The Autobiography of Kathryn Janeway

by Una McCormack

  “You know what the worst thing is, Fitz? It’s not reciprocated. Nothing I do annoys him. He just… always seems to find it lacking somehow.”

  “Kate, you run on intuition so much of the time,” said Fitz. “I bet he finds you damn irritating.”

  “Thanks, I think.” We were making light of the situation, but the truth was that my working relationship with Tuvok was troubling me. It seemed to me that he shot down every suggestion that I made—and, worse, he shot it down with logic. At heart, I am a scientist—I understand how to hypothesize, gather evidence, analyze that data, and provide measured conclusions or reasonable conjectures. But there was the other side to my personality; the side that I guessed Tuvok saw as irrational, but which I called instinct, hunch, gut feeling. Fitz was right: some of my best decisions have come from following my intuition. But Tuvok could see no place for this, and clearly seemed to think it was a fault. I knew that Paris was keeping an eye on things; for this reason, among others, I wanted to make this relationship work. But, most importantly, our mission was likely to take us into dangerous situations. We needed to function as a team. We needed to trust each other implicitly—and I wasn’t sure that Tuvok entirely trusted me.

  “Show him what you can do, Kate,” said Fitz.

  “You know, I think I will.”

  We had been out in the Arias system for a little over nine months. Our scientific mission was progressing well, although since this involved shifting in and out of the system regularly to examine other similar phenomena, our intelligence mission was, as a result, proving less successful. We knew there was Cardassian activity around here: we kept on picking up odd transmissions; nothing we could trace, but hint after hint that something was going on. The Cardassians denied everything, of course; any activity in this area would be a violation of agreements made about territorial expansion, but we didn’t believe them. We just couldn’t pin them down. At this point, however, we were all getting tired, and restive, and ready to head back to Starbase 22 for a break. But I just couldn’t let the matter go, and I kept turning it over in my mind.

  At the senior staff meeting before we were due to return to Starbase 22, Paris heard our reports, and then said with a sigh, “And are we any closer to working out what the Cardassians are doing out here?”

  All around the table heads were shaking. I raised my hand, and said, “I have a suggestion, sir.”

  His interest piqued, he said, “Go on, Janeway.”

  “I think we should take a look at the ninth moon of the ninth world.”

  Now everyone around the table was looking at me as if I’d jumped up on the table to show them my Charleston. The ninth world was a barren chunk of rock that would make Pluto feel overdressed. It was something of a joke on board. As for its ninth moon…

  “Another trip,” Paris said, doubtfully.

  I saw my colleagues agreeing. Everyone just wanted to get back to base.

  “He makes a good point, Janeway,” said Paris. “Any good reason we should drag all the way over there?”

  “I can give a reason, sir, but I’m not sure you’ll think it’s a good reason.”

  I saw a twinge of something—Amusement? Irritation?—pass across the captain’s face. “Try me,” he said.

  “It’s the ninth moon, sir. Of the ninth world.”

  “How’s that relevant?”

  “Cardassians like to do things in threes.”

  There was a pause. Fitz, sitting beside me, muttered something about me dropping by later for a checkup.

  “All right, Janeway,” said Paris. “Explain your thinking.”

  “Cardassians have a tendency to do things in threes. Look at how their government is organized: Central Command, Obsidian Order, Detapa Council. Look at the design of their insignia; damn it, even the architecture of places like Terok Nor. Their music: triple harmonies. Their art: all around a principle of triples—”

  “Are you a student of their culture, Lieutenant?” said Tuvok. Damn the man, I could never tell when he was sassing me.

  “No, but it does no harm to understand something about your…” I hesitated at saying the word enemy, and ended up with “your rivals for space and resources.”

  “They do things in threes…” Paris was shaking his head. “Tuvok. What do you think?”

  Tuvok shook his head. “This is not a logical reason to investigate, sir. Nor is it a logical reason to locate a base upon so remote a location—”

  “That’s part of my point!” I said. I was starting to enjoy myself. “It isn’t logical. It’s intuitive. It’s possibly superstitious. It might even be a kind of joke. These aren’t Vulcans we’re dealing with. They’re Cardassians! Whatever we might think of their ethics, they have a strong sense of aesthetics. The ninth moon of the ninth planet. We’ve been looking for a base. I bet it’s on that moon. It can’t be any moon of the third planet—because it’s got no moons.”

  Paris had been observing our exchange with great interest. “Well,” he said.

  “Sir,” said Tuvok. “I must advise against wasting time and effort on this. The crew is tired, we have been out here for some time, and everyone is ready for rest and relaxation.”

  “I know that what you’re saying makes sense,” said Paris. “But… they do things in threes. I can’t pass that up. We’ll set a course for that moon, and if we’re wrong…” His eyes gleamed. “I’ll send anyone who complains about the delay to their holiday over to you, Janeway.”

  “Sounds fair to me, sir,” I said.

  The meeting ended. “Follow me,” murmured Fitz. “You need your head examined.”

  * * *

  It was nearly six weeks before we were able to return to Starbase 22, but nobody was complaining. As we drew nearer to the ninth moon, we were able to pick up a steady stream of Cardassian transmissions. It turned out that this ninth moon of the ninth world in the Arias system was home to a Cardassian communications array and deep-space freighter repair station. The existence of this outpost was directly contrary to the terms of a nonexpansion agreement signed between the Federation and the Cardassian Union the previous year, the purpose of which was precisely to prevent the militarization of this part of the border. Well, of course the Cardassians were violating that agreement with this outpost, and of course this hidden outpost was on the ninth moon.

  We kept the Al-Batani out of reach of the outpost’s sensors, but close enough to be able to monitor transmissions. The Cardassians on that outpost were arrogant, and that made them sloppy. It took me and Tuvok no time to crack their encryption codes. It wasn’t long before we assembled the evidence that proved that the intention was to establish a larger base here, an outpost that would serve as spearhead for a larger Cardassian military presence to threaten Federation supply lines along this section of the border. We slipped away and were back on route to Starbase 22 just as the president was summoning the ambassador from the Cardassian Union to explain himself and his government.

  I was sitting in the rec room enjoying a drink with Fitz and some of my team when Tuvok appeared.

  “Lieutenant Janeway,” he said.

  “Commander Tuvok,” I replied. “Can I help you?”

  “No,” he said. “I wished simply to acknowledge that you were correct in your assessment of the situation, and that I was wrong. Your analysis was… impressive.”

  Well, he didn’t have to say this in front of other people, and that was impressive in its turn.

  “Not analysis,” said Fitz. “Intuition.”

  Tuvok tilted his head in acknowledgement. “So it seems.”

  “I’m just very relieved we didn’t have a wasted journey,” I said warmly.

  “So are the rest of the crew,” said Fitz.

  “Sit down and join us, Tuvok,” I said. “We’ll be breaking out the kadis-kot board in a little while. I’d like to see your game.”

  “I am not familiar with the game,” he said.

  I stood up and pushed out a chair. “You soon will be.”


  He did sit down with us, if a little stiffly, and watched us play the game for a while, whereupon he proceeded to defeat us all in multiple rounds. As we talked that evening, it turned out that we were both great admirers of Parvati Pandey.

  “I attended the admiral’s classes,” he said. “On—”

  “The Ethics of Command,” I finished up. “I attended those classes too.”

  He looked at me with interest. “Only the very best cadets were invited to those classes.”

  “I wasn’t such a bad cadet,” I said. “And I was only very briefly an arrogant ensign.”

  “You are neither a bad nor an arrogant officer,” he said.

  “Why, Tuvok!” I said. “That’s almost a compliment!”

  “Merely a statement of fact,” he said, and proceeded to win another game.

  I’m glad to say that after this, not only did we establish a cordial professional relationship, but we began to establish to a genuine rapport, a real friendship, and one that has stood me in good stead over the years. Tuvok would say, I think, that I changed his opinion of humans—although I do have a regrettable tendency to rely on intuition and insist on making decisions based on emotion and gut feeling. I take that, too, as a compliment.

  * * *

  That mission brought us several close encounters with Cardassians. I must admit that, however irrational this was, I still bore considerable anger toward their species as a result of the circumstances of my father’s death. I’d like to say that this was aimed specifically toward their government, but in all honesty at this time my antipathy had a more general focus. It was very easy to find oneself slipping into generalizations: that Cardassians were bloodthirsty, that they were duplicitous, that they were not to be trusted. Captain Paris came down hard on these sentiments whenever he heard them; such speciesism, he would say, should never be heard in the mouth of a Starfleet officer. But border wars are dirty fights: not outright hostilities, but sniping at each other, month after month, until respect is whittled away. My mother’s work with Bajoran refugees, to my mind, lent support to my sense that there was something fundamentally wrong with Cardassian society. It has been a long journey away from this prejudice, which I know was shared by many of my peers after the Setlik massacre and reinforced during the Dominion War.

  I did not experience the war, spending that time with my own business in another quadrant, and saw only the plight of the Cardassian Union after the murderous rampages of the Jem’Hadar. But my attitude had already undergone a substantial sea change during my time on the border on the Al-Batani. Strangely enough, this was during an actual firsthand encounter with the Cardassians at Outpost 936. Tuvok, myself, the second officer, Luis Martinez, and another officer had been sent down to a small outpost in the Retik system. There were only a dozen personnel there, at most, and we were providing technical assistance to upgrade their communications system. Nevertheless, we found ourselves under attack from the Cardassian Militia 29, part of the Sixth Order under the command of Gul Pa’Nak. (The Cardassians later claimed that we were the first to open fire; I will deny this until my dying day.)

  Communications with the outside world were cut off within the first few minutes of the attack (one reason to assume that this was planned rather than in response to any action of ours). We were under bombardment for the next three days, struggling to reopen communications and call for backup. We made good use of our resources, our defensible position, and our knowledge of the local terrain, and, after three days, struck back hard against the Cardassian unit attacking us. After a very long twelve hours, the Cardassians fell back. We sat and listened to the sounds of the brush around us—and then we heard the unmistakable sound of someone in pain. It wasn’t one of ours; it could only be one of theirs.

  We listened for a while. He was in agony.

  One of our ensigns was trying not to weep.

  Martinez said, “I can’t listen to this any longer. Janeway, take Ensign Sinclair and go get him. Bring him back.”

  “Luis,” I said, “that’s crazy! They’re waiting for us to go and get him! He’s bait!”

  “Whatever else he is, he’s someone in pain. Go and get him.”

  Well, I wasn’t quite tired enough to disobey a direct order, so Sinclair and I slipped out under cover of darkness, made our way to where our enemy lay shivering and dying, and gave him a sedative. I remember his eyes—bright and feverish, staring up at me. He was very young. Younger than one of our first-year cadets, and already in battle. I took his hand.

  “You’ll be all right,” I said. “We’re here to help you.”

  He passed out, mercifully. Sinclair and I got him on the stretcher and carted him back. While we’d been out there, they’d got the comms link working again. Reinforcements from the Al-Batani were on their way. Fitz transported down and took our prisoner back up to the ship to treat him, although he wasn’t in time to save the young man’s left arm. Later, once the outpost was secured, we went out into the brush again, looking for the dead. We found half a dozen bodies; none of them much older than the one we had saved. Back on the Al-Batani, I went to see our prisoner. His name was Tret Rekheny. He was an ordinary foot soldier, not even an ensign (or a glinn, as the Cardassians would say), and this was his first action. He was scared of us, and scared of what his commanding officers would do once we returned him to them. “They’ll think I gave them away,” he said. “The Order will want to see me. I don’t want to see them…” I realized that he was shaking with real terror at the thought of falling into the hands the Obsidian Order.

  There was little that we could do for him: there was a long-standing agreement that we returned theirs if they returned ours, even though poor Rekheny was not much to bargain with. He was with us for no more than a few days before he was well enough to send home. I saw him most days he was on board the Al-Batani. I remember hearing him chanting names, three times each. It was part of the Cardassian funeral rite, he said: naming the dead to remember them. I said, didn’t I, that they did things in threes. I found myself wondering about his friends, too, the lives behind those dead names. Who they were; where they’d come from; who would learn of their deaths, and whether they would be struck down by grief, the way that I had been when I heard about my father. I knew that I would never see Cardassians in the same way again. They felt pain, they grieved, they were afraid. For the first time ever, I felt compassion for the Cardassian people.

  I have often wondered what happened to our prisoner after he went back, and whether the Obsidian Order did indeed finish what the Central Command had started when they sent him out there to fight us in the first place. I doubt that he survived the Dominion War or the Jem’Hadar’s mass slaughter: very few of his rank did. Perhaps it was better if he did not live to see all the pain that followed. When it was time for him to leave the Al-Batani, an Order operative came over to collect him: a slick, supercilious man who put a possessive hand upon the young soldier’s arm, and said, “We’ll take care of you now.” I have never loathed anyone so much in my life. They beamed back across to their freighter, and that was the last that I saw of Tret Rekheny.

  The four of us—Luis Martinez, Tuvok, Anna Sinclair, and myself—were all decorated for our part in this operation. I suppose that I am proud of what I did, even though at the time I thought the order that Shulie had given us was madness. But what I took mostly from these events was what I tried to tell Seven of Nine later, that a single act of compassion can transform us. Having met Tret Rekheny, however briefly, it was not so easy, in future, for me to think of all Cardassians as cruel, as murderous, as vicious. Some of them, it seemed to me now, were as much victims of their government as the peoples they oppressed.

  * * *

  Altogether, I served as chief science officer under Owen Paris on the Al-Batani for eight years. Much of that time I spent out near the Cardassian border, trying to combine scientific observation with intelligence gathering. To some degree these purposes could be made to work together;
in other respects, they were completely at odds. For one thing, science does not care for borders. It does not care that the place where you need to be to make necessary observations would violate a treaty or test diplomatic sensitivities to the limit. Sometimes we found ourselves tantalizingly close to a breakthrough, an expansion in our knowledge, and we would have to pull back, away from territory we had agreed not to enter. I would have found this less frustrating, had I not known how flagrantly the Cardassians would break their word when the situation was reversed.

  Altogether, I found it increasingly difficult to resolve the tension between these two objectives, and, privately, I was coming to believe that further and more serious conflict with the Cardassians was inevitable. I often found myself thinking back to a conversation I’d had with my father, when I was first making my decision to join Starfleet. He’d said: It takes two sides to make peace. And I’m not sure that both sides want it. The Arias expedition had taught me two things: that not all Cardassians were bloodthirsty warmongers, but that the bloodthirsty warmongers were the ones calling the shots on Cardassia Prime these days. War was coming—the question was, what could I get done before it came to me?

  I knew that the Al-Batani would be continuing in this dual role for the foreseeable future. But I wanted my chance to experience the old Starfleet: the Starfleet of exploration and scientific study. I decided to put in for a transfer. When I told Owen Paris my decision, he did me the kindness of saying how far I had come in the years that I had served under him, and that he now considered me one of the best rising officers within Starfleet. “Whoever gets you next is a lucky captain, Kathryn,” he said, and sighed. “Three requests for transfer on the same day! I must be losing my touch.”

  “Three, sir?”

  It turned out several of his senior staff had made similar decisions. My friend Fitz was heading off to Caldik Prime, to take up a surgeon’s post at the medical facility there. It was one of the leading hospitals in the Federation, with a specialty in biosynthetic prosthetics. I think Fitz’s mind was on the forthcoming war too. I knew that he felt he had been ill-equipped for some of the field surgery he had been required to perform during our time on the border. And Tuvok was moving on as well, to take on a senior security role on Jupiter Station. That evening, the three of us met for supper and a game of kadis-kot, for old time’s sake. We discussed our future plans, and they asked me where I was heading.