PART D

GRAVITY : Episode 107 : portrayed in several parts

Tuvok, meditating.

Paris interrupts Tuvok's meditation. Paris: "Tuvok! Hey!" Tuvok: "I am meditating, Mr Paris." Paris: "I don't care." Tuvok: "I trust there is an urgent reason for your lack of courtesy?" Paris: "You're damn right there is. What did you say to her?" Tuvok: "Our conversation was private." Paris: "Well, whatever you said she's talking about leaving, going off by herself because it's too painful to be around you." Tuvok: "She is under the influence of unfettered emotions." Paris: "Huh. Well, maybe you're able to fetter your emotions, but the rest of us don't have that luxury. She is a living, breathing woman who, for reasons I can't begin to fathom, has fallen in love with you. Now, if you're incapable of returning her feelings, at least show her some compassion, try to let her down easy." Tuvok: "There is no easy way to recover from infatuation." Paris: "Oh really, and what do you know about infatuation?" Tuvok: "More than you might imagine." Paris: "Enlighten me." Tuvok: "I have no intention of continuing this conversation any further." Paris: "Come on, Tuvok, come on. It's just you, me and the rocks!" Tuvok: "When I was a young man I experienced an emotional attraction toward a woman. It nearly destroyed me." Paris: "Your wife?" Tuvok: "No. Her name was Jara, a Terellian female. I would have violated every tenet of Vulcan philosophy simply to be near her." Paris: "She must have really been something." Tuvok: "I lost all sense of who I was. The emotional attraction I felt for her became a kind of insanity." Paris: "Tuvok, everyone feels a little insane when they fall in love, but it's worth the risk." Tuvok: "For you perhaps, but I am Vulcan. My natural emotions are erratic, volatile. If I don't control them, they will control me." Paris: "Whatever happened to Jara?" Tuvok: "I chose to leave her. I spent several months in isolation studying with a Vulcan Master. I learned to suppress my emotions." Paris: "Too bad."

They are interrupted by disturbances in the atmosphere. Tuvok uses his tricorder to scan them.
Tuvok: "Gravimetric distortions."
Paris: "What's causing them?"
Tuvok: "Unknown."
They leave the area.

On the Bridge's main viewscreen the attempt by Yost's ship to seal the anomaly are observed. Kim: "No response to our hails, Captain." Seven: "At this rate their anti-graviton beam will seal the distortion in approximately 29 minutes." Janeway: "Transporter status?" Torres: "I've completed the reconfiguration but we'll only be able to relay one transporter beam through the probe." Chakotay: "We'll have to get Tom and Tuvok within two metres of their distress beacon." Janeway: "Harry?" Kim: "I've opened a channel." Janeway begins her message: "Voyager to away team."

Paris: "What is it?" Tuvok: "The distress beacon. We're receiving a transmission." Paris to Noss: "Can you route it through your com. system?" Noss works the controls on the console. Paris: "If I'm right, this message was sent almost nine hours ago on a very slow carrier wave." Doctor: "Can you speed it up?" Paris: "I'll try." Janeway's distorted signal: "Voyager to away team. A transporter beam with a radius of two metres will activate at the co-ordinates of your distress beacon in exactly thirty minutes." Doctor: "Thirty minutes? That would've been over eight hours ago." Paris: "Shh. There's more." Janeway's distorted signal: "Be advised: we've detected a temporal differential between our two positions. According to our calculations the differential ratio is .4744 seconds per minute. Repeat: Voyager to away team. A transporter beam with a radius of two metres-" Tuvok, reading from his tricorder: "According to that formula, thirty minutes would translate to two days, eleven hours and forty-seven seconds." Doctor: "Well, we've waited this long." Noss is looking through her binoculars. "Tom!" She hands him the binoculars so that he can observe too. Scavengers, members of Yost's species, scurry about outside and one sets an explosive charge which rocks the ship. Tuvok: "The forcefield is holding." Paris: "Not for long if they keep pelting us with these photon grenades." Doctor: "How are we supposed to hold them off for two more days?"

Yost's ship continues to fire an anti-graviton beam at the anomaly in continuous short bursts.
Seven: "The rift will be sealed in less than two minutes." Janeway: "Move us into range. Stand by for transport." Torres, at the science station. "Yes, ma'am."

On the planet surface, inside the ship, the away team and Noss are under siege by a force of scavengers.
Paris: "Forcefield's losing power."
Tuvok: "Time?"
Doctor: "We've still have another hour before transport."
Noss starts towards the exit.
Tuvok to Noss: "Where are you going?"
Noss: "To repair the field generator."
Tuvok: "I will accompany you."
Noss: "No. You stay. Prepare for the attack."
Tuvok: "You can't go alone."
Noss: "Risking two lives would be illogical."

On Voyager's bridge.
Chakotay: "We're in transporter range."
Janeway: "Link up with the probe and relay the signal."
Torres, at the science station: "Stand by. I've got a lock on their beacon."
Janeway: "They're supposed to be ready for transport in thirty-two seconds. Let's hope they don't stand us up. Begin twenty second countdown on my mark. Now."

Doctor: "We've got less than ten minutes to transport."
Paris: "Where the hell is Noss?"
Tuvok moves toward the exit: "I'll find her."

When the field generator gives out Noss is attacked by two scavengers. She phasers one but the other (on the left in the righthand picture) knocks her to the ground.

As the scavenger moves in for the kill, Tuvok arrives in the nick of time and phasers him.

Noss: "Tuvok." Tuvok: "I could not leave you behind."

See Episode Index for info about the Vulcan symbol featured in the page design.