by Star Trek
Vorik stood perfectly still, his eyes closed, his head lifted slightly. The Doctor thought he saw the faintest hint of a smile playing across the ensign’s face, but that seemed unlikely. Vorik reminded him of nothing so much as himself, when he stood alone in his sickbay on a quiet morning listening to Mozart or Puccini.
Moments later, Vorik nodded his head, still entranced. He did not open his eyes until he had removed his hands from Tuvok’s face, but when he did, they burned with a fire he had seen only once before in the ensign, a tempestuous passion that could have been mistaken by a less experienced hologram for the onset of the Pon farr.
“I have been asked to relay two messages, Doctor,” Vorik said evenly, his calm, cold voice bringing the more typical mask of Vulcan restraint over the rest of his face.
“By all means,” the Doctor replied, not bothering to hide his annoyance.
“Tuvok intends to complete this transformation. He does not wish you to take any further steps to prevent it.”
“That’s the message?” the Doctor said pointedly. “Was there anything else? Perhaps something I hadn’t already intuited from Tuvok’s behavior over the past ten hours?”
“You will not understand,” Vorik replied, crossing to the Doctor and gazing at him with something that resembled pity.
“Try me, Ensign.”
“Are you familiar with the Vulcan principle of the Kol-ut-shan?” he asked.
“It means infinite diversity in infinite combinations,” the Doctor answered matter-of-factly. “For most Vulcans it is a philosophical concept or a focus for meditation. However, I believe that there are certain Vulcan…what would be the word…. mystics…. who have gone so far as to suggest that it is also a state of being which a Vulcan may aspire to. Of course this experiential Kol-ut-shan is practically impossible to achieve, not unlike a human mystic achieving Nirvana, or the Questran notion of Sloumantica.”
Vorik’s next words were difficult for the Doctor to accept, despite the uncharacteristic passion that burned behind the young Vulcan’s eyes as he said them. “Once the transformation is complete, Tuvok will live as one with the new life-form that is gestating within him. In this state he will achieve Kol-ut-shan. What is happening to Tuvok is a gift. It is not something any Vulcan would willingly refuse.”
“Does he also understand that his body will die? What use is it to experience infinite diversity in infinite combinations if one won’t be around long enough to enjoy it?”
“But he will,” Vorik replied, the light flaming again in his eyes. “The man we have known as Tuvok will die, but his katra, his essence, all that makes him truly what he is, will survive. We will suffer, but he will never again know the torment of life…only its possibilities.”
The Doctor frowned.
Vorik’s words painted a pretty picture. What he described was something akin to the fulfillment of his most secret desire to actually become human. But he could not believe such a thing was really possible.
“That is comforting to know, Ensign,” he finally replied. “Especially since there is precious little I can to do prevent it.” Tossing his tricorder on the workstation, he was about to raise the forcefield again when it occurred to him to ask, “What was the second message?”
“Before his body dies, Tuvok wishes to speak to someone called Assylia.”
Janeway stood on a gently sloping rise above a dimly lit plain. The field below was awash with chaotic activity. It was a battle. That was easy enough to see. The two opposing sides appeared to be equally matched. The dying lay strewn about like discarded playthings.
She turned to see Phoebe standing beside her.
There were a thousand questions she wanted to ask.
What was this place?
How did this moment fit into the picture that was coming dimly into focus, the image of the Nacene, fighting among themselves to find the solution to the problem posed by the strings?
She wondered whether or not this struggle was still ongoing, until a deeper fear struck her.
Perhaps this was a vision not of the past, but of the future…a future in which she now had a hand to play.
A flutter of motion caught Janeway’s eye. Turning to look over her shoulder, she saw a vast army arrayed behind Phoebe, standing on the rise, watching the battle below, just as she was. She recognized some of them…which was to say, she recognized their species. Among the throng were Hirogen, Borg, Ocampa, Illiderians…almost every race she had encountered in her voyage through the Delta Quadrant, and countless others she could not name.
One of them who vaguely resembled a Monorhan male pushed his way through the throng, and called to those assembled in a commanding voice, “Where will you stand?”
The assembly stared blankly at him. It was as if they were all certain that to enter the fray unleashed on the field was certain death, and though they clearly had a stake in the outcome, they were unwilling to sacrifice themselves to assure their victory.
“We are one!” the Monorhan cried again. “We have experienced life beyond time and know now that our infinite existence was still too small. The Others will force you to choose between slavery and exile. I would make another choice, here and now. I would choose victory!”
Janeway felt her heart rise to the call of this stranger’s words. Though she had no obvious personal stake in the outcome of this battle, the force of his passions called out to her to stand with him and face death rather than shrink from this fight.
But the faces of the listeners did not flame with the same passion Janeway felt surging within her. It was difficult to place a single name on so many disparate and alien expressions, but the best description that came to Janeway’s mind was pity.
Turning his back to the others in defiance, the valiant and doomed speaker ran to the edge of the cliff and leaped. Though from this height Janeway could only assume that he had already met a violent death when he fell to the ground below, moments later she saw him clearly join the battle.
Finally it dawned on her that, like Phoebe, these must all be Nacene who had taken other forms. In their more “natural” state, they appeared as flowing masses of translucent energy like the thousands who were engaging one another on the field below.
In a flash of light, something shot upward from amid the Nacene assembled behind Janeway, and took flight into the sky. It was a strange sight, a star rising with the same speed it might have fallen from the heavens. Moments later, other members of the crowd began to follow. For a dazzling minute, the sky was filled with their beautiful exodus. Many of those on the battlefield turned to witness the spectacle. Once the last had fled, the battle was resumed, though it seemed to Janeway that this desertion had given one side energy and enthusiasm to pursue their ends that had been absent in the more evenly matched battle that had been waged moments before.
Janeway and Phoebe were alone upon the rise.
“Why didn’t they follow him into battle?” Janeway demanded.
“We were afraid,” Phoebe replied simply. “We wanted to live…. to explore…it is our nature. We did not understand that this was our moment. In Exosia, time does not force us to make such choices.”
Exosia?
Janeway had heard that word before.
“Exosia is your realm?” she asked.
“It is our home.”
“Wait a minute,” Janeway interjected hastily. “When we encountered the Caretaker’s mate, Suspiria, we were told that Exosia was her realm. It was the place she went to when she wasn’t present with the Ocampa she had taken to her array.”
“Who told you that?” Phoebe asked with barely concealed contempt.
“The Ocampa who led us to her…his name was…Tanis, I believe,” Janeway replied, annoyed.
“Then he was misinformed,” Phoebe said flatly.
“I beg your pardon?”
“The Nacene you knew as Suspiria was a liar,” Phoebe said. “I am certain she was attempting to reenter Exosia…she was probably using the life forc
e and abilities of the…what did you call them…?”
“Ocampa…”
“Yes, the Ocampa, to create some crude key of her own. But she has been barred from Exosia along with the rest of us for tens of thousands of your years. Whatever the Ocampa who followed her were told…whatever they believed…neither she nor any of them would ever have been capable of entering Exosia without us and the Key.”
Janeway considered this and spared a moment of regret for those Suspiria had misled before another question rose to the surface of her mind.
“Did you say Suspiria was a liar…. as in, she is no longer…” Janeway let the thought trail off.
“I can no longer sense her among us.”
“Then she’s dead?” Janeway asked, as the faint hope of ever encountering her again and perhaps helping her to see reason and return Voyager to the Alpha Quadrant started to fade.
“Not as you understand it. But I am confident that if Exosia was her goal, the Others have found a way to put a stop to her efforts that would be more permanent than death.”
Janeway paused and looked again at the tumultuous field. “Is this a vision of Exosia?” Janeway asked, taking in every detail of the field and the outcropping of rock on which she stood.
Phoebe smiled.
“Of course not. You could not survive there in your present form. Our existence there is beyond you. This is the place between…the place where the last battle was fought and lost.”
Janeway struggled to piece together the fragments of information she had gleaned through her journeys with Phoebe.
“Let me see if I have this right,” she said. “You and the Others were once in Exosia, where you discovered the strings. You learned to interact with them and somehow that knowledge allowed you to leave Exosia and enter our dimension?”
“We played with them, as you played with your toys when you were a child. But as you saw, to touch one, was to disrupt them all.”
“So the strings which somehow form the fabric of all space-time were disrupted by your…play?” Janeway asked, incredulous.
“We meant no harm,” Phoebe replied.
Neither would a five-year-old who picked up a phaser, Janeway thought. But that wouldn’t change the outcome at all.
“Be that as it may, you created the imbalance and your choice to remain in our dimension so that you could continue playing forced the Others to close the gateway between Exosia and our dimension to prevent the imbalance from getting any worse?”
“Yes,” Phoebe replied.
“What is the nature of the imbalance?” Janeway asked.
“You have seen part of it for yourself,” Phoebe answered.
Janeway thought back. She had forced the children out of her mother’s home, just as some of the strings must have been forced from Exosia when the opening between Exosia and what Janeway considered normal space-time was created.
The light.
Suddenly she remembered vividly the strange glowing balls that had approached the house once the children were gone, and the icy inexplicable terror their presence created in her.
“It has to do with photonic energy, doesn’t it?” Janeway theorized.
“It does,” Phoebe replied. “There can be no photonic energy within Exosia. It is disruptive to our natural state. Before the gateway was closed, it began to bleed into our existence in a way that was…dangerous.”
Turning again to the battlefield, Janeway realized that the struggle had ended. A host of Nacene—the victors, she did not doubt—were rising into the sky, much like those who had abandoned the fierce and valiant warrior who had tried to lead them. As they did so, the landscape began to take on a form that was somehow familiar. What had been an anonymous rock face and a barren field took on a more specific quality. The colors…the textures…she could not put her finger on this place, but she knew beyond a doubt that the familiarity was real.
A lone figure rose from among the dead. It was the vaguely Monorhan warrior. He cried out in a voice that echoed throughout this new creation. In any language, the sound would have communicated clearly his utter despair.
As his cry died out, two stars rose above the horizon. Janeway had spent several days analyzing them and knew them at once. They were the two suns of the Monorhan system, Protin and the Blue Eye. But even with her naked eyes, Janeway could see that the Blue Eye at its birth in no way resembled the warped, collapsed star they had discovered only a few days earlier.
“Monorhan space was the place…in between,” Janeway said in recognition. “It was the first place in our space-time that was damaged by your play, wasn’t it?” she asked.
“It was. Those of us who remained behind chose exile rather than return. This reality was created after the Others had retreated to Exosia. Life was not meant to exist here. The Others had forbidden it.”
“But why?” Janeway asked. “Why not return to Exosia with the Others?”
“And spend eternity tending to the strings?” Phoebe asked.
Janeway remembered the strange figure seated in the chair and its constant fruitless sewing. Compared to Phoebe and her fellow Nacene, those who were actively engaged in constructing and deconstructing an entire universe, she could easily understand Phoebe’s choice, however irresponsible it might have been.
Another thought struck her.
“You said life was not meant to exist here. But Monorha is filled with life. How did that happen?” she asked.
“Our life gave life to this place. It is of us, though the creatures that arose once we had left are not,” Phoebe replied.
“Is that why the Monorhans, and the ships that they built using their natural resources cannot leave this system?” Janeway asked.
“They are anomalous, just as you consider this region of space to be anomalous,” Phoebe answered. “They should not exist here. The one that gave our potential for life to them did not foresee that the very life he gave them would bind them to this place for all eternity. Though that which is impossible exists here through his will, that will did not stretch beyond the gateway and could not sustain them beyond its borders.”
“Who is the one that you are speaking of?” Janeway asked.
“Look…”
Janeway turned again to the field. The single Monorhan-looking Nacene was moving among the dead. As he did, he collected them, gathering up their remains and forming them into an object he held firmly with both hands.
“The Key,” Janeway said in utter disbelief.
“Yes,” Phoebe answered.
“And what does the Key do?” Janeway asked.
“It was created so that when we learned from this existence how to solve the problem, how to balance the strings without destroying this dimension or countless others, we could return home and share our knowledge with the Others. Without it, those who remained behind and undertook this great cause will be trapped here forever. The Key opens the conduit, and is the only safe way for us to return home.”
Janeway didn’t want to sympathize with Phoebe. The reckless abandon with which her entire species had wreaked havoc on their own dimension and now hers, was unpardonable. But the simple truth of Phoebe’s words resonated in a way she could not help but relate to.
Home.
Every moment of whatever life Janeway had left would be selflessly devoted to the same quest. Here, at least, she finally met Phoebe on a small shard of common ground.
“If the Key was made by your kind and left here to be used when you had collected the knowledge you seek, why am I important?” she asked.
“It was unforeseen,” Phoebe replied. “The Key lives still…in its way…and has the right to choose its owner.”
“How is that possible?” Janeway asked. “The first Nacene we encountered, the entity known as the Caretaker, told us he was dying. The form that he reverted to at the end…that was death, wasn’t it?”
“In this dimension, yes,” Phoebe replied. “We are eternal, but the longer we stay here, the more energy is re
quired to sustain our existence. The entity you encountered waited too long. Had he returned to Gremadia, he would have found the energy he required to continue his existence in his chosen form. But he has never known death as you understand it.”
Suddenly another truth was clear to Janeway. “That’s why you built the array, isn’t it?” Janeway posited.
“Gremadia is a place where all the exiles must return from time to time in order to replenish themselves if they wish to continue their explorations.”
“And those who do not…”
“Some have chosen to cease the struggle. They wait at Gremadia for our number to be complete again and for the conduit to be opened when the Time of Knowing is upon us.” Phoebe answered. “Those who fell on the field of battle were forced to remain behind. They lacked sufficient energy to rediscover their true form. The formation of the Key was a gift given to them by the one I have spoken of; the one we call the Light.”
“The one who tried to lead you?”
Phoebe nodded.
“Kind of ironic name, isn’t it?” Janeway mused.
Ignoring her, Phoebe went on, “The form he gave them is a vague reflection of the oneness they knew in Exosia. And only in that form can they continue to exert any kind of will. Through that power, they choose their owner. They first chose a Monorhan called Dagan. They did not understand that their choice would kill him. The Monorhans feared the Key, and locked it away. By refusing to touch it, they also denied the Key the right to choose its next owner.”
“Why is it necessary for the Key to have an owner?”
“So that there will always be one with the power to open the conduit. Without that, there is no hope for any of us.”