Janeway nodded her understanding. “Commander Drafar, you will lead the reconstruction efforts. Assign your people as you see fit, and feel free to pull crew from Captain Farkas and Lieutenant Vorik.”
“You’ll want to get Bryce down here yesterday,” Farkas noted.
“Agreed,” Drafar said.
“I’ll expect a complete schedule in six hours,” Janeway added. “I’ll be returning to Earth tonight but available at any time to address any issues that might arise.”
“Understood, Admiral,” Drafar said.
“Aye, Admiral,” Vorik added.
“Thank you, gentlemen.” Janeway smiled. “Captain, walk with me?” she ordered Farkas.
“Of course, Admiral.”
In the weeks that had passed since their last conversation, Regina Farkas had done some thinking. Satisfied that Kathryn Janeway would never again command a starship, let alone the Full Circle fleet, her ire had cooled, and she wondered if she had been too hard on the admiral. While it was true that the actions of the future Kathryn Janeway were beyond the pale, this Admiral Janeway was not that woman. Farkas had been granted more time than usual between postings to consider her past, present, and future. She wondered if in some alternate time line, some other version of her might have made similar choices. She hoped not. She also hoped that Command would find a way to keep her crew together. It was not lost on her that Kathryn Janeway had been the first one to take any meaningful step toward setting that situation to rights.
I bet much to Ken Montgomery’s chagrin, she thought with an inward smile. The poor man had been forced to watch helpless as a mission under his purview had gone from bad to unthinkably bad, when the Federation needed to hear good news. Farkas didn’t envy him. The truth was, Montgomery didn’t have a lot of good choices when it came to the future of the Full Circle fleet, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t his responsibility to get off his ass and pick one. Farkas knew she had ridden him hard and that she wasn’t the only one. And she’d been pleased when the commander in chief had stepped in and eliminated a few options from the table. But now that she’d gotten her wish, she wondered if her grief hadn’t temporarily blinded her to some of Janeway’s strengths. Her anger over the losses of Quirinal, Hawking, Esquiline, and Curie had been all-consuming. It had caused her to wonder if perhaps it wasn’t time for her to take her oldest friend, Doctor El’nor Sal’s, advice and finally retire.
When she’d seen Admiral Janeway’s orders, Farkas’s first thought was, why has she been allowed to give them. Her second was to kick herself for not seeing the elegance of the solution Janeway had concocted. She wasn’t ready to forget the price they’d paid for Janeway’s past decisions. But she understood the necessity of forgiveness. Without it, life’s promise was too easily mired in pointless regret. She hadn’t yet extended that forgiveness to the admiral, but she certainly felt herself being beckoned in that direction.
When they reached the platform leading back to the observation room, Farkas asked, “Once the Vesta is ready to fly, who’s going to command her?”
“I’d have thought that would be obvious, Captain,” Janeway replied, “unless you’ve already made other plans?”
“Oh, I’ll take her.” Farkas smiled. “Thank you, Admiral.”
“You’ll be free to bring with you as many of Quirinal’s people as you like, and I hope the crew recovered from Hawking and Curie as well.”
“It would be an honor. We’ll still be short a hundred,” Farkas noted.
“We may not be able to bring the Vesta to full capacity, unless you want to pull some cadets out a year early.”
“No,” Farkas said. “I think part of our problem, the first time out, was lack of experience in key positions. Let’s not make the same mistake again.”
“Agreed,” Janeway said. “I’m wondering why you were so intent on pushing Drafar and Vorik?”
“They’re engineers; they’re not happy unless the deadlines are impossible,” Farkas quipped. “But that’s not the primary reason.”
Janeway turned to face her. “What is?”
“Are you acquainted with Lieutenant Varia at Pathfinder?” Farkas asked.
“No,” Janeway replied.
“They’ve reported several disruptions to our long-range communication relays in the Delta Quadrant over the last few weeks,” Farkas said. “Admiral Montgomery has been advised but thus far doesn’t think this is cause for undue concern.”
When Janeway’s eyes widened in response, Farkas realized that this was news to her. Interesting that Ken Montgomery was clearly keeping her out of the loop. Something else had obviously been driving Janeway when she decided to resurrect the Vesta. The desire to prove herself worthy of command of the fleet, Farkas presumed.
“Do they have any idea what’s causing these disruptions?”
“Ten percent of the relays we first dropped have now gone dark,” Farkas replied. “It is impossible to tell from here whether they were sabotaged or just suffered from some technical glitch. Voyager and Demeter are out of range, so they can’t provide any intelligence. Pathfinder is now in danger of losing contact with New Talax if any more relays go down. Somebody needs to get out there sooner rather than later and find out what’s going on.”
Janeway nodded somberly. “You think there’s any chance that with your people’s help, Drafar can get the Vesta space-worthy in less than four weeks?”
“Impossible they can do; beyond reason, probably not,” Farkas replied.
“Damn,” Janeway said softly.
“What about the Galen?” Farkas asked.
“They were called to Starbase 185 and are still there,” Janeway replied. “But if the relays have come under attack, it’s not prudent to send the Galen.”
“No,” Farkas agreed, then asked, “When Vesta goes out, will Achilles go with her?”
“I don’t know,” Janeway replied honestly.
“You got this approved through Admiral Akaar?” Farkas ventured.
Crossing her arms at her chest, the first sign of defensiveness Janeway had shown since she arrived, she said, “Is that a problem?”
“No,” Farkas said. “But for all the flack I gave him, Montgomery never stopped defending you, at least initially. I’m not sure why you’d go out of your way to intentionally piss him off by going over his head.”
Janeway sighed. “I don’t have time for politics, posturing, or red tape. Until Command sees fit to assign someone to lead the fleet, I’m going to do everything in my power to see that its needs are met. If that means toes get stepped on or egos get bruised, so be it. Nobody else is making this a priority. You’ve been on leave for a month. That’s a criminal waste of personnel. If I do nothing else before Montgomery or Akaar chains me to a desk, I will see to it that my people are given the best possible chance to complete their mission.”
“Your people?” Farkas asked.
“Yes,” Janeway said simply.
This wasn’t arrogance, Farkas thought, stunned by the revelation. She’d long ago decided that arrogance had been the admiral’s greatest sin. What else but an unhealthy level of self-regard could possibly drive anyone to believe they had the right to alter history for their own convenience?
Pain, Farkas realized. Loss. Regret. And too many years spent wishing she’d done better by those who had trusted her with their lives.
The admiral didn’t think too much of herself. She thought too little of what she had accomplished. Whatever internal scale Janeway used to weigh her achievements, they were measured against a deep and abiding love for her crew. The risks that came with exploration were too great for most starship captains to allow that kind of attachment. It was the quickest path to heartache. Yet, the fearlessness with which Janeway embraced it, even now, was astonishing. Clearly, it could lead even the best intentioned into trouble. Farkas had rarely crossed that line, but Janeway had probably long since ceased to even acknowledge its existence. In some, it might be evidence of inappropriate need. In J
aneway, it might be the source of her formidable strength.
Farkas felt her lips curving upward. Kathryn Janeway had her issues. But she wasn’t here trying to save herself or her position. Her only concern was protecting the fleet. That was something Farkas could respect.
“I suspect we have a great deal in common, more than you’d like to admit,” Janeway had said the last time they’d spoken.
Farkas hadn’t believed Janeway until now.
STARBASE 185
“When will I be well enough to begin our journey to the Delta Quadrant?” Axum asked.
Commander Glenn did her best to keep her face neutral. It was a skill that Glenn had always wondered if she has mastered.
Over the past three days, the Doctor had begun to educate Doctors Mai, Everett, and Frist about the nature and capabilities of the Caeliar catoms. Glenn had focused her attention exclusively on Axum. The Starbase had no counselor, and Mai had refused to request one from Starfleet Medical. For Glenn, this was all the confirmation she needed that Axum would remain here only as long as it took for him to recuperate sufficiently for transfer, likely back to Earth. While it was obvious that whoever was calling the shots wanted Axum alive, it was unclear that a complete recovery was essential to his purposes. Glenn had also learned that the worst of the traumas Axum had suffered had not come from his hasty and horrific efforts to remove his Borg technology. It had begun the first moment he awoke on a Borg vessel with the full memory of his life and Unimatrix Zero.
Clarissa Glenn understood why Seven and Captain Janeway assumed that armed with self-knowledge the drones would have been capable of mounting a resistance. The actions of Korok, the Klingon drone who had gained control of his vessel would have given credence to this belief.
But that had not been Axum’s reality. The only thing that made life as Borg drones possible for the assimilated was their ignorance of their past lives. Nestled within the Collective’s firm embrace, they had known nothing but the rightness of their actions, the nobility of their form, and the quest for perfection.
To awake from that existence alone, but with the constant presence of millions of others within one’s mind, would have been terrifying. They had mounted a resistance from within Unimatrix Zero, but there, they were in control. In the Unimatrix, the drones could manipulate their physical appearance at will. They couldn’t die unless their real bodies were destroyed. All things were possible there. Not so in the world in which they found themselves upon awakening.
Axum hadn’t buckled under the psychological strain overnight. For years he had kept his identity secret from the others aboard his scout vessel. He had carefully planned and executed several small disruptions to the ship’s operations, hoping they would provide him with the means to escape. Then his ship had encountered a small colony, deep in the Beta Quadrant, and had been ordered to assimilate it. That action his conscience could not abide. To survive, however, he had no choice.
Even after those dreadful days, he had struggled to maintain his equilibrium. While executing another small act of sabotage, Axum had been discovered, and a battle had ensued. Fighting for his own life—killing several other drones he could not help but think of as victims, like himself—Axum managed to make his way into an escape pod and trigger the destruction of the vessel as he fled. He immediately set course for the nearest safe haven, a Federation starbase, but it would be a journey of months he was facing alone.
His actions had not escaped the notice of his vengeful queen. She did not trouble herself to dispatch a vessel to retrieve him. And she could not force him, freed as he was, in a sense, to destroy his ship. So, she had chosen to make his last days as a drone as painful as possible. For what felt like years, but had in fact been several weeks, she had been a constant presence in his mind. She had tormented him with visions of his actions as a drone and the progress of the Borg as they attacked the Federation. She assured him that as soon as any Federation craft or base found him, he would be instantly destroyed.
The queen had broken him, driven him to the frenzy that had led him to the only action he could take. He must remove her from his mind by force.
The extractions began.
The process of recounting these events to Glenn had been therapeutic for Axum. He had gained strength daily, and she had chosen to remain by his side long after her duty shifts ended. The commander had chosen not to contradict his belief that as soon as he was recovered, he would be reunited with Annika. In truth, this was the only future that mattered to him.
Glenn feared that to reveal what she believed to be his more likely future would thrust him back into a deep despair. For now, Axum waded in the shallows, still tormented, but grasping for the life of which he dreamed and trusting Glenn implicitly. She didn’t know what a trained counselor would do right now, but she knew what she had to do: no further harm.
“It will be several more days,” Glenn replied, taking his disfigured hand in hers and squeezing it gently.
“Good,” he said with an assured smile. Even through the vivid scars etched across his face it was easy to see now how handsome he must have once been. “I didn’t believe you when you first told me Annika was still alive. But now that I know she is . . .”
“What do you mean?” Glenn asked.
Another smile, this one more distant. “I know,” he said simply. “I feel her again. She is still part of me, the best part of me.”
Glenn nodded, trying to reassure him. How much of the sensation he described was real and how much a product of the catoms that had been transplanted into him was an open question. If it strengthened his will to survive, it could only be a good thing.
The commander truly wished that she could convince her superiors that they were not living up to Federation ideals by using Axum as they clearly intended to. She knew the Borg Invasion and the merciless way they had pursued all-out war against the Federation had many in Starfleet questioning if those ideals lead to the invasion.
But Glenn, who had lost friends and family to the Borg, saw Axum not as a monster. She saw a man who had fought as best he could and now needed help. Unfortunately, Captain Jax Dreshing, the starbase’s commander, still quoted regs when pressed on Axum’s official status, no doubt coached by Doctors Everett and Frist.
Glenn had never before in her young life, as a Starfleet officer, encountered a situation where her oath demanded she sublimate her beliefs. It was a disturbing place in which to find herself and one for which there was no clear remedy.
“The Doctor’s work clearly demonstrates that intermingling catoms from distinct individuals does not render them inoperative or damage them in any way,” Doctor Everett argued.
“It’s one case, Everett,” Mai said. “And in this case, the catoms had reverted to a neutral state prior to the transfer.”
“It’s also worth noting that in C-1’s case, he already possessed catomic technology within his body. This does nothing to shed light upon the possibilities of rejection in individuals not already predisposed to accept the catoms,” Frist added.
The Doctor had followed much of the previous hour’s discussion with the minimal amount of attention required. It had taken this long to make them understand both the established abilities and limits of catoms. What flights of fancy they were now enjoying or their relevance to Axum or Seven he could not imagine, but he was struck again by Frist’s insistence on referring to his patient as C-1. It was more insulting than using his Borg designation.
“Catoms are not transmittable by any means we have observed other than direct injection,” the Doctor interjected. “Axum’s initial catoms were transformed matter. They replaced his former Borg technology. How much of their inability to completely restore him to health was due to his physical injuries prior to the transformation and how much might be credited to his mental state at the time we cannot ascertain to a certainty. But you can’t ‘catch’ catoms like you would contract a viral or bacterial infection.”
All three grew strangely quiet at
this, staring at him intently. Something in the fear that followed each of them like a specter caught the Doctor’s full attention. They were not speculating idly. They were not considering hypothetical uses for catomic technology. Admiral Janeway had insisted that something more was at stake here. For the first time, the Doctor gave serious consideration to what that something might be.
“Has a case been discovered of an individual who is not a former Borg containing catomic technology?” the Doctor asked directly.
The three glanced at one another, clearly wishing they were telepaths. It was Doctor Frist who turned to the Doctor and said, “Possibly.”
“I’d like to review that file,” the Doctor said immediately. What they were suggesting was extremely unlikely, and if their previous work with whatever case they had encountered had been as ham-handed and ill-informed as Doctor Mai’s initial evaluation of Axum, this might well be a simple case of misdiagnosis.
Frist took the padd she was using to take notes on the Doctor’s reports and began to pull up a series of files. She passed the padd to him across the Galen’s conference table saying, “What you are about to see does not leave this room, Doctor.”
Agreeing, the Doctor began to read. In less than a minute he had absorbed the contents. He spent three more minutes pretending to finish reading while he processed the data and searched his diagnostic subroutines for conclusions beyond those already accepted. Finally, he asked, “How many people know about this?”
“Beyond those present here, fifty. The patients have all been quarantined. Starfleet Medical and the Federation Institute of Health have made eradicating this plague their highest priority,” Frist replied.
“You have more than ten thousand cases referenced here,” the Doctor replied. “Their families aren’t curious about what’s happened to them?”
“We’re talking about three worlds that saw heavy fighting during the Borg Invasion, Doctor,” Everett replied. “The damage to all three from Borg weapons was intense, and in each case, Borg vessels were destroyed in orbit. Debris from those vessels would have been found on the surfaces even before the Caeliar transformation. There is no way to know how many of our patients might have come in contact with debris that was once Borg but then dissolved, or how, exactly, they came into contact with Caeliar catoms.”
Star Trek: Voyager - 042 - Protectors Page 20
