Alternate Resolutions
Jan. 27th, 2008 07:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wiseheartThis is just a snippet that will one day become part of the first chapter of "Alternate Resolutions", a late episode of my "Alternate Voyager" series. It just popped up in my head one day and I got up in the middle of the night to write it down, because I liked the idea so much.
The premise is that - unlike in the canon Voyager episode - Chakotay isn't stranded on New Earth with Janeway, but with Ensign Wildman (the blonde exobiologist woman who gave life to a baby not much earlier). I also established the fact that this baby wasn't Naomi (who looked way older than her supposed age) but a boy. Naomi was already four year old at th beginning of the series and stowed away with her Mum when Voyager had to leave DS9 in pursuit of the Maquis.
In this AU, Maquis and Starfleet aren't all buddy-buddy like in canon. You'll see hints of that in these snippets. K'tarians first appeared in the TNG-episode "The Game", where Riker, once again, almost managed to bring the ship down because he couldn't keep it in his trousers. The K'tarian woman he had a romp with was called Etana Jol and really looked like a lioness.
So much about background trivia, now enjoy.
THE LOST VOYAGES
The “Star Trek – Voyager” that could have been
by Soledad
ALTERNATE RESOLUTIONS
Disclaimer: All Star Trek belongs to Gene Roddenberry and Viacom or whoever owns the rights at this moment. I don’t make any profit out of this – I wish I would, but I don’t, so suing me would be pointless.
Author’s note: Yes, I know that in canon Chakotay theoretically is from another lost Native American colony. One that never got mentioned in the show. Well, I’m abusing the AU label and assuming that he is from Dorvan V, as fanon says. The show’s creators didn’t make the distinction overly believable when they cast Ned Romero for the part of Chakotay’s grandfather – the same actor who played Anthwara, the Dorvan V. leader in the TNG-episode “Journey’s End”. Besides, how many lost Native American colonies are out there? Aside from Dorvan V and Miramanee’s planet?
CHAPTER 01: ABANDONED
Chakotay of Dorvan V. formerly First Officer on the U.S.S. Voyager, ex-freedom-fighter, Maquis cell leader and captain of the Maquis raider Crazy Horse, before that instructor of advanced tactical training on Starfleet Academy, sat outside the Starfleet emergency shelter that would be his home for the rest of his life. He just sat there quietly and watched from afar the gentle-faced blonde woman who would share this life in exile with him. The woman feeding her baby, while her other, six-year-old kid was playing in the grass on her side.
Under different circumstances, this would be a dream come true. A whole planet, with all of its resources, accessible for them alone. True companionship, peace, rural beauty, children to raise… everything he had ever dreamed of during the long years of his struggle, during the brutal and ultimately doomed war against the Cardassians. If either of them were here voluntarily.
The planet was truly beautiful. With its lush forests, mild climates and untouched wildlife that excluded any large predators, it could have been the perfect paradise. Which, in a sense, it was. Complete with the snake. Only that in this case the snake was a small insect. An insect with a bite that ensured that whoever entered this paradise would never be able to leave it again. Not alive, that is.
What a bitter irony.
Beyond him, in the shelter, a comm badge chirped. The woman continued feeding her baby, as if she hadn’t heard it, her face now cold and angry. She wasn’t ready to talk to anyone. Chakotay couldn’t blame her. The circumstances of her parting from their commanding officer were less than amiable.
The comm badge chirped again. Chakotay suppressed a sigh and rose to answer the call. There was no reason to pout. This was not Janeway’s fault… or anyone else’s. This was a cruel joke of the universe itself – or, as Tom Paris would put it, an exceptionally tough case of bad luck – and nobody could do anything against it.
“Chakotay,” he said in a clipped manner.
“This is the Doctor speaking,” the voice of the EMH replied. Good. He could deal with the holodoc. Better than with any flesh-and-blood person, at least at the moment.
“I assume you have news,” Chakotay said.
“Yes,” the voice of the EMH answered. “Our sensors show your vital signs are normal. How are you feeling?”
“Physically, we are fine,” Chakotay said. “Just as you have assumed when you took us out of stasis. As for the rest… we are doing as well as we can, considering the circumstances.”
“Commander, I want to emphasize how sorry I am that I have been unsuccessful to find a cure,” was that regret in the hologram’s voice? Chakotay sighed.
“It’s not your fault, Doctor. You’ve been working 24/7 for weeks. I’m sure if there were a cure you’d have found it by now.”
“That is the current stand of things, yes,” the EMH replied, “But I won’t stop trying to develop a counteragent to the virus. I might still find other options to explore, and Lt. Ro promised that she and Lt. Riker will take the Shenandoah and get back to you as soon as I succeed.”
“If you succeed,” Chakotay corrected mildly. “You still think that keeping us in stasis aboard Voyager won’t be a solution?”
“I’m afraid not,” the EMH’s voice said. “Something in the planet's environment is shielding you from the effects of the virus. If you leave, you risk a recurrence of the disease which would undoubtedly prove fatal.”
“I see,” Chakotay said after a brief pause. “When is Voyager leaving orbit?”
“According to Mr. Rollins, within twenty-four hours. After all your equipment has been offloaded and the crew had the chance to say their goodbyes.”
“Understood. Thank you, doctor.”
“You are welcome, Commander. I wish I could do more for you. Sickbay out.”
Chakotay deactivated his comm badge and, after a moment of hesitation, pinned it onto his vest. His people might decide to call, as long as Voyager was in orbit. He wouldn’t deny them that little comfort. They would need it.
Without their leader as second-in-command, they will be having tough times under Janeway’s unquestioned rule. She had already selected Rollins as her new XO – the most narrow-minded, bullish officer Starfleet had produced in the last two decades. Would she still have Tuvok, she might have chosen the utterly reliable Vulcan, but with Tuvix, she couldn’t be so sure. The merged being had Tuvok’s logic and loyalty, but he also had Neelix’ exuberant personality. He was an unknown factor, and Janeway wouldn’t take any risks when re-establishing total control.
Hell, she didn’t even allow Tuvix to perform his duties as chief of security, temporarily disabling all of Tuvok’s security codes, until he declared himself to be ready for being separated again! At the moment Gregor Ayala was still acting as temporary chief of security, but Chakotay doubted seriously that the arrangement would last.
*************************
Between the two snippets, there will be some more stuff that I haven't figured out yet. These two parts have been written with years in-between, but I decided to put them into the same chapter and eventually write the rest around them.
*************************
Her Gresk had been like a tawny lion in its prime: sleek and deceivingly strong and so very beautiful, with his thick, wavy straw-blond mane and golden, feline eyes, emphasized by the typical, lion-like K’tarian features of his high forehead. She had loved him very much. She still missed him badly at times: his soft touches, his low, throaty purr, the unexpected strength of long, sleek muscles under his warm, smooth skin, the way his broad grin showed off his sharp canines, revealing the once violent origins of his people. The thought that she’d never see him again was killing her.
K’tarians were a very old and sophisticated race, and Gresk belonged to one of the most ancient Prides that kept the old traditions in many areas. When he had declared his intention to marry a human, his mothers and his father were every bit as outraged as Sam’s simple, Earth-bound family had been when she’d told them that she intended to marry an alien. The fact that his birth-mother had been long dead and that the kater of the family was not the one who’d begotten him was irrelevant. They were his elders.
Like in the case of Terran lions, K’tarian families consisted of several females with their children, and one male – this practice had its origin in the fact that females outnumbered males in the K’tarian population four to one. But despite the relative rarity and thus the valued status of virile males, the leader of a family group was always the ranking female. To achieve that rank, the females often fought ritual duels – sometimes to the death – especially those from the ancient Prides.
Gresk had not wanted to subject Sam to the sometimes violent traditions of his people. As a Starfleet officer – and an anthropologist at that – he preferred to watch said traditions from a comfortable distance. They had taken up residence on Rigel VI, living in a twosome marriage in Terran fashion, except when they were assigned to different missions. They had been very happy together, even more so after Naomi’s birth, and didn’t care much about the disapproval of their respective families.
Nonetheless, Gresk had kept his K’tarian citizenship, which meant that specific K’tarian laws were still valid and bonding for him. And that meant that Sam and he weren’t married any longer. K’tarian law stated that if there was no contact between married partners for more than a local year, the marriage got automatically annulled. And what was even worse, the law didn’t allow such partners to get remarried to each other.
But for Sam, that was a moot point anyway. She’d spend her life on New Earth, without a chance to return home. Unlike Chakotay, she didn’t hope that a cure might be found yet – not that she really minded. New Earth was a paradise, despite its metaphoric snake. She was used to living under such cicumstances, being the spawn of a naturalist family and having lived with the natives on various planets for years. She had her children with her… and she had Chakotay.
They’d never been interested in each other sexually before. But now they were restricted to spend the rest of their lives with each other on this planet, and Sam was not willing to spend hers in celibacy. Not when there was a strong, handsome, intelligent man with whom she could share it. And Chakotay was a handsome man. She’d always noticed that, in a detached, impersonal way. But now this fact had suddenly gained a more personal – and more practical – meaning.
If Gresk had been a golden lion, Chakotay was like a bear: all bronze and mahogany and eyes like dark chokolate and dimpled smiles. He moved with surprising grace for a man so heavily built, and he had a deep, warm chuckle that could melt ice. But unlike many people, Sam didn’t let herself to be fooled by hs gentle, easy-going, soft-spoken persona. She’d heard stories about the “angry warrior” of the Maquis, and she could sometimes catch a glimpse of that warrior lurking under the calm surface. While she’d liked to think of Gresk as deceivingly strong, there was nothing deceiving in Chakotay’s strength. The man literally radiated it – and considering the circumstances under which the two of them would have to live, that was a very good thing.
T’Prena had offered them anti-conception implants, “in case they wanted to turn to each other for comtort”, as she had put it with her wonderful Vulcan bluntness. They had both refused, agreeing that – should that ever happen – they wouldn’t want to live a barren life in their exile. T’Prena had found that logical; Janeway, on the other hand, had been shocked by the idea of setting children into the world on a planet they wouldn’t be able to leave ever again.
“Mankind has spent thousands of years on the same planet, Captain,” Sam had replied with a shrug. “I’m sure that we’ll manage, too. Commander Chakotay has grown up under such circumstances. We’ll live.”
For visuals: Chakotay
Samantha Wildman:
The premise is that - unlike in the canon Voyager episode - Chakotay isn't stranded on New Earth with Janeway, but with Ensign Wildman (the blonde exobiologist woman who gave life to a baby not much earlier). I also established the fact that this baby wasn't Naomi (who looked way older than her supposed age) but a boy. Naomi was already four year old at th beginning of the series and stowed away with her Mum when Voyager had to leave DS9 in pursuit of the Maquis.
In this AU, Maquis and Starfleet aren't all buddy-buddy like in canon. You'll see hints of that in these snippets. K'tarians first appeared in the TNG-episode "The Game", where Riker, once again, almost managed to bring the ship down because he couldn't keep it in his trousers. The K'tarian woman he had a romp with was called Etana Jol and really looked like a lioness.
So much about background trivia, now enjoy.
The “Star Trek – Voyager” that could have been
by Soledad
ALTERNATE RESOLUTIONS
Disclaimer: All Star Trek belongs to Gene Roddenberry and Viacom or whoever owns the rights at this moment. I don’t make any profit out of this – I wish I would, but I don’t, so suing me would be pointless.
Author’s note: Yes, I know that in canon Chakotay theoretically is from another lost Native American colony. One that never got mentioned in the show. Well, I’m abusing the AU label and assuming that he is from Dorvan V, as fanon says. The show’s creators didn’t make the distinction overly believable when they cast Ned Romero for the part of Chakotay’s grandfather – the same actor who played Anthwara, the Dorvan V. leader in the TNG-episode “Journey’s End”. Besides, how many lost Native American colonies are out there? Aside from Dorvan V and Miramanee’s planet?
CHAPTER 01: ABANDONED
Chakotay of Dorvan V. formerly First Officer on the U.S.S. Voyager, ex-freedom-fighter, Maquis cell leader and captain of the Maquis raider Crazy Horse, before that instructor of advanced tactical training on Starfleet Academy, sat outside the Starfleet emergency shelter that would be his home for the rest of his life. He just sat there quietly and watched from afar the gentle-faced blonde woman who would share this life in exile with him. The woman feeding her baby, while her other, six-year-old kid was playing in the grass on her side.
Under different circumstances, this would be a dream come true. A whole planet, with all of its resources, accessible for them alone. True companionship, peace, rural beauty, children to raise… everything he had ever dreamed of during the long years of his struggle, during the brutal and ultimately doomed war against the Cardassians. If either of them were here voluntarily.
The planet was truly beautiful. With its lush forests, mild climates and untouched wildlife that excluded any large predators, it could have been the perfect paradise. Which, in a sense, it was. Complete with the snake. Only that in this case the snake was a small insect. An insect with a bite that ensured that whoever entered this paradise would never be able to leave it again. Not alive, that is.
What a bitter irony.
Beyond him, in the shelter, a comm badge chirped. The woman continued feeding her baby, as if she hadn’t heard it, her face now cold and angry. She wasn’t ready to talk to anyone. Chakotay couldn’t blame her. The circumstances of her parting from their commanding officer were less than amiable.
The comm badge chirped again. Chakotay suppressed a sigh and rose to answer the call. There was no reason to pout. This was not Janeway’s fault… or anyone else’s. This was a cruel joke of the universe itself – or, as Tom Paris would put it, an exceptionally tough case of bad luck – and nobody could do anything against it.
“Chakotay,” he said in a clipped manner.
“This is the Doctor speaking,” the voice of the EMH replied. Good. He could deal with the holodoc. Better than with any flesh-and-blood person, at least at the moment.
“I assume you have news,” Chakotay said.
“Yes,” the voice of the EMH answered. “Our sensors show your vital signs are normal. How are you feeling?”
“Physically, we are fine,” Chakotay said. “Just as you have assumed when you took us out of stasis. As for the rest… we are doing as well as we can, considering the circumstances.”
“Commander, I want to emphasize how sorry I am that I have been unsuccessful to find a cure,” was that regret in the hologram’s voice? Chakotay sighed.
“It’s not your fault, Doctor. You’ve been working 24/7 for weeks. I’m sure if there were a cure you’d have found it by now.”
“That is the current stand of things, yes,” the EMH replied, “But I won’t stop trying to develop a counteragent to the virus. I might still find other options to explore, and Lt. Ro promised that she and Lt. Riker will take the Shenandoah and get back to you as soon as I succeed.”
“If you succeed,” Chakotay corrected mildly. “You still think that keeping us in stasis aboard Voyager won’t be a solution?”
“I’m afraid not,” the EMH’s voice said. “Something in the planet's environment is shielding you from the effects of the virus. If you leave, you risk a recurrence of the disease which would undoubtedly prove fatal.”
“I see,” Chakotay said after a brief pause. “When is Voyager leaving orbit?”
“According to Mr. Rollins, within twenty-four hours. After all your equipment has been offloaded and the crew had the chance to say their goodbyes.”
“Understood. Thank you, doctor.”
“You are welcome, Commander. I wish I could do more for you. Sickbay out.”
Chakotay deactivated his comm badge and, after a moment of hesitation, pinned it onto his vest. His people might decide to call, as long as Voyager was in orbit. He wouldn’t deny them that little comfort. They would need it.
Without their leader as second-in-command, they will be having tough times under Janeway’s unquestioned rule. She had already selected Rollins as her new XO – the most narrow-minded, bullish officer Starfleet had produced in the last two decades. Would she still have Tuvok, she might have chosen the utterly reliable Vulcan, but with Tuvix, she couldn’t be so sure. The merged being had Tuvok’s logic and loyalty, but he also had Neelix’ exuberant personality. He was an unknown factor, and Janeway wouldn’t take any risks when re-establishing total control.
Hell, she didn’t even allow Tuvix to perform his duties as chief of security, temporarily disabling all of Tuvok’s security codes, until he declared himself to be ready for being separated again! At the moment Gregor Ayala was still acting as temporary chief of security, but Chakotay doubted seriously that the arrangement would last.
*************************
Between the two snippets, there will be some more stuff that I haven't figured out yet. These two parts have been written with years in-between, but I decided to put them into the same chapter and eventually write the rest around them.
*************************
Her Gresk had been like a tawny lion in its prime: sleek and deceivingly strong and so very beautiful, with his thick, wavy straw-blond mane and golden, feline eyes, emphasized by the typical, lion-like K’tarian features of his high forehead. She had loved him very much. She still missed him badly at times: his soft touches, his low, throaty purr, the unexpected strength of long, sleek muscles under his warm, smooth skin, the way his broad grin showed off his sharp canines, revealing the once violent origins of his people. The thought that she’d never see him again was killing her.
K’tarians were a very old and sophisticated race, and Gresk belonged to one of the most ancient Prides that kept the old traditions in many areas. When he had declared his intention to marry a human, his mothers and his father were every bit as outraged as Sam’s simple, Earth-bound family had been when she’d told them that she intended to marry an alien. The fact that his birth-mother had been long dead and that the kater of the family was not the one who’d begotten him was irrelevant. They were his elders.
Like in the case of Terran lions, K’tarian families consisted of several females with their children, and one male – this practice had its origin in the fact that females outnumbered males in the K’tarian population four to one. But despite the relative rarity and thus the valued status of virile males, the leader of a family group was always the ranking female. To achieve that rank, the females often fought ritual duels – sometimes to the death – especially those from the ancient Prides.
Gresk had not wanted to subject Sam to the sometimes violent traditions of his people. As a Starfleet officer – and an anthropologist at that – he preferred to watch said traditions from a comfortable distance. They had taken up residence on Rigel VI, living in a twosome marriage in Terran fashion, except when they were assigned to different missions. They had been very happy together, even more so after Naomi’s birth, and didn’t care much about the disapproval of their respective families.
Nonetheless, Gresk had kept his K’tarian citizenship, which meant that specific K’tarian laws were still valid and bonding for him. And that meant that Sam and he weren’t married any longer. K’tarian law stated that if there was no contact between married partners for more than a local year, the marriage got automatically annulled. And what was even worse, the law didn’t allow such partners to get remarried to each other.
But for Sam, that was a moot point anyway. She’d spend her life on New Earth, without a chance to return home. Unlike Chakotay, she didn’t hope that a cure might be found yet – not that she really minded. New Earth was a paradise, despite its metaphoric snake. She was used to living under such cicumstances, being the spawn of a naturalist family and having lived with the natives on various planets for years. She had her children with her… and she had Chakotay.
They’d never been interested in each other sexually before. But now they were restricted to spend the rest of their lives with each other on this planet, and Sam was not willing to spend hers in celibacy. Not when there was a strong, handsome, intelligent man with whom she could share it. And Chakotay was a handsome man. She’d always noticed that, in a detached, impersonal way. But now this fact had suddenly gained a more personal – and more practical – meaning.
If Gresk had been a golden lion, Chakotay was like a bear: all bronze and mahogany and eyes like dark chokolate and dimpled smiles. He moved with surprising grace for a man so heavily built, and he had a deep, warm chuckle that could melt ice. But unlike many people, Sam didn’t let herself to be fooled by hs gentle, easy-going, soft-spoken persona. She’d heard stories about the “angry warrior” of the Maquis, and she could sometimes catch a glimpse of that warrior lurking under the calm surface. While she’d liked to think of Gresk as deceivingly strong, there was nothing deceiving in Chakotay’s strength. The man literally radiated it – and considering the circumstances under which the two of them would have to live, that was a very good thing.
T’Prena had offered them anti-conception implants, “in case they wanted to turn to each other for comtort”, as she had put it with her wonderful Vulcan bluntness. They had both refused, agreeing that – should that ever happen – they wouldn’t want to live a barren life in their exile. T’Prena had found that logical; Janeway, on the other hand, had been shocked by the idea of setting children into the world on a planet they wouldn’t be able to leave ever again.
“Mankind has spent thousands of years on the same planet, Captain,” Sam had replied with a shrug. “I’m sure that we’ll manage, too. Commander Chakotay has grown up under such circumstances. We’ll live.”
For visuals: Chakotay
Samantha Wildman:
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2008-01-30 09:38 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-01-30 09:53 pm (UTC)Besides, Chak need some serious loving, don't you think? ;))
I googled a little for Robert Beltran - boy, has he gotten old since Voyager ended! But even at the age of 55, I still find him cute. I wonder what it might have been to grow up with 2 sisters and 7 brothers, one of whom is a well-known Latin Jazz musician, and his youngest one has the Dawn syndrome. I might add Chak a similar background, although not entirely the same - that would be cheap...
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-02 10:28 pm (UTC)I love the plot of your AU, too, of course. It's a very intriguing idea and since I love both Chakotay and Samantha, I'm really looking forward to this new story.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-02 10:54 pm (UTC)Yeah, world-building is something that I love to do. For Birthright 2, I created four different species for the Andromedaverse planet Ornithrone, just for the heck of it. *g*
Originally, I wanted to pair up Chak with Ro Laren. But then I decided that someone like Sam would match his hidden desires to become a family man better.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-03 02:03 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-03 02:23 pm (UTC)Do you know "Alternate Caretaker"? It's a WIP, in which I've tried to correct that stupid mistake, and, if I may say so myself, inserted a few interesting twists.
The story has earned me controversial reactions, to put it mildly: some canon freaks wanted to hung me for the changes, others wanted to hung me for "plagiarizing" the original, so I just kinda lost the joy in writing it, although quite a few people seemed to like, it, too.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-05 06:06 pm (UTC)It annoyed me sooo much, all these lost chances *shakeshead* When Voyager was produced, I was a Maquis fan, so I was very excited to hear that Maquis would play a big role in the new Star Trek series. I was so disappointed when all the conflict and "Maquis-ness" was reduced to a couple of half-hearted episodes. They did do a great job with that fifth or sixth season episode, where the Maquis suddenly turned against the Starfleeters - I only wish they'd have had the guts to do something like this in the first or second season. And then have it be a genuine plot, not the result of hypnosis.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-05 07:50 pm (UTC)Re: Maquis
Now, I must admit that of all the "newer" Star Trek series, DS9 is my absolute favourite. ("Enterprise" I don't even consider Star Trek.) But there are three major things that I really, really hate:
1) Kira's utterly failed love life. That she had to end up with Odo, of all people (especially *after* what happened in "Children of Time", I found it absolutely unbelievable), only so that in the end she would get dropped by him and had to be Understanding Woman(TM) for the male's Greater Purpose(TM).
2) Sisko's semi-divine origins, aka the fact that the PTB just didn't have the balls to allow a Starfleet Officer to be a religious symbol at the same time. He'd only have been a symbol, for Pete's sake! The religious *leader* would have remained the Kai, whoever it was at any given time!
3) The way Sisko turned against the Maquis, after some half-hearted sympathies, especially his obsessed pursuit of Eddington.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-06 06:28 pm (UTC)I didn't mind the Kira/Odo pairing. I wasn't a big fan of them, but I didn't mind, either. They had some good episodes. What did annoy me was the "Understanding Woman" twist. I just didn't buy it and I was disappointed. Kira never seemed to me like the kind of woman who would just step back and wait for her man to possibly return some day.
2) Sisko's semi-divine origins, aka the fact that the PTB just didn't have the balls to allow a Starfleet Officer to be a religious symbol at the same time. He'd only have been a symbol, for Pete's sake! The religious *leader* would have remained the Kai, whoever it was at any given time!
*nod* I totally agree.
3) The way Sisko turned against the Maquis, after some half-hearted sympathies, especially his obsessed pursuit of Eddington.
Yeah, but then when the Maquis (supporter) in question is a pretty woman, it's so easy for him to forgive. Sure, I liked her, but I thought it's very unrealistic that he would accept her Maquis past easily when he's so anti-Maquis otherwise. It's one of my pet peeves.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-06 10:33 pm (UTC)As for Sisko, I really didn't understand why he was so anti-Maquis in the first place! If anyone, he had to know that one mustn't trust the Cardassians, right? His pursuing Eddington was a personal vendetta, unrelated to the fact whether the Maquis was right or wrong, and it just destroyed the character for me. Well, to a certain extent anyway.