by Tricia Donovan ©2000
Paramount owns Voyager, the Delta Quadrant, and the Devore Imperium and its most famous son, but they don't own Earth (that belongs to Bill Gates), or this story. Please ask me before posting elsewhere.
One
"BRIDGE to Kashyk"
Kashyk was already on his way, woken from sleep by the ship's pitching and tossing. She was steady again now, but Kashyk heard the strain in Prax's voice, and knew that something serious had happened.
He stepped onto the bridge. Prax turned, and without saying anything, gestured at the viewscreen.
Kashyk stared in astonishment. There, serenely beautiful, a blue-green planet glowed in the darkness of space. It was a planet unknown and yet known. He must have stared at it a hundred times since downloading Voyager's database. In his mind it had become synonymous with Kathryn: alien, beautiful and wholly unattainable.
Unattainable until now. Incredible though it was, he was in orbit around Earth.
The how and why of their arrival could wait. Self-preservation was the main concern now.
"Prax! Are we cloaked? Has Starfleet detected our presence?"
"Sir, we are not cloaked, but, Sir, there is no need."
"No need? Prax ... "
"Sir!"
Kashyk could not remember a single time in their association when Prax had interrupted him.
"Sir, there is no Starfleet, no space stations, no satellites. Sir, this is a pre-warp civilization."
Kashyk made no answer, but moved to the console to inspect the logs himself. Prax was right. But equally he knew this was Earth. He was as familiar with its continents and mountains and rivers as he was with those of his homeworld. He could see, through the viewscreen, the vast bulk of the North American subcontinent. There 320 kilometres below him was the place of Kathryn Janeway's birth.
"A nuclear holocaust perhaps," he said, half to himself.
"Sir, sensors show no radiation except that which would be naturally emitted. Sir, this appears to be a pre-atomic civilization."
Kashyk tried to make sense of this. He studied the data again. The spatial distortion, through which they had passed, had hurled them some sixty light-years away from the world they knew. He thought of the entity that Kathryn Janeway had called The Caretaker. No life-form appeared to be responsible for their predicament, but other than that, their experience seemed to mirror that of the Terrans exactly. He felt a curious pleasure at the symmetry of it all.
Except, there was the puzzle of a starship from a pre-warp, pre-atomic civilization. He wondered about the possibility of a mirror universe. He had heard of the phenomemon, but had never come in contact with anyone who had experienced it.
"What do the temporal logs show?"
"They don't make any sense, Sir."
The young soldier was on his first assignment, and had obviously taken to heart the instruction not to speak until he was spoken to. Kashyk sighed impatiently. Was he really that fearsome?
His fingers moving rapidly over the console, he accessed the data. The young man had been wrong. The logs made perfect sense. That is, although the information they contained was almost unbelievable, they provided the only rational explanation of their situation.
The showman in Kashyk was uppermost at that moment.
"Gentlemen," he said, his sonorous voice ringing across the bridge.
Every man there was silent, looking at their captain. Kashyk allowed his eyes to rest on each man in turn. The young recruit swallowed nervously.
"Gentlemen. The distortion through which we passed has, as you have already surmised, brought us to Earth, to Voyager's planet. He paused again, enjoying the tension of the moment.
"To the other side of the galaxy and ... almost 3,000 years into the past."
Two
"How are the crew taking it, Prax?"
"How do you think they're taking it, Sir?"
Kashyk looked at his First Officer. He decided to ignore the man's insubordination for now.
"You do not see the ... possibilities, Prax?"
"Possibilities, Sir. A lot of savages."
"Savages? Oh no, my dear Prax, scarcely that. Technologically backward perhaps, but not savages. Since we are to live among them, perhaps you should take the trouble to familiarize yourself with their various cultures."
"So you've given up, then?"
All trace of the distortion had disappeared from space. The warp drive was offline. They were, as Kashyk knew, over two millennia from the most primitive form of space travel in this part of the galaxy. Even his own people at this epoch were over a thousand years from the first tentative extraterrestrial explorations. Prax's refusal to see the truth of their situation irritated Kashyk. A certain tenacity was admirable, but unless it was tempered with realism, it became nothing more than a childish tantrum.
"Prax, can you not see how we shall appear to these people? Our magical powers will make us seem as gods."
For a moment he was in her Ready Room. He could hear her voice, full of the arrogance of her race, as she spoke of the glories of her civilization. "He's from Earth's classical period. It produced some of our greatest artists as well."
"Prax, we are to live among a wonderful people. A people of questing mind and eager spirit. A people whose love of the arts is an expression of their desire to make sense of the world in which they find themselves. A people who refuse to accept matters as they stand, but work to bend Nature to their will, strive to the uttermost to impose order on chaos."
Perhaps this was Kashyk's way of making sense of the world in which he found himself, but as he spoke, he began to feel a stirring of anticipation that was almost intoxicating.
"Superstitious and backward," growled Prax.
"Superstitious only because they do not have the knowledge we possess. But still they seek to pierce the night of superstition with the white light of reason."
That sentence, Kashyk felt, had a pleasing ring to it. He reflected that it would be wasted on Prax, and his subordinate's next words proved him right.
"Oh, and I suppose we're going to help them 'pierce the night' by sharing all our knowledge and technology."
"No, Prax. That would hardly do, if we are to rule over them as befits our ... divine status."
Three
It was a day like any other on Voyager. Kathryn and Chakotay had been closeted for some hours going over crew appraisal reports. They were at loggerheads over one particular crewman, and neither was going to give way.
"Chakotay, I'm not prepared to ... " Kathryn's voice died away. Her mouth hung open and her face paled.
"Kathryn?" Chakotay followed her gaze.
"Chakotay, I think I must be going mad."
"If you are, then so am I."
"You see it too?"
"Yes."
Chakotay stood up and walked to where the bust of Pericles had pride of place on a low shelf. The bust was still there, but beneath its helmet, instead of the face both of them knew, were the unmistakable features of Inspector Kashyk.
END
NOTE: I had been toying with the idea of sending Kashyk to Earth, and back in time. I considered him taking the place of Machiavelli, or one of the Borgias, or even Nero. I decided on Pericles because of the scene in Counterpoint where Kashyk is examining the artefacts in Janeway's Ready Room. It has been suggested that the head in question is that of Darius of Persia. It looks like Pericles to me, and I think it more likely that Janeway would admire the latter. It really doesn't make a great deal of difference to the story.
Nevertheless, this quotation from Plutarch's life of Pericles seems a rather neat description of Kashyk: The poet Ion, however, says that Pericles had a rather disdainful and arrogant manner of address, and that his pride had in it, a good deal of superciliousness and contempt for others. Pure serendipity: I read this only after I had decided who the intrepid Inspector was going to be.
The title is from line 7 of Shakespeare's Sonnet 68: To live a second life on second head.
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