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After the third successive probe test had been completed to Chakotay’s satisfaction, he was almost as excited about the prospect of the tetryon transporters as Tom, Harry, and B’Elanna were.

Harry had been right. The tetryon field emitted by the system actually bent space and as long as the appropriate coordinates were transferred to the system, they seemed able to set a specific end point that extended far beyond the realm of any transporter he had ever seen… theoretically… all the way to the Alpha Quadrant.

Tom had also been right. The system was designed to accept telepathic commands for coordinates, and even in species, like humans, who were generally not telepathic, their thoughts took them to any destination they desired. Chakotay’s biggest concern had been trusting any human mind with such a huge variable. On his best days, when he felt most calm and serene, he had rarely been able to experience only one thought at a time. With so much riding on the outcome, he would never have agreed to the test had not B’Elanna solved the final problem to his satisfaction.

Voyager stored dozens of organic containers that were used in transport tests when an operator was uncertain whether or not a life-form could safely transport to a specified area owing to interference or distance. Harry had been the first to come up with the idea of using the organic matter inside the probes to take the place of a human and add the “thought” variable to the equation, but B’Elanna had been the first to successfully code the organic material to emit a specific frequency of “thought” that the tetryon transporter could read. By piggybacking Voyager’s long-range sensors to the array’s much more powerful sensor grid via the data-interface cable still tethered to Voyager, they had successfully detected three successive probes containing the coded organic matter at their appropriate coordinates. The third, their most ambitious test, had been transported a distance of almost twenty thousand light-years. It wasn’t the Alpha Quadrant, but it was twenty years closer to home. Chakotay would have been thrilled with one-quarter of that distance.

The final test would be a shuttle test. Since Tom and Harry had volunteered to pilot the shuttle, all had agreed that this manned flight should be set just beyond the borders of Monorhan space, the closest destination possible that was outside the system, but within twenty hours of the array at impulse speeds. In order to avoid any potential pitfalls of using human thoughts to control the test-no one could say for certain with two men aboard whose thoughts would take precedence, should one’s concentration fail-the shuttle’s navigational array and been routed through one of the coded organic canisters, exactly as had been the case with the probes.

“See you in a few hours,” Tom said jauntily as he stepped inside the shuttle. If all went as planned Tom and Harry would immediately reenter Monorhan space once the shuttle had arrived at the coordinates and return to the array at full impulse.

Chakotay planned to use that time to force Phoebe’s hand by taking the Key back to the array and placing it in the “lock.” Assuming the captain did not return of her own accord, he was still unwilling to accept the idea that Voyager would leave the array without her… especially when their next stop might be home.

Chakotay gave Tom a nod of good luck, then left the shuttlebay to monitor the test with B’Elanna in astrometrics. Neelix, who had been as thrilled as the others at Tom’s potential discovery, had also asked to attend the test and was pacing nervously about the staging area before the main viewscreen when Chakotay arrived.

“Shuttle Homeward Bound, you have clearance to transport,” B’Elanna said over the comm as Chakotay joined her at the sensor control console.

“Homeward Bound?” Chakotay asked.

“Tom renamed the shuttle while we were reconfiguring the navigational array. Somehow Monticello just didn’t have the ring he was going for,” B’Elanna replied with