Basics
Episodes 42 and 43

 

SUMMARY: The Kazon-Nistrim make a concerted assault on Voyager, and the crew learn to live with only the basics on a primitive planet. Tuvok is working to rehabilitate the mentally unstable Lon Suder, a crewman who murdered fellow-crewmember Frank Darwin (ref. [#32 Meld]). Suder wants to overcome his violent nature and is taking meditation lessons from Tuvok to control his violent impulses. As a thank you, Suder names an orchid he has bred after Tuvok. Suder also suggests turning his confinement quarters into an airponics laboratory to intensify food production as he wants "to do something for the ship". Tuvok says the Captain's permission must first be obtained. Suder, with Tuvok in the background, in Suder's confinement quarters Seska's desperate message Chakotay receives a desperate subspace message from Seska. She has given birth to the child that was apparently fathered with DNA she stole from him, and she claims that Maje Culluh is going to take her son away. The message is cut off as her secret transmission is discovered. Chakotay is torn. Knowing Seska is untrustworthy, he fears she could be leading Voyager into a trap. Janeway concurs but pledges the crew's support and urges him to consider the matter most carefully. He goes on a vision quest to consult the spirit of his father Kolopak, and comes to realise that if it is truly his child, whether conceived willingly or not, he owes the baby his help. The senior staff meet and as they plan for the rescue mission they decide to program the deflector grid and install holo-emitters along the hull with parabolic mirrors so as to project decoys in the form of holographic Talaxian ships in the likely event of a Kazon trap. They set out to find Seska. Janeway and Tuvok visit Suder so she can hear Suder's proposal. She receives the proposal positively and says she will consider the matter, but Suder almost blows it by demanding an immediate decision, not realising his rudeness, and Janeway's demeanour cools. Tierna, in Sickbay En route to find Seska, the crew find and take on board Tierna, one of Seska's aides, from a damaged drifting Kazon shuttle filled with noxious fumes. The Doctor saves Tierna from certain death, and Tierna tells Chakotay that Culluh killed Seska when he found out the child was not his own and that Tierna managed to survive by bribing a guard and stealing a shuttle. Voyager heads for the Gema IV colony where, according to Tierna, Culluh has sent Chakotay's son to be raised as a servant. Chakotay is suspicious of Tierna but can find no evidence that he is lying. On the way to Gema IV, Voyager suffers several short assaults from small Kazon ships that focus on the secondary command processors on Deck 12. Although the damage is relatively minor, the pattern of the attacks does raise their suspicions, and Tierna is detained in confinement quarters, next to Suder's own. When Janeway tells Paris to alter their course, Voyager is suddenly confronted with eight large Kazon vessels, clearly attempting to force them to take a particular direction. Refusing to be manipulated, Janeway decides to intercept the lead Kazon-Nistrim vessel. Employing the holographic decoys, Voyager manages to send most of the Kazon-Nistrim vessels at different targets, leaving Voyager only the lead vessel to fight. As the battle intensifies, Tierna deliberately triggers a massive explosion using chemicals smuggled aboard in his own body, acting as a suicide bomber to damage the ship. The ensuing explosion and damage caused also puts offline Voyager's decoys, and three of the previously distracted Kazon vessels return to attack. With the situation now desperate, Paris quickly leaves in a shuttlecraft to seek help from a neighbouring Talaxian colony, but his ship is hit by enemy fire, and Voyager loses contact with him. As Kazon-Nistrim soldiers board the crippled starship through the shuttlebays, Janeway attempts to initiate the self-destruct sequence. But the damage to the secondary command processors renders the sequence inoperative, revealing the ploy behind the earlier attacks. With no other options, Janeway is forced to surrender. Paris ducks weapons fire from the attacking Kazon-Nistrim but then Voyager loses contact with him crippled Voyager surrounded by Kazon-Nistrim vessels A victorious Culluh and Seska, who is still very much alive, take command of the ship. The Voyager crew realise that Seska's distress call to Chakotay was all part of the plan. As Seska, holding her baby, taunts Chakotay, Chakotay learns that Seska has kept from Culluh how the baby was conceived (by lying that Chakotay raped her). As Chakotay and the other prisoners are led away, Seska says a final farewell. Culluh and Seska with the captured Bridge personnel, surrounded by Kazon-Nistrim soldiers Seska shows Chakotay his son. He says: "May he grow up never knowing the contempt his father has for his mother." Culluh strands the crew on the primitive planet Hanon IV to deprive them of technology Culluh's soldiers search Voyager and round up the crew, unaware that the Doctor has secretly deactivated himself for twelve hours and that Suder is in hiding. Culluh lands Voyager on a primitive and seismically active planet (Class M but in a Pliocene stage of evolution thus similar to Earth several million years ago), and strands them there without combadges or other technology, which he believes is a fitting end for those who depend on technology as he challenges them to survive without it. As Janeway divides the crew into groups to search for food and shelter, they espy some primitive humanoids watching them from a distance. The crew do not notice that they have been seen by another native species - a large carnivorous creature (a Hanonian land eel). a Hanonian land-eel primitive native humanoids observe the newcomers Voyager departs, leaving the Voyager crew standed on the primitive planet. Voyager leaves the planet, watched by its crew. This is where Episode 42 ends, ending Season 2; and where Episode 43 begins, starting Season 3. Stranded by the Kazon on a desolate planet ravaged by earthquakes and vicious cave creatures, the crew seeks food and shelter. Ensign Wildman's baby is ill but there are no medicines with which to treat her. Lieutenant Hogan, is ordered to collect bones he finds at the entrance to a cave. No one realises at the time that the cave is home to a land-eel. As Hogan collects the bones the land-eel attacks him. The crew find a sheltered area among rocks and on learning of Hogan's death Janeway orders that the caves are off-limits. The crew set about finding food, and making weapons which include wooden spears and wooden bows and arrows. Hogan Hogan starts to collect the bones Meanwhile, Paris has managed to evade the Kazon, and solicits help from the Talaxians who are commanded by one named Paxim. On Voyager, Seska takes her baby to Sickbay for a medical check-up where the Doctor surprises her by revealing from medical scans that her newborn baby is not Chakotay's child after all but was sired by Culluh. She comments that Culluh will be pleased but her tone indicates that she herself is not. As she leaves Sickbay, she orders the computer to deactivate the EMH. It does so but the Doctor immediately re-activates himself. Seska visits Sickbay with her baby the DNA scans prove that the baby was sired by Culluh, not by Chakotay the Doctor and Suder meet in Sickbay The Doctor discovers from the ship's computer that he is not the only member of the crew left on the ship, as Lon Suder, the sociopath whom Tuvok has been attempting to rehabilitate, is still aboard. The Doctor deletes record of Suder's combadge from the computer to conceal his presence from the occupying Kazon troops. The two join forces against the Kazon but, as they plot strategy, Suder expresses anxiety over the fact that he will probably need to kill Kazon to seize control of Voyager and he is afraid of returning to his violent ways. On the planet Hanon IV, primitive humanoid natives kidnap Kes and Neelix. Chakotay and a rescue party free them, but during their getaway they are forced to take cover in one of the dangerous caves but are trapped inside by the pursuing natives who keep watch at the entrance. Chakotay refuses the chief's offer of his woman in exchange for Kes, as Chakotay wants to rescue both Neelix and Kes Neelix, Kes and Chakotay start to walk away from the natives Chakotay leads his party further inside the cave in the hope of finding another exit. Another crewman is lost to the enormous eel-like creature that lives inside. a desperate Chakotay orders his party inside a cave even though there are signs that it is home to the same creature that killed Hogan the woken land-eel snatches one of the crewmen Janeway directs three crewmembers to distract and lure away the natives at the cave entrance. The natives pursue the three fleeing crewmembers, who allow themselves to be pursued back to the safety of the main crew camp. Chakotay's is thus able to escape the cave through the exit they entered. As they are being pursued by the land eel creature they have woken, they seal off the opening as they exit. On Voyager, Seska has realised the possible significance of the escaped Voyager shuttlecraft and insists that Culluh's men find it and destroy it. They receive a message that this has been done. But the message was false, sent by Paris to cover his tracks. As Paris heads back to Voyager with reinforcements, he piggy-backs the false message with a secret message to the Doctor, asking him to disable the secondary phaser couplings. Suder has been hiding inside the Jefferies tube network, using an old Maquis tricorder trick to avoid detection, but is forced to kill a Kazon-Nistrim soldier who finds him. He returns to Sickbay with the body where the Doctor hides it in a morgue stasis drawer. As Suder, deeply disturbed by having had to kill, returns to hiding in the Jefferies tube network, the Doctor tells him Paris' plan and that Suder must find weapons. Paris and the Doctor secretly communicate Seska, as a former Maquis, knows the tricorder trick and works out that there is a saboteur aboard. She confronts the Doctor, who claims that he is the only saboteur and that he killed the soldier. Seska disables his program. He goes offline before he can cripple the backup couplings, leaving Suder as the crew's last hope. Seska fires at the Doctor's holo-emitter controls and the Doctor goes offline On Hanon IV, the crew are forced to flee camp when a nearby volcano erupts, spewing smoke, dust and lava in their direction. As they do so, they see the native humanoids also fleeing. Suddenly the natives scream - the chief's woman is trapped on a rock amidst the lava flow. Chakotay manages to bring her to safety, earning the tribe's gratitude. The chief indicates that the crew should join his people on the trek to safety, and the two groups begin to make friends. the chief's woman, stranded on a rock in the lava flow at risk to himself, Chakotay carries the woman to safety After a pre-recorded message from the Doctor gives him words of encouragement, Suder heroically invades Engineering, overcomes his new-found concern about killing by phasering the Kazon there. He manages to disable the ship's secondary phaser couplings before being killed by a Kazon. the dying Suder manages to press the control to disable the secondary phaser couplings Attacking in his shuttlecraft, Paris knocks out Voyager's main phasers, and when Culluh tries to use the backup system, an overload caused by Suder's sabotage causes an explosion that mortally wounds Seska and several Kazon on the Bridge. Hearing her son crying in the Captain's Ready Room, Seska manages to reach him with her last strength. Culluh follows her and grieves to find her dead. As Paris and the Talaxians board Voyager, Culluh despairs, takes his baby and orders his men to abandon ship. Paris regains control of Voyager and heads to Hanon IV to retrieve the crew. the dying Seska reaches her baby Culluh finds Seska dead The crew are deepening their new-found friendship with the natives, and the native chief gives medicine to Wildman's baby that cures her. At that moment, Voyager returns. the native chief cures Wildman's baby using a native medicine USS Voyager returns to Hanon IV With the crew back aboard Voyager, Tuvok offers a Vulcan prayer of peace over Suder's body, and Chakotay sees Seska for the last time as she lies dead in Sickbay. Janeway sets a course away from their "old home" and resumes a course for their real home - Earth. the dead Suder and dead Seska in Sickbay Janeway and the crew resume their Voyager posts and the starship jumps to warp as it heads once more for Earth      SUDER: I only want to do something, something for the ship.    CULLUH AS HE STRANDS THE VOYAGER CREW: A fitting end for a people who would not share their technology. Let's see if you manage to survive without it.    JANEWAY: There's no time to worry about blame. Hogan was a fine officer and a good man. And our job is to make sure his death is the last one for a long time! I will not let this planet destroy my crew!    DOCTOR: We must do this together, Mr Suder. If you don't trust yourself yet, then trust me. I will help you any way I can. One hologram and one sociopath may not be much of a match for the Kazon, but we'll have to do.    TUVOK TO SUDER'S DEAD BODY: I offer you a Vulcan prayer, Mr Suder. May your death bring you the peace you never found in life.