Chapter 4 added on 11 July 2000
Disclaimers are in part 1.
Rating: R
B'Elanna and Seven reached Engineering in time to hear Captain Janeway's hail. Lt. Carey was suggesting to the get engines back online so that they could jump to warp, and escape the gravitational forces. The medics came around to check on the two women who looked bruised and battered, before they joined Carey at the warp console.
"The wormhole is pulling us into the event horizon. We're about 12,000 km from the mouth and closing," informed Captain Janeway.
"Structural integrity is going to be a major problem. Tuvok says that we have only five minutes before the gravimetric sheer causes a fatal hull breach," Chakotay noted.
"We're working on boosting structural integrity, but we're already diverting all the power that we can. I suggest we evacuate more decks and reroute power from life support," advised Carey.
"What about the warp engines?" asked Janeway. "We're going to need them in a few minutes before the gravitational pull becomes too great."
B'Elanna was running through all she had learned about spinning wormholes. Warp engines would certainly get them out of the area, but it may not be possible to even establish a warp field. The ship began to rock again, but to a lesser degree. The stress on the hull became even more prominent as the metal began to screech steadily.
Seven must have come to the same conclusion when she interjected, "Captain, we may not be capable of entering warp."
"The engines will be back online in a couple of minutes," argued Carey. "We can't achieve escape velocity on impulse and maneuvering thrusters. We have to give it a try."
B'Elanna now spoke, "We might not be able to warp if the wormhole is already distorting the space-time continuum. I think we should emit large tachyon bursts from the deflector dish. They should cause the other side of the wormhole to collapse. Tachyons are the only FTL particles that can get through a non-traversable wormhole."
"Yes, but it might take time for this end of the wormhole to collapse. We might get sucked in before then," Carey answered back.
"How long would it take to modify the deflector?" the Captain asked.
"Two, maybe three minutes, but it's going to take a lot of energy to generate tachyons," admitted B'Elanna.
The two head Engineers faced off. Each respected the other's idea, but each supported their own. There was no right or wrong under the circumstances. The Engineering crew froze, confused as to whose orders to follow. B'Elanna was out of line, and she knew it. Lt. Carey was Chief Engineer, and she shouldn't have undermined his authority. Time, what little they had, was being wasted.
"Carey's right. We should try the warp engines," conceded B'Elanna, looking away and releasing the aggression from her posture.
Janeway took the silence to mean the decision was made. "Fine, get those engines online in two minutes. We're going to break away."
B'Elanna took her orders from Carey, walked over to the plasma injectors and began working on them. She ignored Seven when the Borg tried to address her.
~~~~~~~~
Voyager was fast approaching the edge of the wormhole. Bits of space debris and dust slowly disappeared in the swirling disarray of the event horizon. Although it was a stunning view and Janeway felt a certain excitement to being so close to such a phenomenon, she preferred to be elsewhere at this particular moment. The bridge crew braced for impact as fifteen metric tons of debris headed towards the bow, smashing into the forward shields and breaking into pieces.
"Captain, the engines are back online!" hollered Paris.
"Engage slowly, Mr. Paris! We don't want to rip the ship apart!" commanded the Captain.
"Aye, Ma'am."
"Engines are operating, Captain, but the warp field isn't generating!" informed Kim.
"Increase the plasma flow to the injectors as well as the antimatter flux to the warp core, Lt. Carey!" ordered Janeway.
"Acknowledge!"
Paris was knocked out of his seat when the ship began bucking uncontrollably again as the gravimetric forces increased exponentially near the event horizon. The eddies of spatial distortion began to collide with the mass of the ship, flowing over the hull like the whitewash of a wave upon a shore. Paris jumped back into his seat, riding it like a bronco, as his fingers flew over the conn.
"Thrusters are failing! We're descending faster into the wormhole!" Tom cried out.
"More power to the warp engines!" hailed Chakotay.
"We're trying!" replied Carey. "It's draining the warp core almost as fast as we can feed it!"
The core hummed louder and louder as the warp engines revved up, the cobalt blue lights rippling. Carey could see on his panel the small spark of a warp field being established around the ship. On the bridge, the view of the mouth of the wormhole was getting larger and larger. Structural integrity was dropping rapidly, and the hull started to buckle, creaking with resistance, under the crushing forces attacking from every dimension.
Carey shouted, "Yes! We got it!" as the sensors detected the warp field formation.
It was the last thing heard over the comm as Voyager blasted off into warp, leaving the singularity behind. The wormhole existed for a little while longer before it spasmed, and collapsed onto it last victim, crushing the hapless asteroid.
~~~~~~~~
-Plop- B'Elanna tossed herself on her bed, sans her uniform and boots. She covered her eyes with her arm, weary from the day. Guilt had always been her bedmate. Why should it be any different now? Fifty-one injured, multiple hull breaches, and damaged systems shipwide. Ensign Wildman was almost sucked out into space when a hull breach tore her station apart right before they jumped to warp. Maybe if she had spent more time helping with Carey with the transition, and less time on the Holodeck, some of this would never have happened. She regretted that she almost undermined Lt. Carey's authority, and cost them crucial time.
'I don't know what I am anymore.'
~~~~~~~~
Chakotay entered the Ready Room, flipping several reports in hand. Janeway could tell there was something on his mind, since he didn't have his usual grin on his face as he walked over to her desk.
"Here are the damage reports." He passed over the hefty pile.
"Thank you." She offered him some coffee, but he turned it down politely, taking a seat in one of the chairs.
"Are we going to talk about what happened today?" he asked.
"Weren't you there? You didn't hit your head, did you? she jested, not really wanting to broach the subject, as she took a ginger sip from her coffee mug.
"You know what I'm talking about, Kathryn." He took the serious tone. "Don't you think it was a close call? You could order her back on the job."
"I can't do that. She has to come to the decision herself, Chakotay."
"Well, then, I guess we're going to be in for a bumpy ride," he said with a straight face, but finally broke out into a grin. He always did have a twisted sense of humor. In truth, he only wanted to test the waters, to see where Janeway was going to go on the issue, but ready to defend B'Elanna, just in case.
"By the way," he add, "the dilithium supplies are low as a result of our little escapade with the wormhole. The attempts to jump to warp to escape drained out most of our stores."
"Tell Carey to arrange the away teams."
~~~~~~~~
Seven finally stepped into the quiet comfort of her Cargo Bay. Unfortunately, to her dismay, it was a mess, with storage bins, boxes, and equipment strewed all over her space. She'd save the clean up for later. Her Borg alcove had been resilient throughout the ordeal, still operational though powered down. Seven reactivated the system and readied it for regeneration, as the Doctor had insisted.
She replayed the day's events in her mind, from its ordinary beginnings to the harrowing encounter with the spatial phenomenon. Some of the crewmen, from what she overheard, had found the experience wild and exciting, despite the obvious life-threatening nature of the event. The only time during the whole ordeal she felt at all stimulated, oddly, was in the Jefferies tube, with Lt. B'Elanna Torres of all people. Seven could still feel the warm presence against her back, and the hot breath against the skin of her neck, sending sensations from the ends of her nerves to her spine. It made her feel strange. She wanted to ask the Doctor about it but he was too busy with the other injured crewmembers. Even when the EMH had touched her so intimately during their dance practices, she never felt such stirring of emotions. Captain Janeway was the only other person who frequently touched her, though it was always comforting, so much so that she often anticipated it.
Seven decided she must do further research on the subject, which would entail her own participation. She would take every opportunity to spend time with the lieutenant, and elicit physical contact from the unsuspecting half-Klingon as much as possible.
Author's notes:
1. True to canon, B'Elanna was the fastest runner on her decathlon team at the academy, in ST Voyager episode: Basics II.
2. Harry Kim was three-time Parrises Square champion at the Academy, ST Voyager episode: Tsunkatse.
3. Einstein-Rosen bridges is a real theory, or at least that was what I found on the net.
4. Wormholes exist as a connection between two blackholes or one black hole and a white hole, and supposedly distort space-time continuum. Non-traversable wormholes have been theorized.
5. Warp drive - distorts space-time, which is why it can bring objects across great distances. So I theorized that the warp drive may not have worked if the wormhole already screwed up the space-time continuum around it.
6. Tachyons not just babble made up by ST writers, they are theorized faster than light (FTL) particles, and supposedly can move fast enough through a non-traversable wormhole before it disappears, but I made up the fact that tachyons could cause the wormhole to collapse faster.
7. Event Horizon - the terrible scifi movie that made no money - heh, heh - or the "opening" to a wormhole/blackhole.
To be continued....