Neelix had purchased on the black market. “He thinks he’ll soon know where they were revived and track them down.”

Chakotay couldn’t move, much less speak. He sensed that Reg meant “if they were revived.” He’d told himself time and again that the odds were against finding Kathryn alive, but now that the facts were stacking up against success, he felt a fury building inside that made it impossible for him to breathe.

“Neelix says not to give up hope, Chakotay. He told me to remind you that the admiral never would, and you shouldn’t either.”

Chakotay nodded. When prospects looked impossible on Voyager, he occasionally handed Kathryn a PADD with a scan of a nearby M-class planet, dutifully listing all of its good qualities for settlement. After the first few times, when she’d simply become angry, she recognized it for what it was-the alternative-and she’d handed it back to him with a weak smile. “Not yet, Commander. I’m not giving up hope yet.” Well, right now he wasn’t ready for the alternative, either.

Reg waited patiently for Chakotay to look at him again. “There’s more?”

“Neelix was also able to purchase a PADD that had been salvaged from the shuttle. It took awhile, but he finally accessed the information on it.” He pushed a few buttons, absently looking away. “It contained the admiral’s logs and some personal messages.”

Chakotay closed his eyes as his friends gasped audibly behind him. Farewell messages. “Her logs?”

“She more or less confirmed the scenario we imagined. Let me tell you, Starfleet was really electrified by the news. Relations with Cardassia are touch and go, with a massive buildup on both sides of the border.”

“Dorvan V?” Chakotay didn’t think he could bear to see his home planet ravaged by war a second time.

“Firmly within the Federation, I assure you.” There was a short silence. “I’m sending you the admiral’s logs so you can hear for yourself what happened.”

Chakotay’s voice was barely audible. “And her message?”

“I’m sending that, too. It was addressed to you, Chakotay.”

Of course it was. He heard Tom stand up behind him and go below to engineering to tell his wife the news. “Anything else?”

“Just this. He wants to be waiting for you when you arrive in the Delta Quadrant. How long before you get started?”

Chakotay swallowed, trying to think. “A couple of hours. Tell him we’ll be there in fifteen days at most.”

“I’ll tell him.” Reg regretted causing the pain he saw on his friend’s face. “Don’t give up hope, Chakotay, no matter what.”

He could only nod in reply.

To say that Kathryn Janeway’s official logs electrified the Federation would be an understatement. They created a firestorm in Starfleet and brought about a close review of the actions taken about Dauntless and the delicate relations with Cardassia.

Travers had assumed that Dauntless’ slipstream drive had failed, and that assumption had led them astray. The fact was that the drive had worked perfectly and was deserving of further research and development. Instead, months had passed since work had been done on the project, and, in that time, Cardassia and Romulus had continued their own slipstream projects without pause.

In addition, the incorrect assumption had prevented them from using Arturis as a viable rescue and investigative option, probably dooming Admiral Janeway and the other two survivors to slow, excruciating deaths in deep space.

In light of Starfleet’s failures, Chakotay’s hijacking of Arturis, an act that was confirmed by his contact through the MIDAS array, seemed not only proper, but heroic in the public’s eye. Unwilling to give up on the survivors under his wife’s command, Chakotay and members of Voyager’s crew had devised and completed a daring plan to travel to the Delta Quadrant and do what they could to discover what really happened. Public opinion was so strongly in favor of his actions that Starfleet had grudgingly agreed to provide whatever support they could to ensure its success.

All this was of little comfort to Gretchen Janeway. She went about her daily life, watering her flowers, corresponding with the many who wrote to encourage her, playing with her grandchildren, but she was feeling the weight of too many years under stress, too many years of doubt and uncertainty about the well-being of her firstborn child. Each night she looked up into the stars and prayed for the safe return of her daughter and son-in-law, and each night the stars, though beautiful, were cold and unresponsive.

Once Arturis reentered the transwarp conduit for the final leg of her journey, Tom, B’Elanna, and Chakotay had time to sit down together to review Kathryn’s logs. The making of official and personal logs was a Starfleet habit, yet they seldom had the opportunity to listen to someone else’s in great detail. The logs were almost always oral, although there were times when video was added, and were generally recorded while the officer was busy doing something else, like reviewing a screen of data, or sitting on the bridge, or, in Kathryn’s case, pacing and drinking coffee.

When the playback began, Chakotay was unprepared for the sound of his wife’s voice and buried his face in his hands, letting her familiar speech race through him like an electric shock. He felt B’Elanna’s hand caress his shoulder as he struggled to control his emotions, but it was several minutes before he could make sense of Kathryn’s words. He realized that the log began when she’d realized that Dauntless’ mysterious power drain was caused by a “fuzzy” object off the port nacelle. The shadow was discovered during the middle of the sixth and final week of the test. She sounded cool, calm, and analytical, yet Chakotay sensed more than heard alarm and concern as she spoke. Unwilling to predict disaster, she knew it was possible that the shadow traveling beside them could mean serious trouble.

As the logs progress through the last three days of the test, Kathryn became more and more serious. It was curious to listen to her reason through the evidence before her much as B’Elanna had done with the same information months after the fact. At one point, she’d even said, as B’Elanna had, that “once the possible explanations have been eliminated, it’s time to consider the impossible ones.”

Her voice had been angry when she realized that the shadow was a Cardassian shuttle probably there to destroy the ship. She was determined to pilot the shuttle and to sacrifice herself and the volunteers with her to save Dauntless, yet, Chakotay could tell, she knew it would take a miracle to be successful.

The final log done on Dauntless included video, and Chakotay gasped to see his wife addressing him in her usual forthright manner, dressed in her usual uniform, holding the inevitable mug of coffee in her hand. Oblivious to her words, he studied her face, seeing there exhaustion from three days of constant worry and determination to do whatever necessary to resolve the situation. She’d probably recorded a “final message” for him at the time, but it had been lost with Dauntless.

It was anathema for a Starfleet officer to address a civilian in an official log, yet he was sure her final comment was meant for him. She looked away for a moment, as if she were deciding whether or not to say what was on her mind, and then, with a resigned sigh, she resumed.

“There have been times on this journey,” she stated, looking directly into the camera, and, Chakotay felt sure, speaking directly to him, “when I’ve wondered whether my presence on this test flight was really necessary. The drive has performed perfectly and has needed nothing more than the planned mid-flight adjustments during the six weeks it’s been active. However, this situation, the threat of this cloaked vessel, has convinced me that my presence has been not only necessary, but essential to this crew. This is a research vessel manned almost exclusively by scientists with little or no combat experience. And while our proposed solution is a gamble at best, it at least gives Dauntless the possibility of survival.”

She went on to commend Captain Strong and her crew for their work and to congratulate them for their sacrifice which was in the highest traditions of Starfleet, etc. The three friends sat in silence once the log ended.

“She thought she’d be killed,” B’Elanna said. “No matter whether Dauntless survived or not, she was sure she was going to her death.”

“I always admired her guts,” Tom admitted, “the way she was willing to do whatever she had to do for the ship and crew.”

“Because she loved them,” Chakotay whispered, tears dropping onto his hands as he leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. “She always said that a good leader loves and serves the crew.”

B’Elanna rubbed his back as she gave Tom an alarmed look. “We’ve heard enough, don’t you think? This is too hard.”

“No.” Chakotay sat up, brushing his tears away. “I need to hear it all.”

B’Elanna kept her arm around him as they listened to the next log entry, recorded three days after Dauntless had exploded. She sounded depressed, her voice strangely muffled as she described the brief battle and their unlikely survival. The shuttle was in bad shape, its nacelles sheered off by the explosion and its impulse drive failing. She estimated that they would survive “five or six days” if they curtailed their power usage, and she hoped that they would be discovered by a non-hostile inhabitant of the sector before their power was depleted. Determined to survive long enough to report on the final hours of their mission, Kathryn stated that she would only update her log when and if important developments occurred in order to conserve power, but at least once a day.

There were only four brief entries following her initial report, and with each of them, Kathryn’s voice was strong and confident in spite of her increasing acceptance that help would not come. Her final entry was terse and official, commending her two fellow survivors for their fortitude, courage, and strength of character in the face of certain death. She sounded like an admiral, Chakotay thought, doing her duty until the very last moment.

The log ended and the three friends once again sat in silence. All that remained was her personal message to Chakotay, which he had no intention of sharing with them.

“Incredible,” Tom said. “You’d think she’d lose control of her emotions! How did she keep their sanity?”

“Kathryn wasn’t the type to lose her cool, Tom,” B’Elanna responded. “She probably continued to work on the shuttle or draft reports on the Dauntless until they froze to death or ran out of oxygen.” She glanced at Chakotay, realizing that she was only making it harder by talking about their suffering. “Sorry.”

Chakotay felt numb and simply shook his head. “I think I’ll go to my quarters and listen to her message.”

“Don’t you want Tom or me to listen with you?” She was concerned about his state of mind and wanted to provide whatever support she could to her old friend.

He gave her a weak smile. “She faced this by herself, and so will I.” He picked up the data chip and walked slowly to his tiny quarters, engaging the privacy lock behind him. He thought it would be easier to hear her final words right away, when he was used to hearing her voice.

He’d just spent the last six months mourning her, yet listening to her for the last hour made him feel her death as a fresh, raw wound. The possibility of her survival had been a lifeline to him, a chance for the happy ending he so desperately wanted, but this message, this farewell, would force him to face a different reality. Her unconscious body had been found on the powerless shuttle hours or days after she’d recorded these words, and the possibility of her survival was pitifully slim.

He imagined what the inside of the shuttle would look like, the hoary frost on every surface, the frigid cold, the lack of oxygen. As the senior officer, Kathryn would retain a final hypospray of triox compound so that she could, in Starfleet’s words, “put the ship in order and record a final personal message without the burden of command.” She would wipe the computer of sensitive information, arrange the bodies of the dead or unconscious with dignity, and take care of her personal issues. When she spoke, the others would already be unconscious or dead. These words would be from Kathryn, his wife, not the admiral.

Closing his eyes, he activated the recording, providing the computer the identifying information required to release a message that had been specified for him alone.

“Chakotay,” she said, sounding cold and breathless, “I want you to know that I’m not afraid to die. I’ve come to terms with what’s happened and know that I’ve done all I could do. My only regret is that we parted on such poor terms, and I take the responsibility for that. I should never have let that happen.” Her voice cracked and she took a deep breath. “I can’t believe that I’ll never see your face again, or hear your voice, or feel your arms around me. But, as always, I feel your presence with me here today and your love and support give me the strength to do what has to be done.

“I don’t want you to regret anything that’s happened between us. I’ve had nothing but time to rethink our lives, and I’m convinced that everything that has happened was meant to happen as it did. Thank you for always being there for me, Chakotay. You never let me down.”

She paused, this time struggling to catch her breath. Chakotay buried his face in his arms on the desktop as he waited for her to speak, his heart breaking. When she spoke again, her voice was a whisper. “You can feel my presence, too, can’t you? You have the best part of me with you and you always will. More than anything, I want you to be happy. You’re the finest person I ever met, Chakotay, and you deserve all the good things life can give you. Loving you has been the best thing I’ve ever done, and being loved by you the biggest honor I’ve ever received.

“I know how hard this is for you, I know how much you wish you could do something to help us, but don’t feel guilty because you can’t. Don’t second guess your decisions. Some people think that dying takes courage, but I know better. It takes much more courage to keep on living.” She stopped to cough, and Chakotay marveled at her generosity as she literally spent her dying breaths reassuring and encouraging him. “I love you, Chakotay, and I always have. Know that my last thoughts will be of you and of the incredible happiness we shared. I have loved being your wife and sharing your life. Never forget that I love you.”

Those were her final words, the three words he’d spent so many years waiting to hear. Tears streamed down his face. In spite of his belief that she was still alive, that he could still rescue her, he had to accept the fact that he might be too late. What would he do if he found out once and for all that she was truly gone? Did he have the courage to keep on living without her?

to be continued