TITLE: The Power of One
AUTHOR: Sally M
SUMMARY: One ship, one crew, one omnipotent being, and one first officer with a problem on his hands
RATING: PG
DISCLAIMER: Characters – theirs, story – mine.
NOTE: This was written for a contest where you had to take an episode from another Trek series and change it into a Voyager scenario. I chose Hide and Q from TNG, in which Q gives Riker Q powers.
THANKS TO: Becca for continually ‘encouraging’ me with this fic, and to SaRa for the notbeta.
PART 1
“Get your feet off my desk and your backside out of my chair,” Kathryn commanded as she entered her ready room and saw the familiar figure reclined behind her desk. “I suppose you’re the reason that my ship has come to a full stop.”
“Yes,” the omnipotent one smiled, “and your little lieutenant just won’t be able to get it moving again. What a pity.”
Kathryn glared at Q. “The last time we met, I thought I made it painfully clear you were to stay out of my way.” She placed her hands on her hips and stared at the intruder in a way that would have made any of her crew crumble. “And get out of my chair.”
In a flash she and Q had changed places. Her feet were now gracing her table, and a mug of coffee was in her right hand. Startled, she moved to take sip of it and then stopped, putting her feet down on the ground and the mug on the table. “Janeway to Paris,” she called, hitting her combadge, “consider yourself relieved for now. I appear to have found the source of our problem.” There was no response. “Lieutenant Paris?” she tried again. “Tom?” Her eyes were stonily fixed on Q, who stood nonchalantly the other side of her desk. “Janeway to the bridge. Please respond.”
No response came, no cocky comment from Tom, and no reassuring words from her first officer. Sensing that something had happened, and that no doubt a Q was behind it, she flung herself out of her chair and strode for the door that connected her sanctuary from the bridge. The door slid open easily, which did nothing to ease her sense of mind.
The bridge was empty, completely devoid of crew. Kathryn stopped in the doorway in horror and turned to look for Q, who suddenly decided to make himself scarce. Despite yelling his name loudly there was no sign of him, which surprised the captain greatly. Q usually liked to make his presence, and his tricks, very well known. “Janeway to engineering,” she called. “Janeway to Neelix. Janeway to Transporter Room One.” No answer was forthcoming. “Computer. How many people are currently on board this ship?”
“There are one hundred and thirty five people on board USS Voyager.”
“Who is currently not on board?”
“Commander Chakotay, Lieutenant Commander Tuvok, Lieutenant Paris, Ensign Harry Kim, and Seven of Nine.”
There was no mention of Torres or the Doctor. “Computer, is the Emergency Medical Hologram functioning?”
“Affirmative. There is one patient in sickbay.”
There was a flash of blinding light as Q appeared in the captain’s chair. “Oh, give me a little credit, Kathy. Would I really intentionally harm a member of your crew?” He paused for a moment. “I did think about including your hologram in my little game, but making sure he had that little holo-emitter thingy was just a touch too tedious for my liking, so he’s where he should be, tending to teeny-weeny little scratches.” He sniffed. “Ensign Carter should be thanking me.”
“Well, I am not thanking you. Where are my crew and what have you done with them?”
Another flash of light found Kathryn sitting in her chair. Seeing the familiar perspective she immediately looked below to check that she wasn’t sitting on anyone’s lap. Although Q had been the previous occupant of the chair she wouldn’t have put it past him to think it funny to deposit her on the lap of her first officer. But she was the only person sitting there, and for one brief moment she would have welcomed the unexpected embrace of Chakotay. At least she wouldn’t have been alone.
The bridge was so quiet it was eerie. It was never this silent, not even during the gamma shift. Now she could actually here the sound of the engines hard at work as they pushed Voyager through endless space. Casting a look around she tried to bring to mind all the sounds that occurred on a daily basis. There would be Tom making a smart comment, and Harry’s useless attempt not to laugh at whatever the pilot had said. The door to the turbolift would be constantly opening and closing as the likes of B’Elanna, Seven and Sam Wildman made their way to the bridge consoles where they usually spent a part of their day. Tuvok would be lightly tapping away at his console, offering status reports on tactical whenever needed. And Chakotay would be beside her, leaning over the centre console they shared. So close that she sometimes thought she could hear the thump of his heart or the sigh of his steady breathing.
“Well, if you’re getting maudlin, Kathy…” Kathryn was getting a headache with all Q’s too-ing and fro-ing. This time he was in the first officer’s seat, sporting the Starfleet uniform, complete with a Maquis rank bar. In the one hand he held a pile of padds and in the other a cup of hot steaming coffee. “I can keep you company.”
Kathryn snorted at the ludicrous sight in front of her. “Oh please, Q,” she responded. “I’m not that desperate.”
Q looked hurt. “And I thought you were missing your first officer.” He twisted his head and an exaggerated version of Chakotay’s tattoo appeared on his face. “Perhaps you’d prefer this version instead.”
Kathryn wasn’t impressed. “Just tell me where my crew is, Q.”
He sighed. “Oh very well. I have them playing a game. It’s quite amusing actually.” The padds and coffee disappeared from his hands as he leaned over the centre console. “Perhaps you’ve heard of it, Cowboys and Indians? Only this is the real thing, based around your pathetic General Custer and his battle at Little Bighorn.” He snorted. “What sort of a name is Little Bighorn? It’s a complete contradiction. But I guess that’s humans for you.”
“Should I ask what side you’ve got my crew on?” Kathryn sighed wearily. She had a feeling she knew the answer.
Q’s face broke into a wide smile. “It’s wonderful, Kathy. Pure genius. I’ve got Chuckles leading the enemy and Paris portraying Custer. Had to stick with the taboos of the time of course. I think your security officer with the pointed ears is quite far down the ranks, hence the sudden promotion for helmboy.”
Kathryn closed her eyes. “Should I ask about Ensign Kim and Seven of Nine?”
Q looked mournful. “Poor civilians, trapped in the way.”
That didn’t tally with Kathryn’s knowledge of history. “There weren’t any civilians at Little Bighorn,” she told him.
“Weren’t there? Custer’s party was there to raze a village. Women and children, poor innocents.” Q’s tone took on an air of sadness. “Anyway, got to get back to see what’s happening.” He pouted. “Sorry to have you leave you, Kathy, but the Continuum won’t allow us to be in two places at the same time. It really is a shame.”
A few seconds after Q left, a distraught Harry Kim appeared at his station. “Harry,” Kathryn gasped, getting out of her chair and striding across the bridge to him. “Are you okay?”
“I’m not sure, Captain,” the young man said. “Apparently, I’m in some kind of a penalty box.” He appeared hesitant. “Q said that if anyone else did anything wrong, I’d be…” he swallowed, “dead.”
Kathryn blinked. So much for Q’s assurances of not harming any of her crew. Now she had a member of her crew to comfort and reassure. “I’m sure it will be fine, Harry.”
He didn’t appear to believe her. “I don’t know, Captain. Q seemed pretty firm.”
A thought crossed the captain’s mind. “You play hockey, Ensign. Am I right?”
Harry was confused. “Yeah, on the holodeck with Tom. Why?”
A slow smile spread across Kathryn’s face. “What happens if you do something wrong in hockey?”
“You get a three minute penalty…” it was beginning to dawn on Harry, “in the penalty box.”
“So after the three minutes are up, what do you do?”
“You go back out to the ice.”
Kathryn nodded. “And if I know my first officer, he’s not exactly going to do anything rash in the next minute or so. So I think you’ll be okay. After your three minutes are up, you’re going back in.”
Harry looked panicked. “No, Captain. I’m not even armed out there.”
She clapped a hand on his shoulder. “You’re going in, Ensign, and that’s an order. Besides,” she added, “I don’t think Q will let you not go back.”
“Of course I won’t,” the tormenting voice retorted. Q had reappeared over by the engineering station. “What would be the fun in that?” He lifted his hand into the air. “Time to go, Ensign. Things are beginning to get really interesting.” The hand waved and Kathryn was left on her own again.
She returned to her chair and sat down grudgingly. There was absolutely nothing she could do. Q had rendered all of Voyager’s main systems useless. Prior to her crew’s removal, they had discovered that the turbolift had jammed so that there was no way off the bridge for them. The only doors that appeared to be working were the ones to her ready room and the observation lounge. And Seven had already worked out that the other doors in those rooms were not going to open. Voyager was stuck in space and Kathryn was stuck on the bridge. She began to wonder if she should have accepted Q’s offer of coffee.
For nearly an hour she sat there, unable to do anything except think. She tried not to imagine what her senior crew might be going through. For Chakotay the choices would be difficult. The scenario required that his role lead in the slaughter of Custer’s men, but Kathryn knew that her friend would be loath to harm any of his crew. History, however, showed that the Sioux and Cheyenne, led by Sitting Bull, had massacred Custer and his men.
A flurry of activity redirected her attention. The bridge was suddenly full of life again as her crew, every one of them, reappeared. Tom, Harry, Tuvok and Seven were all staring at Chakotay who had his hand in the air. He appeared to realise this and lowered it, smacking his combadge fiercely. “Commander Chakotay to Icheb.”
“Icheb here.”
The expression on Chakotay’s face was one of relief. “Are you all right, Icheb?” he asked, the concern apparent in his voice.
“Yes, Sir,” came back the calm, unflustered voice of the teenager. “I am unharmed and require no visit to Sickbay.”
“I’m glad to hear it. Chakotay out.”
Kathryn fixed a steely glare on her first officer. “Please join me in my Ready Room, Commander,” she intoned, before marching into her office.
“Engineering to the captain.”
“Go ahead, Lieutenant.” It was a relief to hear Torres’ voice.
“We’ve isolated the problem with the warp drive and should be underway within a couple of hours.”
“Thank you. Janeway out.” She turned back to the bridge. “Seven, Harry, get down to engineering and see what you can do to assist. Tom, be ready to move when they’re done.”
Chakotay followed her into the ready room and stood in front of her desk. Kathryn went to sit down, but changed her mind, deciding that she really needed a strong coffee. The events of the past hour had unsettled her. Smiling, she picked the requested drink from the replicator mat and tilted the mug to take a gulp from it. Had she been paying less attention she might have seen the subtle wave of Chakotay’s hands. Instead, she found herself grimacing and staring back into a mug of water.
Looking up, she saw her first officer had a sly grin on his face. “What the hell just happened here?”
This time she saw his movements. When she next glanced down at the mug she saw that the contents had turned back to coffee.
“Sorry,” he apologised, “but you know you drink far too much of the stuff.”
“Yes, and I normally ignore your remarks,” she said. “However, I cannot ignore your actions this time.” She put the mug down on the low table in front of her couch and stepped down to the room’s lower level. “What you did just there reminded me of someone. A Q.” Her eyes narrowed. “Just what has he done to you.”
“Given me some of his powers apparently.” Chakotay didn’t seem too concerned. “I’m still trying to figure out why, but they’ve already come in useful.”
She stared at him. “I don’t consider turning coffee into water useful.”
“Kathryn.” Uninvited, he sat down on one of the chairs in front of her desk. “You weren’t there. You have no idea what it was like. I was supposed to kill Tom and the others. Icheb was dead.”
“Since when was Icheb even there? The computer gave me a list of those who were off-ship. Icheb was not among those missing.”
Chakotay ran a hand through his hair. “He appeared when Harry returned to us. One of the people I was leading, or trying to lead, they shot him. He was dead before he hit the ground.” Pleading eyes looked up at his friends. “Q offered. What was I supposed to do? Let them all die in front of me?”
Kathryn took her own seat and sighed. No, he couldn’t have done, and if the truth were known, she wouldn’t have either. But did the way out have to be that option? “You’ve been given a big responsibility,” she said quietly. “What are you going to do?”
“In all honesty, I don’t know.”
“From what I’ve gathered, those powers are unlimited. You could do whatever you wanted; the temptation would be strong. Maybe too strong. Chakotay, as your captain, and your friend, I am asking you not to use them. At all. Do you understand me?”
He nodded. “I think so. We have absolutely no way of knowing the extent of them. And,” he smiled a little sheepishly, “I’m not even sure I know how to use them properly.”
“Thank you.”
PART 2
For the next week, Chakotay stuck by his word. Kathryn could see it was difficult with every problem in engineering, or with the tears of a young girl who had lost her Flotter doll. It would have been so very easy to solve B’Elanna and Naomi’s problems, but he let the engineering team do their work and Flotter turned up in a dark corner of the messhall.
Voyager came across a damaged vessel while travelling in an uninhabited region of the Delta Quadrant. Its engines were off-line and life signs were weak. The captain immediately ordered an away team over to it in order to help the wounded. Chakotay led the team.
In many ways it was a successful first contact. Lieutenant Torres and a small group of engineers were able to patch up much of the damage that had been caused initially. Unfortunately, in the time that had elapsed between Voyager receiving the distress call and the away team actually reaching it, the ship suffered a severe computer malfunction that was centred in its medical facility. Ensign Kim and the Doctor were immediately dispatched with another group, but it wasn’t in time to save a small girl who had been very ill. Chakotay was present in sickbay at the time of the girl’s death and took the loss hard.
“I could have done something,” he raged to the captain in her ready room. “I could have spared her parents from the grief they’re going through.”
Kathryn attempted to persuade him to sit down. Chakotay either didn’t hear her or chose to ignore her words since he continued to pace back and forth along the room’s upper level. His fingers ran through his hair and his face was creased into heavy lines of guilt. Finally he stopped, and leaned on the railing, glaring at her. “I could have saved her life.”
She nodded from her seat at her desk. “I realise that.” She was conscious of the fact that she was treading a very fine line. “What stopped you?”
“I…” He ran his hand through his hair again before letting the words tumble out in a rush. “I don’t know. You, you did. My promise to you. I don’t break my promises, Kathryn. But god, Kathryn,” he moved backwards and sunk down onto the couch, “she could have lived.”
Kathryn sighed and silently berated Q for the mess he’d created with his antics. She knew that Chakotay would be haunted for the rest of his life by what happened, and yet, if he had saved the girl, what then? Would the people he’d helped have heralded him as a miracle worker or an evildoer? Would it have been the opening of the proverbial floodgates? And then she realised something else, that Chakotay would have hated himself for breaking his promise to her. It had been a no-win situation, one that she’d had no right to create.
She stood up and walked around her desk to the steps leading to the upper level. She ascended them slowly, as though taking her time might let her finalise the words she was about to say. When she was finally standing in front of him, she took a deep breath. “Chakotay, look at me,” she commanded quietly. He looked up at her and her heart broke at the ashen face and the pain so clearly reflecting in his eyes. She swallowed. “Chakotay, I’m sorry.”
“What for?” His voice was leaden, heavy with guilt and confusion.
“I had no right to hold you to such a promise. Only you can best decide what is right for you.”
“But you were doing what was right for your ship, weren’t you, Captain?” The words were bitter to her ears.
“And for my crew.” She couldn’t deny him. “But I do trust you, Chakotay. Believe me.”
“So what are you saying?”
“I’m releasing you from that promise. Do what you think is right.” She turned and walked back to her desk. Seconds later she heard her door open and close; he had left the room.
Chakotay called a meeting of the senior staff, as well as Icheb, to tell them what had happened during Q’s games. They sat quietly around the observation room table, listening without interruption as he described the choice that Q had given him, how he had realised there was no choice to be made once Icheb had been killed. He had allowed Q to present him with this twisted gift. Subsequent events had led Chakotay to numerous conclusions, each of them in direct opposition to another.
“So I finally made a decision. I will use them once and no more.”
Kathryn’s eyebrows shot up. “Once, Chakotay?”
He nodded solemnly. “I don’t care what Q does after that, but my mind is made up. I’m going to get us home.”
Several pairs of eyes blinked at him, but no one said anything.
“Well?” Chakotay asked. “Isn’t anyone going to say anything?”
Kim shuffled awkwardly in his seat. “No offence, Commander. But you can leave me here. I’ve been back to Earth when I wasn’t supposed to. It’s not very fun.”
“What will happen to the Maquis?” B’Elanna asked quietly. “I know the captain has been talking to Starfleet, but do we have a decision from them?”
Kathryn shook her head. “Not yet, Lieutenant. I think they consider us too far away to have to make a decision so soon.”
The engineer folded her arms over her chest. “Then you can leave me behind with Harry.”
“Me too.” Tom was stubborn; he wasn’t going anywhere without his friends. Kathryn couldn’t blame him; there was nothing for him waiting back on Earth.
“What?” Chakotay shouted. “I thought you all so desperate to get home.”
Kathryn decided to intervene. “We’re determined, Commander,” she told him, putting a heavy emphasis on his title, “not desperate. I think we would all rather make this journey ourselves, without a Q’s help.” She looked at him. “I’ve had the opportunity to think about what I would do, if I had the chance. The first thing might be to get home. But what if we didn’t even have to be in the Delta Quadrant to begin with? What if we could go back and change time? Would you do that, Chakotay?”
“If that’s what you wanted.”
“Changing time is complicated. Where do you draw the line?” She stood up and walked over to the computer screen. “Would you change it so Gul Evek wasn’t chasing you into the Badlands, or would there be no Gul Evek? What if you could remove the Cardassians completely?” She turned so that she not only faced Chakotay but also their senior crew. “Think of the lives that would be changed. Tom would still be in a bar in Marseilles, for example.”
The pilot grimaced. “Actually, I’d probably be dead.”
One by one, Kathryn walked behind her crew, hypothesising as to where each person could be if the Cardassians hadn’t existed. It wasn’t a pretty picture that she painted. Seven and Icheb would still be Borg drones, the Doctor a program used only intermittently with no chance for self-improvement. Even Kes and Neelix were included. The Kazon would most likely have killed both of them. “Even my life would have been changed completely,” she told him quietly. “And Harry,” she paused, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder, “he might have a stunning career in Starfleet for all we know. But he might also have been killed in the Borg offensive we received details of in the recent mail call.”
“We don’t know that,” Chakotay protested, but it was a protest without heart. He leaned over the empty chair in front of him, the chair he had vacated early on in the meeting. He glanced down at it for a long time, gripping the edge of it as though it were holding him upright. Finally, he nodded and looked up.
“You’re right,” he said, taking a slow look around the table. “Where do you draw the line?”
“The answer becomes easier if there is no line to draw,” Tuvok told him.
Chakotay acknowledged the comment with a nod of the head and a swallow. “How can I change what the spirits ordained? It’s foolish.” He took a big sigh and pushed himself away from the chair. “I don’t want this ‘gift.’ It can only cause nothing but pain.”
“Gah. You’re absolutely no fun.” Q appeared, sitting on the narrow window ledge. “Really, Chuckles. And there I was thinking I was doing you a favour.” He huffed. “Apparently I wasted my time.”
Chakotay turned to him and smiled. “Actually, you didn’t. It reaffirmed to me how important everyone here is to me, and how important my place is here. I probably should thank you.”
Q made a face. “There’s no need to kill yourself over it,” he responded. “Kathy would probably not like me terribly much if that happened. Ah well,” he said, standing up. “I suppose it was worth a shot. Of course, you don’t realise what you could have become.”
“Like you?” Kathryn asked, a half smile gracing her features.
“Well, they do say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.” He took a disparaging glance over at the first officer. “What was I thinking? Very well,” Q waved his right hand in the air, “he can go back to being ordinary,” his nose wrinkled, “and boring.”
He disappeared as quickly as he had come.
Over dinner that night Chakotay was unusually silent. Finally, as they sat over their coffee, Kathryn asked him what was wrong.
He shook his head. “I just keep thinking about everything you said today. It sounded as though you’d really thought about it.”
Kathryn took a mouthful of coffee and swallowed. “I suppose I have. I’ve asked myself what I would change if I could about the way life has gone, and the answer has always come down to absolutely nothing.”
“Even with the heartache and pain?”
She smiled sadly. “I have a lot of good memories to go with the bad,” she said slowly. “But when I think about what I have now,” she put the mug back on the table, “I wouldn’t change a thing. After all, if I did then I wouldn’t be here with you.”
Chakotay looked down at the table. “Even if I am ordinary and boring?”
“Oh, Chakotay,” Kathryn breathed as she reached out a hand to grasp his as it lay on the table, “you’re never ordinary.” She smiled. “And you’re never boring. Not to me.”
FINIS
Back to The Edge