PART E

 

In the Chez Sandrine holoprogram, the Doctor is having to fend off not one hologram (Sandrine) but two. Gaunt Gary: "Come on, pal, one lousy game, spot you six balls." Doctor: "I'm not programmed to play games."

Sandrine: "If he won't play pool with you and he won't make love to me, then as far as I'm concerned, he can mop the floor." Doctor: "You see these hands? These are surgeon's hands, created by the most sophisticated computer imaging technology available. They do not play games, and they do NOT mop floors!" Sandrine: "Then you are fired! I will find a new bartender." Doctor: "I really wish you would."

Kes re-enters the holoprogram. "Doctor." Doctor: "Please tell me you've had some success in re-initialising the holo-emitters." Kes: "I did exactly what you told me but it didn't work." The Doctor realises this, as he is still on the Holodeck and not back in Sickbay. "Of course not." Kes: "I'm starting to get worried about Neelix. What's taking them so long?" Sandrine: "Ah, trust me, cherie. You are better off without him." Pointedly: "All men are alike. In the end, they always break your heart."

Kim enters, supporting Janeway. Urgently: "Can I get some help here!" The Doctor helps lay Janeway on a couch where she lays, unconscious. "What happened to her?" Kim: "She came into contact with the spatial distortions in the Jefferies tube. She seemed fine for a couple of minutes, but then she started to fade in and out of consciousness."

Tuvok and Chakotay are walking along a corridor, using their tricorders.

At a junction, Tuvok heads right, while Chakotay is about to go straight on. Tuvok: "I believe we should go this way, Commander." Chakotay: "What, what makes you say that?" Tuvok: "If we are indeed trapped in some sort of labyrinth, then the logical course is to systematically eliminate all routes which do not lead us to our desired destination. The route that remains will be the correct one. Since we have been making a series of right turns, we should continue to do so until we are certain this path is not the proper one." Chakotay: "There's a flaw in your logic."

Tuvok: "How so, Commander?" Chakotay: "You're assuming there's a logical pattern to this maze we're caught in, but so far I haven't seen any evidence of that." Tuvok: "Even within chaotic systems, there is a pattern of limited predictability." Chakotay: "By the time we figure that pattern out, these distortions may have completely over-run the ship." Tuvok: "That is a possibility."

Chakotay: "The important thing is for at least one of us to make it back to the Bridge. So why don't you go your way and I'll go mine. That way we'll increase the chances that one of us will be successful." Tuvok: "As you wish, Commander."

They head in separate directions. But shortly afterwards, as Chakotay walks ahead, he sees Tuvok ahead of him!

Chakotay: "Tell me something, Tuvok. What does your logic tell you about navigating a maze that's constantly changing shape?"

Tuvok is puzzled.

Engineering. Paris: "Scanners check out." Torres: "Then we're ready to give it a try. Activate the auxiliary pattern buffers." Paris: "Pattern buffers activated." Torres: "Targetting the Bridge co-ordinates. Scanners locked. Energise."

They stand ready as an engineer activates the site-to-site transport.

In the Holodeck, the Doctor is using a tricorder to diagnose the unconscious Janeway's medical condition.

Gaunt Gary is at the pool table, about to play a shot.

Suddenly Paris and Torres materialise in Chez Sandrine, on top of the pool table!

Paris and Torres look around, surprised.

Gaunt Gary: "Would you mind moving your foot, Tommy boy? It's blocking my shot."

Torres is clambering off the pool table.

Chakotay: "Tell me you already made it to the Bridge, and you've come back here to give us a status report." Torres: "We locked onto the Bridge co-ordinates but this is where we ended up. None of you had any luck either?" Tuvok: "Not only has no one been able to reach the Bridge, but the Captain came into contact with the spatial distortion and is now unconscious." Torres and Paris look with concern over at Janeway. Chakotay: "That's not all. We lost Neelix too." Paris: "Lost him?" Chakotay: "He turned a corner, and he was just gone. We think the spatial distortions are continuously changing the configuration of the corridors." Torres: "Kes must be worried sick." Kim: "And it isn't just Neelix who's missing. Where's the rest of the crew?" Tuvok: "It is likely that they too are trapped in other parts of the ship, cut off from communication and unable to find their way out." Paris: "So what do we do now?" Chakotay: "This wave is obviously causing some kind of radical reconfiguration of the ship. We've got to try to reverse it. If not, we may never be able to get to the Bridge." Torres: "How are we supposed to reverse something we don't understand? No matter where we go, we end up here. Corridors are re-aligning, rooms are in the wrong place. What's the pattern?" Tuvok: "We would certainly benefit from having an accurate picture of what the ship currently looks like. That way we would have a better chance of getting where we want to go." Kim: "Maybe we could make a map." Chakotay: "Ensign?" Kim: "One good thing about all the wandering we've been doing is that we've been collecting a lot of tricorder data about the structural changes that have been taking place." Torres: "And if we fed all that information into the central database, the computer might be able to extrapolate a schematic of the ship as it's configured now." Chakotay: "What are we waiting for?" They head outside the Holodeck.

They are gathered outside the Holodeck, by the computer control panel.

Kim: "The computer has analysed all our tricorder data, so this ought to be pretty close to what it looks like now."

They look at the monitor display which shows Voyager as they have never seen it. Paris: "It's as if the entire ship is being compressed and twisted." Torres: "My guess is it's more than just a distortion ring. It looks like some sort of spatial implosion that's slowly crushing us."

Chakotay: "Look, this part of the ship seems unaffected."

Kim: "That's deck 6 where we are."

Tuvok: "Correct, Ensign. However, the area we occupying will not remain unaffected indefinitely."

Chakotay: "How long?" Tuvok: "Based on the rate of implosion thus far, I estimate the ring will crush deck 6 in approximately 68 minutes." They now realise the situation is a matter of life and death.

Back in Chez Sandrine they hold a council of war. Paris: "Is this implosion ring some kind of weapon? Are we under attack?" Kim: "Who'd want to attack us and why?" Tuvok: "There is no clear evidence of an intelligence behind the phenomenon. It is still possible we are dealing with a naturally occurring anomaly which does not conform to the known laws of physics." Torres: "Don't you think it's a little late to be speculating on who or what this thing is?! The important thing now is that we find out some way of stopping it." Chakotay: "B'Elanna's right. It seems to me we've got two options: one, we find a way to get ourselves out of this implosion ring; or two, we find some way of reversing it." Kim: "Invert the effect, turn the implosion into an explosion." Chakotay: "Exactly." Torres: "If I can get back to Engineering, I may be able to generate a shock pulse strong enough to do just that. Of course, I'd have to raise the pressure in the warp core to near critical." Kim: "A shock pulse of that magnitude would create a subatomic particle shower all over the ship." Tuvok: "Which could set off a chain reaction that would cause not only the ring to explode outward but Voyager along with it." Torres: "Not if I can precisely tune the shock pulse to the distortion frequency of the ring." Tuvok: "That will be exceptionally difficult." Torres: "If we don't give this a try, we're going to get crushed anyway. Personally, I'd rather go down fighting." Tuvok: "I must remind you that with the comm. system down, we will have no effective means of alerting the rest of the crew to a potentially lethal particle shower." Chakotay: "Do you have another suggestion, Mr Tuvok?" Tuvok: "I believe it would be safer to attempt to access the navigational array, and from there engage thrusters to steer us out of the ring." Kim: "Can't we try both?" Torres: "It's much too dangerous to have someone working at the navigational array during a shock pulse." Paris: "Besides, this ship is so contorted, there's no reason to expect we'd have any navigational control." Chakotay: "Alright, B'Elanna, let's give your plan a shot. You-"

Tuvok interrupts: "Commander Chakotay?" Chakotay: "Yes, Lieutenant?" Tuvok: "I feel compelled to point out that in my many years of experience as Captain Janeway's tactical officer, she often demonstrated a tendency to follow my-"

Chakotay sternly: "In case you haven't noticed, Captain Janeway's not in any condition to make decisions. I'm in command. Is that understood?" Tuvok: "Yes, sir." Chakotay: "Good." He resumes giving orders to Torres: "B'Elanna, you and Harry get down to Engineering. Evacuate whoever's on duty, then initiate the warp pulse. Move it."