Star Trek: Voyager: Endgame

didn't.”
    “So how's married life?”
    Wasn't this silly? She knew, he knew, and still they continued.
    “Wonderful,” the Doctor accommodated. “You should try it.”
    She laughed. “I think it's a little late for that.”
    Thoughts surged back of her long-ago beau, Mark, and those lighthearted days many years ago, just before
Voyager'
s ten-minute mission that had turned into twenty-six years. Funny— she'd thought she was “mature” then, possibly too mature for marriage, for a whole new start, and she had turned Mark down twice. We'll talk about it later . . . don't complicate things . . . let me get this next assignment out of the way, and maybe then . . .
    In fact she'd been young in those days, younger than she knew, the captain of a starship with a crew even younger. As she gazed back for just an instant, she recalled how senior and settled they had all believed themselves, as if nothing could go wrong or send them on a fool's mission.
    Imagine.
    “Marriage is for the young,” she said, forcing herself out of her musings. “Like your wife.”
    “I can only hope,” the Doctor commented, “she ages as gracefully as you have. I, of course, will be the same handsome hologram twenty years from now that I am today.”
    Janeway smiled. What could she possibly say about that? Could she talk about facing life together—at the same pace?
    No point. The Doctor was a whole brave new world unto himself. Those troubling details were for his wife to hammer out.
    “I've been meaning to ask you,” she began again, “are you familiar with the drug called ‘chronexaline’?”
    A little surprised, the Doctor nodded. He seemed to understand that this was the real reason he had been summoned here by her flimsy cover.
    “We've been testing it at Starfleet Medical,” he said, “trying to determine if it can protect biomatter from tachyon radiation.”
    She stopped fiddling with her duffel. “And?”
    He looked directly at her. “It's very promising. Why do you ask?”
    Ah, the slow dance.
    Or a jig. “I need two thousand milligrams by tomorrow afternoon.”
    This time she really did surprise him.
    “Why?” he asked.
    “That's classified.”
    She was asking for his trust, a long-range act of faith, a ridiculously illegal cooperation based on nothing but their mutual past. A few seconds ticked by.
    “Will you get it for me?”
    “Of course, Admiral. You'll have it by 0900.”
    He sat on the couch with his hands on his tricorder.
    For a moment she thought he might know more than he was saying, or at least suspect more. Then, as she gazed at him, she realized he was extending that secure chain of trust. She didn't really have any command authority over him anymore. Apparently she didn't need it.
    “Thank you,” she said. She closed her duffel bag and put it near the door. “I'm taking my private shuttle. Deliver the package to receiving at the Oakland Shipyard. If anyone asks, I'm on vacation.”
    The Doctor pivoted, still sitting. “Space leave, Admiral?”
    She smiled. “Yes, space leave. Take care of Tuvok.”



CHAPTER 4

    B ORG GRAPHICS SCROLLED ACROSS A MONITOR SCREEN AT HIGH speed. Quick glimpses of the Borg cube schematics shot by, ferociously complex and yet recognizable, and suddenly a blend of intersecting warp corridors skated by in patterns of light and mismatched indecipherables.
    After hours, the Pathfinder Lab was dimly lit, with only a few worklights on along the walkways between the tiers. Anything more would attract attention from the security scans.
    Even after all this time and experience dealing with the Borg, the images rushing past on the screen were processed by Kathryn Janeway's mind more as a recurring nightmare than useful data she was downloading for a purpose.
    When the computer shut the screen down and announced, “Download complete,” Janeway flinched as if someone had struck her.
    “This should be everything you need,” Reg Barclay said as he handed her the padd with all the operative information stored neatly inside.
    She had no idea what else he might've stored in the device, but suspected there was more than what she had just seen, anything he could think of that might be of use in a clandestine mission.
    “The shuttle?” she asked.
    “Waiting for you at the Oakland Shipyard,” he confirmed. “I wish you'd let me come with you.”
    “Sorry, Reg, but this is my mission. Besides, if you leave, there won't be anyone to teach those cadets about the