Mosaic - Jeri Taylor [120]
When that proved impossible, she'd simply found a way to bury that pain so deeply that she could go on. For over a decade, as she rose through the ranks of Starfleet, as her love for Mark deepened, as she became a captain and her friendship with the remarkable Tuvok flourished, as she took command of Voyager and was swept into their phenomenal adventure in the Delta Quadrant-for all that time, the bitter truth of her failure had lain enclosed in her memory, sealed like a plague bacillus which, if it were unleashed, might destroy her.
How then, to save herself now? The vile truth, bubbling up like acid, could never be banished again; it would eat at her every minute of every day, fouling her mind and corroding her spirit. No. No, that simply couldn't happen. Too many people depended on her, too many needed her strength, her indomitability. She mustn't fail them. The memory must be neutralized. This wasn't a conscious thought so much as a fully formed intuition that sprang from her mind like Athena from Zeus. There was only one way to strip it of its awful dominion: use it. After all, the locked door was open now, and the room could be swept clean. Bright light and fresh air could blow through it, chasing darkness and cobwebs. The dream, she was sure, would never come again. And so there must be a way to turn its pain to power.
She was on her feet without realizing it, moving toward the conn, where Paris was still working to move them away from the star-how long had it been? It seemed a lifetime had passed since she'd moved into the mists of memory, but she became aware that only seconds had gone by; the crew was still engaged in assessing damage and assigning repair crews. "All stop, Mr. Paris," she said, and Tom's tousled head swung around to her in surprise.
"Captain?"
"We're not leaving the away team. We're going to go back and get them." Now Chakotay was approaching, brow furrowed in puzzlement and concern. "Do you have a plan, Captain?" he queried.
Janeway stared at him. No, no plan, just flinty determination. But sheer grit wouldn't solve their problem, wouldn't get them past the fiercely protective Tokath. How was that possible?
She felt every eye on her as the crew waited, trustingly, sure their captain had come up with an idea. Her mind seemed to flutter, agitated, starting to panic. She'd made an announcement that was foolhardy, made it with sheer bravado. Now she must back it up-but how? Suddenly she was four years old again, sitting in her father's study, trying to figure out the elevens. She had closed her eyes then and focused, visualizing the situation, and the answer had presented itself to her. The answer was always there, it just had to be accessed. She closed her eyes now and visualized the Tokath, reviewing what she knew about them. She imagined them as they must have been long ago, fierce protectors of a gentle people, sealing the planet from intruders and allowing them all to live in peace.
Until the dreadful accident. She saw in her mind's eye the sun's unexpected eruption-undoubtedly a continuation of the shedding of matter from its atmosphere, the very process which created the nebula in which they had taken refuge-and the havoc it created in the planet's atmosphere. She envisioned the consternation in the population and their desperate plan to save the Tokath, the fierce creatures which had kept them safe from harm for so long....
Her eyes opened and she saw the bridge crew watching her, patiently, trustingly. And as though their confidence were a vast wellspring of positive energy, feeding and nurturing her, the plan came to her. "Dr. Trakis, the environmental disaster that drove the Tokath into hibernation-it happened as this star was shedding its outer atmosphere?" The Trabe looked at her curiously. "That's my understanding.