Sanctuary
A Prologue to "Altruistic Motives"
by jamelia
January, 2003
(Ocampa: Earthdate March 20, 2380 Stardate 56079.7)
Swirls of color, planets and suns and exploding stars, gradually
coalescing into galaxies...then into glittering crystals of rock
which flowed through fault lines of sediments that dated back
to another time, a time when Ocampa's surface sparkled with shallow
seas of azure waters and was seen from space to be flecked with
drifts of fluffy white, nucleogenic-rich clouds of life-giving
weather systems. Her perceptions were sharp. She tasted the tang
of copper, caught a whiff of precious, time-fracturing, quartz-like
dilithium crystals hidden deep within a far-off vein of amethyst.
Only when she was prepared to give up her search did she recognize
at last what she had been seeking: the chiming-bell sound of paragithium-
-flowing like an underground river inside the bowels of Ocampa.
Bright light reflecting from bouncing molecules of air almost
blinded her when she finally emerged from the rock wall. She took
on a ghostly, misty form in front of the young man who was standing
before the wall watching for her. He shivered as Kes pieced myriad
bits of subatomic particles back together into a body.
After several seconds when both stood there in silence, he raised
his left hand in the air and waved it near her shoulder, as if
he wanted to pat her on her back to comfort her but wasn't quite
sure she was solid enough for him to do so. Instead he lowered
his hand back to his side, asking solicitously, "Does it
hurt?"
"No, not really," Kes replied, her voice croaking deeply
with the effort of speech. "Some days it takes a little more
work gathering myself back together." A flicker of amusement
crossed over her face as she took in several quick gulps of air
and completed the transformation back into a being with a body.
Some mornings it took a little more work to get herself together
now when she'd remained perfectly solid all night long. 'You're
not the dewy-eyed young thing you were when you first climbed
to the surface, Kes,' she thought to herself.
Shaking her head as if to clear it of the last vestiges of its
other state, she continued aloud, "The vein of paragithium
runs deep, and it widens within the rock face at an eighty-five
degree angle to the right, sloping down at a twenty-five degree
angle first, then more steeply after fifty-seven meters to a forty-five
degree angle."
He pulled a small computerized recording device from out of his
pocket and punched in the figures. "You're amazing. How do
you know so precisely when you're flowing through it like that?"
She shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know how I know, Josan.
I just do..."
"Well, I know enough to believe you. Whenever we dig into
the wall, you've been always right! "
Kes smiled wearily at the young metallurgist. "So far, anyway."
"Are you ready to walk back now?" Josan asked.
"I think I can manage, as long as you're willing to lend
me a hand if I get a little shaky every now and then. I *am* an
old lady now, you know!"
"You don't seem to be an old lady to me," Josan said
graciously, bowing slightly and offering his arm to her in an
elaborate motion.
Kes tucked her hand beneath his elbow and smiled at him, but she
didn't continue the conversation. She knew very well what she
looked like; she looked into the mirror every day, at least once.
Right now, tired as she was, she must look positively ancient.
The pair walked slowly down the dimly-lit corridor cut into the
rock during Kes' absence from Ocampa. Originally it had been an
exploratory tunnel, earmarked to be used for homes, but the population
balked about having to live in the narrow configurations the geologists
recommended to insure the rock would remain strong enough to support
their roofs. Kes could accept the scientific reasons underlying
the recommendation, but she could also understand the reluctance
of her people to build homes here.
Space in the Ocampan caves was growing scarce, and living underground
really wasn't that bad, when all the alternatives were considered.
Still, burrowing into solid rock and living in tiny warrens didn't
seem to be the answer for her people either. The proposed homes
seemed more like tombs to Kes, tombs where the ceiling could collapse
upon one's head any time. Of course, the presence of the corridor
had made it easier to explore for the paragithium Josan was extolling
as they walked down it.
"....since you found so much, we'll be in really good shape
now! Filaments for light and hard wiring for devices will be so
much more efficient! In fact, I think the resonance of the mineral
may increase our energy efficiency to 99.6% --just shy of perpetual
motion!.
"Yes, but that's still shy of perpetual motion," Kes
agreed. "I wish we could achieve that somehow. With the way
the population is growing, we need all the power we can get."
"Not to mention room for homes. At least the mining operation
may provide another corridor for apartments."
Kes smiled at the young man's echo of her own musings. "That's
what they were supposed to be initially, remember? But no one
wanted to live there."
"Well, no, but if we hollow it all out into another cavern
when we're mining, maybe the apartments would be a better size
and people wouldn't mind moving there."
"Perhaps," sighed Kes. "At the rate the population
is exploding, people may not be able to be so picky about how
big their apartments are in the future. It's not as if they're
so big right now anyway." Her brow furrowed as a thought
came to mind, one she'd considered and rejected before. Now it
didn't seem so absurd a risk, but it still seemed too iffy to
pursue.
As they walked, Josan commented casually, "You know, when
you come out of the rock like that, you look the way I imagine
one of those jennies you told us about must when coming out of..."
"Jennies?" Kes said in a puzzled tone as she turned
her attention back to their conversation. A vision of the Delaney
twins came to mind, but Josan knew nothing of them.
"Yes, you know. The jennies in the bottle. From the Earth
stories you shared with us when you first came back."
"Oh! You mean *genies* in a bottle, from the 'Arabian Nights'!
I'd forgotten all about that." She smiled slightly, reminiscing
about her welcome home, when she was pumped for every memory she
had of Voyager and her life and all the people and cultures
she'd met "on the outside."
Just before they exited the corridor, Josan stopped short. The
murmur of many voices working in the hydroponics gardens outside
could be heard. Their ability to speak privately would soon be
at an end. Facing her, Josan asked solemnly, "Kes, how are
you, really? Our crew has been working you very hard lately. You
look so tired and..." He paused, apparently reluctant to
complete his thought.
Kes completed it for him. "Old. I look old, don't I? Like
I'm twenty years old, instead of only 10?"
Her companion shuddered. "I can't imagine anyone that old."
"You will soon," Kes said, smiling enigmatically at
the impossibly young man before her. He could easily be her grandson.
Had she ever really been so young? Yes, she had been that young--far
younger, even, when she'd first met Neelix and the crew of Voyager
all those years ago on the surface of Ocampa. Giving his arm a
squeeze she reassured him, "There will be a time when we
reach the natural life span as ordained for us by our genetics,
not the brief one the Caretaker imposed upon us with his 'sustenance,'
along with his suppression of our fertility."
"Your theories haven't been accepted by the Council yet,"
he observed quietly.
"They haven't met the Ocampa I encountered on the outer space
station. They reached the ages of fifteen and sixteen, and sometimes
were even older. How many of our own people are living to eleven
or twelve since the Caretaker died? And multiple births are the
rule now rather than the exception. I'm sure he had the best of
intentions, and maybe he just tried to stabilize the population
and overdid it, but ..."
Their conversation was interrupted by the shouts of a young woman
bursting out of the hydroponics cavern and into the corridor.
"Kes! Josan! I thought you would have been back long ago!"
Lyrial gasped as she reached them. "Tyeris just had her triplets,
Josan. A little boy and identical twin girls. She wants their
Uncle Josan to be one of the first to meet them."
"That's wonderful! Is she all right? Are they all right?"
he asked.
"They're all just fine, Josan. And Kes, can you come see
them, too? Tyeris wants to show them off to everyone, I think,
but especially to you."
"Tell her I'll come by later to see her wonderful new family.
Right now I need to rest. I'm too tired to 'oo' and 'ah' over
them as much as they deserve."
"Do you need help getting home? See, I knew turning into
a jennie and sifting yourself through rocks is too hard on you,"
Josan said, in some alarm.
"I'm not so tired I can't get home. I just need a nap, that's
all! Now go 'Uncle Josan'! Shoo!"
At Kes' urging, after she reassured the couple once again she
would be able to return home just fine without them, Josan left
with Lyrial to pay homage to the most perfect nephew and nieces
ever born. Kes walked slowly back to her apartment, taking a short
detour to pass through the potting area where she had spent so
many happy hours as a child helping her mother and father.
Life was so different then. Predictable. Confining. Yet Kes was
sure that had her parents lived longer lives, she would never
have become so dissatisfied by her life and curious about the
"outside" to risk everything by climbing to the surface
to see for herself if the stories about its lifelessness were
really true. And if she hadn't, where would she be right now?
Dead, possibly. Without the intervention of Species 8472 or Tuvok's
help, Kes would never have developed the ability to control her
mind and physical being to the extent that she could help her
people find what they needed to extend the power supplies bequeathed
them by the Caretaker.
Somehow, knowing that wasn't enough to satisfy her. While she
knew she was being of service to her people, there was even more
she should do for them. She simply needed to find the courage
to do it.
=/\=
What Kes called her "apartment" was merely an alcove
in one wall of the living space she shared with Josan and Lyrial,
not a separate housing unit. Cut out of the rock across the cavern
from one of the hydroponics farm bays, Kes' share of the dwelling
was little more than a hollowed out area, barely big enough to
contain a sleeping shelf, with a couple of small trunks tucked
beneath it to hold her meager possessions, a chair, and a small
desk with a box of PADDs she'd kept from her days on Voyager
sitting on top of it. Small as it was, she was happy to have it.
Many three- and even four-generation families made do with little
more. Without husband or children, Kes had no true family members
who could offer her a place to live, one of the bitter side-effects
of the "one Elogium/one child per couple" days, when
the only relatives one could expect to have were parents, direct
descendants, or in-laws. Kes had none.
Kes lay down upon her bed without bothering to cover herself with
a blanket or changing into clothes that were not sprinkled with
dust particles captured when she began to reassemble into solid
form during the last few seconds of her passage through mineral
deposits. If she really wanted to, Kes could dematerialize and
recoalesce her body, reconstituting her clothing at the same time
so it would be nice and fresh and clean. She could even take away
most (but not all) of the lines of her face and replace the faded,
yellowed gray hair with a younger version of herself, although
the young, dewy-eyed Kes she had been when she'd first encountered
Neelix was gone forever. She'd tried to reassume that form in
the past but found she could not maintain it long without draining
her energy to such an extent it was hardly worth the trouble.
It was just as well. She was no longer that Kes. She was another
kind of Ocampan female, one who knew what the Morelogium felt
like, who had learned to control it so that she could move from
one state to another at will. It took so much out of her, though!
Energy conversation, she thought ruefully, wasn't only something
the Ocampan people had to practice--it was something she herself
needed to keep in mind, lest one day she dissipate into the air,
unable to retrieve her body from sheer fatigue.
As she lay there, her thoughts turned to her daughter Linnis--or
rather, to the daughter she and Tom would have had if things had
turned out differently in linear time. The pang she usually felt
when she thought of her lost future wasn't quite as unbearable
as it used to be. Hailed as the marvel of her people and revered
as the savior who was helping them eke out an existence within
the bowels of Ocampa by providing the means for stretching their
energy resources, Kes had learned to deal with the pain of never
bearing a child of her own. Her actual Elogium was spent so far
from Ocampa that no one compatible to mate with her was near when
her time came. The memories of Linnis and Andrew Kim, who would
have been Kes' grandson, would have to be enough for her.
Now that they no longer had the Caretaker's artificial food to
consume, containing all the nutrients a nice little Ocampa needed
for life--including the fertility suppressant that would have
ensured the Ocampa would have died out in a few dozen generations
more had the Caretaker survived as long as he'd thought--plenty
of Ocampa children were being born to a people who were living
longer and longer before slipping away into their Morelogiums.
Although none yet had learned how manipulate the energy and matter
of their own bodies to "come back" the way Kes could,
she was sure the lessons would take eventually.
Until then, Kes could tolerate being called "Auntie"
by her people. Perhaps someday she might be considered an Ocampan
version of Earth's Eve, once they accepted what she had learned
about the true nature of her people's life spans. Or perhaps Eve
wasn't the right reference. Maybe she was a Prometheus, bringing
to the Ocampa the knowledge that the Morelogium brought not death
but a transformation into a different form of life, a non-corporeal
state which could be reversed back to the corporeal when one was
prepared and able to use the proper mental techniques to accomplish
it.
Yes, if she were to delve into her memories of Earth mythology,
Prometheus was the better reference. After all, she'd never found
an Adam on her journeys, never experienced the bond Tuvok had
felt for his T'Pel. She supposed it really was too much to expect
to find a love like that. She had been so passionate to travel
that the chances of meeting a person who might have been the great
love of her life had been greatly reduced, although she cherished
memories of her time with Neelix. He may have loved her jealously,
almost too well, but her relationship with the Talaxian was the
only time in her adult life she had been truly intimate with another
person--in this time line, of course. Although her recollections
of building a family with Tom Paris were of a time that had never
really happened, she treasured them, too.
Kes shook herself, resolving to quit moping over romantic liaisons
she now would never have. She was done with that sort of thing.
She had a new role, a new vocation, and she took it seriously.
Since she still felt shame over the way she'd once lost her way
and the selfish way she had tried to deal with it, this was something
she had to do. There was no more time for bitterness over what
could not be.
She tossed and turned a few more times before arising from her
bed and retrieving her lamp from the shelf above her desk. Seating
herself on her chair, the lamp centered upon the desk before her,
Kes concentrated upon the wick for a moment. It burst into flame.
She smiled a little as she adjusted the degree of brightness downward,
to just high enough a level to aid her in meditation. Staring
into the dancing bit of fire, Kes sent her spirit outwards, expanding
her mind until she felt the velocity of the powers of her mind
stretch towards what she always thought of as Warp 10. Unlike
when Tom Paris had experienced the phenomenon, Kes had no fear
of evolving into a lizard (unless she chose, for some inexplicable
reason, to assume that sort of body).
But her mind sped along, accelerating until, Q-like, she could
feel the entire galaxy enclosed within her perceptions. She wasn't
concerned with most of the galaxy, of course, nor did she even
attempt to sense what was going on in the rest of the universe.
She was only interested in a small corner of the Milky Way Galaxy,
the part located about 70,000 light years from Ocampa--the corner
of the Beta Quadrant not far from the Sol System, where a warm,
dry planet circled around the star 40 Eridani A, where a close
friend now dwelt. She touched his mind lightly, gaining strength
from the knowledge that he was finally at home, back within the
circle of his spouse and family, content with his life.
Using the skills he had taught her long ago, she meditated, considering
carefully all of her options. Kes knew she had a decision to make.
Were her journeying days truly over, as she had hoped the last
time she had encountered her friend and mentor, just before she
had traveled back home? Or did she still have tasks to do off
her own planet, tasks which would change her life and those of
all who lived beneath the barren crust, the dry shell that was
Ocampa?
=/\=
(ShahKar, Vulcan Earthdate March 20, 2380 Stardate 56079.8)
"I sense another, Tuvok," said T'Pel. From the tight
way she voiced her observation, Tuvok could have discerned her
disquiet, even if their fingers were not interlaced one with the
other's in the intimacy of the mind that meant so much to beings
of their species- -a link which met so many needs of a Vulcan
couple, but one which outsiders could never truly comprehend.
Silently, he reassured her. ///It is Kes///
///Her spirit?/// T'Pel thought back to him.
///Without more precise data, I could not presume to categorize
Kes' current state of being except to state that her sense of
self is intact.///
A ripple of amusement entered into his consciousness, so completely
unlike the Vulcan appreciation of irony which comprised what he
considered to be the equivalent of a sense of humor in his wife
that he knew it could only have come from Kes. At the same time--he
could only explain it in this way should he be asked, for no image
or words came into his mind--he knew that Kes continued to maintain
a corporeal form for a substantial portion of the time.
"Fascinating," T'Pel breathed, confirming that she,
too, was privy to this perception through her continuing telepathic
communication with Tuvok.
Carefully, he projected an image of the safe return of Voyager
to Earth and of the well-being of those to whom Kes had been close.
Again, without any awareness of how it was done, he perceived
she was already cognizant of this and was pleased for all of the
ship's crew. He also knew, without question, that Kes herself
was home as well. He was able to "read" her as easily
as he once had in his quarters on Voyager, when they would
sit together as he taught her the disciplines of the mind she
needed to control her latent gift. Tuvok could not contain his
surprise. He was receiving messages from Kes--and sending to her
in return--even though she was on Ocampa, all the way on the other
side of the galaxy.
Swiftly he suppressed his emotions to prevent surprise from turning
into shock, especially since he was still telepathically linked
with his wife. Another ripple of amusement was transmitted, followed
quickly by an element he could only describe as a contrite request
for forgiveness, as Kes realized the private nature of the meditation
she had interrupted.
Now Tuvok was in something of a quandary. Private meditation or
no, the miraculous nature of a telepathic communication from one
side of the galaxy to another almost demanded continuation if
possible, if only to ascertain if by some means they could be
assured of doing it again some time in the future. Somehow this
must have been conveyed to her, because Tuvok could detect the
clear presence of a question in Kes' mind, a question which, it
seemed, was so compelling she had decided to try to sweep away
the inconvenience of tens of thousands of light years of distance
between them to initiate a mental communication with him--and
had succeeded.
Before the full nature of the question had come into his mind,
however, a momentary sense of disorientation occurred--as if still
another mind was trying to wedge its way into the conversation.
The fragile telepathic connection between opposite ends of the
galaxy shattered suddenly. Tuvok became completely aware of the
touch of his wife's fingers between his own and surrendered to
the comfort of her presence within his mind. Shakily, he drew
a breath, unaware of how long he might have been holding it. Opening
his eyes, he looked into the warmth of his wife's gaze.
"Should I be concerned about the status of our union, since
you seem to be sharing thoughts with another?" T'Pel said
quietly, but with a quizzically arched eyebrow raised high to
erase any hint that she was truly accusing him of an infidelity.
"You need not be," he assured her, his own eyebrow raised
in answer, but he found he was unwilling to release her hand from
his.
T'Pel's free hand caressed their joined ones lightly in a greatly
reassuring gesture, as she replied, "I am pleased to hear
it. I find, however, that my mouth is as dry and parched as if
I had traveled a very long way. I believe I would find some Tarkalean
tea refreshing upon this occasion. Wouldst thou care for a cup
of thine own, my husband?"
His gaze softened at her choice of phrasing. "Indeed, thy
offer would be accepted with great gratification, my wife."
After T'Pel had arisen and departed to the food preparation room
to brew the tea, Tuvok sat in the darkened meditation chamber
alone. Neither of them had bothered to extinguish the lamp--the
same lamp that had traveled back from the Delta Quadrant with
Tuvok, having been used on so many nights by Kes as well as Tuvok
himself; he would be hard-pressed to count them accurately at
this late date. The flame of the lamp flickered in the chill air
of the chamber. It was night in the desert, in the winter of the
year, and the air would feel cool even to those who were not of
the Vulcan race. To Tuvok it felt frigid--not that he would be
willing to complain about that fact to anyone, even though the
beads of sweat that had spread across his face could fairly be
cited as the cause of his discomfort.
Truthfully, the quivering sensation that traveled up and down
his spine at that moment had less to do with air temperature than
it did to the circumstances of what had just occurred. Tuvok had
requested his wife's presence during his hours of meditation for
the simple reason that he valued her opinions and wanted her to
participate fully in the decision he now needed to make. He had
no hint that something as momentous as what had just occurred
would interfere with their considering all of the pros and cons
of the decision-making process.
When T'Pel returned, the tray she carried was graced with another
lamp. It shed a considerably brighter light than the meditation
lamp did. Alongside the lamp on the tray were an elegant onyx
teapot with two matching cups. The teapot had a handle but was
otherwise unadorned. The cups were engraved with a series of lines,
none of which completely encircled the cup, creating an optical
illusion of sorts by the impossibility of their geometry. Tuvok
was silent as he contemplated the cups, the teapot, and his wife
(not necessarily in that order) while T'Pel poured the tea, which
steamed profusely in the cool air of the room. The couple sipped
several times before Tuvok advised her, without further prompting,
"Not only has that never occurred before; I would not have
thought it possible had I not experienced it."
"I confess, Tuvok, that had you told me that this communication
had taken place I would have found it difficult to believe, even
from you. Because we experienced it together, I have no choice
but to believe it--unless it has been a sophisticated hallucination
we both perceived at the same time."
The eyes of the couple met. They needed no telepathic touch of
the hand or words to convey to each other that this had been no
hallucination. It had been nothing less than a true telepathic
communication sent across the galaxy from one friend to another.
As one, Tuvok and T'Pel breathed, "Remarkable."
The utterance had nothing to do with the tea.
=/\=
(Ocampa: Earthdate March 20, 2380 Stardate 56079.9)
As her eyes came back into focus, Kes saw the flame of the lamp
flickering before her once again. Her body was rigidly tense,
not at all like it had been when she had been instructed in meditation
techniques by Tuvok during her days on Voyager. Even when
she had made her first frustrating, tentative attempts to expand
her consciousness and make contact with Voyager and Tuvok
she had not felt this way.
The sudden sensation she was being "watched" during
the communication had upset her and caused her to break off the
telepathic link. No, upset was an insufficient descriptor. What
she had felt was terror--momentary, fragmentary, but there--an
emotion she had sought to escape when Captain Janeway had given
her the shuttle and given Kes her blessings to flee home to Ocampa.
Unable to remain still any longer, Kes extinguished the flame
and began to pace the tiny space in front of her bed, crossing
her arms and rubbing her hands roughly over her forearms to quell
her feelings of disquiet. The intrusion reminded her of the time
she had been assailed by visions from Species 8472, filled with
death, destruction, and sheer malice. It was difficult to feel
pity for the Borg, it was true, but Kes had felt it then in the
face of the Species 8472 onslaught. Even worse, poor Harry Kim
had almost been devoured by whatever they had done to him. The
Doctor, with the assistance of Kes, had pulled Harry through that
crisis, but her days on Voyager had been few after that.
She had chosen to leave Voyager, thinking to save her friends
from damage as she learned to control her newfound mental abilities
and explored the subatomic world of particles and energy shifting
between one state and the other.
In retrospect, that choice may have been a mistake. Once she had
learned control, she may have helped them travel home to the Alpha
Quadrant sooner. Then again, she may have been detrimental to
their journey. They'd found their way home at unimaginable speeds
(for a starship, at least). Had she been there, perhaps they would
never have discovered the mechanism that permitted them to get
home. Her attempts to harness her powers may have ended in their
destruction, just as she'd feared when she'd chosen to leave.
Maybe it hadn't been a mistake to leave Voyager, no matter
how badly it had turned out for Kes herself. A very small being,
alone and lost for a very long time, despite her newfound powers
she had been very close to being destroyed by a malevolent galaxy
many times on her travels. Sometimes now she found it hard to
believe she had found her way home, slipping through defensive
lines of Krowtonen Guard ships, dodging the Vidiians and the Kazon,
avoiding the Haakonians and Trabe, even with the ability to transform
herself and her little shuttle, if need be, into a wraith who
could slip through the ether at faster-than-warp speeds, escaping
those bent upon her capture or destruction and returning to solid
form only when she felt she would be safe traveling through normal
space.
"Ouch!" Kes cried as she bumped her shin against the
desk for the fourth time. She could barely take five steps in
any direction before having to reverse direction. In her agitated
state, she kept trying to take that sixth step. She laughed ruefully
and said aloud to the empty apartment, "Able to leap light
years at a thought but unable to remember not to bump into your
own furniture! What a wonder you are, Kes! I wonder what the Doctor
would say to that? Oh, dear, I wonder if the Doctor ever picked
out a name for himself! I miss him so. I miss them all!"
Needing to escape a sudden wave of homesickness for those on Voyager
she had once abandoned, Kes moved the curtain aside, stepped away
from her bed, and crossed the small room quickly. As she fled
through the doorway, Kes made a conscious effort to steady her
heartbeat.
Coming into the hydroponic cavern did help, a little. It was strange.
She always felt closest to her parents here near the growing plants,
as if their spirits still lingered in the familiar haunts where
her family had spent so many happy hours together, working for
the good of the Ocampan people. Perhaps their spirits really did
dwell here, changed by their Morelogiums into non- corporeal beings
who had never learned to how to travel back and forth between
states, as Kes had. She felt like a little girl again, longing
to run into her parents arms for a close hug, to find sanctuary
in the warmth of their love.
Kes sighed. Sanctuary. That's what she'd thought she'd find when
she returned home, to live out her days, however long they might
be, among her own people. In some ways she'd found what she'd
been looking for, but in others...
Life here beneath the surface of her home planet was very different
from the way it had been when she'd left. Better in some ways.
Worse in others. That was always the way of it, she supposed.
The one thing she'd never gotten used to was the absence of the
one thing she'd climbed to the surface for the first time to find.
She longed to feel the warmth of the sun against her face again,
perhaps with a light breeze to tickle her cheek, teasing the strands
of her hair into graceful filaments dancing across her forehead.
She even wished for bad weather as she'd experienced it on many
planets during her journeys. First, the smell of ozone on a freshening
wind. Then sluicing rain, or delicate snowflakes, sifting out
of leaden gray clouds. Driving particles of icy sleet. Streaks
of lightning followed by crashing thunderbolts.
These were her people's birthright, stolen from them by an alien
being whose genuine remorse at the damage caused by his mistake
could never truly recompense the Ocampa for all they had lost.
She knew what weather felt like, but none of the rest of her people
did. The Caretaker had offered them sanctuary and survival, caring
for them the best way he could; but there was nothing more he
could do to help them. He was dead, but the Ocampa were the ones
buried beneath the ground. If the Ocampa were to live and thrive
as a people, they would have to take their own future in hand
and shape it themselves. There was no benevolent being to care
for them as his children. It was time for the Ocampa to grow up
if they were to survive as individuals and as a people.
It was a cold, cruel universe out there, Kes knew, but those who
were willing to stand up for themselves could find friends as
well as enemies. She had learned this lesson well, from those
who had rescued and sheltered her on Voyager until she
had been ready to strike off on her own. The Ocampa simply had
to find the courage to look for them. They lacked only a guide--and
they did not lack that either, if one who was up to the job was
willing to accept it.
Kes made up her mind. Immediately, she knew she had made the right
decision. For the first time in a long time she felt truly at
peace. Kes' journeys were not done; she had not seen the last
of stars and suns.
With a firm, bouncing tread that her friends on Voyager
would have recognized with a smile, Kes strode through the cavern
towards the home of her friends Tyeris and Benan. Finally, her
path was clear. Kes had a task to take up, to complete or die
trying. First, however, she had another promise to keep: to visit
a set of triplets, to cuddle them and "oo" and "ah"
over them and let them know that someday, they, too, would see
the sun.
=/\=
Next week:
When Naomi is *forced* to visit the Cochrane Museum of Spaceflight with her friends Icheb and Griff, little did she know she would find Something to Remember", VS7.5's tribute to the brave men and women of the Shuttle Columbia.